ABSTRACT

Your Seven-Step, One-Day Marketing Plan
you can create a successful plan for your business in just one day:

Step 1 - Understand Your Market and Competition
A profitable market consists of people who have dire wants that are being unmet, so much so that they will jump to buy your solution (product or service). To get an understanding of your market you should ask yourself questions like:

- Are there segments in my market that are being underserved?

- Are the segments of my market for my product or service big enough to make money?

- Is there too much competition in the segment of my market to be competitive?

- What are the weaknesses in my competition's offering that I can capitalize on?

- Does my market want or value my unique competitive offering?

Step 2 - Understand Your Customer

Knowing your customer intimately is the first step to easy sales. Until you know (1) who your customers are, (2) what they want, and (3) what motivates them to buy, you can't prepare an effective marketing plan. To really get to know your customers you'll need to ask yourself questions such as:

- How does my potential customer normally buy similar products (i.e. in a store, on the web, door-to-door)?

- Who is the primary buyer and the primary buying influencer in the purchasing process (i.e. husband or wife, purchasing agent, project leader, secretary)?

Step 3 - Pick a Niche
Carve out a specific niche and dominate that niche, then you might consider moving on to a second niche (but not before you've dominated the first one!). Make sure to choose a niche that interests you and that is easy to contact.

Step 4 - Develop Your Marketing Message
Your first marketing message should be short and to the point. The second type is your complete marketing message that will be included in all your marketing materials and promotions. To make your marketing message compelling and persuasive it should include the following elements:

- An explanation of your target prospect's problem.

- Proof that the problem is so important that it should be solved now, without delay.

- An explanation about why you are the only person/business that can solve your prospects problem.

Step 5 - Determine Your Marketing Medium(s)
Your marketing medium is the communication vehicle you use to deliver your marketing message. It's important to choose a marketing medium that gives you the highest return on your marketing dollar (ROMD). This means that you want to choose the medium that delivers your marketing message to the most niche prospects at the lowest possible cost.

Step 6 - Set Sales and Marketing Goals
Your goals should include financial elements such as annual sales revenue, gross profit, sales per sales person etc. However, they should also include non-financial elements such as units sold, contracts signed, clients acquired, articles published etc
Step 7 - Develop Your Marketing Budget
First, if you have been in business for over a year and tracked your marketing-related expenditures you could easily calculate your "cost to acquire one customer" or "cost to sell one product" by dividing your annual sales and marketing costs by the number of units (or customers acquired) sold. The next step is to take your cost to sell one unit or acquire one customer and simply multiply it by your unit sales or customer acquisition goal