December is a great time to take stock of your current marketing efforts and set new marketing goals for 2015. Marketing is a planned effort, and if you’re not planning your next marketing moves, you’re probably not doing an effective job of marketing your business. Having marketing goals in an updated marketing plan is probably one of the best ways to ensure that your business succeeds in 2015.
Setting good marketing goals
What makes a good marketing goal? The same things that make “good” goals make good marketing goals. Your marketing goals should be specific. Rather than saying, “I want to increase sales,” a specific goal says, “I want to increase sales by 10%.” Or, “I want to increase sales among buyers aged 24-35 by 10%.” Making a goal specific has a lot of benefit, and it helps you to determine what you need to do to make the goal happen.
Your marketing goals must be measurable. Measurability allows you to determine whether or not you’re actually achieving your goal. If, as in the example above, your marketing goals have you pursuing more sales among buyers aged 24-35, measuring those sales will be the only way you can truly know whether you’re appealing to that segment of the market, and whether or not your sales are actually increasing. If you can measure your sales among the target group, and they’ve only increased by 4%, you know that you have to do more to appeal to that demographic . You know that your marketing efforts have not been productive enough to meet your goal. In that case, it’s time to go back to the drawing board for some fresh ideas to help you achieve that particular marketing goal.
Your marketing goals must be attainable. A 10% increase in sales is probably attainable. A 100% increase in sales may be attainable. A 1,000% increase in sales is far less likely to be attained, unless you start very, very small or have little data from the previous year to make comparisons against.
Your marketing goals should be realistic. Marketing goals that involve cornering the market in your particular business segment probably aren’t realistic. Becoming a Fortune 500 company in 2015 probably isn’t realistic either, if you’re not close to becoming a Fortune 500 company in 2014. The realism of your goals depends upon the resources you have on hand, and those you can reasonably acquire in a relatively short period of time. More realistic goals may include opening up new markets, increasing your sales staff, and improving your bottom line.
Your marketing goals should be timely. This means that your goals have a time-limit put on them. If you really want to become a Fortune 500 company, set the timer and go to it. A calendar year makes a good timer for most goals. For your 2015 marketing goals, ask yourself what you can reasonably achieve in 2015? Can you open new markets? Can you improve your advertising? Can you improve your order turnaround time? Some of your goals may not be “marketing goals” in the truest sense of the word, but if you can achieve them, you can use these achievements to help market your company.
If you would like more information about setting marketing goals, making a marketing plan or improving your marketing strategy, please contact our Creative Director Dave Ramsell or give Dave a call at (330) 243-0651 to set up a consultation.
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