Core Marketing Plan Template
When I looked for a free marketing plan template for my own startup business many years ago, I found great big complicated things that looked as if they had come straight out of an MBA course.
If you run your own small business, you want something simple and practical that you know will work.
Which is precisely why I created the One Page Core Marketing Plan Template you can download from this page. It will give you a simple series of steps to help you produce incredible results.
Marketing has been too complicated for too long. In the past month, one of my clients, a small removals business, increased their sales by 60% in one month by taking massive action using the first three steps of the plan.
Meanwhile a £1M turnover company that sells business to business, wanted a marketing plan to capture utility companies as customers. In this case the first 4 steps have been completed and the results are staggering.
With my help in the execution, they have captured 8 utility companies as clients in less than 6 months. These new sales alone should be enough over the next two years to double their turnover.
When looking through the marketing plan template, you’ll see that things like market research and SWOT analysis have been left out. These can be really helpful to prepare your thinking for putting your marketing into action, but for most small businesses the key to success is in the five steps presented.
Download it and let me know how you get on.
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Comments on Core Marketing Plan Template
Lee I’ve really liked your core marketing concept and the fishing analogy since you explained it to be.
I also like the way you’ve turned it into a very short marketing plan.
It’s a good core plan. You may want to re-think the expression “Where Can You Reach Them in Numbers?” section because it’s at odds with its complimentary box “Niche ..”. Obviously, niche markets are specialist markets where the numbers are lower than the market as a whole. Perhaps “Where Do They Buy From Now?” might be better. The “Channels” section could be aligned more with the usefulness of the channel or with channels that actually are proven to give revenues. For example, “Business network meetings”, “Social Networking”, and “Search Engine Optimisation” could be replaced with “Printed Media/ online Advertising”, “Cold Calling”, “Face-to-face potential client meeting”. Do you know of any company whatsoever who has obtained revenue by having 5000 Twitter followers, 2000 Facebook friends?
Hi Russell,
You raise some interesting questions.
Niche vs numbers is a challenge for every business. What I teach my clients is that you need a niche that you can market to in sufficient numbers to win customers. Several times I’ve come across businesses that have defined a niche so very tightly that they have no way to reach the customers they want.
In the marketing plan template, the “Where can you reach them in numbers?” question is really a sanity check to make sure that you have defined a niche that will result in customers for you.
In the marketing channels section, I’ve highlighted a few channels that can be worth exploring, but you’re right that this won’t be the best list for every single business. When working with a client we’ll go into some depth to figure out which ones will yield best results.
While printed media ads are popular, 99% don’t produce sales and so I’m always wary of recommending this approach unless the client understands the importance of using direct response techniques. For this reason I tend to leave it off the free plan I’ve put up here.
Meanwhile business networking is a very well proven lead generator – I know many small businesses that live off the back of a single BNI chapter or 4Networking membership.
Social networking through online sites like LinkedIn, Facebook and Twitter is already producing good results for lots of small business owners who enjoy mixing socialising with work. I know several businesses who have attracted clients through both (including an accountant with under 1,000 followers getting a client through Twitter).
But again, you’re right that it won’t be the best strategy for every business. I think social networking is very much a personality related thing, too, and will be wholly unsuited to a lot of people. I agree that I would rarely promote social networking as a primary marketing strategy apart from special cases.
The template is designed to provide a powerful one-page overview and structure to marketing, instead of it being a hit and miss affair. When working with a client, we’ll start with a completely blank page and tailor it for them.
Just as an aside, my clients who’ve used my Internet marketing strategies extensively have added £ millions to their turnover. This came mainly from SEO and PPC, so I would never rule these out as I consider them ***almost*** essential for every business. For me, they’ve earnt their place on my marketing place template time and time again.
Cheers,
Lee