If you’re leaving your marketing success to luck, you will find it’s run out.

Obviously I’m having a little fun with the play on words this week, but the reality is that successful marketing requires planning. A 5-step plan in fact (I’ll get to that in a minute). Regardless if you have a local small business or are a global entrepreneur, planned marketing reaps greater rewards, costs you less money and saves you a whole lot of headaches.

Advertising costs are expensive, online and offline.

Which is why it’s even more critical that you plan and manage your spending. Throwing money into advertising and praying that it will lead to new clients is literally “Living on a Prayer”. There is a better way and we are going to dig in deep this week in Episode 80 of the podcast.

If you’re ready to set up a marketing system that will work, then this is the episode for you, check it out here.

For now, let’s dive into that 5-step action plan.

#1 – Define your goal, set your objective.

I’m sure you have heard the quote from Antoine De Saint-Exupery “A goal without a plan is just a wish.” The same can be said for your marketing. Without a goal, it’s impossible to measure success or know which direction to sail your ship. Goals and objectives are the same things in this case. What is it you are trying to accomplish with this marketing campaign? Keep in mind there can be campaigns within campaigns as well, but let’s not get ahead of ourselves. Objectives can be things like:

• Increasing your authority
• Building your email list by ___ number of subscribers
• Warming up your email list
• Watching a video
• Reading a blog post
• and more

#2 – Who is your audience, ideal client?

In case you missed it, I do have a freebie you can grab to help you out on this one.  You can snag it here. In Episode 80 this week, I dive even deeper into some ideal client specifics. I spell out some examples but also cover a new component of audiences, where they are in your funnel.  Leads can be cold, warm or hot. Given that information, you will need to set an objective and plan of action for each sector of your ideal clients. For more details tune in here. I also cover some specifics about local vs. global marketing and how to target your specific business and client type.

#3 – What do your people need?

You all know by now how important it is to be creating content. In this episode, I give you some ideas on how to cater your content to your audience so that they are eating it up. Eliminating the guesswork and the time and energy spent creating something no one wants. Lastly, I caution you to show up where your people are and don’t just start a podcast because everyone else is. If your audience isn’t listening to podcasts, Houston, we have a problem. Create what they need and they will come. Put it where they already are and you’ll get their attention.

#4 – Create a followup system.

I have to confess, I went a little deep here when talking about follow up. The reality is, you can create a follow-up system that is as intricate or simple as you can manage. If you have a team of sales reps, then yeah, your follow-up system will have more moving parts.  More people, more steps.  Capiche?  Regardless, the fortune is in the follow-up. So you MUST have a system to continue the relationship with your new leads. Whether that is an email sequence, phone calls, personalized videos using a tool like Loom, messenger messaging or a combination of all of these, that’s entirely up to you. But, put something in place and keep in mind these three factors for your audience temperatures:

Cold—>>> educate and add value —->>> segment by interest

Warm —>>> present offer —>>> convert to purchase or opt-in

Hot —>>> retarget —>>> send to next offer 

#5 – Analyze your tactics to measure success.

This is the most important step of your strategy because if you aren’t measuring success, you will be spinning your wheels. Examining which opt-ins are working, where they are leading as well as emails, phone calls, sales, etc. Don’t leave one piece of your funnel unmeasured. It will keep you from continuing with pieces that aren’t working or giving you a heads up that something is amok and needs to be fixed. It will save you a ton of time, frustration and money.

Now it’s your turn.  If you want all the details for these five steps, head over here and listen to the entire episode.

Which of these steps were you missing? Head on over to the Facebook Group and share what’s working, not working and what you still need to do.

Listen to the entire episode here:

Love this episode?  We would love a Review! Don’t forget to subscribe so you don’t miss any episodes!