Writing a marketing plan Template

In this era of planned business, it is very important to make a plan before you take a leap into the business of any kind. No matter whatever kind of business you plan to start off with, whether you plan to deal in a good or a service, you should start off with a good plan for marketing. Writing a marketing plan is essentially the first stepping stone of a successful business ahead.

While writing a marketing plan one must keep in view a few essential points. The most important of these points would concentrate on the good or service to be marketed, the marketing strategies, the target consumers/ customers or group and their identification. In order to determine one’s target group, there is the necessity of some kind of market research which involves a number of research tools like focused group discussions, questionnaire surveys, circulation records, user surveys, personal interviews etc.

Writing a marketing plan can be taken up with the following steps in focus.

Firstly, the person preparing to write the marketing plan should conceive a mission statement which would incorporate the target for the business whose marketing plan is being written. This should describe vividly the essential and basic details of the business under consideration, defining clearly the business type and objectives, the nature of the product/ services and the section of the market served.

The next step involves the identification of the target section which in turn is derived from considerable research. The marketing plan should clearly mention the section of society which the business under consideration is targeting to cater, how large this segment is, what their buying power is in the recent times, what is the preference of this system in terms of similar products/services. This section of the marketing plan should bear all the identifying and essential details of the target niche like the age group, socio-economic status, and occupational trends if any in order to make easy the process of decision making on the part of the entrepreneur.

The next job in writing the marketing plan involves the statement of the nature of the goods and/or services offered under the current business plan. This should be done in harmony with the findings of the market researches so that they are in sync with the general psyche of the target niche. One should mention the current services provided and also the future goods and services which may be offered while writing a marketing plan.

The most important feature of a marketing plan follows next; it involves scheming out marketing and promotional strategies to be adopted by the entrepreneurs. This essentially involves the detailing of all the promotional activities, marketing techniques to be adopted, contacts and networks to be used, media to be seeking support from, etc.

While writing a marketing plan one should take into account the existing and projected competition in the market and propose a plan to counter them. The marketing plan should also set for the business measurable goals to be achieved within a set period of time and finally while writing a marketing plan, one should incorporate ways to monitor the progress of the business.