How to write a sales marketing plan, step by step

Marketing in sales is based on goals, plans, target customers, advertising formats, the company's strengths and more. Doing sales marketing planning creates an overall strategy that lets a business spot risks in time and move closer to success. In this article, Mona Media will explain what a marketing plan is and walk you through, from A to Z, the steps of building a sales and marketing plan that works for your business. We hope you can use it to set the best direction for your sales team.

What is a marketing plan?

A marketing plan (Marketing Plan) is a formal document used to run the marketing activities for a brand, or for a product or service of a business.

A marketing plan includes these key parts:

• Analysis of the market situation
• Defining the target market
• Setting specific marketing goals
• The means to reach those goals
• Budget for marketing strategy

An effective marketing communications plan helps a business find its right position in the market. From there it can propose business strategies that fit and help the company grow in the future.

Why does every business need a marketing plan?

A marketing plan plays an important role in a business's success. The reasons below explain why you need a marketing plan before you start selling.

The business understands its customers more easily

A complete marketing plan analyzes your Customer insight goals clearly. So a business can use the plan to understand customers' needs and behavior toward its products or services. That is also an advantage for building business strategies that match market demand.

It helps the business define clear marketing goals

Any business, big or small, needs clear marketing goals to succeed. That is why writing a marketing plan that fits the company's vision and mission gives the business the right direction at each stage.

It gives the business a clear direction

A complete plan shows a business what it has to do to reach its marketing goals. With a marketing plan, managers can easily keep marketing activities under control and staff can focus more on their own work. This raises productivity sharply and helps the business reach the goals it has set.

If you're curious which marketing methods MONA has used to grow revenue and headcount so quickly since 2019, the video below has Mr. Vy Nguyễn Khánh Hùng, CEO & Founder of The MONA, answering that himself

What a marketing plan should include

Here are the 9 things a marketing plan needs to include.

1. Executive Summary

The marketing summary is usually short and to the point, setting out proposed ideas that fit the business's current situation. It helps leaders judge whether the marketing plan fits the market context.

The summary also helps the business assess in detail how feasible the plan is, as a percentage. Only once the leadership approves the marketing plan summary can the next steps go ahead.

2. Current Marketing Situation

You need to list the business's current marketing situation in detail, so managers can judge how promising the marketing strategy is. It covers:

• Market situation analysis: Share the data you've collected about customer psychology, current consumer trends, and how well the product or service sells in the market.
• Product/service analysis: Give details on the features of your product or service, including production cost, selling price, revenue, profit and the product's current position in the market.
• Competitor analysis: Give information on direct and indirect competitors in the market. You also need to analyze each competitor's size and the marketing channels they use. Only with this information can you build a plan with a real chance to compete.
• Marketing channel analysis: Based on the analysis above, the business can evaluate and choose the distribution channel that fits best and works most effectively for its customers.

3. Opportunities and Issue Analysis

This is an important step that lets managers form views on the factors that directly affect the marketing plan. You can use a SWOT model to analyze the business's opportunities and threats, strengths and weaknesses, and issues. Specifically:

• Opportunities/threats: List the opportunities the business can use to grow, and point out the threats that could directly affect its growth.
• Strengths/weaknesses: Analyze the strengths the business has so it can keep building on them, and propose solutions to limit the weaknesses that remain.
• Issue analysis: From the two analyses above (opportunities/threats and strengths/weaknesses), you can state precisely what problem the marketing plan has to solve.

4. Objectives

Setting objectives for the marketing plan helps the business run its marketing strategies in the direction it wants.

Marketing plan objectives usually include:

• Setting specific options to get the product in front of customers who need the business's products or services.
• Marketing activities must narrow the gap to the business goals the company has set.
• Defining the position the business can reach after a period of marketing activity
• Setting the numbers the business can reach. From there, evaluate the costs and the profit after running the online sales strategy. You also need to measure the risks, if any.

5. Marketing Strategy

The marketing strategy is built once the four items above are done. A solid marketing strategy needs to meet these conditions:

• Be clear and aim at the goals set in the original marketing plan.
• Set the timeline for carrying out and finishing each group of marketing activities.
• Each strategy must be consistent with and fit each stage of the marketing plan.

A marketing plan usually needs several sales strategies so you can pick the right one for each stage. To have a marketing strategy that management rates highly and that really works for the business, you need to invest heavily in market and competitor research.

6. Action Programs

At this stage, you list every activity in the marketing plan in detail. The list must cover:

• The specific tasks and activities to carry out
• The timeline for each activity
• The number of staff for each item
• The estimated cost of each marketing activity

7. Project Profit and Loss Statement

Estimating profit and loss for the marketing plan lets the business see the consequences it may face when it carries out the plan. This is an important step that helps the company's leaders decide whether to go ahead with the plan.

To estimate the plan's profit and loss, list these items:

• Estimated costs of running the marketing plan
• Other estimates, such as selling costs and taxes
• Projected revenue and profit the business can reach.

8. Controls

Any plan that is to work well needs control over its activities. The same goes for a marketing plan: assign someone to take charge of this item so the plan stays on course and on schedule.

The person in this role should be capable and know marketing well. It could be a director, a department head or a team leader. These people already have the leadership skills to push staff to reach the goals that were set.

An effective marketing and sales plan relies not only on strategy but also on the right business mindset. In Vietnam, though, many people still hold prejudices about business and selling, which leads to unrealistic approaches. The video below will help you understand business thinking better, so you can build a realistic and more effective sales marketing plan.

How to build an effective sales marketing plan

To build a complete marketing plan, follow the 8 steps below:

1. Know your product well

To plan promotion and sales for your product, the first thing is to know it well.

• What opportunities does your product have to compete well in the market?
• What challenges does your product face against competitors?
• The timing and the specific strategy will depend on how well you know your product.

When you know your product well, you know how to manage it, advertise it and carry out the right plans.

In advertising you can "talk it up". But before you plan the advertising steps, you must understand the product well so you can choose ad segments and target customers and focus on a marketing plan that fits.

In Vietnam we often say "know your enemy and know yourself, and you will win a hundred battles". Knowing your product, and studying your product and your competitors' information, helps you build distinctive strategies. You'll stand out and come up with sales marketing plans that win the market.

See more:

• Choose the right ad segment with Maslow's hierarchy
• Tips for selling cosmetics online effectively

2. Who are your competitors?

Customers are the target of your sales strategy. But they are not only your target. Your competitors' products and services are also studying this same pool of potential customers.

Once you know who your competitors are and study them in detail, you can build strong strategies to beat them and win potential customers, and boost your sales.

Learn about the products and services your competitors offer. Compare them with what you sell to see strengths and weaknesses. To do that, compare across several dimensions.

• Who are your competitors selling to?
• What advantages does their product have over yours? What are its limits, so you can see their weak points and drive your advertising?
• How are your competitors running their sales marketing plans? Use that to do better than their plan.
• Where they sell, when they launch advertising, and why they are as successful as they are today.

With a clear strategy, you can avoid the mistakes your competitors in the same industry have made. A strategy consulting package delivered by MONA's experts. We are an agency for end-to-end website design and we provide professional website SEO services, helping businesses build marketing strategies, with 10+ years of experience. With more 6.000+ projects completed successfully, bringing outstanding growth to our clients' brands.  Without a reputable, capable partner, wide brand reach will be hard to achieve. Without marketing knowledge, hands-on experience and real commitment, no door to success will open for you. CONTACT US NOW to 4X YOUR REVENUE for your brand. Save as much cost as possible by investing in the right place at the right time.

3. Build an effective sales marketing strategy

An effective sales marketing plan is a compass for action and points you toward success. It guides your staff to act and sell better.

To do this, you need to set your goals, plan and desired results. Don't forget to choose the advertising formats, manage risk, plan finances and more.

First, answer these basic questions to find the key and direction for your goals:

• What product resources, staff and market advantages do you have?
• Product vision, the future direction of the product, and the long-term plan for production and competing with others in the same field.
• What short-term and long-term goals do you need to reach for the product? What will you do if you miss them? If you've passed your sales targets and have a large customer base, what does the next plan look like?
• Who is your target audience? Is your product right for them? Does it need changes, and what price suits your potential customers?
• Which advertising channels will you use to market your product?
• What is the right timing for each marketing format to get the best result? Each product needs the right moment to earn more interest from customers.

-> Read more:

• Tips for selling online and attracting customers
• 8 steps to start a successful business
• What is a brochure? How to design a brochure that attracts customers

4. Direction for the online sales marketing plan

Set clear goals for your offline and online marketing campaigns. Plan the message, slogan and budget for this area. This is key to guiding customers toward success. When customers see your advertising, direction and the benefits your product brings, it leaves an impression and goodwill, and they buy or use your service more.

Online marketing is growing fast. Almost every consumer has a smartphone, tablet or laptop. When buying a product or looking into a service, the first thing they do is search on Google, check social media ratings and YouTube reviews, and only then order or visit a store.

This habit became even more common during the complicated stretch of the Covid pandemic. More people buy online and browse products and services from home. Shipping policies, order promotions, on-page optimization and so on all matter. At this time, put more weight on online marketing strategies than offline.

5. Choose online marketing channels wisely

Press, media, email, Google Ads, YouTube, website SEO, giveaways, physical booths. Posters and social media marketing on Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn and more. Dozens of effective sales channels are in use today.

All of these advertising channels can be paid or free, and each needs a specific sales marketing plan from your team. You will not be able to cover every channel, so pick the ones that fit your products and services best.

• Sales marketing through mass media such as TV, radio, newspapers and magazines suits essential, everyday products with a wide customer base.
• Sales advertising for large businesses and bulk wholesalers works best through large-scale direct mail.
• Conferences, exhibitions and trade fairs suit new products that need to catch customers' attention.
• Phone outreach works through the contact details customers leave on your advertising channels, or through customer lists bought from reliable sources.

-> Read more about marketing channels:

• What is online marketing? How to build an online marketing strategy
• What is email marketing? How beginners can do it well
• What is digital marketing? What you need to know
• SEO vs Google Ads: which brings lasting results?

There are many advertising methods that can spread your brand to customers. But they can eat up your budget and still not work. Most of the traffic they bring will be PPC, and the number of organic traffic will be close to zero. 

Invest heavily in finishing your website

Buyers visit your website to look at product photos and descriptions. They especially compare prices across websites and look at customer care programmes. You need to invest in building a polished website. For example:

• Invest in photographing and editing attractive product images from every angle.
• Products on the site need clear categories and detailed pricing.
• Invest heavily in articles on the website, and link link to other websites in Vietnam and abroad. You can also exchange links with well-known sites to bring in valuable clicks.
• The website should be registered with the Ministry of Industry and Trade and show a clear company address.
• Pay attention to customer care…

The most important things are web SEO and on-page optimisation, such as images, links, articles, keywords, video and so on. To do this, you need to hire a web SEO company or build a professional online marketing team.

-> Read more:

• What is affiliate? How to make money online with affiliate marketing
• Integrating Visa payments into your website

To run your marketing strategy well, you need to build a website. It is the tool that lets you do business online. Unlike other kinds of websites, a sales website has its own requirements so you can easily manage orders and customer information, and keep everything SAFE AND SECURE. 

Budget for your online marketing plan

Among the steps of sales marketing planning, budget has the biggest say in success. The bigger the budget, and the better matched your channels and methods, the higher your chance of success.

Sales marketing budget covers salaries and bonuses, advertising costs, team activities, booths, resources and other costs paid for your sales marketing plan. Draw up a specific sales plan based on the total amount your company invests in this area.

6. Analyse the current state of your products and services

To plan sales marketing well, you must know your product well. No product is 100% perfect. Your products and services will have strengths and weaknesses you cannot fix yet. More importantly, you need to know the problem you are facing, so you can choose realistic online sales marketing to fix and develop from where you are.

• What advantages do your products and services have today? Use these advantages and strengths to shape your advertising strategy.
• Prices of products and services Do they satisfy customers and hold up against competitors? From there you can design more distinctive sales marketing, such as discounts or attractive, fitting free gifts.
• Distribution and order handling, delivery and return policies need regular review and renewal. Find what does not work in how you supply your products and fix it.
• Promotion Promotions are one tactic for attracting customers' interest. Base them on the real state of your product and make them more attractive. They must compete well against your rivals' promotions.
• In particular, pay attention to the channels you distribute through. Watch the market overall, the general level of marketing costs, and how much return you have actually earned.

7. Make an action plan

Plan your sales marketing and act on it in a sensible, methodical way. You have many ways to sell, for example:

Organise sales by team

Do not split sales by individual. Split it by team, and each team will divide tasks among its members. Team selling is done by a set group of people or in a given area.

Sell according to customer potential. Some teams specialise in finding prospects, some in closing orders, and others in promotions…

A clear workflow

Every team and member should understand the workflow, and know their direction and responsibility in it. This pushes staff to give their full capacity for the best results.

Set actions with the 5W – 2H formula

The 5W are:

• What for: what is the goal of the sales marketing?
• What: What activities will be held during the sales process?
• Who: Who is responsible for this work?
• Where: Where will the sales marketing happen? Online, offline at outdoor booths, in a showroom, or advising on the website to close orders…
• When: How long will this sales marketing plan run?

The 2H are:

• How: How will the sales marketing plan be carried out?
• How much: How much will the sales marketing plan cost?

Plan for sales risks

No calculation is 100% certain to succeed. You can never predict every unexpected risk in selling. Always guard against risk and keep a backup plan ready for challenges.

8. Measure performance

Keep tracking and analysing the performance of your sales marketing continuously. This especially tells you whether your business is heading in the right direction, so you can change your strategy in time.

Measure revenue, the number of customers visiting the store or website, and every source you advertised on. Track in detail the number of customers who call, leave an email, click on the website or engage on social media. Compare with your original sales marketing plan to see how well it is doing.

Whether selling becomes more effective also depends on your ability to manage. Sales management software is a powerful aid for online sellers. This “assistant” not only helps you manage well, it also improves your business results. 

• Detailed reports by day, week, month and quarter
• Accurate stock counts in the warehouse
• Saves staff training time and cost

This sales management software can be integrated into your website . It also runs well on Android and iOS, on every platform today.

Follow the sales marketing planning steps above and your business will have clear marketing goals and a direction that fits and is easy to follow.

If your company is stuck in a cycle of one month with customers and the next with none, what you need most is a clear system for winning them. MONA climbed out of that stage bit by bit too. Watch the video to see the 7 ways Hùng used to do it.

Things to keep in mind when building a marketing plan

To make sure your marketing plan is carried out effectively, watch for the problems below that come up often.

No coordination between departments

If managers and departments do not agree with each other, a marketing plan will struggle to succeed. The end goal of a marketing plan is to bring your products and services closer to customers who need them. So departments should meet and discuss seriously, which saves time and gets better results.

Unclear strategy and tactics

Not everyone finds it easy to tell strategy and tactics apart. Most people writing their first plan mix them up, set the wrong goals, and lose a lot of time.

To see the difference, look at their definitions:

• Tactics means using specific activities to reach short-term goals within a set period.
• Strategy is the set of decisions leaders and managers make on broader, clearer goals that drive activities toward long-term goals.

So in a marketing plan, strategy is broader and contains the tactics.

Lack of people and money

A plan needs two things to succeed: people and finances.

• Crew Experienced people are one of the key factors in securing sales and helping the business persuade customers.
• Finance: However good a marketing plan is, a business without stable finances has a serious problem that greatly affects the plan's success.

Lack of experience

Buying behaviour changes with trends. So you need to study customer insight closely and build a complete, flexible plan that follows market trends and meets users' needs accurately.

Not understanding customer psychology

As said above, customer trends change over time. A marketing plan that wants to reach business goals must study customer psychology and current market trends carefully.

Also, when things change in ways you did not predict, you need to catch it and quickly bring in suitable backup plans.

Setting expectations too high and unrealistic

When building a marketing plan, always set goals so the business can control and grow effectively. But if you set expectations too high without studying the market, the plan will fail. It also wastes time and effort and, in serious cases, can cause big losses for departments and the business.

Successful marketing plan examples for businesses

Here are 5 standout sample marketing plans that helped businesses succeed with their strategy.

1. Buffer's content marketing plan

Buffer collected many marketing plan templates, tested them and assessed which strategy worked best. It then took the strengths of the best strategies to make its marketing plan. Buffer's marketing plan covers these main points:

• Set smart marketing goals
• Create accurate customer personas
• Use content that solves customers' problems
• Research and analyse competitors
• Analyse and assess the content strategy by topic
• Build an editorial calendar
• Develop marketing and advertising strategies

2. Contently's marketing plan

Instead of building a whole new strategy for every campaign, Contently uses the strengths of its earlier strategy to get the best results from the marketing plan for a new campaign.

Contently's content marketing plan includes:

• Adjust content and KPI goals
• Define the customer persona clearly
• Keep creating content that fits each marketing stage
• Choose the right marketing channels for the strategy
• Pick topics customers care about

3. Forbes's marketing plan

Forbes's plan became known in late 2013 and drew nearly 4 million views, an impressive number any marketer would want. This marketing plan is also cited in many marketing lessons.

Forbes's marketing communication plan guides marketers through a roadmap of 15 main items:

• Write a summary
• Identify target customers
• Propose distinctive sales channels
• Pricing strategy and brand positioning
• Propose distribution channels
• Create incentives for marketing activities
• Marketing materials
• Promotion strategy
• Online marketing strategy
• Digital transformation strategy
• Business partnerships
• Referral marketing strategy
• Product/service price increase strategy
• Retention strategy
• Financial income and expense forecast

4. Venture Harbour's marketing plan

Venture Harbour's growth marketing plan is a solution built on real data and testing. It is seen as the ideal marketing plan if you want to test many campaigns across different platforms.

The 5 things a Venture Harbour digital marketing plan should have are:

• Goals
• Benchmarking
• Testing
• Roadmap
• Insights

5. Chief Outsiders' marketing plan

Chief Outsiders' new product marketing plan is aimed at one specific product, not all of a business's products. So if you plan to launch a new product or service, it is a good fit for you.

Chief Outsiders' new product marketing plan has 7 main parts:

• Define the product/service to market
• The business's strategic goals
• Define the target market
• Competitor analysis
• Position the new product
• Consider sales and service

FAQ

1. What is a digital marketing plan?

A digital marketing plan is an overall marketing plan down to the detail, drawn up by marketers. Digital marketing planning is an important step in business: it helps you define the goals you want to reach so you can budget and staff sensibly.

2. What is a plan in marketing?

A marketing plan is a map outlining how a business markets its products and services. It steers marketing activity so products and services reach the right target market and potential customers.

3. What do you need to plan marketing?

To build an effective marketing plan for a product, follow these 6 steps:

• Understand the product
• Competitor analysis
• Set specific goals
• Decide on marketing communication tools
• Budget for marketing
• Carry out the marketing plan

4. What basic elements does a marketing plan have?

Plan Marketing covers the content and scope of marketing activity: goals, market and competitor analysis, product position, budget, resources and timeline.

With an effective marketing plan your business can define its position in the market correctly. From there you can build a marketing strategy that reaches potential customers, which improves sales. Mona Media We hope the information above helps you build an effective sales marketing plan for your business.