Pub 2 2021 Issue 1

http://wvcar.com 28 WVADA Drive traffic to your website with a banner ad • Cost: About $200/month (costs will vary from $0 to thousands, depending on where you choose to place your ad) • Time: 3 hours • Tactic: Banner ads are those rectangular ads you see in the margins of just about every website. When someone clicks on a banner ad, they’re typically taken to the advertiser’s website, where they can redeem the offer or shop for whatever is advertised in the banner. Promote your business with email • Cost: Starting at about $10/ month for an online email marketing tool • Time: One to five hours per month • Tactic: This assumes you have a list of email addresses to start with. If so, subscribe to an email builder and customize one of the email templates. Start by sending one information-filled email every 10 days to two weeks (“Check out our latest offerings.” “SAVE 10% now through Thursday!”, etc.). Track customer responses. Resend emails that work and stop sending those that don’t. 11. Define metrics and KPIs The final step as you create a marketing plan is to decide what metrics you will use to evaluate your campaigns. Better-known measurement options like surveys can be useful, but you’ll also want to understand things like the cost of customer acquisition (for every new customer you get, how many marketing dollars do you have to spend?) or market share (out of the universe of your potential customers, what percentage do you have, and is that growing?). Raubi Marie Perilli Raubi Perilli is a website strategist, content creator, and founder of Simply Stated Media. She loves helping free - lancers, small businesses and start-ups use their website to drive more interest, leads and sales. Learn more about Raubi by following her on Instagram, or improve your website today by grabbing her FREE 50-point website audit. If your business is growing faster than expected, if your customers give you feedback you didn’t have before, if your competition changes, then these are all good reasons to make adjustments. Don’t be afraid to tweak your marketing plan or even make substantial revisions. Remember, you’re never really finished writing a marketing plan. The document should evolve along with your business. Don’t just put your marketing plan in a filing cabinet never to see the light of day. Use it. Share it with your team. A marketing plan, like any tool, is good only if it’s used. And when it is, it’s a powerful guide for running and growing your business, from startup to wherever you’re headed. Bring your marketing plan to life You now know what a marketing plan is, why you need one and how to create a marketing plan in 11 simple steps. You’re ready to start outlining the path you will take to launch, market and grow your business. Go through the marketing plan steps outlined in this post and then, make it easy to execute your plan with GoDaddy’s Websites + Marketing service. It supports your plan by helping you build a professional website and market your business everywhere online. t This article includes content originally published on the GoDaddy blog by the following authors: Andrea Rowland and Jennifer Friedman. continued from the previous page Look at your marketing campaigns and decide what metrics will be best for showing results tied to your goals. As mentioned earlier, having the right set of metrics will allow you to make more informed decisions about your budget as well as make adjustments to strategies as you go. Check your new business marketing plan, iterate and improve. Now, you know how to make a marketing plan, but your work doesn’t stop here. Use the framework to go through the marketing plan steps and start writing your plan. Then, review your finished marketing plan with fresh eyes and make plans to continue to update and improve your outline. 1. Ask questions of others to check your thinking. It’s easy to get in your own head and substitute your judgment for your customers’ because you’re passionate about your business. You might think “I’d prefer receiving a coupon rather than a sample; a coupon would make me more likely to buy.” Run that by some people who fit the profile of your target market before you decide which way to go. You might be surprised. 2. Don’t try to think of everything yourself. Look at your competitors and learn from what they do well. But don’t forget to look at other industries, too. There’s no reason you can’t steal a trick from a different kind of company facing the same issue. It will save you time, in the long run, to test tried-and- true methods in addition to your own brilliant, unique ideas. 3. Stick to the plan — and keep changing it. I know this sounds contradictory but do both. Being true to the decisions you’ve made in your marketing plan is key to remaining focused.