Suze Bragg

Do You Have Your Strategic and Tactical Marketing Plans Completed?

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Successful marketing planning is the foundation of a thriving business. Many people have good intentions when it comes to researching and writing a clear, concise plan, while others build it up to be a huge, insurmountable task. To keep things simple, there are two principle types of marketing plans: strategic and tactical. Both are crucial, but should be approached differently. In a strategic marketing plan, there are 11 parts:

1. Mission statement - what are the goals of the company in 1-2 concise sentences? Be sure not to make it so narrow that you don't leave yourself room to grow (example: We sell master suite beds, or we are a typewriter company. Just think of what IBM would have become had they stuck with that mission statement).
2. Financial summary - summarize the financial implications over the planning period. Where do you stand now, what are you expenditures in growing your business, and how will you get there?
3. Market overview - what is the market structure, trends, key segments and gap analysis?
4. SWOT analysis (strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threats) of your business.
5. Issues to be addressed that were found during the SWOT analysis - how will you combat these?
6. Portfolio summary - usually drawn as a 2-dimensional matrix graph with the horizontal axis measuring the strengths and the vertical axis measuring the attractiveness.
7. Assumptions - what do you assume will happen for your plan to work? Foot traffic will continue to grow outside your door due to the building of the condos around the corner, the economy won't head into a deep recession, etc.
8. Marketing objectives are quantitative statements (profit, volume, value, and market share) of what you wish to achieve.
9. Marketing strategies - states how you plan to achieve your objectives and involve the 4 P's (product, price, promotion, and place).
10. Resource requirements and budget - how much is this going to cost you in realistic figures?

In a tactical plan, there are 7 parts (for a small business, more parts for a larger business)

1. Demographics of customers
2. Description of competitors, including the level of demand for the product or service and the strengths and weaknesses of competitors
3. Description of the product or service, including special features (otherwise known as the Marketing Mix or the 4 P's: product, price, promotion, place)
4. Marketing budget, including the advertising and promotional plan
5. Description of the business location, including advantages and disadvantages for marketing
6. Pricing strategy
7. Market Segmentation

A full marketing plan outline can look like this if you have a medium or large business. Smaller businesses can get by just fine using the tactical plan outlined above. One of the biggest barriers to success in planning is being disorganized. Set aside time to research, think, discuss and plan. Then complete the strategic marketing plan before the the tactical plan. It doesn't have to be viewed as an academic exercise, just as a way to dig deep into the core of you business model and develop it from the inside out.

Posted by Suze Bragg on August 25, 2008 | Comments (2)