Tick tock, tick tock. Have you given any thought to marketing your business next year?
Marketing plan development can feel like a daunting task, but if you approach it knowing there’s no one-size-fits-all solution, then that should help ease some of the stress. Taking the time to think about it now (as opposed to January) will also help.
Here’s what to keep in mind.
1. Start gathering analytics. Now’s the time to do some number crunching. Review the following items:
- Email marketing (newsletters, lead nurturing, one-off campaigns—pay close attention to click-through rates)
- Social media (engagement, visitor-to-lead and lead-to-customer conversions)
- Marketing offers (conversions, both leads and customers)
- PPC/online advertising (Google AdWords, Facebook ads, retargeting campaigns)
- Outbound efforts (direct mail, print ads, and so forth)
- Website marketing (number of visitors, conversions, most popular pages, most popular blog posts, CTAs, most effective keyword phrases)
- Buyer personas (are they still on target? Do you need to update them? Are there any additional ones you need to create?)
2. Take a hard look at the numbers and make decisions. You need to cut what isn’t working. Yes, even your “darlings.” For example, you might love social media (because who doesn’t love spending more time on Pinterest?). But if your social media efforts aren’t producing tangible results (e.g. leads, sales), it might make sense to…
- Rethink your social strategy
- Reallocate at least some of your social investment elsewhere
Note: Consider each marketing program and campaign in this manner.
3. Map out next year’s objectives. You’ll likely have some big, overall objectives, such as increasing revenue by six percent. Continue drilling down until you can state objectives that translate into clear marketing action items.
For example, maybe every time you release a new marketing offer, you generate 100 leads. Of those 100 leads, 10 (on average) become customers. In 2015, you released four marketing offers, which resulted in 40 new customers. In 2016, you could release six new offers, which would hopefully yield 60 new customers. That’s an actionable, measurable item—one that will support your big, overall goal of increasing revenue by six percent.
Rinse, lather, and repeat until you have a marketing plan with actionable items that will produce the revenue numbers you want for next year.
4. Get feedback from your sales team. Remember, marketing and sales should be working in harmony. The days of departmental silos are over, and for good reason. While marketing people should be regularly communicating with sales throughout the year, consider carving out time in Q4 for a longer conversation between your two teams. Together, review numbers from the current year, discuss numbers for next year (so that everyone is on the same page), and get the sales team’s feedback on what they thought worked and didn’t work—and why.
5. Brainstorm new ideas. Compile a list of ideas you encountered over the last year that you might want to try in 2016. For example, maybe you’ve seen some fabulous customer testimonials done via video, and you’d like to create some for your website and social channels. (No, you won’t be able to do every idea on your list, but it’s always a smart strategy to have a tickler file of ideas.)
6. Ask your customers to weigh in. We’re not suggesting you send an email saying, “Hey, what type of marketing do you like?” But you should solicit customer feedback regarding what they want from your company in general. Perhaps they responded well to the “how to” video series you created and would like more helpful videos. Or maybe they’re interested in podcasts. Or perhaps they want webinars. Make sure you’re listening to customers and prospects alike.
7. Remember, it’s all fluid. A marketing plan shouldn’t be a straightjacket. The most effective plan is one that evolves over the year and that you adjust due to changes within your organization, industry, and overall marketplace. There’s no such thing as a perfect marketing plan. But you can put together a plan that makes sense for your company and its goals based on data and feedback.
What are your strategies for developing a strong marketing plan? Share in the comments below.