What is a business plan marketing plan. Analysis of the competitive environment

The marketing section, which reveals the proposed ways of developing the enterprise, occupies far from last place. It is not enough to catch a creative business idea in time, you need to find ways to implement it and turn it into reality. That's what a marketing business plan is for.

It is designed to show ways to increase profits and track the current state of affairs in the company. This includes the forecast of quantitative sales of products, price categories, the influx of new customers, the development of advertising campaigns and much more. The basis for these calculations are marketing research. It has already been said that marketing research can be quantitative and qualitative. Some allow you to assess the capacity of the market, others offer methods of alternative solutions for promoting goods on the market.

The marketing section of a business plan should answer a number of questions:

• What is the image of a potential buyer of your product - social stratum, income level, behavior patterns?
• How do you rate your value in your chosen market segment?
• Will war be declared against competitors?
• What is the estimated net sales income?
• Will there be systems of discounts and benefits?
• What distribution channels are preferred?
• Are the measures taken to promote goods effective?
• Is advertising funded enough?
• Etc.

The marketing section of the business plan includes several items.

Marketing Goals and Strategies

The very first point of the plan, setting the tone and indicating the ultimate goal. Here the general target strategy of the enterprise is formulated, then a detailed plan for its distribution is drawn up for each type of product. Particular emphasis is placed on such concepts as assortment, competition and the consumer market. These concepts are interrelated, the assortment directly depends on the needs of customers and the omissions of competitors.

Pricing

Prices are always based on three pillars - cost, demand

or competition. In the first case, the entrepreneur determines the initial price of the goods, taking into account costs, overheads and maintenance, then adds the desired percentage of profit. In the second case, the price is calculated taking into account the average market value. In the third case, the price can be either above or below the market value, depending on the willingness of consumers to pay the bills.

Goods distribution scheme

Distribution and marketing of products are based on: transport, storage and contacts with the consumer. Products from the manufacturer through the distribution channels are sent to the consumer. Here it is necessary to determine the methods of distribution, choose the appropriate channels, set hours of operation and consider other details. Separately, you need to estimate the number of required personnel, storage conditions for your products (if necessary), transportation.

Sales promotion methods

Incentive methods include various promotions designed to draw attention to your products. It can be both systems of discounts and benefits, as well as competent design of shop windows and advertising booklets. Actually, this includes advertising, business meetings and promotions of all kinds and directions.

Organization of after-sales customer service

Service and warranty customer service. These can be both service centers at stores, as well as small repair shops or craftsmen who come to the client's house on call. Required service maintenance for the installation of purchased machinery, equipment, or when eliminating technical problems. Your task is to decide on the type of set of services, its cost and quality. Outline the channels for obtaining spare parts for the goods. Also, after-sales service includes the organization of a telephone technical support service.

think over advertising company, decide on costs, with the tastes of the consumer and, according to the study, select the most suitable set of advertising tools and projects designed to introduce your product and assure the public that it is your product that they simply need.

Formation public opinion about the company and products

Marketing planning during the business plan phase is a necessary part of a successful product launch. Who is the main consumer of a product or service, how to inform a potential client, on what platforms to promote a product or service - these questions are answered by the marketing strategy. For more information on how to write a business marketing plan with an example, read our article.

Marketing part of the business plan

After a thorough study of such items as the design of the enterprise, product descriptions and sales markets, a marketing strategy is written in a business plan in stages. This section determines the cost of products, the sales market and promotion features. The advertising campaign itself is carried out immediately before the launch of the project.

Goals and objectives of the marketing strategy in the business plan

The purpose of strategic marketing is to develop a program of actions, thanks to which the business will subsequently receive profit, support from investors and partners, and an advantage over competitors.

Objectives of a marketing plan in a business plan:

• understand the mission of the project;
• determine the goals of possible development;
• unmistakably draw a portrait of the buyer;
• create a unique selling proposition (USP);
• paint a marketing strategy for months;
• predict profit - and how much to spend on marketing;
• analyze strengths and weak sides competitors;
• find potential partners.

Marketing Research Business Plan

The main condition of marketing research is veracity. You can use statistics from open sources, but this does not guarantee the objectivity of the information. Better to do your own analysis. (for example, a survey in social networks).

There are many methods and plans by which you can get an objective picture of the market before launching a project. Here are the most popular ones.

Sherrington 5W Method: (What? Who? When? Where? Why?)

4P plan

In fact, close to the 5W-method. 4-P involves analysis:

• product- Full description goods or services;
• price - what the price is made up of, the calculation of the margin (optimally - 20-70%, depends on the product category), what discount is the maximum possible;
• promotion - how to promote a product or service;
• place - where the products will be sold, at what sites.

Stages of marketing planning

Marketing planning forms the pricing policy of the business and determines possible ways development.

How to calculate the budget for the marketing part in a business plan

• be proportional to the overall financial plan;
• meet the goals of the advertising campaign (the goal at the start of the business is to attract customers and increase the customer base);
• to work on key areas of work with potential buyers, which means not to spread out.

For example, if you decide to promote a beauty salon in social networks, then, firstly, you cannot spend half of the budget laid down in the business plan on this in the hope of a quick payback; and secondly, it is not worth investing in Yandex.Direct “on a residual basis”: there is a risk of losing funds irrevocably without clear work in the direction of contextual advertising.

• direct advertising (non-Internet promotion: advertising on TV, in the media, on the radio, banners and signs);
• Internet (creation and content of the site, social networks, contextual advertising);
• production (production of brochures, catalogs and leaflets);
• trade marketing (promotions, events, master classes, meetings, holidays - for example, timed to coincide with all-Russian holidays);
• side costs (catalogs, flags, balloons, notepads with the company logo).

At first glance, it seems that the costs of the marketing part of the business plan are huge. But there are a few "hacks" here:

1. Attract a partner to a promotional event with the same target audience. Spending divided in half is not so intimidating.
2. Learn storytelling. bright, interesting, amazing stories will attract attention.
3. Monitor events, festivals and fairs close to your field and offer speaker services at a master class or lecture.
4. Use audio advertising and advertising in public transport: it is not so expensive with a large audience coverage (there are limitations here: specific and elite goods and services are unlikely to find potential customers in the minibus).
5. Arrange a contest in social networks - this method of marketing at minimal cost gives a good increase in the audience.

Writing a marketing business plan can be done by many, but it takes time and careful analysis. A mistake in planning a strategy can result in losses, loss of time and lost profits. If you doubt your own abilities, you should contact an experienced marketer or advertising agency. Specialists will help implement the marketing part of the business plan, and you will have free time for business development. For the same purpose, we recommend transferring some of the routine tasks to outsourcing using the service. The first month is free.

An example of a marketing plan in a children's store business plan with calculations

This is the amount of expenses for the first month of work to promote the store, included in the marketing business plan. The second and subsequent months - monthly expenses (we leave advertising in transport, a banner at the bus stop - 10,000 r and spending on promotion in social networks - 20,000 r) plus spending on promotions (handouts for lectures, guests and master classes - about 4,000 r per month ) and updating the thematic photo zone (this, like meetings with parents, is the “trick” of the store: from 2000 r for posters or other design).

The vast majority of Russian marketers were brought up on Kotler's books. His contribution to the popularization of marketing is, of course, invaluable. But, perhaps, it is in this role that he will remain in history.

The American authors Heebing and Cooper, known worldwide for their books on marketing planning, focused much more on practical side. Their main contribution was the phased planning of marketing based on the establishment quantitative relationship between sales and marketing communications. It is no coincidence that thousands of students learn from their books in all US business schools.

Another American author Schultz made a great contribution to the development integrated marketing communications (IMC),- a system based on an objectively proven scientific fact that the consumer integrates all information about the market of a particular product, coming to him from various sources. Therefore, the presence of several communication channels greatly increases the impact on the consumer. On the other hand, when information coming from one source is not supported by similar information from others, its effect is just as much reduced.

The combination of these two methods, namely prudent transformation of IMC into real sales, is the key and most effective idea in modern marketing. Against the background of "emotional propaganda" books by foreign and domestic authors, this is by far the most rational and practically useful technique for businessmen and marketers.

There are practically no examples in the open press and the web of how this works? Mostly common words and academic plans are found. Therefore, it will be especially useful for you to familiarize yourself with our practice.

In the practice of Russian and many foreign companies, marketing and sales plans exist separately and have little to do with each other. You will find many such plans online, which are more like bureaucratic circulars, consisting of bulky paragraphs rewritten from textbooks and a lot of unnecessary terms and definitions. There is no the most important thing - any plan should give a result. Therefore, we will not talk about a plan "for the sake of a plan" and not about a training case. It's about a marketing plan that can actually increase sales.

It should also be remembered that the marketing plan is a key part of the investment plan. Not production or financial, which many people emphasize, but marketing! The marketing component is the weakest point of investment strategies and plans. A sales plan cannot be credible without a compelling marketing justification. This must always be remembered.

In practice, it is really very difficult to link sales and marketing plans with each other. It is easier to make formal plans or "replies" that are suitable for the role of "whip" for managers and do not help them in any way in their work.
In reality, this is a rather cumbersome and time-consuming construction, if presented in a schematic or tabular form. In addition, it is very difficult to fit into a visual model of a marketing and sales plan the many preliminary and intermediate studies and chains of reasoning that affect the content and indicators. But one thing makes her different:

At any given time, you understand why sales are rising or falling and what and how intense actions need to be taken to maintain, accelerate or slow down (if you want) these sales by the desired amount.

We took the least voluminous marketing and sales plan of the Moscow representative office of a small manufacturer of electrical household appliances from neighboring countries, which recently appeared on Russian market. Based on the results of the market and product portfolio analysis, it was planned to double the current sales volumes, excluding online sales, which at that time did not yet make a significant contribution and were not so actively practiced. Although the products belong to a variety of goods that, despite the influence of the Internet, remain committed to traditional distribution channels. Therefore, the relevance of the project remains quite high.

By the time the project started, the customer had a small Moscow representative office in Russia of 5 people, sales of several hundred units of household appliances per month, and the only “urgent” question for him was in which publication to place an advertisement that would solve all sales problems?
We proposed a research phase, as a result of which this marketing plan was drawn up and began to be implemented, which is presented in full schematic form below:

Complete Marketing and Sales Plan Diagram

It is important to clarify the following points:

1. Target markets

At the start of the project, the target markets with which the company worked were limited to customer groups marked orange. After conducting market analysis and segmentation, other target groups of customers were identified, which are marked in green. In the process of field research, their main characteristics were determined - price segments, decision-making system and decision makers, basic needs and wishes, dynamics and trends in recent years.

Target Markets

Source: Analytical Marketing Agency

2. Positioning

This is the weakest point of the absolute majority of Russian companies. Because they underestimate the simple but painstaking procedure for developing this position. In most cases, it is enough to carefully approach this to get a quick and noticeable result. In this case, the product portfolio was analyzed and product positioning was developed, which was then adapted with minor variations to different target markets. This is an important point! Different target markets require specific positioning, even if at first glance it may not be fundamentally different.
In our case, a new positioning was tested in the form of a commercial offer for a small sample of customers. Its results were evaluated according to the system awareness - the share of positive attitude - decision-making on purchases (conclusion of a contract).

3. Goals of communications

The model of consumer behavior known in Western literature 4A is deciphered as a sequence of communications with the consumer Awareness - Attitude - Action - Action Again (Awareness - Attitude - First / trial purchase - Repeat purchase). In the Russian-language literature, you can find similar analogues of AIDA / AIDAS from the field of advertising, but we prefer to measure the specific "Attitude" of the consumer, rather than the abstract "Interest". Most importantly, you must learn to give these qualitative characteristics a quantitative dimension in order to understand the most effective direction of your communications. If, for example, you cover 100% of the target group with communication, 25% of them have a positive attitude, 5% make a purchase, of which half make a repeat purchase, then by distributing this data to a wider audience of consumers with similar characteristics, you can calculate the potential the effect of their communications. In order to get these numbers, you need local samples. And your ongoing challenge as a marketer or business owner is to constantly try to narrow the ranges between these numbers. For example, instead of 100% - 25% - 5% - 2.5%, achieve 100% - 30% - 10% - 7% in the first stage. This is the meaning of the quantitative relationship between marketing communications and sales in the general case. But this is only one of the rough (but illustrative!) options for interpreting this relationship, and it has its drawbacks. Most often, you have to select more subtle practical tools for each specific case.

Positioning is just one of these, although it is the most powerful tool for achieving such results. We will talk about this in detail in special articles.

4. Identification of leading and secondary target markets.

The target markets identified as the most promising green color in the topic "Marketing Objectives". "Specialized retail chains" were not previously considered by the customer due to the difficulty of getting there. This problem was solved by the consultants during the testing process. It was possible to agree with the large M-Video network on the placement of products there in the ideal price segment, which turned out to be unfilled by competitive analogues, which was brought to the attention of decision makers on purchases. Thanks to a well-reasoned proposal, it was possible to get their consent almost immediately.

By the way, at the first telephone conversation the head of the procurement department was offered to get acquainted with the results free of charge marketing research market of electric kettles in Russia and Moscow, in particular, in which a gap was shown in the price range of the trading network. During the second phone call, the sales network manager immediately agreed to a meeting that lasted no more than 10 minutes with the above result. Model 4A in this case looked like 100% (awareness) - 15% (positive attitude) - 7.5% (trial purchase). A positive attitude was expressed in the fact that, in addition to the main one, another small chain out of 13 covered, having familiarized themselves with the offer and product positioning, was ready to carry out a trial purchase a little later.

Wholesalers, who had previously refused to work with the company's products, were able to inspire loyalty with the new positioning of products and encourage some of them to test purchases. According to model 4A 100% - 29% -14%, this allowed to double the base of wholesale buyers - from 7 to 15.
In fact, the consultants worked in these examples as a sales department. Due to the small number of customers in the collected databases, instead of limited samples, these target markets have been worked out in full. High degree efficiency was achieved through a well-adjusted positioning, which was adjusted after each contact until the share of a positive attitude increased. If at the beginning of the work it did not exceed 10%, then at the end it reached 29%.
All contacts were transferred to sales managers to work out the details and conclude contracts. And this main feature in our work, unlike classical consultants. We do not offer solutions that have not been tested with real markets and customers.
yellow color in the "Marketing Objectives" section highlights target markets or customer groups that are considered secondary.

Marketing Goals

Source: Analytical Marketing Agency

5. Secondary target markets are secondary in order to limit them in human and financial resources compared to priority ones.

You can't embrace the vast, or as we like to say, you can't do a little of everything! Unfortunately, the reality is that no manager or entrepreneur ever follows this principle. Most often they do the exact opposite and consider it a blessing. Because of this, we have to constantly check the compliance of the client's decisions with this principle.

"yellow"Target customer groups were recognized as secondary according to the test results. Certain difficulties appeared with them, which were expressed in low shares of positive attitude and potential sales regarding awareness. These were problems associated with identifying and reaching out to decision makers, with reporting to them important information about the company and products, with forecasting the level of average purchases and sales in general, price pressure (market traders working with cheap Chinese products), with some seasonality in purchases, with the difficulty of ranking marketing and communication tools, etc.

All this in general increased the costs of promotion in these target markets. Therefore, in accordance with the "golden rule" of business - "don't do a little of everything"- a decision was made to limit activity in relation to them at this stage, and the main task of communications was their primary awareness of the positioning of the company and products. The mailing list of a specially designed informative booklet was chosen as the main means of communication. Therefore, the forecasts of concluded contracts or potential sales in this case were approximate and were not of great interest, since they did not plan a significant contribution to sales on their part.

While with respect to the main green"Target markets forecasts turned out to be quite reliable, and due to them it was supposed to receive more than 80-90% of all planned sales. Contacts with their representatives were made in full and specific agreements on deliveries were reached.

6. Ranking of means of communication according to the principle "Price - Effect"

Human psychology tends to trust and pay great attention to the most expensive things and means to achieve goals. Therefore, in our case, expensive and other paid types of advertising were deemed inappropriate until the available and free marketing tools were exhausted. The purpose of the sale was doubling current sales volumes, and the marketing plan budget is estimated at 1010 USD according to the exchange rate prevailing at the time. Tellingly, less than half of them actually achieved sales targets.

We specifically focus on the insignificant amount marketing budget to emphasize the fact that not always big money solves the problem of achieving the goal of sales. There is always an opportunity to achieve a lot using the simplest and most cost-effective methods based on analytics and market research. In this case, the very fact of being represented in a large network makes huge advertising costs for promotion redundant and allows you to reach, among other things, numerous minor groups of customers. Selling to large customers automatically attracts smaller customers. Another thing is that serving large customers is special art and requires constant focused effort. For example, this manifests itself in working with, whose standards, as our practice has shown, are not able to withstand a significant part of Russian manufacturers in light industry or food production. And this is despite the fact that only German retail is able to surpass all Russian sales of an individual company, not to mention the profit margin that is incomparable compared to the domestic market.

From the point of view of BCI demonstration, this project was not very successful due to the described artificial limitations. But the goal of a marketing plan is not to master the budget, but to get a result that is qualitatively different from the current one. Therefore, the set of selected tools for target markets can be expanded in the future with greater efficiency than in this moment. On the whole, it can be noted that in a country where one federal channel easily replaces all possible BCIs, it is not so easy to show such examples.

Marketing Communications Goals, Marketing Means and Budget

Marketing analysis is the most time-consuming and most important when drawing up a business plan. After conducting marketing research, a conclusion is made about the advisability of promoting the product to the market.

To draw up a marketing plan, it is necessary to determine the goals and objectives of marketing.

The tasks of marketing research within the framework investment project can be:

1. Analysis of the needs of the end user and demand, secured by the solvency of potential customers. Analysis of the market where it is planned to promote the company's products, substantiation based on the obtained data of the enterprise's production program and sales plan.
2. The study and analysis of positive and negative factors that may affect the change in the magnitude of demand.
3. Determination of indicators of quality and competitiveness of goods and services, ways to improve these indicators.
4. Definition and implementation of systems for marketing and stimulating demand for products. This is the definition of a marketing strategy, pricing strategy and policy, as well as strategies, tactics and methods of promoting a product to the market.
5. Evaluation of the effectiveness of the sales and marketing policy of the company and the degree of implementation of the goals.

The main task of marketing research for the development of a business plan is to identify unsatisfied demand and obtain data for the preparation of sales and production plans. In the process of this work, potential customers can be identified, with whom agreements of intent are concluded, and who are a guarantee that the company's products are in demand on the market.

A marketing plan is drawn up in six stages:

1. The characteristics of the market and products are determined:

• market segment;
• customer needs;
• the path of the product to the consumer;
• product competitiveness;
• stage of the product life cycle;
• ways to improve the product;
• the degree of legal protection of the goods;
• ease of copying products by competitors.

The most common strategies are:

• minimization of costs, which allows you to minimize the price and achieve competitive advantage on initial stage entering the market;
• differentiation, when our products have unique differences, and this stands out in the general mass of competitive offers;
• targeting a specific market segment, depending on demographic, social or geographical criteria with further expansion.

3. Analysis of the competitive environment:

• the main competitors of the company that operate in your market and industry leaders are determined;
• by all possible means, maximum information is obtained about them, especially about the financial situation, the number of employees, production volumes;
• strengths and weaknesses of competitors are determined;
• a comparative analysis of our products and competitors is made in terms of quality indicators, price, service and maintenance, sales channels.

In addition, it determines the likelihood of competitors entering your sales market, the complexity and obstacles that they face for this, the ease of reproduction of your products by competitors. For convenience, all collected data can be presented in the form of a table.

4. Pricing strategy. The success of your enterprise or its failure largely depends on it.

There are four main pricing strategies:

• high price strategy high quality- if demand and your production capabilities allow;
• low quality at a low price - to cover a wide mass of the population and work on the volume;
• low quality at a high price - suitable for monopolists;
• high quality at a low price - seasonal sales, promotions, market capture.

Pricing strategies are not a constant parameter and may change depending on different stages company development and product life cycle.

5. The next step is to analyze the issues related to the definition of the company's pricing policy:

• How long will it take from the moment the finished product is delivered to the warehouse, until the client pays for it and transfers the product to his property?
• What are the terms of payment for products?
• How can you encourage the client to pay for the goods on time (penalties, discounts for prepayment)?
• What systems of discounts and benefits can be introduced for wholesale buyers and regular customers?

These are just the basic questions, the answers to which will help shape the pricing policy of the enterprise. Skillful manipulation of prices and discounts can increase sales and form a circle of regular customers.

6. The final stage of the marketing plan is to determine the strategy for promoting the product to the market.

How do consumers and buyers find out about us and our products? This may be advertising through the media or the Internet, printed editions or sending emails to the target audience.

The choice of promotion method depends on the financial capabilities and the feasibility of using certain methods, which requires an understanding of customer needs, as well as knowledge of the geography of the sales market.

A marketing plan is drawn up to determine the feasibility of producing a product and promoting it to a specific market for a specific target group of consumers.

You must know:

• how much will it cost to promote your product;
• what opportunities do you have to attract consumers with promotions, discounts;
• price parameters of products;
• how your products outperform competitors;
• cons of your sales and marketing system.

After conducting a complete marketing analysis and drawing up a marketing plan, it is concluded that the products and services are in demand in the market and there are all opportunities to enter it with your product. You can proceed to planning the production program and drawing up a production plan.