What’s in a Marketing Plan?

What are the elements of a marketing plan? How do you create a marketing plan? Here is a simple outline that gives you the different stages of marketing. The first 3 are marketing planning stages and the last 3 are marketing implementation stages.

• Identify Marketing Strategy
  1. Vision
  2. Goals & Objectives
  3. Defining Your Ideal Target Customer
  4. The 5 P’s as applied to  your customer’s needs
     • Product Strategy: features, benefits, problems it solves, uses, warranties, etc.
     • The Pricing Strategy
     • Place or Distribution Strategy: how people will get it, buy it, shop for it.
     • Promotion: the positioning, the voice, the messages, the image, marketing materials, packaging
     • People: what are the unique skills, experiences, backgrounds our people have that give you an advantage
• Marketing Tactics
  1. Where do we find your customer?
  2. List of all tactics and materials needed to reach that customer
  3. Prioritize based on budget, timing and customer reach and appeal
• Sequencing & Scheduling
  1. Find lead times, budget and deliverables for each tactic
  2. Incorporate persuasion techniques (this is the new thing I’m adding, not sure if it goes here or earlier on)
• Implementation
  1. Project manage the process
     • Set up accounts; create communication pieces, websites, sales channels, marketing events, the product, etc.
     • Confirm progress at checkpoints and deliverables
  2. Work with specialists to create the product and marketing materials.
• Launch
  1. Release all materials and communications to the customer according to the pre-determined schedule (typically a specific widow of time coinciding with the availability of the product).
• Sustaining Marketing
  1. Continued communication with new customers.

The most important thing is you have a plan and you implement it. Also note that your marketing plan does not have to be written in stone. It is a living breathing document that changes as needed to meet the needs of your customer and your company’s objectives.