Marketing is like a successful road trip. Imagine for a moment, a family leaving for a vacation, that takes off in their car and then ask themselves where they are going, how to get there and how long it will take. This situation is difficult to imagine. Most families would plan ahead for a successful vacation.If not, they might run into avoidable problems such as getting lost or sleeping in shoddy accommodations. To avoid these kinds of problems, most travelers will plan ahead to ensure a successful and pleasurable road trip. Marketing is like a successful road trip. Both need the assistance of a plan. A marketing plan serves as a road map or guideline. The activities of every person/department involved in any aspect of marketing are given direction through a marketing plan. A marketing plan enables an organization to establish objectives, priorities, schedules, budgets, strategies, and checkpoints to measure performance. A complete marketing plan involves many details and even the most experienced marketing manager can easily forget or overlook critical areas. Remember that all companies operate differently, so an effective marketing plan must be custom-made for you company.
Here are tips to remember when writing a marketing plan to ensure success.
1.Keep accurate records. Good marketing plans begin by analyzing what is currently happening and what has happened in the past. It is impossible to develop solid plans for the future if the current situation is not clearly understood.
2.Allow sufficient time to write the plan. A good marketing plan cannot be written overnight. In most cases, several weeks of detailed analysis and strategy planning are required. If your records are current and orderly, the time necessary to write the plan will be reduced.
3.If you don’t gathering data, assign someone to assist with the details. The task of assembling sales records, compiling statistics, computing percentages, and gathering market intelligence can be done by others. A well-trained secretary can often perform many of these tasks.
4.Set aside time to critically analyze the factual-statistical portion of the plan. Ask yourself, what do these figures mean? What is occurring?
5.Seek advice from advisors, co-workers and subordinates. It may be necessary to establish a special session for finalizing the marketing plan in a setting away from the office. This can be done in a hotel, lodge, or other facility.
6.Devote maximum attention to the development of appropriate strategies to meet your marketing objectives. The task of gathering and analyzing the essential data can be so time-consuming that the most critical portion of the marketing plan becomes a last-minute crash attempt to get something down on paper. Well-thought-out strategies are the key to success. They cannot be dashed out at the last minute. They need to be developed and critically analyzed before becoming a part of your overall plan.
7.Design and implement a program to ensure participation in the development of a marketing plan by all key members of your team. 8.Develop a mentality that the development of a marketing plan is an ongoing and vital key to success.
