It is imperative that, as a small business owner, you create a marketing plan. It’s also imperative that you realize your marketing plan is going to be a work in progress. Your plan (and you!) must be flexible enough to change and adapt to the current market conditions, changes in the economy, advances in technology and so on.

Here are 6 great tips to keep in mind when you begin creating your own small business marketing plan:

1. Establish Goals

Your small business marketing plan should be very goal oriented. Being able to visually see what your intentions are for your business can often help you plan and organize in a way that will help you reach your goals quicker and more efficiently. Before beginning your marketing plan you should sit down and write out exactly what goals you intend to reach.

Next, figure out a rough idea of how you plan to reach these goals. Be as specific as possible; include exact numbers (number of clients, number of products, number of websites, etc), exact dollar amounts (amount of sales, amount of profit, amount of affiliate commissions, etc) and exact dates (when your website will be completed, when your sales calls will be made, when your products will be released, etc.) There is no way you can draft an outline of what you plan to do with your business unless you really know what you want out of your business.

2. Identify Yourself

Though many small business owners do not see the point in creating a brand for themselves, you are creating a brand whether you realize it or not. So why not do it deliberately? Include in your marketing plan exactly what you want your customers’ and the market’s perception of your business to be. What personality will your business take on? What do you want to be known for? What do you want the “gossip” about you to be about? This should be spelled out in your marketing plan and should be something that you actively strive for on a day to day basis.

3. Develop a Budget

Be sure to include in your yearly marketing plan the budget for the year as well as your plan for achieving this budget. Though there will always be additional financial documentation separate from the marketing plan, it helps to include exactly what your goals are for spending, budget, and earning. This way you have a perfect example to look at; and remember to always leave room for flexibility and editing of your marketing plan.

4. Describe Your Product or Service

One of the greatest things about your small business marketing plan is that it will come in very useful as your business grows. You’ll be able to hand it off to your new team members and they’ll have a perfect sense of where the business is going and how it’s going to get there.

But one of the funniest things I encounter in working with small businesses is that many of the ancillary team members can’t exactly tell me what the business they work for does. Since they’re only involved in a small portion of the business, they’re not familiar (or have never been told) the big picture. This is especially true with consulting businesses and service providers.

So be sure to describe in detail your product or service and how it will improve the lives of your customers. Many small business owners skip this step, thinking they already know exactly what they do. But remember, you’ll have a larger audience than just yourself for your small business marketing plan – and you might be pleasantly surprised at useful this step is to you and how you view your future marketing activities.

5. Describe Your Target Consumer

You should make it abundantly clear within your marketing plan who your business is aimed at and how you plan to market to that particular group. Clearly targeted customers are vital to a business or marketing plan. Your plan is all about articulating who, what, when, where, and why. This is the “who” and it helps to make it clear to everyone in the business (especially you) what sort of person you are targeting as a potential customer or client. By having a very clear description of your target customer, when you set out to advertise, promote, or change a product, you’ll know exactly where and when to do that. You’ll know where to spend your advertising dollars, you’ll know how to phrase your messages, you’ll know what type of graphics to use, and on and on. Don’t be tempted to skip this either – again, I think you’ll be pleasantly surprised at a useful it is to get your target market profile down on paper.

6. Tell What Makes You Unique?

Being able to set yourself apart from all of your competitors is a huge part your small business marketing challenge. You need to clearly separate yourself from the crowd. This is called your “unique selling proposition”. What makes you different? How do you stand out from other businesses that are selling the same product or offering the same services? Create a clear and coherent statement on this differentiation within your marketing plan. Not only does this help to improve confidence in your product, but if a prospect asks why he should do business with you, you’ll have a clear answer to give him.

Can’t find anything that sets you apart? Be sure to spend the time creating something! Schedule a brainstorming session with your staff members, your best clients, even your family and friends. Often times, these people already know what sets you apart, and it’s usually something that you’ve taken for granted all along. And one last word of warning: avoid using Price as your unique selling proposition. There is always someone willing to undercut you or use your product as a loss leader, trapping you in a never-ending game of sales and price reductions.

A small business marketing plan is essential to your business. It doesn’t have to be something large and cumbersome; you’ll get more use out of a marketing plan that is flexible and easy to follow. So I challenge you to set aside a few hours over this upcoming weekend and begin drafting your small business marketing plan. You’ll be amazed at how helpful this step is to the growth of your business.

Having a good small business plan will ensure that your journey to success is much smoother. All successful business owners know that having an organized, well thought plan is essential to see the results they expect. Even if the business plan doesn’t give the results that you would have thought in the beginning, you can tweak and change different areas of your process to perfect it.

I thought I would go through a step by step guide to what you need for an effective small business plan. Many people try and start a business without any true expectations for the future other then ‘oh this is going to work’. You have to know exactly what “should” happen so that the surprises are less. In most cases surprises in business aren’t positive.

You must have a plan for many different areas of starting a small business. How are you going to fund the start up fees? How do you expect to sell your product/service? How do you expect to pay your employees? How are you going to promote your company effectively? Most importantly and what most business owners don’t think about is where do you want your business to be in 5…10…20 years?

Creating the right small business plan is all about creating effective systems. A system is something that you can use over and over again in different situations to receive expected results. You at least have some idea of what’s going to happen if you have the right systems in place.

The first step to your business plan is knowing exactly how much money it’s going to take to start your company. None of this has to be a professionally written up small business plan that costs thousands and thousands of dollars hiring an “expert”. Take out a piece of paper and write down your plan. The main thing is that you know exactly how you are going to fulfill your dream of being a successful small business owner.

So what are your opening expenses? Here are some questions you need to answer to find out your estimated dollar amount:

How much money does your product or service cost you? How much money will you charge for your service/product? How much money do you require to live for two years with no profit coming in from your business (safety precaution)? How much will it cost for your employees for 2 years? What are your legal fees? What are your CPA fees? How much will getting a physical location cost you (if needed)?

Every business is going to be different so think about anything that you need to spend money on to get it running. The next step you must consider is how are you going to get this start up money. Are you going to go to a bank for a loan? Are you considering finding a partner that can cover the costs with the agreement you can buy out the company later down the road? Do you want to talk with a wealthy family member about your business? Anyway you choose to get the money doesn’t matter.

Having a thorough small business plan is going to help you get that start up money though. As long as you can show the lenders how you plan on getting a return on their investment, you will be set. It doesn’t matter if you have horrible credit or don’t know anybody that will lend you large amounts of money. You can always find a way. Think outside the box!

Alright the next step should be the simplest for you. You want to write down your complete sales funnel for how you plan to sell your product or service. Go through every step you expect a customer to go through to reach your bank account. What are you selling exactly? How are you packaging the items? Are you providing multiple services and products? What do you expect to be your number one seller? What’s your specialty?

Once you have all these areas done, you have to know how you are going to promote your business and keep the business coming in. This seems to be the biggest problem most business owners have. You know everything there is to know about your products/services, but you know nothing about marketing. That’s expected too. Marketing is an expertise in itself.

If you’ve read much of my blog, you know how I preach about smart marketing. Smart marketing is all about spending your hard earned dollar and getting more then you spent in return. In other words, big return on investment (ROI). Every market will be different and different marketing tactics will work in each of them. You have a huge list of options too.

Newspapers, Yellow Pages, Radio, Television Ads Fliers, postcards, promotion coupons Referral programs Internet marketing Email marketing Holding seminars and special events Business to business referral programs

These are just to name a few of the options you have. You can never go wrong working with other local businesses. It’s beneficial for both businesses and can be something that explodes your business quickly. It should definitely be part of every small business plan.

No matter which direction you take your marketing in, remember to always be able to track your marketing method. You always want to know how effective each method is for your business. Don’t spray and pray! In other words, don’t just buy what that marketing salesman is selling you if they can’t show you how many customers you are getting in return.

Creating your small business plan with all of these areas covered is a great start to having a successful business. You can go in deeper and deeper to have an even more effective plan and you should, but this is a great start for anyone. Once you have the plan, you just have to follow it step by step. It makes your job so much easier. You have too much to worry about already. There is no reason to have to constantly be wondering…’what am I going to do now?’ You need to know what you’re doing beforehand.

When it comes to getting Help Starting a Small Business, doing research on this topic is definitely not a small task. Many people want the freedom to do the things in life they have always wanted to do. They are discouraged because of the economy and therefore feel the need to start a business in order to help them succeed financially. With many having lost their jobs and continue to lose their jobs they find themselves in a position of total despair. Starting a Business is not an easy task and requires you to devote all your time and energy to start it up and to maintain it.

Help Starting a Small Business – How to get Started:

Prepare a Business Plan Find a Mentor, someone who is a small business owner. You will need to find capital to fund your small business, search for grants offered by the state you live in. You can buy an existing business or purchase a franchise. Find a Location, this is extremely important for your business. Start Networking online with various business owners.

Another piece of advice that I can offer is that you can find a company online that will train you and provide all the support you will need to get your business up and running as far as marketing and advertising is concerned. Learning how to market your business will help you and will determine how well you do.

There are many ways to getting Help Starting a Small Business, having a business with inventory, employees, rent, insurance can be very costly. Look into a business online that can help you gain the capital you will need and give you all the training and support.

Every small business owner knows how important it is to make your presence known to those whom you serve with your products and services. This is why branding and logos are so important. It also makes the most sense to customize all your important papers and business stationary with the same brand or logo. The public needs to see your mark on everything so they can begin to associate this mark with what you do and who you are. What would some of our favorite businesses be without the great logo we have come to recognize as part of our daily lives?

When one considers the thought of a well designed invoice, it needs to be one that is professional in nature. No more of the print it yourself variety. It is time to look for a professional who can customize it to your needs and give you a working template easy enough for you to use for every transaction each time you make a sale. Every template to include the invoice template should have the same quality about it. It should be easy to use but look like a million bucks to the customer.

Many places on the internet can customize all your invoice templates to meet your specific shipping needs. They can also match the design of the invoice with other important things like receipts, letterhead, envelopes, and more. The cost is fairly inexpensive when you are referring to custom designed work. It will make the most impact on those who see how professional your small business is and the time you took to carefully present yourself in the best way possible. None of your customers wants to open the invoice and see a sloppy mess in front of them when they could have a nicely done invoice providing them the information they need the most.

You will feel your business is well thought out and being managed in a most efficient way. Isn’t it time to leave your mark on the world and get yourself recognized? The best way to give your customers the reassurance they are doing business with a true professional is to give them a professional and custom appearance when they receive their invoice in their package of goodies!

I have had very good success using Jian software, and Business Planner Pro software. I have reviewed and adapted business plan templates from the Small Business Association at both the state and federal level. I consider the business plan to be one of the most important aspects of starting your own business. I have just completed my own 10th consecutive year of profitability and would like to share the following insight with you.

After you get done crashing all the numbers, making all your projections, and compiling the facts and statistics into a spreadsheet I believe you are left with a fundamental truth about business plans.

The most important purpose of your business plan is to prepare you to survive on your worst day in the market.

I want you to think about your business plan is your most important insurance policy against disaster. On good days at your business, you have customers, positive cash flow and a prospect for an unlimited future. But on your worst day, you might be staring at a loss of customers, indebtedness, in a lawsuit against you that threatens to take away all of your most valuable possessions. It’s on that day that your good business plan is prepared to protect you and allow you to continue to reach for your vision.

Most of the literature you see on the web and in popular business books describe the glory and excitement of being a small business owner. And in truth it is an opportunity for you to realize your life long dream of financial independence and working for yourself. Very few of these books in my opinion do a good enough job to equip you to handle the harsh realities of life in the business world. It remains a fact that 90% of businesses fail in their first five years and the reason for that is an insufficient level of detail in the area of disaster prevention.

You would be well served to take the time to identify everything that you and some trusted advisors think could possibly go wrong, and develop some redundant contingency plans for addressing these issues. This would be a good place for you to solicit the advice of naysayers and people who believe it just can’t be done. Take advantage of their pessimism and their willingness to find things wrong with your plan. If you can come up with answers for their insights and you stand a far better chance of surviving your first five years in business.

Best wishes to you and keep an eye out for the wolves!