What is the marketing plan and its importance in institutions? Certainly, every successful business is based on proper planning because of the importance of planning, as it is necessary to achieve the goal of the activity, as achieving the goal of the business activity will lead to increased profits. All of this happens because of commitment to the marketing plan, so we will talk in today’s article about what is a marketing plan. Its importance in institutions.
Read also: How to design attractive marketing advertisements?
What is the marketing plan and its importance in institutions?
- considered as Marketing plan The backbone of marketing management, and the basic foundation on which the marketing process is based.
- A plan is a method prepared based on a specific measure in order to provide excellent services and products to customers, and retain existing customers.
- Attract more potential customers to do business with your company.
- Therefore, increasing its profits, and of course the marketing plan, like all other plans, must be specific to a time period of no less than three months and no more than a year.
- During this period, many important aspects of the success of the marketing process were identified, most notably market details, defining the marketing strategy, and market segments.
- The main goal of the plan is to increase the financial return of the company or organization.
What are the reasons for preparing a marketing plan?
You must be Marketing plan Comprehensive of all marketing activities of the company and make Marketing plan Adopting organized thinking rules, the company needs a marketing plan for the following reasons:
- Clarifying the company's path and resources and developing the correct methods for distributing them.
- Define all tasks and set a timetable for their implementation.
- Encouraging the company to adopt new thinking and strategies that will lead it to excellence.
- Anticipate and avoid threats, solve problems and remove obstacles.
What is the role of a marketing plan?
The marketing plan plays several important and indispensable roles for the success of the marketing process, the most prominent of which are the following:
- Providing advice and guidance to the organization's management in all stages of marketing.
- It helps management to make the right decisions.
- The company avoids making mistakes and seeks to correct deviations.
- It provides comprehensive information to the marketing department and employees in the marketing department, that important department in the company.
- This information is comprehensive about competing products, the strength of competitors in the market, available opportunities, threats, customer interaction with the company’s products, and competing products.
- It puts the company on track to achieve increased market share, by enhancing its competitive advantage.
What are the main elements of a marketing plan?
The marketing plan depends on a set of basic elements as follows:
Executive summary of the marketing plan
It is defined as a set of short paragraphs that outline all the main objectives and propositions included in a marketing plan.
Situation analysis in the marketing plan
Situation analysis analyzes several main steps and stages, which are the strengths, weaknesses, opportunities available to the organization, and the threats it may be exposed to.
Marketing plan objectives
The marketing plan is a very important element in the marketing process, as it focuses on the goals that the company can achieve within the time period of the plan.
Marketing strategies
This step defines all the strategies needed to achieve the goals.
Marketing strategies take into account several main aspects, most notably all elements of the marketing mix, such as products, types, prices, distribution outlets, and reliable promotional means.
Read also: The future of e-commerce
Business programs marketing plan
The implementation part is important because it turns all strategies into actions that must be implemented.
Control, monitoring, management and development
The final step is to monitor the actions taken, manage the process, and measure the results. It includes 7 steps to implement the plan:
- Begin implementation immediately after completing the marketing plan.
- Assign someone to monitor the entire plan, and give them the authority to do so.
- Hold regular meetings to follow up on the plan. Meetings can be 20 minutes long at the beginning of the week.
- If not today, the contestants will start tomorrow.
- Review what was accomplished at the end of each quarter, and determine if assistance is needed.
- Paying attention to measuring results first and calculating the return on marketing investments, while constantly improving the available marketing tools to reduce their cost as much as possible.
Targeting new customers
Company growth always involves finding new customers, these may be different sectors or markets, and may encourage the company to develop its products.
Opportunities available to the company should be considered which may lie in:
- Sell more products and services to existing customers.
- Sell existing products to new customers.
- Improve your current product offering.
- Moving into a new market with a new product offering.
Customer base segmentation
Company strategies include one or more of these options:
- Entering new markets.
- New product development.
- Improving the company's competitive position.
- Maintain a competitive position.
- The marketing manager chooses the most appropriate strategy according to the size of the target customer base.
- Customer base is determined by age/gender/purchasing power.