Every business needs to have a strategy as the foundation it’s built upon. Accomplishing your business strategy requires that you pursue a collection of tactics. A solid marketing plan is necessarily a tactic of any business strategy. The purpose of the marketing plan is to lay out how you intend to approach your target market and familiarize them with your services. Through this process of familiarization, you turn prospects into clients, increasing business revenue. Let’s explore a few ideas about how a marketing plan is one of the tactics of your business strategy.

1. Create a marketing plan that “plays to” your strengths.

If you’re an excellent public speaker and love doing it, that should be a major component of your marketing plan. Likewise for writing, radio, networking, social media, or your website writing. Whatever your strengths are, focus your marketing plan on those activities.

» Read more: Your Marketing Plan Is a Tactic In Your Strategy

Sometimes finding a sample marketing plan to use as a guide for writing yours can be a challenge. The problem is that there is no “one-size-fits-all” plan that you can specifically use for your business without some kind of modification.

In this article I will outline the 6 necessary elements you need in your marketing plan and some applications that will help illustrate each element. The six things you must include: an evaluation of your marketplace, the profile of your ideal customer, what you want to accomplish as a result of your marketing, the big picture view of media tools, an accountability structure that will aid in implementation, and strong financial proof that your plan will work.

Evaluate your marketplace

No matter what format you use the concept of evaluating your market is always the first step. In this part of the plan you research your top 5-10 competitors and come up with a list of strengths and weaknesses for each. You do the same exercise on your own company. This will help you create a clear picture of how you are different from everyone else.

» Read more: Sample Marketing Plan – 6 Steps For Creating a Marketing Plan

Just do a search for the term marketing plan and you are likely to be faced with approximately 9 million page results. Not only that, but if you go into some of the results you will find differing terms and differing opinions on how to develop the best one for your small business. It can all be a little confusing and could be one of the reasons why you do not have a marketing plan for your small business.

Before we look at the myths, it should be noted that just having a marketing plan will not guarantee success. It is the quality of the plan and importantly the implementation and tracking of the plan that will show you whether you are achieving your goals.

Myth 1 – Only Big Business Need a Marketing Plan
Remember successful big businesses today started as a small business. They know one of the secrets to success is to work on your business and set goals and decide on the key marketing strategies and tactics each year so time and money is not wasted.

» Read more: Marketing Plan Myths Revealed