In order to create a successful marketing strategy, you will first need to understand all of its components. A marketing strategy consists of numerous moving parts, all of which will determine the level of success you’re able to reach in their own respective ways.

So, to enable your marketing strategy to help you grow your business and expand your reach, you will first need to create a good marketing strategy template. Or you should hire a marketing agency to do the job.

The best marketing plans are usually the most detailed ones. These will help your business reach the exposure it needs to achieve current success and lay the groundwork for the year ahead. When considering email marketing tools, Klaviyo and its alternatives stand out as options that align with comprehensive marketing strategies.

That being said, here is a list of some of the most important elements of a successful marketing strategy, as well as some tips that will help you make the best of it in 2022.

How To Create A Marketing Plan?

Before we dive any deeper into the matter, we must first start at the beginning. When it comes to creating a marketing plan, it’s important to understand that this is not a one-and-done type of process. So, instead of simply putting together a handbook of sorts on company policy, you will need to create a so-called living document.

This document is supposed to grow and expand as you continue learning and expanding your own knowledge base regarding your audience, current trends, shifts in the industry, and other relevant details.

So, in a way, this document should act as a point of reference for your team, rather than a strict guide.

5 Key Points Of Planning A Marketing Strategy 

With everything previously mentioned, it becomes quite clear that any marketing strategy needs to have some sort of an outline. This only serves as a main point of reference, before you create your final and best marketing plan which will, of course, go into far greater detail.

That being said, here are 5 main points every marketing strategy needs to address.

1. Run A Thorough Situational Analysis(SWOT)

Before you begin thinking about creating your marketing plan, you first need to determine what your business’s current situation is. This will enable you to determine your business’s strengths and weaknesses, as well as its opportunities and threats. That’s why this type of analysis is commonly called SWOT analysis. What's more, this type of analysis won’t only focus on your business itself, but it will also provide insight into the current market and your competitors. By understanding the market and analyzing your competitors, you’ll be able to easily determine any gaps in the current offer, which will leave plenty of room for competitive advantage.

2. Determine Your Target Audience

Understanding and identifying who you’re trying to market to is of huge importance. According to top website design companies from New York you must first understand who you’re targeting, in order to be able to do so in the first place. Here, you will need to create so-called buyer personas that will include various demographic information, such as age, gender, socio-economic status, as well as psychographic information. These personas should reflect your audience’s needs and demands and your business should aim at solving them. If, on the other hand, you have already established your buyer personas, do make sure you review them for updates, as customers’ needs and demands do tend to change over time.

3. Define Your Goals

This step is pretty straightforward. In order to be able to achieve your goals you must first determine what those goals actually are. So, make sure you write down your goals, but also focus on making them SMART – specific, measurable, attainable, relevant and timely. That way you can easily keep track of your progress – or lack thereof – and notice in a timely manner if your approach to reaching your goals needs to change. Additionally, you can also set a framework for objectives and key results (OKR) which will help you break down your main goals into smaller and more easily achievable milestones. This will not only enable you to stay on top of your progress more easily, but it also provides greater transparency across the organization, enabling every member of your team to stay on the right course.

4. Analyze Your Tactics

Once you analyze your company, determine your audience and set clear goals, it’s time to move onto analyzing various marketing tactics you’ll have at your disposal. These tactics should align with your goals, and match your audience and opportunities for your company. For nonprofit organizations, leveraging the right strategies can make a huge difference. Introducing marketing automation for nonprofits can significantly enhance how these organizations connect with donors and automate various tasks, ensuring higher levels of engagement and efficiency in operations. By using advanced tools, nonprofits can tailor their communication, ensuring each donor feels valued and appreciated while freeing up time to focus on broader mission goals.

Here, you will also need to determine and choose the most appropriate distribution channels, which shouldn’t be difficult at all if you’ve done the previous three steps right. The tactics you opt for should help you reach your goals, establish a strong presence in distribution channels where the majority of your audience is and tap into various opportunities that will enable your business to grow and expand its reach.

5. Create A Budget

The last key point of any successful marketing strategy is setting a clear budget. Although last on our list, this step is in no way, shape or form any less important than the previous four. With a clear budget in mind, you will easily prevent stretching your assets too thin. Moreover, make sure that you clearly determine the budget for each portion of your marketing strategy, rather than simply setting a budget for it as a whole. That way you can closely monitor whether your efforts really do pay off within a given timeframe, or you need to make some further adjustments.

Main Marketing Strategy Components

Now that we’ve roughly defined the key points of planning a marketing strategy, it’s time to dive into the details. These are some of the most important components of any successful marketing strategy:

Executive Summary

An executive summary should act as a table of content of sorts. Here, you will summarize each part of your marketing plan, making it clear-cut and easy to follow. Additionally, this is the part of your marketing strategy where you can include your business information – i.e., location, mission statement, marketing team members’ names, and so on, as well as consider the option to hire remote marketing team.

Goals

As mentioned earlier, you should clearly define your goals in order to be able to clearly envision what you’re working towards. Of course, aside from simply writing down your goals, make sure you include a plan of action of how you intend to achieve them, as well as a timeframe in which you want to make it happen.

Customer Analysis

This is the part that focuses on your buyer personas. Explain who your audience is, why they may be interested in your offer, and how they will benefit from interacting with your business.

Unique Selling Proposition (USP)

When it comes to determining your unique selling proposition ask yourself this – Why would anyone be interested in buying your products or hiring your services over all the others on the market? You will know that you’ve managed to define your USP once you’re able to give a clear and concise answer to that question.

SWOT Analysis

Due to the fact that SWOT analysis helps you determine your strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threats, it becomes quite obvious why it made the list. As soon as you’re able to identify all of these points, you will be able to decide which steps you should take next. Not only that, but you’ll also be able to predict and prepare for any potential hindrances that come your way.

Brand Image

Any business that strives towards success should keep its brand image in mind at all times. That’s why you need to determine how you wish your brand to be perceived by your audience and analyze whether or not that’s currently the case.

Marketing Strategy And Tactics

In this section, you’ll need to decide on the initiatives and strategies you wish to implement, that will help you reach your ultimate goals. Of course, the competitive analysis will play a huge role in defining those, which is why you need to make sure you’ve been as thorough as possible when conducting it.

Budget And ROI

As mentioned earlier, having a clear budget in place will help you stay on top of your marketing efforts. By assigning a specific budget to every part of your marketing strategy you will be able to keep track of that part’s overall success. Additionally, you’ll also be able to identify how big of an ROI each part of your marketing strategy brings in, which will speak volumes about its success.

Distribution Channels

In order to define your lead distribution channels, you – once again – need to go back.. Review all of your previous marketing efforts and see which channels have been most effective historically. Try to assess which of them brought in the most qualified leads and see where the majority of your current leads are coming from (and how qualified are they). That way, you’ll be able to determine which channels you should focus on the most in your marketing efforts.

SEO

In this part, you should focus on determining how you plan on creating and optimizing your content based on target keywords and search terms. Again, create a clear strategy to help you stay on the right track at all times. You can get it done yourself by your in-house team or get outside help via online marketing jobs on Jooble.

Measurements And KPIs

In the end, you also need to determine how you intend on measuring the progression and success of your marketing plan. Determine your key performance indicators (KPIs) and make sure that your strategies are aligned with them.

To Sum Up

Creating a successful marketing strategy requires a lot of work and dedicated research. It’s not something that can be done overnight or rushed in any sense. So, if you wish to upgrade your current marketing strategy or create an entirely new one for 2022, make sure you start your research as soon as possible. Keep an eye out for all the important aspects of a successful marketing campaign and pay meticulous attention to detail.