Four essential tips for putting together the marketing plan, a crucial point for conquering the market.
1º) Select the target markets: Identify the needs of customer segments that you can best serve and make money with, discarding the unprofitable ones.
2º) Analyze your target markets: Gather information and draw quantitative conclusions (number of customers, how much they spend, etc.) and qualitative conclusions (why they buy, what they like and dislike, what they need, etc.)
3º) Measure the target market: Evaluate each market segment, determining where the greatest sales potential is, what new products you can offer, improvements, etc.
4º) Develop the actions: Plan what you are going to do and act (advertising, promotion, direct sales, etc.). Receive feedback. Control deviations from reality versus what was planned and quantify results.
Our commercial effort must focus on a group of clients:
Put the focus: Identify needs of more profitable clients, dominating a market niche where you have strengths.
Segment: Divide the market into groups with similar characteristics that require similar products.
Outline: Know customers by segment, identifying what they need and value, what benefits they expect and purchasing behaviors
To what extent are we satisfying our customers and how our competitors do.
Features of our company: Identify key aspects of our business: products and services; customer segments; sales channels; etc
Business performance: To what extent can we satisfy the different needs of our segments. Use SWOT ANALYSIS. (Strengths, Opportunities, Weaknesses and Threats).
Analysis of our competitors: Make a SWOT for our main competitors.
Identify what I have to “attack the market”:
Identify resource needs: Do I have human and material resources to act successfully?
Identify differentiation opportunities: Can we gain at least a comparative advantage and differentiate ourselves (in the “customer’s mind”) on key business points?
Evaluate current and potential market: Forecast sales by formulating 3 cases (optimistic, realistic and pessimistic) and measure the economic return of each action.
Applying tactics communication and sale
Press and Public Relations: Stimulate demand through media news or public presentations. Ex.: Seminars and workshops; sponsorships; magazine articles; exhibitions; etc
Advertising: In paid mass media or “for exchange” (radio, TV, online, newspapers, magazines, public roads, brochures, etc.)
Custom Sale: Presentation of a product in direct contact with the potential customer. Ex.: sales force; e-mail; telemarketing; by mail; etc
Sale promotion: Short-term incentives to stimulate the quick purchase of a product. Ex: Offers for a certain time; sales and discounts; contests, demonstrations, etc.
Feedback Mechanisms: Receive information from customers about their satisfaction, needs and evaluation of our products, services and company
