• 1. Identify your BHAG.
• 2. Identify 2-3 goals that will help you get closer to achieving your BHAG this year.
• 3. Who are you talking to? (Target audience)
• 4. Take a look under the hood. (Audit)
• 5. Brainstorm.
• 6. Competitive Analysis.
• 7. Research: Take the time to do it.
• 8. Organize your thoughts.
• 9. Look at your budget and resources.
• 10. Create a timeline and action plan.

1. Identify your BHAG.

BHAG (pronounced Bee-Hag) stands for Big Hairy Audacious Goals. It was first coined by Jim Collins and Jerry Porras in the 1994 book “Built to Last: Successful Habits of Visionary Companies” and it is essential to the success of your business. Why? Because your BHAG is the thing that gets you up in the morning. It is the goal or vision that creates momentum and keeps your team inspired. Once you’ve identified your BHAG it will be easier to create the smaller goals and stepping stones in your marketing plan that will help you achieve your vision.

In step 1 you want to identify that one big, overarching goal that you would love to see happen, that you can base the rest of the plan around.

Learn more about BHAGs:

• • • What Is Big Hairy Audacious Goal (BHAG)? (Investopedia)
    • How to Set a Big Goal
    • Why Your Business Needs a BHAG

2. Identify 2-3 goals that will help you get closer to achieving your BHAG this year. 

You already know how important goals are in building a business—you might’ve even been able to predict this would be an important part of the process. In this step, you must decide the overall endpoint of this plan. What are one or two measurable things you would love to see happen in your business over the next 6-12 months that will move you closer to achieving your BHAG? For example, you might decide your goals this year are to have a successful YouTube channel, grow your newsletter list and increase comments on your Facebook page.

The clearer the picture is, the easier it will be to achieve. Don’t worry about the how yet. As you begin to develop your plan the how will become evident.

Learn more about setting goals:

• • • Why is goal setting so hard?
    • Why OKRs are a great tool for setting goals
    • FREE Worksheet: A Goal-Setting Framework to help you define your goals

3. Who are you talking to? (Target audience)

You may have heard marketing jargon like buyer persona and avatar. These words are used to describe the person who is buying (or who you think will buy) your product or service.

As you develop your marketing plan it is essential to have a clear vision of who you are talking to. Knowing who you are trying to reach will help you determine your messaging and where you need to be present to promote it.

Struggling a little? Consider which customers seem to be most inspired by your business and your business philosophy. These are likely the audience that you connect with the most, and who you enjoy talking to. What are their characteristics (income, gender, age, location, etc.)? Dig deep here. Try to identify how they spend their time, what they do for a living, what social media platforms they use, and how they communicate.

There’s also the possibility that you aren’t yet reaching the group you want to reach—you might be hoping to talk to more young people and expand your customer base, or maybe you want to reach people in a new location. If that’s the case, use this audience to guide your plan.

Have fun with this step! Create some imaginary personas of customers you’d love to talk to: what do they do with their time, and what are they interested in? Use that creative power that drives your business to imagine some of your future audience in detail.

By the way, It is absolutely okay to have more than one target audience but if you’re a solopreneur or have little resources, keep it simple. Start with one ideal customer and create your marketing plan around that customer. You can always build up your marketing to reach other audiences later.

Learn more about your target audience:

• • • Have Fun Identifying Your Target Audience
    • Understand Your Target Audience to Give Better Customer Service
    • What Kind of Community Do You Want to Create?

4. Take a look under the hood (Audit)

Now that you have some solid goals and identified your ideal customer, it’s time to revisit all of your current marketing and identify what is working and what isn’t. Do you have a logo? Do you have a website? Do you have a Facebook page? Maybe a blog or newsletter? Perhaps you’re spending money on ads. Are these initiatives doing what you want them to do (and do you know what you want them to do?)

In this step, you might see areas that are performing well, that you could put more time into and make even better. Or you might see areas that are underperforming but could step up in a big way with just a little more attention. Observe and take note of all the recommendations you’d give yourself. Give yourself a pat on the back for the things that are doing what they are meant to do.

Pay attention to the things you enjoy working on. If you are running your own business and marketing is already the last thing you want to spend your time on, select the initiatives that give you a little thrill when you work on them, or see the results of your work on them.

Doing an audit will help your vision take shape as it’s a way to reflect and measure.

Learn more about doing a content audit:

• • • • How to Audit Your Own Marketing and Social Media + Free Audit Worksheet!
      • Feeling Overwhelmed From Doing Your Content Audit? Stay Motivated With These Tips

5. Brainstorm.

.Now it’s time to get creative and dream big. You are an entrepreneur, a risk-taker, and a creative spirit! Don’t hold yourself back in this step. The sky’s the limit. Do not underestimate what you can achieve. Write down all of your ideas for what you’d like to see for your marketing. Think about all the areas you audited in the last step, but also include all the dreams you have about where you’d like to expand. Have you ever thought about being a speaker at industry conferences? What about running your own course? Write all of these ideas down. Don’t stop until you have a list of at least twenty ideas.

6. Competitive Analysis.

Here’s one of those big, jargon-y words! Don’t worry, we don’t want you to make intense spreadsheets to track your competitor’s every move. In fact, we’re not even sure we like the word “competitor.”  We have an abundance-based mindset which means we believe that there is enough for everyone, and that businesses can help each other build and grow together. So what do we mean in this section? We mean looking to others in your industry for ideas and opportunities. What audiences do they reach and what’s working for them? What areas are they not as strong in? This step often opens the door to all kinds of possibilities you never thought of yourself, just by seeing what people like you are already doing. You might also start to notice the ways your own business is unique.

7. Research: Take the time to do it.

We list this as a separate step, but really it overlaps with many of the steps in our framework! You should do some research as part of your brainstorm, and you’ll definitely need to do some more as part of exploring your competitors. We find that when we create a marketing plan for a client, we come up with new things to research in every step, and it’s valuable to take the time to dig in when these ideas come up.

Doing research will help to inform your choices when it comes to everything from social media content, to blog titles and topics, to which products to purchase to help support your marketing.

8. Organize your thoughts.

This is the step where you take all of your dreams, all of your research, and all the opportunities, and start to organize them. Organize these thoughts by identifying key projects and then create a list of action items you will need to do to accomplish the key project.

The key projects can be anything from social media marketing to a new brand and logo to getting speaking engagements. What matters most is that you identify these key projects so that you can create action items and timelines to get to the finish line and achieve your goals.

Pro-tip for spreadsheet averse business owners

Do spreadsheets make you cringe? Have a 30-minute post-it note party. Write every single one of your ideas down on separate post-it notes. Do this as fast as possible. Do not let yourself fall into the trap of judging your ideas before you’ve had a chance to explore them. Stick the post-it notes on the wall as you complete a thought.

Once you’re done, organize them. Which ideas go together? Which ones should be achieved first, and which ones might be less of a priority? Which ones light you up when you think about them? Which ones do you already have the resources to achieve? Which ones are you already doing? Which ones will connect best with your target audience?

As you complete this exercise you should have a list of 5-10 key projects. Rank these key projects by importance so that when you get to step 9 you’re prepared to make some real decisions and begin taking action right away.

Once you’ve identified and prioritized your key projects list, create a detailed list of action items for each one. This doesn’t have to be overly complicated, but it should be comprehensive enough that you have a list of things to do to complete the project. 

9. Look at your budget and resources.

You have your list of key projects. You developed your list of action items. Now you must look at what resources you have to get there. How much money do you have to spend, and how much time do you have to dedicate to your marketing projects?

You may not have the time or money to tackle all of the key projects right away, but you know the projects that are most important because you identified them in step 8. Lay out your key projects based on your budget and resources.

10. Create a timeline and action plan.

You’ve done all the heavy lifting! The key projects have been identified, the long list of action items has been created, now you need to dump that information into a spreadsheet. At Fesyk Marketing, we put months as the column headings and spread the action items out over the course of 12 months for our clients. It’s a great way to create milestones and measure your results.

This timeline and action plan should be a living document that you update with additional action items as time goes on. It’s important to take stock and measure your progress. Sometimes it feels like you’re running in circles, but actually, you are still moving in the direction of your dreams. And if you track your progress, you’ll see that even more clearly.

Creating a marketing plan for your business is not an easy task. It takes time and motivation but the rewards are great. The investment will pay off in spades when it saves you time and resources over the next year because you now have laser focus and know where you are going. Say goodbye to wasted time and money on pointless marketing initiatives. You’ve picked your lane and now you are on the road to success.

If you know a marketing plan is needed to achieve your goals but this still feels too big to DIY, Fesyk Marketing has your back. Give us a call. Let’s talk!