How do I start creating a Marketing Strategy?

Author : William Royal

All businesses, no matter the size should have an updated marketing or digital marketing strategy. Generating business and obtaining customers does not always automatically happen with a good product or service. For most small businesses, creating a clear marketing strategy ensures you are targeting the right people with the relevant content that appeals to them*

 

So, how do you create an effective marketing strategy & what should an effective plan look like?

The first step is always the hardest when creating a strategy and the problem most small business encounter is the question, how and where do I begin? Luckily there is help.

In 1990s, Dublin born, author and marketer Paul Smith created the SOSTAC Planning System that is used by businesses worldwide to help them with creating a marketing strategy **

Below is an image of the SOSTAC Model .

So, what exactly is SOSTAC?

Well SOSTAC is a six-step process that will help you write an effective plan, whether it’s an overall marketing strategy or specific to a single channel.

Below is a short overview of each step, however over the next few weeks I will be posting a blog to provide more details on each step, this will help provide all of your small business owners more information on the importance and how to implement each step.

Step 1 - Situational Analysis ***

Think of this as an examination of where you are now? It is an exercise looking at the internal and external factors that affect your organisation using activities such as competitor analysis, SWOT analysis, value proposition, customer insights including persona development and looking at your current digital landscape. A tool very useful for this exercise is the business model canvas.

Step 2 - Objectives

Defining where you want to go? Here you define the vision and mission of your marketing plan using SMART objectives and defining your 5 S Goals – Sell, Serve, Sizzle, Speak, Save.

Step 3 - Strategy

How do we get there? This is the most difficult part of any plan, how do we go about achieving the goals we set out. Smith suggests a popular marketing model to help with your strategy - Segment, Target and Position. What these mean is you segment your audiences and then start to develop marketing material to position your brand so that it is in front of your audience.****

Step 4 - Tactic

Details of strategy? How exactly do you get there? This is a detailed plan to implement the strategy, looking at the specific tools of the digital marketing mix that you plan to use to reach the objectives. E.g SEO, content marketing, email marketing. ***

Step 5 - Action

Defining who does what when? Whether you action this in-house or use an external agency, what systems are in place? 

Step 6 - Control

Monitoring performance frequently so that you can adapt and change throughout the campaign. You would do this through activities such as web analytics, KPIs, usability testing, customer satisfaction surveys and reporting.

Why don’t we also get PR Smiths comments on the SOSTAC Model:

 

Also to help illustrate the effectiveness of this marketing model, HERE is an example of a SOSTAC marketing plan for challenger bank Monzo.

If you need help creating your own marketing strategy or would like to discuss how we can help you implement the SOSTAC model into your small business why not drop us an email : digitalmarketingspecialists@gmail.com

Did you enjoy this blog?

Check back next week for our next blog in this SOSTAC serious or check out one of our most recent other blogs on how to get your business onto page 1 of Google : Click HERE

Reference List:

Your Engine Room - 16/1/20 - Ed : 5 Reasons to Create a Marketing Strategy. Available From : https://yourengineroom.com/blog/5-reasons-to-create-a-marketing-strategy/

PR Smith Marketing Success : About Section. Available from :https://prsmith.org/about/

Daniel Nilsson 29.4.2013 : SOSTAC Marketing Model - To Ranked Planning System. Available from : https://medium.com/@danielnilsson77/sostac-marketing-model-top-ranked-planning-system-66dabb931435

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