The changing of the calendar prompts many of us in the Western Hemisphere to take a moment to look both ahead and behind as we make our resolutions of what we’ll do better or differently during the upcoming year. Almost every business owner I know includes "marketing smarter" as part of their New Year’s Resolutions.
I’ve seen a LOT of marketing blogs talking about "marketing calendars" which makes me smile, because of all the resolutions you can make, creating a marketing calendar is probably the easiest one to do AND the most effective! Of course, this is a GREAT time to create a marketing calendar for your business.
Unfortunately, I can’t create one for you… not without sitting down and getting to know your business VERY well. But YOU should definitely create a marketing calendar for your business RIGHT THIS MOMENT! It’s really quite easy to do.
STEP 1: Write down what you know is going to happen throughout the year.
Mark upcoming trade shows and events on your marketing calendar. Your industry’s big trade shows are already scheduled, so put them on your calendar now.
STEP 2: Take a look at the various holidays. Identify PR opportunities.
When you identify which holidays are important to your target audience, then you can begin working "backwards" to ensure enough time to properly promote your product or service for any particular holiday.
For example, I have a client whose target audience are grieving widows. We just began working together in the beginning of December when she announces, "I want to offer a free teleseminar for the holidays!" It was a GREAT idea… and one that we should have been planned way back in July or August. Needless to say she was disappointed by the turnout this year… but for next year’s marketing calendar… she needs to mark AUGUST as the month to begin planning how she’s going to promote December 2008’s free teleclass.
Now, as we look ahead, we’re marking other holidays that are difficult for those who have lost a loved one during the previous year. We’ll be setting up free teleseminars for those holidays but this time, we’ll be planning those events months ahead of the event. That way, we’ll be able to contact the media and possibly get some exposure for her services via newspaper, radio and television.
Taking a few minutes to create your 2008 marketing calendar will pay GREAT dividends during the coming year!
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