All companies that want to scale their business have a marketing plan. Some entrepreneurs see it as an expense, but you should consider it an investment.
After all, without a marketing plan, your brand will not win customers or grow. So if you’ve thought he’s irrelevant, get that idea out of your head.
In short, a market plan will describe your market, your goals, your target audience, and everything you need to do to attract customers. It is essential for the creation of a strategic action plan. In marketing, nothing happens by chance: everything is well thought out and laid out, and that’s what a program does.
This post will show you that making a marketing plan is not that difficult. You will learn to start yours in 7 steps. Keep reading to understand:
- What is a marketing plan?
- The seven steps of a marketing plan.
What Is A Marketing Plan?
A marketing plan is, above all, a document where a company writes and details all the strategies for promoting a brand, product or service. It contains the marketing actions that must be taken to achieve each specified objective. In addition, information about the market, competitors, persona, sales channels and budget are also there.
As you can see, the marketing plan is nothing more than a company growth guide. With it, you are equipped with all the necessary data to implement marketing strategies effectively.
The plan also allows the marketing manager to have a broad view of the scenario and marketing actions. Thus, we can say that a marketing plan helps to:
- Attract new customers, retain current ones and recover old ones;
- Increase sales and revenue;
- Raise your authority in the market, generating brand awareness ;
- Disclose products or services;
- Identify opportunities and threats.
So let’s see how this document can be made.
The Seven Steps Of A Marketing Plan
A marketing plan doesn’t have to be a complicated 1000 page book . You can be objective and do everything in 7 steps. Do you still doubt it? So come on, we’ll show you how it works!
Market Analysis
First, know your market. To do this, you can research everything about your niche: current global scenario, trends for the future, risks and direct and indirect competitors. The competition analysis step is crucial, as you need to know how much you will have to fight to stand out.
Person
Your business persona is the representation of your ideal customer. Knowing your target audience is essential, but delving into them is critical. And you can do that by building your buyer persona.
To build your persona, you must think of it as a fictional person or character. Give her physical and psychological characteristics, interests, hobbies, profession, style, desires, and fears and write about your love and family relationships.
The more specific you are, the better, as it will be easier to understand how to communicate with your audience.
Marketing Objectives
Every market plan needs specific goals and objectives, so you know where to go. You can set your goals with the help of methodologies like OKR and the SMART method.
Purchase Journey
In this step, you must explain the shopping journey of your ideal consumer. How will it get to your product? What does he need to do to be converted into a client? Some companies use the most well-known funnel of the journey, which is divided into four stages:
- Learning and Discovery;
- Problem recognition;
- Solution consideration;
- Buying decision.
- Marketing mix
In the market mix, you must define how the variables of the 4Ps of market will be in your business. Are they:
- Product refers to everything that makes up the product, such as materials, manufacturing and intangible characteristics;
- Price: refers to everything related to the pricing and (emotional) value of the product;
- Square: here, you should talk about the product distribution channels ;
- Promotion: all marketing actions and activities to promote the product in these channels.
Action Plan
It’s time to create a list of 5 to 10 marketing actions your brand will take to achieve its goals. Remember, they should be built into your market mix. That way, you ensure that all your strategies are aligned.
Budget And Results Control
Finally, you must define how much you want to spend on your marketing plan efforts and how much you expect to return. That is: having a defined budget will help you not to exceed your cost limits.
In addition, you must estimate a value for each market action and a time frame. Once you’ve set the value, select the most relevant KPIs to analyze your performance.