Recently, a prospective client said they wanted to get customers’ attention through non-traditional marketing using printed products. Who knew that in 2016, the printed word would be considered “non-traditional?” Non-traditional? We’re saying this about a medium that was developed back in the 1400’s by Johannes Gutenberg! While Webster’s (of dictionary fame) mind might be little blown by this reference, when you think about it, it actually makes a lot of sense.

Make no mistake about it: a business is more important than any one person. A successful business is truly the sum of its parts. It's a collection of people all working together to form a cohesive whole, helping the business as an entity move forward into the future and accomplish the goals that it has outlined for itself at the same time. Finding the right people to fill the right positions is one important step towards achieving this environment, but it is exactly that – one part. An element that is just as important (but one that far too many business owners fail to pay attention to until it's far too late) comes from the idea that your employees also have to actually enjoy working with one another if your business is going to succeed the way you want it to.

Kids and cats seem to have this well figured out. We’ve all seen or experienced first-hand the joy that kids and cats take in taking an “ordinary box” and making that product packaging into the most exciting plaything of all time. What they are instinctively telling us, without truly understanding for themselves, is this: if the packaging sparks the imagination, it almost doesn’t matter what’s inside.

So now we understand the importance of creating and then following a well-designed yearly marketing plan for your business, as discussed in the 1st blog of this three part series. In this 2nd part of our 3-part blog we give structure to your marketing plan. An unstructured marketing plan will invariably cost your company a fortune as you spend money in areas that are not giving the return on investment needed while not allocating enough funds in areas that could yield much more fruit.

The first thing you need to do is decide on your budget. And the most important aspect of deciding on your budget is: be realistic, but do not be too tight. You may have grand marketing plans for the new year, but if you don’t have the budget set correctly, you will run out of money for marketing long before 2016 ends.

As 2015 draws to a close and we look back and assess the results in our business, we are also looking forward into next year. By this time you should already have your preliminary business and marketing plans for 2016 in place. Of course that is often much easier said than done. But, even if you have your plans in place, having a checklist to make sure you have not missed anything is always a good thing to have.