A marketing plan isimportant because it is the best way to help you prepare yourself. It willensure that you stick to your schedule and that you are spending your moneywisely.
It will serve as a road mapto making you achieve your company goals.
Marketing Audit
Take a look at yourmarketing collateral materials. You will need to review all of your marketingactivities that have occurred in the past three years. Review everyannouncement, advertisement, phonebook ad, brochure, flyer, and evaluate if itwere successful.
Situation Assessment
Under this section you willwrite the market analysis and segmentation. Write a competitor analysis. Forexample, what are the similarities of your company and your competitors? Whatsets your company apart from the competition? What are the major trends in theenvironment? What are the internal capabilities and current position in servedmarkets?
Financial Summary
Write a cost and profitanalysis. Write your budget information the amount that you have set asideeither per quarter or per annual for marketing. Set your prices for yourproduct or service as a competitive rate. For example, price your product orservice at a higher rate than your fixed or variable cost. Evaluate the processof the marketing plans effectiveness. Measure your results against thestandards that you set when you made or set your goals. Develop a schedule forwhich gives a timeline for each marketing actions.
Reference:
AAFP; Nine Steps to aStrategic Marketing Plan; Rebecca Anwar, PHD and Judy Capko; 2001
SBA: Developing a MarketingPlan