This document provides guidance for marketers on planning for 2017. It recommends conducting a thorough review of 2016 performance to identify what strategies and tactics were most successful. Marketers should then work with sales to set lead and opportunity targets that will support overall revenue goals for 2017. With these targets in mind, the document suggests identifying overarching themes for the year that will guide marketing strategies and focus efforts. Marketers are also encouraged to do an exercise to identify practices to stop, start, and adjust for the coming year based on past learnings. Both major annual campaigns as well as more agile, quarterly planning are important to allow for flexibility and adjustment based on ongoing results.
As the New Year begins, it is time to look back at what you achieved last year (and other years prior) and assess the performance of your business. Knowing how well (or poorly) you did the past years can help you improve for the coming years. Here are 14 checklists for your home business start of the year review:
You Got Served: Email Marketing Ideas for RestaurantsiContact
Mega food and beverage brands now spend more money on mobile digital marketing than any other medium, and who can blame them when 75% of Americans say they use their smartphones most often to check email. No matter how many restaurant locations you currently market—whether it’s one or many—you can do everything the big brands do with email marketing, digital coupons, and online reviews. Going digital with your advertising and marketing is easier than you think — if you pick the right partner; plus, you’ll spend less, know more about your customers, and have more time to run your restaurant!
Join David Gonynor, CEO of That’s Biz, the restaurant digital marketing agency that’s distributed over 500 million digital coupons since 2007, and iContact’s Content & Creative Manager, Jess Knight (previously with newBrandAnalytics d.b.a. Sprinklr), as they spill the beans on everything you need to be successful with email marketing.
On this free webinar, you’ll learn about:
• The best- and worst-performing subject lines sent by restaurants
• Sending single use coupons customers can show on their smartphones
• Email design tips sure to get your customers opening and clicking more
• Where to put your Email Club signup offer on your website and social
… And many more tips and tricks!
As the New Year begins, it is time to look back at what you achieved last year (and other years prior) and assess the performance of your business. Knowing how well (or poorly) you did the past years can help you improve for the coming years. Here are 14 checklists for your home business start of the year review:
You Got Served: Email Marketing Ideas for RestaurantsiContact
Mega food and beverage brands now spend more money on mobile digital marketing than any other medium, and who can blame them when 75% of Americans say they use their smartphones most often to check email. No matter how many restaurant locations you currently market—whether it’s one or many—you can do everything the big brands do with email marketing, digital coupons, and online reviews. Going digital with your advertising and marketing is easier than you think — if you pick the right partner; plus, you’ll spend less, know more about your customers, and have more time to run your restaurant!
Join David Gonynor, CEO of That’s Biz, the restaurant digital marketing agency that’s distributed over 500 million digital coupons since 2007, and iContact’s Content & Creative Manager, Jess Knight (previously with newBrandAnalytics d.b.a. Sprinklr), as they spill the beans on everything you need to be successful with email marketing.
On this free webinar, you’ll learn about:
• The best- and worst-performing subject lines sent by restaurants
• Sending single use coupons customers can show on their smartphones
• Email design tips sure to get your customers opening and clicking more
• Where to put your Email Club signup offer on your website and social
… And many more tips and tricks!
Having good years of experience in Marketing Communication, Brand Management, Digital Marketing, Events and exhibitions, Marketing budget and strategy, Vendor management. Altogether 10 years of vast work experience in creative agencies and brand side helped me to gain more knowledge and skill set to my domain. Though this period have planned, designed and executed many campaigns which helped brand to put a strong identity in the market.
My work portfolio will give you a glimpse of my capabilities & potentials and dedication towards my work.
Welcome to the 12th Annual Content Marketing Benchmarks, Budgets, and Trends: Insights for 2022 report. What a year it has been.
This edition of our report looks back on the last 12 months and includes expectations for 2022. Throughout, you will see quotes from the many rich, qualitative responses we received to the question, “What did the pandemic change most about your organization’s content marketing strategy/approach?” In all, 75% of respondents took the time to answer this question and we are ever so grateful. What amazing insights it yielded!
The key theme that emerged was this: The pandemic awoke a sleeping giant – content marketing, that is. Without in-person events and face-to-face selling, many who had previously paid little attention to content marketing suddenly became aware of its power. More content marketers got a seat at the table and helped keep many businesses on their audiences’ radar. Some discovered new audiences altogether.
The research also confirmed what many of us already knew: Content marketers are some of the fiercest business pros around. In the most difficult of times, they get the job done – and many come through more creative and stronger than before.
Congratulations, content marketers, for a job well done in the most difficult of times. Our entire team salutes you!
Future of Voice in eCommerce - Voice shopping at S Group - SpeechlySpeechly
S Group Harri Laaksonen presentation at Speechly event "Future of Voice in eCommerce" held in January 2020.
S Group is one of the biggest retailers in Nordics. They are using Speechly to power their grocery shopping experience.
Read more about the event here https://www.speechly.com/blog/voice-experience-in-ecommerce-event/
What can the PR industry learn from Kung Fu Panda?Ben Shipley
Presentation slides from Council of PR event in Hong Kong on the 21st of July. Thoughts on what one plucky cartoon character can teach an industry high on value but low on recognition.
Company Culture: Connecting to Performance ManagementSherrie Suski
Sherrie Suski's lesson on company culture continues, with this thorough presentation on performance management, core competencies, and establishing goals for the business. Sherrie Suski's lesson is great for startups.
SCA Promotions - Your Source For Promotions That MotivateJulie Davis
SCA partners with advertising agencies, big brands, and other ROI-minded clients to implement the most effective, high-return promotions, sweepstakes, games, and contests in the industry. SCA offers an entire suite of classic promotions and cutting-edge digital promotions from which to choose, each proven through years of successful implementation to meet or exceed client marketing objectives.
How to Create an Inbound Marketing Services ProposalHubSpot
Creating proposals that win business is a difficult task! As the fields of PR, marketing, advertising, SEO, social media, web design ... all merge, it has gotten even more difficult. So, how do you adapt and grow your agency despite this increasing complexity?
A solid inbound marketing proposal includes a plan for:
- Search engine optimization and pay per click management.
- Branding, messaging and content creation.
- Public relations, blogging and social media marketing.
- Web design and development.
- Online lead generation, lead nurturing and lead qualification.
- Aligning marketing and sales processes, goals and messages.
In this webinar, you'll learn how to diagnose your prospect's needs in all of these areas. Armed with the right questions to help determine your prospect's challenges and goals, you'll master the art and science of pulling together the perfect custom proposal.
Here's the truth, the majority of marketers FAILat content marketing. Don't believe us, data shows the overwhelming amount of companies openly admit that their content marketing is not meeting their expectations.
Our presentation shares content marketing "do's" and "don'ts" and how content strategy is the foundation for successful content marketing.
Accelerating Your Enterprise Sales FunnelEvan Lewis
This deck was created for a sales training session I ran at Askuity, another Toronto software startup. It focuses on tactics for accelerating your enterprise deal cycle.
Social media marketing plan strategy 2018Fraser Hay
Social media marketing plan strategy 2018 is an overview document of the social media marketing coaching and consultancy support on offer by Fraser Hay to help you plan your social media strategy for 2018, write a social media marketing plan in 2018, execute and implement your social media plan, review, monitor and measure your social media effectiveness in 2018 and how to systemise and automate your marketing funnel process and sales process to create a sales prospecting system, lead generation system and webinar marketing system to help you achieve your online marketing goals. For more info visit http://www.fraserhay.co.uk
Whether you need a social media marketing plan template for 2018 and help how to implement or execute your marketing plan template then open, read and act on the information in this document before your online competitors do.
A simple content strategy that works for any brand: Plan > Create > Promote > Measure
Presented at Redi Social, Ahmedabad on Social Media Day 30.06.2018.
How to properly brief your agency by JJ Nonis Hacking DigitalJude Jefferson Nonis
This is just a little basic deck on why Client's should write a proper brief to their Agency. A proper brief will help agencies understand and create better strategies & creative for brands.
It’s that time of year again!
No, we’re not talking about presents under the tree or hot apple cider or snowball fights.
We’re talking marketing budget, new resource planning, strategic marketing plans and more!
We realize both end-of-year business planning as well as holiday preparations can both be stressful. We can’t really help you with your shopping, but we can offer a series of best practice guides and advice on how to plan for and hit the ground running on some focused, strategic sales and marketing initiatives to start the New Year right.
Enjoy!
Developing a marketing communications plan using the SOSTAC model | Growing P...Brent Spilkin
Developing a marketing communications plan using the SOSTAC model
For traditional or digital campaigns this user friendly tool will help you create and measure a successful plan.
Having good years of experience in Marketing Communication, Brand Management, Digital Marketing, Events and exhibitions, Marketing budget and strategy, Vendor management. Altogether 10 years of vast work experience in creative agencies and brand side helped me to gain more knowledge and skill set to my domain. Though this period have planned, designed and executed many campaigns which helped brand to put a strong identity in the market.
My work portfolio will give you a glimpse of my capabilities & potentials and dedication towards my work.
Welcome to the 12th Annual Content Marketing Benchmarks, Budgets, and Trends: Insights for 2022 report. What a year it has been.
This edition of our report looks back on the last 12 months and includes expectations for 2022. Throughout, you will see quotes from the many rich, qualitative responses we received to the question, “What did the pandemic change most about your organization’s content marketing strategy/approach?” In all, 75% of respondents took the time to answer this question and we are ever so grateful. What amazing insights it yielded!
The key theme that emerged was this: The pandemic awoke a sleeping giant – content marketing, that is. Without in-person events and face-to-face selling, many who had previously paid little attention to content marketing suddenly became aware of its power. More content marketers got a seat at the table and helped keep many businesses on their audiences’ radar. Some discovered new audiences altogether.
The research also confirmed what many of us already knew: Content marketers are some of the fiercest business pros around. In the most difficult of times, they get the job done – and many come through more creative and stronger than before.
Congratulations, content marketers, for a job well done in the most difficult of times. Our entire team salutes you!
Future of Voice in eCommerce - Voice shopping at S Group - SpeechlySpeechly
S Group Harri Laaksonen presentation at Speechly event "Future of Voice in eCommerce" held in January 2020.
S Group is one of the biggest retailers in Nordics. They are using Speechly to power their grocery shopping experience.
Read more about the event here https://www.speechly.com/blog/voice-experience-in-ecommerce-event/
What can the PR industry learn from Kung Fu Panda?Ben Shipley
Presentation slides from Council of PR event in Hong Kong on the 21st of July. Thoughts on what one plucky cartoon character can teach an industry high on value but low on recognition.
Company Culture: Connecting to Performance ManagementSherrie Suski
Sherrie Suski's lesson on company culture continues, with this thorough presentation on performance management, core competencies, and establishing goals for the business. Sherrie Suski's lesson is great for startups.
SCA Promotions - Your Source For Promotions That MotivateJulie Davis
SCA partners with advertising agencies, big brands, and other ROI-minded clients to implement the most effective, high-return promotions, sweepstakes, games, and contests in the industry. SCA offers an entire suite of classic promotions and cutting-edge digital promotions from which to choose, each proven through years of successful implementation to meet or exceed client marketing objectives.
How to Create an Inbound Marketing Services ProposalHubSpot
Creating proposals that win business is a difficult task! As the fields of PR, marketing, advertising, SEO, social media, web design ... all merge, it has gotten even more difficult. So, how do you adapt and grow your agency despite this increasing complexity?
A solid inbound marketing proposal includes a plan for:
- Search engine optimization and pay per click management.
- Branding, messaging and content creation.
- Public relations, blogging and social media marketing.
- Web design and development.
- Online lead generation, lead nurturing and lead qualification.
- Aligning marketing and sales processes, goals and messages.
In this webinar, you'll learn how to diagnose your prospect's needs in all of these areas. Armed with the right questions to help determine your prospect's challenges and goals, you'll master the art and science of pulling together the perfect custom proposal.
Here's the truth, the majority of marketers FAILat content marketing. Don't believe us, data shows the overwhelming amount of companies openly admit that their content marketing is not meeting their expectations.
Our presentation shares content marketing "do's" and "don'ts" and how content strategy is the foundation for successful content marketing.
Accelerating Your Enterprise Sales FunnelEvan Lewis
This deck was created for a sales training session I ran at Askuity, another Toronto software startup. It focuses on tactics for accelerating your enterprise deal cycle.
Social media marketing plan strategy 2018Fraser Hay
Social media marketing plan strategy 2018 is an overview document of the social media marketing coaching and consultancy support on offer by Fraser Hay to help you plan your social media strategy for 2018, write a social media marketing plan in 2018, execute and implement your social media plan, review, monitor and measure your social media effectiveness in 2018 and how to systemise and automate your marketing funnel process and sales process to create a sales prospecting system, lead generation system and webinar marketing system to help you achieve your online marketing goals. For more info visit http://www.fraserhay.co.uk
Whether you need a social media marketing plan template for 2018 and help how to implement or execute your marketing plan template then open, read and act on the information in this document before your online competitors do.
A simple content strategy that works for any brand: Plan > Create > Promote > Measure
Presented at Redi Social, Ahmedabad on Social Media Day 30.06.2018.
How to properly brief your agency by JJ Nonis Hacking DigitalJude Jefferson Nonis
This is just a little basic deck on why Client's should write a proper brief to their Agency. A proper brief will help agencies understand and create better strategies & creative for brands.
It’s that time of year again!
No, we’re not talking about presents under the tree or hot apple cider or snowball fights.
We’re talking marketing budget, new resource planning, strategic marketing plans and more!
We realize both end-of-year business planning as well as holiday preparations can both be stressful. We can’t really help you with your shopping, but we can offer a series of best practice guides and advice on how to plan for and hit the ground running on some focused, strategic sales and marketing initiatives to start the New Year right.
Enjoy!
Developing a marketing communications plan using the SOSTAC model | Growing P...Brent Spilkin
Developing a marketing communications plan using the SOSTAC model
For traditional or digital campaigns this user friendly tool will help you create and measure a successful plan.
The 10 responsibilities of marketing departmentsSales Layer
In many companies, marketing departments turned into a kind of catch-all... But what are their real responsibilities?
In this post you’ll find 10 tasks that are the responsibility of the marketing department. All of them have a crucial importance in ensuring the survival of your company.
Watch This Free Webinar On-Demand: http://dg-r.co/2fJTpcj - Marketing Planning Mastery: 4 Strategies From The Best Marketing Organizations
Don't suffer through a disjointed planning - Learn how high-performing marketing leaders have evolved the planning process
The strength of your marketing plans and how well you execute them is the #1 indicator of success.
However, too many orgs struggle to rally around a single planning process. For them, planning is disjointed and chaotic and the resulting marketing execution can seem constantly behind the eight-ball: reactive, rather than proactive.
We spoke to a group of high-performance marketing leaders and analysts to uncover 4 of the most effective & practical ways they’ve evolved planning at their organizations, including:
• Aligning marketing plans with company-wide strategy;
• Making practical use of analyst frameworks;
• Combining top-down with bottoms-up planning; and
• Achieving harmony with the finance
iVIaster ClassHow do you w o r k lmith the CEO or CiVIOt.docxpriestmanmable
iVIaster Class
How do you w o r k lmith the CEO or CiVIO
t o identify which metrics matter most?
PANEL
Chad Latz
President, global digital and
social media practice, Cohn & Wolfe
chad.lat2®cohnwolfe.com
Bill Ogle
CMO, Motorola Mobility
[email protected]
Adam Schoenfeld
CEO and cofounder. Simply Measured
[email protected]
Dan Scott
CMO, Scott Kay
[email protected]
Eve Stevens
VP, measurement, Waggener Edstrom Worldwide
[email protected]
Identifying metrics that matter most
requires asking the obvious questions first.
What are the biggest issues facing the
business? What are the most pressing prior-
ities and objectives? Is the main focus repu-
tation, financial, or a combination of the
two? From there, you have a barometer to
help set key performance indicators (KPIs)
and outcomes.
Knowledgeable executives and marketers
are not mired in the confusion between
monitoring and true measurement, which
is actually focused on a quantifiable result.
Unfortunately, the conversation around
measurement is often tool-centric and
not outcome-oriented. The value is in the
analysis and having a business-aligned
measurement strategy in the first place.
We are often asked to create an integrated
measurement strategy for clients that evalu-
ates the relationship and output of earned,
owned, and paid media to drive action and
intent. While fan acquisition is part of
the strategy, it typically isn't the result the
C M O is looking for. Executives want
measurement outcomes that can impress
the audiences that matter most to them,
whether it is the board of directors or
the investor community.
Digital and social media help us evolve
our approach to measurement with tools
and the ability to accumulate and track vast
amounts of data. Social media has allowed
us to introduce new KPIs into the vernacu-
lar, but statistics such as number of likes or
followers are meaningless if they can't be
tracked through to an outcome.
"NUMBER OF LIKES
OR FOLLOWERS
ARE MEANINGLESS
IF THEY C A N T BE
TRACKED THROUGH
TO AN OUTCOME"
- Chad Latz
Paid media has long been held to a standard
that demonstrates conversions. As a result,
I haven't met a CMO who is content to let
their PR or social media agency off the hook
with a measurement strategy simply based on
reach and impressions. Instead, they demand
more value and a measurement approach that
highlights and presents business outcomes.
By establishing business-driven KPIs,
defining process inputs and a baseline, you
have the foundation for an approach that
measures and optimizes your program while
quantifying impact and ROI.
Chad Latz, president, global digital and
social media practice, Cohn & Wolfe
For most companies, the overarching
goal - whether through marketing, sales, or
product development - is to find a direct
link between brand engagement and financial
performance. Yet, despite all the measure-
ment tools at our disposal, identifying
metrics that accurately reflect this relation-
ship is often a challenge for ...
5 steps to executing a successful digital pr campaign - Brighton SEOTom Mansell
The huge value and potential of digital PR is undeniable, yet many brands still shy away from it due to the complexities involved in executing a succesful campaign. In this session, Tom Mansell will outline the five key steps to take to ensure your next digital PR campaign is a success - from bringing together the right teams, to the importance of creativity, to tips on how to outreach.
Measuring Your Business’ KPIs: A WhitepaperResults
http://info.results.com/rethinking_kpis | Results.com offers a comprehensive whitepaper to help you measure your business’ key performance indicators (KPIs). By learning what metrics best represent business success, you can create goals for success.
How to get buy-in for your people analytics from the boardroom and beyond.The Happiness Index
This talk at the Mission Critical HR Analytics conference in London looked to help HR professionals with their people analytics, most importantly - how to get buy-in for their program from their board as well as their staff. The presentation covers:
- Engaging teams from the outset
- Securing buy-in from the boardroom by making data relevant
- Getting the frequency, language and questions right
- Improving response rates for maximum insight
- Building trust internally – anonymous vs. identified responses
- Best practice for creating a compelling employee engagement strategy
Planning and Preparation covering:
SWOT analysis & audit
What is a marketing plan & how can it help you?
Marketing plan types & getting started
Elements of a digital marketing strategy
SMART goals
Breaking goals down
Content marketing timeline
Social Media Scheduling & CRM
Pricing Clarity
Pareto 80:20 Rule
Pricing Offer
B2B Content Marketing 2015 Benchmarks, Budgets & Trends - North America
Hello Content Marketers, Welcome to the fifth annual B2B Content Marketing Benchmarks, Budgets, and Trends—North America report. It’s hard to believe that it’s been five years since we first surveyed marketers on how they use content as part of the marketing mix. Since then, the survey has grown to reach marketers all across the globe. This year, we heard from more than 5,000 marketers—in 25 industries in 109 countries—from for-profit and nonprofit organizations. In this report, you’ll learn how the B2B marketers from North America responded. As you’ll notice, we made some changes to this year’s survey to better reflect how the industry is growing. We added new questions, changed the way we asked some of the prior ones, and even removed a few. We also asked content marketers about the initiatives they’re working on—and the list is long, as you will see… We’re thrilled to be with you on this journey.
Yours in content,
Joe & Ann
Joe Pulizzi
Founder
Content Marketing Institute
Ann Handley
Chief Content Officer
MarketingProfs
Sponsored by Brightcove
2015 B2B Content Marketing Benchmarks, Budgets, and Trends for North AmericaMarketingProfs
This is the fifth year that MarketingProfs and Content Marketing Institute have put together this report on how marketers use content in their marketing mix. With changes in the industry, the report may look a little different than you remember. Dive in, and enjoy!
B2B Content Marketing Research: Focus on Documenting Your StrategyMadalina Balaban
This reserach - B2B Content Marketing 2015: Benchmarks, Budgets, and Trends — North America, produced by Content Marketing Institute and MarketingProfs and sponsored by Brightcove, reflects the progress our industry is making in exciting new ways.
Learn the essentials of building a documented content marketing strategy, from our Co-Founder and Chief Content Officer, Debbie Williams. Set goals and KPIs, develop buyer personas and an SEO plan, and map editorial content ideas to your buyer's journey. Filled with data, insights, and dozens of ideas for generating content ideas that will deliver results. www.sproutcontent.com
Similar to Modern Marketers Guide to 2017 Planning (20)
1. T H E M O D E R N M A R K E T E R ’ S
G U I D E T O 2 0 1 7 P L A N N I N G
2. Every marketer knows what it’s like to be buried in spreadsheets from the second
half of Q4 to the middle of Q1. That magical time of year when you get out of the
day-to-day to look back and plan ahead while sales lunges toward the finish line on
last-minute deals.
There’s a real satisfaction to be had in a year’s worth of analysis — combing
through campaign stats and mining the answers to marketing’s toughest
questions: What worked? What turned out to be an epic failure? What haven’t you
tried yet?
A solid plan, backed by data from your previous campaigns and performance, is
more important than ever. Why? Because there’s more noise than ever. You need
to rise above the din to stand out and connect. You need to engage your audience
with authentic conversation and programs that move the needle — and this year,
you have even more competition.
According to Content Marketing Institute, 70% of survey respondents say they’re
creating more content than they did a year ago. And no one creates content for
the sake of it. Rather, marketers need content to survive.
Content is at the heart of every B2B digital marketing campaign — serving to unite
the prospect with the brand at the exact moment of googling. And once that
connection is made, your job is to not screw it up.
T H E M O D E R N M A R K E T E R ’ S G U I D E T O 2 0 1 7 P L A N N I N G 2
A solid plan, backed by data from your
previous campaigns and performance,
is more important than ever.
3. T H E M O D E R N M A R K E T E R ’ S G U I D E T O 2 0 1 7 P L A N N I N G 3
Albert Einstein had a compelling approach to problem solving: “If I had an hour to solve a
problem I'd spend 55 minutes thinking about the problem and 5 minutes thinking about
solutions.”
As marketers, are we so different? Not really — especially these days, with access to so
much data. Many of us spend more time in Salesforce poring over dashboards and running
reports than we do running actual campaigns. And that’s not a bad thing.
To be a modern marketer is to be a data-driven marketer, with a keen understanding of
strategies that work and how to convert leads to real sales opportunities. That’s why your
marketing plan is essential: a solid plan means you’ve done a thorough job of
understanding the problems you’re trying to solve first. Only then will you nail the landing.
L E T ’ S D I V E I N T O 2 0 1 7
P L A N N I N G W I T H A F O C U S
O N 5 K E Y A R E A S :
1. Get honest about 2016
2. Set your vision for 2017
3. Create an agile marketing plan
4. Build a programs budget
5. Define your metrics
Many of us spend more time running
reports in Salesforce than we do
running actual campaigns.
4. T H E M O D E R N M A R K E T E R ’ S G U I D E T O 2 0 1 7 P L A N N I N G 4
BEFORE WE BEGIN
We have a lot to cover so let’s lay the
foundation with a few assumptions.
SALES & MARKETING1
Let’s assume that sales and marketing have a shared understanding
of the goals and numbers required in 2017.
YOU2
Let’s assume you’re ready to embrace change and do things
differently by rallying around a theme of “how to be a smarter team
in 2017.” Either that or you’re in a new role and ready to shake some
major action in the new year.
TOUGH QUESTIONS3
Let’s assume you’re ready to ask them, face the answers, and tackle
your marketing plan accordingly.
BUDGET4
Let’s assume you have one and you know what it is.
Whether you’re B2B or
B2C, a lean team or a
global operation, this
guide provides real-world
insights to strengthen
your plan and energize
your team.
5. T H E M O D E R N M A R K E T E R ’ S G U I D E T O 2 0 1 7 P L A N N I N G 5
GETTING HONEST
A YEAR IN REVEIW
Your plan for the upcoming year is only as good as your audit of the past 6 to 12 months.
Take a look at your goals and review questions like:
• Did the company achieve its revenue target? What did marketing contribute?
• Which campaigns generated the most leads? The fewest?
• Which campaigns had the highest impact on sales pipeline?
• How did the funnel perform compared to your assumptions?
• What did you learn about specific strategies, tactics, or processes in 2016?
If you already do quarterly reviews, great! But there’s nothing like a look back at Q1 when
you’re at the end of Q4. Those “what were we thinking?” moments will seem like ancient
history — and serve as a reminder of where NOT to spend your money in the year ahead.
You’ll also realize how far you’ve come, so there’s that.
Get the data, do the analysis, and document it as Section 1: The Year in Review of your
marketing plan. Your executive team will love it, and the marketing team can refer to it as a
sanity check during the (many) strategy meetings to follow.
1
R E S P E C T T H E PA S T
It’s not uncommon for teams to
breeze through the year in
review, but the upcoming year is
only as good as your audit of the
past 12 months.
6. T H E M O D E R N M A R K E T E R ’ S G U I D E T O 2 0 1 7 P L A N N I N G 6
The end of the year is the right time to get your sales and marketing
leaders in a conference room for an afternoon. Your goal? To discuss
revenue targets, confirm a shared understanding of the demand waterfall,
and agree on how many opportunities sales will need to create in order
to achieve the revenue plan.
From there, you’ll plug in your lead to opp conversion rate(s) to figure out
how many leads marketing will need to generate to support the sales
pipeline.
See why this matters? Only once this exercise is complete can you even
begin to think about the campaigns and programs that will drive the
leads you need.
2 YOUR VISION, YOUR PLAN
#marketingGOALS
Lead and OPP
Targets to Achieve
Revenue Goals
Average Sales Price (ASP)
Lead to OPP Conversion Rate
Sales Cycle
Revenue Goals
T H I N K O F I T T H I S W AY:
B O N U S
Not super mathy? Download this Lead to
Revenue Template to help you get started.
7. T H E M O D E R N M A R K E T E R ’ S G U I D E T O 2 0 1 7 P L A N N I N G 7
BIG YEAR, BIG THEMES
Now that the math is out of the way (just kidding,
those numbers will change a lot before you land on
the final plan), here comes the fun part — the reason
most of us wanted to be marketers in the first place:
themes and strategy.
Think of your themes for the year like umbrellas,
under which all of your campaigns and tactical plans
will fit. Themes are the guideposts to keep the
marketing team focused on what really matters and
help you spot extraneous activities that won’t help
you achieve your goals.
A S Y S T E M T H AT S U P P O RT S Y O U
Sign up for the Systematize Your Funnel Webinar to learn how
to implement your demand waterfall from an ops perspective.
For inspiration, look to the brands
you admire. Remember that great
line from Cary Grant? “I pretended
to be who I wanted to be, until I
became that person. Or he
became me.”
Here are a few examples of themes ripped from actual marketing plans:
AWARENESS – This is the year we step up PR and social for brand awareness.
TARGET PERSONA – This is the year we tighten up who we’re marketing to and
abandon generic offers catered to everyone and no one.
DATA – This is the year we increase our marketable database by 50% by engaging
existing leads and increasing net new leads through targeted marketing programs.
INBOUND – This is the year of “them finding us.” We focus on creating content to be
repurposed across channels and SEO optimized. We’ll experiment with ungated
content and minimal forms that drive conversion.
Of course, these are just examples to get you started. You’ll know what’s appropriate
for your team based on the strategic goals of the company. For mature teams at large
enterprises, a reasonable goal might be to optimize lead nurturing to decrease time
to revenue, whereas startups might focus on a foundational goal like, start doing
email marketing.
IDEA:
Why not do a marketing crush session? Talk about the
companies and campaigns you admire and
brainstorm how to make them your own.
8. T H E M O D E R N M A R K E T E R ’ S G U I D E T O 2 0 1 7 P L A N N I N G 8
STOP. START. ADJUST.
Stop, Start, Adjust is an exercise that forces brevity and clarity around where you’ve been and where you want to go.
Once you’ve nailed lead and opp targets and you have an idea of themes for the year, dedicate a session to outline the practices that need to go
away completely, that need to begin in earnest, and that need to be optimized for better performance.
Here are some real-world examples from a recent planning session:
• Stop running programs that don’t
convert leads to opps at an agreed
rate
• Stop reacting and stay on course to
deliver higher quality leads that
convert better
• Stop defining all leads by company
type and do a better job of targeting
by job title/role
• Stop getting distracted by minor data
points and start looking at trends
S T O P
• Start defining a weekly top of the
funnel (TOFU) lead goal, middle of
the funnel (MOFU) lead goal, and a
goal for demos and trials
• Start running end-to-end campaigns
that target different stages of funnel
• Start piloting highly targeted
programs (LinkedIn, content
syndication, webinars) to capture the
right persona
• Start assessing vendors to pilot ABM
• Start segmenting and nurturing
prospects by their by job title and role
S TA RT
• Adjust the balance between highly
targeted campaigns and “catch alls”
that influence opps and still contribute
to the waterfall
• Adjust content strategy to focus more
on MOFU assets and less on
snackable pieces
• Refine the business development
program and enable them with fresh
email templates, follow ups, and
scripts
• Refine the feedback loop between
sales and marketing on campaign
effectiveness and lead quality
A D J U S T
9. T H E M O D E R N M A R K E T E R ’ S G U I D E T O 2 0 1 7 P L A N N I N G 9
3 MAJOR CAMPAIGNS VS. AGILE
WHY YOU NEED BOTH
So far we’ve covered annual planning and how it relates to themes and
strategy. But when you think about the year ahead, consider the need for
flexibility.
Let’s say your team plans to roll out two big campaign themes in the first half
of the year, with various multi-channel programs rolling up under those
themes.
You’re on track with your campaigns, but you’re not hitting the number of
leads you planned. Your goals and themes won’t change, but your tactics
might have to — and that’s what agile is about.
If social is proving ineffective for driving leads, for example, you’ll need to
rethink your social strategy or consider replacing it with another tactic to
close the gap.
A close relationship with sales and a pulse on real-time metrics are key — if
something’s not working, you need to react quickly to turn things around
while there’s still time to impact pipeline. Simply looking back at the end of
the quarter and saying, “That didn’t work; we should have done something
else,” helps no one.
GOAL
250 opportunities
1953 leads (conversion rate = 12.8%)
CONTENT WEBINARS CONTENT WEBINARS EVENTS
Helping agencies
do more with less
Driving efficiency
in the cloud
Content
Syndication
Search/
display
Social
Email
Content
Syndication
The 80/20 rule applies well here: 80% of your campaigns and activities
(and thus, resources) should be planned in advance, while the
remaining 20% can be committed later as you test, learn, and iterate.
Website
Social
Email
Website
Search/
display
Social
Email
Website
Social
Email
Website
Email
Website
Social
BIG CAMPAIGN 1 BIG CAMPAIGN 2
Channels for
Promotion
=
10. T H E M O D E R N M A R K E T E R ’ S G U I D E T O 2 0 1 7 P L A N N I N G 10
4 BUDGETS & PROGRAMMING
3 TIPS TO WHITEBOARD
Now that you’ve outlined your goals and themes for the year, it’s time to think budget and programming.
The results of the Stop, Start, Adjust exercise will help you identify programs that will need more or less
funding in the new year.
Here are 3 guidelines to throw on your budget whiteboard right now:
1. Be bold enough to kill anything that isn’t working. Do not be afraid of losing leads. If you have
campaigns or channels that generate leads with abysmal conversion rates, take them out back and shoot
them. Free up that budget to try something new. You have nothing to lose.
2. Revisit your target personas. Funny how we lose sight of who we’re actually marketing to in the midst
of all this number crunching. Make sure everyone is clear on who your target personas are and aren’t —
and evaluate whether your programs do a good job of reaching them.
3. Budget with agility. We talked about marketing agility, and the same is true of budgeting. Start with the
big buckets and assign budgets accordingly. Then plan a budget review every two weeks and adjust as
necessary. Give your team the freedom to spend smarter on campaigns that move the needle.
P R O T I P
If you have budget to spend at the end of the year, spend it. Start evaluating
new technologies and queuing up campaigns to accelerate deals.
Sales reps are desperate to
hit Q4 numbers, so
negotiate a deal on new
technologies you want to
pilot in the new year.
Thinking about ABM? Start
assessing vendors, lock in
the deal, and implement
for a January kick off.
11. T H E M O D E R N M A R K E T E R ’ S G U I D E T O 2 0 1 7 P L A N N I N G 11
5 METRICS
MEASURING WHAT MATTERS
We all agree that B2B marketing and analysis is tough. Our systems are difficult and not fully integrated. We invest in automation platforms like
Marketo, Pardot, and Hubspot, yet still rely on Salesforce and Excel for most of our reporting. Our roles have evolved into a unicorn-like mix that
requires deeply analytical and uniquely creative thinking.
Regardless of the complexities you face, 5 metrics will help you stay the course:
1. Lead to opp conversion. Sure, this metric relies on sales follow up and performance, but it also reflects
lead quality. Track this conversion rate monthly but also go back a year or two and observe trends.
2. Campaign opportunity influence and ROI. Whatever you do, have access to a dashboard that shows
which campaigns and content are influencing opportunities during the quarter.
3. Email open rates and engagement. Opens and click-throughs are a great way to check the
temperature of your nurture campaigns. Email is still the best way to engage leads once they’re in your
database. Poor performance could be a sign of exhaustion and/or lack of compelling offers.
4. Funnel velocity. Work with marketing ops to ensure you have a way to track lead flow from beginning
to end. When the CEO asks, “How long does it take a lead to convert to an opportunity?” you should
probably have the answer ready to go.
5. Happiness. You read that right. Don’t lose sight of your team and your customers. Don’t get so caught
up in analysis paralysis and hitting your numbers that you sacrifice quality and sanity.
Enjoy the 2017 planning process, and may you do truly amazing marketing work this year!
TA L K I T O U T ?
If you’re in the midst
of planning and
analysis, Sponge can
help. Talk to a
demand gen expert
and get some fresh
perspective.
“It is a capital mistake to theorize before one has data.” – Sherlock Holmes
CONTACT US
12. A B O U T U S
Sponge is an all-in-one marketing planning & analytics solution that helps users model different revenue
scenarios, create data-driven marketing plans, and measure performance to understand which campaigns
are driving results.
Founded by demand gen leaders frustrated by the lack of visibility into core operational metrics, Sponge
drives sales and marketing alignment by enabling users to work back from revenue goals to calculate lead
and opportunity goals, manage campaigns, and analyze performance across channels — all without Excel.
Want to see how Sponge can automate your funnel math?
SIGN UP FOR EARLY ACCESS: http://spongesoftware.com/beta