March 10, 2011

Plan, Push, Interact – a 3 Part Marketing Series

Over the next three articles, we will discuss current, relevant topics and techniques that, when utilized properly, can make a big impact in the marketing and subsequent growth of your business.

The first article will focus on planning, developing a strategy, and helping you identify areas where you’ll need help, as well as things you or your team can manage on your own. The second article will discuss branding, messaging and traditional media and approaches. Finally, we will dive into online marketing, SEO and social media, and how to tie everything together.

The goal of this series is to provide some knowledge and tools to point you in the direction of success. Whether you’re looking to expand into new areas or vertically within your niche market, establishing an effective marketing plan will help get you there.

Get it Together

Of all the possible steps toward growing a business, a commonly overlooked – yet extremely important – aspect is planning. Identifying your goals doesn’t need to be rocket science. Think generally: Would you like to have more customers? How about better customers? Do you want to expand service offerings or your service area? When you can definitively outline what it is you want, put it down on paper.

With goals well established, you’ll already be able to see the finish line – and it won’t seem out of reach or even far from your current state. From there, you can work backwards, creating milestones along the way, steps that you need to take to reach each milestone, and tasks you can complete, in the very short term, to complete each step.

A business or marketing consultant can be a very valuable asset in your marketing program. A professional marketer will help you establish these goals, create timelines and actionable items, and help monitor progress and evaluate the success of your efforts. With enough available time and thought, these aspects can undertaken by a manager or owner of the business as well. Owners may also feel more assured knowing they are directly involved in creating and implementing the strategy themselves. However, unless you come from a business administration/advertising or marketing background, the help of a professional is strongly suggested.

Next in Series: We Need A Push