2015 is looming! We can’t believe it but the countdown to the new year is on. And for most of us, a new year marks resolutions for our health, relationships, finances and careers. We also believe it’s a time to make resolutions for your organization’s marketing plan. As you begin to implement a commitment to include more nutritious vegetables into your own diet, make sure your marketing plan is getting the nutrition and care it deserves in the new year as well.
We’ve created a five step guide to preparing your marketing plan for 2015 that will help you do just that.
- Set your goals for 2015. Without set goals, you can’t even begin to think about planning for 2015. You need to ask yourself what your goals are across the many functions of your organization. Goals will be the building blocks and driving forces behind every piece of your marketing strategy for the new year. Set goals for financial revenue, client growth, media placement metrics, social content metrics and whatever you deem necessary. This is a great opportunity to have a team workshop and develop these goals together. When you’re done, make sure to boil your list down to your 3-5 most important goals to keep everyone focused.
- Research your industry and analyze trends. After setting your goals, it’s imperative to make sure you’re up to speed with where your industry is going in the year ahead. Read up on trends in your industry and channel inspiration from leaders in your field. You should also review your own metrics from the past few months of 2014 to evaluate trends.
- Set your strategy. In order to achieve your goals, you have to set your roadmap and stick to it. A well thought out, detailed strategy will be your lifeline for 2015. To create your strategy, use your goals as foundation and then pull from your research to establish what you want to accomplish in 2015. Your strategy will detail the high-level steps that you’ll take to bring your brand to life and achieve your marketing objectives.
- Create tactical calendars calendars. Your strategy defines what you’re going to do in 2015, but you also need to detail the tactics that define how you’ll do it. A marketing plan that doesn’t get into tactics will be difficult to implement, so you should make tactical planning an important part of your process. Developing a tactical and content calendar for the entire year may sound daunting, but we believe it’s important to a schedule of activities and information on themes around which you’ll develop content in order to focus your efforts. Changes in consumer habits, world events and other factors will impact your content as time goes on, but having a general idea of what you push out keeps you on track to achieve your goals.
- Get organized. This last step is the easiest to forgo, but it makes a world of difference. Heading into 2015, you’ll want your marketing plans to be ready for action and implementation. This means developing processes, setting to-dos and organizing content. This is especially imperative at this time of year as most organizations take a holiday break at the end of December. When you return to work on January 2, your marketing plan will already be in a great place to kick-off the year if you put in the necessary organization work now.
Getting excited about 2015? So are we! The new year is a great time to press refresh on your marketing efforts and gear up and tackle your goals head on.
Need more help planning your 2015 roadmap? Sign up for our FREE marketing workshop on December 11 from 12-2pm.
Photo credit: Klearchos Kapoutsis, Flickr via Creative Commons
