example of marketing strategies in a business plan

15 marketing plan examples to inspire your work

Whether you’re a marketer or managing a team of marketers, a marketing plan is essential to keep your department on track. Following a marketing plan ensures your team executes the correct strategy and achieves its goals.

But every business is different, which means every marketing plan is unique. It’s helpful to see marketing plan examples to understand all the different formats and types of marketing plans.

In this guide, we’ll share 15 examples of successful marketing plans to inspire your team to create its next great strategy. We’ll also share best practices and tools to set direction and provide structure for your marketing efforts. At the end of this article, you’ll have a better understanding of how to create the right marketing plan for your organization.

This post will cover:

How to create a marketing plan

• Visit Baton Rouge
• University of Illinois
• Lush Cosmetics
• The Wisconsin Public Library
• Botanical Bounty
• The Palm Beaches, Florida
• The City of West Chicago
• Safe Haven Family Shelter
• Austin, Texas
• Visit Oxnard

Create a strong marketing plan for your business

Adobe can help, marketing plan faq.

Before we look at marketing plan examples, it’s important to understand the foundational concepts of how companies structure their marketing plans.

Every organization is unique, but you can create a marketing plan by first identifying your business goals and establishing the metrics you’ll use to measure results. From there, learn about the customers you’re targeting and conduct competitor research. Then you can organize a team and set a budget before creating the marketing plan.

When it’s time to write the marketing plan, make sure your document includes these seven sections at a minimum:

• Executive summary. This is a high-level overview of your business and the marketing approach you’ll follow.
• Mission statement. Describe your company’s unique selling proposition (USP) and your brand’s purpose.
• Marketing objectives. This section of the plan should focus on marketing-specific goals that will help you achieve your broader business objectives.
• SWOT analysis. Through a SWOT analysis, your team will identify internal strengths and weaknesses and external opportunities and threats.
• Market research. This section of the marketing plan addresses your market, competitors, existing solutions, and target audience.
• Marketing strategy. The marketing strategy part of your plan should detail exactly how you’re going to achieve your marketing goals. Be as specific as possible to make this document valuable to your marketing team.
• Budget. Finally, break down your marketing tactics and assign a budget for each area of your strategy. If your budget changes frequently, set aside a certain percentage of your total budget for each tactic, instead of dollar amounts.

Once you create a marketing plan, you might wonder whether it’s effective or if there’s a better way to structure the plan for your situation. For example, a SaaS business has very different needs than an ecommerce company, so your marketing plan likely needs some level of customization.

If you need more direction, check out marketing plan examples from businesses within your industry or with a similar business model. Learn from these 15 successful marketing plan examples to create an effective plan for your own business.

1. Visit Baton Rouge

Baton Rouge, Louisiana might not be as well-known as New Orleans, but the vibrant city wanted to change that through an ambitious new marketing plan . Not only is the plan organized and easy to follow, but it does a great job of highlighting the needs of its multiple audiences.

For example, its separate personas for “Leisure Travelers” and “Sales/Meetings Travelers” help Baton Rouge create custom marketing journeys based on each persona’s unique expectations. The marketing plan has a fully fleshed-out strategy that includes an event calendar, which gives the marketing team actionable next steps after creating its plan.

2. University of Illinois

In 2021, the University of Illinois set out to boost enrollment. Its Office of Undergraduate Admissions created an in-depth marketing plan with three major sections:

• Section I provides context on the admissions process and knowledge of its target students.
• Section II dives into market research on the current state of admissions and student demographics.
• Section III details the university’s strategic action plan, including success metrics.

The University of Illinois marketing plan is effective because it breaks down the high-level components of its strategy, as well as specific marketing tactics. Instead of aiming for generic goals like “interact with high school students,” the plan indicates specific tactics to make that happen, such as direct mail campaigns, swag, and events.

As this marketing plan example for Sony shows, it’s possible to compose a simple but actionable plan for your team. The plan keeps its introduction, vision, and marketing objectives clean, to-the-point, and easy to read.

This marketing plan does a great job of focusing on pricing as a marketing differentiator. Although you might consider pricing to be a sales or product issue, it can have a direct impact on how customers perceive your business. Specify what your prices will be, how the pricing model works, and why your pricing is a differentiator.

4. Coca-Cola

Marketing plans are usually documented in text, but this isn’t the only way you can share your marketing plan with the team. For example, Coca-Cola created its own video marketing plan in 2020. The video follows the typical format of a written marketing plan, but distills big concepts into easily digestible visuals through the power of video.

This approach is ideal if you need to communicate the contents of your marketing plan to a large group or to marketing-adjacent teams, like sales or product development. It doesn’t hurt that the whiteboard-style cartoon animation draws viewers in to ensure everyone truly understands your marketing strategy.

5. Lush Cosmetics

Lush Cosmetics is a renowned international beauty brand. In anticipation of its expansion into Portugal, Lush created a new marketing plan for customers in this new market.

The Lush in-depth marketing plan touches on several elements, including:

• Specific geographical areas of Lush’s two stores in Portugal, and the unique considerations for shoppers in these areas.
• Physical marketing within Lush stores, including the store and staff direction, as an extension of the marketing team.
• The brand’s unique approach to sensory marketing, which describes precisely how Lush products appeal to all of its shoppers’ senses.

When crafting your own marketing plan, consider adding new sections that are unique to your brand, such as Lush’s section on sensory marketing. This will make the plan more relevant to your business and simplify execution.

6. The Wisconsin Public Library

The Wisconsin Public Library created this no-frills marketing plan example specifically for other organizations to copy and use. Although it’s intended for use by libraries, anyone can access and use the components in this free marketing plan template.

The Wisconsin Public Library marketing plan includes several helpful resources. For example, the “Research Your Audience” section links to resources for conducting audience research, including the United States Census and focus groups.

As with any template, be sure to replace the library’s content with information about your business and market. This marketing plan example doesn’t include a list of marketing tools or media. If that’s important to your company, be sure to create a new section detailing the tools your marketing team will use to execute the strategy.

7. Patagonia

Sometimes it’s difficult for companies to articulate their mission statement. However, every business has a greater purpose. Outdoor brand Patagonia is a great example of how large companies should lead marketing initiatives with a mission statement.

On the Patagonia website , the brand makes its mission statement clear: “We're in business to save our home planet.” This isn’t lip service — Patagonia donates a percentage of its profits to protecting the environment.

Your marketing plan needs to marry your corporate mission statement with direct action. For example, if you’re a B2B brand and your mission is to support small businesses with affordable accounting software, your marketing plan could include interviews with small business owners. Or maybe you could host local get-togethers for small business owners while promoting your brand.

The goal is to blend your mission statement with your marketing tactics in a way that makes it clear your business is truly living out its mission statement.

8. Cyberclick

Cyberclick is a marketing agency based in Barcelona, Spain. As a marketing agency, it knows the importance of understanding its target audience.

In this marketing plan example, Cyberclick creates multiple buyer personas to help it understand customer pain points. For example, it has personas like Bilingual Brandon, Millennial Molly, and Donor Dana to understand the unique traits of its target buyers.

When composing your own marketing strategy, follow Cyberclick’s example by creating in-depth personas that your marketing team will find useful. Your personas should include:

• Demographic information
• Geographic information
• Social media preferences
• Personality
• Personal and professional goals
• Pain points
• Software and tools used

9. Starbucks

Coffee giant Starbucks is famous for its distinctive brand elements. Consumers immediately recognize the hunter-green mermaid logo, but the Starbucks marketing plan doesn’t just revolve around clever branding. If anything, the company’s success comes down to the buyer experience.

In fact, experience is part of the Starbucks marketing plan . The company targets higher-earning professionals who are willing to pay a premium for drinks. Instead of simply serving coffee, its marketing team works with interior designers and architects to create posh spaces that encourage buyers to spend time in the store as a “third place,” which also increases brand engagement and retention.

Your marketing plan should address the experience buyers can expect from your brand. In an age when many businesses compete over customer service and experience, the quality of service you provide can also give you a competitive marketing advantage.

10. Botanical Bounty

Botanical Bounty is an herbal tea and supplement company based out of New York City. In this marketing plan example , the Botanical Bounty executive summary quickly spells out the problem, solution, market overview, competition, and unique selling proposition (USP) for the company. Formatted like a case study, the executive summary is easy to read and does a great job of summarizing the entire report.

Botanical Bounty also highlights specific due dates for its marketing milestones, as well as target metrics for those milestones. Many marketing plans fail to set specific due dates for milestones, but Botanical Bounty holds itself accountable for executing the plan by assigning due dates for each goal.

11. The Palm Beaches, Florida

The Palm Beaches is known for upscale homes and beaches, but the Cultural Council for Palm Beach County wanted to turn the Florida town into more than a beach destination. In its marketing plan , the council lays out its plan to transform The Palm Beaches into a hub for culture and art in a post-COVID environment.

The marketing plan first describes the council’s past successes in 2020 and 2021, which lays the groundwork for the 2022 marketing plan. This is a great way to show a continuation between different marketing plans, especially if your company’s past initiatives feed into this year’s strategies.

12. The City of West Chicago

The City of West Chicago has a rich history, but it’s largely misunderstood by people in the surrounding areas. In an effort to revitalize tourism, the city created a new marketing plan to rebrand itself and promote the area as a travel destination.

If you’re considering a new image or brand for your company, the West Chicago marketing plan is a great example to follow. The plan creates new market segments for the city’s ideal audience, a plan to drive awareness, and a list of strategic partnerships to aid in the rebrand.

13. Safe Haven Family Shelter

Safe Haven Family Shelter is a nonprofit that aids families experiencing homelessness. Its 2022 marketing plan tells the story of Safe Haven while promoting itself as an industry authority.

In this marketing plan example , Safe Haven takes an action-focused approach. Its template aligns objectives and action steps side by side, assigning staff members to each action step. The marketing plan also includes items like an editorial calendar and social media calendar, which its staff use for planning precise messaging that fits the organization’s larger goals.

14. Austin, Texas

Austin, Texas isn’t just the state capital — it’s also considered the live music capital of the world. However, tourism dipped substantially during the pandemic, and the city’s Visit Austin nonprofit responded with an updated marketing plan to attract tourists to the Texas capital.

The Visit Austin marketing plan includes a visual representation of its wins from 2021, which measured the impact of the organization’s work in past years. But this marketing plan truly shines in terms of its market research. Visit Austin not only conducted in-depth research about travelers’ plans to visit Austin, but also visualized this data in an engaging format to boost understanding.

15. Visit Oxnard

Oxnard, California, faced similar challenges with pandemic recovery. Visit Oxnard created a marketing plan to position the city as a destination for both leisure and business.

What’s unique about the Visit Oxnard plan is that it leans heavily into the business side of travel. Its marketing plan includes considerations for business events and meetings, as well as a strategy for attracting film productions as a less expensive alternative to Los Angeles. This is a great example of how marketing plans can introduce new, out-of-the-box positioning and segmentation to take advantage of a gap in the market.

Marketing plans clarify your focus and give marketing teams a solid vision of what they need to do. But not all plans are effective. It’s important to develop a strong marketing plan to give your audience exactly what it needs, as well as make a name for yourself in an increasingly competitive market.

While these 15 marketing plan examples are a great jumping-off point, you might need more guidance on how to create a marketing plan. Check out Adobe’s guide to building a marketing plan to get the most results from your marketing plan. You can also use our marketing plan templates to save time organizing and formatting your marketing plan.

You need a marketing plan to move forward. But then you need to execute your plan, and that’s where things can get complicated.

After investing in a marketing plan, opt for an automation platform to save time and deliver a better user experience. Adobe Marketo Engage helps businesses make sense of complex buying journeys. Build engaging, personalized experiences at scale and prove your impact every step of the way with this all-in-one marketing platform.

Watch the Marketo Engage overview video or take the interactive tour to learn more.

What is a marketing plan?

A marketing plan is a documented strategy for how a business plans to promote itself over a period of time. Organizations use this marketing plan to set goals, learn about their audience, and create marketing campaigns to help the business stand out.

What are some marketing plan examples?

Coca-Cola created a unique marketing plan formatted not as a written document, but as a video. This marketing plan example is a great illustration of how businesses should make their marketing plans as digestible as possible to increase internal adoption and understanding.

What are the elements of a good marketing plan?

Every good marketing plan should include an executive summary, a mission statement, marketing objectives, a SWOT analysis, market research, a marketing strategy, and a budget. Many marketing plans include additional sections as needed, depending on an organization’s goals and strategy.

https://business.adobe.com/blog/basics/digital-marketing-strategy-definition

https://business.adobe.com/blog/basics/strategic-planning

https://business.adobe.com/blog/basics/learn-about-marketing-campaign-management

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• How to create a winning marketing plan, ...

How to create a winning marketing plan, with 3 examples from world-class teams

A marketing plan helps leaders clearly visualize marketing strategies across channels, so they can ensure every campaign drives pipeline and revenue. In this article you’ll learn eight steps to create a winning marketing plan that brings business-critical goals to life, with examples from word-class teams.

To be successful as a marketer, you have to deliver the pipeline and the revenue.”

In other words—they need a well-crafted marketing plan.

Level up your marketing plan to drive revenue in 2024

Learn how to create the right marketing plan to hit your revenue targets in 2024. Hear best practices from marketing experts, including how to confidently set and hit business goals, socialize marketing plans, and move faster with clearer resourcing.

7 steps to build a comprehensive marketing plan

How do you build the right marketing plan to hit your revenue goals? Follow these eight steps for success:

1. Define your plan

First you need to define each specific component of your plan to ensure stakeholders are aligned on goals, deliverables, resources, and more. Ironing out these details early on ensures your plan supports the right business objectives, and that you have sufficient resources and time to get the job done. 

Get started by asking yourself the following questions: 

What resources do I need? 

What is the vision?

What is the value?

What is the goal?

Who is my audience?

What are my channels?

What is the timeline?

For example, imagine you’re creating an annual marketing plan to improve customer adoption and retention in the next fiscal year. Here’s how you could go through the questions above to ensure you’re ready to move forward with your plan: 

I will need support from the content team, web team, and email team to create targeted content for existing customers. One person on each team will need to be dedicated full-time to this initiative. To achieve this, the marketing team will need an additional $100K in budget and one new headcount. 

What is the vision?  

To create a positive experience for existing customers, address new customer needs, and encourage them to upgrade. We’ll do this by serving them how-to content, new feature updates, information about deals and pricing, and troubleshooting guides. 

According to the Sales Benchmark Index (SBI) , CEOs and go-to-market leaders report that more than 60% of their net-new revenue will come from existing customers in 2023. By retaining and building on the customers we have, we can maintain revenue growth over time. 

To decrease the customer churn rate from 30% to 10%, and increase upgrades from 20% to 30% in the next fiscal year. 

All existing customers. 

The main channel will be email. Supporting marketing channels include the website, blog, YouTube, and social media. 

The first half of the next fiscal year. 

One of the most important things to do as you create your marketing strategy is to identify your target audience . As with all marketing, you need to know who you’re marketing to. If you’re having a hard time determining who exactly your target audience is, try the bullseye targeting framework . The bullseye makes it easy for you to determine who your target audience is by industry, geography, company size, psychographics, demographics, and more.

2. Identify key metrics for success 

Now it’s time to define what key marketing metrics you’ll use to measure success. Your key metrics will help you measure and track the performance of your marketing activities. They’ll also help you understand how your efforts tie back to larger business goals. 

Once you establish key metrics, use a goal-setting framework—like objectives and key results (OKRs) or SMART goals —to fully flush out your marketing objectives. This ensures your targets are as specific as possible, with no ambiguity about what should be accomplished by when. 

Example: If a goal of your marketing plan is to increase email subscriptions and you follow the SMART goal framework (ensuring your objective is specific, measurable, achievable, realistic, and time-bound) your goal might look like this: Increase email subscription rate from 10% to 20% in H1 . 

3. Research your competition 

It’s easy to get caught up in your company’s world, but there’s a lot of value in understanding your competitors . Knowing how they market themselves will help you find opportunities to make your company stand out and capture more market share.

Make sure you’re not duplicating your competitors’ efforts. If you discover a competitor has already executed your idea, then it might be time to go back to the drawing board and brainstorm new ways to differentiate yourself.  By looking at your competitors, you might be surprised at the type of inspiration and opportunities you’ll find.

To stay ahead of market trends, conduct a SWOT analysis for your marketing plan. A SWOT analysis helps you improve your plan by identifying strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, and threats. 

Example: If your competitor launches a social media campaign identical to what you had planned, go back to the drawing board and see how you can build off their campaign. Ask yourself: How can we differentiate our campaign while still getting our message across? What are the weaknesses of their campaign that we can capitalize on? What angles did they not approach?

4. Integrate your marketing efforts

Here’s where the fun comes in. Let’s dive into the different components that go into building a successful marketing plan. You’ll want to make sure your marketing plan includes multiple supporting activities that all add up into a powerful marketing machine. Some marketing plan components include: 

Lead generation

Social media

Product marketing

Public relations

Analyst relations

Customer marketing

Search engine optimization (SEO)

Conversational marketing

Knowing where your consumer base spends the most time is significant for nailing this step. You need to have a solid understanding of your target audience before integrating your marketing efforts. 

Example: If your target audience is executives that spend a lot of time on LinkedIn, focus your social media strategy around placing branded content on LinkedIn. 

5. Differentiate with creative content

Forty-nine percent of marketers say visual images are hugely important to their content strategy. In other words, a clear brand and creative strategy is an essential component to every marketing plan. As you craft your own creative strategy, here are some tips to keep in mind: 

Speak to your audience: When defining your creative strategy, think about your audience—what you want them to feel, think, and do when they see your marketing. Will your audience find your creative work relevant? If your audience can’t relate to your creative work, they won’t feel connected to the story you’re trying to tell. 

Think outside the box: Find innovative ways to engage your audience, whether through video, animations, or interactive graphics. Know what screens your creative work will live on, whether desktop, mobile, or tablet, and make sure they display beautifully and load quickly across every type of device. 

Tie everything back to CTAs: It’s easy to get caught up in the creative process, so it’s important to never lose sight of your ultimate goal: Get your audience to take action. Always find the best way to display strong Calls to Action (CTAs) in your creative work. We live in a visual world—make sure your creative content counts.

Streamline creative production:   Once you’ve established a strong creative strategy, the next step is to bring your strategy to life in the production stage. It’s vital to set up a strong framework for your creative production process to eliminate any unnecessary back and forth and potential bottlenecks. Consider establishing creative request forms , streamlining feedback and approval processes, and taking advantage of integrations that might make your designers’ lives easier.

Example: If your brand is fun and approachable, make sure that shows in your creative efforts. Create designs and CTAs that spark joy, offer entertainment, and alleviate the pressure in choosing a partner.

6. Operationalize your marketing plan

Turn your plan into action by making goals, deliverables, and timelines clear for every stakeholder—so teams stay accountable for getting work done. The best way to do this is by centralizing all the details of your marketing plan in one platform , so teams can access the information they need and connect campaign work back to company goals.  

With the right work management tool , you can: 

Set goals for every marketing activity, and connect campaign work to overarching marketing and business objectives so teams focus on revenue-driving projects. 

Centralize deliverables for your entire marketing plan in one project or portfolio .

Mark major milestones and visualize your plan as a timeline, Gantt chart, calendar, list, or Kanban board—without doing any extra work. 

Quickly loop in stakeholders with status updates so they’re always up to date on progress. This is extremely important if you have a global team to ensure efforts aren’t being duplicated. 

Use automations to seamlessly hand off work between teams, streamlining processes like content creation and reviews. 

Create dashboards to report on work and make sure projects are properly staffed , so campaigns stay on track. 

With everything housed in one spot, you can easily visualize the status of your entire marketing plan and keep work on track. Building an effective marketing plan is one thing, but how you operationalize it can be your secret to standout marketing.

Example: If your strategy focuses on increasing page views, connect all campaign work to an overarching OKR—like “we will double page views as measured by the amount of organic traffic on our blog.” By making that goal visible to all stakeholders, you help teams prioritize the right work. 

See marketing planning in action

With Asana, marketing teams can connect work, standardize processes, and automate workflows—all in one place.

7. Measure performance

Nearly three in four CMOs use revenue growth to measure success, so it’s no surprise that measuring performance is necessary. You established your key metrics in step two, and now it’s time to track and report on them in step eight.

Periodically measure your marketing efforts to find areas of improvement so you can optimize in real-time. There are always lessons to be learned when looking at data. You can discover trends, detect which marketing initiatives performed well, and course-correct what isn’t performing well. And when your plan is complete, you can apply these learnings to your next initiative for improved results. 

Example: Say you discover that long-form content is consistently bringing in 400% more page views than short-form content. As a result, you’ll want to focus on producing more long-form content in your next marketing plan.

Marketing plan examples from world-class teams

The best brands in the world bring their marketing plans to life every day. If you’re looking for inspiration, check out these examples from successful marketing teams.

Autodesk grows site traffic 30% three years in a row

When the Autodesk team launched Redshift, it was initially a small business blog. The editorial team executed a successful marketing plan to expand it into a premier owned-media site, making it a destination for stories and videos about the future of making. 

The team scaled content production to support seven additional languages. By standardizing their content production workflow and centralizing all content conversations in one place, the editorial team now publishes 2X more content monthly. Read the case study to learn more about how Autodesk runs a well-oiled content machine.

Sony Music boosts creative production capacity by 4X

In recent years the music industry has gone through a pivotal transition—shifting from album sales to a streaming business model. For marketing and creative teams at Sony Music, that meant adopting an “always on” campaign plan. 

The team successfully executed this campaign plan by centralizing creative production and approvals in one project. By standardizing processes, the team reduced campaign production time by 75%. Read the case study to learn more about how Sony Music successfully scaled their creative production process.

Trinny London perfects new customer acquisition 

In consumer industries, social media is crucial for building a community of people who feel an affinity with the brand—and Trinny London is no exception. As such, it was imperative that Trinny London’s ad spend was targeted to the correct audience. Using a work management tool, Trinny London was able to nail the process of creating, testing, and implementing ads on multiple social channels.

With the help of a centralized tool, Trinny London improved its ad spend and drove more likes and subscriptions on its YouTube page. Read the case study to learn more about how Trinny London capitalized on paid advertising and social media. 

Turn your marketing plan into marketing success 

A great marketing plan promotes clarity and accountability across teams—so every stakeholder knows what they’re responsible for, by when. Reading this article is the first step to achieving better team alignment, so you can ensure every marketing campaign contributes to your company’s bottom line. 

Use a free marketing plan template to get started

Once you’ve created your marketing strategy and are ready to operationalize your marketing plan, get started with one of our marketing templates . 

Our marketing templates can help you manage and track every aspect of your marketing plan, from creative requests to approval workflows. Centralize your entire marketing plan in one place, customize the roadmap, assign tasks, and build a timeline or calendar. 

Once you’ve operationalized your entire marketing plan with one of our templates, share it with your stakeholders so everyone can work together in the same tool. Your entire team will feel connected to the marketing plan, know what to prioritize, and see how their work contributes to your project objectives . Choose the best marketing template for your team:

Marketing project plan template

Marketing campaign plan template

Product marketing launch template

Editorial calendar template

Agency collaboration template

Creative requests template

Event planning template

GTM strategy template

Still have questions? We have answers. 

What is a marketing plan.

A marketing plan is a detailed roadmap that outlines the different strategies your team will use to achieve organizational objectives. Rather than focusing solely on the end goal, a marketing plan maps every step you need to reach your destination—whether that’s driving pipeline for sales, nurturing your existing customer base, or something in-between. 

As a marketing leader, you know there’s never a shortage of great campaign and project ideas. A marketing plan gives you a framework to effectively prioritize work that aligns to overarching business goals—and then get that work done. Some elements of marketing plans include:

Current business plan

Mission statement  

Business goals

Target customers  

Competitive analysis 

Current marketing mix

Key performance indicators (KPIs)

Marketing budget  

What is the purpose of a marketing plan?

The purpose of a marketing plan is to grow your company’s consumer base and strengthen your brand, while aligning with your organization’s mission and vision . The plan should analyze the competitive landscape and industry trends, offer actionable insights to help you gain a competitive advantage, and document each step of your strategy—so you can see how your campaigns work together to drive overarching business goals. 

What is the difference between a marketing plan and a marketing strategy? 

A marketing plan contains many marketing strategies across different channels. In that way, marketing strategies contribute to your overall marketing plan, working together to reach your company’s overarching business goals.

For example, imagine you’re about to launch a new software product and the goal of your marketing plan is to drive downloads. Your marketing plan could include marketing strategies like creating top-of-funnel blog content and launching a social media campaign. 

What are different types of marketing plans? 

Depending on what you’re trying to accomplish, what your timeline is, or which facet of marketing you’re driving, you’ll need to create a different type of marketing plan. Some different types of marketing plans include, but aren’t limited to:

General marketing plan: A general marketing plan is typically an annual or quarterly marketing plan that details the overarching marketing strategies for the period. This type of marketing plan outlines marketing goals, the company’s mission, buyer personas, unique selling propositions, and more. A general marketing plan lays the foundation for other, more specific marketing plans that an organization may employ. 

Product launch marketing plan: A product launch marketing plan is a step-by-step plan for marketing a new product or expanding into a new market. It helps you build awareness and interest by targeting the right audience, with the right messaging, in the right timeframe—so potential customers are ready to buy your new offering right away. Nailing your product launch marketing plan can reinforce your overall brand and fast-track sales. For a step-by-step framework to organize all the moving pieces of a launch, check out our product marketing launch template .

Paid marketing plan: This plan includes all the paid strategies in your marketing plan, like pay-per-click, paid social media advertising, native advertising, and display advertising. It’s especially important to do audience research prior to launching your paid marketing plan to ensure you’re maximizing ROI. Consult with content strategists to ensure your ads align with your buyer personas so you know you’re showing ads to the right people. 

Content marketing plan: A content marketing plan outlines the different content strategies and campaigns you’ll use to promote your product or service. When putting together a content marketing plan, start by identifying your audience. Then use market research tools to get the best insights into what topics your target audience is most interested in.

SEO marketing plan: Your SEO marketing plan should work directly alongside your content marketing plan as you chart content that’s designed to rank in search results. While your content marketing plan should include all types of content, your SEO marketing plan will cover the top-of-funnel content that drives new users to your site. Planning search engine-friendly content is only one step in your SEO marketing plan. You’ll also need to include link-building and technical aspects in order to ensure your site and content are as optimized as possible.

Social media marketing plan: This plan will highlight the marketing strategies you plan to accomplish on social media. Like in any general or digital marketing plan , your social media strategy should identify your ideal customer base and determine how they engage on different social media platforms. From there, you can cater your social media content to your target audience.  

Related resources

Write better AI prompts: A 4-sentence framework

What is content marketing? A complete guide

Smooth product launches are simpler than you think

How Asana uses work management for smoother creative production

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Blog Marketing What is a Marketing Plan & How to Create One [with Examples]

What is a Marketing Plan & How to Create One [with Examples]

Written by: Sara McGuire Oct 26, 2023

A marketing plan is a blueprint that outlines your strategies to attract and convert your ideal customers as a part of your customer acquisition strategy . It’s a comprehensive document that details your:

• Target audience:  Who you’re trying to reach
• Marketing goals:  What you want to achieve
• Strategies and tactics:  How you’ll reach your goals
• Budget:  Resources you’ll allocate
• Metrics:  How you’ll measure success

In this article, I’ll explain everything you need to know about creating a marketing plan . If you need a little extra help, there are professionally designed marketing plan templates that’ll make the process much easier. So, let’s ditch the confusion and get started!

Click to jump ahead:

What is a marketing plan?

How to write a marketing plan .

• Marketing plan v.s. business plan
• Types of marketing plans

9 marketing plan examples to inspire your growth strategy

Marketing plan faqs.

A marketing plan is a report that outlines your marketing strategy for your products or services, which could be applicable for the coming year, quarter or month.  

Watch this quick, 13-minute video for more details on what a marketing plan is and how to make one yourself:

Typically, a marketing plan includes:

• An overview of your business’s marketing and advertising goals
• A description of your business’s current marketing position
• A timeline of when tasks within your strategy will be completed
• Key performance indicators (KPIs) you will be tracking
• A description of your business’s target market and customer needs
• A description of how you will measure the performance of the strategy

For example, this marketing plan template provides a high-level overview of the business and competitors before diving deep into specific goals, KPIs and tactics:

Learning how to write a marketing plan forces you to think through the important steps that lead to an effective marketing strategy . And a well-defined plan will help you stay focused on your high-level marketing goals.

With Venngage’s extensive catalog of marketing plan templates , creating your marketing plan isn’t going to be hard or tedious. In fact, Venngage has plenty of helpful communications and design resources for marketers. If you’re ready to get started, sign up for  Venngage for Marketers   now. It’s free to register and start designing.

Whether you’re a team trying to set smarter marketing goals, a consultant trying to set your client in the right direction, or a one-person team hustling it out, Venngage for Marketers helps you get things done.

As mentioned above, the scope of your marketing plan varies depending on its purpose or the type of organization it’s for.

For example, you could create a marketing plan that provides an overview of a company’s entire marketing strategy or simply focus on a specific channel like SEO, social media marketing, content marketing and more, like in this example:

A typical outline of a marketing plan includes:

• Executive summary
• Goals and objectives
• User personas
• Competitor analysis/SWOT analysis
• Baseline metrics
• Marketing strategy
• Tracking guidelines

Below you will see in details how to write each section as well as some examples of how you can design each section in a marketing plan.

Let’s look at how to create a successful marketing plan (click to jump ahead):

• Write a simple executive summary
• Set metric-driven marketing goals
• Outline your user personas
• Research all of your competitors
• Set accurate key baselines & metrics
• Create an actionable marketing strategy
• Set tracking or reporting guidelines

1. Write a simple executive summary

Starting your marketing plan off on the right foot is important. You want to pull people into your amazing plan for marketing domination. Not bore them to tears.

One of the best ways to get people excited to read your marketing plan is with a well-written executive summary. An executive summary introduces readers to your company goals, marketing triumphs, future plans, and other important contextual facts.

Basically, you can use the Executive Summary as a primer for the rest of your marketing plan.

Include things like:

• Simple marketing goals
• High-level metrics
• Important company milestones
• Facts about your brand
• Employee anecdotes
• Future goals & plans

Try to keep your executive summary rather brief and to the point. You aren’t writing a novel, so try to keep it under three to four paragraphs.

Take a look at the executive summary in the marketing plan example below:

The executive summary is only two paragraphs long — short but effective.

The executive summary tells readers about the company’s growth, and how they are about to overtake one of their competitors. But there’s no mention of specific metrics or figures. That will be highlighted in the next section of the marketing plan.

An effective executive summary should have enough information to pique the reader’s interest, but not bog them down with specifics yet. That’s what the rest of your marketing plan is for!

The executive summary also sets the tone for your marketing plan. Think about what tone will fit your brand ? Friendly and humorous? Professional and reliable? Inspiring and visionary?

2. Set metric-driven marketing goals

After you perfect your executive summary, it’s time to outline your marketing goals.

(If you’ve never set data-driven goals like this before, it would be worth reading this growth strategy guide ).

This is one of the most important parts of the entire marketing plan, so be sure to take your time and be as clear as possible. Moreover, optimizing your marketing funnel is key. Employing effective funnel software can simplify operations and provide valuable customer insights. It facilitates lead tracking, conversion rate analysis, and efficient marketing optimization .

As a rule of thumb, be as specific as possible. The folks over at  VoyMedia  advise that you should set goals that impact website traffic, conversions, and customer success — and to use real numbers.

Avoid outlining vague goals like:

• Get more Twitter followers
• Write more articles
• Create more YouTube videos (like educational or Explainer videos )
• Increase retention rate
• Decrease bounce rate

Instead, identify  key performance metrics  (KPI) you want to impact and the percentage you want to increase them by.

Take a look at the goals page in the marketing plan example below:

They not only identify a specific metric in each of their goals, but they also set a timeline for when they will be increased.

The same vague goals listed earlier become much clearer when specific numbers and timelines are applied to them:

• Get 100 new Twitter followers per month
• Write 5 more articles per week
• Create 10 YouTube videos each year
• Increase retention rate by 15% by 2020
• Decrease bounce rate by 5% by Q1
• Create an online course  and get 1,000 new leads
• Focus more on local SEO strategies
• Conduct a monthly social media report to track progress

You can dive even deeper into your marketing goals if you want (generally, the more specific, the better). Here’s a marketing plan example that shows how to outline your growth goals:

3. Outline your user personas

Now, this may not seem like the most important part of your marketing plan, but I think it holds a ton of value.

Outlining your user personas is an important part of a marketing plan that should not be overlooked.

You should be asking not just how you can get the most visitors to your business, but how you can get the right visitors.

Who are your ideal customers? What are their goals? What are their biggest problems? How does your business solve customer problems?

Answering these questions will take lots of research, but it’s essential information to get.

Some ways to conduct user research are:

• Interviewing your users (either in person or on the phone)
• Conducting focus groups
• Researching other businesses in the same industry
• Surveying your audience

Then, you will need to compile your user data into a user persona  guide.

Take a look at how detailed this user persona template is below:

Taking the time to identify specific demographic traits, habits and goals will make it easier for you to cater your marketing plan to them.

Here’s how you can create a user persona guide:

The first thing you should add is a profile picture or icon for each user persona. It can help to put a face to your personas, so they seem more real.

Next, list demographic information like:

• Identifiers
• Activities/Hobbies

The user persona example above uses sliding scales to identify personality traits like introversion vs. extroversion and thinking vs. feeling. Identifying what type of personality your target users tend to have an influence on the messaging you use in your marketing content.

Meanwhile, this user persona guide identifies specific challenges the user faces each day:

But if you don’t want to go into such precise detail, you can stick to basic information, like in this marketing plan example:

Most businesses will have a few different types of target users. That’s why it’s pertinent to identify and create several different user personas . That way, you can better segment your marketing campaigns and set separate goals, if necessary.

Here’s a marketing plan example with a segmented user persona guide:

The important thing is for your team or client to have a clear picture of who their target user is and how they can appeal to their specific problems.

Start creating robust user personas using Venngage’s user persona guide .

4. Conduct an extensive competitor analysis

Next, on the marketing plan checklist, we have the competitor research section. This section will help you identify who your competitors are, what they’re doing, and how you could carve yourself a place alongside them in your niche — and ideally, surpass them. It’s something you can learn to do with rank tracking software .

Competitor research is also incredibly important if you are starting a blog .

Typically, your competitor research should include:

• Who their marketing team is
• Who their leadership team is
• What their marketing strategy and strategic marketing plan are (this will probably revolve some reverse-engineering)
• What their sales strategy is (same deal)
• Social Media strategy (are they using discounting strategies such as coupon marketing to get conversions)
• Their market cap/financials
• Their yearly growth (you will probably need to use a marketing tool like Ahrefs to do this)
• The number of customers they have & their user personas

Also, take as deep a dive as you can into the strategies they use across their:

• Blog/Content marketing
• Social media marketing
• SEO Marketing
• Video marketing
• And any other marketing tactics they use

Research their strengths and weaknesses in all parts of their company, and you will find some great opportunities. Bookmark has a great guide to different marketing strategies for small businesses  if you need some more information there.

You can use this simple SWOT analysis worksheet to quickly work through all parts of their strategy as well:

Click the template above to create a SWOT chart . Customize the template to your liking — no design know-how needed.

Since you have already done all the research beforehand, adding this information to your marketing plan shouldn’t be that hard.

In this marketing plan example, some high-level research is outlined for 3 competing brands:

But you could take a deeper dive into different facets of your competitors’ strategies. This marketing plan example analyses a competitor’s content marketing strategy:

It can also be helpful to divide your competitors into Primary and Secondary groups. For example, Apple’s primary competitor may be Dell for computers, but its secondary competitor could be a company that makes tablets.

Your most dangerous competitors may not even be in the same industry as you. Like the CEO of Netflix said, “Sleep is our competition.”

5. Set accurate key baselines & metrics

It’s pretty hard to plan for the future if you don’t know where your business stands right now.

Before we do anything at Venngage, we find the baselines so we can compare future results to something. We do it so much it’s almost like second nature now!

Setting baselines will allow you to more accurately track your progress. You will also be able to better analyze what worked and what didn’t work, so you can build a stronger strategy. It will definitely help them clearly understand your goals and strategy as well.

Here’s a marketing plan example where the baselines are visualized:

Another way to include baselines in your plan is with a simple chart, like in the marketing plan example below:

Because data can be intimidating to a lot of people, visualizing your data using charts and infographics will help demystify the information.

6. Create an actionable marketing strategy

After pulling all the contextual information and relevant metrics into your marketing plan, it’s time to break down your marketing strategy.

Once again, it’s easier to communicate your information to your team or clients using visuals .

Mind maps are an effective way to show how a strategy with many moving parts ties together. For example, this mind map shows how the four main components of a marketing strategy interact together:

You can also use a flow chart to map out your strategy by objectives:

However you choose to visualize your strategy, your team should know exactly what they need to do. This is not the time to keep your cards close to your chest.

Your strategy section may need to take up a few pages to explain, like in the marketing plan example below:

With all of this information, even someone from the development team will understand what the marketing team is working on.

This minimalistic marketing plan example uses color blocks to make the different parts of the strategy easy to scan:

Breaking your strategy down into tasks will make it easier to tackle.

Another important way to visualize your marketing strategy is to create a project roadmap. A project roadmap visualizes the timeline of your product with individual tasks. Our roadmap maker can help you with this.

For example, this project roadmap shows how tasks on both the marketing and web design side run parallel to each other:

A simple timeline can also be used in your marketing plan:

Or a mind map, if you want to include a ton of information in a more organized way:

Even a simple “Next, Now, Later” chart can help visualize your strategy:

7. Set tracking or reporting guidelines

Close your marketing plan with a brief explanation of how you plan to track or measure your results. This will save you a lot of frustration down the line by standardizing how you track results across your team.

Like the other sections of your marketing plan, you can choose how in-depth you want to go. But there need to be some clear guidelines on how to measure the progress and results of your marketing plan.

At the bare minimum, your results tracking guidelines should specify:

• What you plan to track
• How you plan to track results
• How often you plan to measure

But you can more add tracking guidelines to your marketing plan if you see the need to. You may also want to include a template that your team or client can follow,  for  client reporting ,  ensure that the right metrics are being tracked.

The marketing plan example below dedicates a whole page to tracking criteria:

Use a task tracker to track tasks and marketing results, and a checklist maker to note down tasks, important life events, or tracking your daily life.

Similarly, the marketing plan example below talks about tracking content marketing instead:

Marketing plan vs. marketing strategy

Although often used interchangeably, the terms “marketing plan” and “marketing strategy” do have some differences.

Simply speaking, a marketing strategy presents what the business will do in order to reach a certain goal. A marketing plan outlines the specific daily, weekly, monthly or yearly activities that the marketing strategy calls for. As a business, you can create a marketing proposal for the marketing strategies defined in your company’s marketing plan. There are various marketing proposal examples that you can look at to help with this.

A company’s extended marketing strategy can be like this:

Notice how it’s more general and doesn’t include the actual activities required to complete each strategy or the timeframe those marketing activities will take place. That kind of information is included in a marketing plan, like this marketing plan template which talks about the content strategy in detail:

Marketing plan v.s business plan

While both marketing plans and business plans are crucial documents for businesses, they serve distinct purposes and have different scopes. Here’s a breakdown of the key differences:

Business plan is a comprehensive document that outlines all aspects of your business, including:

• Mission and vision
• Products or services
• Target market
• Competition
• Management team
• Financial projections
• Marketing strategy (including a marketing plan)
• Operations plan

Marketing plan on the other hand, dives deep into the specific strategies and tactics related to your marketing efforts. It expands on the marketing section of a business plan by detailing:

• Specific marketing goals (e.g., brand awareness, lead generation, sales)
• Target audience analysis (detailed understanding of their needs and behaviors)
• Product:  Features, benefits, positioning
• Price:  Pricing strategy, discounts
• Place:  Distribution channels (online, offline)
• Promotion:  Advertising, social media, content marketing, public relations
• Budget allocation for different marketing activities
• Metrics and measurement to track progress and success

In short, business plans paint the entire business picture, while marketing plans zoom in on the specific strategies used to reach your target audience and achieve marketing goals.

Types of marketing plans that can transform your business strategy

Let’s take a look at several types of marketing plans you can create, along with specific examples for each.

1. General marketing strategic plan / Annual marketing plan

This is a good example of a marketing plan that covers the overarching annual marketing strategy for a company:

Another good example would be this Starbucks marketing plan:

This one-page marketing plan example from coffee chain Starbucks has everything at a glance. The bold headers and subheadings make it easier to segment the sections so readers can focus on the area most relevant to them.

What we like about this example is how much it covers. From the ideal buyer persona to actional activities, as well as positioning and metrics, this marketing plan has it all.

Another marketing plan example that caught our eye is this one from Cengage. Although a bit text-heavy and traditional, it explains the various sections well. The clean layout makes this plan easy to read and absorb.

The last marketing plan example we would like to feature in this section is this one from Lush cosmetics.

It is a long one but it’s also very detailed. The plan outlines numerous areas, including the company mission, SWOT analysis , brand positioning, packaging, geographical criteria, and much more.

2. Content marketing plan

A content marketing plan highlights different strategies , campaigns or tactics you can use for your content to help your business reach its goals.

This one-page marketing plan example from Contently outlines a content strategy and workflow using simple colors and blocks. The bullet points detail more information but this plan can easily be understood at a glance, which makes it so effective.

For a more detailed content marketing plan example, take a look at this template which features an editorial calendar you can share with the whole team:

3. SEO marketing plan

Your SEO marketing plan highlights what you plan to do for your SEO marketing strategy . This could include tactics for website on-page optimization , off-page optimization using AI SEO , and link building using an SEO PowerSuite backlink API for quick backlink profile checks.

This SEO marketing plan example discusses in detail the target audience of the business and the SEO plan laid out in different stages:

4. Social media marketing plan

Your social media marketing plan presents what you’ll do to reach your marketing goal through social media. This could include tactics specific to each social media channel that you own, recommendations on developing a new channel, specific campaigns you want to run, and so on, like how B2B channels use Linkedin to generate leads with automation tools and expand their customer base; or like making use of Twitter walls that could display live Twitter feeds from Twitter in real-time on digital screens.

For B2C brands, you can target Facebook and Instagram. Gain Instagram likes to build trust for your brand’s profile and post engaging content on both platforms

Edit this social media marketing plan example easily with Venngage’s drag-and-drop editor:

5. Demand generation marketing plan

This could cover your paid marketing strategy (which can include search ads, paid social media ads, traditional advertisements, etc.), email marketing strategy and more. Here’s an example:

1. Free marketing plan template

Here’s a free nonprofit marketing plan example that is ideal for organizations with a comprehensive vision to share. It’s a simple plan that is incredibly effective. Not only does the plan outline the core values of the company, it also shares the ideal buyer persona.

Note how the branding is consistent throughout this example so there is no doubt which company is presenting this plan. The content plan is an added incentive for anyone viewing the document to go ahead and give the team the green light.

2. Pastel social media marketing campaign template

Two-page marketing plan samples aren’t very common, but this free template proves how effective they are. There’s a dedicated section for business goals as well as for project planning .

The milestones for the marketing campaign are clearly laid out, which is a great way to show how organized this business strategy is.

3. Small business marketing strategy template

This marketing plan template is perfect for small businesses who set out to develop an overarching marketing strategy for the whole year:

Notice how this aligns pretty well with the marketing plan outline we discussed in previous sections.

In terms of specific tactics for the company’s marketing strategy, the template only discusses SEO strategy, but you can certainly expand on that section to discuss any other strategies — such as link building , that you would like to build out a complete marketing plan for.

4. Orange simple marketing proposal template

Marketing plans, like the sample below, are a great way to highlight what your business strategy and the proposal you wan to put forward to win potential customers.

5. One-page marketing fact sheet template

This one-page marketing plan example is great for showcasing marketing efforts in a persuasive presentation or to print out for an in-person meeting.

Note how the fact sheet breaks down the marketing budget as well as the key metrics for the organization. You can win over clients and partners with a plan like this.

6. Light company business fact sheet template

This one-page sample marketing plan clearly outlines the marketing objectives for the organization. It’s a simple but effective way to share a large amount of information in a short amount of time.

What really works with this example is that includes a mission statement, key contact information alongside all the key metrics.

7. Marketing media press kit template

This press kit marketing plan template is bright and unmistakable as belonging to the Cloud Nine marketing agency . The way the brand colors are used also helps diversify the layouts for each page, making the plan easier to read.

We like the way the marketing department has outlined the important facts about the organization. The bold and large numbers draw the eye and look impressive.

8. Professional marketing proposal template

Start your marketing campaign on a promising note with this marketing plan template. It’s short, sharp and to the point. The table of contents sets out the agenda, and there’s a page for the company overview and mission statement.

9. Social media marketing proposal template

A complete marketing plan example, like the one below, not only breaks down the business goals to be achieved but a whole lot more. Note how the terms and conditions and payment schedule are included, which makes this one of the most comprehensive marketing plans on our list.

What should marketing plans include?

Marketing plans should include:

• A detailed analysis of the target market and customer segments.
• Clear and achievable marketing objectives and goals.
• Strategies and tactics for product promotion and distribution.
• Budget allocation for various marketing activities.
• Timelines and milestones for the implementation of marketing strategies.
• Evaluation metrics and methods for tracking the success of the marketing plan.

What is an executive summary in a marketing plan and what is its main goal?

An executive summary in a marketing plan is a brief overview of the entire document, summarizing the key points, goals, and strategies. Its main goal is to provide readers with a quick understanding of the plan’s purpose and to entice them to read further.

What are the results when a marketing plan is effective?

When a marketing plan is effective, businesses can experience increased brand visibility, higher customer engagement, improved sales and revenue, and strengthened customer loyalty.

What is the first section of a marketing plan?

The first section of a marketing plan is typically the “Executive Summary,” which provides a concise overview of the entire plan, including the business’s goals and the strategies to achieve them.

Now that you have the basics for designing your own marketing plan, it’s time to get started:

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10 Marketing Plan Examples to Inspire Your Campaigns

What do hiking a trail, driving to a friend’s house, and executing marketing campaigns all have in common? Each requires you to closely follow directions.

Directions are a critical part of our daily life. Used correctly, they can guide decision-making processes, make labor more efficient, and get where you want to go as quickly as possible. 

But failing to keep track of directions could cost you — and not just gas money. When it comes to marketing strategies, not having a clear goal tanks web traffic, dissipates brand interest, and costs companies across the United States a whopping $400 billion a year.

Designing a marketing plan is certainly no easy task, but it can be made easier with best practices, strategic tips, and concrete examples from successful businesses all over the world.

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What is a marketing plan?

A marketing plan is a strategic document that acts as a guide for marketing campaigns and strategies. These critical road maps detail where you are, where you’re going, and how you plan to get there.

The average marketing plan consists of seven major sections:

• Writing an executive summary
• Discussing the mission statement
• Listing marketing objectives
• Performing a SWOT analysis
• Completing market research
• Designing a market strategy
• Determining a budget

The more detailed a marketing plan is, the more efficient it will be at accomplishing its goals. 

As you might imagine, marketers who bother to write a concrete marketing plan enjoy several benefits :

• Organized marketers have a 674% higher chance of reporting success
• Marketers who set goals are 377% more successful than those who don’t

It’s clear that a successful marketing plan opens pathways to other forms of business success — although the process is underutilized at best. More than three out of four small business owners lack an overarching marketing plan if they don’t have a clear path of growth. Creating a holistic marketing plan is absolutely necessary to scale brands at any level of development.

10 marketing plan examples from every industry

It’s much simpler to design a plan of action when the groundwork already exists. Below are 10 marketing plans sourced from real companies and brands around the world, highlighting unique approaches to researching, crafting and implementing a marketing strategy . 

1. Contently

Popular SaaS Contently developed a visual marketing plan for developing future campaigns. The strategy depicts its plan in a “waterfall” format, with goals blending into methods of application that eventually lead to success metrics. Although far more casual than other examples on this list, the work provides an excellent overview of a marketing plan’s necessary components.

2. Visit Baton Rouge

The Baton Rouge area of Louisiana generates millions of dollars every year from tourism alone. The Visit Baton Rouge marketing plan was born from a need to better position the area and create long-term strategies for generating interest. This 38-page document goes into detail describing different destinations, events, and calendars, including recommended measurements for success.

Created by SaaS company HubSpot , this template includes a business summary, SWOT matrix, market strategy, budget, and other important aspects of a marketing plan. By filling it out, you can make informed decisions about your company’s positioning and your marketing in general.

4. Evernote

Evernote provides a comprehensive marketing plan template for businesses of any size. Create a plan that walks through overviews, timelines, research, personas, and all other elements of an airtight campaign. If desired, you can also implement this template into your Evernote account to start developing a marketing plan almost immediately.

5. University of Illinois

Even educational institutes need marketing plans. The University of Illinois created a very straightforward document that encapsulates its market context, research efforts, and current campaigns. Objectives and success metrics are completed in the third section, with about 40 pages overall. 

6. Monday.com

Monday.com is a project management platform providing in-house templates to all active users. This marketing plan offers various categories and subcategories that track project progress with data visualizations. Detailed objectives and KPIs can be identified in-app, including columns for a projected cost range.

Popular health and hygiene brand Lush released a comprehensive marketing plan walking through some products, positioning, and a marketing calendar for upcoming product releases. One of the highlights includes a detailed SWOT analysis with easy to read graphics. This is particularly helpful for brands in the personal care industry, among others.

8. Coca-Cola

Industry titan Coca-Cola released a strategy video that encompasses all seven elements of a holistic marketing plan. The proposal primarily explains the major content initiatives for the coming year, and focuses on how the brand’s initial ideas can be practically implemented into the existing strategy. 

9. Naperville Park District

Publicly funded recreational parks often have limited access to resources, which is why the Naperville Park District created a strategic marketing plan right at the beginning. This extremely detailed document walks through the company’s mission, situational analysis, strategy, and budget, on a micro-level.

10. Starbucks

Unlike the longform documents we’ve seen already, Starbucks takes a more concise approach. This six-page release details a strategy to elevate CX and brand ambassadors around the world. The marketing plan touches on individual strategies and tactics, as well as the methods used to ensure success. It’s important to note the detailed customer journey profiles that fit into a five-year strategy.

How to approach a marketing plan

Now that you know what a marketing plan looks like, it’s time to explore the initial stages of drafting and publishing your very first plan. Once you establish some basic starting points, a little research is all you need to get started.

Determine your goals

Directions simply don’t matter without an endpoint in mind. Craft some meaningful goals for your marketing campaign that envelop your brand’s values, objectives, and year-end plans. It’s best to use the SMART goal framework:

The more specific your goals are, the more effective your marketing plan will be.

Check your competitors

Staying abreast of your competitors and market share is critical in the early stages of a marketing plan. Using competitive analysis tools or an internal process, take some time to evaluate the approach that others are using — and how you can do better.

You might want to:

• Perform a competitive analysis
• Keep a close eye on industry news
• Browse competitor social media content

Keep in mind that it’s possible to hire freelancers to perform competitive analysis for you, depending on your needs and time constraints.

Identify your audience

Understanding your target market — including their goals, ages, values, and demographics — is the golden rule of marketing. This can be done several ways, either by using data, creating personas, or outlying features in a document.

It’s best to consider everything that may be relevant to your audience in the marketing plan, including how products can be positioned in a way that makes them relevant. For example, a customer with a degree in IT would be more interested in ads that speak to their experience and industry pain points.

If you don’t have a target audience in mind yet, consider using programs like Google Analytics or in-platform insights from Facebook to identify specific segments.

Craft final KPIs

The difference between a good marketing plan and a great marketing plan starts with key performance metrics (KPIs). These will be used to measure the effectiveness of your campaign and provide detailed information about what worked, what didn’t, and what you can change in the future.

Every marketing plan should rely on its own unique set of metrics, all fitted to individual needs. If you’re looking for specific examples, you might want to try:

• Raising the number of followers on a social media account
• Generating a certain amount of website leads 
• Achieving higher email open rates 

Keep in mind that your final metrics should adhere to the SMART method for best results.

Perform your revisions

The marketing plan is a living document and must be updated regularly to remain current. The average plan only has a shelf life of one to five years , on average, and should receive regular revisions in the meantime.

Take a closer look at your past goals, competitors, audience, and KPIs. Are any of these outdated or ill-aligned? What has changed for the company since its initial publication date? Make these adjustments accordingly (and hopefully with members of a team or committee).

Create marketing plans that guide your business well

It’s not enough to just write a marketing plan. In an increasingly competitive world of iron-clad strategies, marketing pros should take their time developing a plan that lasts. The above examples are a great place to start, especially as you craft an approach that is catered to your industry. 

Keep an eye on the growth of your business once your marketing plan hits the shelves. Continue to find new ways to optimize, refine, and otherwise make what you have even better than before. With an airtight marketing plan by your side, the possibilities are virtually limitless.

Want to learn more?

• How to Create a Killer Social Media Marketing Plan
• The Complete Guide to Getting Started With Influencer Marketing
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Written by Jesse Sumrak | December 12, 2022

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Marketing is an often misunderstood profession. Peers often stereotype marketing with massive budgets, loosey-goosey timelines, haphazard tactics, high-profile influencers, and Snapchat filters. In reality, modern marketing plans are more complex and orchestrated than a Premier League-winning football team.

Businesses have big goals to hit and fine margins to walk—and they need realistic, yet imaginative, marketing plans to make it happen. Sure, bigger companies can spend all willy-nilly hiring Taylor Swift for a commercial op and dropping a quarter million on Facebook advertising, but small businesses and startups have to get downright strategic with every dollar they spend.

If your business is trying to stretch every penny, you’ve come to the right place. This article will show you how to create a marketing plan in 2023 that actually works with a down-to-earth budget. We’ve included step-by-step actions, outlines, examples, and more to give you everything you need to take an idea to the market with laser precision.

Table of Contents

What is a marketing plan?

How to create a marketing plan

Marketing plan template

Marketing plan example

Marketing Plan FAQs

What is a marketing plan.

A marketing plan is a documented roadmap for how you plan to drive awareness, sales, signups, attendance, or other marketing initiatives. It outlines your KPIs, budget, and timeline, dictating everything from the critical milestones to the nitty-gritty to-do items.

Marketing plans come in all shapes and sizes. You could build an overarching marketing plan to document and guide your entire department’s annual goals and strategies for the upcoming year. Or you might create a marketing plan detailing the launch strategy for the brand-new product release coming out next quarter. Big plans can even include small plans, just like an adorable collection of Russian nesting dolls.

Plans can be short, long, fat, or thin—just remember what your plan is trying to accomplish. If you’re trying to pitch an idea to a team of venture capitalists or a local bank, you might need a chunky document with accompanying spreadsheets and financial figures. However, if you’re trying to communicate the plan to your marketing team leads, you’ll want to skip straight to the point with tactics, deadlines, and deliverables.

Regardless of your use case, the next section will give you the building blocks you need to create a marketing plan that works.

How to Create a Marketing Plan

This section will show you the 7-step process to creating a marketing plan. Plans are fluid and versatile, so we don’t recommend filling out one of these with pen and paper—get your eraser ready because a marketing plan is never perfect from the get-go.

Here’s an overview of the 7-step process:

• Establish Your Marketing Goal
• Identify Your Audience and Competitors
• Set Your Marketing Budget
• Determine Your Deadline(s)
• Pick Your Marketing Channels and Tactics
• Outline the To-Do List and Make Assignments
• Track Performance and Review Analytics

Don’t worry too much about making it all nice and pretty right now. Later, you can use our provided marketing outline to copy, paste, and format a more articulated version for widespread distribution. For now, just focus on hashing out each section and answering the thought-provoking questions.

1. Establish Your Marketing Goal

Define exactly what you’re trying to achieve. Do you want to drive more sales? How much? What about recurring customers? How many? Do you need to increase brand awareness? To whom and by how much?

Work out the details of what you want to accomplish, why, and how you’re going to measure it. Establish your KPIs early on to measure the success of your marketing campaign. You’ll refer to these numbers throughout the rest of your marketing plan, so get specific.

For example, how many website visitors you’re trying to drive will affect your marketing budget, deadlines, and tactics. And if you’re targeting a specific demographic, you may need to engage different marketing teams to use the appropriate channels and messaging.

Fine-tune your marketing goal so that you can communicate it simply in a single sentence. For example: “The goal is to drive 25,000 key decision-makers to the new product page by the end of October with a limited marketing budget of $75,000.”

2. Identify Your Audience and Competitors

Explain who this campaign is targeting. If you’ve already built out your buyer personas, you’ll just plug in the persona appropriate to this campaign. However, if this is your first time thinking long and hard about your target audience, really get to know the person you’re marketing to.

Depending on your product, industry, and market, you’ll want to know demographics like:

• Marital status

These details help you identify a broad audience, but you’ll want to narrow it down with psychographics.

Psychographics dig deeper . They cover your audience’s:

• Influencers
• Shopping behaviors

Demographics explain the “who,” while psychographics explain the “why.”

Think about if you were trying to sell a baseball glove. How you market that glove is going to be very different depending on the buyer. Are your messaging and channels targeting a college athlete, recreational youngster, mom, dad, or low-income family? It’s hard to know what to say and how to say it unless you know who you’re talking to.

Don’t just gloss over this section. Without a target audience, you’ll be blindly throwing darts at a board—sure, some plans might work out, but it’ll come down less to strategy and more to sheer luck. A target audience and replicable formula make your success a science and not a game of Russian roulette.

Once you’ve identified your audience, you need to figure out who’s also targeted the same people. Competition research is a way to understand who you are up against for eyeballs, SEO rankings, and influence, but it also can serve as an opportunity to fill gaps in our needs that your competitors are missing.

One easy way to do this is to look at comment sections or reviews of similar companies in your industry. Look for:

• Frequent complaints about product design.
• Consistent issues with customer service.
• Ads or branding language that falls flat.
• If the competitor hasn’t made a product their customers are asking for.

By identifying your competitor’s weaknesses or gaps their missing with their customers, you’ll have a treasure trove of marketing copy to use in order to differentiate your business from the pack.

3. Set Your Marketing Budget

Marketing plans need budget constraints. Without a cap, plans could hypothetically include:

• 60-second Super Bowl commercial
• Cristiano Ronaldo as a celebrity endorser
• Billboard advertisements along the entirety of Route 66

For most startups, that’s just not a possibility.

And it’s not where the magic happens. Powerful marketing plans turn tiny marketing budgets into impressive ROI. They prioritize the right channels, messaging, and tactics to stretch every dollar to the max.

Decide beforehand how much budget you’ll need to allocate to meet the goals you set in Step 1. When push comes to shove, you may need to throw additional money at the campaign later to get it across the finish line, but stay strong and do your best to create a marketing plan that works with the budget constraints.

Tight on budget but full on creativity? Check out our Small Business Marketing Guide: From Scratch to Success .

4. Determine Your Deadline(s)

Deadlines create the boundaries to your marketing campaign—you can’t have a plan without them. No deadlines mean there’s a never-ending period to achieve your objective, and it’s probably not a good idea to have a 20-year free pass to accomplish that sales goal you set.

Set your deadline. Be realistic, but also be ambitious. The faster you achieve this goal, the faster you can move on to the next one—and each progressive goal should be moving your business forward.

Establish the final deadline for achieving your primary KPI. Then, set the necessary milestones along the journey. For example, you might set milestones for launching different aspects of your campaign, such as hosting 4 webinars, publishing 10 supporting blog posts, or earning a callout in 2 prime news outlets.

Finally, set the start date for when you’ll need to get the ball rolling to meet your deadlines. Don’t assume it’s ASAP—you might have a few weeks to get your ducks in a row instead of immediately heading off into a chaotic marketing battle.

5. Pick Your Marketing Channels and Tactics

This is arguably the funnest part of creating a marketing plan. This is the step where you get to choose the channels, tactics, and deliverables. The right channels and tactics will vary depending on your audience and product or service, but here are the most popular ones to consider:

• Email Marketing: Email marketing is one of the tried-and-true tactics of the digital marketing world. It generates an average ROI of $40 for every $1 invested —you can’t get much more bang for your buck than that. (Check out our complete email masterclass to learn how to conquer this lucrative channel.)
• Social Media Marketing: Whether you’re running organic strategies or targeted paid campaigns , social media marketing is an excellent modern-day tactic for reaching consumers where they’re most comfortable: Instagram, Facebook, Snapchat, YouTube, or TikTok.
• PPC Marketing: Pay-per-click (PPC) marketing lets you run advertising campaigns on search engine pages and other websites across the internet. It’s a competitive way to get your content in front of the right eyeballs.
• Content Marketing: Content marketing paired with a solid search engine optimization (SEO) strategy is a long-term tactic that can drive organic traffic (read: free) to your website for years to come.

And do you know what all these channels have in common? They each give you the ability to monitor your results and track your progress to prove if a channel is worth your time and money. Unlike traditional outbound advertising and its estimated impressions and influence, you know exactly what you’re getting with these digital marketing strategies.

6. Outline the To-Do List and Make Assignments

Here’s where you get into the nitty-gritty of your marketing plan. Step 6 is where you’ll outline everything that needs to get done:

• Launch meeting
• Recurring meetings and syncs
• Creative assets
• Promotional channels
• Post-mortems

And that’s just the start. Outline everything that needs to happen to make your plan a reality. Once you know what needs to happen, it’s time to start making assignments. Someone needs to be responsible for every deliverable.

Here’s where you may run into roadblocks. You may discover that your creative team is overwhelmed and won’t be able to handle the creative requests until later, or you may find that other email campaigns or social media advertisements are the top priority.

If that’s the case, go back to Step 4 to revisit your timeline. Make adjustments to ensure there’s bandwidth available to make your marketing plan a reality.

7. Track Performance and Review Analytics

No marketing plan will go off without a hitch. That’s why you need your ear to the ground to understand what’s working. Through analytic tools, you can understand if your marketing plan’s target audience, messaging, or creative needs adjusting. Thankfully, most digital tactics allow you to do this on the fly.

Make sure you familiarize yourself with these basic marketing analytics tools:

• Facebook Ads Manager
• Google Analytics
• Google Search Console
• Semrush or Ahrefs for SEO

For more on analytics, read our marketing metrics guide .

Marketing Plan Template (Copy/Paste)

Marketing Plan Template: [Name of Project]

Marketing Plan Example (Filled Out)

Here’s a fake content marketing plan example for a fictitious shoe company.

Marketing Plan Template: [Project Zeus Running Collection]

Marketing Goal Drive $200,000 in sales for the new Zeus running collection within the first 4 months of launch day.

Target Audience The primary audience is 35 to 50-year-old male recreational runners who tend to run 30-40 miles a week at an average page of 8:00-10:00 minutes per mile. They’re not overly competitive, but they like to race 5K and 10K races occasionally throughout the year and are always trying to beat their personal best. Many have experienced mild injuries over the last few years that the Zeus Running Collection can help alleviate.

Marketing Budget We have a budget of $40,000 for the initial launch period. If we can prove out the Zeus Running Collection, we’ll allocate additional budget after the first 4 months.

• Launch Day: June 1
• Marketing Assets Ready to Go: May 28
• Pre-Launch Teaser: May 24
• Creative Assets Finished: May 21
• Product Beta Tester Reviews Submitted: May 10
• Written Content Creation Period: April 12 – May 7
• Enlist Beta Testers: April 12
• Project Kickoff Meeting: April 5

Marketing Tactics

• Social Media Marketing: Target runners on Instagram and Facebook with paid ads featuring our endorsed runner racing in the shoe.
• Email Marketing: Email existing customers with a 15% off discount code on the new Zeus Running Collection. Email prospects with a link to the product breakdown page with a code for free shipping.

Responsibilities and Assignments

• Lizzy K: Creative assets
• Mark B: Blog post announcement + product page
• Spencer S: Beta tester outreach
• Larry G: Email and social media marketing campaigns
• Carly M: Project manager

Do I need to write a marketing plan for everything?

As stated earlier, marketing plans can come in all shapes and sizes. But that doesn't mean you need one for every single Facebook ad or whitepaper your team creates. The best marketing plans serve as a source of truth for your team to reach a goal. Within the marketing plan, you should have enough wiggle room to adjust your strategy and tactics. Marketing is an art and science, so there are bound to be surprises once you start executing your plan.

How do I know if my marketing plan is a success?

One of the most common mistakes marketers make is creating a seemingly perfect marketing plan and then going off script as soon as there's a sign of trouble or distraction. Using the SMART goal method (specific, measurable, achievable, relevant, and time bound) is a simple way to ensure your marketing plan is applicable. Every marketing plan should be a success, whether you hit your goal or not, because you'll learn something new about your customer, tactics, and business throughout the process.

Who should make a marketing plan?

If you're reading this article, ideally you. A marketing manager or marketing team member typically writes marketing plans, but marketing strategy should start at an enterprise level. The more people understand the marketing plan for your business, the more you can work together (not in silos) to achieve a common goal. You'll see this happen in larger organizations where the marketing team works plan that the product or sales team have no idea about.

Plan It Out—Make It Happen

Every great campaign starts with an even better plan. Don’t leave your startup’s success up to chance—give it all the thought and attention you can.

With the right plan in place, you won’t be crossing your fingers on launch day or during the quarterly review. You’ll be sitting confidently, knowing that everything is running according to plan.

Need a high-level plan for your startup? We got you covered with our free content marketing training .

About Jesse Sumrak

Jesse Sumrak is a writing zealot focused on creating killer content. He’s spent almost a decade writing about startup, marketing, and entrepreneurship topics, having built and sold his own post-apocalyptic fitness bootstrapped business. A writer by day and a peak bagger by night (and early early morning), you can usually find Jesse preparing for the apocalypse on a precipitous peak somewhere in the Rocky Mountains of Colorado.

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5 Steps to Create an Outstanding Marketing Plan [Free Templates]

Published: January 04, 2024

Do you take a good, hard look at your team's marketing strategy every year?

You should. Without an annual marketing plan, things can get messy — and it's nearly impossible to put a number on your budget for the projects, hiring, and outsourcing over the course of a year if you don't have a plan.

To make your plan's creation easier, we've put together a list of what to include in your plan and a few different planning templates where you can easily fill in the blanks.

To start, let's dive into how to create a marketing plan and then take a look at what a high-level marketing plan has inside.

In this article, we're going to discuss:

• What a High-Level Marketing Plan Includes

How to Create a Marketing Plan

• Marketing Plan Templates You Can Use
• Simplified Marketing Plan Template
• Plus — Social Media Plan Templates

Free Marketing Plan Template

Outline your company's marketing strategy in one simple, coherent plan.

• Pre-Sectioned Template
• Completely Customizable
• Example Prompts
• Professionally Designed

You're all set!

Click this link to access this resource at any time.

Fill out this form to access a free marketing plan template.

Marketing plan outline.

Download This Marketing Plan Outline for Free

The above marketing plan outline will help you create an effective plan that easily generates buy-in from stakeholders and effectively guides your marketing efforts.

Marketing plans can get quite granular to reflect the industry you're in, whether you're selling to consumers (B2C) or other businesses (B2B), and how big your digital presence is. Nonetheless, here are the elements every effective marketing plan includes:

1. Business Summary

In a marketing plan, your business summary is exactly what it sounds like: a summary of the organization. It's essential to include this information so that all stakeholders, including your direct reports, learn about your company in detail before delving into the more strategic components of your plan.

Even if you’re presenting this plan to people who’ve been in the company for a while, it doesn’t hurt to get everyone on the same page.

Most business summaries include:

The company name

Where it's headquartered

Its mission statement

Our marketing plan outline also includes information on marketing leadership, which is especially helpful for companies with large marketing teams.

2. SWOT Analysis

Your marketing plan's business summary also includes a SWOT analysis , which covers your business's strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, and threats. It’s essential to include this information so you can create targeted strategies that help you capitalize on your strengths and improve upon your weaknesses.

In my experience, you need a lot of patience when doing a SWOT analysis; it requires market research and competitive analysis to become truly accurate. I tend to revisit this section periodically, adjusting it as I discover more information about my own business and competition.

3. Business Initiatives

The business initiatives element of a marketing plan helps you segment the various goals of your department. Be careful not to include big-picture company initiatives, which you'd normally find in a business plan. This section should outline the projects that are specific to marketing. You'll also describe the goals of those projects and how those goals will be measured.

Every initiative should follow the SMART method for goal-making . They should be specific, measurable, attainable, relevant, and time-bound. For example, a broad goal might be something like, "Increase my Facebook following." But a SMART-ified version of this goal could be, "Increase my Facebook following by 30% by June." See the difference?

4. Customer Analysis

In this part of the marketing plan outline, you get plenty of space to share all the data you collected during your market research . If your company has already done a thorough market research study, this section of your marketing plan might be easier to put together. Either way, try to do your research before synthesizing it in a shareable document like this one.

Ultimately, this element of your marketing plan will help you describe the industry you're selling to and your buyer persona . A buyer persona is a semi-fictional description of your ideal customer, focusing on traits like:

Personal challenges

Triggering event

5. Competitor Analysis

Positioning

Market share

Our marketing plan template includes space to list out the specific products you compete with, as well as other facets of the other company’s strategy, such as their blogging efforts or customer service reputation. Keep this part of your plan simple — your full competitive analysis should be done separately. Here are a few competitive analysis templates to get started.

6. Market Strategy

Your market strategy uses the information included in the above sections to describe how your company should approach the market. 

For instance, when I'm filling out this section, I always pull insights from my SWOT analysis, my competitive analysis, and my general market research. This helps me write targeted, effective descriptions of my strategies.

Here's an example: if you found that one of your competitors employs stronger social media marketing strategies , you might add "We'll post 3 times per week on our social media profiles" under "Promotion."

In our full-length marketing plan outline, the market strategy section contains the "seven Ps of marketing" (or the “ extended marketing mix ”):

Physical Evidence

(You'll learn more about these seven sub-components inside our free marketing plan template, which you can download below.)

When I created my first marketing plan, I made the mistake of confusing the marketing budget section of my plan with my product's price and other financials.

Here's a better way to think of this section: it should describe how much money the business has allotted the marketing team to pursue the initiatives and goals outlined in the elements above.

Depending on how many individual expenses you have, you should consider itemizing this budget by what specifically you'll spend your budget on. Example marketing expenses include:

Outsourcing costs to a marketing agency and/or other providers

Marketing software

Paid promotions

Events (those you'll host and/or attend)

Knowing the budget and doing analysis on the marketing channels you want to invest in, you should be able to come up with a plan for how much budget to invest in which tactics based on expected ROI. From there, you'll be able to come up with financial projections for the year. These won't be 100% accurate but can help with executive planning.

Remember: Your marketing plan only includes a summary of the costs. We recommend keeping a separate document or Excel sheet to help you calculate your budget much more effectively. Here’s a marketing budget template to get started .

8. Marketing Channels

Your marketing plan should also include a list of your marketing channels. While your company might promote the product itself using certain ad space, your marketing channels are where you'll publish the content that educates your buyers, generates leads, and spreads awareness of your brand.

If you publish (or intend to publish) on social media, this is the place to talk about it. Use the Marketing Channels section of your marketing plan to map out which social networks you want to launch a business page on, what you'll use this social network for, and how you'll measure your success on this network.

Part of this section's purpose is to prove to your superiors, both inside and outside the marketing department, that these channels will serve to grow the business.

Businesses with extensive social media presences might even consider elaborating on their social strategy in a separate social media plan template.

9. Marketing Technology

Last, but certainly not least, your marketing plan should include an overview of the tools you'll include in your marketing technology (MarTech) stack . These are the tools that will help you achieve the goals you outlined in the previous sections. Since all types of marketing software usually need a generous investment from your company’s leadership, it’s essential to connect them to a potential ROI for your business.

For each tool, describe what exactly you’ll use it for, and be sure that it’s a strategy that you’ve mentioned elsewhere. For instance, we wouldn't recommend listing an advertising management tool if you didn’t list “ PPC Advertising ” under “Marketing Channels.”

• Conduct a situation analysis.
• Define your target audience.
• Write SMART goals.
• Analyze your tactics.
• Set your budget.

1. Conduct a situation analysis.

The first step I take when creating a marketing plan is conducting a SWOT analysis. It helps me uncover the strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, and threats facing my business.

Additionally, I need a good picture of the current market. How do I compare to my competitors? Doing a competitor analysis can help.

In doing so, I can identify the gaps (and opportunities) in a competitor's approach. What are they missing? What can I offer that'll give me a competitive advantage?

Answering questions like this should help you figure out what your customer wants, which brings us to step number two.

2. Define your target audience.

If your company already has buyer personas , this step might just mean you have to refine your current personas.

But if you don't have a buyer persona, you should create one. To do this, you might have to conduct market research.

Your buyer persona should include demographic information such as age, gender, and income. However, it will also include psychographic information such as pain points and goals. What drives your audience? What problems do they have that your product or service can fix?

Once you have this information written out, it'll help you define your goals, which brings us to step number three.

3. Write SMART goals.

My mother always used to tell me, "You can't go somewhere unless you have a road map." Now, for me, someone who's geographically challenged, that was literal advice.

However, it can also be applied metaphorically to marketing. You can't improve your ROI unless you know what your goals are.

After you've figured out your current situation and know your audience, you can begin to define your SMART goals .

SMART goals are specific, measurable, attainable, relevant, and time-bound. This means that all your goals should be specific and include a time frame for which you want to complete them.

For example, your goal could be to increase your Instagram followers by 15% in three months. Depending on your overall marketing goals, this should be relevant and attainable. Additionally, this goal is specific, measurable, and time-bound.

Before you start any tactic, you should write out your goals. Then, you can begin to analyze which tactics will help you achieve that goal. That brings us to step number four.

4. Analyze your tactics.

At this point, you've written down your goals based on your target audience and current situation.

Now, you have to figure out what tactics will help you achieve your goals. Plus, what are the right channels and action items to focus on?

For example, if your goal is to increase your Instagram followers by 15% in three months, your tactics might include hosting a giveaway, responding to every comment, and posting three times on Instagram per week.

Once you know your goals, brainstorming several tactics to achieve them should be easy. That said, you may not be able to pursue every tactic on your list (unless you have an unlimited budget, which, if so, jealous ) — which brings us to step number five.

5. Set your budget.

Before you can begin implementing any of the ideas that you've come up with in the steps above, you have to know your budget.

For example, your tactics might include social media advertising. However, if you don't have the budget for that, then you might not be able to achieve your goals.

While you're writing out your tactics, be sure to note an estimated budget. You can include the time it'll take to complete each tactic in addition to the assets you might need to purchase, such as ad space.

Now that you know how to create your marketing plan, let's dive into creating a marketing campaign outline that will help you reach the goals outlined plan.

Marketing Plan Timeline

Rolling out a new marketing plan is a big lift. To make sure things are running smoothly with all of your projects, you'll want to create a timeline that maps out when each project is happening.

A marketing plan timeline allows your team to view all projects, campaigns, events, and other related tasks in one place — along with their deadlines. This ensures everyone on your team knows what’s due, when it’s due, and what’s up next in the pipeline. Typically these plans cover marketing efforts for the entire year, but some companies may operate on a bi-annual or quarterly basis.

Once you’ve completed your analysis, research, and set goals, it’s time to set deadlines for your assignments. From new blog posts and content initiatives to product launches, everything will need a deadline. Take into account any holidays or events taking place over the course of the year.

While setting deadlines for the entire year may seem daunting, start by estimating how long you think each task will take and set a deadline accordingly. Track the time it actually takes for you to complete similar types of projects. Once you’ve completed a few of them, you’ll have a better idea of how long each takes and will be able to set more accurate deadlines.

For each project, you’ll want to build in time for:

• Brainstorming : This is the first phase where your idea comes to life in a project outline. Decide what you want to achieve and which stakeholders need to be involved to meet your goal. Set a due date and set up any necessary meetings.
• Planning : This can include determining the project’s scope, figuring out how much budget will be allocated for it, finalizing deadlines and who is working on each task. Map out any campaigns needed for each project (social media, PR, sales promotions, landing pages, events, etc.).
• Execution : This third phase is all about your project launch. Decide on a date to launch and monitor the progress of the project. Set up a system for tracking metrics and KPIs.
• Analysis : In this final phase you will analyze all of your performance data to see whether or not your marketing efforts paid off. Did you meet your goals? Did you complete your projects on time and within budget?

All projects and their deadlines should be in a central location where your team can access them whether that’s a calendar like HubSpot's tool , shared document, or project management tool.

One-Page Marketing Plan Template

As demonstrated above, a marketing plan can be a long document. When you want to share information with stakeholders or simply want an overview of your plan for quick reference, having a shorter version on hand can be helpful. A one-page marketing plan can be the solution, and we’ll discuss its elements below.

Include your company name, list the names of individuals responsible for enacting the different stages of your plan, and a brief mission statement.

2. Business Initiatives

3. Target Market

Outline your target audience(s) that your efforts will reach. You can include a brief overview of your industry and buyer personas.

This is an overview of the money you’ll spend to help you meet your marketing goals. Create a good estimate of how much you'll spend on each facet of your marketing program.

5. Marketing Channels

List the channels you’ll use to achieve your marketing goals. Describe why you're using each channel and what you want to accomplish so everyone is on the same page.

Free Marketing Plan Template [Word]

Now that you know what to include in your marketing plan, it's time to grab your marketing plan template and see how best to organize the six elements explained above. The following marketing plan template opens directly in Microsoft Word, so you can edit each section as you see fit:

Download your marketing plan template here .

Marketing campaign template.

Your marketing plan is a high-level view of the different marketing strategies you’ll use to meet your business objectives. A marketing campaign template is a focused plan that will help achieve those marketing goals.

A marketing campaign template should include the following key components:

• Goals and KPIs: Identify the end goal for each of the individual campaigns you’ll run and the metrics you will use to measure the results of your campaign when it ends. For example, conversion rates, sales, sign-ups, etc.
• Channels: Identify the different channels you’ll use to enact your marketing campaign to reach your audience. Maybe you run a social media campaign on Twitter to raise brand awareness or a direct mail campaign to notify your audience of upcoming sales.
• Budget : Identify the budget you’ll need to run your campaign and how it will be distributed, like the amount you’ll spend on creating content or ad placements in different areas. Having these numbers also helps you later on when you quantify the success of your campaign, like ROI.
• Content: Identify the type of content you’ll create and distribute during your campaigns—for example, blog posts , video ads, email newsletters, etc.
• Teams and DRIs: Identify the teams and people that will be part of enacting your marketing plan from start to finish, like those responsible for creating your marketing assets, budgets, or analyzing metrics once campaigns are complete.
• Design: Identify what your marketing campaigns will look like and how you’ll use design elements to attract your audience. It’s important to note that your design should directly relate to the purpose of your campaign.

Digital Marketing Plan Template

A digital marketing plan is similar to a marketing campaign plan, but, as the name suggests, it’s tailored to the campaigns that you run online. Let’s go over the key components of a digital marketing plan template to help you stay on track to meet your goals.

• Objectives: The goals for your digital marketing and what you’re hoping to accomplish, like driving more traffic to your website . Maybe you want to drive more traffic to your website, or
• Budget : Identify how much it will cost to run your digital marketing campaign and how the money will be distributed. For example, ad placement on different social media sites costs money, and so does creating your assets.
• Target audience: Which segments of your audience are you hoping to reach with this campaign? It’s essential to identify the audiences you want to reach with your digital marketing, as different channels house different audience segments.
• Channels: Identifies the channels that are central to your digital marketing campaign.
• Timeline: Explains the length of time your digital campaigns will run, from how long it should take to create your assets to the final day of the campaign.

Many people use social media in their digital campaigns, and below we’ll discuss some ideas you can use for inspiration.

Social Media Marketing Plan Templates

As your marketing department grows, so will your presence on social media. And as your social media presence grows, so will your need to measure, plan, and re-plan what types of content you want to publish across each network.

If you're looking for a way to deepen your social media marketing strategy — even further than the marketing plan template above — the following collection of social media marketing plan templates is perfect for you:

Download 10 social media reporting templates here .

In the above collection of marketing plan templates, you'll get to fill in the following contents (and more) to suit your company:

• Annual social media budget tracking
• Weekly social media themes
• Required social media image dimension key
• Pie chart on social media traffic sorted by platform
• Social media post calendar and publish time

Below, let's review the social media reporting templates, and what you'll find in each one.

1. Social Media Questions

This template lists out questions to help you decide which social media management platform you should use.

What We Like

Once you know what social media tactics you're going to implement in your marketing plan, it's time to figure out what channels are right for you. This template will help you do that.

2. Facebook Live Schedule

If Facebook Live is one of the marketing tactics in your plan, this template will help you design an editorial calendar. With this template, you can organize what Facebook live's you want to do and when.

Once you've decided on dates, you can color-code your FB calendar and coordinate with your editorial calendar so everyone can see what lives are running in relation to other campaigns.

3. Instagram Post Log

Are you going to begin using Instagram regularly? Do you want to increase your following? With this template, you can organize your Instagram posts, so everyone on your team knows what posts are going live and when.

This is more than just a content calendar. You can use this doc to collaborate with your team on messaging, landing pages linked in your bio, and campaign rollouts.

4. Paid Social Media Template

With this template, you can organize your annual and monthly budget for your paid social media calendar.

With this spreadsheet, all you need to do is plug in your numbers and the formulas will do the works for you. I recommend using this in conjunction with your marketing plan budget to make sure you are not overspending and funds are allocated appropriately.

5. Social Media Audit

Conducting a social media audit? You can use this template to help you gather the right analytics. Tracking the results of your marketing efforts is key to determining ROI.

Use this template to track each of your campaigns to determine what worked and what didn't. From there, you can allocate funds for the strategies that deliver the results you want.

6. Social Media Editorial Calendar

With this template, you can organize your social media editorial calendar. For example, you can include social media posts for each platform, so your team knows what's going live on any given day.

This calendar makes it easy to track activity across every social media platform, since each platform is assigned a specific color. 

7. Social Media Image Sizes

With this template, your team can have the latest social media image sizes handy. This template includes image sizes for all major social media platforms, including Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter.

Having a resource like this readily available for your team ensures that everyone is on the same page regarding image sizes and prevents delays.

8. Social Media Marketing Proposal

With this template, you can create an entire social media marketing proposal. This will outline the social media goals, the scope of the work, and the tactics that you plan to implement.

This proposal functions as more of a deep dive into the marketing channel section of your marketing plan. It's relatively straightforward and contains all the essential sections of a proposal.

9. Social Media Reporting Template

With this template, you'll gain access to a slide deck that includes templates for social media reporting.

If you plan to implement social media in your marketing plan, these reporting templates can help you track your progress. If using the social media audit above, you can add all of your data here once it's been collected.

10. Hashtag Holidays

If you're going to lean into social media in your marketing plan, you can use hashtag holidays to generate ideas.

These holidays are a great way to fill out your social media publishing schedule. With this template, you'll get a list of all the hashtag holidays for the year. Once you've come up with content ideas, you can add them to your social media calendar.

Simple Marketing Plan Template

Of course, this type of planning takes a lot of time and effort. So if you're strapped for time before the holidays, give our new Marketing Plan Generator a try.

This tool simplifies yearly planning by asking prompted questions to help guide your process. You’ll be asked to input information about:

Try our free Marketing Plan Generator here .

• Your annual marketing mission statement, which is what your marketing is focused on for the year.
• The strategy that you’ll take with your marketing throughout the year to accomplish your marketing goals.
• Three main marketing initiatives that you’ll focus on during the year (i.e., brand awareness or building a high-quality pipeline) metrics you’ll use to measure your success.
• Your target goals for those marketing initiatives like generating 100 leads per week.
• Marketing initiatives that are not aligned with your current strategy to stay focused on your goals and activities that will help you be successful.

Once you input all information, the tool will spit out a table (as shown in the image below) that you can use to guide your processes.

Pro Tip: If the tool doesn't work, clear your browser's cache or access it in incognito mode.

Start the Marketing Planning Process Today

The best way to set up your marketing plan for the year is to start with quick wins first, that way you can ramp up fast and set yourself (and your team) up to hit more challenging goals and take on more sophisticated projects by Q4. So, what do you say? Are you ready to give it a spin?

Editor's note: This post was originally published in December 2016 and has been updated for comprehensiveness.

Don't forget to share this post!

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Your Guide to Creating a Small Business Marketing Plan

Table of Contents

To have a successful business, you need a well-thought-out marketing plan to promote your products or services. Although making a few social media posts or blasting a few promotional emails may seem simple enough, disjointed marketing efforts not only confuse your target audience, but can ultimately harm your business. 

What is a marketing plan?

A marketing plan is a strategic road map for how you communicate (online and offline) with your target audience to successfully promote your products or services. Depending on your goal, marketing plans can be extremely basic or highly detailed.

According to Molly Maple Bryant, vice president of marketing at Vibrent Health, a marketing plan is not simply a list of things you want to accomplish. Instead, it should list the outcomes you seek — measurable and contextual, like the pipeline you’re developing, or leads you’re generating — and it should explain the high-level strategies you will use to achieve those outcomes. Developing strategies can be complicated, but they make a major difference in keeping you on track and avoiding diversions, also called scope creep .

“Once you have an agreed-upon plan, you are able to compare any incoming requests against your strategies to determine ‘Yes, this adheres to my strategy so we can add it,’ or ‘No, this sounds good in theory, but it doesn’t adhere to our agreed-upon strategy, so we won’t adjust resources,'” Bryant told us.

Types of marketing plans

There are several different types of marketing plans you can use based on certain strategies that make sense for your organization. Your business will likely need a combination of the following marketing plans to create an effective, comprehensive marketing strategy:

• Advertising plan
• Branding plan
• Content marketing plan
• Customer acquisition plan
• Direct marketing plan
• Email marketing plan
• Public relation plan
• Print marketing plan
• Reputation management plan
• Retention plan
• Search engine optimization plan
• Social media marketing plan

Why is it important to have a marketing plan for your business?

A marketing plan is a crucial resource for any small business because it helps you identify the market needs your product or service meets, how your product is different from competitors, and who your product or service is for. Marketing plans also serve as a road map for your sales strategy, branding direction and building your overall business. This is important for successfully conveying your brand messaging to your target audience .

Another significant benefit of a marketing plan for your company is that rather than simply guessing metrics, it forces you to sit down and do the math about your business goals and how to realistically fulfill them. When you look at your growth outcomes, you can delve further to determine what it will take to get to those numbers.

Bryant offered the following example: “Need $100,000 in revenue? How many sales is that? If 10, what’s your close rate? Let’s say 10 percent from lead to closed deal. Now you have a metric to start with — to get to 10 sales, we need 100 leads. Where will they come from, and what strategies will you use? The plan helps you put it all on paper so you can map out resources and tactics later with a lot of preparation and realism,” said Bryant.

When analyzing outcomes and resources, you can save time and avoid scope creep by focusing only on strategies that are relevant to your marketing plan. A marketing plan helps you think realistically about your strategies, gets your stakeholders on the same page, and holds your marketing team accountable for their decisions.

“When everyone’s tasks and goals are laid out for the stakeholders and company partners to see, it is much easier for the entire team to feel at ease about reaching sales goals and allowing the marketing team the space and freedom needed to execute work without constant supervision,” said Cassady Dill, digital marketing consultant and owner of Ethos Agency.

Additionally, Dill said a marketing plan should be easily understood by your entire team, executives and outside departments. Your plan should also serve as an easy guide for future marketing managers and team members to understand and implement.

What are the key elements of an effective business marketing plan?

A marketing plan should be customized to fit your business; however, Dill said, all marketing plans contain five essential functions:

• Your business goals
• Key metrics (how you quantify and measure success)
• Strategies (an overview of implementation and how that will achieve goals)
• A plan (the details of execution and the human resources, departments and software that will be involved)
• Reporting (what reports of progress will include and/or look like)

We broke down those five functions into 10 actionable categories to help you create a marketing plan that is unique and effective for your business.

1. Executive summary

The executive summary is a great place to give the reader of your plan an overview of your business’s mission or goals, as well as the marketing strategy you’re looking to employ. An executive summary is often written after you’ve completed the rest of the marketing plan, to ensure it covers all the important elements of your plan. If the executive summary is the only part of your marketing plan that someone reads (which is highly possible), you want to be sure they understand the most crucial details.

2. Mission statement

The mission statement , not to be confused with a vision statement, is a statement that encompasses your company’s values and how they relate to your overall goals as an organization. Here are some good questions to get you thinking:

• What does your company do today?
• What’s important to your company?
• What would your company like to do in the future?
• What is your brand identity?
• What’s your culture like ?
• How does your company benefit customers, employees and stakeholders?

3. Target markets

Identifying your target market is one of the most important parts of your marketing plan. Without a defined target audience, your marketing expenses will be wasted. Think of it like this: Some people need your service or product but don’t know it exists yet. Who are those people?

Here are some other questions to help you brainstorm your target market :

• What is the demographic of your customers (gender, age, income, education, etc.)?
• What are their needs and interests?
• What’s their psychographic profile (attitudes, philosophies, values, lifestyle, etc.)?
• How do they behave?
• What are some existing products they use?

4. Products and services

In this section, don’t just list what your product or service is. Think critically about what you have to offer your customers and what that value proposition means to them.

• What do you make or provide for customers?
• What are your customers’ needs?
• How does your product or service fulfill customers’ needs?
• What value do you add to your customers’ lives?
• What type of product or service are you offering?

5. Distribution channels

At this point in your report, you should transition your thinking into actual marketing theory and practices. Distribution channels are the avenues you’ll use to reach a prospective customer or business . Think of all current and potential sales channels on which your specific target audience is active. One distribution channel that works great for one organization may be useless to another. For example, one company may host their website for free on a site like HubSpot and solely rely on that as their sales channel, while another company may have a whole team of people using Pinterest to drive sales. [Learn how CRM systems can help track your marketing leads based on various distribution channels.]

Examples of sales channels include the following:

• Mobile text message marketing
• Social media
• Print (newspapers, magazines, brochures, catalogs, direct mail)
• Broadcast (TV, radio)
• Press releases
• Trade shows, product demonstrations, event marketing

6. Competitive profile

One of the major aspects of your marketing plan is developing your unique selling proposition (USP). A USP is a feature or stance that separates your product or service from competitors. Finding your USP is all about differentiation and distinguishing your company as a sole proprietor of one type of good or service. Conduct a competitive analysis to identify your competitive profile and how you stack up against the competition. It is important to remain unbiased when conducting this analysis.

Here are some ideas to consider:

• What’s your USP?
• Who are your competitors? What do they offer?
• What are the strengths and weaknesses of your competition?
• What needs of the market (or customer) are not being served? What can you do to meet those needs?

7. A pricing strategy

Consider pricing when drafting your marketing plan. Developing the right pricing strategy helps you better market your product. Think about your current and projected finances when developing a long-term marketing strategy that is realistic and beneficial for your business. Here are some key questions to ask yourself about your pricing:

• What are reasonable margins to make a profit and cover production costs?
• Is there a market for products or services at your projected price point?
• Are you willing to sacrifice profit margins in return for a greater market share?
• What are your marketing and distribution costs?

8. Objectives

Consider your objectives when developing a marketing plan. This aspect of your plan should involve specific goals related to market penetration and revenue targets. Be sure to keep your marketing objectives on-brand with your business. Here are some things to consider:

• Sales quotas
• Number of new customers gained
• Customer retention percentages
• Revenue targets
• Market penetration
• Brand awareness
• Website traffic

9. Action plans

With all of the above items outlined, determine what steps need to be taken to enact your marketing plan. This includes determining the proper steps, setting goals, breaking down responsibilities, and establishing an overall timeline.

It’s also important to brainstorm potential roadblocks your business could face and some solutions to overcome them. Your research is useless if you don’t have an actionable plan that can be realistically implemented to carry out your ideas.

10. Financial projections

This last step allows you to establish a realistic marketing budget and better understand your marketing plan from a cost perspective. In addition to setting a budget, consider the overall return on investment as well. Here are some other financial projections to consider:

• Cost of implementation
• Cost to produce product or service
• Existing and projected cash flow
• Projected sales
• Desired profit margin on projected sales

What is a template for creating a successful marketing plan?

The internet is full of useful tools, including paid and free marketing plan templates, to help you build a successful marketing plan .

Whether you are looking for a free template generator to build a new marketing plan or a benchmarking tool to evaluate your current strategies, several great resources are available. Keep in mind that the best marketing plan for your business will be a customized one.

“Ultimately, you should design a marketing plan that best serves the needs of your team as you see fit,” said Dill. “Don’t force yourself into a plan that doesn’t fit your team. Use templates to shorten the workload time, but then adjust it for a more custom plan.”

Here are some tools and templates to get you started:

• Free marketing plan template : business.com has developed a free template that is fully customizable based on the needs of your business. Each section provides in-depth explanations, examples and resources to help you create an impressive marketing plan.
• Smart Insights: In addition to offering marketing plan templates, some companies, like Smart Insights, offer marketing benchmarking templates to help you evaluate your strategy performance. These are accessible with a free Smart Insights membership.
• GERU: Similarly, GERU offers a funnel-planning, profit-prediction and simulation tool to help you assess mock business ideas and simulations. This can help you identify weak points in your marketing strategy that need improvement. Although GERU requires users to sign up for a paid account, you can access a free trial to test it out.

What mistakes should you avoid when creating your marketing plan?

When creating an effective marketing plan, you need to avoid falling for common missteps and mistakes. For starters, failing to identify any of the 10 actionable categories above is an obvious mistake.

Here are some other key mistakes to avoid:

• Setting unrealistic budgets: Underestimating the costs of marketing activities or setting an unrealistic budget can limit your ability to execute your plan effectively. Marketing can be expensive, so it’s important to fully understand the estimated cost and budget before building a marketing strategy that you can’t afford.
• Focusing on quantity over quality: “More” doesn’t always mean “better” if you are posting on irrelevant marketing channels or your efforts are bringing in unqualified leads. Prioritizing the quantity of marketing activities over their quality can lead to superficial engagement and a lack of meaningful results.
• Not testing campaigns: Launching large campaigns without testing can lead to wasted resources if the messaging or tactics don’t resonate as expected. Test out your new campaigns to ensure they achieve your intended goal.
• Ignoring customer feedback: You may be tempted to ignore negative feedback, but disregarding customer comments and failing to address their concerns can lead to negative perceptions of your brand. Instead, use customer feedback to your advantage to improve your product and marketing efforts.
• Overpromising and underdelivering: Setting unrealistic expectations in your marketing messages that your products or services can’t fulfill can damage your brand’s reputation.
• Ignoring seasonality and trends: Failing to account for seasonal trends and market changes can result in missed opportunities for timely marketing efforts.
• Not reviewing and updating your plan: A rigid marketing plan that doesn’t allow for adjustments in response to market feedback and changing conditions can hinder your success. A marketing plan should be a living document that is regularly reviewed and updated to reflect changes in the market and your business’s goals.

Avoiding these mistakes and missteps can help you create a more effective and successful marketing plan that drives results for your business.

How can you take action with your new marketing plan?

Before you dive into marketing plan templates, it’s important to understand how to think about a marketing plan.

A good marketing plan targets who your buyers are, establishes the service or product you are offering, and determines your unique selling proposition. From here, you will tackle the marketing planning process and develop the best way to get your product in front of buyers who want your product or service.

Dill created a simple four-step process for how small businesses can take action with creating a marketing plan.

• The first step is to hold a marketing meeting with all the marketing team and executives or stakeholders. This gives them time to offer questions, concerns and criticisms you haven’t thought of so you can go back to the board room and revise your strategy or plan.
• Next, add a timeline to all your tasks and assign team members and all the help you’ll need to execute that plan.
• Once your plan is in action, hold weekly check-ins in person or by email to keep everyone on track.
• Share a weekly progress report with all parties involved and execs to ensure you are moving in the right direction.

In addition to drafting your own plan, you can work with a digital marketing agency or use internet marketing and pay-per-click management services to leverage your online presence.

Once you’ve established a general road map, update it annually. Developing an evolving marketing plan sets your business up for continued success because it allows you to prepare for the unexpected and establish a connection between your brand and your audience.

Matt D’Angelo contributed to this article. Source interviews were conducted for a previous version of this article.

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12 Marketing Strategy Examples, How to Create One + Tips

What is a marketing strategy?

Marketing strategies vs. marketing plans vs. marketing tactics , types of marketing strategies, how to create the most effective marketing strategies.

• Top 11 great marketing strategy examples and 1 you shouldn't follow

Top tips for creating successful marketing strategies

• Marketing strategies make it more likely that you'll reach your goals

Whether you’re a Fortune 500 company or just starting out on your very first small business venture, every company in the world needs an effective marketing strategy to build brand awareness and drive new customers to its products and services. However, if you’ve never been involved in successful marketing strategies, creating one can be easier said than done.

The most effective marketing strategies consider every aspect of the marketing flow, from a thorough understanding of your audience personas to a clear-cut marketing budget and so much more; there’s a lot to cover in a company marketing strategy.

In this guide, we’re going to look at some of the best marketing strategies of all time and explain how you can utilize different types of marketing strategies to maximize your returns in no time.

Before we tell you how to compose an effective marketing strategy, you need to understand what a marketing strategy is and how it can help you improve your advertising.

In simple terms, business marketing strategies are a tool marketers use to outline their various campaigns and marketing models. It’s the how of how you’ll get customers interested in your products and services.

To create an effective marketing strategy, you need to do four things:

• Understand who buys your products or services (who are your customers?)
• Understand how to motivate these people to buy/continue to buy your products or services
• Understand who your competitors are and what they’re doing to achieve the same objectives
• Understand how to measure the success of your marketing campaigns and efforts.

You can do it too.

Like a marketing plan, your marketing strategy should cover the five “Ps” of marketing:

• Product – What you’re trying to sell
• Price – Profit margins, marketing budget, etc. 
• Place – What channels or platforms will you use? (For example, will you be advertising on social media, utilizing email marketing, or going offline?) Consider where your customers already spend their time for the optimal marketing locations. 
• Promotion – What are you trying to achieve? (Are you hoping to build your social media presence, increase brand perception, promote a new product, or something else?)
• People – Who is your target audience? What drives them? 

Once you’ve answered these questions, you’ll be in a fantastic position to start building your company’s marketing strategy.

Although “marketing strategies” might seem relatively straightforward, there can often be some confusion when establishing whether you’re creating a marketing strategy, marketing plan, or marketing tactic. While all three of these marketing initiatives work together, they cover slightly different aspects and should not be used interchangeably.

Marketing plan

A marketing plan is an overview of all your marketing initiatives. This will include all the campaigns you intend to run over a set period of time, your goals and ambitions for the projects as a whole, and any research you’ve compiled to support these aims.

Marketing strategies

Marketing strategies at first glance appear very similar to the overarching marketing plan. However, the strategies will take a closer look at just a few select parts of the marketing plan.

For example, if your marketing plan is to promote a new product or service, you might have a strategy dedicated to how you’re going to use email marketing to support these broader goals. Every marketing plan will most likely produce several marketing strategies as part of the broader plan.

Marketing tactics

While the marketing plan and strategies are committed to explaining what you’re going to do, marketing tactics go deeper again and establish how you’re going to do it.

Using the above example, the marketing plan is to build awareness for a new product. The marketing strategy is how you’ll utilize email marketing as part of this. The marketing tactics will detail the specific actions you’ll take as part of the marketing campaign.

Now we understand some of the different marketing terms, it’s time to zone in on marketing strategies and how these work as part of your business plan.

There are numerous different types of marketing strategies you can use depending on your business needs. While we’re not going to cover every marketing strategy type today, these are some of the main ones that you’re likely to come across:

1. Social media marketing strategy 

Today, social media marketing is a huge part of any business’s marketing plan as it’s a hugely compelling way to drive traffic, build brand awareness, and take advantage of the social selling revelation that’s taking over online marketing. 

According to recent data, around 54% of social media users use social platforms to research brands and products, and 89% of consumers who follow a particular brand will purchase from that brand. 

With these figures, if you’re not utilizing an effective social media marketing strategy, you’re missing out on untold rewards.

2. Email marketing strategy

Anyone who’s ever told you “email is dead” is dead wrong. Capturing your customers’ emails and browsers should be an essential part of your marketing strategy and is an excellent way to continue a conversation with people who have expressed interest in your brand.

There are loads of email marketing tools available to help you in this area. However, you still need an effective email marketing strategy to produce consistent, compelling emails that convert readers into buyers. 

3. Inbound marketing strategy

An inbound marketing strategy is all about pulling customers in and driving traffic to your website or products. Rather than using “disruptive” marketing techniques (like TV advertising), inbound marketing is about lead generation using people who have shown interest in your products, services, or brand as a whole.

Email marketing can be a good example of an inbound marketing strategy. If someone has subscribed to your mailing list, chances are they’re at least somewhat interested in what you have to say. This enables you to take a softer approach to your marketing, as these leads are already more likely to become sales.

Another inbound marketing strategy could be blog posts. People will only see blog posts relevant to their search terms and interests, meaning they’ve expressed a need that at least somewhat relates to what you’re selling.

4. Content marketing strategy

A content marketing strategy is likely to overlap with an inbound marketing strategy, but it is more specific. With content marketing strategies, you focus on content creation that will draw people in and build interest.

This is likely to cover blog posts and white papers and can even overlap with your social media marketing.

Effectively, any part of your marketing campaigns that require content will require an effective content marketing strategy.

5. Editorial strategy

Taking an editorial approach is a particularly vital marketing strategy for advertising companies as it highlights the content formats, workflows, and channels you’ll be utilizing to hit your marketing goals.

It’s similar to the sort of marketing strategies you would expect to see in a news or media organization and can be essential for brand publishers or advertisers to keep their marketing efforts and ideas in focus.

6. Marketing communications strategy

Your marketing communications strategy should be primarily focused on your brand’s message and value proposition . It’s all about how you’re going to say what you need to say. 

For example, is your tone of voice serious or humorous? Are you marketing yourself as an expert in your industry? What is the message you want to get across?

7. Digital marketing strategy

Digital marketing probably doesn’t need much introduction… This marketing strategy will encompass all your online marketing, SEO , social media lead generation, performance marketing , and more…. Effectively, if it’s online, it should be covered by your digital marketing strategy. 

8. Internal marketing strategy

Although internal marketing will be less vital for SMBs, it can be a vital part of the marketing efforts for large companies. A good example of an internal marketing strategy would be an internal email that lets employees know they’re eligible to become shareholders or asks existing shareholders to support a new initiative.

Internal marketing can also cover more mundane issues, such as keeping staff up to date on any changes to the company, branding, or internal procedures.

9. Public relations strategy

If you’re in business, you’ll probably know how complicated PR strategies can be. Not only does getting PR right ensure you keep your customers happy, but it’s also vital for protecting your brand image in the eyes of your stakeholders, the media, and even governmental bodies or other influential institutions.

Any large business should have a dedicated PR team in charge of the brand’s public image. In addition to protecting it, good PR can also offer invaluable word-of-mouth advertising.

10. SEO strategy

SEO should form part of all the different marketing strategies. Still, you may find it beneficial to have some of your marketing efforts explicitly dedicated to SEO, as this is likely to be your primary source of lead generation.

SEO (or Search Engine Optimization) is pretty much what it says on the tin: the art of using keywords and phrases to boost your visibility when users search for relevant terms on the internet. Getting SEO right is arguably the best way to drive traffic to your website and should be front of mind in all your digital marketing and content marketing strategies.

Naturally, SEO goes beyond just keyword optimization and considers a plethora of other aspects to help you rise on those search engine results pages (SERPs). So, it’s a good idea to have at least one marketing team member dedicated to the latest SEO trends so you can rank #1 on Google.  

When it comes to strategic marketing strategies, there isn’t always a one-size-fits-all solution. Strategies can take many different forms, from word documents to flowcharts to slides… But although they can look different on the outside, the most effective marketing strategies will always have a few things in common.

If nothing else, your marketing strategy should cover the following questions:

Who are you trying to reach? 

For this section, you need to really get into the mind of your target audience. This includes building detailed buyer personas and user personas, with information including their demographics, age, location, employment status, interests, passions, pain points, and anything else you can think of. The more detail you can include in your target market research, the better you will understand and communicate with your audience. 

Where will you reach your potential customers? 

As part of your research into your target audience, you should also spend some time considering the places (online and offline) where they spend their time. For many businesses today, most of your marketing strategies will probably be focused on social media. Still, even once you’ve narrowed this down, it can also be valuable to create marketing strategies for the various social media platforms and any other marketing channels you would like to use. 

What action do you want people to take?

The answer to this question will fuel your Call - to - Action phrases and is essentially nailing down the goals of your entire marketing campaign. Do you want to drive more website traffic? Increase sales? Raise awareness for a new product? Get more followers on social media? Boost your search results rankings? Whatever your goals are, having them clearly laid out as part of your digital marketing strategy is essential. 

How will you inspire potential customers to take action?

The next question leads off this, and it’s about how you’re going to convince or inspire consumers to take the desired action. This could incorporate discount codes, summer sales, referral programs, or you could even let your brand, product, or service speak for itself if you’re just hoping to build awareness.

How will you measure success? 

If you have no KPIs or objective method for measuring the success of your marketing campaign, you really have no way of monitoring whether or not your campaigns are working! Having clear, measurable goals and precise targets you can see whether you’re hitting are essential for an effective marketing strategy. For eg, if your target is to get more followers on Instagram for your brand… It’s easy to see when you’re on track. However, you’ll want to dive deeper than this, with goals for conversions, weekly and monthly targets, etc.

Top 11 great marketing strategy examples and 1 you shouldn’t follow

Now you have an idea of what a marketing strategy is and how to write some of the best marketing strategies, we wanted to give you some great marketing strategies examples so you can see how these work in the real world.

These examples of marketing strategies of a business will provide you with plenty of inspiration for your own campaigns and help you ace the advertising industry. Plus, we’ve included a bonus example of when a marketing strategy didn’t quite go to plan… Take a look!

1. Spotify: offering an alternative user experience

Spotify is the go-to music streaming service for most people around the world, but what is it that makes them stand out?

Spotify’s key marketing efforts focus on how the brand is different from other services, providing users with the chance to discover new music with ease and even lets you filter tracks by mood as well as genre. The artificial intelligence in Spotify’s algorithms provides users with carefully curated, bespoke playlists that actually suit their tastes and manages to turn playing music or listening to a podcast into a whole new experience.

2. Nordstrom: Retargeting campaigns

Nordstrom is well-known for dominating when it comes to marketing, and this campaign was remarkably successful. Employing the latest retargeting technology and tactics, Nordstrom was able to dramatically boost its bottom line and reduce cart abandonment. This campaign primarily utilized abandoned cart emails alongside social media ads that were activated following a website visit from the user.   

3. GoPro: User-generated content

GoPro certainly isn’t the first – or the last – company to achieve success with a user-generated-content-led marketing strategy, but that doesn’t make it any less effective or worthy of inclusion in our list! As a brand dedicated to creating on-the-go, fast content, the product lends itself nicely to this marketing tactic, so GoPro can benefit from a “spectacular” Instagram feed without needing a huge budget to take the images itself. And what’s more, each user-generated image that ends up on the feed motivates others to snap pics and share their experiences.

4. Sephora: Loyalty programs

Loyalty programs are a bit of a tale as old as time for maximizing customer retention, but that doesn’t mean all loyalty programs are created equal. Sephora discovered the trick to innovative, inspiring loyalty programs with its tiered approach and generous rewards. These rewards provide plenty of incentive for users to buy and are a fantastic way of increasing word-of-mouth marketing.

5. Rainforest alliance: “Follow the Frog.”

These days, the top online stores all offer information about how they engage in sustainable practices, have cruelty-free manufacturing, and/or how they support charities and initiatives around the world. Rainforest Alliance’s “ Follow the Frog ” campaign tapped into this priority by offering B2B and B2C organizations the chance to demonstrate their commitment to the environment and sustainability with a green frog seal on their products and website. This became a well-known symbol that’s highly desirable to other brands in all industries.

6. Twitch: Niche-specific marketing

Many brands make the mistake of trying to market their product or service to a target audience that’s simply too broad. But that only leads to a confusing message and few real customers. Instead, follow the lead of the social streaming service, Twitch. This company wasted no time or money advertising to people who won’t be interested in what makes the brand unique… Instead, all its efforts went into establishing precisely who the niche market is and how to attract them.

7. Nike: “Just Do It” – promoting values

We are all familiar with Nike’s “Just Do It” slogan , but have you ever given the marketing plan behind it any thought? Well, Nike used to be a brand dedicated to providing athleticwear to athletes… But they changed their model to appeal to the masses and put values first. The “Just Do It” and “*If you have a body, you’re an athlete” campaigns have been instrumental in Nike’s prolonged success by making everyone feel included and welcomed.

8. Chipotle: Fun contests

Contests are always an effective way to build brand awareness or promote a new product. Chipotle’s 2020 social media contest came at a perfect time and gave the audience a fun and unique way of interacting with the brand. The contest was called “Chipotle Royalty” and involved users posting a TikTok video explaining why their Chipotle order was the best. The prizes? A chance to win $10,000 and have their order become a permanent menu fixture. Definitely worth a video!

9. Red Bull: Putting identify before products

Similar to Nike’s values before products , Red Bull prioritizes experiences and identity of risk-taking front-and-center when it comes to marketing. With Red Bull sponsorships covering everything from Red Bull Stratos (seriously, take a look, it’s really cool) to rallycross racing to Formula One, and so much more, Red Bull had made its identity and brand persona clear… And ensures we won’t forget it any time soon! 

10. Starbucks: Making coffee into an experience and a lifestyle

Selling coffee certainly doesn’t sound like a unique endeavor, but Starbucks’ marketing team worked hard to create an experience that wasn’t just about the coffee. With an incredibly famous logo that can be spotted worldwide, Starbucks created a feeling of comfort, inclusion, and home that cannot be rivelled. Coschedule has an interesting, deep-dive article looking at Starbucks ‘ marketing strategy in more detail. 

11. AllBirds: Humorous, transparent, sustainable

Allbirds’ goal was to create “the world’s most comfortable shoe.” And while they did seem to manage this, it’s not why we’re highlighting their marketing strategy. This strategy really stands out because of the consistent tone of voice and values visible in every piece of marketing, every web page, and every interaction with the brand. The quirky and humorous voice is highly memorable and matches the values of transparency, sustainability, and comfort.

12. Segway: Failed to identify pain points

Now we’ve considered some of the best marketing strategies of all time, we also wanted to look at one brand that didn’t do quite so well. When Segway was first introduced, the idea was that it would replace walking as the primary A-to-B method and could go up to 12.5mph. The primary reason Segway failed is because people didn’t want to stop walking, running, or cycling (among others). So, the pain point the device was built to solve wasn’t really a pain point at all, and Segway offered little benefit to users. 

The lesson here? Do your target market research thoroughly , and don’t just build a product because you think it looks cool.

No matter how big or small your ad campaigns are, it’s essential to always support them with marketing strategies that summarize how you will convert browsers into consumers. To give you a head start at employing the best and most effective marketing techniques, ensure every strategy you create does the following:

Set specific goals

SMART (Specific, Measurable, Achievable, Relevant, Time-based) goals are essential for an excellent marketing strategy. These will not only give you something to aim for, but they’ll also help you monitor your progress and hold you accountable.

Identify your target audience.

Correctly identifying your target audience, their passions, and their pain points is vital. As we learned from Segway, not having a thorough understanding of your audience and what they need/want is only ever going to be a recipe for disaster.

Identify your competition

There’s a lot to be learned from the competition. On the one hand, you can check on other businesses in your industry to see what they’re doing well and what their audience responds to. On the other hand, identifying your competition’s weaker points can be a brilliant springboard to help you find your unique selling proposition and help you stand out. 

Choose the most effective platform

There’s no point in shouting about your products in a location your customers never visit. As part of your market research, you should also investigate where your customers spend their time online and offline. Then, build a marketing strategy using the platforms and channels your customers are already using.

Marketing strategies make it more likely that you’ll reach your goals

You don’t need to be a Fortune 500 company to invest in an effective marketing strategy and reap the benefits. Even small businesses need marketing to build brand awareness and get people interested. After all, even with the best products in the world, nobody will buy them if they don’t know who you are!

As the famous quote goes, “failing to prepare is preparing to fail.” And the research backs this up, with 313% of marketers being more likely to report success when they have a documented marketing strategy than those without. 

So, don’t waste your precious time and money investing in poorly thought-out marketing campaigns. Instead, take the time to build a detailed plan and strategy with marketing tactics for success, and you’ll be sure to maximize your ROI in no time.

How do you create a marketing strategy?

Building a marketing strategy isn’t that different from writing a marketing plan… It’s just more detailed and niche than the overarching plan and focuses on one/two platforms at a time.

How do you write a marketing strategy example?

It’s worth (if you can) taking a look at some other successful marketing strategy examples from similar companies in your industry before writing your own if you’re not sure where to start. This will give you an idea of what has/hasn’t worked in the past and will enable you to cultivate a better strategy than the one before. Even if you can’t view the marketing strategy document, plenty of research is always necessary for any advertising campaign; the more information you have before you start, the better your marketing strategy will be.

What are the five marketing strategies?

The five “Ps” of marketing are Product, Price, Promotion, Place, and People. These “Ps” are essential to quality marketing efforts and should all be covered in your marketing strategy example.

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I'm a content manager at sixads. I'm fiery about marketing, writing and traveling, so you can often find me scribbling away in some unknown corner of the world. If you want to know more ways to increase traffic and attract buyers to your online store get in touch with sixads on one of the channels bellow.

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Strategic Marketing Plan Template & Examples

Imagine setting out to climb Mt. Everest guided only by intuition. You wouldn’t make it very far without a detailed plan (and an experienced sherpa) to guide the way. 

Marketing may not be an extreme sport with life-or-death consequences, but you’ve got big goals to reach nonetheless. And your team’s success relies on a lot more than gut instinct. 

That’s why a strategic marketing plan is a must, no matter your industry. Think of it as the roadmap that gets your business where it needs to go each and every year. 

Drafting your first marketing plan can feel intimidating, but don’t worry. We’ll walk you through the basics, show you what a strategic marketing plan looks like, and even give you a couple of free templates to get started. Here’s what we’ll cover:

What is a strategic marketing plan?

Essential elements of a strategic marketing plan, free marketing plan templates and examples.

Let’s start from square one and define what a strategic marketing plan is. 

A strategic marketing plan is a formal document that guides your team’s marketing efforts throughout the year. It maps your annual marketing goals to your company’s overall business objectives, while also outlining how you’ll spend your yearly marketing budget.

A good marketing plan clearly outlines:

• Your target market and key competitors
• Major goals for the year and how they’ll help you get ahead
• Key results that serve as indicators for success
• How you’ll use your money and resources to meet your goals 

Keep in mind that your plan may vary based on your industry and goals. Length and format don’t matter as much as the details you include. Do your research, and make it as easy as possible for company leaders to understand how your strategic marketing plan helps business grow.

What’s the difference between a marketing strategy vs. marketing plan?

A marketing strategy details how you’ll execute a piece of your marketing plan with a specific tactical goal in mind. You might do this by launching an email or social media campaign, publishing a blog series, offering a special promo, or hosting a live event. 

A marketing plan , on the other hand, is the high-level framework that drives all your marketing strategies. It’s a big-picture look at the who, what, and why behind your marketing goals, with a focus on tying them to larger organizational objectives. 

No two marketing plans are exactly the same, but they do share some common threads. Here are 6 important elements you’ll want to identify and research before you build out your next strategic marketing plan.

• Business objectives

Everything you do as a marketing team should support your company’s overall strategy and goals. So summarize your organization’s business objectives, and let it serve as your marketing plan’s true north. Your team and stakeholders should be able to clearly see how the marketing strategies and goals you outline in your plan align with your company’s top priorities.  

• SWOT analysis

A SWOT analysis breaks down your company’s strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, and threats. This enables you to assess both the internal and external factors that influence your success so you can build targeted strategies that close gaps and drive results. 

• Strengths and weaknesses : Take stock of your organization’s inner workings. Where does your team or company really shine? What’s working well, and what needs to be improved? Do you have any resource limitations?
• Opportunities and threats : Now look outward to consider your market and competition. Where do you have a chance to push ahead? Where are you struggling to keep up? Are there any market changes to consider?
• Market research

Research is the core of any marketing plan because it’s what you’ll use to shape your goals and strategy. Don’t be afraid to dive deep into the details here. A well-researched marketing plan is worth the time invested. 

Focusing your research energy on these areas will equip you with a solid base for smart marketing decisions.

It’s important to understand major movements in the industry you’re marketing to so you have a feel for the pulse of the market. Thoroughly research the industry your organization works in, and be sure to report on the general climate, as well as any noteworthy happenings. If your company serves any subindustries, don’t forget to include them in your analysis too. 

Target market

Marketing to the masses rarely pays off. That’s why narrowing down your target audience is a must for any marketing plan. Consider it the filter you run every marketing strategy through. 

The more specific you can get, the better. Answering questions like these can help you paint a clear picture of your ideal buyer so you know how to focus your resources for a bigger impact on the people you want to reach.

• What are your ideal buyer’s key demographics (e.g., age, location, job title)?
• What do they care about (e.g., interests, values)?
• What are their biggest challenges or pain points? 
• Where does your ideal buyer hang out (e.g., Twitter, LinkedIn, industry conferences or events)?

Competitive analysis

It’s also important to understand who and what you’re up against when it comes to attracting your perfect buyer. Identify the key players in your space, and give a brief rundown of what they’re doing to win. This groundwork will make it easier to see how to differentiate yourself from the competition. 

• Strategic marketing goals

Now that you’ve laid the groundwork, it’s time to talk strategy. Outline your strategic marketing goals for the year, and briefly explain how these strategies support company-wide goals. Use a gantt chart to establish a timeline for each goal and monitor results along the way. This is an easy way to set expectations and keep your team and stakeholders in the loop.

• Key marketing metrics

Metrics are where the rubber meets the road in your marketing plan. Use your market research to define specific KPIs or key marketing metrics that will serve as your measure for success. This will help you track progress so you know if you need to change course mid-project to ensure you hit your strategic marketing goals.

• Marketing channels

Marketing channels are the vehicles you’ll use to reach your target audience and grow your brand. Choose your channels wisely based on where you expect to get the most bang for your marketing buck. Briefly explain the purpose of each channel and how it supports your overall marketing strategy and business goals. 

Want to build a more detailed plan for each marketing channel so you can bring your ideas to life? Check out our free social media strategy plan and editorial content plan templates for more information on planning by channel. 

Marketing budget

Establishing a monthly budget for your marketing plan—and tracking it along the way—helps you maximize ROI and identify wasted spend before it drains your marketing dollars. 

Start by listing any ongoing expenses you have so you know what you can afford to spend on new initiatives. Then do your best to estimate any new costs you expect in the coming year. Don’t forget to account for any new hires, freelance workers, or third-party agencies you might need to rely on to get the work done. 

Not sure where to start? We’ve got you! Here are a few examples of how you might structure a marketing plan so you can easily start writing your own. 

Your marketing plan may shake out differently depending on the industry you work in or the goals you’re focused on. Use these marketing plan templates and samples as a guide to jumpstart the process and come up with a marketing plan structure that works for you. 

Google Docs marketing plan template and example

The most common way to create a marketing plan is simply to write it out as a text document. This format enables you to freely elaborate on any research findings you gathered during discovery, while also making a clear case for the marketing goals you’ve set for the year.

We put together a free Google Docs marketing plan template to help you save time so you can get your planning process off the ground faster. This marketing plan example is perfect for documenting and sharing the full scope of your strategic marketing plan with your team and stakeholders.

Here’s a basic breakdown of what the Google Docs marketing plan template covers:

• Company mission

Save a copy of the template to your Google Drive or download it as a Word document, and customize it to fit your own strategic marketing plan needs.  ‍

Use template in Google Docs

Gantt chart marketing plan template and examples

A plan’s no good if you set it and forget it. That’s where a gantt chart comes in handy. Use this free gantt chart marketing plan template to track your strategic marketing plan all the way to success. 

A gantt chart is a great way to lay your marketing plan out in a simple, visual timeline that’s easy to update as work progresses. It gives you a high-level view of your plan’s major goals and strategies, while enabling you to collaborate on and share your plan with your team and stakeholders.

How you use a gantt chart to put your plan into action is up to you. Build a timeline for the tasks you need to complete as you develop your marketing plan, like the example below. 

Once you’ve fleshed out the details of your marketing plan, you can use a gantt chart to define and track your strategic marketing goals. For example, you could break your marketing plan down by quarter to show when specific objectives will come into play and update progress as you close in on your goal. Here’s how that might look.

Use template in TeamGantt

Ready to build a strategic marketing plan of your own? 

We’ve created a free marketing plan template for you in TeamGantt so you can jump right in!

Customizing the template is quick and easy, thanks to TeamGantt’s drag and drop simplicity. And since everything’s online, your whole team can collaborate on activities in real time.

Here are a few pointers to help you get the most out of our free TeamGantt strategic marketing plan template.

Drag and drop tasks to schedule your plan

Configuring your marketing plan is as easy as dragging and dropping tasks—or entire task groups—into their new rightful place. Click and drag the edges of each taskbar to set a new task duration. 

Communicate with comments 

Collaboration is easy with TeamGantt's discussion feature . Share documents and chat with your team directly from a task’s Comments section. Use Notes to communicate important information—like goals, target audience, and budget—at the project level. 

Have a more formal marketing plan document? Attach the file or link to your project so everyone has easy access to it.

Share a copy with stakeholders

Plans are meant to be shared, so we made it easy to keep even the most inquisitive stakeholders in the loop. Export your plan to a printer-friendly PDF , or share a view-only link to your project so stakeholders can see your marketing plan progress in real time. 

Sign up for a free TeamGantt account today , and save time on project setup with this free marketing plan template!

Marketing Strategy Business Plan

Marketing is one of the key components of any business organization. Without marketing, companies would never succeed and will definite go bankrupt in a span of months. The importance of a marketing plan cannot be understated, that is the reason why marketing plans are formulated by both small enterprises and large corporations.

• 9+ Project Action Plan Examples
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To help you create your own marketing strategy business plan, we have provided some tips on how to write one as well as examples (in PDF format) you can use as a reference.

Marketing Strategy Business Plan Example

• Google Docs

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Strategic Marketing Plan Template

Career Marketing Strategy Business Plan Example

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What Is a Marketing Plan?

A marketing plan is a document that identifies and analyzes what marketing tools the company should use to achieve maximum profitability. A simple marketing plan incorporates all campaigns that will be used, in which the said campaigns will also be monitored and measured. A marketing plan is also involved in the following functions:

• Create market research to support pricing decisions and new product lines
• Disseminate the main message of the product to demographics and geographic areas
• Choose from numerous platforms to promote products and services (i.e. digital, radio, Internet, magazines, television, print media, or a combination of those platforms)
• Set up results metrics and reporting timelines

Marketing plans and marketing strategies are often used interchangeably. This is because a marketing plan cannot exist if there is no strategy (or strategies) that is implemented in the said plan. There are instances where a marketing plan and marketing strategy can be merged, although it is more applicable for smaller companies since they only run very few marketing campaigns in a year.

But take note that marketing plan outlines the the company’s marketing activities while the strategy is only a tool that is being used to achieve the goals of the marketing plan.

When creating a marketing plan, the value proposition of the business should be considered and the plan should have a set time period. When identifying a target audience, market research is often used. Market research is also used to identify which marketing channel should be used (for example, online ads, radio, social media, and TV advertising spots).

The general marketing plan also describes the overall marketing strategy and lists down the rationale for each marketing decision. Additionally, the plan should also focus on the creation, timing and placement of specific campaigns, and how the outcome of those campaigns will be measured.

For a marketing plan to be properly executed, the marketing plan should be adjusted at any point and at any time based on the results. For example, if your digital ads are performing better than it was initially expected, the budget for digital ads can be increased to fund the platform that is performing at a more effective rate. You may also see simple business plan examples .

Marketing leaders often face the challenge of ensuring every platform has sufficient time to show results, a challenge in today’s fast-paced digital world.

Going back to the digital ads example, digital marketing shows results in near real-time, while traditional television ads still undergo a long process before it can be aired, which results in a longer time for results to be collated and analyzed. You may also like business plan examples .

A marketing plan would fall under the category of “promotion” in a traditional marketing mix model. Promotion is one of the Four P’s of Marketing   (a term coined by famous American professor Neil Borden), together with product, price, and place.

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Non-Profit Marketing Strategy Business Plan Example

Tips in Creating a Marketing Strategy Business Plan

Here are some tips in creating a marketing strategy business plan. Remember to incorporate the tips listed below to maximize the effectiveness of your marketing plan.

1. Situation analysis

You first need to determine the position of your business before you start developing a plan. Your company might want to move into a new market segment but you are still meeting your financial goals on your current market. Remember that any marketing plan will not be of help if your employees or untrained.

Most of the data you create for your situation analysis is mostly found in your company reports. If the said information is not available, you can always conduct a SWOT analysis to identify potential issues. You should be clear on what makes your company stand out from the competition.

2. Define the ideal customer

No business owner in his right mind will say that “everyone is my client” and “I cater to all types of markets.” Demographics is very important in determining the ideal customer base of a company. Not all market segments purchase the same products. For example, senior citizens are not the ideal market for smartphone manufacturers. You may also see business plan examples .

Similarly, teenagers aging 12 to 16 years old should not be the target market of antibiotic medicine for life-threatening diseases. It should be priority for you to do research first to identify your target market or ideal customer. Once you have identified your ideal customer or market segment, define how your products solve a need in that group. You may also like importance of business plan .

3. Establish marketing goals

The end goal of marketing should be sales. You should list down how your marketing efforts will improve revenues. For example, you can give discounts to customers who have already purchased your products more than once, or give out gift certificates to your loyal customers. Set a time frame so that you can be specific in the goals you want to achieve.

4. Select marketing tools

Your marketing tools will determine how you deal with your customers or clients. Choose from digital or traditional marketing methods, but you can always choose both although it will be more expensive on your end. Also, keep in touch with your customers via professional email , postal letter, or phone call/text.

5. Budget funds

Every commodity costs money. That is the reason why you should establish a budget for each marketing strategy you create. You should also monitor results to determine the effectiveness of the strategies you formulated, and do not hesitate to adjust the budget if you feel some marketing campaigns are not working in your favor.

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Components of a Marketing Strategy Business Plan

Before you start writing your marketing strategy business plan , make sure to incorporate the components listed below. They are essential to the success of your marketing plan.

1. Market research

Research is the backbone of any marketing plan. There are numerous online resources where you can gather important information for your strategy business plan (consumer buying habits, market size, market growth or decline, current trends, etc.). You may also see how to make a business plan .

2. Target market

The target market is essentially the demographic of customers where you will be selling your product. But take note that selling to a single market segment will not be advantageous to your business. Diversify your portfolio to fit multiple market segments. You may also like business plan outline with examples .

3. Positioning

Positioning is the perception of your product or brand in the marketplace. Basically, your business will never profit if you position yourself in an identical way as your competitors. Take priority in developing your company’s brand and clearly communicate to your target market on how you want your business to be perceived. You may also check out maintenance strategy plan examples .

4. Competitive analysis

Identify your competitors and analyze how your products provide a competitive advantage. Competitive analysis and positioning are similar as you will developing a brand that will give an an edge against your competitors.

To create an effective competitive analysis, you should answer these questions: “What are the prices of the products your competitors are selling?” “To which market segment are they catering to?” “What are the distinct features of their products or services?” “How long have they been in the industry?” “What technology are they implementing in their products?” You might be interested in networking strategy plan examples .

5. Market strategy

Revenue goals is the ultimate professional goal of market strategy. Identify and apply methods that you think will reach your customers in the most accessible and convenient way possible, and the methods should always translate to revenues for your business. You can choose from traditional or digital methods, or you can implement both in your market strategy.

As similar to almost all types of business activities, budget is needed to maintain a market strategy business plan. A sizable budget is not mandatory though, as you just need to be smart on how you handle your resources. A budget action plan or schedule is also beneficial as you budget your marketing activities.

Metrics is very helpful in tracking the results of your marketing activities. One software you can use is Google Analytics. This software tracks website visits, the demographics of your website visitors as well as their location, and other visitor information. The great thing about Google Analytics is that the free version does not hold back on the functionality which is very beneficial if you can’t afford the paid version. You may also see website strategy plan examples .

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Template for Marketing Strategy Business Plan Example

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Creating a marketing strategy business plan should be on the top of your priority list when identifying and analyzing the marketing activities of your company. A business, either a small enterprise or large corporation, will not be able to last in the industry it’s operating if it does not implement an effective marketing strategy business plan.

We hope you found this article to be informative as well as helpful when you will be making your own marketing strategy business plan. We have also provided some examples in PDF format for your reference.

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How To Create Marketing Plans for Small Businesses

Big businesses make big plans. They also create elaborate marketing schemes to put those plans into action.

It’s easy for SMB (small and medium business) owners and their teams to feel that a full-fledged marketing plan is out of their reach. While they may lack the resources to go toe to toe with larger competitors in the market, though, that makes the strategic planning and guidance of small business marketing efforts that much more valuable.

Let’s go over what it means to create marketing plans for small businesses, why having a small business marketing strategy is so important for success, and how your business can create its own master marketing plan.

What are Marketing Plans for Small Businesses?

A marketing plan, at its most fundamental level, is a series of steps that you can take to promote your brand and its products and services to consumers. In other words, a marketing plan isn’t your actual marketing activity. It’s the strategy or guidelines that you create to set those initiatives in motion. 

In the context of marketing plans for small businesses, this could include anything from creating a website to crafting an email drip campaign, drafting a social media marketing campaign, building credibility through digital PR , and more. A small business marketing plan takes the limited resources of a small business and considers how that entity can effectively reach its target audience with its marketing.

Why are Marketing Plans for Small Businesses Important?

Grasping the goal of a marketing plan is the easy part. For a small business team with finite time and resources, justifying the investment in a marketing plan is where things can bog down.  

It’s tempting to redirect your team’s efforts toward activities with more immediate or tangible results, such as sales or product development. When you take the time to invest in a genuine growth-oriented marketing plan , though, you can provide a long-term blueprint for growth that you simply can’t recreate through other areas of business activity.

The goal of a marketing plan is to create basic parameters, such as a schedule and marketing budget, that help you optimize your promotional resources. Developing the plan itself may require some extra investment, but the benefits are well worth it.  

By planning ahead of time, you give yourself the opportunity to consider all of your marketing options. It also allows you to either establish or revisit key factors, such as your target audience, primary selling points, and your competition. From there, you can decide which marketing activities are the most cost-effective and beneficial for your brand, as well as the order in which you need to execute them.  

For example, a marketing plan might reveal that paying for ongoing PPC (pay-per-click) ads is exorbitant and expensive over the long term. It also may reveal that the money saved from slashing your PPC ads in half allows you to invest in a content marketing strategy. From there, you can plot out the steps required to generate, optimize, and promote that content (see the next section) as an effective way to put your marketing in motion. 

Small business marketing plans also allow you to gauge the ROI of your marketing investments over time. This gives you the ability to make adjustments and maximize results as you go along. It also frees you up to be more creative in your long-term approach to marketing by building on past successes that you otherwise might not have known about.

What Should You Include in Marketing Plans for Small Businesses?

If you’re sold on the concept of developing a marketing plan for your small business but aren’t quite sure where to start, you’ve come to the right place. In the following section, we’ll break

down a step-by-step analysis of how you can turn your marketing ambitions into a solid plan of action that can guide you.

Step 1: Define Your Goals

It’s easy to skip this step, but trust us, you don’t want to do that. Most small business owners think they know their marketing goals — and in a certain sense, that’s true. As an involved executive of a smaller enterprise, you probably have your finger on the pulse of your organization more than most leaders. 

But that proximity to daily operations and activities can also make it easy to cloud out the big-picture stuff at times. Before you establish your marketing plan, take a minute to step back. 

What are you trying to accomplish with your marketing in the next year? What about the next five years? Do you want to generate revenue? Build brand awareness? Increase online visibility? Spark long-term growth? 

Each goal is related to your marketing, but the differences are important. Get each specific marketing goal in place before you flesh out your plan.

Step 2: Identify Your Audience

Your target audience should be the central focal point of your entire operation. When you develop products, you should consider whom they serve. When you bring them to market, you want to consider how to communicate to a select group of consumers that they’re available to solve their problems.

Make sure you have a buyer persona in place that reflects precisely whom you’re trying to market to and what their pain points are. If you’ve already considered what your customer base looks like, use this step to review that data and ensure that it’s informed by up-to-date market research.

Step 3: Consider Resources and Competition

As a final step to set the stage for your planning, review what resources you have available. As a small business, do you have a marketing team, or does that responsibility overlap with other employees (or yourself)? How much time do you have to invest in marketing? What is your marketing budget? What assets do you already have, such as a CRM or social media marketing tools?

Also, consider conducting a fresh round of competitive analysis. You likely did this when you were pulling together your business plan. Go back and observe how your competitors are marketing themselves to your target audience. Note the pros and cons of their efforts.

Step 4: Identify the Marketing Tactics You Can Use

Now comes the marketing magic. Once you’ve considered your goals, target audience, resources, and competition, it’s time to bring it all together. 

Consider the marketing tactics you have available and which ones best meet your current marketing needs. Then, weave these marketing ideas into a plan that considers resources and timelines. A few common marketing tactics that work well for small businesses include:

• Creating a strong website : This becomes your central online presence and a place to host your blogs, user-generated content, landing pages, and other content marketing.
• Optimizing your website : SEO is important. Optimizing your site with long-tail keyword phrases, links, and technical SEO (think metadata, mobile-friendly, etc.) is a powerful way to maximize your content creation efforts.
• Build up off-site marketing : Create a social media presence using platforms your target audience prefers. Nurture email marketing, as well, including drip campaigns, newsletters, and targeted announcements.
• Organize leads in a CRM : As a small business owner, you want to stay organized. When your marketing begins to gain momentum, have a customer relationship management (CRM) platform ready to keep things organized and under control.

Remember, you’re a small business with limited marketing resources. Consider which tactic is particularly relevant to your brand at the moment, and invest in those areas first.

Step 5: Establish Success Metrics and Feedback Loops

Finally, consider how you’ll track your marketing over time. Use tools like Google Analytics 4 to keep tabs on important marketing metrics, such as ranking for brand keywords, measuring organic traffic, and tracking conversions.

Also, request feedback from customers and team members and then use that information to hone your marketing activities moving forward. If you’re unsure how to adapt your plan (or create one in the first place), consider working with a growth marketing agency that can bring a cost-effective degree of experience and knowledge to bear on your brand’s marketing initiatives.

Building Master Marketing Plans for Small Businesses

As a small business, you may have limited time, money, and tools to work with. However, that doesn’t mean investing in a marketing plan isn’t worth it.

On the contrary, creating an effective marketing strategy helps you ensure that every ounce of resources you pour into promoting your business has a purpose. This gives you the best chance of sparking genuine, measurable growth, which can enable you to build larger marketing budgets, plans, and strategies in the future.

Marketing Plan for Private Practice

Carepatron's free PDF download can help you develop a comprehensive marketing plan for your private practice. Learn from real-life examples and boost your business today!

By Wynona Jugueta on May 19, 2024.

Fact Checked by Ericka Pingol.

Marketing in the healthcare industry

Marketing in the healthcare industry plays a pivotal role in promoting practices and refer clients. Essentially, it involves promoting and advertising healthcare services to attract patients and build a robust clientele base. Effective marketing is essential for private practices to stand out in a competitive landscape and connect with individuals seeking mental health services and other specialized care.

In today's digital age, leveraging online platforms such as social media has become a cornerstone of private practice marketing. Social media provides a dynamic avenue to engage with potential clients, start blogging and share valuable insights, and showcase expertise. Creating informative blog posts tailored to address common concerns or questions within the niche is a great way to establish authority and attract organic traffic to your website.

Marketing your private practice requires a nuanced approach that considers the unique needs of your target demographic and the competitive landscape. Collaborating with other mental health professionals or healthcare organizations can also be beneficial in expanding your reach and attracting referrals. Ultimately, effective marketing strategies not only increase visibility but also foster trust and credibility among potential clients, driving the growth and success of your private practice.

Printable Marketing Plan for Private Practice

Download this Marketing Plan for Private Practice to effectively grow your patient base and enhance your practice's visibility.

How can you market your private practice to potential clients?

In today's competitive landscape, effectively marketing your private practice is essential for attracting potential clients and growing your business profile. Here are some proven strategies to help you reach and connect with your target market:

Establish a professional website

A professional website serves as the virtual storefront for your practice. Ensure that it is visually appealing, easy to navigate, and provides essential information about your services, expertise, and contact details. Incorporating search engine optimization (SEO) techniques can also help improve your website's visibility on search engines, making it easier for potential clients to find you online.

Engage in social media marketing

Utilize social media platforms such as Facebook, Instagram, and LinkedIn to connect with your audience and share valuable content. Regularly posting updates, educational website content, and testimonials can help build credibility and attract more clients. Engaging with your audience through comments, direct messages, and live sessions can foster deeper connections and trust.

Create informative blog posts

Blogging is a powerful way to establish yourself as an authority in your field and attract organic traffic to your website. Write blog posts that address common concerns or questions your ideal clients may have, providing valuable insights and solutions. Sharing personal experiences or case studies can also help prospective clients relate to your expertise and services.

Collaborate with other professionals

Forming mutually beneficial partnerships with other professionals in related fields can expand your reach and attract more clients. Consider partnering with therapists, physicians, or wellness practitioners to cross-promote services or offer joint workshops or events. Networking within your community or professional associations can also lead to valuable referrals.

How to write a marketing plan for your therapy practice

Crafting a marketing plan is essential for effectively promoting your therapy practice and attracting prospective clients. Here are the key steps to consider when writing a comprehensive marketing plan tailored to your practice:

Step 1: Define your target audience

Identify your ideal client demographic, including age, gender, location, and specific mental health concerns. Understanding your target market will allow you to tailor your marketing steps to reach and resonate with prospective clients effectively.

Step 2: Set clear marketing goals

Establish measurable marketing goals that align with your practice's growth objectives. Whether it's increasing website traffic, growing your social media following, or attracting a certain number of new clients, having clear goals will guide you on how you market your private practice.

Step 3: Identify your unique selling proposition (USP)

Determine what sets your therapy practice apart from others in the market. This could be your specialized expertise, unique approach to therapy, or specific services offered. Highlighting your USP in your marketing materials will help attract possible clients who resonate with your unique offerings.

Step 4: Choose effective marketing channels

Select the most relevant online marketing channels to reach your target audience effectively. This may include social media apps such as Facebook, Instagram, or LinkedIn, as well as your practice website, email newsletters, and posting a blog post. Tailor your messaging and content to each platform to maximize engagement and attract possible clients.

Step 5: Develop content marketing strategy

Create valuable and informative, helpful content that resonates with your target audience's needs and interests. This could include blog posts, articles, videos, or podcasts addressing common mental health concerns, therapeutic techniques, or self-care tips. Consistently sharing high quality content will position you as a trusted authority in your field and attract prospective clients to your own practice.

Step 6: Implement tracking and analytics

Monitor and analyze the performance of your marketing ways using tracking tools and analytics. Measure key metrics such as website traffic, social media engagement, and ideal client inquiries to evaluate the effectiveness of your marketing steps. Use this data to make informed adjustments and optimizations to continuously improve your marketing plan and attract more clients to your practice.

Marketing Plan for Private Practice example (sample)

As a visual aid to assist healthcare practitioners and individuals in crafting their own marketing plans for private practice, we've developed a sample marketing plan template at Carepatron. This sample provides a comprehensive overview of the key elements and strategies for effectively marketing a private practice.

Our marketing plan example covers essential aspects such as defining target demographics, setting measurable goals, selecting appropriate marketing channels, and creating engaging content. It is a practical guide for structuring your marketing ways and maximizing your practice's visibility and reach.

With a clear and actionable marketing plan, healthcare practitioners can effectively promote their private practice, increase client inquiries, and drive business growth and success. Explore our sample marketing plan template to kickstart your journey towards marketing success in private practice.

Download this free Marketing Plan for Private Practice example here

Tips for using social media in your marketing strategy

Incorporating social media into your marketing strategy can significantly enhance your visibility and reach within your target market. Here are seven tips to help you effectively leverage social media for promoting your therapy services or counseling practice:

Define your social media goals

Before diving into social media marketing, establish clear objectives aligned with your overall marketing goals. Whether your goals are increasing brand awareness, driving traffic, or attracting new clients, defining them will guide your social media strategy and measure its success.

Choose the right platforms

Identify which social media apps your target market frequents and focus your efforts there. For instance, LinkedIn may be more suitable if you primarily serve professionals, while Facebook and Instagram are ideal for reaching a broader demographic.

Optimize your profiles

Ensure that your social media profiles are complete, accurate, and reflect your brand identity. Use high-quality images, concise descriptions, and relevant keywords to optimize your profiles for visibility in search results and online directories such as Google Maps.

Share valuable content regularly

Keep your wider audience engaged by sharing informative and engaging content regularly. This could include tips for mental well-being, inspirational quotes, success stories, or relevant industry news. Aim to provide value to your followers and establish yourself as a reputable source of information.

Encourage client testimonials

Happy clients can be powerful advocates for your practice. Encourage them to share their positive experiences on social media apps or review sites. Client testimonials can build trust and credibility with prospective clients and enhance your reputation within the community.

Network with professional organizations

Joining and actively participating in professional groups and online communities related to mental health can expand your network and visibility. Engage in discussions, share your expertise, and connect with colleagues to establish valuable professional relationships.

Attend networking events and community organizations

Attend local networking events, workshops, or seminars hosted by community organizations to connect with prospective clients and referral sources. Building relationships in-person can complement your online efforts and strengthen your presence within the community.

Enhance your private practice marketing efforts with Carepatron

Effective marketing is crucial for private practitioners to attract and retain clients. Carepatron offers comprehensive tools and solutions to streamline and enhance your private practice marketing ways.

Practice management software

Carepatron's practice management software empowers medical practitioners to efficiently manage every aspect of their practice, from scheduling appointments to billing and invoicing. With intuitive features and customizable workflows, practitioners can optimize their operations and focus more on delivering quality care to their patients.

Electronic patient records

Carepatron's electronic patient records system allows medical practitioners to store and access patient information securely anytime, anywhere. This system streamlines administrative tasks, improves accuracy, and enhances patient care by making all relevant medical data readily available at your fingertips.

Telehealth platform

In today's digital age, telehealth has become essential to healthcare delivery. Carepatron's telehealth platform enables medical practitioners to conduct virtual consultations with patients, providing convenient access to care while expanding their reach beyond geographical boundaries.

Commonly asked questions

Marketing a private practice involves defining your target market, leveraging online and offline channels such as social media, networking events, and referral partnerships, and consistently promoting your services to attract clients.

To include a marketing plan in your business plan, outline your target market, competitive analysis, marketing strategies, tactics, budget, and metrics for measuring success.

Lay out a marketing plan by defining your objectives, identifying your target market, outlining strategies and tactics, setting a budget, establishing timelines, and assigning responsibilities.

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Relationship Marketing: What It Is, Examples & Top 7 Benefits

Maintaining strong relationships with customers is more important than ever. Relationship marketing, a strategy focused on building long-term connections and fostering loyalty, has emerged as a key differentiator for businesses seeking sustainable growth. Explore the principles of relationship marketing and how organizations can leverage tools like QuestionPro to cultivate meaningful connections with their customer base.

What is Relationship Marketing?

Relationship marketing is a customer-centric approach that prioritizes cultivating lasting relationships with customers. Unlike traditional transactional marketing, which focuses solely on driving sales, relationship marketing emphasizes personalized interactions, open communication, and mutual value creation. By understanding customers’ needs, preferences, and behaviors, businesses can tailor their marketing efforts to build trust, loyalty, and emotional connections over time.

Key Principles of Relationship Marketing:

• Customer-Centricity: Relationship marketing puts the customer at the center of all interactions. Businesses can create personalized experiences that resonate with their target audience by prioritizing customer needs and preferences.
• Trust and Transparency: Building trust is foundational to relationship marketing. To foster trust and credibility, businesses must demonstrate transparency, integrity, and reliability in customer interactions.
• Two-Way Communication: Effective relationship marketing requires open and transparent communication channels between businesses and customers. By actively listening to customer feedback, addressing concerns, and soliciting input, businesses can strengthen their relationships and demonstrate their commitment to customer satisfaction.
• Value Creation: Relationship marketing focuses on delivering customer value beyond the transactional exchange. Whether through exceptional service, personalized recommendations, or exclusive offers, businesses must continuously seek opportunities to enhance the customer experience and add value to their lives.
• Long-Term Perspective: Relationship marketing is not about short-term gains; it’s about building enduring relationships that stand the test of time. Businesses must adopt a long-term perspective and invest in nurturing ongoing connections with their customers.

Relationship Marketing Examples

Relationship marketing is a fundamental strategy businesses use to cultivate long-term customer connections. By building trust, loyalty, and engagement, companies can create meaningful relationships that extend beyond individual transactions. In this article, we’ll explore ten inspiring examples of successful relationship marketing initiatives implemented by leading brands.

From loyalty programs and personalized experiences to exceptional customer service and community engagement, these examples demonstrate the power of relationship marketing in strengthening brand-consumer relationships and driving business success. Let’s explore how these brands have mastered the art of fostering lasting connections with their audiences.

Here are some examples of successful relationship marketing:

Top 7 Benefits of Relationship Marketing

Relationship marketing focuses on meaningful connections and personalized experiences, which has emerged as a powerful strategy for businesses looking to cultivate loyal and satisfied customer bases. Let’s explore seven key benefits of relationship marketing and how they can positively impact your business’s bottom line.

• Customer Loyalty: Relationship marketing focuses on creating emotional connections and trust with customers, leading to increased loyalty. Loyal customers are more likely to continue purchasing from a brand even when faced with competitive alternatives.
• Increased Customer Lifetime Value: By nurturing relationships with customers, businesses can maximize their lifetime value by encouraging repeat purchases and upselling or cross-selling additional products or services. Customers who feel valued tend to invest more in the brand over time.
• Enhanced Customer Satisfaction: Relationship marketing involves understanding and meeting the needs and preferences of individual customers. By providing personalized experiences and addressing customer concerns promptly, businesses can enhance overall satisfaction levels and build stronger relationships.
• Improved Brand Reputation: Positive interactions and personalized experiences create a favorable brand image. When customers feel valued and appreciated, they are likelier to speak positively about the brand to others, leading to an enhanced reputation and increased credibility.
• Higher Customer Retention: Building strong customer relationships reduces the likelihood of churn. Customers who feel connected to a brand and satisfied with their experiences are less likely to switch to competitors, resulting in higher retention rates and a more stable customer base.
• Word-of-Mouth Marketing: Satisfied customers are likelier to recommend a brand to friends, family, and colleagues. Positive word-of-mouth referrals can lead to new customers and organic growth, as people trust recommendations from those they know and respect.
• Competitive Advantage: In today’s competitive marketplace, establishing meaningful connections with customers can differentiate a brand from its competitors. Businesses prioritizing relationship marketing can create a unique value proposition based on personalized experiences and exceptional customer service, giving them a competitive edge.

Importance of a Good Relationship Marketing Strategy

A good relationship marketing strategy prioritizes customer-centricity, fosters trust and transparency, enables two-way communication, creates value for customers, and adopts a long-term perspective. Here’s how you can identify a good relationship marketing strategy:

How QuestionPro Supports Relationship Marketing

QuestionPro offers a suite of tools and solutions designed to empower businesses in their relationship marketing efforts. From robust survey software to powerful customer feedback tools, QuestionPro enables organizations to gather valuable insights, engage with customers effectively, and build lasting connections. Here’s how QuestionPro can support relationship marketing initiatives:

• Customer Feedback Surveys: With QuestionPro’s survey software, businesses can collect customer feedback at every touchpoint, gaining valuable insights into their needs, preferences, and satisfaction levels. By leveraging customer feedback, businesses can identify areas for improvement and tailor their offerings to meet customer expectations better.
• Net Promoter Score (NPS) Surveys: QuestionPro’s NPS surveys allow businesses to measure customer loyalty and satisfaction, helping them identify promoters, passives, and detractors. By understanding customer sentiment, businesses can proactively address issues, strengthen relationships with promoters, and mitigate churn among detractors.
• Audience Response Tools: QuestionPro’s audience response tools, such as LivePolls and real-time feedback features, enable businesses to engage with customers during events, presentations, and meetings. By soliciting input and facilitating interactive discussions, businesses can enhance participant engagement and foster connections with their audience.
• Customer Journey Mapping: QuestionPro’s customer journey mapping tools enable businesses to visualize and understand the end-to-end customer experience. By mapping customer touchpoints, pain points, and interactions, businesses can identify opportunities to optimize the customer journey and deliver seamless, personalized experiences at every stage.
• Personalized Email Campaigns: With QuestionPro’s email marketing tools, businesses can create and send personalized email campaigns tailored to individual customer preferences and behaviors. Businesses can strengthen their relationships and drive engagement by delivering relevant content and offers directly to customers’ inboxes.

Relationship marketing has become a strategic imperative for businesses looking to differentiate themselves and drive sustainable growth. Businesses can cultivate meaningful connections with their customers and establish a competitive advantage by prioritizing customer-centricity, trust, communication, value creation, and long-term relationships.

With tools like QuestionPro, businesses can unlock new opportunities to engage with customers, gather valuable insights, and build lasting relationships that drive success in the digital age.

LEARN MORE         FREE TRIAL

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Free MS Word Strategic Planning Templates

By Courtney Patterson | May 11, 2024

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Below is a collection of the best strategic planning templates in Microsoft Word to help you create a comprehensive roadmap for future growth and success.

Included in this article, you'll find: 

• A one-page business strategy template
• A Microsoft Word IT Strategic Plan Template
• A 5-year strategic business plan template
• A nonprofit strategic plan template
• A list of related strategic planning templates

Microsoft Word Basic Strategic Plan Template

Download the Sample Basic Strategic Plan Template for Microsoft Word   Download the Blank Basic Strategic Plan Template for Microsoft Word  

When to Use This Template : Use this template with or without sample data when you are starting your business and need to outline a clear direction and foundational strategies. This tool is crucial for transitioning from an informal approach to a more structured strategic planning process. 

Notable Template Features : This basic strategic plan template simplifies the planning process with a clear, easy-to-follow structure that covers essential strategic elements. It includes sections for mission and vision statements, a SWOT analysis, goals, and action plans, making it accessible for first-time strategists.

Check out these  free strategic planning templates that offer robust resources, including ready-to-use frameworks and expert advice, so you can meticulously craft and execute your strategic vision.

Microsoft Word One-Page Business Strategic Plan Template

Download Sample One-Page Business Strategic Plan Template for Microsoft Word Download Blank One-Page Business Strategic Plan Template for Microsoft Word

When to Use This Template : Consider this template when you’re on a deadline and need a swift, comprehensive snapshot of your strategy. Available with or without sample data, the template is ideal for pre-meeting preparations, allowing you to quickly and thoroughly review your strategic position.

Notable Template Features : This one-page business strategic plan template boils down intricate strategies to a single, accessible page. Featuring streamlined sections for goals, actions, and metrics, it delivers a clear and concise strategic outline that's easy to share and discuss. Download the sample version for a pre-filled template, or try the blank version to fill in the sections with your own data.

Check out this  strategic planning guide , complete with free templates that offer you all the tools and insights you need to expertly develop and implement your strategic plans.

Microsoft Word IT Strategic Plan Template

Download Microsoft Word IT Strategic Plan Template Download Sample IT Strategic Plan Template  

When to Use This Template : Dive into this template when your IT department is gearing up for a major overhaul or aligning with new business strategies. Available with or without example text, the template is a must-have for plotting out the technological roadmap that supports your organization's long-term vision.

Notable Template Features : This IT strategic plan template features IT-specific sections, such as technology assessments and future roadmaps, making it a powerhouse for managing and planning IT investments. The template includes detailed prompts, so you can thoroughly address and align each aspect of your IT strategy, from cybersecurity to cloud computing, with overarching business objectives.

Explore this  article on crafting strategic plans . It offers a treasure trove of free templates to guide your team through the strategic planning process, ensuring a seamless and effective strategy formulation.

Microsoft Word Advanced Strategic Planning Template

Download the Sample Advanced Strategic Planning Template for Microsoft Word Download the Blank Advanced Strategic Planning Template for Microsoft Word

When to Use This Template : Turn to this dynamic template with or without sample data when you’re ready to plan an all-inclusive strategy. Perfect for times of significant growth or change, it's especially useful for teams looking to blend comprehensive market insights with long-term planning.

Notable Template Features : This advanced strategic planning template is designed to guide you through every facet of strategic development, from SWOT analysis to detailed financial planning. Offering structured sections for an all-encompassing view of your business landscape, it ensures that you have a robust foundation for decision-making and future growth. Download the sample version for a pre-filled template, or try the blank version to fill in your own data.

Dive into this comprehensive  guide on strategic planning model templates to access a diverse array of free resources and streamline the path to your strategic goals.

Microsoft Word One-Year Strategic Business Plan Template

Download Sample One-Year Strategic Business Plan Template for Microsoft Word Download Blank One-Year Strategic Business Plan Template for Microsoft Word

When to Use This Template : Use this one-year template with or without sample data to reach your key goals within the next year. It's a must for companies looking to translate annual objectives into clear, actionable steps.

Notable Template Features : This one-year strategic business plan template is designed with simplicity in mind, featuring sections that help break down goals into achievable actions and timelines. The template’s streamlined approach ensures that you can focus on what matters most, making it easier to track progress and adjust strategies as needed.

Microsoft Word 5-Year Strategic Business Plan Template

Download the Sample 5-Year Strategic Business Plan Template for Microsoft Word Download the Blank 5-Year Strategic Business Plan Template for Microsoft Word

When to Use This Template : Use this template to lay the strategic groundwork for the medium-term achievements your organization aims to reach in the next five years. Available with or without sample text, it's perfect for transitioning from startup to established entity, allowing you to focus on expansion and scalability.

Notable Template Features : This 5-year strategic business plan template empowers you to set ambitious yet attainable goals and create strategies for market expansion. It also includes tools for financial forecasting and resource allocation, making it easier to manage growth and measure success over a longer period.

Microsoft Word Long-Term Strategic Business Plan Template

Download the Long-Term Strategic Business Plan Template for Microsoft Word

When to Use This Template : Use this template when you’re aiming for a plan of 10 years or longer and envisioning your business's journey toward long-term innovation and industry leadership.

Notable Template Features : Featuring a decade-spanning outlook, this long-term strategic plan template empowers you to set visionary goals and detailed strategies for sustainable growth and innovation. It’s designed to help you align your long-range plans with actionable steps, ensuring every department is moving toward a common, ambitious future.

Microsoft Word University Strategic Plan Outline Template

Download Sample University Strategic Plan Outline Template for Microsoft Word Download Blank University Strategic Plan Outline Template for Microsoft Word

When to Use This Template : This template helps university leaders chart a future course that enriches academic excellence and campus life. Use it during periods of strategic reflection or in advance of accreditation reviews to ensure all goals align with the institution's mission and vision.

Notable Template Features : Tailored to the academic sector, this strategic plan outline includes sections for setting educational priorities, creating a strategy for program development, and planning campus enhancements. Available with or without example text, it facilitates a comprehensive approach to institutional growth, encouraging stakeholder engagement and long-term planning for academic and infrastructural improvements.

Microsoft Word Marketing Strategic Planning Template

Download the Sample Marketing Strategic Planning Template for Microsoft Word Download the Blank Marketing Strategic Planning Template for Microsoft Word

When to Use This Template : Turn to this template when you're preparing to put a new product on the market or revamping your brand's presence. It's ideal for synchronizing your marketing initiatives with your overarching business goals.

Notable Template Features : This template with or without sample data stands out with its clear sections for defining marketing objectives, pinpointing your audience, and crafting detailed campaign strategies. It supports marketers by laying out a comprehensive plan that not only attracts but also retains customers, ensuring all marketing activities are in lockstep with the business's vision and objectives. Try the pre-filled template to see sample text, or use the blank template to fill in your own data.

Microsoft Word Nonprofit Strategic Plan Template

Download the Nonprofit Strategic Plan Template for Microsoft Word

When to Use This Template : Reach for this template when your nonprofit is gearing up for a period of strategic renewal or aiming to better align its efforts with its core mission. Helping you clearly articulate your organization's direction and impact, this tool is crucial for running annual planning sessions or preparing funding and grant applications.

Notable Template Features : This template is designed specifically for nonprofit organizations, featuring sections dedicated to mission statement clarification, stakeholder engagement strategies, and impact assessment methods. It offers a comprehensive framework for nonprofits to navigate the complexities of sustainability and mission-driven planning, ensuring every activity contributes to long-term success.

Related Strategic Planning Templates

Discover this list of free templates that perfectly complement your strategic planning needs. From business model canvases to detailed market analyses and customer journeys, these tools ensure a solid value proposition and guide your business toward success.

Free Microsoft Word Action Plan Templates

Check out these  free Microsoft Word action plan templates for tools to streamline your project planning, enhance your task management, and achieve your goals more efficiently.

Free Gap Analysis Templates

Explore this  collection of free gap analysis templates to help you identify the discrepancies between your business's current state and its desired future state, offering a clear pathway for strategic improvement and goal achievement.

Free Scenario Analysis Templates

Use these  free scenario analysis templates to get frameworks that prepare you for various future possibilities, enabling strategic decision-making and risk management.

Secure Your Organization’s Future Success with Strategic Planning Templates from Smartsheet

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The Smartsheet platform makes it easy to plan, capture, manage, and report on work from anywhere, helping your team be more effective and get more done. Report on key metrics and get real-time visibility into work as it happens with roll-up reports, dashboards, and automated workflows built to keep your team connected and informed. 

When teams have clarity into the work getting done, there’s no telling how much more they can accomplish in the same amount of time.  Try Smartsheet for free, today.

Discover why over 90% of Fortune 100 companies trust Smartsheet to get work done.

More From Forbes

Top 5 essentials for new entrepreneurs starting a business.

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Top 5 Essentials For New Entrepreneurs

Being an entrepreneur is one of the most exciting and rewarding endeavors you can undertake. It offers the freedom to innovate, the opportunity to pursue your passion, and the potential for significant personal and financial growth. Because the path to entrepreneurial success is filled with challenges, it's crucial for new entrepreneurs to set themselves up for success by establishing a solid foundation from the start.

Having the right skills is crucial for setting your business up for success. These skills enable you to navigate the complexities of entrepreneurship with confidence and precision. Effective communication, strategic thinking, financial literacy , and marketing acumen are just a few of the essential competencies that can help you make informed decisions, manage resources efficiently, and adapt to changing market conditions. By honing these skills, you can build a resilient business, attract and retain customers, and create a sustainable growth strategy.

In essence, the right skills empower you to transform challenges into opportunities, driving your business toward long-term success.

Here are the top five essentials every new entrepreneur needs when starting a business:

1. clear vision and mission.

Your vision and mission are the cornerstones of your business. They define what you want to achieve and how you plan to get there. A clear vision provides direction and purpose, while a mission statement outlines your business's core values and goals. These elements not only guide your decision-making but also inspire your team and attract customers who resonate with your purpose.

Tip: Spend time refining your vision and mission. Make sure they are specific, achievable, and aligned with your personal values.

2. Comprehensive Business Plan

Apple ios 17 5 major iphone software release should you upgrade, baby reindeer piers morgan seeks richard gadd for interview after real martha segment, if you feel out of place at work here are five strategies for success.

A well-thought-out business plan is essential for laying out your roadmap to success. It should include your business goals, target market analysis, competitive landscape, marketing strategy, operational plan, and financial projections. A robust business plan helps you stay focused, secure funding, and measure your progress.

Tip: Use business plan templates and resources available online to structure your plan. Regularly update it as your business evolves.

3. Strong Financial Management

Don’t underestimate the importance of financial management . Sound financial management skills are crucial to build a financially stable business. This involves budgeting, forecasting, managing cash flow, and keeping accurate financial records. Understanding your finances allows you to make informed decisions, avoid unnecessary debt, and ensure your business remains profitable.

Tip: Consider hiring a professional accountant or using accounting software to keep your finances in order. Review your financial statements at a minimum of monthly to stay current on your business’s financial health.

4. Solid Marketing Strategy

A strategic marketing plan is vital for attracting and retaining customers. This includes understanding your target audience, creating a strong brand identity, leveraging social media, and utilizing various marketing channels to reach potential customers. Consistent and effective marketing helps build brand awareness and drives sales.

Tip: Invest in digital marketing tools and techniques such as SEO, content marketing, and email marketing. Track your marketing efforts and adjust your strategies based on what works best.

5. Supportive Network and Resources

Building a supportive network of mentors, advisors, and peers can significantly impact your entrepreneurial journey. These connections provide valuable advice, support, and opportunities for collaboration. Additionally, access to resources such as industry events, workshops, and online communities can help you stay informed and motivated.

Tip: Join local business groups, attend industry conferences, and engage with online forums. Don’t hesitate to seek mentorship and build relationships with experienced entrepreneurs.

The bottom line is that embarking on the entrepreneurial journey is both thrilling and demanding. By focusing on these five essentials—clear vision and mission, comprehensive business plan, strong financial management, solid marketing strategy, and supportive network and resources—you can set a strong foundation for your business. Remember, success doesn’t happen overnight. Stay committed, keep learning, and adapt as needed. With determination and the right tools, you can turn your entrepreneurial dreams into reality.

Melissa Houston, CPA is the author of Cash Confident: An Entrepreneur’s Guide to Creating a Profitable Business and the founder of She Means Profit . As a Business Strategist for small business owners, Melissa helps women making mid-career shifts, to launch their dream businesses, and I also guide established business owners to grow their businesses to more profitably.

The opinions expressed in this article are not intended to

replace any professional or expert accounting and/or tax advice whatsoever.

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