The Benefits of a Marketing Plan

In our high tech world of tablets, phones and other electronic devices, we are living in a time that is being defined by the quality content that companies put out. Everywhere you look, marketing is playing a part in getting your attention. From a simple blog post, down to the shirt and hat that someone may be wearing in their restaurant job, marketing is playing a critical part in how you perceive brands. When you walk by a local Starbucks, you may receive a notification on your phone, reminding you that a nice, warm coffee is just a block or two away. Or perhaps your favorite fitness app is reminding you that right now is a great time to get your daily exercise in.

All of these notifications, clothing worn by employees, videos produced and blog content created, have their origins in marketing. Which is why it has never been more important for successful brands to maintain an established and effective marketing plan to help guide your brand management. Without a marketing plan, you’re company may find that their goals and objectives are scattered, unreliable and ineffective. A marketing plan helps to keep your marketing strategy consistent and on track. Without one, your company could end up spending lots of effort, times, and money, achieving vaguely defined goals. Still moving, but not sure where you are going!

Why do you need a Marketing Plan?

In today’s world, brands are creating content as an engagement tool on different social media channels at a rapid pace. Entire teams are dedicated to creating quality content based on a specific strategies which are outlined by the company’s marketing plan. Proper marketing plan management is essential to your company’s ability to innovate and develop new products and services. A marketing plan helps you identify your target market, so you can gain insights into exactly what it is your customers want, and you can develop desirable products for their benefit. It is sort of like a story, where your brand is trying to convince customers why they should buy your product over competitors. One critical benefit of having a marketing plan is being able to have a full overview of activity for the months or years, which creates a level of predictability for creating content and managing marketing efforts.

The Risks of not having a Marketing Plan

A good story tends to draw people in and make them feel a connection with the plot or character’s in it. On the other hand, a bad story will often feel jumbled, unorganized, boring and make the reader want to put the book down and find a new one to read. This is similar to companies and organizations who operate without a marketing plan. Their brand message is jumbled, difficult to understand, or sometimes they don’t even have one. The content they put out is inconsistent with their company and brand, which fails to draw in audiences for the long haul. Lacking marketing plan and strategy will lead to poor engagement and a stagnant digital, social, and business presence.

The Difference a Good Marketing Plan makes

A proper marketing plan will help you develop and uncover the most unique aspects about your business, which you can then utilize in your strategy. It can help you figure out how to make your customers understand the value brought to them through your products and services. Every customer has a need or desire, and an effective marketing plan will show you how to align your product or service with someone who can get value from that product or service. It helps you establish your company’s goals for projects and task deadlines. Your plan will help you map out the messaging strategy, channels you intend on using and the tools you will utilize to effectively market your brand to and identify potential and recurring customers.

Your marketing plan should be seen as an actively updated document that can adapt to the newest forms of marketing channels and networks as they come into existence. And most importantly, it serves as a reference point and benchmark for how your team will coordinate and effectively push out new marketing content to draw customers in.

In the present day, having a well-established marketing plan is critical to the success of your company. Without one, you simply have no way to measure your objectives, no path forward for producing quality and consistent content, and will most likely face a much higher risk of your marketing campaigns and paid advertisements missing the mark with your target market. So if your company has been operating without a marketing plan, consider getting your team together to discuss the creation of one. The time and effort spent coming up with a solid marketing strategy is worth it, whereas wasting your money on going after the wrong target market is not!

Piece Contributed By Brian Glassanos