Marketing Objectives – A small business must at all times be aware of developing certain key marketing objectives that can cover all aspects of projected marketing efforts. This is vital for the growth and success of the business. For instance, a business needs a target for its market slice and also one for the amount of customers. By doing such a thing, the business won’t get deceived by an upsurge in customers if it starts to lose market share. Now, in order to write down some key marketing objectives for your business, you must first create precise and measurable goals. Writing the list of key marketing objectives involves starting with the marketing mix or the “4P’s”. Begin by giving an outline to headings for product, price, place and promotion. It would help you to build a more inclusive and thorough set of vital marketing objectives.
Marketing is an essential component of any business strategy and involves creating awareness about the products, services and the business as a whole. A well-thought out of marketing objectives in a marketing plan is an indispensable strategy of any successful business organization. Regardless of any marketing tactic, all you need to do is to actually implement the marketing objectives in a marketing plan as effectively as you can.
Some of the main marketing objectives that every business considers in its marketing strategy are as follows:
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Increase Sales
For most of the for-profit business entities, driving business and increasing sales is the primary motive. Marketing also needs a solid return on investment, i.e. the rise in sales revenue must considerably be over and above the costs incurred and should be precise. Merely, stating an increase in percent terms may not be sufficient when it comes to sales figures. The more precisely you write, the better it gets. For instance, “We would like to increase sales to our women customers who are above forty years of age.”
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Increase Product Awareness
This objective comprises invigorating the interest of people in a product which was in the market since long and people have age-old approaches to it. By adopting such a tactic, the interest of common public can be revived and hence the product (or service) gets more popularity and acceptance. For example, the “Got Milk” campaign started in the mid 1990’s got a huge uplift after it was campaigned nationwide.
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Launching the brand
It is very important to launch yourself as a brand effectively in the industry as there are several other competitors already existing. Customers can easily get distracted by other alternatives, thus a great deal of care needs to taken with the launch of a new brand. An example of a marketing objective can take the shape of “We want to become one of the top three brands in the industry”. For instance, the web hosting service called Godaddy.com, launched a vigorous marketing campaign during the Super Bowl and got benefitted.
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Effective Brand Management
To get a public eye towards your brand requires some effort to be put in. Because of this, there are some brands in the world such as Nike and McDonald’s that use images just to remind its consumers of the brand and nothing else. Thus, a useful marketing objective can be” To get our consumers aware about our brand with no further stimuli provided”. The company called Starbuck used a similar strategy when it removed the name of its brand and simply relied on its logo to appeal to consumers.
Marketing objectives outline what you wish to achieve via your marketing efforts. There may be a few important aspects to consider while instituting actual marketing objectives. While setting objectives, it must be taken into consideration that your objectives are SMART or specific, measurable, achievable, realistic and time specific. The “SMART” approach lets you to efficiently manage the marketing actions and importantly enables you to determine how successful these have been and if they have provided the particular profits sought.
The “SMART” methodology typically is explained as follows:
- Specific- Are the objectives identified by you precise enough as to what you are expecting to achieve?
- Measurable- Can you count each objective in terms of quantity, i.e. can you make use of a unit of measure like market share in percentage or some other to enable a way to know your state of success?
- Achievable- If your objectives are rational in terms of actually achieving them or are they just beyond your reach by every way?
- Realistic- Do you have adequate personnel and resources to realize the goals you have established and whether they can actually be achieved or not?
- Time specific– By when are you expecting to realize your objectives? And, what is going to be your timing plan along with target timing for every specific goal
Here are steps to guide you through the process of writing some key marketing objectives:
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Step #1
Split your document into 4 sections with titles for product, place, price and promotion. Make subheads for all that classify the marketing objectives and goals you will have for producing or taming your product, probing various pricing strategies, analyzing the different promotional decisions you have and assessing your product circulation options.
Record your sales objectives as aggregate dollars or as the per cent increase. If for instance, you set your next sales objective as a gross sales figure of $1 million, then you can also record it as a specific (25%) rise in sales. You can also include your marketing strategy to reach your objectives in your sales objectives. For example, “ABC Company will upsurge sales 30% by venturing into a new market”.
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Step #2
Make your product heading by writing a marketplace synopsis which addresses the reasons that impact the demand for your service or product. Embrace the marketing objectives and goals for describing the optimal aimed customer using thorough demographics, comprehending how your competition is performing well, surveying the customers regarding their needs, and ascertaining which product features you must take advantage of depending on your marketplace research results. Fix a bottom-line objective of defining whether you need to entirely change, modify or maintain as-is the current product or service functionalities.
Do make sure to keep a goal for market share. And, it must be accurate and incremental. This means that you shouldn’t set unachievable targets such as to capture 90 per cent market share in just 2 years. In reality, set goals that are compatible with your marketing plan and just add a percentage figure for a small period of time. It should sound more like “We wish to escalate our share by 10% in the next bi-year.” Such a target would not only be achieved in reality but would also motivate your marketing staff much more.
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Step #3
Set targets for ascertaining the changes which diverse prices can put on your sales quantities, proceeds, gross profits, unit profit margins and brand. Create price-testing goals which allow you briefly sell at diverse price points in dissimilar geographic areas. This strategy will give you durable data about the implications of various pricing strategies. Get in touch with sales partners to ascertain whether they presume you can increase your prices without a subsequent quality reduce and decrease in your sales.
You must ascertain a specific figure as to how many customers and how much of the market share you aim to capture. It requires a close examination of an average purchase. For example, if your average consumer spends just $50, then obviously you would need at least 20 customers to make the estimated $1,000. Luring customers involves investing money and thus you must allocate a proper budget for it. So, you can write “We would like to draw 300 more customers by publicizing in local newspapers that we haven’t utilized till now.” An even better thing would be to name those newspapers and also their per ad rate.
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Step #4
Do a SWOT analysis of the different distribution channels you must use to promote the sales of your product. This involves writing the strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threats linked with each. Include the distributors, retailers, and wholesellers, outside sales representatives, inside sales personnel or firms and online sales. Assess not only the effect each aspect will have on sales quantity but also assess possible impact on your sales costs, gross profits, margins, and overall image. Set a goal of creating a position list so to determine which supply channels are working the best.
Pick an estimated percentage rise of each customer purchase. For example, if customers usually spend $50 per purchase then, choose a nearby figure in percent that you would like to add. More precisely, the objective would sound more like “We wish to escalate the average customer consumption by 20 percent through training our sales personnel the skill of up-selling or advising supplementary products after customers have bought the product.
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Step #5
Do a SWOT analysis which points out the various advertising, public relations and promotion choices you own. Ascertain the “per unit cost,” or the cost to achieve a thousand probable customers for every option. Plan the cost for each option and its potential effect on your sales volume. Ascertain the ROI for each, based on your expected sales volume and the cost of each choice.
Decide upon price targets. The marketing objectives and goals invariably depend on operational prices. Review your prevalent pricing structure to ascertain your current stance in the market. For example, a premium quality wine could explain a high price to lure the upper class enthusiasts. On the other hand, stuffed toys would have to be priced according to the competition faced by neighboring businesses. Set a price objective that yields a reasonable profit margin and still makes you stay in the market. To reach such a pricing objective, one may have to be very persistent and increase prices by 10 percent per quarter.
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Step #6
Now, group all your key objectives into a summary paragraph, so as to know if they could work in cohesion or not. If you notice a conflict, then adjust those causing it. For example, if the summary mentions,”We wish to increase sales by 35 per cent and reduce the prices by 20 per cent”, then you come to know that these are conflicting statements. Instead, your summary could read more like“We wish to achieve sales of $1 million and a 20 percent market share. We wish to upsurge number of customers by 25 per cent and increase average sales by 22 per cent. Furthermore, we wish to increase our prices by 10 per cent over the coming 3 quarters.”
Conclude your report with a summary declaring the key outcomes from your investigation. Avoid repeating detailed support for your inferences, which the reader can already find in the inner sections. And, embrace some recommendations towards the end of the summary statement.
Conclusion
A business organization’s marketing objectives should be consistent and specify the main concern of the organization. This involves that your goals should flow from the mission statement of your organization to the financial goals and finally to rest of the marketing strategy. Visibly defined objectives do also give a direction for your staffs in terms of what and how to accomplish and by what time? These also act as motivators for the employees by producing an attainable task which they can endeavor to achieve.
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