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Effective marketing starts with a considered, well-informed marketing strategy. A good marketing strategy helps you define clear, realistic and measurable marketing objectives for your business.
Your marketing strategy affects the way you run your business, so it should be planned and developed in consultation with your team. It is a wide-reaching and comprehensive strategic planning tool that:
- describes your business and its products and services
- explains the position and role of your products and services in the market
- profiles your customers and your competition
- identifies the marketing tactics you will use
- allows you to build a marketing plan (the tactics to deliver) and measure its effectiveness.
A marketing strategy sets the overall direction and goals for your marketing, and is therefore different from a marketing plan, which outlines the specific actions you will take to implement your marketing strategy. Your marketing strategy could be developed for the next few years, while your marketing plan usually describes tactics to be achieved in the current year.
Write a successful marketing strategy
Your well-developed marketing strategy will help you realise your business's goals and focus on the actions required to reach the right customers.
Developing a marketing strategy that includes the components listed below will help you make the most of your marketing investment, keep your marketing focused, and measure and improve your sales results.
Identify your business goals
Align your marketing strategy to the business goals outlined in your business plan; you can then define a set of marketing goals to support them. Your business goals might include:
- increasing awareness of your products and services
- selling more products from a certain supplier
- reaching a new customer segment.
When setting goals it's critical to be as targeted as possible so you can effectively measure the outcomes against what you set out to achieve. A simple criteria for goal-setting is the SMART method:
- Specific – state clearly what you want to achieve
- Measurable – set tangible measures so you can measure your results
- Achievable – set objectives that are within your capacity and budget
- Relevant – set objectives that will help you improve particular aspects of your business
- Time-bound – set objectives you can achieve within the time you need them.
State your marketing goals
Define a set of specific marketing goals based on the business goals. These goals will motivate you and your team and enable you to track your success.
Examples of marketing goals include increased market penetration (selling more existing products to existing customers) or market development (selling existing products to new target markets). These marketing goals could be long-term and might take a few years to successfully achieve. However, they should be clear and measurable and have time frames for achievement.
Make sure your overall strategies are also practical and measurable. A good marketing strategy will not be changed every year, but revised when your strategies have been achieved or your marketing goals have been met. You may need to amend your strategy if your external market changes due to a new competitor or new technology, or if your products substantially change.
Research your market
Research is an essential part of your marketing strategy. You need to gather information about your market, such as its size, growth, social trends and demographics (population statistics such as age, gender and family type). It is important to keep an eye on your market so you are aware of any changes over time, so your strategy remains relevant and targeted.
Profile your potential customers
Use your market research to develop a profile of the customers you are targeting and identify their needs.
The profile will reveal their buying patterns, including how they buy, where they buy and what they buy. Again, regularly review trends so you don't miss out on new opportunities or become irrelevant with your marketing message.
While you try to find new customers, make sure your marketing strategy also allows you to maintain relationships with your existing customers.
Profile your competitors
Similarly, as part of your marketing strategy you should develop a profile of your competitors by identifying their products, supply chains, pricing and marketing tactics.
Use this to identify your competitive advantage – what sets your business apart from your competitors. You may also want to identify the strengths and weaknesses of your own internal processes to help improve your performance compared with your competition.
Develop strategies to support your marketing goals
List your target markets and devise a set of strategies to attract and retain them. An example goal could be to increase young people's awareness of your products. Your corresponding strategies could be to increase your online social media presence by posting regular updates about your product on Instagram or Facebook; advertising in local magazines targeted to young people; or offering discounts for students.
Use the '7 Ps of marketing'
Reach your selected market by utilising the 7 Ps of marketing mix. If you can choose the right combination of marketing across product, price, promotion, place, people, process and physical evidence, your marketing strategy is more likely to be a success. You can choose any combination of these to achieve your marketing strategy.
Test your ideas
In deciding your tactics, do some online research, test some ideas and approaches on your customers and your staff, and review what works. You will need to choose a number of tactics in order to meet your customers' needs, reach the customers within your target market and improve your sales results.
Also consider...
Good direct marketing campaigns focus on promoting a specific product or service, and call on your customers to act – to receive further information, register their interest, visit your website, make a booking or a purchase.
Direct marketing gives you the opportunity to promote your products and services directly to the customers who most need them. A good direct marketing campaign will:
- help you build relationships with new customers
- test the appeal of your product or service
- tell you which marketing approaches reach your target market
- provide customers with compelling content they can share with potential customers
- increase sales.
However, direct marketing campaigns require careful planning and a clear understanding of responsible direct marketing practice. Being aware of the benefits and challenges of direct marketing will help you use direct marketing effectively.
Making the most of direct marketing
A well-planned direct marketing campaign can take you straight to your ideal customers. Identifying the benefits of direct marketing will help you stay focused on getting the most out of your direct marketing campaign.
Target your ideal customers
Using direct marketing allows you to target specific groups of customers with tailored messages. By taking the time to research and identify the customers who are most likely to need or want your products and services, you can focus your marketing efforts where they have the highest chance of achieving results.
A well-targeted direct marketing campaign will also provide you with an accurate understanding of how your customers are responding to your product and service offers.
Market on a budget
Direct marketing that is targeted to a specific audience can help you set realistic sales goals and improve sales results on a tight marketing budget. Businesses can run effective and purposeful direct marketing campaigns at a fraction of the cost of broadcast advertising.
Increase sales to current and lapsed customers
Most customers welcome contact from familiar business people who make an effort to understand their needs and build a personal relationship. You can increase sales to your existing customers by maintaining reliable customer records and choosing simple, well-planned promotional tactics.
You can also use direct marketing tactics to re-establish relationships with customers who haven't returned to your business in a while. Approaching lapsed customers is an opportunity to rekindle sales, keep your customer records accurate, and find out why your customers move on.
Improve customer loyalty
Direct marketing helps you build direct relationships with your customers. You can personalise promotions, letters and offers to create an immediate link with your customer and increase their personal connection to your business.
Many businesses combine direct marketing and customer loyalty strategies to keep and build customer relationships (e.g. by sending birthday cards, discount offers, invites to upcoming sales).
Create new business
When using direct marketing you can communicate directly with your chosen target market and this should give you a better sales success rate than communicating to the mass market, many of whom may not be interested in your products and services.
If you use effective techniques for sourcing and finding new customers, you can generate new customer prospects and grow your sales to new customers.
Direct marketing lets you adapt and respond to the needs of your market, and your business. You can achieve fast and flexible sales results using direct marketing. For example, you could use a direct marketing campaign to:
- boost sales of a particular product
- run out discontinued stock
- renew stale sales figures
- increase customer contacts
- directly follow-up on a promotion.
Word-of-mouth is the most powerful form of marketing. An effective marketing campaign will provide customers with collateral about your business that they can easily share with their friends, colleagues and family. This can generate new leads for your business.
Test and measure your products and sales performance
Direct approaches provide direct feedback. Direct marketing is also a great way to gauge your customers' appetite for your products and trial new products or services.
Direct marketing also allows you to test new markets, review sales results, measure the effectiveness of your sales and advertising tactics, and easily make adjustments to your campaign. Each time you run a direct marketing campaign you should monitor and review the results, using this information to improve the success of your next campaign.
For example, if you mail 100 customers a catalogue with a discount voucher on the back page and 20 customers bring this into your business to use, the campaign had a response rate of 20%. By working out the cost of creating and mailing the catalogue, as well as the profit you made from each customer that responded, you can assess the success of your direct marketing campaign.