Thursday, August 26, 2010

Creating a Marketing Plan: advice for picking platforms


I love this image as it lists just about every media platform that I can think of and visually shows the type of communication (one or two way) capable by each.

Yellow arrows - 2 way
Red arrows - mostly 1 way
Blue arrows - 1 way

As marketing plans go, the simplest & most effective that I've ever seen was written by Gary Vanerchuck.  In Gary's book Crush It, Gary outlines his version of the best marketing strategy ever.   The entire chapter is 1 word...CARE.  

To me, CARE means a lot of things.  Care about my service, my product, my staff, pricing, competition etc. etc. etc.   It also means I should care about my marketing platforms and my message.   If I don't care, then I'll choose types of media that allow for only 1 way communication.    

These one way advertising platforms are not 'communication' platforms...they'd be better defined as monologue platforms.   While monologues are important for character development in theatre,  real life people/brands who never ask a question are just boring.  

So here's the goods.
  1. Care
  2. Goals - set them
  3. Budget - stick to monthly budget based on your goals.  (2-10% of total sales)
  4. Allocate - your budget per platform according to average daily media usage & target audience
  5. Maximize - the impact on each paid platform before adding others
  6. USP - Craft & Deliver your Unique Selling Proposition
  7. Leap - Execute your plan & engage internal and external customers



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