Failing to Plan is Planning to Fail. Should You Take This Risk with Your Marketing Plan?

We receive calls every day from companies asking for help with their marketing.  We are often asked to help with social media, with redoing a website, helping with branding, or even doing a direct mailer.  While we are skilled and equipped to help with any of these components, and love to do them, the first question we always ask is this:

What is your marketing strategy?

You see, engaging in one or two marketing campaigns can be good for your company.  They can get your name out there, tell your story more succinctly, or even just let your clients know about product or company changes that are taking place.  However, with no marketing strategy, no plan for how you are going to use marketing tools to tell your story, it is like trying to build a house on sand.  Without a foundation, or strategy, upon which to build your marketing efforts, they will not be sustainable.

At this point, many people are still skeptical.  They often subscribe to doing things the way they always have, and thus achieving the same results.  They wonder why they should engage in a marketing strategy.  So, why should they?

Why should you create a marketing strategy? 

A good marketing strategy contains several components to help measure success along the way.  Here are a few good reasons each company should create a marketing strategy:

Identifies target market and ideal prospect.

One of the first and most important things an effective marketing strategy does is helps you identify your target market and ideal prospect.  By going through a series of exercises and questions, you can easily figure out who your target market should be, as well as your ideal prospect within the market.  Once you know the answers to these questions, you will be on your way to a more solid foundation upon which to build your strategy.

Establishes problems you are trying to solve through marketing.

Simply put, all the efforts that go into marketing a product, service, or company boil down to one thing—what problem are you trying to solve?  All companies have a problem they are trying to solve for their clients.  Whether it is providing faster internet speed, a shiny new car, or a better software solution for an organization, all companies are attempting to solve a problem.  A strong marketing strategy equips you to identify those problems up front, and then put a plan in place to face those problems head on.

Sets Foundation and objectives. 

A strong marketing strategy enables you to set the foundation upon which your plan will be built.  Identifying your target market, ideal prospect, and the problem you are trying to solve sets a firm foundation upon which to build how you will reach your prospects, which generates stronger lead opportunities, which leads to revenue.

Determines measurable benchmarks.

An effective marketing strategy is lucid in nature, and helps you establish benchmarks along the way against which you can measure progress.  Benchmarks are designed to take a quick gut check and make sure what is being done is working.  When companies don’t take the time to set benchmarks as part of the marketing program, allowing for changes in the strategy as needed, they can fail in their marketing efforts.

Provides methodology to achieve objectives

Once everything else is in place, it is time to discuss the tools and the methodology against which to achieve the objectives set.  Whether it is a new brand, a new website, stronger social media presence, advertising, or an email campaign, companies can begin to create strong, results-based campaigns based on the strategic marketing plan put in place from the beginning.

Strategic marketing is essential to growing your business effectively and impactfully.  Without a core strategy through which to tell your company’s story, solve your customer’s issues, and demonstrate success through increased market awareness and revenue generation, companies often fail.

MEMO Marketing Group works with companies who do not have marketing programs already in place, and walks them through planning and implementing a strategic marketing plan.  We are experts in working alongside companies who are growing, but are not quite ready to hire their own marketing team.   Please call us today for a complementary consultation to see how we can help you on your way to marketing success!

 

 

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