Follow Robert Ainger associate director at The Marketing Practice’s six steps to create a successful marketing plan
If you were a fly on the wall of many marketing meetings you might think there’s no room – or even need – for marketing planning these days. The discussion is quite likely to be about marketing as a continuous conversation and the adoption of increasingly agile techniques to respond to the needs of individual customers. Surely with this in mind, a structured planning process is likely to cramp your style?
Having worked with many different marketing teams over the past 25 years, it’s clear to me that those who take a systematic approach to planning are the most successful in focusing attention on the critical challenges. They also get agreement from senior managers and secure the resources needed to do a great job. This creates greater freedom and flexibility for the team, rather than restricting it.
Inevitably, your planning will evolve to meet your specific needs. But it will be more effective if you follow a few simple rules…
1. Be clear on the ‘why’
If you’re only planning because your boss told you to – or you think you’re for the high jump if you don’t – then you’re on the high road to failure. As with most marketing initiatives, you’ll do best if you start by identifying your key audiences. What are their needs? How is your planning process going to add value for them? These audiences include your team, senior managers, and your peers in sales. Putting yourself in their shoes as you kick off the process will stand you in good stead.
2. Create a plan
Be ruthless with exactly which steps you need to go through, who needs to be involved and when they will be needed, will help you make the most of everyone’s time. And make it much easier to keep people engaged.
At this stage you probably want to identify an overall sponsor for the planning exercise. This could be the most senior marketing leader in your organisation, or you could ask a business unit leader or head of marketing to be your sponsor. Either way, this ensures the exercise is taken seriously as it is key to success for the whole business.
3. Step back and take stock
Life in many marketing teams is becoming more and more frenetic, as marketing leaders are constantly called upon to respond to this month’s latest challenge. During the planning cycle you must put aside time to step back and work with your team to answer key questions:
- Are we clear on the strategic direction of our business and the implication this has for marketing?
- What are the key trends and dynamics in our market place? What impact do these have on our customers and how are our competitors reacting?
- What lessons have we learned from our marketing initiatives over the past year?
- What strengths and weaknesses do we need to consider as we plan for the future?
Ideally this review includes quantitative analysis and will capture input and opinion from stakeholders across the business.
4. Agree clear objectives
A cheeky question I like to ask when working with a team to create a marketing plan is: “Why does marketing exist in this business?” This can spark some interesting debates, but it also focuses attention on identifying and agreeing clear and measurable objectives, which will sit at the heart of the plan.
Without wanting to go over the old chestnut of sales and marketing alignment, it’s essential to engage with sales at this point to agree how marketing will support and drive sales to deliver against the wider business targets for the year.
Increasingly, many successful marketing teams are engaging with sales to deliver against this year’s targets, while investing in brand building to improve the performance of the business for years to come. So make sure you identify the right mix of objectives to reflect this.
5. Leave space for creativity
Be careful to avoid regurgitating the same activities from one planning period to the next. Innovation and creativity are essential for successful B2B marketing. Make sure you explore a range of options, building a degree of challenge and experimentation into the process.
6. Review, revise and optimise
Follow these rules of thumb and you should be well on the way to creating a strong plan that the business supports with an appropriate budget. Job done? Well no, actually – this is just the start of the process.
Now is the time to agree with all stakeholders how the plan will be reviewed, and to make sure you have the right measurement and feedback in place. This will make it a truly valuable, living asset for your business.
Planning isn’t always the most exciting activity for marketers. But if you follow these guidelines you have every chance of making it a really valuable string to your bow. Best of all, it will help to position marketing as a key driver of your business.
