Almost every company conducts some marketing activities (and if not, they definitely should). However, without proper direction, they're meaningless – then you definitely can't expect to achieve the expected results, and it's much harder to figure out where you went wrong. Therefore, marketing activities should begin with defining their goals and strategy. What is it? How do you do it? We explain!
What is a marketing strategy?
Every brand, regardless of size, should have a marketing strategy. It's a document that analyzes the company's current situation and defines marketing goals and how to achieve them. It should be quite comprehensive and indicate the direction of marketing activities to achieve the best possible results. It can be considered a guide for the team that will coordinate all marketing-related activities.
More specifically, your marketing strategy should include:
- strengths and weaknesses of the company,
- the goals he wants to achieve,
- a way to implement them,
- defining the target group,
- identifying the competition and what advantage the company has over them,
- costs of marketing activities.
Importantly, a good marketing strategy should not only be implemented on an ongoing basis but also reviewed, updated, and supplemented in line with the latest market realities, technological developments, trends, etc. This allows it to support a company at every stage of its development and serve as a guide. It's worth putting effort into creating this document, as its professionalism and comprehensiveness will facilitate the management of the company's operations.
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Why create a marketing strategy?
As mentioned, strategy should guide the company's marketing efforts . Its primary goal should be to define how communication should be conducted so that it:
- better than the competition's communication,
- tailored to the needs, expectations and characteristics of the target group.
Moreover, it is important to define the target itself, which will help to specify the actions.
A marketing strategy is created to avoid blindly pursuing and incurring unnecessary costs on unsuccessful advertising that doesn't deliver the expected results. It truly brings many benefits. Primarily:
- allows you to focus on opportunities and avoid threats,
- allows you to identify tools that will prove useful in combating competition,
- allows you to recognize the competitive advantage of your company's product over other similar ones,
- helps save time and money, setting the direction for creating effective campaign,
- supports the company's effective communication with customers and partners,
- helps increase sales and maximize profits.
A well-constructed document of this type and its execution should directly contribute to increasing sales, acquiring new contacts, gaining new customers and retaining those who have already used the company's services, while increasing their satisfaction.
How to create a good marketing strategy?
Creating a good and comprehensive marketing strategy is certainly not easy. It requires extensive analysis and consideration, as well as consultation with specialists. Above all, it's crucial to understand your product (what you're selling) and your target audience (the type of people who might be interested in your offer). You need to look at your company objectively, putting yourself in the shoes of a potential customer, which isn't always easy. It's crucial to highlight what makes your offering unique and superior to the competition.
You need to consider, among other things:
- what is the purpose of the product or service (e.g. does it meet specific needs, solve problems, provide a unique experience, etc.),
- how and to what extent the product is better than competitors' proposals,
- how it may be useful to a potential customer.
It's also important to precisely define who this potential customer is. If you sell children's products, your target audience will be young parents; if you produce spades and rakes, you'll aim for allotment gardeners, garden enthusiasts, or perhaps professional gardeners, fruit growers, or farmers; if you offer beauty treatments, you'll primarily be interested in women above a certain age. You must always know who to address in your marketing communications and tailor its form, content, and message to the requirements and needs of your target group.
The target segment of a marketing strategy should be as comprehensive as possible. It's not enough to simply define a company's potential customer base. It's also important to consider the interests, habits, needs, and lifestyles of the target audience, as well as how they communicate. The target audience can also be divided into segments based on various criteria, and the segment that appears most profitable can be selected.
Marketing goals – what are they?
Once you've analyzed your offerings and your target audience, it's time to define your company's marketing goals. These are simply assumptions that define what you want to achieve through marketing activities . You might think that nothing could be simpler – every business owner wants to maximize profits. However, marketing goals are all about specifics . They can be tied to various criteria. However, it's important that they are defined precisely enough to allow for a determination of whether they have been achieved or not. Marketing goals can include, for example:
- increase sales,
- increasing recognition,
- acquiring a partner or sponsor,
- number of visits to the website,
- increasing the brand's reputation (e.g. being perceived as an expert in a given field).
It's also crucial to define the scale of the expected effect and the timeframe for achieving it . Marketing goals should certainly not be confused with vision or wishes. They must be realistic, achievable, and measurable!
How to define marketing goals?
Still unsure how to define marketing goals for your company? The SMART model, which provides a very helpful framework, can be helpful. Each letter of the SMART acronym defines a characteristic that a marketing goal should meet. What does it involve?
- S (Specific) – specific, concreteThe idea is to provide enough detail in the goal to address real threats or opportunities. An example might be "acquire 1000 new customers" (rather than "acquire more customers"—the latter version of the marketing objective is too vague).
- M (Measurable)A goal must have an attribute that allows it to be measured or counted to verify whether it has been achieved to the required extent. Therefore, goals typically contain numerical data, as in the example above, or percentages.
- A (Attainable) – availableYou should only work towards goals that are challenging but achievable. "Taking over the world" isn't a realistic goal, but being number one in your industry in sales is.
- R (Relevant) – important for a given business and related to the overall operating strategyThe goal should be consistent with the overall marketing strategy, industry realities, target group needs, etc.
- T (Time-bound) – time-boundYou should set specific dates by which your goal should be achieved. This is the only way to gauge your success. Setting a timeframe will also give you greater motivation. Otherwise, you might constantly be putting things off until later.
Generally speaking, marketing goals can be divided into several groups. It's worth setting at least a few tasks from each group. The most important ones include:
- strategic goals – aimed at increasing sales, revenues or market share, as well as creating and implementing an action plan for the next few years;
- tactical goals – applied separately for each product in accordance with the market situation, for example, increasing brand awareness, acquiring sales leads, improving the quality of customer service, increasing the number of returning customers, etc.;
- operational goals – related to the development of a marketing program, are the most specific, for example, they concern acquiring a specific number of customers or selling a specific number of products.
In addition, a distinction can be made between qualitative and quantitative, and short-term and long-term goals.
Examples of marketing goals
What might marketing goals look like? Following the principles above, examples of well-defined marketing goals include:
- achieving a specific amount of turnover in a specific tax year (or an increase compared to the previous year expressed as a percentage),
- introducing a new product to the market (with a deadline, i.e. the date by which the goal can be achieved at the latest),
- acquiring a specific number of new customers,
- acquiring a specific number of returning customers,
- increasing the number of sales points by a certain amount,
- increasing the number of requests for quotes by a certain amount,
- increasing the inflow of foreign orders by a certain value,
- increase in market share by a certain amount,
- achieving a specific sales volume,
- improving the quality of customer service by a specific indicator,
- reducing the cart abandonment rate in the online store by a certain value,
- Increase the Open Rate of newsletters by a specified number.
Various tools help in measuring marketing goals. It's also worth using Key Performance Indicators (KPIs) , which allow you to measure the progress of specific processes. It's also crucial to establish primary marketing goals and secondary objectives, which together contribute to brand success.
What are marketing metrics and why is it worth measuring them?
KPIs are metrics that allow for the evaluation of a company's activities. They allow for verification of whether solutions implemented so far are delivering results. This allows for the identification and elimination of problems, as well as modification of certain aspects of the strategy to increase its effectiveness. Nowadays, businesses have access to numerous methods for measuring their marketing effectiveness, which proves extremely helpful. However, it's worth remembering that monitoring all indicators is usually not worthwhile, as there are simply too many of them and can lead to informational chaos. So what should you pay particular attention to?
- Website traffic – more people visiting your site means more potential customers. You can also find out who your visitors are and where they come from, allowing you to better tailor your website's design and content to their needs. Among other things, this will help you acquire traffic. website positioning on relevant keywords.
- Conversion rate If increased website traffic doesn't translate into more orders or inquiries, something's wrong. Potential customers may not be finding what they're looking for or are experiencing technical difficulties.
- Proportion of sales leads to customers – if few of the so-called sales leads become customers, this also heralds certain problems, for example in the area of customer service.
- Cost of acquiring a lead It's also worth checking how much time and money it takes to acquire a single lead. This may indicate insufficient effectiveness of your efforts.
- Lead Revenue by Source – It's also good to know how much revenue each lead generates and compare it to the costs. This metric will also help you determine which lead source is proving most profitable.
- Social media reach and user engagement – this is a good method to check, among other things, the position and influence of the brand.
These are just a few examples of important data that allow you to monitor how well your marketing solutions are performing and to what extent your marketing strategy goals are being met. The premise is simple: define your goals and begin implementing them, monitoring your progress on an ongoing basis. In practice, however, this is difficult. That's why truly good marketing specialists —those who can define marketing tasks and goals and then implement them—are few and far between!
FAQs about SMART Marketing Strategy
This comprehensive document serves as a guide for the entire team. It analyzes the company's current situation, sets the direction for marketing activities, and precisely defines how to achieve the desired results.
For activities to be based on solid foundations, the document must include:
- Strengths and weaknesses of your company.
- Precise definition of the target group.
- Analyzing the competition and defining your market advantage.
- Specific goals and ways to achieve them.
- Estimated costs of marketing activities.
No. Strategy is a tool that must live. It should be constantly reviewed, updated, and supplemented to keep pace with changing market realities, technological developments, and new trends.
This method protects against wishful thinking and vague assumptions. According to this method, each goal set in the strategy must be:
- Specific,
- Measurable,
- Achievable,
- Relevant (Relevant from a business point of view),
- Time-bound.
KPIs (Key Performance Indicators) are key performance indicators. They should be established and regularly monitored to ensure your marketing communications are actually working. They help you identify where you went wrong if your campaign isn't delivering the expected results.
Summary
The above article covers the following topics:
- Basics of marketing strategy,
- How to create a good marketing strategy?
- Marketing Metrics: Role and Purpose
- Tools for measuring indicators.
