Use This 5-Point Checklist to Kick-Start Next Year’s Marketing Plan 

The new year is right around the corner and as a business owner, you’ve got your hands full – from holiday sales to end-of-year financials to carving out time for your personal life. Considering everything going on this time of year, you may have let your marketing plan for the new year fall by the wayside. Or perhaps you assume your current plan needs no changes.

While your current marketing strategy may well cruise into the new year with no problems, it’s advisable to review and revamp your plan each year (and as needed throughout.) If you haven’t updated your marketing plan yet, don’t worry. We’ve put together a quick, 5-point checklist that will help you get started on a fresh marketing plan for the new year.

B udgets aren’t exactly a festive topic of conversation, but they’re an important part of any business marketing plan. A defined budget not only helps you plan effectively, it also helps you calculate your ROI and alter your strategy when needed.

The US Small Business Administration recommends spending 7-8% of your gross revenue on marketing. However, current research and many small business marketing experts suggest your marketing budget should be more like 2-5% of your sales revenue.

Remember, a marketing budget isn’t just a pot of money you set aside for Facebook ads. Instead, it should contain itemized entries for all your marketing activities and related expenses. This includes, but is not limited to:

• Salaries for your internal marketing staff
  
• Costs associated with an outside marketing agency
  
• Website related expenses like domains, hosting, site building, and maintenance
  
• Photography expenses, as they relate to website or other marketing material
  
• Printing expenses, as they relate to marketing and advertising
  
• Client gifts, giveaways, or incentives

Just like our parents taught us: Accomplishments start out as goals. And that’s no less true in the marketing world. Laying out specific goals helps you plan your marketing roadmap, formulate your budget, and measure your overall success.

While, “Make more money,” or “Grow my business,” might be your overall goals, these are not good examples of marketing goals. Your marketing goals should be specific, detailed, and measurable.

Consider some goals like:

• Generate x% more leads than last year
  
• Increase social media engagement by x%
  
• Building more brand awareness
  
• Grow number of online reviews by x%

Regular review of your branding guidelines is always a good idea. It may be quite easy to maintain the same look and feel across your website, social media, and other communications when your company is very small. But as you grow, you’ll notice maintaining your brand image gets increasingly difficult.

As part of your marketing plan, make some time to revisit your branding guidelines. Does the look and feel of your brand still convey your company’s message? If not, it’s okay to make some updates. Having a strong brand doesn’t mean your brand never changes. (Learn more about why branding is important for your small business here .)

Branding guidelines should be written in detail and made available to your entire team. There are some basic aspects that should be included, like logos, color codes, and fonts. But don’t forget the more subtle aspects that can really tie your brand together, like:

• Vocabulary and language style used throughout your website and social media
  
• Look and feel of imagery – both stock photos and in-house photos
  
• Templates for customer and client communications
  
• The voice of your company and overall message you wish to convey

Most business owners think they have a clear idea of their target customer. But consumers are notoriously fickle and because of this, your target audience could shift or even change significantly. It’s a good idea to examine your target audience on a regular basis, just to be sure you still have a good grip on who your customers really are.

Market research can help you identify your target customer but sometimes this can be pricey and time consuming. Fortunately, there are steps you can take to learn about your target without diving into a large market research project. Consider identifying your audience using these techniques:

• Closely monitor social media interaction – This allows you to see who is really engaging with your brand
  
• Check your competition – Who are your competitors’ frequent customers?
  
• Get to know your current customers – Don't shy away from using customer surveys to gather information

Obviously, updating and maintaining your website should be an ongoing task. But an all-over website review is an important part of any marketing plan.

Take a deep dive into your site and its analytics. Is it still accomplishing its goals? Does it match your company’s branding? Your website is a huge piece of the marketing puzzle; if it’s not up to par, your other marketing efforts may fall flat, too. Remember, your website is your company’s calling card, its elevator pitch, and its portfolio.

Do a preliminary review of your site, checking these things:

• Is the site optimized for search engines?
  
• Is it visually attractive with an up-to-date design?
  
• Are the images current?
  
• Is the site mobile friendly?
  
• Does the site load quickly?