3 Reasons to Create A Marketing Plan for Your Small Business

[00:00:00] When I think of a marketing plan, I look at it as kind of like you have a map, right? Like a treasure map. And that map is basically the marketing plan that you've laid out for yourself.

[00:00:10] Hey everyone, welcome to the S.O.B. Marketing Podcast where we celebrate the S.O.B. that you are. And if you haven't figured it out yet, we mean small owned business. We don't mean S.O.B.

[00:00:22] Listen, we know that as a small business owner, you are working hard on the daily to keep your business fully operational while trying to promote it.

[00:00:31] And while some days it may feel like the business is owning you, if we're being honest with each other, I bet you would admit that you wouldn't give up the insanity for anything.

[00:00:41] Our commitment here at the S.O.B. Marketing Podcast is to give you the real talk, what works when it comes to advertising, marketing, promoting your business, and then what doesn't really work.

[00:00:53] And Chelsea and I promise to always keep the conversation real.

[00:00:56] Welcome back to another episode of the S.O.B. Marketing Podcast. S.O.B. as in small owned business.

[00:01:03] Y'all already know we're not out here calling you names.

[00:01:06] So I'm here with my beautiful sister, Chelsea.

[00:01:09] And before we hop into our exciting topic for the day, we just want to do a little bit of housekeeping.

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[00:02:15] But Chelsea, what are we talking about today?

[00:02:18] Okay, Vivian, today we are talking about marketing plans, specifically three reasons why you need to create a marketing plan right now for 2025.

[00:02:30] Before we get started, I do want to say if you want a deeper dive into what a marketing plan is in general, we have done an episode on that.

[00:02:40] So go check out that video first.

[00:02:42] Before we get started real quick, a marketing plan is exactly what it sounds like.

[00:02:47] It's a plan for your marketing initiatives and your campaigns.

[00:02:51] It can be as long or as short as you would like it to be.

[00:02:55] Probably not a month.

[00:02:56] I feel like a month would be too short, but quarterly, yearly, semi-annually, whatever works best for you.

[00:03:06] But there is a reason to create a marketing plan.

[00:03:09] There's three actually, and we're going to talk about them today.

[00:03:11] And Chelsea, I just want to hop in here and say, I think that people don't realize what they're doing when they decide not to create a marketing plan.

[00:03:22] And I think it's for the reason that you just said.

[00:03:24] If you're a small business owner, I almost guarantee that when someone has asked you to put together a marketing plan, they've always talked about putting together a year-long plan.

[00:03:33] And that can feel super overwhelming.

[00:03:37] And so like Chelsea said, instead of just thinking that you have to put something together that's going to be 12 months long, you can easily put a game plan together that's only going to be for the next three to four months.

[00:03:50] So, you know, portion it off in chunks that seem doable to you.

[00:03:55] So that way you can get your small business on this marketing plan train and kind of have a guide to just help you achieve some of those goals throughout the year.

[00:04:07] Absolutely.

[00:04:07] As someone who works in quarters, do not ask me to make a year-long marketing plan.

[00:04:14] I'm not going to be able to do that.

[00:04:15] But like quarterly.

[00:04:17] All right.

[00:04:17] So Chelsea, what is reason number one?

[00:04:19] So reason one for creating a marketing plan is it's going to help you stick with your budget.

[00:04:26] A marketing plan is going to help you organize your money in the most effective way possible.

[00:04:33] So without a marketing plan, you could end up spending too much money going over budget or you could spend too little money.

[00:04:41] You might go under budget, which is a problem.

[00:04:44] It's not that you're saving money.

[00:04:46] It's that you're not using your money effectively.

[00:04:48] That is a really great thing to point out because I do know that most of us do worry about overspending.

[00:04:57] But the truth is that if you are not, what ends up happening is you're going to have money that you allocated for marketing.

[00:05:08] And then you're going to get, let's say, halfway through the year and you're going to be like, oh my gosh, you know, I haven't done like half the stuff that I had planned on doing.

[00:05:17] And so it does keep you on track.

[00:05:19] You're not even that.

[00:05:19] You just didn't spend half the money you planned on spending.

[00:05:23] Right.

[00:05:24] Because if you had a marketing plan, but if you don't have one, then you don't even have an idea of what you could do with the money.

[00:05:31] You just have allocated this amount of money.

[00:05:33] Yeah.

[00:05:34] And then you're handicapping yourself because potentially you could be doing things that are growing your business.

[00:05:41] But because you don't have a marketing plan in place to help you guide or to help guide you, you're just not doing any of it.

[00:05:49] And so then your business is kind of stagnating.

[00:05:52] Absolutely.

[00:05:52] You know what this makes me think of?

[00:05:54] What?

[00:05:54] This makes me think of dad.

[00:05:57] Okay.

[00:05:57] Okay.

[00:05:58] So it makes sense.

[00:06:00] So our father was in the Air Force and he, I don't, I don't remember what position this was or anything, but he was in charge of a warehouse.

[00:06:08] Right.

[00:06:10] And at the end of the year, you always had to spend all of the money because if you don't spend all of the money, then next year they'll give you less money.

[00:06:19] And you don't want to lose out.

[00:06:21] It's called the good old government.

[00:06:24] Use it or lose it.

[00:06:25] That is what they're saying.

[00:06:27] That is exactly what it was.

[00:06:29] You got to use it or you lose it.

[00:06:30] So at the end of the year, dad was buying random stuff that they probably didn't need because he had to make sure that they spent that money.

[00:06:42] Likewise, for a small business, you might get to the end of the year and say, oh, I saved all this money to do some marketing campaign or I saved all this money to do marketing and then I never used it.

[00:06:53] Let me just put all that money into this one thing.

[00:06:56] I think that's probably not going to be very effective.

[00:07:25] So at the end of the year, you're seeing how much money you spent.

[00:07:28] Maybe that changes the way that you spend your marketing dollars in Q2 because you're saying, oh, you know, I don't want to do billboards anymore.

[00:07:37] Instead, I'm going to try, you know, this OTT advertising, which is, you know, now on the streaming channels.

[00:07:44] So, you know, streaming on Hulu, all that.

[00:07:47] I want to run commercials there.

[00:07:49] So it does allow you to kind of look, reflect, and then adjust as you go.

[00:07:54] And then by the end of the year, you're able to say, well, for next year, I really did get a lot of value out of X, Y, and Z, but not so much, you know, the other one.

[00:08:04] So Vivian, I'm so glad you brought that up because this is going to lead into reason two that you need a marketing plan.

[00:08:10] It's almost as if marketing is all related.

[00:08:13] It's all connected, like I like to say.

[00:08:16] But so reason two is going to be you need to track your success and you need to be able to set realistic goals.

[00:08:23] If you don't have a marketing plan, you're also likely not going to have clear marketing goals, clear goals that are trackable.

[00:08:31] And you need to be able to track these initiatives and to track these goals because that's going to help you see progress and make educated decisions.

[00:08:42] Yeah, absolutely.

[00:08:43] I think the other thing, too, is, you know what?

[00:08:47] You know I like being a visual person.

[00:08:50] Like I have to have some type of image going on in my head of what's happening.

[00:08:54] When I think of a marketing plan, I look at it as kind of like you have a map, right?

[00:08:59] Like a treasure map.

[00:09:00] And that map is basically the marketing plan that you've laid out for yourself.

[00:09:05] If you do not have this thing, like how are you going to know when you do?

[00:09:10] Like you're saying, if you have to tie it into your goals, you have to put on that map where you're heading and what you're doing and what you're going to what you're going to consider a success.

[00:09:23] In your marketing for that quarter, for that, you know, six months or year.

[00:09:29] It's like you're if you don't take the time to put one together, you're going out into the wild.

[00:09:36] Like I envision myself going out into the woods like here, you know, on my property, going out into the woods with a little map and like basically just like getting off track.

[00:09:47] Right.

[00:09:48] Right.

[00:09:48] If you don't have it written down, every little shiny thing that comes to you is going to throw you off the path that you, you know, you are set on.

[00:09:57] And we see this a lot of time with small businesses in the sense that they have a tight marketing budget and then they have someone who approaches them with a good quote unquote marketing, you know, opportunity.

[00:10:10] And they're like, yeah, I'll just put all of my dollars in that instead of saying, no, no, no, we have a plan.

[00:10:19] Right.

[00:10:20] And if I want to grow my website, I have to do certain things to upgrade my website.

[00:10:27] Right.

[00:10:27] So therefore, I can't be using that money on this cool marketing opportunity that just came out of left field.

[00:10:35] I will say, OK, for listeners, if you're saying, Vivian, you always tell us to be flexible and, you know, to take chances and stuff.

[00:10:45] Yes, we're saying make educated decisions.

[00:10:48] If you get a marketing opportunity out of left field that is like, I don't know, going on tour with Beyonce, like obviously, OK, go ahead and do that.

[00:11:00] But if it's something that which listen, even then I'm going to be like, how does that help your small business?

[00:11:05] Like, you know what?

[00:11:10] Vivian's right.

[00:11:11] Vivian's right.

[00:11:11] That was not a good example because how would going on tour with Beyonce help your business?

[00:11:16] I mean, it's totally good if, you know, if her audience is the same audience that potentially could buy your product or your service.

[00:11:24] I mean, I get it.

[00:11:25] My point was, if you have marketing plans are flexible.

[00:11:29] OK, if you get a marketing opportunity that will help you get to your goals.

[00:11:38] So, again, keeping in mind your actual goals.

[00:11:41] If this new marketing opportunity can help you do that, consider it, you know, make an educated decision.

[00:11:49] But just because it's shiny and new and the person knows how to talk does not mean that you should spend all your money like Vivian said.

[00:11:58] Well, we definitely do not want you to get swindled.

[00:12:02] So if you guys ever have questions about stuff to ask if it's legit or a good idea, go ahead and email us.

[00:12:10] Like you can send us an email to help at the season marketer dot com.

[00:12:14] We're always there for you guys if you just want to throw spaghetti at a wall and just kind of see what, you know, what someone else has to say about that opportunity.

[00:12:23] But I will say this to your point, Chelsea.

[00:12:26] Yes, absolutely.

[00:12:27] We do have to remain flexible.

[00:12:29] I think what a marketing plan also helps us do is it helps you to prioritize because I promise you this.

[00:12:35] You are not going to put something on your marketing plan that isn't a big deal to you.

[00:12:42] Do you see what I'm saying?

[00:12:43] That isn't important to your business.

[00:12:45] And so I think what it does is let's say somebody does come to you with a new marketing opportunity.

[00:12:50] You take a look at that marketing plan that you put together and you're like, OK, out of the five things that I outlined that I want to be spending my time on or I know are going to impact the revenue of my small business.

[00:13:05] Am I willing to take away one of these to try this new thing?

[00:13:10] And so then you're able to make those really good decisions because you're rolling the dice.

[00:13:15] You're like, I choose to take on this risk.

[00:13:18] I'm going to set this aside.

[00:13:20] I can actually do, you know, marketing item number five next quarter.

[00:13:26] And instead, I'm going to try to do this new thing and experiment.

[00:13:31] And can we talk about, guys, we said tangible goals.

[00:13:36] OK, when you are creating your marketing plan, it is not enough to say, I want to grow my business.

[00:13:45] OK, cool.

[00:13:46] That is not enough.

[00:13:48] You need to create trackable goals like I want to grow my website traffic to this percent by the first quarter.

[00:13:56] Like that is a trackable goal.

[00:13:58] And it is a very clear goal.

[00:14:00] So you can say, OK, I want to increase the traffic to my website.

[00:14:04] That means I should probably find ways to promote my website.

[00:14:10] That gives you a very clear path.

[00:14:12] I love Vivian.

[00:14:14] I loved your treasure map analogy.

[00:14:17] So we're going to we're going to stick with that.

[00:14:19] I don't understand why you said the woods, though, instead of like the open ocean, but to each their own.

[00:14:24] So creating a clear goal so that you can clearly say this is the path I'm going to take so that I can get to the X.

[00:14:33] So trackable goals, tangible goals.

[00:14:38] Yes.

[00:14:39] And let's use us as an example.

[00:14:42] One of the things that we've actually spent time this year talking about is growing our podcast.

[00:14:48] And so with that, the conversation has come in.

[00:14:52] And so, you know, you put you set a goal of growing a podcast.

[00:14:57] Right.

[00:14:57] You put a number, how many downloads you would like, you know, monthly downloads, this and that.

[00:15:03] And then you work backwards and you think, what are the marketing initiatives I need to do in order to help increase that goal or to get that goal to where I want it to be?

[00:15:13] And so that's where Chelsea and I toss around ideas.

[00:15:17] Do we want to run Facebook ads to, you know, for our podcast specifically?

[00:15:22] Do we want to perhaps run podcast ads on other podcasts?

[00:15:30] Right.

[00:15:31] For people that would have the same type of audience, small business owners.

[00:15:34] So that's I think it does help to get some of those important conversations going.

[00:15:40] And it's kind of like moving.

[00:15:42] You have to move the pieces every once in a while.

[00:15:44] You have to say, yeah, this is going to be, you know, on the back burner because this is the bigger priority.

[00:15:50] But let's say that you're, you know, selling T-shirts on a website, then maybe one of the key things that you want to do is I need to get a Shopify site up so that people are able to go in there and very quickly and easily order product from me.

[00:16:09] Order their T-shirts.

[00:16:10] Right.

[00:16:10] So everybody's priorities are going to be different.

[00:16:13] And the nice thing about doing this year to year is the business that you were in 2023 is not the business that you want to be in 2024.

[00:16:24] Your business changes as you grow and as you evolve and your marketing plan should too.

[00:16:31] So that's why we just want you guys to be giving some thought to this because it really will help you.

[00:16:37] And it's nice, Chelsea and I, I'm going to share something with you all.

[00:16:41] Chelsea and I earlier, we were talking about just what we're proud of for this week.

[00:16:49] And she said that she actually took time this week to reflect back on some of the things in that she had seen that she had grown in a certain area.

[00:16:57] Right.

[00:16:57] But see, you're not able to do that unless you're able to reflect back and take a look at what you were doing and what you're doing now.

[00:17:05] Marketing plans help you with that.

[00:17:07] What did I do in 2023 to promote my business?

[00:17:11] What am I going to do differently in 2024 to promote the business that I am today?

[00:17:17] Absolutely.

[00:17:17] I'm glad you said that because I was going to bring up the fact that, you know, making sure that you're tracking success also means you can look at what happened if you don't reach your goal.

[00:17:29] You can go back and say, OK, this is what I did.

[00:17:31] It wasn't very effective.

[00:17:33] So moving forward, this is how I'm going to pivot.

[00:17:37] Or even I think it's all mindset to Chelsea.

[00:17:40] I know I'm always the I've always got my head in the clouds.

[00:17:44] I get it.

[00:17:44] I'm just a super optimistic person.

[00:17:47] I choose to live my life like that because I don't want to think about the world just being a sad, sad place.

[00:17:52] OK, so I choose to always be optimistic.

[00:17:55] But I think sometimes, you know, sometimes people set goals that they know they're going to reach.

[00:18:04] And what's the challenge in that?

[00:18:06] What is the challenge in that?

[00:18:08] And so if you aren't setting some goals that you're not reaching, then, you know, I challenge you that maybe for this upcoming year in 2025 that you give serious thought to what's my pie in the sky or what is it that, you know, I'm hoping to accomplish.

[00:18:24] That would be a little extreme, but at least I'm challenging myself to get there.

[00:18:31] And so even if I don't reach that goal, I've at least grown quite a bit.

[00:18:36] I think it's so funny that you said that because my tip was going to be, you know, make goals that are realistic so that you are so that you're not like depressed when you don't reach them.

[00:18:50] So meet us in the middle.

[00:18:52] OK, like create a goal that you can reasonably reach if you put in the effort.

[00:18:59] So like it's a harder goal.

[00:19:00] Like don't don't give yourself a baby goal.

[00:19:03] OK, give yourself a hard goal that is still achievable.

[00:19:07] Yeah.

[00:19:08] Or maybe just do what works best for you in your personality and what is going to keep you on track and motivate you.

[00:19:15] Because as you just saw, Chelsea and I are two very different people.

[00:19:19] So like Chelsea says, for her, she wants those clear, actionable goals that are within reason because she that's her target.

[00:19:30] She's like, I need that because I need to check it off the box and then be like, good.

[00:19:34] I accomplished what I was supposed to do.

[00:19:37] For me, I'm a little more chaotic.

[00:19:39] OK, so for me, it's like I can put a goal out there and say, listen, if I only reach half of this, then I'll still consider it good because it doesn't affect me the same way.

[00:19:51] Right.

[00:19:51] It's still motivating to me just in a different way.

[00:19:54] So do what's best for y'all.

[00:19:56] But it would be nice to have a healthy dose of, you know, maybe just throw one goal in there.

[00:20:01] That's like your pie in the sky.

[00:20:03] And that way, when you don't reach it, you're you're still seeing how far you stretch yourself.

[00:20:09] That's a great point.

[00:20:11] OK, I think it's really funny.

[00:20:14] I don't real real quick side tangent.

[00:20:16] Do you ever think that maybe our personalities are in the wrong bodies?

[00:20:21] Oh, 100 percent.

[00:20:23] Like, I feel like you should be the one that's like chaotic and all this, especially because you like not grunge, but you like punk and, you know, all that.

[00:20:35] Yeah, metal music.

[00:20:36] I feel like that should be more of your speed, your personality.

[00:20:40] Mm hmm.

[00:20:41] No.

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[00:21:18] OK, well, let's move on to reason three.

[00:21:22] So third reason why you need to make a marketing plan and stick with us here.

[00:21:27] It's that consistency is key, especially when it comes to marketing.

[00:21:32] OK, if you're creating a marketing campaign in January, you let it run for a couple of weeks and then you don't do anything related to marketing until like November.

[00:21:43] What was the point of that?

[00:21:45] Like what?

[00:21:46] That's not effective.

[00:21:48] You need to be consistently working on your marketing, consistently seeing what's working and what's being effective throughout the year.

[00:21:58] And a marketing plan is going to help you stay consistent.

[00:22:03] It does.

[00:22:05] And it keeps marketing top of mind for you.

[00:22:09] Y'all, the consistency, even if the consistency is just in the fact that you're checking in on your marketing initiatives like every four months or every six months.

[00:22:19] I think that is a big win.

[00:22:22] But to Chelsea's point, let's say so let's say you have a big overarching goal, marketing goal of revamping your website.

[00:22:33] Right.

[00:22:33] Because you've started to include you want to include blog posts and now you have digital products.

[00:22:40] And then you want to amp up like your copywriting, right, to really tell your story and whatnot and connect with website visitors.

[00:22:49] If that is your goal, the only way you're going to be able to complete such a big project like that, an overhaul of a website, is to be consistent on the quarter to quarter on what you're changing.

[00:23:02] Right.

[00:23:02] And so what that means is you're having to go in there and pre-plan that.

[00:23:07] Very rarely do you launch a website in like two weeks.

[00:23:11] All right.

[00:23:12] So it takes longer than that, especially if you're overhauling something and you're rebranding, let's say, or doing something like that.

[00:23:19] And so the consistency part of it is going to be what does help you end up reaching those goals at the end of it.

[00:23:26] So I do think that is really one of the biggest reasons that you want to have and put together a marketing plan.

[00:23:35] Vivian, let's also talk about how consistency and having a marketing plan is going to help your small business as a whole.

[00:23:45] And by that, I mean the vendors you work with, all of your employees.

[00:23:50] Like everyone is going to be on the same page.

[00:23:53] You're not going to throw anyone off with something that's going on with your small business.

[00:23:59] Yeah.

[00:24:00] Going back to that map, it's kind of like you could easily hand that map over to somebody else and be like, this is where we're heading.

[00:24:08] Right.

[00:24:09] And everyone can get on board with that.

[00:24:11] And I do think it helps for clarity with the team as far as like seeing where the company or the business is heading for that year and what the focus is going to be on.

[00:24:23] Because year to year, if you have employees, let's say you have three team members and they've been with you for like two to three years now.

[00:24:31] Year to year, you want to give them something to look forward to.

[00:24:34] And also they're going to start to recognize that every year is a little different.

[00:24:40] And so what you focus on in year two might be different than what you're focused on in year three simply because you're growing and expanding.

[00:24:47] And so a marketing plan I think is just good overall so that everybody is on the same page.

[00:24:55] They're looking at the same map and they all can buy into your vision and where you guys eventually are heading.

[00:25:03] Guys, I do want to reiterate one more time.

[00:25:06] You know, you don't have to create a marketing plan that's a year long.

[00:25:09] That's just I guess that's the most common length for a marketing plan.

[00:25:14] But you still need to give yourself enough time to reach your goals, to be able to track it, to use consistency, all that kind of stuff.

[00:25:24] Yeah, you definitely don't want to be setting weekly goals.

[00:25:27] I mean, you can do that, but, you know, I would not put a marketing plan together week to week.

[00:25:33] That's too much.

[00:25:34] Yeah, no.

[00:25:35] Marketing plan.

[00:25:36] Because again, a marketing plan is, you know, where do I want to take my business?

[00:25:41] Like you're creating those larger goals.

[00:25:44] You can create a weekly plan.

[00:25:46] I do.

[00:25:47] It's not a marketing plan.

[00:25:48] It's just a list of what I need to do for the week.

[00:25:52] Like if you're anything like me, I need to be able to like check off things.

[00:25:57] Well, and the marketing plans too.

[00:25:58] What's interesting, Chelsea, we've talked about this before, how sometimes the biggest mistake that people make with their marketing is not giving it enough time to work.

[00:26:08] Right?

[00:26:08] So they expect results like immediately.

[00:26:10] So that's the reason that we tell you putting this together is also going to help because I think it just does something to your brain where like it reiterates the fact that like, hey, you might not see big results in quarter one.

[00:26:26] But if you continue this marketing initiative, you'll see those in quarter two or quarter three.

[00:26:31] So I think it forces you to just remember it's a long-term game, right?

[00:26:38] Marketing, you have to give it time to work.

[00:26:40] You can't just put three ads out there and expect that it's going to work.

[00:26:43] It can in some circumstances, but you need a little more time.

[00:26:49] So just to wrap up, you need a marketing plan because it's going to help you stick with a budget.

[00:26:55] So you're not overspending or underspending, which is definitely a problem.

[00:27:00] You're going to need goals to track your success.

[00:27:04] That's really important to grow as a small business.

[00:27:08] And a marketing plan is going to help you do that.

[00:27:10] And a marketing plan is going to help you stay consistent.

[00:27:14] And consistency is key when it comes to marketing and growing your small business.

[00:27:18] So go out there and try to create a marketing plan.

[00:27:22] And just remember, whether you choose land or sea, it is your map.

[00:27:30] So it is going to be the one thing that you can keep reverting back to just to be sure that you're staying on track

[00:27:36] and that you're not out here chasing shiny new things when you don't need to be.

[00:27:42] We're all about flexibility, but we want to be sure that we have a good idea of where we're heading.

[00:27:48] So that way, little things don't deter us and we're able to reach those big lofty marketing goals that we set for ourselves.

[00:27:56] So thank you guys for listening.

[00:27:57] Again, go and leave us a five-star review.

[00:28:01] We would really appreciate it.

[00:28:03] Share this with someone.

[00:28:04] Or if you haven't watched us on YouTube, go check out the YouTube videos because you get to see the faces we make.

[00:28:14] And go out there and be the best SOB you can be.