Introduction
The fourth edition of The Marketing Plan differs in a number of
ways from its predecessor, published ten years ago. It includes
ten more years of the experiences and knowledge gained from
helping companies write their marketing plans—in boom
economies and in bust. The book walks you through every part
of the plan, with detailed analysis of case histories. After reviewing
each case, you can insert on the accompanying software
the data for your own company and complete your
marketing objectives and strategies. By the time you finish the
book, you can have a complete, written marketing plan for your
own business.
If you go to the AMACOM website, you can download my
computer marketing plan “what if” software models, free of
charge. These allow you to insert your own data into the files and
see the results for your business. The web address is www
.amacombooks.org/go/MarketingPlan4. For best results and
ease of use, you should download the software to either a CD or
your hard drive. Then you can go try different data until you get
the results you are seeking, such as the most effective positioning
of your business, your best target audience, most favorable
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pricing, sufficient advertising and sales promotion weight, viable
public relations plans, and enviable customer service plans.
This edition can also better help you develop a popular Internet
site and enable you to become a strong player in the new world
of social media.
The software comes in three parts: case history “what if”
files; “what if” files with formulas for inserting your own
company data; and marketing plan (and other) worksheets
where you insert your objectives and strategies. Although the
book discusses each case history, at your leisure you should
bring up these files and alter some of the inserted data and
then look at the resulting outcomes. Practicing on the case
history files will enable you to see how the formulas work before
you start inserting your company data into your own section
of the software.
The software is easy to use. You use a spreadsheet like Microsoft
Excel for the “what if” files and a word processing program
like Microsoft Word for the marketing plan objectives and
strategies and other worksheets. The files that have a “C” in
front of the name are the case histories. The file names that do
not begin with a “C” before the name are the modules into
which you insert your own company data.
When these files are completed, you should print them out
and put them into a document called a “fact book.” This is supporting
data for your objectives and strategies and by inserting
the files in this different document, you keep your actual marketing
plan short and concise—so everyone will read and act
on it. Your fact book will probably number over a hundred
pages and your marketing plan should only consist of your objectives
and strategies and therefore can be less than twenty
pages. The third part of the software, in the folder labeled
“Worksheets,” contains Word files into which you can insert
your objectives and strategies for each component of your
marketing plan, along with other useful worksheets. If you
complete each module as you go through the book, your plan
will be written by the end of the last chapter.
The marketing plan belongs on the top of the desk of
everyone involved with marketing so it can constantly be monitored;
the fact book can go on their shelves. If you began to
miss an objective, you return to the fact book and make the
necessary changes to support your revised objectives and
strategies.
Wow! eBook
