marketing plan vs market research

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Market research vs. marketing research — What’s the difference?

Have you ever wondered whether there's a difference between market research and marketing research? Although these two terms are often used interchangeably, they have some qualities that differentiate them.

The four Ps of marketing

To understand the difference between market research and marketing research, you first have to understand the ‘ marketing mix ’, otherwise known as the Four Ps of Marketing :

• Product (goods or service)
• Price (how much the customer pays)
• Place (where the product is marketed)
• Promotion (advertising and PR)

These are the four essential key factors involved in marketing goods or services. They all need to function optimally together for those goods or services to be a success in the marketplace.

What is market research?

Market research studies a target market. It collects data about that marketplace and the consumers within it.

It deals with only one P of Marketing – Place . Place in this context means a specific market or segment .

Market research gathers, analyzes and interprets data about:

• that specific market
• a product, service or developing concept to be offered for sale in that market
• customers (present, past and future) for that product, service or concept

Market research delves into a variety of the target market’s areas: needs, wants, spending habits and characteristics. It can also make comparisons with the competition and industry standards. Market research is the first port of call for a business to assess how viable new goods or service are for their target market. In the process, it can often reveal new target markets and customer wants and needs.

A typical market research process is as follows:

• An issue gets identified
• Decide who will conduct the research (in-house or an external agency)
• Choose appropriate market research techniques
• Gather data
• Organize, interpret and analyze data
• Report back findings

What is marketing research?

Marketing research is much broader. It deals with all four Ps of Marketing – including Place. It covers diverse areas, some of which market research wouldn’t touch, and others where it would only touch lightly:

• New product research
• Product development
• Advertising research
• Customer research
• Distribution methods
• Public relations

In essence, marketing research covers the conception, development, placement and evolution of a product or service, its growing audience and its branding – all the way from brand awareness to, we hope, brand equity .

Market research, because it emphasizes Place, is an integral part of marketing research. We could sum it up like this: market research is a subset of marketing research.

A typical marketing research process is as follows:

• Identify an issue, discuss alternatives and set out research objectives
• Develop a research program
• Gather information
• Organize and analyze information and data
• Present findings
• Make a decision based on the research

Free ebook: Guide to Modern Agile Research

The differences between marketing research and market research

Although market research informs marketing research, the table below compares the considerable differences between them.

The similarities between marketing research and market research

• crucial for a business’s success.
• research projects, and as such produce valuable data.
• useful for quantitative and qualitative tools and techniques such as surveys, focus groups, questionnaires and interviews to gather information
• effective for making decisions regarding type and quality of products and services offered to customers, suitable locations for the business, the best advertising, and the most efficient distribution channels and networks.

We offer research services for both marketing research and its subset, market research. Run any customer, brand, or product research project with confidence.

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Market Research vs. Marketing Research

Market research vs. marketing research – they may look similar, but there are distinct differences you should know.

By the end of this post, you’ll understand exactly what differentiates market research from marketing research. And be confident in explaining each and how they serve a business .

What is market research?

Market research examines a target market, looking at a marketplace and the people within it . Most market research types can be either primary , secondary, qualitative , or quantitative .

It’s a type of research that typically gathers information tied to a specific research objective.

The process collates, analyzes, and interprets data relating to:

• A target market (or several)
• A service or product
• A target audience – be it past, present, or forward-looking.

A company can use market research to determine many things. A few examples are:

• Whether to take a new product to market.
• Assess the viability of a business within a market.
• Uncover opportunities for growth.
• Decide on investment.
• Develop strategies to enter a new market.

What is marketing research?

Marketing research addresses a broader set of questions than market research. It goes beyond simply looking at the marketplace – considering pricing, product features, positioning, go-to-market strategy, channels, branding, customer journeys, and more. It seeks to answer a more broad set of questions than market research – as it covers the conception, development, delivery, and evolution of a product or service within a market.

• Different marketing channels .
• Opportunities for growth.
• Ad-spend for various channels or products.
• The types of creatives and content to use.
• Organic and paid traffic analysis.
• Website traffic and engagement metrics .
• Social media analysis .

A company can use marketing research to determine many things. A few examples are:

• Which channels deliver ROI for others in the same market.
• Audience demographics , including geography , age, gender, loyalty , search interests, and cross-shopping behaviors of a target audience.
• The most popular pages , content, products, and campaigns.
• The ad creatives and content resonate most with a target audience.
• The levels of pricing, promotions, and packages offered by others in a market.
• Customer journey mapping.

Market vs marketing research similarities

Both marketing and market research are crucial to the success of a business. Although both are different, here are a few areas and ways they can overlap.

• A tool to inform decisions about the type of products or services to offer.
• Types of online market research take the form of a project.
• Seek to provide answers to organizational questions.
• Used to uncover optimal markets or geographical locations to enter.
• Gather information using qualitative and quantitative research methods.

Differences between marketing research and market research

Marketing research looks at products, pricing, positioning, and promotions (the four Ps of marketing), whereas market research focuses mainly on the marketplace.

Market research informs marketing research. However, some believe marketing research is part of market research, whereas others think market research is part of marketing research. To clarify things, I spoke with various leaders in Similarweb – and asked each to explain marketing research vs. market research in their own words.

Here’s what they had to say…

Definition of marketing research vs. marketing research

Marketing research is research around the marketing process. Market research is research around the market/marketplace – sometimes, it’s called business research. Under market research, you have market positioning , market sizing (PAM, TAM, SAM), demand analyses, and comparing different geographies.

There is an overlap between consumer needs, audience demand, and consumer trends are interesting from both a market and marketing perspective. But market research is done when you plan to enter a new market or think about creating a new product when you launch a company or acquire via an M&A/partnership.

Marketing research is done once you already have a product and region, and you need to run marketing activities for this product efficiently and effectively. So I would say the purpose is the most significant difference.

Definition of market research vs. marketing research

Market Research is analyzing the ‘macro’ environment in which your company exists: audiences, major player moves, emerging industries trends, and competitor benchmarking across business impact metrics, e.g. (sales, revenue, job hires, ad spend, customers), etc

Marketing Research is analyzing more at the micro level. So, reviewing either specific or multiple marketing channel activity (PPC, SEO, Referral, Advertising), campaign efficacy, and looking for opportunities to drive ROI on your marketing budget to become more efficient.

As you can see, each person answers the same question with a slightly different sentiment, but fundamentally, they all say the same thing. Market research addresses the marketplace, and marketing research takes a broader view that considers many factors relevant to the marketing mix.

Similarweb: A tool for marketing and market research

Both types of research deliver value to organizations that help shape strategy, uncover opportunities, and enable a razor-sharp focus on efficient growth.

Similarweb Digital Research Intelligence is designed to help you measure the digital world. With coverage that spans web, mobile web, and app data, you can evaluate an entire market in an instant.

• Market research tools
• Company research
• Audience analytics
• Consumer journey Analyzer
• App Intelligence
• Benchmarking tools

Here’s a quick example of how Similarweb Research Intelligence is being used to do market research.

For market research, you’d look at things like market distribution, market size, and perhaps industry leaders and emerging players too. 

Similarweb Digital Marketing Intelligence helps you get granular and uncover the tactics, tools, techniques, and channels used in a market or company at any time.

• Competitive analysis tool
• Keyword research suite
• Ad & Media Intelligence
• Affiliate finder

Wrapping up….

Whether you’re doing market or marketing research, you need up-to-date data , relevant to your research objectives. The information you use must be timely, trustworthy, and telling. What’s more, you need a way to analyze an industry, company, or market fast so you extract the most telling of insights, relevant to your market or marketing strategy.

Similarweb’s suite of Digital intelligence solutions gives you immediate access to timely market and marketing data you can trust . Showing you what’s important, and helping you find insights, trends, and opportunities to leverage in your business.

Stop Guessing, Start Analyzing

Get actionable insights for market research here

Is market research and marketing research the same thing?

Marketing research is an element of market research. Market research is focused on the market and its consumers. In comparison, marketing research looks deeper into the product, pricing, positioning, and promotion.

Can you do marketing research without market research?

You need to do market research to evaluate things like pricing, positioning, promotions, and product. So, you can do market research without marketing research, but you cannot do marketing research without first conducting market research.

Is market research or marketing research best for a start-up?

Both can be important, depending on the industry and stage of the start-up. If it’s pre-launch, you need market research to inform you of the marketplace, and its consumers. Marketing research will help you determine the best opportunities to leverage your market if you’ve already launched.

by Liz March

Digital Research Specialist

Liz March has 15 years of experience in content creation. She enjoys the outdoors, F1, and reading, and is pursuing a BSc in Environmental Science.

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Market Research Vs Marketing Research: 8 Key Differences

Understanding the distinctions between market research vs marketing research is fundamental for any business aiming to make informed decisions and strategize effectively. While the terms might seem interchangeable, they represent distinct domains in the realm of business intelligence. 

Market research hones in on specific markets and consumer behavior, ensuring a product’s viability within a targeted demographic. On the other hand, marketing research casts a wider net, encompassing not just markets but also advertising, pricing, packaging, and public policy. 

Join us as we unravel the nuances, methodologies, and objectives that set these research disciplines apart, shedding light on how each contributes uniquely to business success.

Table of Contents

What Is Market Research?

Market research is a systematic process of gathering, analyzing, and interpreting information about a specific market, industry, or consumer behavior to make informed business decisions. It involves studying market trends, competition, consumer preferences, and other relevant factors to understand the market’s dynamics. Researchers employ various techniques such as surveys, interviews, focus groups, and data analysis to collect and analyze data. 

The objectives of market research include:

• Identifying potential market opportunities.
• Assessing demand for a product or service.
• Evaluating market saturation.
• Understanding consumer needs and preferences.
• Gauging the effectiveness of marketing strategies .

Ultimately, market research provides valuable insights that guide businesses in developing effective marketing, product development, and business strategies.

What Are Some Common Market Research Methods?

Several common market research methods include:

• Surveys and Questionnaires: Gathering data through structured questions to collect opinions, preferences, and demographics from a targeted audience.
• Interviews: Conducting one-on-one or group interviews to delve deeper into individuals’ attitudes, beliefs, and motivations regarding a product or service.
• Focus Groups: Organizing discussions with a small group of participants to explore their perceptions and opinions about a particular product, service, or concept.
• Observational Research: Directly observing and recording behaviors, interactions, and reactions of individuals in natural settings or controlled environments.
• Secondary Research: Analyzing existing data and information from sources like reports, articles, government publications, and industry databases to gather insights and trends.
• Data Analysis: Analyzing collected data using statistical methods and software to derive meaningful patterns, correlations, and trends.
• Competitor Analysis: Evaluating the strategies, strengths, weaknesses, and performance of competitors to identify opportunities and threats in the market.
• Customer Feedback and Reviews: Analyzing customer feedback, reviews, and ratings from various platforms to understand customer satisfaction, preferences, and areas for improvement.
• Social Media Monitoring: Tracking and analyzing conversations, mentions, and trends on social media platforms to gauge public opinion and sentiment about a product, brand, or industry.
• Ethnographic Research: Studying people in their natural environments to understand their behaviors, needs, and cultural influences on product usage and decision-making.
• Mystery Shopping: Sending anonymous individuals to interact with a business or service to assess the quality of customer experience and service provided.
• Online Analytics: Utilizing web analytics to track online user behavior, website traffic, and conversions to optimize online marketing strategies.

What Is Marketing Research?

Marketing research is a systematic process of gathering, analyzing, interpreting, and utilizing information related to a specific market, product, or service. It involves studying various aspects of the market environment, consumer behavior, competitors, and industry trends to make informed and strategic business decisions. 

The main objectives of marketing research include

• identifying market opportunities,
• understanding customer preferences and needs,
• assessing market demand,
• evaluating the effectiveness of marketing strategies and
• aiding in product development and positioning.

What Are Some Common Marketing Research Methods?

Several common marketing research methods include:

• Surveys and Questionnaires: Collecting structured data by asking specific questions to a target audience, either online, by phone, mail, or in-person methods.
• Interviews: Conducting one-on-one or group discussions to obtain detailed insights into consumers’ attitudes, opinions, and behaviors.
• Observational Research: Directly observing and recording consumer behaviors, interactions, and responses in natural or controlled settings.
• Secondary Research: Analyzing existing data from various sources such as reports, publications, articles, and online databases to gather information and insights.
• Data Analysis: Utilizing statistical analysis to interpret collected data and identify patterns, correlations, and trends relevant to the research objectives.
• Competitor Analysis: Evaluating competitors’ strategies, market positioning, strengths, weaknesses, and market share to formulate informed marketing strategies.
• Customer Feedback and Reviews: Analyzing feedback, reviews, and ratings from customers on various platforms to understand satisfaction levels, gather suggestions, and enhance offerings.
• Social Media Monitoring: Monitoring and analyzing conversations, sentiments, and trends on social media platforms to gauge public opinion, brand perception, and emerging market trends.
• Ethnographic Research: Studying consumers in their natural environments to understand cultural and social influences on their behaviors, preferences, and product usage.
• Experimentation and A/B Testing: Conducting controlled experiments to assess consumer responses to different variations of marketing elements such as advertising, pricing, or product features.
• Market Segmentation: Dividing the target market into distinct groups based on demographics, psychographics, behaviors, and preferences to tailor marketing strategies effectively.

Are Marketing Research and Market Research Similar?

Yes, marketing research and market research are related but not identical. Market research is a subfield within the broader domain of marketing research. Market research focuses specifically on understanding a particular market and its consumers.

It delves into consumer behavior, preferences, and market dynamics, aiming to ensure a product’s viability and success in that specific market. On the other hand, marketing research encompasses a more comprehensive scope, including market research as one of its components.

Both market research and marketing research utilize common methodologies such as focus groups, surveys, interviews, and questionnaires to collect both quantitative and qualitative data.

These methods aid in gathering valuable insights that inform decisions related to marketing strategies, product development, pricing, advertising, and more.

To derive beneficial conclusions for business operations, adhering to a systematic research procedure is essential. Each study should address a specific problem statement and follow a structured approach.

The findings obtained from either market research or broader marketing research contribute to informed decision-making.

Key Differences Between Market Research Vs Marketing Research

1. scope focus.

Market research narrows its focus to the study of a particular market and its consumer behavior. It delves into understanding the dynamics, preferences, and trends within that market.

On the other hand, marketing research adopts a broader perspective, encompassing all facets of the marketing discipline.

It encompasses a comprehensive analysis of various elements such as market dynamics, consumer behavior, product development, pricing strategies, promotional activities, and distribution channels.

Marketing research aims to provide a holistic understanding of the entire marketing landscape, enabling informed decision-making and strategy formulation to optimize marketing efforts effectively.

2. Subset Relationship

Market research is a subset within the broader domain of marketing research. While both are essential components of understanding market dynamics, market research specifically focuses on a singular aspect: a detailed examination of a specific market and its consumers.

It’s a crucial piece of the larger puzzle that is marketing research. On the other hand, marketing research is all-encompassing, spanning the complete marketing information system.

It involves a comprehensive study of markets, consumers, competition, marketing strategies, and other factors vital for making informed decisions to steer a business’s marketing initiatives effectively and efficiently.

Market research is a targeted effort aimed at assessing and ensuring the viability and potential success of a product or service within a specific market. It focuses on understanding the specific needs, preferences, behaviors, and buying patterns of consumers within that market. 

On the other hand, marketing research has a broader purpose. It is geared towards gathering information and insights that inform a wide range of marketing strategies and decisions pertaining to economic output. 

4. Applicability

Market research findings are highly specific and pertain only to the market under investigation. The insights gained are tailored to that particular market’s characteristics, making them relevant and actionable in that specific context.

However, these findings might not be directly transferable or applicable to a different market due to varying consumer behaviors, preferences, and market dynamics.

In contrast, marketing research findings possess a broader applicability and can be generalized across diverse situations and markets.

The comprehensive nature of marketing research allows the insights gained to be adapted and utilized across various scenarios, providing a versatile toolkit for making informed decisions in different market settings and strategic contexts.

5. Consumer vs. General Focus

Market research predominantly zooms in on general consumer behavior within a specific market or demographic. It aims to understand how consumers interact with products, services, and brands in a targeted market.

This involves analyzing buying patterns, preferences, attitudes, and other behavioral aspects to tailor strategies accordingly. 

In contrast, marketing research takes a broader approach by systematically delving into a wide array of marketing issues.

It encompasses not only consumer behavior but also a spectrum of marketing elements such as product development, pricing strategies, distribution channels, promotional effectiveness, and market positioning. 

In marketing research, two main types are distinguished: dependent and independent research. Dependent research relies on variables impacted by other factors, often aiming to establish cause-and-effect relationships. Independent research, on the other hand, explores variables without being influenced by other factors, providing a broader view of the subject matter.

Market research, however, is not typically categorized into distinct types like dependent or independent research. Instead, it focuses on understanding specific markets and their unique characteristics, often involving custom approaches tailored to the objectives and requirements of the study.

The emphasis is on gaining insights into the particular market being analyzed rather than fitting into pre-defined categories of research types.

7. Application Scope

Market research narrows its focus to understanding a specific market and consumer habits within it. It’s primarily concerned with assessing market dynamics, consumer preferences, and behavior to determine product-market fit and optimize marketing strategies tailored to that particular market segment.

On the other hand, marketing research takes a broader approach, encompassing a comprehensive study that goes beyond the market and consumer habits. It delves into various marketing elements, such as advertising effectiveness, pricing strategies, packaging, and public policy impacts.

This wider scope allows for a more holistic understanding of the marketing landscape and enables organizations to make informed decisions across diverse facets of their marketing efforts.

8. Knowledge Purpose

The primary aim of market research is to ensure the success of a product or service in a specific market. By studying consumer preferences, behaviors, and market conditions, businesses can align their offerings with what the market demands, increasing the likelihood of product acceptance and success.

In contrast, marketing research serves the purpose of making informed judgments about marketing operations and strategies on a broader scale. It involves analyzing a myriad of marketing aspects to optimize strategies, improve operational efficiency, and make informed decisions that lead to overall marketing effectiveness and organizational growth.

Effective Ways To Conduct Market Research:

Conducting effective market research is crucial for understanding market dynamics, consumer preferences, and competition. Here are steps and strategies to conduct market research effectively:

Define Your Objectives

Clearly outline the goals and objectives of your market research. Determine what specific information or insights you need to gather to drive informed decision-making.

Identify Your Target Audience

Define your target market and audience. Understand their demographics, behaviors, preferences, and needs to tailor your research approach accordingly.

Choose the Right Methodology

Select appropriate research methods such as surveys, interviews, focus groups, observations, or online analytics based on your objectives, target audience, and budget.

Design the Research Tool

Develop well-structured questionnaires, discussion guides, or survey forms that elicit the information needed to meet your research goals. Ensure questions are clear, unbiased, and relevant.

Collect Data

Conduct the research and collect data using the chosen methodology. Ensure consistency, accuracy, and relevance in data collection. Use online platforms, phone interviews, in-person surveys, or a mix of methods.

Analyze Data

Organize and analyze the collected data using appropriate tools and techniques. Identify patterns, trends, correlations, and key insights that address your research objectives.

Interpret Findings

Interpret the analyzed data to derive meaningful insights. Understand consumer behaviors, market trends, and competitive landscapes to inform your marketing strategies.

Draw Conclusions

Summarize the insights and conclusions from the research. Connect the findings to your business goals and objectives, highlighting actionable recommendations.

Make Informed Decisions

Utilize the research findings to make informed marketing, product development, pricing, and promotional decisions. Align your strategies with consumer needs and market trends.

Monitor and Iterate

Continuously monitor the market landscape, consumer behaviors, and competition. Use feedback loops to refine your strategies and adapt to changing market conditions.

Effective Ways To Conduct Marketing Research:

Conducting effective marketing research involves a strategic approach to gathering insights that inform marketing strategies and decisions. Here are effective ways to conduct marketing research:

Define Clear Objectives

Clearly outline what you aim to achieve through the research. Whether it’s understanding consumer preferences, evaluating a new product’s potential, or assessing market competition, well-defined objectives guide the research process.

Understand Your Target Audience

Gain a deep understanding of your target market and audience. Identify their demographics, behaviors, preferences, and pain points. Segment the market to tailor strategies effectively.

Utilize Multiple Data Sources

Combine primary data (collected firsthand) and secondary data (existing data) for a comprehensive view. Use sources like surveys, interviews, focus groups, market reports, industry publications, and online analytics.

Select the Right Methodologies

Choose appropriate research methodologies based on your objectives and audience. Employ surveys, interviews, observations, competitive analysis, social media monitoring, and more to gather diverse insights.

Design Effective Surveys and Questionnaires

Create well-structured and unbiased survey questions. Ensure the questions are clear, concise, and in line with the research objectives. Use a mix of open-ended and close-ended questions for in-depth insights.

Leverage Digital Tools

Utilize online survey platforms and data analytics tools to streamline data collection and analysis. Online tools provide real-time results and help in reaching a broader audience.

Conduct Competitive Analysis

Analyze competitors’ strategies, strengths, weaknesses, and market positioning. Understand their marketing tactics, target audience, pricing strategies, and product offerings to identify gaps and opportunities.

Engage in Focus Groups and Interviews

Organize focus groups or conduct interviews to gather qualitative insights. Engage participants in meaningful discussions to understand their perceptions, attitudes, and motivations.

Interpret and Analyze Data Thoroughly

Analyze collected data using appropriate statistical methods and tools. Extract meaningful patterns, trends, and correlations to derive actionable insights for decision-making.

Stay Updated with Trends and Innovations

Keep up-to-date with the latest marketing trends, technologies, and industry developments. Understanding emerging trends can help refine your strategies and stay ahead of the competition.

Frequently Asked Questions

What is the fundamental difference between market research vs marketing research.

Market research is a subset of marketing research. While market research focuses specifically on a particular market and its consumers, marketing research encompasses a broader spectrum, including market analysis along with other critical marketing elements like advertising, pricing, packaging, and public policy.

Are The Methodologies Used In Market Research And Marketing Research Similar?

Yes, the methodologies overlap significantly. Both market research and marketing research employ methods such as focus groups, surveys, interviews, questionnaires, and data analysis to gather both qualitative and quantitative data for insights.

How Do The Objectives Of Market Research And Marketing Research Differ?

Market research aims to ensure a product’s success in a specific market by understanding consumer behavior and preferences within that market. On the other hand, marketing research focuses on making informed judgments about various marketing operations and strategies for economic output, considering a broader scope beyond a single market.

Can Findings From Marketing Research Be Applied Universally Across Markets?

Yes, findings from marketing research have broader applicability and can be generalized across various markets and situations. In contrast, market research findings are specific to the particular market being studied and may not be directly transferable to different markets due to varying consumer behaviors and market dynamics.

Are There Different Types Of Marketing Research?

Yes, marketing research can be categorized into types such as dependent research, which explores variables impacted by other factors, and independent research, which examines variables without external influences. Market research, however, is not typically classified into distinct types.

What Is The Ultimate Goal Of Conducting Market Research?

The primary goal of market research is to ensure the viability and potential success of a product or service in a specific market. By studying consumer habits, preferences, and market dynamics, businesses can tailor their offerings to meet the demands of that specific market effectively.

How Does Marketing Research Impact Decision-Making For Businesses?

Marketing research plays a pivotal role in shaping informed decisions for businesses. By providing insights into market trends, consumer behaviors, competitive landscapes, and marketing strategies, marketing research guides organizations in optimizing their marketing efforts, enhancing product offerings, and ultimately achieving success in the market.

So, Market Research Vs Marketing Research: Which Is More Effective?

The effectiveness of market research versus marketing research depends on the specific objectives and needs of a business. Market research is more effective when the goal is to ensure the success of a product or service in a particular market by understanding consumer behavior and preferences within that market. It is highly focused and tailored to the nuances of a single market.

On the other hand, marketing research is more effective when the aim is to make informed judgments about various marketing operations and strategies that go beyond one market. It offers a broader perspective, encompassing a comprehensive understanding of marketing elements, allowing for strategies that can be applied across diverse markets and situations. Ultimately, the choice between the two depends on the scope of the research and the extent to which insights need to be generalized or tailored to a specific market.

About The Author

Mahmud kabir.

Dedicated creator and storyteller with a passion for crafting compelling narratives. A perpetual learner, finding inspiration in every experience. Enthusiast of technology, art, and the great outdoors. Striving to make a positive impact through creativity. Believer in kindness, the power of words, and the magic of a good book.

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Market Research vs. Marketing Research – Unveiling the Nuances

Today, we’re venturing into the definition of two often-confused commercial terms: market research and marketing research. While they may battle in the same business arena, understanding their unique steps is crucial for business strategy enhancement.

Though frequently used interchangeably, these distinct business disciplines reveal complex cooperation that, when understood, empowers informed action. This article sheds light on market research definition, marketing research purpose, and the essence of each, showing their individual contributions and complementary value to guide your business towards prosperity.

Exploring Market Research: Customer-Centric Approach

Think of market research as a detective of the business world, constantly gathering leads about customer preferences, market trends, and industry landscapes. Its mission is to uncover the needs, wants, and behaviors of your target audience, not just through gut feeling, but through data collection and analysis. 

This intel comes in various forms, like:

• Surveys and interviews: Uncover demographics, purchase behaviors, and opinions directly from your target audience.
• Product reviews and social media analysis : Gauge sentiment and understand real-world experiences with existing products and services.
• Market reports and industry data: Gather insights on broader trends, competitor analysis, and emerging technologies.

By providing a clear picture of the market landscape, product feasibility analysis, and your customer’s needs, market research helps you to make informed decisions about product development, pricing strategies, and even entering new markets.

Delving into Marketing Research: Comprehensive Marketing Analysis

Now, let’s shift our focus to marketing research , which acts as the director of your marketing efforts. It meticulously aids the effectiveness of your marketing mix analysis, which comprises four Ps: product, price, place, and promotion – and their impact on customer behavior and market decision-making. Picture it as:

• Campaign performance analysis: Evaluating the success of your advertising campaigns, website traffic, and lead generation efforts.
• Go beyond clicks and impressions : Dig deeper into metrics like engagement, conversion rates, and cost per acquisition (CPA) to understand the true effectiveness of your campaigns. Identify which channels and ad formats are driving the most qualified leads and delivering the highest return on investment (ROI).
• Segment your audience: Analyze performance by different audience segments to see which messages resonate most and where to allocate your budget for the best positive response.
• Test and optimize: Continuously test different creative elements, campaign timings, and targeting strategies to refine your approach and maximize results.

Get deeper feedback than clicks and impressions to understand which campaigns drive qualified leads and deliver the highest ROI. Optimize elements, targeting, and budget allocation for maximum impact. 

• Analyze price sensitivity : Conduct surveys to understand how customers respond to different prices. This can help you identify opportunities for price optimization or bulk-selling strategies.
• Monitor competitor pricing: Stay informed about your competitors’ pricing strategies and adjust yours accordingly to maintain a competitive edge.

Track the metrics of your ads beyond sales. Analyze price sensitivity, monitor competitor pricing, and consider bundling strategies to optimize pricing for profit and customer perception.

• Identify touchpoints : Map all the interactions your customers have with your brand, from first awareness to post-purchase support. This can include website visits, social media interactions, email campaigns, customer service calls, and more.
• Pinpoint friction points: Analyze each publicity platform to identify any obstacles or pain points that might hinder customers from moving through the journey. This could be confusing site navigation (poor user interface), a long checkout process, or lack of customer service response. This could be confusing site navigation (poor user interface), a long checkout process, or lack of customer service response.

By diving deeper into these key areas, you’ll gain valuable insights that can help you improve your marketing effectiveness, boost sales, and create a loyal customer base. 

With these insights, marketing research enables you to refine your marketing approach, optimize campaigns for maximum ROI, and ultimately, fuel business growth.

Comparing Market and Marketing Research

While distinct, market vs marketing research aren’t rivals in a fight-to-death game. Rather, they’re important allies working in unison to fuel your business success. Think of it like this:

By combining the two, you gain an interconnected perspective and comprehensive market approach, enabling you to make informed decisions about everything from product development to brand positioning.

Integrating Both Approaches for Business Success

By integrating both approaches, you gain a comprehensive understanding of your market, your customers, and the effectiveness of your marketing efforts. This invaluable knowledge aids informed decision-making in business:

• Product development : Creating products that truly resonate with your target audience.
• Pricing strategies : Setting competitive prices that maximize profits.
• Marketing campaigns : Crafting targeted campaigns that generate higher engagement and conversion rates.
• Resource allocation : Optimizing your marketing budget by allocating resources to proven strategies.
• Market adaptability : Staying ahead of the curve by anticipating market shifts and trends.

Both market and marketing research boost business growth. Regularly revisit these tools to stay informed, adapt to changing business circumstances, and seize new opportunities in the aspect of business strategy integration.

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How to Create a Market Research Plan

Before starting a business, you want to fully research your idea. A market research plan will help you understand your competition, the marketplace and more.

Table of Contents

While having a great idea is an important part of establishing a business, you’ll only get so far without laying the proper groundwork. To help your business take off, not only do you need to size up the competition, but you also need to identify who will buy your product, how much it will cost, the best approach to selling it and how many people will demand it.

To get answers to these questions, you’ll need a market research plan, which you can create yourself or pay a specialist to create for you. Market research plans define an existing problem and/or outline an opportunity. From there, the marketing strategy is broken down task by task. Your plan should include objectives and the methods that you’ll use to achieve those objectives, along with a time frame for completing the work.

What should a market research plan include?

A market research plan should provide a thorough examination of how your product or service will fare in a defined area. It should include:

• An examination of the current marketplace and an analysis of the need for your product or service: To know where you fit in the market, it’s important to have a broad understanding of your industry — covering everything from its annual revenue to the industry standards to the total number of businesses operating within it. Start by gathering statistical data from sources like the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics and BMI Research and consider the industry’s market size, potential customer base and how external factors such as laws, technology, world events and socioeconomic changes impact it.
• An assessment of the competition: By analyzing your competitors, you can discover strategies to fill market gaps. This involves identifying well-known competitors and noting trends they employ successfully, scrutinizing customer feedback about businesses in your sector, such as through online reviews, and understanding competitors’ product or service offerings. This knowledge can then guide the refinement of your own products or services to differentiate them from others in the market.
• Data about customers: Identify which segment of potential customers in your industry you can effectively target, considering their demographics — such as age, ethnicity, income and location and psychographics, including beliefs, values and lifestyle. Learn about the challenges your customers face in their daily lives and determine how the features and benefits of your offerings address their needs.
• The direction for your marketing in the upcoming year: Your plan should provide a clear roadmap for your marketing strategies for the next year, focusing on approaches to distinguish your brand from competitors. Develop marketing messages that resonate with and display empathy toward your target market and find ways to address customers’ needs and demonstrate value.
• Goals to be met: Outline goals your business would like to achieve and make these goals clear to all employees on your team. Create goals that are realistic and attainable while also making a meaningful impact on the business’s growth. Consider factors including your target number of products or services, the expected number of units to sell based on market size, target market behavior, pricing for each item and the cost of production and advertising.

How to create your market research plan

Doing business without having a marketing plan is like driving without directions. You may eventually reach your destination, but there will be many costly and time-consuming mistakes made along the way.

Many entrepreneurs mistakenly believe there is a big demand for their service or product but, in reality, there may not be, your prices may be too high or too low or you may be going into a business with so many restrictions that it’s almost impossible to be successful. A market research plan will help you uncover significant issues or roadblocks.

Step 1. Conduct a comprehensive situation analysis.

One of the first steps in constructing your marketing plan is to create a strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threats (SWOT) analysis , which is used to identify your competition, to know how they operate and then to understand their strengths and weaknesses.

Step 2: Develop clear marketing objectives.

In this section, describe the desired outcome for your marketing plan with realistic and attainable objectives, the targets and a clear and concise time frame. The most common way to approach this is with marketing objectives, which may include the total number of customers and the retention rate, the average volume of purchases, total market share and the proportion of your potential market that makes purchases.

Step 3: Make a financial plan.

A financial plan is essentia l for creating a solid marketing plan. The financial plan answers a range of questions that are critical components of your business, such as how much you intend to sell, what will you charge, how much will it cost to deliver your services or produce your products, how much will it cost for your basic operating expenses and how much financing will you need to operate your business.

In your business plan, be sure to describe who you are, what your business will be about, your business goals and what your inspiration was to buy, begin or grow your business.

Step 4: Determine your target audience.

Once you know what makes you stand out from your competitors and how you’ll market yourself, you should decide who to target with all this information. That’s why your market research plan should delineate your target audience. What are their demographics and how will these qualities affect your plan? How do your company’s current products and services affect which consumers you can realistically make customers? Will that change in the future? All of these questions should be answered in your plan.

Step 5: List your research methods.

Rarely does one research avenue make for a comprehensive market research plan. Instead, your plan should indicate several methods that will be used to determine the market share you can realistically obtain. This way, you get as much information as possible from as many sources as possible. The result is a more robust path toward establishing the exact footprint you desire for your company.

Step 6: Establish a timeline.

With your plan in place, you’ll need to figure out how long your market research process will take. Project management charts are often helpful in this regard as they divide tasks and personnel over a timeframe that you have set. No matter which type of project management chart you use, try to build some flexibility into your timeframe. A two-week buffer toward the home stretch comes in handy when a process scheduled for one week takes two — that buffer will keep you on deadline.

Step 7: Acknowledge ethical concerns.

Market research always presents opportunities for ethical missteps. After all, you’ll need to obtain competitor information and sensitive financial data that may not always be readily available. Your market research plan should thus encourage your team to not take any dicey steps to obtain this information. It may be better to state, “we could not obtain this competitor information,” than to spy on the competitor or pressure their current employees for knowledge. Plus, there’s nothing wrong with simply feeling better about the final state of your plan and how you got it there.

Using a market research firm

If the thought of trying to create your own market research plan seems daunting or too time-consuming, there are plenty of other people willing to do the work for you.

Pros of using a market research firm

As an objective third party, businesses can benefit from a market research firm’s impartial perspective and guidance, helping to shape impactful brand strategies and marketing campaigns. These firms, which can help businesses with everything from their marketing campaigns to brand launches, deliver precise results, drawing on their expertise and experience to provide in-depth insights and solutions tailored specifically to your company’s needs. 

Even more, working with a market research firm can elevate a brand above the competition, as they provide credible and unique research that is highly valued by the media, enhancing brand credibility and potentially increasing website traffic, social media shares and online visibility.

Cons of using a market research firm

Although hiring a firm can provide businesses with tremendous results, certain downsides can lead a business toward the do-it-yourself route. Most notably, market research firms can be a costly expense that some businesses can’t afford. However, businesses that can allocate the funds will likely see a positive return on investment, as they are paying for the expertise and proficiency of seasoned professionals in the field.

Additionally, finding the right market research firm for your business’s needs can take some time — and even longer, ranging from weeks to months, for a market research firm to complete a plan. This lack of immediate results can be detrimental for businesses that don’t have the time to wait. 

Market research firms can charge into the thousands of dollars for a market research plan, but there are ways to get help more affordably, including:

• Outline your plans carefully and spell out objectives.
• Examine as many sources as possible.
• Before paying for any information, check with librarians, small business development centers or market research professors to see if they can help you access market research data for free.
• You may think you’ll need to spend a hefty sum to create a market research plan, but there are plenty of free and low-cost sources available, especially through university business schools that will guide you through the process.

Miranda Fraraccio contributed to this article. 

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Written by Mary Kate Miller | June 1, 2021

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Market research is a cornerstone of all successful, strategic businesses. It can also be daunting for entrepreneurs looking to launch a startup or start a side hustle . What is market research, anyway? And how do you…do it?

We’ll walk you through absolutely everything you need to know about the market research process so that by the end of this guide, you’ll be an expert in market research too. And what’s more important: you’ll have actionable steps you can take to start collecting your own market research.

What Is Market Research?

Market research is the organized process of gathering information about your target customers and market. Market research can help you better understand customer behavior and competitor strengths and weaknesses, as well as provide insight for the best strategies in launching new businesses and products. There are different ways to approach market research, including primary and secondary research and qualitative and quantitative research. The strongest approaches will include a combination of all four.

“Virtually every business can benefit from conducting some market research,” says Niles Koenigsberg of Real FiG Advertising + Marketing . “Market research can help you piece together your [business’s] strengths and weaknesses, along with your prospective opportunities, so that you can understand where your unique differentiators may lie.” Well-honed market research will help your brand stand out from the competition and help you see what you need to do to lead the market. It can also do so much more.

The Purposes of Market Research

Why do market research? It can help you…

• Pinpoint your target market, create buyer personas, and develop a more holistic understanding of your customer base and market.
• Understand current market conditions to evaluate risks and anticipate how your product or service will perform.
• Validate a concept prior to launch.
• Identify gaps in the market that your competitors have created or overlooked.
• Solve problems that have been left unresolved by the existing product/brand offerings.
• Identify opportunities and solutions for new products or services.
• Develop killer marketing strategies .

What Are the Benefits of Market Research?

Strong market research can help your business in many ways. It can…

• Strengthen your market position.
• Help you identify your strengths and weaknesses.
• Help you identify your competitors’ strengths and weaknesses.
• Minimize risk.
• Center your customers’ experience from the get-go.
• Help you create a dynamic strategy based on market conditions and customer needs/demands.

What Are the Basic Methods of Market Research?

The basic methods of market research include surveys, personal interviews, customer observation, and the review of secondary research. In addition to these basic methods, a forward-thinking market research approach incorporates data from the digital landscape like social media analysis, SEO research, gathering feedback via forums, and more. Throughout this guide, we will cover each of the methods commonly used in market research to give you a comprehensive overview.

Primary vs. Secondary Market Research

Primary and secondary are the two main types of market research you can do. The latter relies on research conducted by others. Primary research, on the other hand, refers to the fact-finding efforts you conduct on your own.

This approach is limited, however. It’s likely that the research objectives of these secondary data points differ from your own, and it can be difficult to confirm the veracity of their findings.

Primary Market Research

Primary research is more labor intensive, but it generally yields data that is exponentially more actionable. It can be conducted through interviews, surveys, online research, and your own data collection. Every new business should engage in primary market research prior to launch. It will help you validate that your idea has traction, and it will give you the information you need to help minimize financial risk.

You can hire an agency to conduct this research on your behalf. This brings the benefit of expertise, as you’ll likely work with a market research analyst. The downside is that hiring an agency can be expensive—too expensive for many burgeoning entrepreneurs. That brings us to the second approach. You can also do the market research yourself, which substantially reduces the financial burden of starting a new business .

Secondary Market Research

Secondary research includes resources like government databases and industry-specific data and publications. It can be beneficial to start your market research with secondary sources because it’s widely available and often free-to-access. This information will help you gain a broad overview of the market conditions for your new business.

Identify Your Goals and Your Audience

Before you begin conducting interviews or sending out surveys, you need to set your market research goals. At the end of your market research process, you want to have a clear idea of who your target market is—including demographic information like age, gender, and where they live—but you also want to start with a rough idea of who your audience might be and what you’re trying to achieve with market research.

You can pinpoint your objectives by asking yourself a series of guiding questions:

• What are you hoping to discover through your research?
• Who are you hoping to serve better because of your findings?
• What do you think your market is?
• Who are your competitors?
• Are you testing the reception of a new product category or do you want to see if your product or service solves the problem left by a current gap in the market?
• Are you just…testing the waters to get a sense of how people would react to a new brand?

Once you’ve narrowed down the “what” of your market research goals, you’re ready to move onto how you can best achieve them. Think of it like algebra. Many math problems start with “solve for x.” Once you know what you’re looking for, you can get to work trying to find it. It’s a heck of a lot easier to solve a problem when you know you’re looking for “x” than if you were to say “I’m gonna throw some numbers out there and see if I find a variable.”

How to Do Market Research

This guide outlines every component of a comprehensive market research effort. Take into consideration the goals you have established for your market research, as they will influence which of these elements you’ll want to include in your market research strategy.

Secondary Data

Secondary data allows you to utilize pre-existing data to garner a sense of market conditions and opportunities. You can rely on published market studies, white papers, and public competitive information to start your market research journey.

Secondary data, while useful, is limited and cannot substitute your own primary data. It’s best used for quantitative data that can provide background to your more specific inquiries.

Find Your Customers Online

Once you’ve identified your target market, you can use online gathering spaces and forums to gain insights and give yourself a competitive advantage. Rebecca McCusker of The Creative Content Shop recommends internet recon as a vital tool for gaining a sense of customer needs and sentiment. “Read their posts and comments on forums, YouTube video comments, Facebook group [comments], and even Amazon/Goodreads book comments to get in their heads and see what people are saying.”

If you’re interested in engaging with your target demographic online, there are some general rules you should follow. First, secure the consent of any group moderators to ensure that you are acting within the group guidelines. Failure to do so could result in your eviction from the group.

Not all comments have the same research value. “Focus on the comments and posts with the most comments and highest engagement,” says McCusker. These high-engagement posts can give you a sense of what is already connecting and gaining traction within the group.

Social media can also be a great avenue for finding interview subjects. “LinkedIn is very useful if your [target customer] has a very specific job or works in a very specific industry or sector. It’s amazing the amount of people that will be willing to help,” explains Miguel González, a marketing executive at Dealers League . “My advice here is BE BRAVE, go to LinkedIn, or even to people you know and ask them, do quick interviews and ask real people that belong to that market and segment and get your buyer persona information first hand.”

Market research interviews can provide direct feedback on your brand, product, or service and give you a better understanding of consumer pain points and interests.

When organizing your market research interviews, you want to pay special attention to the sample group you’re selecting, as it will directly impact the information you receive. According to Tanya Zhang, the co-founder of Nimble Made , you want to first determine whether you want to choose a representative sample—for example, interviewing people who match each of the buyer persona/customer profiles you’ve developed—or a random sample.

“A sampling of your usual persona styles, for example, can validate details that you’ve already established about your product, while a random sampling may [help you] discover a new way people may use your product,” Zhang says.

Market Surveys

Market surveys solicit customer inclinations regarding your potential product or service through a series of open-ended questions. This direct outreach to your target audience can provide information on your customers’ preferences, attitudes, buying potential, and more.

Every expert we asked voiced unanimous support for market surveys as a powerful tool for market research. With the advent of various survey tools with accessible pricing—or free use—it’s never been easier to assemble, disseminate, and gather market surveys. While it should also be noted that surveys shouldn’t replace customer interviews , they can be used to supplement customer interviews to give you feedback from a broader audience.

Who to Include in Market Surveys

• Current customers
• Past customers
• Your existing audience (such as social media/newsletter audiences)

Example Questions to Include in Market Surveys

While the exact questions will vary for each business, here are some common, helpful questions that you may want to consider for your market survey. Demographic Questions: the questions that help you understand, demographically, who your target customers are:

• “What is your age?”
• “Where do you live?”
• “What is your gender identity?”
• “What is your household income?”
• “What is your household size?”
• “What do you do for a living?”
• “What is your highest level of education?”

Product-Based Questions: Whether you’re seeking feedback for an existing brand or an entirely new one, these questions will help you get a sense of how people feel about your business, product, or service:

• “How well does/would our product/service meet your needs?”
• “How does our product/service compare to similar products/services that you use?”
• “How long have you been a customer?” or “What is the likelihood that you would be a customer of our brand?

Personal/Informative Questions: the deeper questions that help you understand how your audience thinks and what they care about.

• “What are your biggest challenges?”
• “What’s most important to you?”
• “What do you do for fun (hobbies, interests, activities)?”
• “Where do you seek new information when researching a new product?”
• “How do you like to make purchases?”
• “What is your preferred method for interacting with a brand?”

Survey Tools

Online survey tools make it easy to distribute surveys and collect responses. The best part is that there are many free tools available. If you’re making your own online survey, you may want to consider SurveyMonkey, Typeform, Google Forms, or Zoho Survey.

Competitive Analysis

A competitive analysis is a breakdown of how your business stacks up against the competition. There are many different ways to conduct this analysis. One of the most popular methods is a SWOT analysis, which stands for “strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, and threats.” This type of analysis is helpful because it gives you a more robust understanding of why a customer might choose a competitor over your business. Seeing how you stack up against the competition can give you the direction you need to carve out your place as a market leader.

Social Media Analysis

Social media has fundamentally changed the market research landscape, making it easier than ever to engage with a wide swath of consumers. Follow your current or potential competitors on social media to see what they’re posting and how their audience is engaging with it. Social media can also give you a lower cost opportunity for testing different messaging and brand positioning.

SEO Analysis and Opportunities

SEO analysis can help you identify the digital competition for getting the word out about your brand, product, or service. You won’t want to overlook this valuable information. Search listening tools offer a novel approach to understanding the market and generating the content strategy that will drive business. Tools like Google Trends and Awario can streamline this process.

Ready to Kick Your Business Into High Gear?

Now that you’ve completed the guide to market research you know you’re ready to put on your researcher hat to give your business the best start. Still not sure how actually… launch the thing? Our free mini-course can run you through the essentials for starting your side hustle .

About Mary Kate Miller

Mary Kate Miller writes about small business, real estate, and finance. In addition to writing for Foundr, her work has been published by The Washington Post, Teen Vogue, Bustle, and more. She lives in Chicago.

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Market Research vs. Marketing Research: What’s the Difference?

In the world of research, nuance is king. The varying outcomes of any study — regardless of its focus or its methodology — rely on an attention to detail held in such high esteem that subtle effects are neither mismanaged nor misunderstood, but rather searched for and celebrated. Indeed, the veracity of both the research process, as well as the documentation of its findings, depends on people being able to determine just what’s important and what isn’t. This is hardly surprising. Research is about discovery , after all, the uncovering of new information from facts and perceptions and opinions that might seem insignificant at first but that actually inform critical insight if only viewed through the right lens. This is why it’s so important that the foundation of any research project be fully understood prior to data collection. Take, for instance, market research vs. marketing research. While it might seem inconsequential, the difference between the two terms — that “-ing” — is enormous, necessitating vastly different research strategies and yielding vastly different results. Here’s a quick review of market research vs. marketing research and why the differences between the two matter:

Marketing Research is Broad; Market Research is Specific

Marketing research is a broad term meant to represent all the activities a company undertakes in order to uncover information relating to the four Ps of marketing : product, price, place and promotion. Market research, on the other hand, is specific, focusing on only one part of the marketing mix, “place.” In this way, market research is a subset of marketing research. The subtle difference between the two terms shifts research priorities and, as a result, the planning and execution of each one’s research objective(s). Marketing research emphasizes a greater breadth of data collection while market research concentrates on gathering facts and figures on a smaller, but more in-depth, scale. To expect one to deliver the other’s scope of results needlessly wastes resources and only confounds overall research discovery.

Marketing Research Studies The Marketing Process; Market Research Studies Market & Consumer Behavior

As one might imagine, broad marketing research complements the granular nature of market research. While market research can help businesses assess certain target markets and product performance in those markets, marketing research offers companies greater tranches of information relating to numerous marketing variables. Together, they enable businesses to make informed, detailed decisions that can significantly improve large-scale marketing strategies.  

Learn More with the Right Data Collection Partner

Of course, these are just a few of the differences between market research and marketing research. Too often people — researchers included — jump to conclusions, dismissing precision just so they can get something done. In the business world, this has serious implications. Putting the proverbial cart before the horse can lead to unfortunate assumptions that confuse issues, negate opportunity, inhibit growth and, ultimately, ruin a company’s chances for success. Our team at Research America understands the different kinds of business research and can help your company choose the right tools to extract meaningful and actionable insight from consumers, customers and/or markets, whichever audience offers the most fitting potential for solving the problem at hand. Please contact us to learn more.

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Market Research vs. Marketing Research: Similarities & Differences

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Making assumptions about your customers, market, rivals, or processes when running a business may waste time, money, and effort.

To make successful decisions to help your firm expand and manage its resources properly, you must devote part of your resources to market research and marketing research.

These two terms appear to be synonymous with a difference of just three letters, but they are not. Market research should not be confused with marketing research. Market research often covers market-related research, whereas marketing research includes marketing-related research activities. 

Even though tons of resources talk about market research vs. marketing research, there still seems to be an underlying confusion about the two in terms of their application.

This is why, in this blog, we’re going to throw light on the similarities & differences between market research & marketing research . Let’s start with the basics.

What Is Market Research?

Market research establishes the feasibility of a new service or product via direct customer study. Market research enables a firm to identify its target market and obtain comments and other customer input on their interest in a product or service.

Market research examines the market for a certain commodity or service to determine how the audience will react to it. 

It may involve obtaining information for market segmentation and product differentiation, which can be used to customize advertising efforts or identify which attributes are viewed as important by the customer.

To finish the market research process, a company must do several tasks. It must collect data depending on the market sector under consideration. The generated data must be analyzed and interpreted by the company to evaluate the presence of any patterns or important data points that may be used in the decision-making process.

Market research enables businesses to understand their product’s demand and feasibility and how it may perform in the real world. 

Market research is performed using primary or secondary information, providing distinct insights into a company’s product. Market research is an important part of a company’s research and development (R&D) stage and its success and growth.

Here’s an example of a typical market research procedure:

• A problem is discovered.
• Determine who will carry out the research (in-house or an external agency)
• Select relevant market research methods.
• Collect information
• Data organization, interpretation, and analysis
• Please report your results.

Frost & Sullivan conducted 100k surveys across 300 industries annually with Voxco.

What Is Marketing Research?

Marketing research systematically collects, records, and analyzes qualitative and quantitative data about marketing goods and services concerns. The purpose is to discover and analyze how changing marketing mix elements affect customer behavior.

This includes defining the data needed to solve these concerns, establishing the strategy for gathering information, managing, and implementing the data collection process. 

After reviewing the acquired data, the conclusions, findings, and consequences are transmitted to those with authority to act on them. The goal of marketing research (MR) is to offer management knowledge that is relevant, accurate, trustworthy, valid, and up to date. 

Marketing research must deliver good information because of the competitive marketing climate and the ever-increasing expenses associated with bad decision-making. Sound judgments are not made purely on gut instinct, intuition, or even pure logic.

Following is an example of a typical marketing process:

• Determine the problem, consider alternatives, and establish research objectives.
• Make a research plan.
• Gather research information
• Gather audience information
• Data organization and analysis
• Showcase your results
• Make data-driven judgments

Explore: Voxco’s Market Research Hub

Marketing Research vs. Market Research: Components

Market research and marketing research are frequently used interchangeably; in some cases, they are, particularly for those outside the sector. However, the two names are not interchangeable in the business. 

Because they are similar, the names are frequently used interchangeably. They are both fundamental parts of marketing, which implies they occur before selling the product or service. 

Marketing research entails investigating new goods, distribution channels, and product development. Depending on the setting, it can also involve promotion research, pricing, advertising, and public relations. It has a considerably broader reach and may thus be utilized to determine a marketing plan. 

Marketing Research is also far more technical, systematic, scientific, and objective than Market research.

Components of market research:

It aims to provide a broader overview of the industry, potential customers, and external factors influencing the market. Here are the key components: 

• Market size and growth analysis helps estimate the overall size of the market and predict future growth.
• Market segmentation helps categorize markets into distinct segments based on unique needs.
• Competitive analysis helps identify strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, and threats.
• Trends and opportunity analysis to identify potential opportunities for growth and innovations. 

Components of marketing research: 

Marketing research, however, delves into aspects related to promoting and selling products or services. It focuses on the practical application of insights derived from market research. Here are the key components: 

• Consumer behavior analysis helps study how customers make decisions and identify the factors influencing purchasing choices.
• Product positioning allows you to determine how the target market perceives a product.
• The competitive analysis identifies opportunities to differentiate your product from the competition.

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Differences Between Market Research and Marketing Research

We understand that these terms might be used interchangeably, but they have distinct meanings.

Let’s go straight into the differences between market research and marketing research. The distinction between market research and marketing research is easily discernible on the following grounds:

1. Market research is the study of customers and the market.

2. Marketing research is the study of all aspects of marketing.

3. Market research is reliant.

4. Marketing research is autonomous.

5. Marketing research has a much broader reach since it involves doing product research and customer preferences.

6. Market research involves gathering market information.

7. Marketing research has a much broader reach since it involves product research and customer preferences.

8. Market research investigates the market success of a product or service.

9. Marketing research collects data for marketing intelligence activities and decision-making.

10. Market research is focused on answering particular questions.

11. Marketing research is more general and utilized to solve various marketing challenges.

Learn how Apple leveraged Market research to deliver exceptional experiences, which helped them engage customers globally.

Similarities Between Market Research and Marketing Research

Now that we’ve established the distinction between these two, let’s look at some of their commonalities:

• Both are important to the success of a business.
• Both types of research generate useful data.
• Surveys, focus groups, questionnaires, and interviews are examples of quantitative and qualitative tools and approaches that may be used to acquire information. 
• Effective for making judgments on the type and quality of items and services given to clients, appropriate company sites, the best advertising, and the most efficient distribution methods and networks.

Related: Market Research Mistakes to Avoid

So, Is Marketing Research and Market Research the Same?

No, they’re not. 

Following the preceding debate, it is well-understood that marketing research is a broader word than market research. In reality, market research is a subset of marketing research. 

Both of these researches use quantitative and qualitative procedures to collect information, such as focus groups, surveys (telephonic or face-to-face communication), interviews, and questionnaires.

Whatever research you undertake, you must follow the whole research technique to get a conclusion that will assist your organization. If your results result in a solution to your issue statement, you can choose the next actions for your company.

If you failed to find an answer to the research question, this does not imply that your study was flawed. That is, maybe, because the issue was much more complex than imagined. You just need to ask additional questions and keep researching until a solution is found.

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Marketing Strategy vs. Marketing Plan: What’s the Difference?

Is there really a difference between a marketing strategy and a marketing plan? Are they two sides of the same marketing program coin?

While the terms are commonly used interchangeably, they’re two very different concepts in the real world. It may seem like splitting semantic hairs, but understanding the difference between marketing strategy vs. marketing plan is crucial to the success of your campaigns and your progress toward overarching business goals.

Let’s compare and contrast the concepts in greater depth so you’re prepared when it comes time to take your marketing to the next level .

What Is a Marketing Strategy?

A digital marketing strategy is the “why” behind your marketing. Every piece of marketing collateral you create will be informed by this documentation, which means it works hand-in-hand with your content strategy .

Basically, a marketing strategy is a reflection of your short-term and long-term business approach. This strategy should also be a distillation of your brand values, voice, mission and messaging. For example, if your business aims to scale up quickly, the strategic marketing vision you develop needs to support that objective, perhaps by focusing on consumer acquisition or ramping up your online presence.

A good marketing strategy will encompass your unique selling proposition, all that your business hopes to achieve and its brand identity.

What Is a Marketing Plan?

Your marketing plan is the “how” to your strategy’s “why.” Ideally, a marketing plan should be just that — a plan of action for how you will execute your strategy to accomplish each marketing goal.

The process of creating a tactical marketing plan is about addressing the real-world steps you will take to create, promote, track and measure your campaign, programs and assets. The workflows and procedures you develop will provide a roadmap for making your strategy actionable.

How a Marketing Strategy and Plan Work Together

To use a not-at-all-complicated metaphor, let’s say your business needs a ship to sail through your marketing campaign. That ship needs a direction in which to travel (i.e., a strategy) and the sails to power it (i.e., a plan).

Marketing strategy and plan work hand in hand, with the latter taking cues from the former. Everything laid out by your strategy should be addressed with a plan — one that defines the processes for tactical marketing.

However, the lines can be a bit blurred. Strategic planning is one oft-used phrase that can create confusion. In reality, strategic planning is just high-quality planning informed by a thorough marketing strategy.

Needless to say, a strategy without planning is like a winning idea without a way to realize it; and planning without a strategy will lead to a rudderless ship.

How to Create a Marketing Strategy

Strategy is not an amorphous concept. It takes real work and thinking to establish a good marketing strategy that ultimately facilitates business success.

Here are some basic steps to crafting a comprehensive strategy:

• Identify each marketing objective: Strategy begins with your goals, both now and in the future. For example, if your business plan is to expand into new markets, the strategic marketing approach may be to make inroads with new customer segments. Brainstorm how your marketing can reflect other short-term goals and long-term ambitions, like becoming an authority in your industry.
• Refine your audience: Defining your audience enables you to resonate with buyers and push customers through the marketing funnel. A strategic marketing priority is to develop buyer personas. These personas will be central to deciding on the angle and value prop of the marketing you create.
• Establish your brand guidelines: Your brand needs to be codified in a way that ensures every piece of marketing content will be identifiable and conforms to your standards. This means outlining editorial voice, graphic design preferences and all other critical brand elements. Having a unified presence leads to a better customer experience. Without a single source of truth for how the brand should be represented, your actual marketing may devolve into disparate shots in the dark.
• Assess opportunities and threats: Your level of strategy will influence how prepared you are to capitalize on a market research opportunity or manage risks. Research competitors to understand what they’re doing — and, more importantly, what they’re not doing. Know how you’ll leverage your competitive advantage to meet a new market need or shifting consumer preferences.

Importantly, strategy is not static. It needs to be constantly updated and fine-tuned to keep your business on track and achieve changing marketing objectives.

How to Create a Marketing Plan

Returning to the question of “how” shows us the best way to create a marketing plan that works. Ask yourself these questions as you set out to develop your plan of action:

• How will we reach consumers? The answer to this question will help define your marketing mix. What types of marketing will you utilize to reach leads, prospects and existing customers? Content marketing, digital marketing, search marketing, social media marketing , event marketing and all other types of marketing are in play here.
• How will we create marketing materials? Clearly defined workflows and processes will support the creation of high-quality marketing materials. You need to suss out who owns which project phases, how cross-functional teams will collaborate and what quality controls are in place (like checking for adherence to brand guidelines).
• How will we share content and collateral? Not only must you choose your marketing mix, but also your selection of marketing channels. Once again, there are many types to consider: direct mail, social media, email, your website, pay-per-click (PPC) advertising, organic search, etc. Each distribution channel will have its place in planning.
• How will we track campaigns and measure results? Data is the lifeblood of strategic marketing. You’ll need to create a list of key performance indicators (KPIs) with which to track campaigns. These may include anything from conversion rates to cost per lead.

Marketing Strategy and Marketing Plan Examples in Action

Let’s look at some examples of how the waterfall of business objectives to marketing strategy to marketing plan works in real life:

• Business goal: To pivot or reinvent the business, whether due to a merger, new market need or modernization effort.
• Marketing strategy: Launch a rebranding campaign; craft new messaging to align marketing with the business’s new direction; create new brand guidelines.
• Marketing plan: Pursue a website redevelopment; create a marketing plan template to ensure all new efforts adhere to guidelines; reoptimize website content and copy; coordinate a rollout of new colors, logos and fonts to all social media platforms; hire a marketing agency to consult on best practices.

It’s much easier to see the differences between marketing strategy vs. marketing plan in such a scenario, but also easier to grasp how they work in conjunction. Let’s consider another:

• Business goal: To launch a new service or product line.
• Marketing strategy: Research competitors and the existing market; develop a new set of buyer personas; outline the marketing funnel and customer journey; generate leads for the proposed expansion.
• Marketing plan: Create content around the new product for outreach (e.g., blogs, emails, white paper, one-pagers, etc.); decide which assets to gate in exchange for a name and email address; balance customer acquisition with retention by creating a loyalty program.

Getting the picture?

• Business goal: To increase revenue or raise sales by a certain percentage.
• Marketing strategy: Support sales enablement with high-quality marketing content and collateral; revitalize or refine the value proposition; reach out to new customer segments.
• Marketing plan: Track KPIs related to conversions; focus on high-performing channels; leverage customer data to make upsell or cross-sell recommendations; start a retargeting campaign.

One more for good measure:

• Business goal: To become an industry leader.
• Marketing strategy: Highlight brand strengths and competitive advantages; present the brand as friendly, knowledgeable and authoritative; raise brand awareness and cultivate brand evangelists.
• Marketing plan: Build influencer marketing relationships; publish thought leadership content and/or guest blogs; use social media for customer service and conversations; conduct webinars.

Level Up Your Marketing Campaign

When a marketing strategy and marketing plan are in harmony, what they create is music to your business’ ears. Alignment between the two gives your brand its best chance to impact consumers, raise its profile and succeed in its key business objectives.

Editor’s Note: Updated December 2022.

Dominic Tortorice

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Dom, an English major and journalism enthusiast, was just happy to get a job out of college writing and editing professionally. That it turned out to be in the burgeoning content marketing industry with Brafton was all the better.

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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 look for performance marketing agency to 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. Complement your goals with website optimization tools (e.g., A/B testing speed with Nostra – check Nostra AI review to learn more) to further improve conversions.

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. Leverage AI social media tools to automate and scale your content plan..

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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Marketing Planning and Marketing Research

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• Ralf T. Kreutzer 2  

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9 Best Marketing Research Methods to Know Your Buyer Better [+ Examples]

Published: August 08, 2024

One of the most underrated skills you can have as a marketer is marketing research — which is great news for this unapologetic cyber sleuth.

From brand design and product development to buyer personas and competitive analysis, I’ve researched a number of initiatives in my decade-long marketing career.

And let me tell you: having the right marketing research methods in your toolbox is a must.

Market research is the secret to crafting a strategy that will truly help you accomplish your goals. The good news is there is no shortage of options.

How to Choose a Marketing Research Method

Thanks to the Internet, we have more marketing research (or market research) methods at our fingertips than ever, but they’re not all created equal. Let’s quickly go over how to choose the right one.

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1. Identify your objective.

What are you researching? Do you need to understand your audience better? How about your competition? Or maybe you want to know more about your customer’s feelings about a specific product.

Before starting your research, take some time to identify precisely what you’re looking for. This could be a goal you want to reach, a problem you need to solve, or a question you need to answer.

For example, an objective may be as foundational as understanding your ideal customer better to create new buyer personas for your marketing agency (pause for flashbacks to my former life).

Or if you’re an organic sode company, it could be trying to learn what flavors people are craving.

2. Determine what type of data and research you need.

Next, determine what data type will best answer the problems or questions you identified. There are primarily two types: qualitative and quantitative. (Sound familiar, right?)

• Qualitative Data is non-numerical information, like subjective characteristics, opinions, and feelings. It’s pretty open to interpretation and descriptive, but it’s also harder to measure. This type of data can be collected through interviews, observations, and open-ended questions.
• Quantitative Data , on the other hand, is numerical information, such as quantities, sizes, amounts, or percentages. It’s measurable and usually pretty hard to argue with, coming from a reputable source. It can be derived through surveys, experiments, or statistical analysis.

Understanding the differences between qualitative and quantitative data will help you pinpoint which research methods will yield the desired results.

For instance, thinking of our earlier examples, qualitative data would usually be best suited for buyer personas, while quantitative data is more useful for the soda flavors.

However, truth be told, the two really work together.

Qualitative conclusions are usually drawn from quantitative, numerical data. So, you’ll likely need both to get the complete picture of your subject.

For example, if your quantitative data says 70% of people are Team Black and only 30% are Team Green — Shout out to my fellow House of the Dragon fans — your qualitative data will say people support Black more than Green.

(As they should.)

Primary Research vs Secondary Research

You’ll also want to understand the difference between primary and secondary research.

Primary research involves collecting new, original data directly from the source (say, your target market). In other words, it’s information gathered first-hand that wasn’t found elsewhere.

Some examples include conducting experiments, surveys, interviews, observations, or focus groups.

Meanwhile, secondary research is the analysis and interpretation of existing data collected from others. Think of this like what we used to do for school projects: We would read a book, scour the internet, or pull insights from others to work from.

So, which is better?

Personally, I say any research is good research, but if you have the time and resources, primary research is hard to top. With it, you don’t have to worry about your source's credibility or how relevant it is to your specific objective.

You are in full control and best equipped to get the reliable information you need.

3. Put it all together.

Once you know your objective and what kind of data you want, you’re ready to select your marketing research method.

For instance, let’s say you’re a restaurant trying to see how attendees felt about the Speed Dating event you hosted last week.

You shouldn’t run a field experiment or download a third-party report on speed dating events; those would be useless to you. You need to conduct a survey that allows you to ask pointed questions about the event.

This would yield both qualitative and quantitative data you can use to improve and bring together more love birds next time around.

Best Market Research Methods for 2024

Now that you know what you’re looking for in a marketing research method, let’s dive into the best options.

Note: According to HubSpot’s 2024 State of Marketing report, understanding customers and their needs is one of the biggest challenges facing marketers today. The options we discuss are great consumer research methodologies , but they can also be used for other areas.

Primary Research

1. interviews.

Interviews are a form of primary research where you ask people specific questions about a topic or theme. They typically deliver qualitative information.

I’ve conducted many interviews for marketing purposes, but I’ve also done many for journalistic purposes, like this profile on comedian Zarna Garg . There’s no better way to gather candid, open-ended insights in my book, but that doesn’t mean they’re a cure-all.

What I like: Real-time conversations allow you to ask different questions if you’re not getting the information you need. They also push interviewees to respond quickly, which can result in more authentic answers.

What I dislike: They can be time-consuming and harder to measure (read: get quantitative data) unless you ask pointed yes or no questions.

Best for: Creating buyer personas or getting feedback on customer experience, a product, or content.

2. Focus Groups

Focus groups are similar to conducting interviews but on a larger scale.

In marketing and business, this typically means getting a small group together in a room (or Zoom), asking them questions about various topics you are researching. You record and/or observe their responses to then take action.

They are ideal for collecting long-form, open-ended feedback, and subjective opinions.

One well-known focus group you may remember was run by Domino’s Pizza in 2009 .

After poor ratings and dropping over $100 million in revenue, the brand conducted focus groups with real customers to learn where they could have done better.

It was met with comments like “worst excuse for pizza I’ve ever had” and “the crust tastes like cardboard.” But rather than running from the tough love, it took the hit and completely overhauled its recipes.

The team admitted their missteps and returned to the market with better food and a campaign detailing their “Pizza Turn Around.”

The result? The brand won a ton of praise for its willingness to take feedback, efforts to do right by its consumers, and clever campaign. But, most importantly, revenue for Domino’s rose by 14.3% over the previous year.

The brand continues to conduct focus groups and share real footage from them in its promotion:

What I like: Similar to interviewing, you can dig deeper and pivot as needed due to the real-time nature. They’re personal and detailed.

What I dislike: Once again, they can be time-consuming and make it difficult to get quantitative data. There is also a chance some participants may overshadow others.

Best for: Product research or development

Pro tip: Need help planning your focus group? Our free Market Research Kit includes a handy template to start organizing your thoughts in addition to a SWOT Analysis Template, Survey Template, Focus Group Template, Presentation Template, Five Forces Industry Analysis Template, and an instructional guide for all of them. Download yours here now.

3. Surveys or Polls

Surveys are a form of primary research where individuals are asked a collection of questions. It can take many different forms.

They could be in person, over the phone or video call, by email, via an online form, or even on social media. Questions can be also open-ended or closed to deliver qualitative or quantitative information.

A great example of a close-ended survey is HubSpot’s annual State of Marketing .

In the State of Marketing, HubSpot asks marketing professionals from around the world a series of multiple-choice questions to gather data on the state of the marketing industry and to identify trends.

The survey covers various topics related to marketing strategies, tactics, tools, and challenges that marketers face. It aims to provide benchmarks to help you make informed decisions about your marketing.

It also helps us understand where our customers’ heads are so we can better evolve our products to meet their needs.

Apple is no stranger to surveys, either.

In 2011, the tech giant launched Apple Customer Pulse , which it described as “an online community of Apple product users who provide input on a variety of subjects and issues concerning Apple.”

"For example, we did a large voluntary survey of email subscribers and top readers a few years back."

While these readers gave us a long list of topics, formats, or content types they wanted to see, they sometimes engaged more with content types they didn’t select or favor as much on the surveys when we ran follow-up ‘in the wild’ tests, like A/B testing.”  

Pepsi saw similar results when it ran its iconic field experiment, “The Pepsi Challenge” for the first time in 1975.

The beverage brand set up tables at malls, beaches, and other public locations and ran a blindfolded taste test. Shoppers were given two cups of soda, one containing Pepsi, the other Coca-Cola (Pepsi’s biggest competitor). They were then asked to taste both and report which they preferred.

People overwhelmingly preferred Pepsi, and the brand has repeated the experiment multiple times over the years to the same results.

What I like: It yields qualitative and quantitative data and can make for engaging marketing content, especially in the digital age.

What I dislike: It can be very time-consuming. And, if you’re not careful, there is a high risk for scientific error.

Best for: Product testing and competitive analysis

Pro tip:  " Don’t make critical business decisions off of just one data set," advises Pamela Bump. "Use the survey, competitive intelligence, external data, or even a focus group to give you one layer of ideas or a short-list for improvements or solutions to test. Then gather your own fresh data to test in an experiment or trial and better refine your data-backed strategy."

Secondary Research

8. public domain or third-party research.

While original data is always a plus, there are plenty of external resources you can access online and even at a library when you’re limited on time or resources.

Some reputable resources you can use include:

• Pew Research Center
• McKinley Global Institute
• Relevant Global or Government Organizations (i.e United Nations or NASA)

It’s also smart to turn to reputable organizations that are specific to your industry or field. For instance, if you’re a gardening or landscaping company, you may want to pull statistics from the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA).

If you’re a digital marketing agency, you could look to Google Research or HubSpot Research . (Hey, I know them!)

What I like: You can save time on gathering data and spend more time on analyzing. You can also rest assured the data is from a source you trust.

What I dislike: You may not find data specific to your needs.

Best for: Companies under a time or resource crunch, adding factual support to content

Pro tip: Fellow HubSpotter Iskiev suggests using third-party data to inspire your original research. “Sometimes, I use public third-party data for ideas and inspiration. Once I have written my survey and gotten all my ideas out, I read similar reports from other sources and usually end up with useful additions for my own research.”

9. Buy Research

If the data you need isn’t available publicly and you can’t do your own market research, you can also buy some. There are many reputable analytics companies that offer subscriptions to access their data. Statista is one of my favorites, but there’s also Euromonitor , Mintel , and BCC Research .

What I like: Same as public domain research

What I dislike: You may not find data specific to your needs. It also adds to your expenses.

Best for: Companies under a time or resource crunch or adding factual support to content

Which marketing research method should you use?

You’re not going to like my answer, but “it depends.” The best marketing research method for you will depend on your objective and data needs, but also your budget and timeline.

My advice? Aim for a mix of quantitative and qualitative data. If you can do your own original research, awesome. But if not, don’t beat yourself up. Lean into free or low-cost tools . You could do primary research for qualitative data, then tap public sources for quantitative data. Or perhaps the reverse is best for you.

Whatever your marketing research method mix, take the time to think it through and ensure you’re left with information that will truly help you achieve your goals.

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Marketing Plan

A document that lays out the marketing efforts of a business in an upcoming period

What is a Marketing Plan?

A marketing plan is a document that lays out the marketing efforts of a business in an upcoming period, which is usually a year. It outlines the marketing strategy, promotional, and advertising activities planned for the period.

Elements of a Marketing Plan

A marketing plan will typically include the following elements:

Marketing objectives of the business : The objectives should be attainable and measurable – two goals associated with SMART, which stands for Specific, Measurable, Attainable, Relevant, and Time-bound.

Current business marketing positioning : An analysis of the current state of the organization concerning its marketing positioning.

Market research : Detailed research about current market trends, customer needs, industry sales volumes, and expected direction.

Outline of the business target market : Business target market demographics.

Marketing activities : A list of any actions concerning marketing goals that are scheduled for the period and the indicated timelines.

Key performance indicators (KPIs) to be tracked

Marketing mix : A combination of factors that may influence customers to purchase products. It should be appropriate for the organization and will largely be centered on the 4Ps of marketing – i.e., product, price, promotion, and place.

Competition : Identify the organization’s competitors and their strategies, along with ways to counter competition and gain market share .

Marketing strategies : The development of marketing strategies to be employed in the coming period. These strategies will include promotional strategies, advertising, and other marketing tools at the disposal of the organization.

Marketing budget : A detailed outline of the organization’s allocation of financial resources to marketing activities. The activities will need to be carried out within the marketing budget .

Monitoring and performance mechanism : A plan should be in place to identify if the marketing tools in place are bearing fruit or need to be revised based on the past, current, and expected future state of the organization, industry, and the overall business environment.

A marketing plan should observe the 80:20 rule – i.e., for maximum impact, it should focus on the 20% of products and services that account for 80% of volumes and the 20% of customers that bring in 80% of revenue.

Purpose of a Marketing Plan

The purpose of a marketing plan includes the following:

• To clearly define the marketing objectives of the business that align with the corporate mission and vision of the organization. The marketing objectives indicate where the organization wishes to be at any specific period in the future.
• The marketing plan usually assists in the growth of the business by stating appropriate marketing strategies, such as plans for increasing the customer base.
• State and review the marketing mix in terms of the 8Ps of marketing – Product, Price, Place, Promotion, People, Process, Physical Evidence, and Performance.
• Strategies to increase market share, enter new niche markets, and increase brand awareness are also encompassed within the marketing plan.
• The marketing plan will contain a detailed budget for the funds and resources required to carry out activities indicated in the marketing plan.
• The assignment of tasks and responsibilities of marketing activities is well enunciated in the marketing plan.
• The identification of business opportunities and any strategies crafted to exploit them is important.
• A marketing plan fosters the review and analysis of the marketing environment, which entails market research, customer needs assessment, competitor analysis, PEST analysis , studying new business trends, and continuous environmental scanning.
• A marketing plan integrates business functions to operate with consistency – notably sales, production, finance, human resources, and marketing.

Structure of a Marketing Plan

The structure of a marketing plan can include the following sections:

Marketing Plan Objectives

This section outlines the expected outcome of the marketing plan with clear, concise, realistic, and attainable objectives. It contains specific targets and time frames.

Metrics, such as target market share, the target number of customers to be attained, penetration rate, usage rate, sales volumes targeted, etc. should be used.

Market Research – Market Analysis/Consumer Analysis

Market analysis includes topics such as market definition, market size, industry structure, market share and trends, and competitor analysis. Consumer analysis includes the target market demographics and what influences their buying decisions – e.g., loyalty, motivation, and expectations.

Target Market

This defines the target customers by their demographic profile, such as gender, race, age, and psychographic profile, such as their interests. This will assist in the correct marketing mix for the target market segments.

SWOT Analysis

A SWOT analysis will look at the organization’s internal strengths and weaknesses and external opportunities and threats. SWOT analysis includes the following:

• Strengths are the organization’s competitive advantages that are not easily duplicated. They represent the skills, expertise, and efficiencies that an organization possesses over its competitors.
• Weaknesses are impediments found in the operations of an organization, and they stifle growth. These can include outdated machinery, inadequate working capital, and inefficient production methods.
• Opportunities are prospects for growth in the business through the adoption of ways to take advantage of the chances. They could include entry into new markets, adopting digital marketing strategies, or following new trends.
• Threats are external factors that can affect the business negatively, such as a new powerful competitor, legislative changes, natural disasters, or political situations.

Marketing Strategy

The marketing strategy section covers actual strategies to be included according to the marketing mix. The strategy centers on the 8Ps of marketing. However, firms are also at liberty to use the traditional 4 P’s of marketing – product, price, place, and promotion. The 8 P’s are illustrated below.

The correct marketing mix is determined by the target market. The most expensive options are advertising, sales promotions, and PR campaigns. Networking and referrals are less costly.

Marketers also need to pay attention to digital marketing strategies that make use of technology to reach a wider market and have also proven to be cost-effective.

Digital marketing channels, which became popular in the early 21 st century, may eventually overtake traditional marketing methods. Digital marketing encompasses trending methods, such as the use of social media for business.

Other strategies within the marketing strategy include pricing and positioning strategy, distribution strategy, conversion strategy, and retention strategy.

Marketing Budget

The marketing budget or projection outlines the budgeted expenditure for the marketing activities documented in the marketing plan. The marketing budget consists of revenues and costs stated in the marketing plan in one document.

It balances expenditures on marketing activities and what the organization can afford. It’s a financial plan of marketing activities to be carried out – e.g., promotional activities, cost of marketing materials and advertising, and so on. Other considerations include expected product volume and price, production and delivery costs, and operating and financing costs.

The effectiveness of the marketing plan depends on the budget allocated for marketing expenditure. The cost of marketing should be able to make the company break even and make profits.

Performance Analysis

Performance analysis aims to look at the variances of metrics or components documented in the marketing plan.  These include:

Revenue variance analysis : An analysis of positive or negative variance of revenue. A negative variance is worrisome, and reasons should be available to explain the cause of deviations.

Market share analysis : An analysis of whether the organization attained its target market share. Sales may be increasing whilst the organization’s share of the market is decreasing; hence, it is paramount to track this metric.

Expense analysis : An analysis of marketing expense to sales ratio . This ratio needs to be compared to industry standards to make informed comparisons.

The ratio enables the organization to track actual expenditures versus the budget. It is also compared to other metrics, such as revenue analysis and market share analysis. It can be dissected into individual expenditures to sales to get a clearer picture.

Administration of a Marketing Plan

The marketing plan should be revised and adapted to changes in the environment periodically. The use of metrics, budgets, and schedules to measure progress towards the goals set in the marketing plan is a continuous process by marketing personnel.

There should be a continuous assessment to verify that the goals of the marketing plan are being achieved. The marketing manager should be able to review if the strategies documented are being effective, given the operating environment.

It is irrational for the marketing manager to notice anomalies and wait to review at year-end when the situation might have already deteriorated.

Changes in the environment may necessitate a review of plans, projections, strategies, and targets. Therefore, a formal periodical review – such as monthly or quarterly – may need to be in place. This may mean preparing an annual marketing plan but reviewing the plan quarterly to keep targets and plans aligned closely to environmental changes. It goes without saying that plans are as good as their feasibility to succeed in the given environment.

More Resources

Thank you for reading CFI’s guide to Marketing Plan. To keep learning and advancing your career, the additional CFI resources below will be useful:

• 4 P’s of Marketing
• Market Research
• Return on Ad Spend (ROAS)
• Competitive Advantage
• See all management & strategy resources
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Market Intelligence Vs Market Research – The Elusive Difference

Table of contents

Introduction

What is market research, quantitative vs qualitative research, primary vs secondary research, what is market intelligence, the value of integrated market intelligence and market research, contify's framework for starting your market intelligence program.

Market intelligence and Market Research are frequently used interchangeably, but they are distinct concepts. Market research is generally a one-off project aimed at addressing particular business questions. In contrast, Market Intelligence is an ongoing activity that helps businesses stay updated on changes in the market landscape.

While both provide critical insights for businesses to make informed decisions, their applications, methodologies, and purposes differ significantly. This article will explore the nuanced difference between Market Intelligence and Market Research, delving into their definitions, categories, and their roles in business success.

Market Research is the process of collecting, analyzing, and interpreting data to answer a specific business question. Companies conduct Market Research to gain insights into their target market, identify growth opportunities, and make informed business decisions.

These questions are usually strategic — not day-to-day operational or transactional questions. Common questions for Market Research projects include:

– Who are the key market participants (competitors, customers, regulators, or suppliers), and what are their strategies, strengths, and weaknesses?

– What are the emerging needs and preferences of our target customers?

– What are the gaps and niches in the market that we are best positioned to serve?

– What is our products’ market perception/ positioning, and what enhancements should we make to differentiate them in the marketplace?

– What would be the most effective go-to-market strategy for our products or services?

– What should be the pricing strategy for our products or services?

– How can we differentiate ourselves from competitors and create a unique value proposition?

– What risks and challenges do you need to overcome or mitigate?

Insights from Market Research enable companies to develop products or services that directly address customer pain points, thereby increasing the likelihood of market adoption and customer loyalty.

Market research also helps align various aspects of a business—product development, marketing, and even operational processes—with market needs and opportunities.

Market Research can be categorized along different dimensions, such as qualitative vs. quantitative, or primary vs. secondary. Here’s a brief overview:

Quantitative research involves collecting numerical data from a large sample of respondents using structured methods such as surveys, experiments, or observational research.

It offers numerical data that can be generalized across larger groups, making it excellent for testing hypotheses and making predictions. It typically applies statistical analysis to interpret results, which makes it good for measuring parameters such as customer satisfaction, purchase intention, brand recall, etc.

Quantitative research can provide a more accurate and generalizable picture of a target market than qualitative research, but it can be less in-depth.

Qualitative research involves collecting non-numerical data from a small sample of respondents using unstructured methods such as interviews or focus groups. It allows you to explore themes such as customer emotions, opinions, attitudes, etc.

Therefore, Qualitative research can provide insights that are difficult to obtain through quantitative research, such as the reasons why consumers buy a particular product or service. It provides rich, contextual insights, but the findings may not be statistically representative of the larger population.

The following table summarizes the key differences between qualitative and quantitative research:

Primary research involves the collection of original data directly from respondents. Primary research is tailored to meet specific research questions and can be either qualitative (e.g., interviews, focus groups) or quantitative (e.g., online surveys, experiments).

While primary research offers more accurate and up-to-date information, it can be time-consuming and expensive than secondary research.

Secondary research, also known as desk research, involves analyzing existing data that is already available in the public domain, such as news, company websites, government data, other research reports, trade journals, etc.

Secondary research is generally quicker and less expensive than primary research but may not be as targeted or up-to-date.

Choosing between qualitative and quantitative research, or primary and secondary research—or a combination of all—depends on various factors such as research objectives, budget, timeline, and the specificity of the information needed.

For a successful Market Research project, you need to be clear about your goals. What do you hope to learn from the research? However, Market Intelligence serves a different purpose than Market Research.

Market intelligence is also about gathering, and analyzing data about markets, customers, competitors, and other market participants, and disseminating it to the stakeholders. But, Market intelligence is NOT about finding an answer to a specific business question. It is about understanding the changes in the business environment that you operate in.

In simpler terms, it’s concerned with “what’s changing”, not “what currently exists.” It is a continuous process — not a one-time project. Rather than a project it is a program— a ‘Market Intelligence (MI) Program.’

When we label it as a “program,” we imply a structured set of activities and processes that are consistently followed. It involves regular data collection, analysis, and reporting. Its purpose is to keep internal stakeholders informed, alert, and ready to act.

While Market Research provides the foundation for making informed business decisions, a Market Intelligence program ensures that the underlying assumptions of those business decisions have not changed. It is like a business’s radar system, constantly scanning the environment to detect weak signals before they become apparent industry trends.

Some of the common objectives for Market Intelligence program include:

– Track activities of the key market participants (competitors, customers, regulators, or suppliers), to spot any changes in their strategies, strengths, and weaknesses.

– Monitor sources and collect data to maintain an ongoing pulse on consumer needs, behavior, preferences; and trigger alerts when any change is detected.

– Continuous market monitoring to identify potential threats and enable your stakeholders to take proactive measures.

– Spot any changes in the market perception/ positioning of competitors’ products

– Highlight any changes in the marketing activities or go-to-market strategy of our competitors

– Monitor shifts in the pricing strategies employed by competitors.

– Capture and analyze early signs of upcoming trends that could either present opportunities or pose threats.

Market Intelligence serves a different yet complementary role to Market Research. The following table summarizes the key differences between the two:

Both Market Research and Market Intelligence have distinct yet complementary roles in helping a company achieve its objectives. Utilizing both allows a company to not only make informed decisions but also adapt and evolve in a continuously changing market landscape.

For example, you can use Market Intelligence to identify a potential gap in the market for a new product or service. Then, you can use Market Research methodologies to test your idea with your target customers and get their feedback.

The table below summarizes how the focused insights from Market Research can be complemented by the broader, real-time insights from Market Intelligence, giving companies a well-rounded strategy for achieving their objectives.

Interestingly, the data used for both Market Research and Market Intelligence often overlaps. The table below outlines the diverse range of sources for data collection, each offering its own unique characteristics.

Leveraging both Market Research and Market Intelligence provides a comprehensive framework for understanding your market, making data-driven decisions, and sustaining a competitive advantage.

The in-depth analysis from Market Research pairs seamlessly with the dynamic, real-time insights from Market Intelligence, equipping companies with a balanced strategy to meet their business objectives.

We have established that Market Intelligence is not focused on a specific business question. It is intelligent monitoring of your market landscape for weak signals, changes, and emerging trends.

So, what should be the scope of a Market Intelligence program? It can’t be random monitoring of everything—after all, random actions yield random results.

At Contify, leveraging over 14 years of experience in implementing Market Intelligence programs, we’ve developed a specialized framework to guide companies in outlining the scope of their Market Intelligence initiatives.

Feel free to download our framework to take a more structured approach to your Market Intelligence efforts.

Get access here

Markets are in constant flux, influenced not just by competitors but also by evolving technology, regulatory shifts, and changing consumer behaviors. While Market Research can answer specific questions, Market Intelligence serves as the company’s radar, continuously scanning a broader spectrum of the business environment.

The absence of a Market Intelligence program in today’s competitive landscape is akin to walking into a shoot-out without a handgun. Traditional approaches to Market Intelligence are not equipped to handle the enormous volume of data available on the internet today.

However, the evolution of technologies like AI, machine learning, and natural language processing has modernized Market Intelligence into a more agile, efficient, and responsive discipline.

Contify is a market and competitive intelligence platform that helps organizations track competitors, customers, and key intelligence topics. It gathers key insights from news, company websites, regulatory portals, and social networks, among other online sources. To know more about the Contify platform, request access here.

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How To Create A Successful Marketing Plan

Published: Aug 13, 2024, 7:15am

Table of Contents

What is a marketing plan, marketing plan vs. marketing strategy, why businesses need a marketing plan, essential marketing channels, how to create a marketing plan, bottom line, frequently asked questions (faqs).

The difference between a flourishing business and a floundering business often comes down to an effective marketing campaign. This is especially true for small businesses. Every successful marketing campaign starts with a well-thought-out marketing plan. In this article, we will guide you through the steps on how to create a top-notch marketing plan to help put your business on the road to success.

A marketing plan is essentially a roadmap that guides businesses through the complex terrain of promoting their products or services. Think of it as a blueprint that details specific marketing campaigns, timelines, target audiences and channels such as social media , email or traditional media. Your plan should also establish clear metrics for success, the methodology used to evaluate performance and allocated budgets.

It is important to note that a marketing plan is not a static document. It is supposed to be an ever-evolving plan that adapts to market trends, customer feedback and the successful or unsuccessful marketing efforts. If done properly, a marketing plan will help you synchronize your marketing objectives with your overall business goals and ensure every marketing activity aligns with your broader vision of growth.

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Some assume that “marketing plan” and “marketing strategy” are the same thing, but be aware they hold distinct meanings and serve different purposes. A marketing strategy is more big-picture thinking. It identifies your target market, your value proposition, how you position yourself against competitors and how you will sustain your value over time. It involves deep insights into your customers’ needs, market trends and competitive analysis. It is essentially the “why” behind all your marketing actions.

The marketing plan, on the other hand, details the “what” and the “when” of those efforts. Once you have your marketing strategy outlined, you can begin to create a marketing plan. The plan should outline the specific campaigns, activities and tactics you’ll use to carry out the strategy. This includes details on the marketing channels you’ll use, the timeline for implementation, the budget and the key performance indicators you’ll track to measure success. It’s a blueprint that translates the strategy into actionable tasks and schedules.

A carefully crafted marketing plan can be a game-changer for small businesses dreaming of steady growth and a competitive edge over larger companies. Marketing plans with smart strategies and targeted campaigns can level the playing field by helping small businesses carve out their niche. It provides a clear roadmap that aligns marketing efforts with business objectives to ensure every marketing action contributes to the broader company goals.

This focused approach saves small businesses money by efficiently focusing resources instead of using a scattergun approach that can drain limited budgets. By identifying and understanding target markets, businesses can tailor their messaging to meet specific needs, which increases the likelihood of conversion. A solid marketing plan offers a framework for measuring success by setting benchmarks. With careful tracking, small businesses can quickly see what’s not working and adjust strategies in real time for better outcomes.

Today’s businesses have a wide array of marketing channels available to them. From highly analytical PPC advertising to engaging in-person event marketing, there’s no shortage of methods to promote your company.

Social Media

During the past two decades, social media has proved to be a highly effective way for small businesses to market themselves at little to no costs. Platforms including TikTok, Facebook, Instagram, X and LinkedIn offer businesses a dynamic platform to engage directly with their audience. They allow for the sharing of content, running targeted ads and fostering community through comments and shares. Effective social media marketing can enhance brand awareness, drive traffic and strengthen customer loyalty.

Email Marketing

Email marketing is another highly effective way to reach an audience directly. Newsletters, promotional offers and personalized content can nurture leads, promote loyalty and drive conversions. Email marketing offers measurable results and high ROI, making it a staple in a digital marketing strategy toolbox.

• Content Marketing

Content marketing involves creating hyper-relevant and compelling content that will act as a magnet to attract a laser-focused group of people. You can create blogs, videos, infographics and podcasts to cultivate an engaged community of followers with whom your brand’s message genuinely resonates.

Search Engine Optimization (SEO)

SEO is the practice of optimizing website content to rank higher in search engine results pages. Effective SEO strategies including on-page optimization, quality link building and keyword research help drive traffic to your website.

Pay-Per-Click (PPC) Advertising

PPC advertising is a method of online marketing where you pay a fee each time someone clicks on your ad. Popular platforms such as Google Ads and Bing Ads guarantee your ads show up first in search engine results for specific keywords, allowing you to bypass the “organic” results. While the pay-per-click fees can add up, this form of advertising provides immediate traffic and measurable results.

Influencer Marketing

Influencer marketing leverages the reach of influencers in specific niches to help you promote your business to a larger audience. When you partner with a credible influencer, you can tap into their loyal followings, gain trust quickly and drive engagement that will hopefully lead to greater sales. Affiliate marketing can complement influencer marketing by allowing influencers to earn commissions on the sales they drive. This performance-based option is cost effective, as you will only pay for actual results.

Event Marketing

Event marketing involves marketing your brand, company or service through in-person or virtual events. It can be anything from interactive webinars and educational workshops to large-scale conferences and industry trade shows. Event marketing gives you the opportunity to directly engage with your audience and hopefully provide a memorable experience for your customers.

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Creating a marketing plan is a step-by-step process. Make sure you take your time with each step before moving on to the next one.

1. Create an Executive Summary

An executive summary is a snapshot of your simplified marketing goals, significant milestones and an outline of future plans. It should encapsulate relevant facts about your brand, setting the stage for the detailed strategy that follows. This section provides stakeholders with a clear understanding of where the company stands and where it intends to go, concisely summarizing the essence of the marketing efforts.

2. Identify Your Target Market

Who are you trying to reach? By identifying your target market you can tailor your marketing strategies effectively to help them reach the people most likely to be interested in your products or services. Outline the characteristics of your ideal customer including age, location, goals, pains and trigger points.

3. Research Your Competitors

Competitor research is a critical step in forming a marketing plan. Analyze the strengths and weaknesses in other businesses in your industry. This insight can help you identify opportunities for differentiation and areas where you can fill in the opportunity your competitors may have overlooked.

4. Determine Your Marketing Goals

Without clear marketing goals, you are just shooting barrels in the dark. Are you trying to increase brand awareness, boast sales or grow your digital footprint? And if so, by how much and in what timeframe? Use the SMART criteria for goal setting, which advises that goals should be specific, measurable, achievable, relevant and time-bound.

5. Establish and Track Benchmarks

Once you determine what your marketing goals are, it is important to track their effectiveness.

To do this, set baseline measurements for key performance indicators related to your goals, such as website traffic, conversion rates or social media engagement. Monitor these benchmarks on a regular basis and adjust strategies as needed to enhance marketing performance.

6. Identify Your Marketing Channels

Are you going to throw all your eggs in the social media basket? Or are you going to diversify your marketing strategy with both digital and in-person events? This step requires a deep dive into the various channels available—be it social media, email marketing, SEO or traditional advertising. When choosing your marketing channels, be sure to ask yourself where your target audience is most engaged.

7. Create a Budget

Finally, create a budget that covers all aspects of your marketing efforts from paid advertising and content creation to software subscriptions and event sponsorships. This will help you stay financially responsible as more marketing opportunities arise.

One of the keys to a successful business is setting yourself apart from the competition. A strategic marketing plan that details your marketing efforts can not only help you stand out but also provide a step-by-step guide toward reaching your business objectives.

What are the main elements of a marketing plan?

The main elements of a marketing plan typically include an executive summary, marketing objectives, target audience definition, marketing strategies, budget and metrics for performance evaluation. It outlines the company’s strategy for attracting and retaining customers by detailing specific actions to achieve campaign goals, timeline with key milestones, channels to be used and team members responsibilities.

What is a realistic marketing budget?

A realistic marketing budget is typically determined as a percentage of a company’s revenue. It is recommended that B2B companies spend 2% to 5% of their revenue on marketing. Because B2C companies typically have a broader range of marketing channels, it is recommended they spend between 5% and 10% of their revenue on marketing.

What should every marketing plan start with?

Every marketing plan should start with a clear mission statement for the marketing department that aligns with the overall mission of the business. This statement should be specific enough to guide marketing efforts but also allow room to adjust the plan as needed. For example, if your company’s mission is “to revolutionize home cooking,” the marketing mission might be “to inspire home cooks and provide them with innovative cooking solutions.”

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Jennifer Simonson draws on two decades as a journalist covering everything from local economic developement to small business marketing. Beyond writing, she tested entrepreneurial waters by launching a mobile massage service, a content marketing firm and an e-commerce venture. These experiences enriched her understanding of small business management and marketing strategies. Today, she channels this first-hand knowledge into her articles for Forbes Advisor.

• Key Differences

Know the Differences & Comparisons

Difference Between Market Research and Marketing Research

Market research should not be confused with marketing reasearch , which is the scientific and objective study of the overall marketing process which involves collection, analysis, communication and utilization of information, so as to help the management in the process of decision making and also resolving marketing problems.

Check out the article provided below, in which we have discussed the substantial differences between market research and marketing research.

Content: Market Research Vs Marketing Research

Comparison chart.

Basis for Comparison	Market Research	Marketing Research
Meaning	A study undertaken to collect information about the market statistics, is known as market research.	Marketing research is the systematic and objective study, analysis and interpretation of problem related to marketing activities.
Branch of	Marketing Research	Marketing Information System
Scope	Limited	Wide
Nature	Specific	Generic
Involves	Research of marketplace and the buyer's behavior within that market.	Research of all the aspects of marketing.
Dependency	Dependent	Independent
Purpose	To check the viability of the product in the target market.	To make effective decisions regarding marketing activities and to keep control on the marketing of economic output.

Definition of Market Research

Market Research, as its name suggests, it is the study of the target market. It is an act of collecting information about the marketplace and consumers within that market. It is used to ascertain and analyse the market structure, size, recent trends, major players, customer needs, taste, preferences, buying behaviour.

Market Research acts as a guide, that helps you to know about your customers, competitors, needs, products, markets, etc.. The research helps in determining the viability of the new product in the target market. Various techniques are employed to know the chances of success, such as product testing. It can be conducted by the organization itself or by an external agency. A number of steps are followed to conduct market research which is as under:

• Identifying the problem
• Ascertain the party who will conduct the research.
• Choosing an appropriate technique for research.
• Gathering information
• Organization, interpretation and analysis of the result.

Definition of Marketing Research

By the term ‘marketing research’ we mean a well-planned study of the whole marketing process to collect, analyse and report information. The research is undertaken to find out a perfect solution to a marketing situation facing the company. The research plays a major role in identifying the consumer demand and their expectation from a particular product or service along with an efficient way of satisfying those needs. It involves an array of activities which are provided as under:

• Market and Customer Research
• Product Research
• Pricing Research
• Distribution Channel Research
• Promotion Research
• Sales Research
• Advertising Research

Marketing Research is aimed at providing facts and directions to the managers who need the accurate and authentic information for making important marketing decisions. The process of marketing research is explained in the following steps:

• Identify the problem, decision alternative and research objectives.
• Developing plans for research
• Organization and analysis of information
• Presentation
• Decision making

Key Differences Between Market Research and Marketing Research

The distinction between market research and marketing research can be drawn clearly on the following grounds:

• Market Research refers to the study of the entire market and consumer behavior, within that market. Marketing research implies well planned and rational study, analysis, and interpretation of marketing problems undertaken for actionable decision making.
• Market research is a branch of marketing research, whereas marketing research is a component of marketing information system.
• The scope of market research is limited as it studies about the aspects of market and consumer behavior only. On the other hand, marketing research involves the study of the whole marketing process, i.e. the research of advertising, pricing, packaging, policymaking and the market as well.
• Market research is specific in nature, i.e. the research gives and understanding about the particular market which is not applicable to other markets. Conversely, marketing research is generic in nature, i.e. the study can be helpful in solving various marketing problems.
• Marketing research is dependent while marketing research is independent.
• Market research is conducted to check the viability of the product in the target market. Unlike marketing research is carried out to make effective decisions regarding marketing activities and to keep control on the marketing of economic output i.e. goods and services.
• Market research involves research of the marketplace and the buyer’s behavior within that market. In contrast to marketing research, that involves the study, of all aspects of marketing.

After the above discussion, it can be said that marketing research is a wider term than market research. In fact, the market research itself is a part of marketing research. Both the researches involve quantitative and qualitative techniques to gather information like focus groups, surveys (telephonic conversation or face to face communication), interviews, questionnaires.

Moreover, the researches are very helpful for the business startups and the existing businesses to take effective decisions regarding the business such as product or service you serve your customers, place of doing business, distribution channels to be employed by the business, promotional channels and so on.

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Krystal says

October 26, 2016 at 8:36 pm

This is a very clear for understanding the differences. Many thanks for this article

Prince musty says

August 9, 2018 at 2:19 pm

This is good precisely expression to understand always keep it up

salmon ahmed says

September 20, 2019 at 6:37 am

Clearly discussed in easy way,thanks.

Parag Prakash Lad says

June 29, 2020 at 1:17 am

Thanks for easy and clear differentiation between Marketing Research and Marketing Research. It helped me lot in competing my project on Information gathering – Primary & Secondary an overview.

Nafeesah ibrahim says

May 6, 2023 at 8:42 pm

Thanks for the answers

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What Is a Target Market?

• Defining a Product's Target Market
• 4 Target Markets

Why Are Target Markets Important?

What are market segments, target market and product sales.

• Target Market FAQs

The Bottom Line

• Marketing Essentials

Target Market: Definition, Purpose, Examples, Market Segments

Investopedia / Mira Norian

A target market is a group of people that have been identified as the most likely potential customers for a product because of their shared characteristics, such as age, income, and lifestyle.

Identifying the target market is a key part of the decision-making process when a company designs, packages, and advertises its product.

Key Takeaways

• A target market is a group of customers with shared demographics who have been identified as the most likely buyers of a company's product or service.
• Identifying the target market is important in the development and implementation of a successful marketing plan for any new product.
• The target market also can inform a product's specifications, packaging, and distribution.

How Do I Define My Product's Target Market?

Part of creating a new product is envisioning the consumers who will buy it.

A new product must satisfy a need or solve a problem—or both. That need or problem is probably not universal (unless it reaches the level of indoor plumbing). More likely, it is needed by a subset of consumers, such as environmentally-conscious vegetarians, science nerds, or outdoor enthusiasts. It may appeal to a teenager or a middle-aged professional, a bargain-hunter or a snob.

Envisioning your likely target market is part of the process of creating and refining a product and informs decisions about its packaging, marketing, and placement.

What Are the 4 Target Markets?

Market researchers use activity, interest, and opinion (AIO) surveys to construct psychographic profiles of their target customers. Marketing professionals divide consumers into four major segments:

Demographic : These are the main characteristics that define your target market. Everyone can be identified as belonging to a specific age group, income level, gender, occupation, and education level.

Geographic : This segment is increasingly relevant in the era of globalization. Regional preferences need to be taken into account.

Psychographic : This segment goes beyond the basics of demographics to consider lifestyle, attitudes, interests, and values.

Behavioral : This is the one segment that relies on research into the decisions of a company's current customers. New products may be introduced based on research into the proven appeal of past products.

What Is an Example of a Target Market?

Each of the four target markets can be used to consider who the customer is for a new product.

For example, there are an estimated 49,773 Italian restaurants in the U.S. Clearly, they have enormous appeal.

But a corner pizza joint might appeal mostly—although by no means entirely—to a younger and more budget-conscious consumer, while an old-fashioned white tablecloth place might be frequented by older individuals and families who live in the neighborhood. Meanwhile, a newer venue down the street might cater to an upscale and trend-conscious crowd who will travel a good distance for the restaurant's innovative menu and fancy wine list.

In each successful case, a savvy business person has consciously considered the ideal target market for the restaurant and has tweaked the menu, decor, and advertising strategy to appeal to that market.

Few products today are designed to appeal to absolutely everyone. The Aveda Rosemary Mint Bath Bar, available for $26 per bar at Aveda beauty stores, is marketed to the upscale and eco-conscious woman who will pay extra for quality. Clé de Peau Beauté Synactif Soap retails for $110 a bar and is marketed to wealthy, fashion-conscious women who are willing to pay a premium for a luxury product. An eight-pack of Dial soap costs $11.49 at CVS, and it is known to get the job done.

Part of the success of selling a good or service is knowing whom it will appeal to and who will ultimately buy it. Its user base can grow over time through additional marketing, advertising, and word of mouth.

That's why businesses spend a lot of time and money in defining their initial target markets, and why they follow through with special offers, social media campaigns , and specialized advertising.

Dividing a target market into segments means grouping the population according to the key characteristics that drive their spending decisions. Some of these are gender, age, income level, race, education level, religion, marital status, and geographic location.

Consumers with the same demographics tend to value the same products and services, which is why narrowing down the segments is one of the most important factors in determining target markets.

For example, people who fall into a higher income bracket may be more likely to buy specialty coffee from Starbucks instead of relying on Dunkin' Donuts. The parent companies of both of these brands need to know that in order to decide where to locate their stores, where to stock their products, and where to advertise their brand.

A business may have more than one target market—a primary target market, which is the main focus, and a secondary target market, which is smaller but has growth potential. Toy commercials are targeted directly to children, and their parents are the secondary market.

Identifying the target market is an essential part of a product development plan, along with manufacturing, distribution, price, and promotion planning. The target market determines significant factors about the product itself. A company may tweak certain aspects of a product, such as the amount of sugar in a soft drink or the style of the packaging, so that it appeals more to consumers in its target group.

As a company’s product sales grow, it may expand its target market internationally. International expansion allows a company to reach a broader subset of its target market in other regions of the world.

In addition to international expansion, a company may find its domestic target market expands as its products gain more traction in the marketplace. Expanding a product's target market is a revenue opportunity worth pursuing.

How Detailed Should a Target Market Be?

It depends. Broadly speaking, a product may be designed for a mass market or a niche market, and a niche market can be a very small group indeed, especially in a product's early introductory phase.

Some carbonated beverages aim for a practically universal market. Coca-Cola had to branch out to 200 markets abroad to continue growing its customer base. Gatorade is owned by Pepsi Cola, but the brand is positioned as a drink for athletes. The soda brand Poppi, which is branded as a healthy, sparkling, prebiotic soda with real fruit juice and gut health and immunity benefits, is clearly aimed at a younger, healthier, and more trend-conscious target market.

Consider a casual apparel company that is working to build its distribution channels abroad. In order to determine where its apparel will be most successful, it conducts some research to identify its primary target market. It discovers that the people most likely to buy its products are middle-class women between the ages of 35 and 55 who live in cold climates.

It's reasonable for the company to focus its advertising efforts on northern European websites that have a strong female audience. But first, the company may consider how its apparel can be most attractive to that target market. It may revise its styles and colors and tweak its advertising strategy to optimize its appeal to this new prospective market.

What Is the Purpose of a Target Market?

A target market defines a product as well as vice versa. Once a target market is identified, it can influence a product's design, packaging, price, promotion, and distribution. A product aimed at men won't be packaged in pink plastic. A luxury cosmetic won't be sold in a pharmacy. An expensive pair of shoes comes with a branded cloth drawstring bag as well as a shoebox. All of those factors are signals to the target audience that they have found the right product.

Identifying the target market is part of the process of creating and refining a new product.

A target market can be translated into a profile of the consumer to whom a product is most likely to appeal. The profile considers four main characteristics of that person: demographic, geographic, psychographic, and behavioral. These characteristics help determine who might purchase a company's product.

IBISWorld. " Italian Restaurants in the U.S. - Number of Businesses ."

Aveda. " Rosemary Mint Bath Bar ."

Cle de Peau. " Synactif Soap ."

CVS. " Dial Antibacterial Deodorant Bar Soap, White ."

Coca-Cola Australia. " Coca-Cola: From Start-Up to Global Enterprise ."

Pepsico Partners. " Gatorade ."

DrinkPoppi. " Home ."

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How to Create an Attorney Marketing Plan (With Example)

Have ideas for growing your law firm and making a dent in the legal industry?

If you can think it, you can make it—but only if you document it into a detailed attorney marketing plan. 

We put together this step-by-step guide on how to build a marketing plan that will bring your goals to fruition. We’ll guide you through specific steps, like conducting competitor research, outlining your legal services, pinning down your marketing budget, and so on. 

But first, a quick example.

Law Firm Marketing Plan Example

Putting together a cohesive marketing plan takes a lot of work. To get the ball rolling, let’s take a look at a law firm marketing plan example from Legal Expert Connections . 

The plan starts with a list of priority marketing activities and their frequency. Each activity should come with a brief, actionable description.

The rest of the marketing plan requires you to specify important information, including your law firm’s marketing goals, areas of practice, target revenue, and an “elevator pitch” that encapsulates your firm’s value proposition and vision.

Remember, your marketing plan should be readable, accessible, and detailed. There’s no need to write an essay in any part of your plan — just be sure it’s clear enough for your marketing team to stay on the same page. 

Legal Marketing Strategy Vs. Plan

In the business world, marketing strategy and marketing plan are sometimes mistakenly used interchangeably. And while they seem similar at first, they have significant differences in terms of scope and function. 

Your legal marketing strategy addresses the “whys” behind marketing tactics and establishes long-term, overarching guidelines for campaigns. Marketing plans, on the other hand, outline the specific steps your law firm should take in order to achieve your marketing objectives. 

How to Build Your Law Firm’s Marketing Plan

Every legal marketing strategy needs a marketing plan that turns ideas into actionable steps. 

Let’s get started:

1. Identify Your Marketing Goals

First things first, you need to underline the main reasons why you need a marketing plan. 

Do you need to generate law firm leads through Google Search? Are you looking to establish a community-driven company and raise brand awareness through local events?

The more specific your goals, the better. As a rule of thumb, make sure that your goals are SMART (Specific, Measurable, Achievable, Relevant, and Time-bound) and well-documented to make them useful for decision-making. 

For example, here’s what a SMART goal for law firms should look like: 

“The goal is to increase our personal injury leads by 200% through a combination of offline and online marketing strategies targeting New York and New Jersey areas in the next 60 days.” 

Apart from empowering your legal marketing decision-making, setting clear goals is also statistically proven to improve your chances of success. CoSchedule’s 2022 Trend Report on Marketing Strategy shows that brands that set clear marketing goals are 377% more likely to succeed than their peers. 

Defining your goals will help you determine the tools, talents, and channels you need to get results. It’s also the key to identifying which metrics and KPIs to track in order to measure performance. 

2. Outline Your Legal Services 

You should already know the legal services your law firm offers, be it estate planning, criminal defense, or DUI. It’s time to spice them up and repackage them specifically for the marketing plan you’ll carry out. 

Let’s say your firm’s legal practice areas include intellectual property law. What you should do is highlight the reasons why new leads should choose your law firm over competitors.

What specific infringement claims do you handle? Do you have a proven track record or total amount recovered from won cases? Perhaps your firm will only charge clients if you win? 

Answering these questions lets you create a more compelling core message, which will be reflected in your marketing content. This includes your print advertising materials and law firm’s website pages. 

Here’s another tip: When building pages for your legal services, sprinkle them with client reviews and essential contact information. 

3. Research Your Target Audience

Researching your target audience’s background, pain points, goals, and demographics will have a profound effect on your marketing plan. It will help you craft stronger copy for ads and marketing campaigns — as well as the most effective ways to deliver your message to potential clients. 

Some of the best ways to research your target audience are conducting interviews, reviewing client testimonials, running surveys, reading legal market reports, and checking website traffic data with Google Analytics . 

Compile everything you know about your target audience and past clients into a buyer persona. This is a mock profile of your ideal client, helping your marketing team fine-tune your firm’s messaging, content strategy, and promotion tactics.

4. Define What Your Law Firm’s Brand Stands For

The next step is to develop and instill a value proposition into your overall marketing strategy. 

Think about the vision that drives your law firm forward. It should also briefly summarize the advantages of working with you and who your services are for. 

Check out these examples:

• “We help business owners overcome and grow past legal issues with our personalized service.” 
• “Helping the American worker get back on their feet with battle-tested injury law services.” 
• “Protecting the future of hard-working New Yorkers facing bankruptcy challenges.” 

Value propositions are often used to highlight a Call-To-Action or CTA. This is best done with an opt-in offer, like a free consultation or online course delivered via your email list. 

While value propositions are short, they are essential to a law firm’s brand identity and marketing. A well-written value proposition will also enable you to connect with your target audience on a more personal and emotional level.

Your value proposition — or the main keywords in it — must be consistent across different marketing channels. This will keep your branding consistent and recognizable, helping you stand out among the competition and win the trust of your target clients. 

5. Conduct Competitor Research and Try to Find a Market Gap

To launch an effective marketing campaign, you need to know who you’re up against. 

Scout out the competition and try to locate gaps in their offline and digital marketing strategies. This pertains to underutilized marketing channels in your niche that could put your firm at the top of your audience’s mind. 

Competitor research is also a great way to discover proven marketing tactics that will boost your local and online presence.  

Suppose you’re a family law attorney based in San Diego. An easy starting point is to analyze the top results on Search Engine Results Pages (SERPs).  

You may notice that all of your top competitors run active blogs, but none of them leverage local events or video marketing for lead generation. While legal blogging should definitely be a part of your strategy, make it your priority to fill marketing gaps and rise from the competition. 

Dissecting your competitors’ strengths and weaknesses will help you concoct aggressive marketing plans that get results. But it’s still important to experiment with other marketing channels to discover what works best for your law practice. 

6. Identify the Best Marketing Channels For Your Law Practice

Law firms can utilize a number of marketing channels — online or offline — to win more business. Use the information you’ve gathered about your audience and competitors when choosing the best marketing channels for your campaign. 

Below are ideas you can explore:

• Social media marketing (Facebook, LinkedIn, Twitter, etc.)
• Event marketing
• Email marketing campaigns
• Referral marketing (verbal or through backlinks)
• Legal directories (Avvo, Service Direct, Google My Business, etc.) 
• Direct mail marketing
• Organic Search Engine Optimization (SEO)
• Local services advertising
• Google Ads and other Pay-Per-Click (PPC) platforms

Of course, you should also consider your budget when finalizing the channels for your marketing plan. 

Certain channels like direct mail, webinars, podcasts, and event marketing are more expensive than others, but they usually have higher ROI potential when executed effectively. There are also cost-effective channels capable of quick results, like social media platforms and local search ads. 

7. Arrive at Your Marketing Budget

Sooner or later, you need to think about the costs associated with your marketing plan. 

Setting a marketing budget ensures you don’t go overboard with your spending. It will help you allocate funds strategically over multiple marketing techniques and channels. More importantly, it lets you calculate the ROI of your marketing efforts. 

How much money should you set aside for marketing? 

According to the 2023 CallRail Marketing Outlook for Law Firms , law firms spend 15% of their annual budget on marketing activities. 

However, every law firm is different — and a 15% annual budget allocation may be too much for some firms’ marketing goals. If you’re planning a marketing plan for a small law firm, feel free to settle for a lower budget until you’re getting consistent monthly returns from your marketing. 

8. Settle on Your Law Firm’s Pricing Point

With your marketing budget set, you’ll be able to calculate your average Customer Acquisition Cost (CAC) — the amount you spend to convert a single lead into a paying client. You can do this using the formula below: 

CAC = (cost of sales + cost of marketing) ÷ number of new clients

Getting this figure will help you adjust your pricing strategy for your firm’s legal services. Just be cautious when marking up your prices and think about your type of client’s buying power.

If your rates become substantially higher than competitors, look at other ways to reduce your CAC and secure a positive cash flow. You can scale down your marketing activities, invest in automation, optimize conversion rates, find more cost-effective, or use a combination of these to reduce costs. 

9. Get the Right Team in Place

With your target marketing channels and budget set, the next step is to assemble the manpower to give your plans some legs. 

You have two options here: build your own team or hire a law firm marketing agency . 

The first option is more practical if you have budget constraints. To further reduce costs, hire freelancers as opposed to hiring full-time professionals. You’ll find experienced marketing freelancers on marketplaces like Upwork . 

Some of the talents you need for law firm marketing are: 

• Copywriters
• Law firm SEO specialist
• Marketing strategist 
• Media buyers
• Social media manager

But if budget is not a problem and you need reliable, measurable results, go with an agency with a proven track record with legal marketing services. This route lets you skip the tricky aspects of planning a marketing strategy and building a team. 

Just be sure to look for positive reviews and case studies to see if the agency has verifiable results. It’s also a good idea to investigate if they share the same core beliefs with your firm in terms of business values, client success, and accountability. 

10. Set up Marketing Attribution and Establish KPIs

Before wrapping up your marketing plan, ask yourself these questions: 

What will success look like? How can I determine which strategies actually impact my bottom line? 

To answer these questions, start by identifying KPIs that are relevant to your marketing efforts. In addition to CAC, here are additional KPI examples in law firm marketing campaigns: 

• New clients by source — The number of new clients acquired from marketing channels (events, referrals, social media, landing page, etc.). 
• Conversion rate — The percentage of leads who become clients after engaging with your marketing content (can also be used to measure user experience and website design performance). 
• Return On Investment — A straightforward KPI that compares profits against the amount spent on a marketing campaign. 

You can track these KPIs and set up marketing attribution using analytics tools and law firm Customer Relationship Management (CRM) platforms like Clio. 

By monitoring KPIs, you’ll be able to pinpoint weaknesses in your marketing strategy. This allows you to continuously discover improvement opportunities, maximizing your chances of achieving or even exceeding your marketing goals.

Kickstart Your Law Firm Marketing with Seasoned Professionals

Now it’s time to draft your law firm’s marketing plan. It is the embodiment of your entire marketing process, so build it carefully to position yourself for success. 

If you need an expertly crafted blueprint for marketing success, we can build a tailor-made digital marketing plan for you if we’re a fit. Contact us sharing you business and marketing goals.

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