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8 Steps to Create and Execute a Strategic Marketing Plan
Marketing is a critical part to building any business and being able to create and carry out a strategic plan will
Step 1: Set your 12-week goal – is it to build visibility and build brand awareness? Generate more sales? Collect more leads? Your marketing activities, the content you share, and the call-to-action you promote depends on what you’re looking to achieve in the next 12 weeks. Identify the lead and lag indicators for this goal, such as an increase in sales, discovery calls booked, or email subscribers.
Step 2: Get clear on your ideal clients (see Episode 10 to find out the 10 things you absolutely need to know about your ICA!) and the messages that you need to share to build trust.
Step 3: Identify the top 3 or 4 topics that are pillars of your offer (for most of my clients these pillars are one of the following: nutrition, hydration, stress management, time management, physical activity, gut health, and self care.
Step 4: For each one of these big topics, identify 3 subtopics that align with the pain points your ideal client is struggling with. You’ll focus on one subtopic per month (4 weeks)
Step 5: For each one of the subtopics, create 4 engaging pieces of content. Each piece of content should pertain to a relevant problem/solution that interests your ideal client in the format they want to consume it (blog post, vlog, podcast episode, etc). Plan to publish these pieces weekly.
BTW – The type of content you create is up to you! Will you create a step-by-step tutorial? Tell a story to build connection? Share a case study to show how you help people just like them? Will you provide an interactive tool such as a calculator or a quiz that will engage your readers?
Step 6: Send a weekly email to subscribers teasing the content you’ve published for the week and provide them with a link back to your site to get the whole story.
Step 7: From each piece of content, create 5 pieces of micro-content that connect to some aspect of the main piece that you’ll share throughout the week that the piece is published. Tease the main piece of content with the micro-content and share it on social media to pique the curiosity of your followers, directing them back to where the main content is published (ideally on your website!)
Step 8: Find out which platform your ideal client hangs out on most and be sure to engage with other users on that platform for 15 minutes before and 15 minutes after publishing your content daily.
