Develop a Marketing Plan for Your Business

 

I’m sure you’ve heard the saying “Failing to plan is planning to fail” once or twice before. Probably in regards to a diet or workout plan.

Think about it – you’re on a new diet and everything is going great. Until, you’re starving out of seemingly nowhere with absolutely no food in sight. What do you do? Run to the nearest fast food joint you can find. And then what happens? You’re probably going to feel low-energy and disappointed in yourself for the remainder of the day.

This situation can easily be translated to entrepreneurship as well. If you’re not prepared in your business, you’re likely going to end up scrambling to give it what it needs and in result, begin outputting some pretty sub-par content.

You NEED to Have a Plan:

In running a business, the day-to-day can overwhelm and distract even the most motivated business owner. And let’s face it, without a plan and processes in place, you definitely can’t do it all on your own.

To be successful (and prevent burnout) your marketing needs to have a solid process that runs like clockwork, with or without you.

Start to build a solid marketing strategy by following these steps.

Step 1:

You need to do more than a simple outline of your target customer. You need to do a deep-dive analysis of who they are, what they want, and why they want it. You need to understand their struggles and pain-points as well as their needs and desires. In order to know how to market your services you need to truly know and understand your ideal client. This will set the foundation for everything your brand does to market your products and/or services.

Step 2:

Decide which social media platforms your buyer spends the most time on. This goes back to Step 1. If you truly know and understand who they are – you will know whether they use Instagram or Twitter or neither. Don’t waste your time spreading yourself thin across every single social channel in the hopes of capturing your audience’s attention somewhere. Rather, focus on creating high-quality content that your audience will be sure to see and value.

Step 3:

Customer relationships are the foundation of your business. Without your customers, you don’t have a business. And without a CRM, it can be really difficult to cater to their wants and needs the way you should. To build a loyal customer base, you need to sign up for a CRM software ASAP. There are so many out there, but don’t overthink. You can always migrate later if you need to! 

Step 4:

Your content should the center of your marketing strategy. If you focus your efforts on creating high-quality and valuable content – everything else will flow from there. To do this, you need to create a content marketing strategy. You need to ask yourself questions like “How will I educate, inform and engage my ideal buyer?” and “What does my ideal buyer want and need to know tomorrow?”. You should always be two-steps ahead of them.

Step 5:

Once you start creating high-quality content – you’ll realize how easy it is to put it out there and to stay consistent with your posting. If you need some inspiration: each time you create content you can imagine you are engaging with your buyer for the very first time. Don’t be shy. Get out there on social media, promote your content, send it in newsletter form.  

Right now is the perfect time to start creating your 2020 marketing plan. It’s a new decade and it’s time to break out of your comfort zone and experiment with innovative and unique marketing strategies. 

Need some help? We’re experts on creating marketing plans. This is what we specialize in. From researching and writing blog post content, creating editorial calendars on auto-pilot, and getting your content out in front of the world so they know that you are the go-to expert. 

Think you need some help getting your marketing strategy in place?

Contact us today for a free consultation!