The popular adage “If you fail to plan, you are planning to fail” conveys the time-tested truth that success doesn’t just magically happen—it takes careful thought and preparation. That’s why companies both big and small often begin turning their attention toward the next year months in advance, formulating their annual marketing plans and outlining their objectives.
If you haven’t begun working on your strategy for 2024 already, it’s not too late to put together a solid one. Follow the tips in this guide to help maximize your marketing success in the new year.
Think of it as a bird’s-eye view of your marketing. From this perspective, you can take a comprehensive look at your industry’s general market conditions and landscape along with the overall well-being of your company—all with the goal of intentionally guiding your business’s growth in the upcoming year.
Engaging in this process can yield many rewards. For example, looking ahead may reveal new opportunities, such as an avenue for fresh leads or lower customer acquisition costs. It also enables you to course-correct your business based on predicted market conditions and account for any new business-related laws expected to take effect. Perhaps best of all, an official plan makes your marketing for the year measurable and gets your people pumped about the heights that can be reached.
If you google “create a marketing plan,” you’ll be greeted with an endless array of articles about what should be in your plan, but don’t be dissuaded by the information overload. Here are some of the most commonly used sections to consider including.
This outline highlights the most critical points of your marketing blueprint, allowing you and your team to get a holistic look at everything ahead. While it’s generally the first page of the marketing plan, you might actually want to put it together last, after you’ve fleshed out the rest of the document.
Here’s where to dig deep for information about your industry’s current and expected status as well as on how your rivals are doing, how they’re differentiating themselves, and what they’re planning for the new year. The endgame: gather as much data as you can to make your own timely, informed projection for next year.
When it comes to your goals, it’s best to utilize the S.M.A.R.T. goals strategy—make them specific, measurable, achievable, relevant to your team’s “why,” and time based—to ensure they’re laser focused. In addition, you should lay out both short-term (i.e., monthly or quarterly) and long-term objectives for the year. Remember, the more detail, the better, as this will give you a clearer vision for what you want to achieve.
Nailing down your marketing spend for the year is key to the entire project, so take the time to be thorough. First, look at what did and didn’t work this year, and retain and eliminate strategies accordingly. Then determine your 2024 revenue goals. Only after these are established can you calculate your future budget for things like ads, social media, and direct mail. (You can download the handy marketing plan charts below to help you do it.) It’s a good idea to keep two worksheets—projected spend and actual spend—to monitor your budget and track your progress throughout the year.
Finally, lay out the means for meeting your goals. The objective is to formulate a thorough blueprint that answers the following question: Who is your customer, and what marketing methods, language, and message will you use to make them a raving fan next year? Be sure to clearly explain the rationale behind your strategies, how this chosen path will lead to success in the coming year, and how that success will be measured.
Once your marketing masterpiece is done, seek out the opinions of trusted leaders in sales, creative, and other teams to help identify any possible gaps or improvements, and encourage open-ended questions and discussion to ensure everyone is on the same page about the direction you’re going. Above all, make sure to maintain a flexible mindset rather than a rigid one as the year goes on—this plan can always be modified if circumstances call for it, whether in the short term because a team member had a good idea or in the long term because of unexpected market shifts.
An annual marketing plan is a key tool in your company’s arsenal, allowing you to pinpoint avenues for impactful growth in the next calendar year and what benchmarks you need to hit to achieve it. When you share this strategy with your team, you’ll not only provide clarity, direction, and focus about what’s ahead but also inspire them by providing a clear path for mutual success.
TAKE ACTION:
Depending on where you are in the process, start formulating or fine-tuning your company’s 2024 marketing plan.
Dr. Margaret Ann Neale, professor emerita at Stanford University, has studied the science of negotiation for her entire academic career. Here she provides insights into how you can get more of what you want by approaching negotiations as opportunities for collaborative problem-solving rather than as battles.
How do you define negotiation?
Negotiation is influence. You don’t have any command in negotiations, so you have to figure out how to get your counterpart to voluntarily engage with you. You can’t force them to say yes, but you can create a situation where they think it’s in their best interest to agree on a common course of action.
How can people do that?
Since you don’t have any control, you need to understand who your counterpart is. Consider their potential interests, preferences, and obstacles and how each may impact their willingness to walk that path of agreement with you. This can ultimately help you present a proposal that, at least from their perspective, benefits them. Otherwise, there’s no reason for them to negotiate. Too often in negotiation, we focus on what we’re getting out of it. And that just belies the notion that it is an interdependent process—you can’t do this alone.
What can you do to prepare for negotiations?
You need to first determine what your alternatives are. These are a source of power in a negotiation because the better they are, the easier it is for you to walk away. And the easier it is for you to walk away, the more your counterpart has to contribute to the goodness of your outcome to keep you involved in the negotiation.
Once you have your alternatives, you must consider your reservation price, which is the tipping point where the outcome goes from being one where you could say yes to something you should say no to. It’s one of the most strategic pieces of information because it will prepare you to recognize when you should walk away.
Lastly, you need to set an aspiration, or an optimistic assessment of what you could achieve in this negotiation. What would it look like for things to go well for you? What would you define as a good deal? When you have that aspiration, you can do better in the negotiation.
Are there any common negotiation mistakes people make?
A lot of people think you’re better off receiving the first offer instead of making it, but that’s not always the case. If you receive it, you get the benefit of information. But if you make it, you get the benefit of anchoring. Rather than just always looking to receive the first offer, you need to assess which strategy would leave you in a better position in the negotiation.
There’s also the common mistake of negotiating issue by issue. When you do this, you destroy value. For instance, you and your counterpart likely care more about different things. Instead of getting caught up in your list, you should look for where you can give your counterpart more of what they care about that’s not too important to you. In turn, you can get more of what you care about that’s not too important to them.
The last flawed approach is to solve the easy issues first. That just leaves the hard stuff. And when all you have is a challenging topic, it’s going to be a fight. This approach also assumes that your easy issues are the same as your counterpart’s, but people value issues differently. So it’s important to find out what those differences are rather than just assuming that you know.
How can you determine those differences?
You ask questions. You could start the negotiation by saying, “Before we begin, let’s spend some time talking to each other about what we’re trying to achieve in this interaction.” This can help you better understand what a good deal is for each of you and what your individual goals are for the negotiation. You can then use what you learn to verify and expand the information you got when you were planning and preparing, which will help you see if it is accurate or if you’re way off.
What are the benefits of becoming a better negotiator?
You get more of what you want. People tend to think negotiation is about fighting, but that’s not accurate. Most of the people we negotiate with are those with whom we have, or have the potential for, a relationship. If you think of negotiation only as a fight, you’re going to have to pick and choose who you negotiate with based on who you are willing to argue with. Viewing it as collaborative problem-solving instead allows you to broaden the perspective that you take. You can then engage in many more negotiations because you don’t have to limit yourself to antagonistic situations.
Do you have any advice for people looking to improve their skills?
Rather than just negotiate, problem-solve. It changes the entire conversation and process. Instead of preparing for battle, both parties end up more willing to work together to find solutions for the challenges they may both be facing. And that can leave them better off than had they only negotiated.
TAKE ACTION:
Examine your current approach to negotiations. Consider how you can better prepare for and approach them as opportunities for problem-solving.
According to a 2022 Statista study, a whopping 82 percent of Americans use some form of social media. It’s no surprise, then, that most businesses also maintain an active presence on these digital platforms. You only need to scan major players like Instagram, YouTube, and Facebook for a second to discern how prominently they feature marketing content from various companies.
As lucrative as these titans may be, though, limiting your social media marketing to them may cause you to miss other qualified leads. Depending on your organization’s target consumer, initiating a presence on platforms dedicated to a particular interest, demographic, or media type may better present you as closely aligned with their lifestyle and social concerns. This can, in turn, build public trust in and favor for your brand.
If you’re eager to elevate your organization’s marketing campaigns, explore the opportunities on the following overlooked social media platforms. By contemplating their unique potential, you can find creative ways to engage with consumers and increase brand awareness on each one.
On the surface, Spotify is just a colossal music streaming service—and it is. However, its members’ behavior presents several possibilities for reaching new consumers. Spotify offers its over 500 million monthly users the ability to curate playlists featuring their preferred genres of music, news, and podcasts. (They can even publish audio media they produce themselves.) Members with accounts on large platforms like YouTube and Instagram will often then drop links to their Spotify pages in order to draw more eyes to their playlists, thus engaging in a form of casual recruiting.
Sensing this potential, many advertisers have flocked to Spotify to reach a younger, more engaged audience that actively draws more users to the platform. Its accessible marketing services include ads that target specific users based on their age, preferred media and genres, and other details, all of which Spotify aggregates to craft a thorough lifestyle profile for each user. Simply record an audio ad, and it will play to the app’s users organically, allowing you to reach an attentive niche market.
This social media platform helps users socialize with like-minded folks in their communities, whether locally in-person or online. Members build profiles based on their hobbies and interests, then locate events that appeal to them, such as hiking, watching horror movies, or reading mystery novels. These events are hosted by individual groups featuring their own niche pages, which welcome kindred users to join and connect with one another. Group organizers may even require individuals to request membership so they can vet them for suitability before admitting them.
Meetup’s overall user age ranges, demographics, and interests vary drastically, making it an excellent platform for reaching a broad consumer audience or even networking with your peers. Set up group pages to invite compatible industry professionals to connect and converse or to attract consumers to sponsored events tailored to their interests. For example, financial professionals can plan weekly complimentary cocktail hours for young adults who are kicking off their corporate careers. They can entertain these guests, then pivot toward conversations about their services.
With a tremendous one billion active members, TikTok’s social media dominance may soon contend with that of Facebook, Instagram, and YouTube, especially given its quick growth trajectory that is only likely to shoot up in forthcoming years. While there isn’t necessarily a distinct demographic uniting all of its user personalities, content on this platform tends to lean young (or at least youthful), and this seems to be the preferred platform for teenagers and young adults. So if you’re attempting to appeal your organization to a budding audience, you should look to market on TikTok right away.
You can sign up for TikTok’s Ad Manager to launch ad campaigns and reach your preferred segment of their usership, then measure ad performance with its built-in analytics tools. However, the best way to capitalize on TikTok’s marketing opportunities is to become an active user and draw in organic engagement. Create a profile for your business, and start uploading short videos that demonstrate your products or services at work, introduce team members, and highlight your brand personality. Lean into humor, music, or behind-the-scenes industry secrets to gain viral traction, and update often: recommended frequency varies, but a good rule of thumb is to post on TikTok about four to six times a week.
A messaging platform that aggregates texting, phone calls, videoconferencing, and multimedia sharing, Discord helps its worldwide participants gather in unique servers, or community subplatforms that users can enter via a link. Once they join a server, they can start communicating with fellow members in general chat threads, topical channels, voice-call rooms, and more. Users can create their own casual servers or unite in fan groups dedicated to a certain content creator, such as a Twitch streamer or podcast host. In fact, one of the most notable facets of this app is its seamless compatibility with other sites—as with Spotify, users can recruit members to their Discord channels by simply dropping a link on other platforms.
Marketing with Discord can be incredibly lucrative if you know how to navigate its seemingly ad-averse layout designed to preserve exclusive communication. The secret to success is utilizing its promise to “create an invite-only place where you belong.” Build a server that pertains to your industry, then invite clients to join and stay engaged with you. For example, landscape designers could launch a Discord server where clients can share their designs and seek advice on lawn care challenges. You could also set up server channels to segment like-minded clients, permit clients to invite their loved ones to join, and welcome other industry professionals to market themselves alongside you. Arm your marketing strategy with Discord’s uniquely crafted social platform, and you can not only make yourself memorable to your clients but also engage with them personally—embedding your organization within their social circle.
TAKE ACTION:
Determine where your target audience maintains an active social media presence, and supplement your marketing strategy on these platforms.
Your team is one of your business’s most valuable assets, and as a leader, it’s your job to determine how best to maximize it. However, it can be difficult to accurately assess your employees’ skills and experience, especially since they may have worked across multiple positions and fields before joining your organization. You could be underestimating their capabilities without even realizing it.
One way to ensure you make the most of your company’s workforce is by developing a skills database, a comprehensive catalog of all your employees’ abilities, qualifications, and educational backgrounds. With this tool, you may be able to pinpoint individuals suitable for important projects, build optimal teams, and fill open positions with the best candidates, whether they’re in-house talent or outside applicants.
A skills database is a powerful instrument you can use to bolster your company in many ways. For one, it can enable you to identify individuals who have the requisite technical skills for a particular project or who would work most effectively as a team based on their personalities, communication styles, or emotional intelligence. Conversely, a skills database can also highlight your employees’ weaknesses. Perhaps they’re missing certain key abilities to perform optimally in their role, or maybe there are simply areas where they could stand to improve. In identifying these deficiencies, you can better support your employees in their growth, either by providing the necessary training or by encouraging them to pursue it on their own.
Your database will also come in handy when you need to fill an open position. It can help you locate internal candidates, including ones you may not have otherwise thought of, who either have the skills or the capacity for the job so you can promote from within. This can both boost employee morale and save you the time and expense of conducting an external applicant search. And if you must extend your hunt outside your organization, your database can help you determine which skills applicants should have for the roles you are hiring for.
Finally, you can utilize your database to take a proactive approach to your workforce. In addition to your current employees’ abilities, document the skills that are essential for each role of your company. Doing so can better reveal any existing gaps, such as in social media marketing, which can then allow you to train your employees or, if needed, hire new talent who possess these abilities. In addition, you can use this outline of required skills to create defined career paths you can share with your staff. This will give them a clearer vision of their growth possibilities within your company while also providing your human resources department another tool to use for recruiting outside candidates.
The first step in creating a skills database is deciding on your method. If your company isn’t very large, you could use a simple Excel spreadsheet. Otherwise, consider skills-management software like AG5, SkillNet, or Skills Base, which can make it easier to manage and utilize the information you collect. For instance, such software can give you the ability to quickly search your database, receive alerts when employees’ qualifications expire, and create helpful reports and analytics on their performance and skills.
Once you’ve decided on the structure of your database, you can begin building it by adding a profile—or skills matrix—for every employee. In each one, include their experience, degrees and certifications, positions held, accomplishments, career goals and professional interests, hard (technical) proficiencies, and soft skills like public speaking, persistence, and adaptability. There are several ways you can gather this information, such as by referencing your employees’ resumes or LinkedIn profiles. You should also consult with the employees themselves to get more accurate and updated data and with your HR department and team leads for a more objective perspective.
As with most things in business, your employees’ skills won’t remain static, so neither should your database. You should make sure to update it regularly, such as when employees change positions, earn qualifications, or exit your company. The more up-to-date your database is, the more effective it will be as a tool to help you strategically manage your workforce and lead your company to greater success.
TAKE ACTION:
Start building an employee skills database for your organization today.
