6 Questions to Answer for Your Marketing Plan

In order to get the most out of any marketing activity you implement, you need to be clear on 6 specific areas. By answering these questions, you'll ensure that you are focused and on-track with exactly what you want and need to accomplish in implementing a particular marketing tactic.

Let's take a look at each of these 6 questions:

1) Who is your audience or target?

What group of people is this marketing strategy aimed towards? Is it your main target group or a subset of them?

You need to be very clear about who this specific marketing strategy is targeted towards in order to ensure that the content, distribution and promotion of it are actually reaching the people you've intended it for!

2) What is your main objective?

Before you start to figure out and follow the steps required to implement this marketing tactic, you need to be very clear on your objective(s) for undertaking this.

It's perfectly okay to have one main objective and several smaller, complementary objectives. This makes sense as marketing strategies do not exist in a vacuum - they are all intertwined and work together. Just pick the objectives that are the most compelling reason right now for implementing this particular marketing tactic.

3) Is this part of another marketing tactic or strategy?

Many of your marketing tactics work in conjunction with each other. The ideal is to have everything work together and feed into each other to gain the most momentum and leverage with your marketing.

If this particular marketing tactic is part of another marketing strategy, then keep focused on that while creating your marketing plan. You want to make sure that everything you do is aimed at reaching all of your objectives - general and specific.

4) How much time is required, and how much time do you have, to implement this?

The time needed to create, produce, distribute and promote a marketing tactic is dependent on you and any other persons you use as a resource (i.e. copywriter, design company, Virtual Assistant, and so on).

There are many things that can impact how long it takes to get something done, such as:

* being a perfectionist

* procrastinating

* not planning ahead

* not having enough money allocated

* not giving people enough notice

* unrealistic deadlines

* not having the tools readily available

* emergencies and unplanned events

* personal commitments

Depending on what you've got going on (big promotion or launch, personal vacation or event, busy time of year, etc.) and how much of the work is dependent on other people, try to determine how long it will take to complete all the steps involved in getting your marketing tactic up and running.

5) How much is it going to cost and how much money do you have to spend on setting up this?

This is a hard question to answer as it depends on how much of the work you farm out to other people and your existing resources. Many marketing strategies can be done for not-too-much money.

Depending on where you are at in your business, you may already have some of the software and products needed to get this marketing tactic up and running, and therefore it won't be a new expense for you. If you have extra money you can hire outside help, but many of the steps and activities can be done relatively inexpensively by you.

6) Do you need this implemented by a specific date?

When you plot out due dates for your plan, start with any hard deadlines that you are working towards. This usually ties back into your objectives for the marketing strategy.

For example, do you want this tactic to be up and running a couple months before you have your big summer sales promotion? Or do you want to get in on a great Joint Venture opportunity and need to have this strategy in place before then?

Take the time to answer these 6 important questions before you even attempt to put together a marketing plan. This will ensure that the marketing strategies are aimed at the right people and are easily, quickly and affordably accomplished by you.