Have you ever felt like you are not sure where to start with your marketing strategy?

You want to work on marketing products/services that you believe in, but don’t know how to go about it. What’s more, you feel that there are too many opinions and too many ways of doing things. You don’t know where to look or what to focus on.

If this sounds familiar, don’t worry!

We were in a similar situation when we decided to rebrand our eCommerce store. We knew that we wanted to keep the essence of our brand while incorporating the technology and design of the 21st century. But, changing our name and refreshing our entire website’s design were just the beginning.

Since then, we have had to develop processes and procedures to make sure that we are consistently delivering high-quality work while meeting our deadlines. And, in doing so, we have learned a lot about how to come up with a sound marketing strategy that will drive growth for our business.

Get Inspired

One of the first things you need to do is get inspired. Do you have a hobby? If so, you can use it to get inspired. For example, if you love to cook, why not use it as a way to explore new flavors and combinations. If you love to travel, you can use it as a way to see new places and people. If you love to read, why not use it as a way to learn about different cultures and how they live. When you get inspired, you will have ideas that you can use to develop your strategy. And, of course, don’t forget about your personal life experiences. Those are the things that will inspire you the most. Use your personal life experiences to develop your strategy. It could be how you overcame a challenge or difficulty in your personal life, how you handled a tough situation, or even a time when you were appreciated for your skills or talents.

Create A Roadmap

Now that you have your inspiration, it’s time to create a road map. Create a detailed plan that will lead you to get from where you are (at this point) to where you want to be (at the end of your strategy period). This plan should include key milestones as well as a detailed list of what will be accomplished by the end of each milestone. To create this plan, you will need to put yourself in the shoes of a market person. A market person is someone who is going to be using your product or service. So, they will have a clear picture in mind of what it is that they are looking for. The main objective of this exercise is to make sure that you consider all the different aspects that they will need to consider when making a buying decision.

For example, if you are creating an eCommerce store for an online clothing shop, you will need to consider the design of your website, the types of articles and products you will offer, the pricing, and so much more. Your plan should have clear milestones that you can track and be able to measure your progress towards reaching your goals.

Brainstorm Nuts And Bolts

Once you have your plan in place, it’s time to brainstorm nuts and bolts. What are the critical things that you need to include in your plan? The answers to this question will form the basis of your strategy and will help you determine what will be the next step in the process. Once you have your plan and your list of nuts and bolts, it’s time to dive into the planning phase. This phase will involve you sitting down with your team (if you have one) and going through the plan and your list of nuts and bolts to determine what needs to be done and how you will be measuring your progress. This is a very important phase as it will determine the success of your strategy. If you are tracking your progress effectively, you will be able to determine if what you are doing is working or not.

This is also the phase where you will be making changes to your plan. Things always change and things will always improve. So, be sure to revisit this phase and make changes as necessary.

Determining The Marketing Mix

Now that you have your plan developed, it’s time to determine the marketing mix. This is the combination of the various marketing tactics and media platforms that you will use to promote your product or service.

When you identify the different types of customers that you have, it will be easier to determine the marketing mix that will work best for them. Different types of customers will require different marketing mixes.

For example, if you have customers that are currently engaged in active social media use, it would be a good idea to incorporate this into your marketing mix. But, if most of your customers are older generations who have been using more traditional methods of advertising, it might be a good idea to focus more on radio or TV ads.

Key Takeaways

As you can see, there are a lot of steps involved in coming up with a sound marketing strategy. But, don’t worry, it’s not as complicated as it seems. By following the steps discussed above, you will be able to work on developing a marketing strategy that will put you on the right footpath to growth.