Happy Holidays! As a gift from us to you, here’s a step up on your competition — helpful advice on putting together your marketing plan for next year.
Your goal at this point is to develop a high-level view of your marketing year. So, while everyone else is making leftover turkey sandwiches or standing in line for the hottest new toy, you’ll be productive with these simple, goal-setting steps:
Choose your objectives for next year.
What would you like to achieve next year? It might help to use the SMART goal concept, which simply means that your goals should be:
Specific
Measurable
Achievable
Realistic
Timely
These should be business-building objectives that will help you reach your goals of profitability, customer trust, and name recognition. Here are a few ideas to get you started:
• Grow your email list 20% by the end of the year.
• Update your website by June 30.
• Try new SEO tactics from January 1 – June 30.
• Run an online promotion to increase your top product/service’s sales 25% by the end of the year.
Choose the promotions/strategies you want to use to achieve those objectives.
Looking at your list of goals, start thinking about promotions or strategies to prioritize in the coming year.
You might want to consider:
• Sending a regular e-newsletter and/or adding a “Subscribe to our emails”
feature on your site.
• Choosing a team of existing employees or outside resources to rewrite
and redesign your site.
• Conducting an SEO audit and search for alternate keywords to try for six months.
• Brainstorming different online tactics for a creative campaign focused
on your top product/services.
Some types of promotions to think about:
• New products = Pre- and post-launch promotions
• Old products = Refresh existing promotions or create product updates
• Low-cost products = Front-end promotion
• Back-end promotions and upgrade offers for customers
• List-building promotions
• Lead-generating promotions
And, don’t be afraid to get creative! Test new ideas and trust your knowledge of your target audience. Do what you think will work — even if you’ve never tried it before and nobody else is doing it. You might be onto something!
Set a schedule you can stick to.
Now you know what you want to promote, and when you want to promote it. But, is your plan practical?
Ask yourself:
• How long can/should each promotion run?
• Should you repeat a promotion during the year OR bring back a previously successful promotion?
• Do you need to create new promotional materials?
• Is there time to develop new products/strategies? Will you need outside help?
• Have you got the resources and budget to do it all?
• Can you fit it all into your calendar — without overwhelming you, your team or your audience?
A few more tips:
Your plan needs “breathing room.” Don’t run too many big promotions or feature too many products.
Think about grouping similar products into a package and promoting them that way. Or, maybe promote a few front-end products to your entire list, while only offering EXISTING customers more frequent back-end promos.
Remember, you don’t have to do everything on your list. One idea might be so good/effective that you can take another off the list. You could focus on building one area of your business this year, and another next year. Just make sure you set your priorities and stick with them!
Believe it or not, you don’t need to do much more than this to have a good start on your marketing plan. (The steps above should probably take you a few hours, at most).
Get a bird’s eye view of your business objectives and the promotions you want to run. Think about how they fit into your calendar, and jot down any ideas as they come to you.
You’ll have organized your entire year. And, that’s the first step to getting it all done.
Happy Holidays!