Hi, 

Sorry this month's newsletter is running a little behind schedule, but, I've had to add a 5th part to our Marketing Plan series which is the primary reason for the hold-up.

Table of Contents:

• Save Time - Automate Your Typing: Here are a few tips and tricks that I use to spend less time typing.

• Marketing Plans [Part 4]: Learn my secret to creating powerful, effective, quality, strategic marketing plans.

• Staying In Touch: Learn how to never miss an issue - and what's coming up in future newsletters.

Save Time - Typing Automation Tricks:

On an average day, I personally respond to, type and send at least 20 e-mails - most of which require more than the 5 word cave-man response - go on, laugh, I know you've seen them.  

If sending 20 e-mails a day sounds like a lot, then why do I constantly have so many more that need to go out than what I am sending?  Have you ever felt like you just can't ever get to sending all the e-mails you know you should?

In fact, I am so obsessed with the amount of time I spend drafting responses to e-mails that I tracked the time I spent in one week.  I was astonished when I learned that I spend better than 10 hours a week responding to e-mails. 

Holy Cr*p!  That's one whole long work day, just writing e-mails.  In fact, there are at least 2 emails I send every day that require as much as 20 minutes each to compose: 40 minutes, just 2 e-mails...  Something's got to give. 

Here is how I've taken back nearly 4 hours of time and increased my outbound e-mail volume by 20% - and I am still a hunt-and-peck typist!

Stock e-mail responses - I started using this trick years ago.  I spent some time drafting a really solid follow-up e-mail that I can send to all the people I meet through networking. I would personalize and customize the first and last paragraph.  The key is that the content needs to be brief and succinct enough to be relevant.

As new situations would emerge, I'd create a new version, then, after sending, I'd always go into my sent folder, open the e-mail, choose "resend" from the "actions" menu, tweak it and then save 2 copies into my draft folder in Outlook. 

The best part is that every time you use one of the stock responses, go over it quickly to be certain that it is accurate and up-to-date, thus, your stock responses should never become obsolete. 

This is a great solution for churning out whole complete e-mails.  But, what about repetitive blocks of text?  Many of the e-mails I compose contain whole blocks of text from several paragraphs down to just a sentence that are somewhat repetitive.  I've always tried to make good use of the copy & paste function, but sometimes finding the location of the needed text can be just as time consuming.

Typing Automator - I discovered this tool about 7 months ago and every time I type text that I think I'll need to re-use in the future, I highlight the text, and add it to the typing automator.

For frequently used snippets, I can call the text from an easy to remember short cut code.  For example, I always sign my e-mails, "To Your Success" and I use the code "TYS", or to enter my contact info, I just type "CNTCT1". Imagine never typing out all your contact information ever again!

Now if you can't remember all the codes, don't worry, the program always runs, and in 2 clicks, I can view my entire content library, organized into topic and sub-topic folder.  In 2 more clicks, I can send the selected text into an e-mail, word document, text box or any other application that accepts text.

I've composed entire e-mails directly from the Typing Automator interface.  click-click, click-click, click-click, done.  What would have taken me 4-6 minutes hunting, copying, pasting and editing is now down to 2 minutes.

There is a free version that you can test to see if it works for you - download the free version HERE.  Go here for more info.

Your Opinion Counts - Plus Get $200 of Free Tools:

DEVELOPING MARKETING PLANS [PART 4]:

In our next-to-last installment of creating effective quality marketing plans, we arrive at my favorite part, the Strategy or to follow our analogy, "plotting the course".

You should recall that in part 1 of this series we learned that an effective, quality marketing plan is part strategy, part compass, and part road-map and must encompass the present, the near future and the long term.

We learned that conducting a market potential feasibility analysis is like a COMPASS, it orients us as to the direction we want to travel, identifying for us our market the "true north".

We also learned that we needed a ROAD-MAP, to understand our environment and we used 3 tools, a PEST analysis, Porters 5 Forces analysis and a Positioning Grid to gain insight into obstacles, competition and the topography of an industry.

In our last lesson, we learned how to take an inventory using the "SWOTS" analysis and we established a "destination" using both the extrapolated method where we compound current performance and a reverse engineered method where we select a destination and back into our current status.  In both cases, we did not plot our course, or determined the strategy that will yield the results we seek.  But, we are getting close

In this lesson we take everything weve done so far, draw extensively on our "tools", our compass, our road-map, our starting location and our intended destinations for year 1, 3 and 5 to chart a path to move from where we are to where we want to be within the constraints offered by our compass and road map and our ability / resources.

Developing the Marketing Plan
The plan for years three and five is mostly theoretical and conceptual.  Bear in mind that your assumptions will need to be validated against the believability of your assumptions and strategy outlined in your plan for years one and two.  Therefore, the bulk of an effective, quality marketing plan will be spent detailing strategies for the next 2 years and have 2 layers, the conceptual strategy and the tactical execution strategy.

The Conceptual Strategy
Ask 10 marketers to define the conceptual strategy of a marketing plan and youll get 10 convoluted, hard-to-follow statements full of meaningless marketing jargon. My research has uncovered 10 such "requirements" from many well-known marketing "gurus".  In a future issue of this newsletter, I will attempt to clarify and differentiate each of these items, but for now, here is a list for you to consider

• Mission Statement
• Vision Statement
• Benefit Statement
• Positioning Statement
• Value Proposition
• Unique Sales Proposition
• Strategic Differentiation Statement
• Brand
• Brand Promise
• Brand Identity

Before you try to figure out what all these statements are needed for, and exactly how each is different from the other, I will advise you to first develop your "Corporate Philosophy". My friend Alan Chapman defines this as:

"Philosophy is the perspective by which staff, customers, suppliers and the world at large can truly align with the organization".  In other words, how do you want all the people you touch to conceptually mesh with your company?  What is the common ground, the passion that resonates with them? What is the core motivation that drives their support?

Issues that represent the emerging and converging ideas that need to be considered include: Corporate Social Responsibility, the Triple Bottom Line, Sustainability, Corporate Integrity, Ethics, Love and Compassion, Humanity and Morality, Congruence and Alignment (between employer and employees), etc.

Defining a meaningful philosophy that reconciles all of these ideas with the economic necessities of the organization; is the foundation on which all the other marketing elements are built - whatever the elements are and however they are defined.

Chances are, youre already operating with a philosophy in mind. You just need to be able to communicate your philosophy, ethics and corporate position of integrity clearly, simply and succinctly so that everyone you touch clearly gets it.  Mr. Chapman has written extensively on this subject, so instead of belaboring the point here, you can read more at www.alanchapman.com/market.htm

Once you have completed your conceptual strategy, from the philosophical to the product benefits and positioning, your next step will be to develop a tactical execution strategy.  Specifically, what actions are you planning to take to achieve the stated goals.

The Tactical Execution Strategy
This is where I see many business owners attempting to start with their marketing planning efforts.  This kind of impatience reeks of desperation and worst of all, band-aid marketing with no higher vision, no clear purpose and no guidance. This knee-jerk type of plan is only as good as what went into it and offers limited results at best if any at all.  An effective strategic marketing plan is NOT a sprint event; it is an endurance event that requires the planning of the previous three parts covered in this newsletter.

Your tactical execution strategy will leverage a mix of marketing channels that supports your conceptual strategy. It will take into account the work youve done to understand your market and identify your "true north".  It will direct your initiatives relative to the topography, competition and obstacles present in your market.  It will call upon your assets, and strengths and have identified your intended destination. 

Quite simply, this part of your plan is the actual steps of HOW you intend to reach your goals and fulfill your objectives and HOW you will measure the success of each initiative, (also known as ROMD Return On each Marketing Dollars spent).

Many marketing plans Ive seen expend a great deal of time and resources to the acquisition of new customers, please make certain you spend nearly as much time on retention and loyalty initiatives since it is far more cost effective to sell to a previous customer than it is to find a new one.

Effective marketing plans require understanding the lifecycle stages customers go through. There are 2 lifecycles, the stages they go through as they become your customer and mature into raving loyal fans or move on to another vendor.  The other is the individuals personal lifecycle - observing their unique life events and behaviors can present key  moments and opportunities to connect with your customer. Every interaction between your company and an individual (or lack thereof) provides an opportunity to improve the relevance of your messages and the ROI of your campaigns.

Customer Lifecycle
The six stages of every customers lifecycle are:

• Prospects - non-customers, yet fit the profile of a target customer. 

• First Time Buyers - in a trial stage, and need to have a good experience in order to maintain a long-term relationship with your business. 

• Limited Buyers - have made repeat purchases however they do not use you exclusively.

• Loyal Buyers - customers who buy only from you. Regardless of the amount of money they spend, their buying patterns are consistent and predictable. They tend to be your raving fans, and represent your most powerful sales force.

• At Risk Customers this group has become dissatisfied and no longer feels they are getting a good value from your business. As such, they have the potential of defecting, and moving their business elsewhere. 

• Defectors these customers have become so dissatisfied, that they have moved their account into the care of another vendor.

Knowing which of these six stages each customer is in will let you develop the right marketing and communication strategy to better manage your relationship with that customer. The process of marketing and communicating to customers through these stages is often termed as "Customer Relationship Management", or CRM.

Sales and Marketing Strategies
Each of the six stages within a customers lifecycle is the result of that customers unique experiences, expectations, needs and desires.

In order to fully maximize the revenue and profit potential from each customer, different sales and marketing strategies should be used for each of the six customer types.

Match these strategies to the lifecycle stages:

1.   Acquisition Strategy includes all sales and marketing ideas used to acquire new customers. The goal here is to convert prospects into buyers of your product or service.

2.   Activation Strategy is used to move first-time buyers to limited buyers. The objective here is to welcome new customers, educate them to the many services you have to offer, and encourage them to become repeat purchasers in order to build a consistent buying pattern.  

3.   Up-Sell and Cross-Sell Strategies are used after the customer has established buying patterns in order to move them from limited buyers to frequent, loyal buyers. At this point, you should begin encouraging them to try new or additional services by providing incentives to customers for higher spending levels.  

4.   Loyalty Strategy is designed to recognize, reward, and say "Thank You" to your most valuable customers. Keep in mind, "most valuable" doesnt necessarily mean biggest spending. These customers may just regularly refer other customers to you making them "valuable," even if they dont technically spend the most money.  

5.   Retention Strategy is a recovery effort needed to reinforce or restore value to a customer when it has been lost. Key warning indicators such as declining sales volume or customer complaints are usually signs of customer dissatisfaction and predict the likelihood of attrition. 

6.   Reactivate Strategy is a specialized campaign designed to re-introduce, and re-engage customers who have churned or been inactive.  While our human nature wants to resist admitting any wrong-doing, youll be amazed at the positive results some have had in turning ex-customers back into loyal buyers.

Your homework for this fourth part of creating an effective marketing plan, you will focus your efforts on defining a conceptual strategy and corporate philosophy and begin to brainstorm tactics and strategies to reach your market throughout every life transition the customer faces and through every stage of the customer lifecycle.

In our fifth and final installment of creating effective, quality marketing plans, we will discuss budgeting, the marketing mix, your message and creating a media or advertising plan.

PLEASE: STAY IN TOUCH
And never miss out on future lessons

Add ALTI to your custom news page - My Yahoo, My MSN, My AOL, My Netscape, My Google and many others. Subscribe to our RSS Syndication feed, just add this link to your content feeds: http://feeds.feedburner.com/practicalbusinesslessons

Get my feeds sent to you via e-mail

To listen to the latest audio or podcast, go to http://feeds.feedburner.com/practicalbusinesslessons

Up-Coming Topics For Discussion:  

• Marketing Plans (part 5)

• eMail Marketing

• Creating Joint Ventures and Alliances

• Using the Web for List Building

• Creating a Funding Strategy

• Managing and Evaluating Ideas 

Want to suggest a topic, ask a question or offer a comment?  Please send your input to me at

To your success,

Allan Sabo
Chief Success Advisor
ALTI Success Strategies

Hi,

Many wonderful things are happening since my last issue.  Here is a short "table of contents" for you:

• Surf the Net More Efficiently: Tips and tricks to improve your overall web research abilities.

• Marketing Plans [Part 3]: Learn my secret to creating powerful, effective, quality marketing plans.

• Staying In Touch: Learn how to never miss an issue - and what's coming up in future newsletters.

Surf the Net More Efficiently:

I've collected just a few of my favorite tips and tricks for surfing the net.  (Do you have a tip to share?  Please send it to me HERE. 

Multiple Windows - When using Microsoft's Internet Explorer, I will typically use the "open in new window" feature found when you hover over a clickable link, right click and the cursor menu will open to reveal the "open in new window" option.  This is great when I have not yet finished using the page I am on, and am afraid I will lose my place.  The new window allows me to hold my place, and explore a new tangent.

Exact Phrase Searching - Are you tired of going to a search engine like www.Google.com and getting 40 million results, and yet NONE of the results on the first page are what your looking for???  Try using an exact phrase search by placing your words in "quotes" and see what happens to the quality of your results.  Here is an example: Perform the search on Business Strategy Consulting, without quotes delivers 98,300,000 results yet add quotes and search "Business Strategy Consulting" and you will get 78,900 results or about 92% fewer results!

Podcasts and Blog Searches - Need to find a blog or a podcast?  Begin your search by opening a free account with www.BlogLines.com and www.iPodder.com 

Browser Tool Bars - I typically refuse to install any kind of browser tool bar, I've said NO to Yahoo, Google, Alexa and a host of others.  I find most offer redundant services I already have, and clutter up the top of my browser, making the browsable area smaller.  Not to mention the many others that are just cloaking devices for malicious spyware.  

I have only ever made one exception.  Forget for a moment that there is a small text ad (that I've conveniently slid out of view) and a subtle MLM-ish-ness to it's rapid growth as I could care less about the so-called "Biz-Op".  This free tool is actually the best I've ever seen and is jam-packed with hundreds of invaluable resources that are all just one click away. 

Learn which browser toolbar I am using - take my survey here at www.AltiConsulting.com/ask 

Your Opinion Counts - Plus Get $200 of Free Tools:

DEVELOPING MARKETING PLANS [PART 3]:

This is part 3 of what looks to be shaping up into a 4 part series.

In part 1 we learned that an effective, quality marketing plan is part strategy, part compass, and part road-map and must encompass the present, the near future and the long term. 

We learned that conducting a market potential feasibility analysis is like a COMPASS, it orients us as to the direction we want to travel, identifying for us our market the true north.

We also learned that we needed a ROAD-MAP, to understand our environment and that we used 3 tools, a PEST analysis, Porters 5 Forces analysis and a Positioning Grid to gain insight into obstacles, competition and the topography of an industry.

Youve now created a compass and a business environment road-map, the next step is to find your origin or where you are. The key to using any map is to first determine where you are, (identifying your relative location on the map).  Once we know this, then we can begin to identify WHERE on the map you want to go. 

Your Financial Data - The Business Equivalent Of GPS
To identify your originating location, you will need to create a picture, in financial terms, of the current state of your business.  State this in terms of your sales volume, the number of people employed, the number of units sold, the number of clients or customers that you are servicing.  If youre a service firm, use the number of billable hours delivered.  These are the metrics required to communicate the growth and health of the company.

Other questions you should answer:

• Does your business currently have sales? 

• Have you taken on investment capital?

• Is your company currently growing?

• Are there any trends that you have noticed over the course of your lifetime of your venture? Specifically in the last 12-24 months. 

• What notable activity has been taken on?

• Has there been a new or major contracts signed or have you secured new purchase orders?

• If you do not have sales, how close are you to launching your product to the market?

• How many units will you need to sell to break even on an operating basis?

• How many units will you need to sell to turn a profit? 

Clearly answering questions like those above quantifies your starting point, where the business and what its going to take to get the company to the point of generating sales.

Before you embark on a journey or an expedition, you will need to take a sober inventory of your resources, your supplies, your capabilities and skills.

The SWOT Understanding your Capabilities
The best tool for taking an inventory of your businesses resources and capabilities is a SWOTS analysis which stands for Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats. The SWOT provides a framework for reviewing strategy, position and direction of a company, a proposition, or even an idea.  Remember, A SWOT analysis measures a business unit, a proposition or idea; a PEST analysis measures a market.  My friend Alan Chapman describes the SWOT further

The SWOT analysis template is normally presented as a grid, comprising four sections, one for each of the SWOT headings: Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities, and Threats.

Download afree SWOT template from the link below that includes sample questions, whose answers are inserted into the relevant section of the SWOT grid. The questions are examples, or discussion points, and obviously can be altered depending on the subject of the SWOT analysis.

Note that many of the SWOT questions are also talking points for other headings - use them as you find most helpful, and make up your own to suit the issue being analysed.

It is important to clearly identify the subject of a SWOT analysis, because a SWOT analysis is a perspective of one thing, be it a company, a product, a proposition, and idea, a method, or option, etc.  

Alan Chapman, www.alanchapman.com 

For the free SWOT template, go to www.alanchapman.com/swotanalysisfreetemplate.htm to download.

Identifying The Intended Destination
The next stage, where do you want to go is like choosing a destination on the map. This can be done in two ways; by extrapolation and by reverse engineering.

Destination By Extrapolation: If you have an established business, you will want to look at the trends that have been driving your growth to now, and extrapolate those trends outward in time to create a picture of where the business is going in the next year, 3 years, or 5 years.  This method is often the more conservative method.

Destination By Reverse Engineering: Using your market data and competitive intelligence in the industry, you should have somewhat reliable forecasts on the industry, its growth and sales volume in 5 to 10 years.  

When you integrate your competitive analysis, you should have some idea of leading market share and average market share along with the resources those companies are leveraging to hold the position the currently occupy.  By plotting your companys targeted destination in 5 to 10 years, you can work backwards building a bridge to where the company is now.

I prefer to use both methods and overlay them to show the differences in destinations along with how the path for each varies. This combined technique helps to assure your destination is plausible and in harmony with the conventionally accepted market forecasts and potentially attainable under current trends.  Basically, you are headed to somewhere real on your road map.

NOTE:  WE HAVE NOT YET SELECTED A FINAL DESTINATION.  You will likely choose a path in between the reverse engineered and the extrapolated.  But before we choose a path, now is a good time to double, triple and quadruple check all your data. It is very important that your estimates and forecasts are based on real market and competitor data and you will have to justify all your assumptions that you are basing your forecasts on.

Translating Analysis Into Business Language
You need to quantify key positions along the reverse engineered and extrapolated paths in terms of sales volume, people employed, units sold or shipped, clients or customers being serviced.  If youre a service firm, use the number of billable hours delivered.  These are the metrics required to communicate the position or location along either of your growth routes.

This insight will prove critical as you enter into our next stage of plotting your course which will be covered in Part 4 of creating effective, quality marketing plans.

PLEASE: STAY IN TOUCH
And never miss out on future lessons

Add ALTI to your custom news page - My Yahoo, My MSN, My AOL, My Netscape, My Google and many others. Subscribe to our RSS Syndication feed, just add this link to your content feeds: http://feeds.feedburner.com/practicalbusinesslessons

Get my feeds sent to you via e-mail

To listen to the latest audio or podcast, go to http://feeds.feedburner.com/practicalbusinesslessons

Up-Coming Topics For Discussion:  

• Marketing Plans (part 4)

• eMail Marketing

• Creating Joint Ventures and Alliances

• Using the Web for Listbuilding

• Creating a Funding Strategy

• Managing and Evaluating Ideas 

Want to suggest a topic, ask a question or offer a comment?  Please send your input to me at

To your success,

Allan Sabo
Chief Success Advisor
ALTI Success Strategies

Hi,

Many wonderful things are happening since my last issue.  Here is a short "table of contents" for you:

• Your Opinion Counts: Help me to help you - and get these great gifts.

• Marketing Plans [Part 2]: I am sharing with you my secret to creating powerful, effective, quality marketing plans.

• Staying In Touch: Learn how to never miss an issue - and what's coming up in future newsletters.

YOUR OPINION COUNTS:

As part of my 2006 New Years resolution I vowed I would do everything I can to make my newsletters of compelling value to all my readers.  Many of you took 2 minutes to help me help you by taking my short online survey at www.alticonsulting.com/ask.  As an incentive for your time, I am offering the ethical bribe of giving all respondents access to a collection of tools / information worth over $200 US Dollars! 

Complete my survey - here is what you get:

DEVELOPING MARKETING PLANS [PART 2]:

In part 1 we learned that an effective, quality marketing plan is part strategy, part compass, and part road-map and must encompass the present, the near future and the long term.  

We also learned that a critical component of a marketing plan is its foundation. One element of a proper foundation is to conduct a market potential feasibility analysis. 

The feasibility analysis is like the COMPASS, it orients us as to the direction we want to travel, identifying for us our market the true north.  However, a compass alone is of limited value.

In addition to your compass, youll need a ROAD-MAP.  This is our second foundational element to an effective, quality marketing plan.

When constructing an accurate map, youll need to determine the topography of the land and identify all major obstacles.  We do this with two tools, described below:

The Business Topography or Environment
When defining the environmental forces with which your venture must operate. I recommend using a P.E.S.T. or PESTELI analysis. An excellent explanation and a free MS Word template can be found at www.alanchapman.com/pestanalysisfreetemplate.htm. But here is a brief description quoted from the site:

Here the PEST analysis template is presented as a grid, comprising four sections, one for each of the PEST headings: Political, Economic, Social and Technological.

The free PEST template below includes sample questions or prompts, whose answers can be inserted into the relevant section of the PEST grid. The questions are examples of discussion points, and obviously can be altered depending on the subject of the PEST analysis, and how you want to use it.

Make up your own PEST questions and prompts to suit the issue being analyzed and the situation (ie., the people doing the work and the expectations of them).

Like SWOT analysis, it is important to clearly identify the subject of a PEST analysis, because a PEST analysis is four-way perspective in relation to a particular business unit or proposition - if you blur the focus you will produce a blurred picture - so be clear about the market that you use PEST to analyze.
          Alan Chapman, www.alanchapman.com 

Major Obstacles & Competitive Analysis
Identifying Major Obstacles is an analogy for a thorough competitive analysis.  There are 2 parts to the competitive analysis, the first plots the five forces of competitive position and the second is a product or service positioning grid.

The best explanation Ive seen is Porters Five Forces. 
Free MS Word or .PDF template can be found at www.alanchapman.com/portersfiveforcesofcompetition.htm 

Porter's Five Forces Are:
(and are arranged as a cross, with item #1 being in the center)

1. Existing competitive rivalry between suppliers
2. Threat of new market entrants
3. Bargaining power of buyers
4. Power of suppliers
5. Threat of substitute products (including technology change)

Product / Service Positioning Grid
For each of your products and services, you will want to compile a positioning grid.  On the left side of our grid is the quality axis, high quality at the top, low quality the bottom.  On the bottom side of our grid is the price axis, low price to the left, and high price to the right.  You should have 4 quadrants, each corner representing a combination of price and quality. 

By plotting the competitive products and services on the grid, you can determine how much competition you will be directly facing for that niche market.

We can also get very complex with this simple grid, and overlay our market research data onto this grid to identify underserved market niches to target and saturated market niches to avoid.  Below, is an example of product positioning grid.

The next phase of your marketing plan is to determine where you are.  Now that youve created a map, and a compass, the next critical element is determining your relative location on the map. We will delve in more detail how this is done in our next installment.

PLEASE: STAY IN TOUCH
And never miss out on future lessons

Add ALTI to your custom news page - My Yahoo, My MSN, My AOL, My Netscape, My Google and many others. Subscribe to our RSS Syndication feed, just add this link to your content feeds: http://feeds.feedburner.com/practicalbusinesslessons

Get my feeds sent to you via e-mail

To listen to the latest audio or podcast, go to http://feeds.feedburner.com/practicalbusinesslessons

Up-Coming Topics For Discussion: (this is just the tip of the iceberg as there were 22 topics that got a significant vote).  

• Marketing Plans (part 3)

• eMail Marketing

• Creating Joint Ventures and Alliances

• Using the Web for Listbuilding

• Creating a Funding Strategy

• Managing and Evaluating Ideas 

Want to contribute, ask a question or offer a comment?  Please send your input to me at

To your success,

Allan Sabo
Chief Success Advisor
ALTI Success Strategies

Hi,

This months newsletter is jam-packed with valuable information for you my readers, my associates and my friends.  Here is a short "table of contents" for you:

• Survey Rewards: Learn what others got for helping me to help you.

• Client / Projects: Funding Academy, Grad School, and Getting Mentally and Emotionally Free.

• Survey Results:  You Spoke -  I listened and will teach you what you asked, "How to Create a Marketing Plan" (Part 1).

• Staying In Touch: Learn how to never miss an issue - and what's coming up in future newsletters.

SURVEY REWARDS:

Over the holidays, many of you saw more than a few e-mails from me asking you to visit my online survey at www.alticonsulting.com/ask-allan-2.htm and give me your feedback by selecting any combination of 81 different topics. 

The purpose of this survey is to guide and add value to all my e-mail communications.  As an incentive for your time, I offered the ethical bribe of giving all respondents access to tools / information worth over $50 and one lucky person would win a special surprise bonus worth over $1,500.

So, for those of you who responded, you'll be getting a separate e-mail from me with all the links to your gifts (listed below), for those of you who would like to still be heard, I am still offering all of the free gifts below for those who complete the survey.

Complete my survey - here is what you get:

CLIENTS & PROJECTS:

Funding Academy - I have been teaching businesses how to find investment capital in my system, "Marketing for Money".  Well, I've teamed up with the GrowAmerica Foundation to develop what I swear is the perfect capital raising system.  

Entrepreneurs can now get access to CAPITAL, keep CONTROL of their venture, retain EQUITY, and even better, GUARANTEE the investors principal by protecting it from any and all risk associated with small business and start-up investments.  That's right your investors will never LOSE their investment.

I've teamed up with a great group of guys to help bring GrowAmerica's Funding Academy to Phoenix on February 16th and 17th.  Best of all, tuition to the class is GUARANTEED should your venture not get funded in 90 days. For more information and tuition rates, please visit the Vital Funding Academy or pasting this URL into your browser: http://tinyurl.com/alum8 

Graduate School - I've been asked to teach marketing courses for the Graduate School of Ministry Management.  I am teaching a 2 part eMarketing course, and a Marketing for Ministry course.  All courses run about 6 weeks long and are taught entirely online.  We've had some great press (story in the Arizona Republic HERE) All of my courses are also available as "continuing education" and you can enroll through the website at www.gsmm.org.

Mental & Emotional Freedom - I have just completed the first of six product driven websites for my client, Freedom For Life Ministries.  This first site offers free information about how to overcome anger, anxiety, depression, stress, relationship struggles, and a host of disorders / addictions that manifest themselves physically.  

I've been through their program to adequately research and understand their product, and I must testify that even if you think your "ok", go through their program and you'll be amazed and how much more peace and freedom can be added to your life - I was! The website is at www.livingtotallyfree.org 

SURVEY RESULTS:
DEVELOPING MARKETING PLANS (part 1)

The number one topic of interest among those who took my online survey (nearly 70% of respondents) was "Developing Marketing Plans".  While I could literally spend several hours on this topic - I promise to devote at least 2 more issues of my newsletter to this topic.  

Further, there were at least 22 other topics that generated better than 36% of the votes.  This is very inspiring and motivating to me as I see we have a lot of work to do. If you would like to give me your feedback (if you haven't done so already) then please visit this link, and besides, you'll also get access to a whole bunch of really productive tools to help you be more efficient throughout the year.

DEVELOPING MARKETING PLANS (part 1)
What is a Marketing Plan?  A marketing plan is that document that helps guide and direct your marketing efforts.  It is part strategy, part compass, and part road map and must encompass the present, the near future and the long term.

One of the most critical steps of developing any marketing plan is the foundational elements that the entire plan eventually is built upon.  So, before we can get into the actual plan, we need to take a step backward, and begin with the preparation. 

I like to begin with full market potential feasibility analysis. This is very important because I've seen so many forecasts ratchet themselves right out of realistic feasibility in a matter of 4 or 5 years.  This happens because no one has considered the entire market capacity.  Here's an example to illustrate:

One of my clients developed a skin care product, it had a very broad list of uses and applications, so the inventor argued that anyone with skin was a potential customer.  This is a gross overstatement, largely because the use of the term "customer" is incorrect.  

The term customer implies that the person has encountered a problem or has recognized an unfulfilled desire; that person is then seeking a solution to the problem or something to fill the desire and lastly, that person has made a decision to acquire a product and has the resources to acquire it.  This is NOT everyone with skin, but is a small minority of skin owners.

Just because someone "could" use your product or service does not mean they will. Oh, and I get this all the time, "Well, if we educate all skin owners as to why our product will give them x, y and z then they will want to buy our product."  This is unrealistic because it assumes skin owners are open to being educated.  Truth is, there will always be a segment of the market that is untouchable.

So, when developing you market feasibility analysis, you must segment the "universe" of potential customers as follows:

Suspects - We think these people could use our product or service

Prospects - The segment of the market that is yet to take action, but has identified itself as "interested" in the products or service offered.

Customers - The market segment that has bought, hence establishing a "market" footprint in terms of annual sales.

Next is to understand how the Prospect segment behaves with regard to making a decision.  Typically this will result in about 4 sub-segments or "leads" as follows:

Potential Leads - not interested, happy with current arrangement.

Future Lead - contact me again in X months (typically twice as long as your average sales cycle). 

Warm Lead - Expresses interest and willingness to explore.

Hot Lead - Have identified a need and resources to allocate to fill it.

Lastly is to understand how the current market is growing, annual sales trends give insight to the growth potential of a market.  Then, combine this information with a competitive analysis to determine the market share of various players and the entry of new players into the market.

There are markets with few competitors where dominant market leadership requires a market share of 50% or more, yet in other industries the market leader may hold only a 5% market share. Markets that are growing rapidly may face competition in the form of many new entrants, which serve to segment the market further, making market dominance in market share harder to achieve.

APPLYING THIS TO YOUR BUSINESS:
Often time the best you'll be able to do is make pot-shot guesses.  Lets take my friend that owns a doggy-day-care. The business is geographically limited, hence there is no need to do extensive feasibility research on national or even state wide data. 

Instead, I am aware that there have been reports on dog ownership by zip code.  I would use these figures for the zips that her business is closest to (say 10 minute drive). Location is critical, I would factor in "transient" work population if your located next to offices, or longer drive times if your located next to a major freeway interchange.

In the end, you'll end up with a number that represents the potential "universe" of dog owners. Next, we would do some analysis on socio-economic trends to determine who our "suspects" are. These would be dog owners who have the means, resources and social disposition to take their pet to a doggy day-care.

Finally, we would apply sub-segmenting to qualify our suspects into "prospect" types.  When developing market forecasts for clients, we apply the following % to each segment:

Potential Leads - 50%

Future Leads - 35%

Warm Leads - 10%

Hot Leads - 5%

Remember, we are speaking about feasible market potential, and thus, my friend can not count the "potential leads" sub segment as part of the market because there will always be people who are satisfied with the status quo and will never give you the time or interest to be open to your marketing efforts.

In my second part of developing a marketing plan, I will discuss another critical foundation element that is required before we can actually begin committing to a marketing plan.

Do you have question, comments or feedback specifically related to developing marketing plans?  I encourage you to send all responses to me at asabo@alticonsulting.com and I'll do my best to integrate answers throughout the series.

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