Understanding Different Types of Marketing Plan - Smart Insights

28/05/2019 Understanding different types of marketing plan | Smart Insights
Understanding different types of

marketing plan
Introduction
With so many different types of marketing plans used by businesses, it can be difficult to
know how they differ and which is the best type of plan to use in different situations.
We have created this guide to help you understand the different types of plans, when and why
those plans should be used, potential drawbacks and how to structure them. Whether you’re
not sure which plan will work best, or you simply want to make sure you’re producing the
most relevant plan, this guide will help you to understand the different types of plans, how to
use them, and when to use them.
In each section this guide covers:
 What the plan is: What is its scope compared to other plans?
 When to use it: Is it an annual plan, long-term plan or a short-term tactical plan?
 What should be included:How should it be structured?
 Recommended resources:What other resources are available to help your produce or

use that plan?
As you review each section of the guide, consider the elements below to see what kind of plan
will suit you best.
https://www.smartinsights.com/advice/marketing-plans-guide/ 1/28
 Purpose: What is the primary function of the plan you need to create?
 Timeframe: How long does your plan need to be in place for?
 Scope: What areas of your business should your plan affect? Which departments and
personnel will be affected by the plan and when will they have input into the plan’s
construction?
 Channels: Which online and offline channels will you utilize?
 Key outputs: What are your major objectives, KPIs, and other measurables that will
determine success?
Strategy Recommendation: Plan how different plans will integrate
If you don’t already have a set of plans, it’s worth planning your plans. Overall business
strategies and plans work best when they are aligned with marketing plans. In turn,
campaign plans, digital marketing plans and campaign plans should be aligned and
integrated with the overall business and marketing plan.
(https://www.smartinsights.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/08/hierarchy-of-plans.png)
Source: Digital Marketing: Strategy, Implementation and Practice. 6th edition (2015). Dave Chaffey and Fiona Ellis-
Chadwick.
Business plan
What is a business plan?
A business plan is a formal document which outlines organizational objectives and the
strategies required in order to achieve those objectives. It identifies how you drive your
organization’s future. It aims to answer the question: How do we plan to make our business a
success? It is a written record of goals, coupled with a track record of delivering against those
goals.
As outlined in our Quick Win – Create a multi-channel marketing plan

(https://www.smartinsights.com/quick-wins/multichannel-marketing-plan), the purpose of a
business plan is to define strategies for growing profitability over a long-term period. The
scope of a business plan is typically 12 months to three years and content usually includes:
 New product development
 Revenue sources
 Means of cost management
The purpose of a business plan is to match targeted opportunities with resources, focused
activity, and strategies. It supports in guiding and directing different areas of your
organization to ensure that you are all working towards the same objectives.
When to use a business plan?
A business plan is used by organizations for establishing and monitoring continuous business
growth, remaining competitive and in achieving specific goals. Business plans are typically
utilized by organizations when:
 Gaining initial investment as a new-business or startup
 Planning market expansion for an existing company
 Undertaking product development
 Preparing for acquisition
 Planning divestment
 Gaining or sustaining a competitive advantage
 Evaluating resource allocation and strategic goals
Organizations seeking funding require business plans in order to demonstrate the strength of
the business and its future to investors.
What should a business plan include and how should it be structured?
A business plan typically defines how an organization will change to become more
competitive in future. It typically includes:
1. A review of existing financial performance
2. Objectives
3. Strategies
4. Value proposition (products and services)
5. Sales
6. Marketing tactics including the 7Ps of the marketing mix

(https://www.smartinsights.com/marketing-planning/marketing-models/how-to-
use-the-7ps-marketing-mix/)
7. Operations
8. Financial forecasting
9. Staffing
10. Potential threats and challenges
11. Tactics
A business plan is an effective way of monitoring progress as it establishes targets in all areas
of your business, from sales and expenses to staff recruitment and financial requirements.
Once established, these targets translate into performance goals.
A solid business plan has:
 Clear, realistic goals which you can be confident of hitting
 The best strategy to achieve these goals against your competition
 Sufficient details of the tactics and actions needed to translate the strategy into action
 A method to check you are on track with your plans

Which type of business is a business plan most suited for?
A common perception is that business plans are formulated by cash-starved startups seeking
investment to launch a new venture, but a business plan can and should be utilized by
businesses of any size, type, and at any stage of existence.
Even though the techniques for business planning may vary between different sizes and types
of organization, the objective is always the same: to define targeted opportunities to become
more competitive with resources, focused activity, and strategies.
In smaller organizations, the business planning process may be more straightforward than for
larger organizations with distinct business areas and who may need to make some difficult
decisions regarding resource allocations and strategic priorities. This may lead to internal
uncertainty and conflict. The business planning process, however, can also be a good
opportunity to gather employee feedback on potential ideas and improvements. You could
hold a brainstorming session to gather knowledge and get your employee’s support, for
example. They will value the opportunity to contribute to the business.
For already established businesses, a business plan will enable you to objectively look at what
is working well and which area need improvement. Many business plans are formulated by
organizations that are long past the startup stage. There may be a need for a formalized plan
to manage rapid growth, stakeholder expectations or in order to secure funding for growth.
Recommended resource: Business plan summary template
A focused, one-page summary of your long-term, 3-5-year business plans suitable for
new or existing businesses. This is an efficient summary of your future direction for
setting future direction.
Access resource (https://www.smartinsights.com/guides/online-business-plan-

summary-template/)
Marketing plan
What is a marketing plan?
A marketing plan is a strategic document that specifies your organization’s target markets,
marketing objectives, programmes, and activities to achieve them, timescales and the
resources to be utilized, according to defined budgets.

marketing plan is to define strategies to engage audiences in order to achieve business
objectives. In smaller businesses, the scope of a marketing plan is typically annual and for the
whole business. In larger organizations, its focus will change, depending on the type of
organization. A separate marketing plan might be:
 Geographically based
 Product based
 Business unit based
 Focused on segmentation
A marketing plan in a large organization may integrate a number of plans, specific to

individual parts of the business. It is practical planning that takes place at divisional, business
unit or individual company level.
The purpose of a marketing plan is to ensure that marketing activities are relevant and timely
to achieve an organization’s objectives. It’s a plan defining a sustainable competitive position
and defining the resources necessary to achieve it.
When to use a marketing plan
The process of marketing planning within an organization will differ, depending on whether a
strategic marketing plan or an operational marketing plan is utilized. Here are the differences
between the two:
 A strategic marketing planoutlines the overall strategy within a market, connecting

customers, competitors, and what the organization is capable of achieving. It is
typically created at divisional or company level.
 An operational marketing planoutlines the marketing mix strategy that will be used to
gain an advantage in a market. It typically focuses on products, market segments, and
how marketing communications and campaigns achieve targets defined in the

strategic marketing plan. It usually has separate sections covering tactics for customer
acquisition and retention which will sometimes be covered in separate plans in larger
organizations.
In an organization’s planning process, marketing links:
 Customers’ needs and wants
 Competitor value proposition and actions
 Strategic direction
 Organizational objectives
Recommended resource: Customer acquisition guide
The guide features a structured approach to creating an online acquisition plan by

reviewing current performance; defining the right KPIs to control acquisition; creating
a media and content engagement strategy; creating a zero-based budget model and
reviewing attribution and tracking.
Access resource (https://www.smartinsights.com/guides/online-customer-acquisition-

plan-guide/)
What should a marketing plan include and how should it be structured?
A marketing plan should include:
1. The current position, priorities, and direction of your organization
2. Its position in relation to external environmental factors
3. A critical analysis of your organization’s strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, and

threats
4. Clearly-defined objectives and a way to benchmark their success
5. The means by which to achieve those objectives
6. Relevant and timely actions and responsibilities by function, product or service and
market segment
7. The finances and resources required and forecasted revenues
8. Regular measurement of progress and outcomes against benchmarks
A solid marketing plan has:
 Clear, realistic goalswhich you can be confident of hitting
 The best strategyto achieve these goals against your competition
 Sufficient details of the tactics and actionsneeded to translate the strategy into action
 A method to checkyou are on track with your plans
Which type of business is a marketing strategy most suited for?
Marketing planning will assist in the day-to-day running of any size, type or age of business.
The targets and milestones set will help organizations, from small start-ups to large
corporates, to effectively:
 Allocate resources and budget
 Motivate teams
 Manage the performance of staff members and marketing efforts
Larger organizations with clearly-defined management structures and a wealth of resources

will make use of marketing principles very differently from smaller organizations.
Smaller organizations typically have:
 Small market shares
 Owners involved in all aspects of strategic and operational management
 Independence
 A high degree of uncertainty
 Difficulty innovating owing to limited resources
Such differences between large and smaller organizations tend to be reflected in the
development of marketing plans.
When establishing a small startup, marketing planning is an essential element. A small

number of these businesses launch and grow, but for those that are successful, a strategic
marketing approach will ensure continued development.
Although the techniques for marketing planning may vary between different sizes and types
of organization, the outcome is always the same: to implement the objectives, strategies and
activities in order to gain an advantage.
Campaign plan
What is a campaign plan?
The purpose of a marketing campaign plan is to identify relevant, integrated, marketing

activities and channels to reach campaign objectives as well as influence customers. An
effective campaign plan has an engaging, shareable campaign concept which utilizes both
online and offline marketing communications tools and digital media channels.

(https://www.smartinsights.com/quick-wins/multichannel-marketing-plan), a marketing
campaign plan is a shorter-term integrated communications plan for using different digital
media to hit lead or sales targets. Its purpose is to engage audiences, it typically has a content
marketing focus and an integrated media schedule.
A solid marketing campaign plan has:
When to use a campaign plan?

Your marketing campaign plan should be used in order to maximize the reach of online
campaigns and acquire new customers. Retention campaigns are used in larger organizations.
Campaigns should be used and designed with specific goals in mind, such as:
 A branding campaign to build brand awareness, favourability, and familiarity
 Launching a new product
 Distributing a new content asset as part of a content marketing lead generation

initiative
 Increasing sales of a current established product
 Promotional campaigns to increase sales by offering a seasonal discount
Defining a campaign’s goal will determine your plan’s use and which marketing channels will
be most effective.
How should a campaign plan be structured?
A campaign plan should be structured around the six areas summarized below. These have
been defined in the Smart Insights Marketing campaign plan template.
(https://www.smartinsights.com/guides/marketing-campaign-plan-template/)
The stages of marketing campaigns and key issues that need to be included in your campaign
plan are:
1. Campaign goals and tracking

What are we trying to achieve through our campaign and how will we know when we
achieve it?
2. Campaign insight and targeting

Who are we trying to reach and influence?
3. Key campaign messages and offers

How are we trying to position our company, products and services?
Which campaign or product offers will engage and convert our audience?
4. Campaign media plan and budget

Which media channels will you use to reach and influence your target audience?
What will be the sequence and integration of media activities?
5. Campaign asset production

Managing the assets to form the campaign
6. Campaign execution
What needs to be tested before the campaign is live and adjusted during the campaign?
Across each of these six stages, a campaign plan typically includes defining:
 Relevant customer profiles or personas to target
 The value proposition of the product or service
 The primary or hero offer which is the call to action (CTA)
 The promotional channels for raising awareness and encouraging action
 How website landing pages and customer journeys will feature the offer
 The timeline and action plan
 The budget required
 The mechanics for how leads generated will be nurtured and followed up through
offers
 How results will be measured and reported
Recommended resource: Digital marketing health check
For premium members our digital marketing e-learning and digital marketing audit
has a more detailed breakdown of each part of RACE into 5 key activities giving 25
essential activities, many of which are relevant for campaign planning.
Access resource (https://www.smartinsights.com/guides/digital-marketing-

benchmarking/)
Which type of business is it most suited for?
Marketing campaign planning isn’t just for big marketing departments. Organizations of any
size, type and at any stage of existence can utilize a marketing campaign plan in order to
achieve an effective campaign. Today, with the wide use of content marketing by businesses,
a campaign plan to launch your content makes campaign planning more relevant to all
business.
A marketing campaign plan does not need to be lengthy or complicated. Creating a simple
campaign plan with clear actions can ensure that both small and larger organizations are
focusing on their goals and the overall success of the business.
How does it relate to other plans?
A marketing campaign plan is one small piece of your marketing plan; actions designed to
achieve a particular objective. It is not produced regularly as part of an annual cycle, it is
project or situation specific.
In contrast to a business plan, marketing plan, digital marketing plan and multichannel
marketing plan, a campaign plan tends to have a limited duration to achieve defined
objectives. It should integrate with, for example, your overall marketing plan, digital
marketing plan and multichannel marketing plan to ensure full alignment.
Recommended Smart Insights resources
Recommended resource: Marketing campaign planning guide
A guide to creating and running effective integrated campaigns
Access resource (https://www.smartinsights.com/guides/marketing-campaign-

planning-guide/)
Recommended resource: Marketing campaign plan template
A marketing campaign planning template that you can modify to best suit your
campaigns
Access resource (https://www.smartinsights.com/guides/marketing-campaign-plan-

template/)
Digital marketing plan/Digital transformation plan
What is a digital marketing or transformation plan?
Digital or online marketing is any form of marketing that involves using online channels for
goals of acquisition and retention. It also includes digital technology and use of data to target
audiences more precisely with personalised messages. Since creating awareness and
achieving conversion still commonly involve offline channels such as a call-centre or in-store,
digital marketing plans need to define integration between channels using techniques like
customer journey mapping.
The purpose of a digital marketing plan is to define how to compete more effectively with
competitor digital marketing efforts. The scope of a digital marketing plan is typically annual,
but a digital transformation plan will o en be longer since this involves creating long-term
roadmaps for implementing new technologies and ways of working. Digital media and
technology offer new channels to market, so a digital transformation strategy is a channel
strategy. This means that a digital strategy:
 Understands the channel: Your strategy should be informed by customer online

behaviour and preferences. In particular, understand which intermediary sites
influence purchase and how your customers switch between the channels.
 Sets objectives for future channel contribution: This includes specific monthly targets
for both direct (online) sales and indirect (offline) sales.
 Identifies and prioritizes target audiences: As with traditional marketing, targeting the
right audiences or personas is key. Digital media enable you to micro-target.
 Encourages use of the channel: You may still need to communicate the benefits of
using digital channels to encourage switching and enhance your brand.
 Creates propositions to emphasize the differences: This includes differences between

online channels and other channels.
 Supports integration between channels: Although you want to emphasize the

differences, that doesn’t mean the channel shouldn’t be integrated. Customer
journeys should be seamlessly integrated.
 Reviews how competitors use the channel: Understand their targeting and
propositions, where do they excel?
 Develops channel partners: Find the key players and influencers in the value chain or
ecosystem and form strategic partnerships.
Selecting the best mix of digital media to meet your goals of customer acquisition and
retention is a large part of a digital marketing strategy. There are a variety of paid, owned, and
earned media assets (https://www.smartinsights.com/digital-marketing-strategy/customer-
acquisition-strategy/new-media-options/) that fall within digital marketing, including, for
example, your:
 Online brand
 Website and potentially mobile apps
 Blogs
 Automated email communications, promotions and e-newsletters
 Social media channels
 Digital advertising
 Online PR
 Partner co-marketing and affiliate marketing
(https://www.smartinsights.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/08/Types-of-paid-owned-and-
earned-media.png)
A digital marketing plan provides a clear picture of how the combination of different media
supports an organization’s goals and objectives. The purpose of a digital marketing plan is to
ensure that digital marketing activities are relevant and timely in the achievement of your
organization’s objectives, that they can be implemented with available resources and that
they are capable of creating and sustaining a competitive position online.
In a large organization, a digital marketing plan may be part of a number of integrated

marketing plans, specific to individual parts of the business.
When to use a digital marketing/transformation plan
Digital marketing planning is an effective way of strategically organizing your digital

marketing tactics and effectively measuring their success. A digital marketing plan provides
clear strategic targets for what you want to achieve from your online marketing activities.
Implementation can provide numerous benefits:
 Clear and agreed targets including a roadmap of changes to people, process, and
technology needed for digital transformation
 Clear and agreed targets including a roadmap of changes to people, process and
technology needed for digital transformation
 A competitive edge and increased share of the market through better use of digital
media than competitors
 Valuable customer insights and analytics such as popular content, demographics,

devices used and buying behaviours
 A powerful online customer value proposition (http://www.davechaffey.com/E-

marketing-Insights/Customer-experience-management/Online-customer-value-
proposition) to achieve differentiation, customer engagement and to encourage
loyalty
 Reduces the likelihood of duplication, particularly in larger organizations
 Provides your organization with the agility to catch up or stay ahead
 Measures how many people are engaging with your content and how many qualified
leads are being generated
An effective digital marketing plan will enable you to distinguish behaviour patterns and
trends throughout your customer’s journey, providing you with the ability to make informed
decisions and improvements at every stage of this journey.
What should a digital marketing/transformation plan included and how

should it be structured?
A digital marketing plan typically includes:
 A review of your organization’s digital capabilities
 Setting SMART objectives to grow online leads and direct online or indirect offline
sales
 Defining the digital marketing methods to be invested in
 Defining the resources required for digital marketing

Recommended resource: 7 Steps digital marketing strategy guide
A step-by-step guide to rapidly create an integrated digital strategy—your roadmap to

success.
Access resource (https://www.smartinsights.com/guides/digital-marketing-strategy-

guide-7-steps-to-success/)
A solid digital marketing plan has:
Which type of business is a digital marketing/transformation plan most

suited for?
A digital marketing plan can be a valuable asset to any organization. Regardless of what you
sell, a digital marketing plan will enable you to:
 Develop customer personas
 Establish customer needs
 Cra valuable online content
How your digital marketing plan is implemented will differ, depending on whether you are a
Business-to-Business (B2B) or Business-to-Consumer (B2C) organization, for example:
Online lead generation tends to be the goal of B2B organizations, so the focus of your
marketing plan will be attracting and converting quality leads via your website and digital
channels for your sales teams.
Providing an enhanced customer journey tends to be the focus of B2C organizations, so the
focus of your marketing plan will be attracting prospective online customers and converting
them, without the input of a sales team.
Multichannel marketing plan
What is a multichannel marketing plan?
Multichannel marketing is the process of utilizing online and offline marketing

communications channels to target and engage with your customers.

multichannel marketing plan is to define a strategy and plan the resources needed to achieve
business sales targets. The timeframe is typically annual but potentially longer-term, such as
18 months to three years.
Examples of communications channels could include, for example:
 Websites
 Physical stores
 Catalogues
 E-mail marketing
 TV
 Text messaging
 Blogging
 Direct mail
The goal is to deliver leads and sales targets for defined products and services, which can
apply to an organization as a whole, or a single market if there are multiple markets and
product or service categories.
An effective multichannel marketing plan outlines the marketing communications techniques

and channels required in order to enable customer acquisition for particular product or
service categories. A multichannel marketing plan strategically connects multiple channels
together into one thriving, multi-channel communications approach.
When to use it
The key to a successful multichannel marketing plan is integration – a common challenge that
most marketers face. For example, if your organization has established a digital marketing
plan, it should not be used in isolation but instead used to inform the multichannel marketing
planning process.
Your multichannel marketing plan should set out campaigns that span multiple channels,
catering to the customer and tailoring them to fit multiple channels. Buying processes are
controlled by the customer, rather than the marketer so the ‘always-on’ nature of
multichannel marketing will reach customers via the inbound or outbound channel of their
choice.
Organizations using an effective integrated multi-channel marketing plan will continuously

stand out, gain qualified leads and maximize conversion throughout the customer lifecycle.
Your multichannel marketing plan should therefore continually engage, nurture and retarget
customers in order to convert to sale.
What should be a multichannel marketing plan include and how should it

be structured?
A multichannel marketing plan typically includes:
 Detailed customer profiles and relevant marketing communication channels for each
 SMART objectives for acquiring or retaining customers
 Marketing tactics including content marketing with an inbound focus
 The integrated marketing communications channels to be utilized, across multiple

platforms and devices, in order to attract and convert customers
 How multichannel results will be measured for effectiveness, influence and exclusion
Knowing which campaigns on which channels have led to the most sales will enable you to
establish the success of your activities and the return on investment (ROI) that particular
channel returns. Customers move across channels quickly, therefore both your strategy and
analytics should simultaneously adapt.
The Smart Insights Multichannel Marketing Growth Wheel

(https://www.smartinsights.com/marketing-planning/create-a-marketing-plan/multichannel-
marketing-plan-growth-wheel-infographic/) infographic gives a visual view of key planning
activities that are needed as part of the process of producing an integrated digital marketing
plan.
A solid digital marketing plan has:
Which type of business is a multichannel marketing plan most suited for?
A multichannel marketing plan is suited to:
 Small-to-medium-sized businesses (SME/SMB) as an annual communications plan
 Larger businesses as an annual communications plan for one market or audience
It can also act as a longer-term customer engagement plan, focusing on one market or
audience.
For larger organizations, formulating multichannel marketing plans is typically challenging,

owing to obstacles when attempting to:
 Centralize goals
 Achieve coherent customer relationship management (CRM)
 Co-ordinate messaging across departments, brands and business units
 Achieve consistency across channels
 Measure frequency and reach of activities
How do the plans compare?
To help you quickly compare the types of plan covered in this guide (and a few more you may
consider creating), we’ve compiled this quick table for you to review all your options:
PR Smith's SOSTAC(R) framework
To make sure your business plan has all the essential features, I recommend the SOSTAC®
structure developed by PR Smith—Dave Chaffey’s co-author of the printed book Digital
Marketing Excellence.
PRSmith’s SOSTAC® is a great framework for structuring business, marketing or digital

marketing plans since it’s relatively simple and logical, so it’s easy to remember and to explain
to colleagues or agencies. SOSTAC® is a strategic planning process framework that gives you a
clear structure to work through to create and manage your plan.
Here’s a summary of how different multichannel marketing activities map to different

sections of SOSTAC®.
(https://www.smartinsights.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/08/SOSTAC-marketing-plan-
structure.png)
What does SOSTAC® stand for?
SOSTAC stands for:
 Situation
 Objectives
 Strategy
 Tactics
 Action
 Control
Situation analysis means ‘Where are we now?’ For business planners, questions include:
 What industry are we operating in?
 What are our products and/or services?
 What is our current business structure?
 What do our cash flow statement, balance sheet and financial ratios look like?
 Are we measuring results accurately?
 Who and where are our customers?
 What are our competitors doing?
 What’s working for them?
Objectives mean ‘Where do we want to be?’ What is the growth forecast? What are the top-
level goals 5 Ss (Sell, Serve, Speak, Save and Sizzle)? Here we can build specific and
measurable business plan targets. Good objectives are quantified against timescales.
Strategy means ‘How do we get there?’ Strategy summarizes how to fulfill the objectives. It is
the shortest part of the plan, but arguably, the most important, as it gives direction to all the
subsequent tactics. It answers questions including: how do we position ourselves in order to
gain a competitive advantage? How will business plan targets be achieved?
Tactics are the details of strategy. They highlight on a business plan exactly which tactics
occur when. To recruit new staff, for example, we would include what methods we will
implement to improve our employer brand.
Action is the detailed planning of tactics. Who does what, when and how? What processes and
activities are required to make things happen?
Control identifies what you need to measure when, a review process and corrective action
when you’re not hitting your targets. The Control section of the plan ensures you know if you
are succeeding or failing – and you can make adjustments – before it is too late.
Recommended resource: SOSTAC® Planning Guide
If you want to know more about each stage of SOSTAC® premium members can
download PR Smith’s guide for Smart Insights. Its focus is on situation analysis, but it
covers all elements.
Access resource (https://www.smartinsights.com/guides/sostac-digital-marketing-

planning-guide/)
RACE Planning
RACE is a practical framework to help manage and improve results from your digital
marketing. Ultimately, it’s about using best practice across digital marketing techniques to get
more commercial value from investments in digital marketing. It will help simplify your
approach to reviewing the performance of your marketing campaigns and taking actions to
improve their effectiveness.
Although SOSTAC® provides a superb framework for structuring a plan, I recommend

combining it with the Smart Insights RACE planning framework since:
 RACE is practical and action oriented: It focuses on tactics you can implement in your
marketing communications and on your website and mobile apps
 RACE is customer centred: It follows the established customer lifecycle of relationship

building or marketing funnel from creating awareness, generating leads from new
prospects, converting prospects to sale online or offline and encouraging loyalty,
repeat sales and advocacy such as social sharing.
 RACE integrates performance evaluation: It defines KPIs that marketing campaign

planners should include at each stage for setting target and reviewing results using
analytics and summary dashboards.
What does RACE stand for?
RACE covers the full customer lifecycle or marketing funnel from acquisition to retention as
shown in this infographic showing the goals for each part of RACE and how you can measure
them.
(https://www.smartinsights.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/08/RACE-planning-framework-
landscape.png)
(Plan) > Reach > Act > Convert > Engage
There is also an initial phase of Plan involving creating the overall digital strategy, objective
setting and plan.
RACE consists of four steps or online marketing activities designed to help brands engage
their customers throughout the customer lifecycle.
1. Reach: Reach involves building awareness and visibility of your brand, products, and
services on other websites and in offline media in order to build traffic by driving visits
to different web presences like your main site, microsites or social media pages. It
involves maximizing reach over time to create multiple interactions using different
paid, owned, and earned media touchpoints.
2. Act: Act is short for Interact. For most businesses the main aim of Act is to generate
online leads. So, it’s about persuading site visitors or prospects take the next step, the
next Action on their customer journey when they initially reach your site or social
network presence. It may mean finding out more about a company or its products,
searching to find a product or reading a blog post. You should define these actions as
top-level goals of the funnel in analytics. Goals can include “Viewed product”, “Added
to Basket”, “Registered as member” or “Signed up for an e-newsletter. Act is also
about encouraging participation. This can be sharing of content via social media or
customer reviews (strictly, part of Engage).
3. Convert: This is simply conversion to sale, online or offline. It involves getting your
audience to take that vital next step which turns them into paying customers whether
the payment is taken through online e-commerce transactions or offline channels.
4. Engage: This is long-term customer engagement and communications that is,

developing a long-term relationship with first-time buyers to build customer loyalty
as repeat purchases using communications on your site, social presence, email, and
direct interactions to boost customer lifetime value. It can be measured by repeat
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28/05/2019 Understanding different types of marketing plan | Smart Insights

Understanding diﬀerent types of

In each section this guide covers:

 What should be included:How should it be structured?

 Recommended resources:What other resources are available to help your produce or

 Timeframe: How long does your plan need to be in place for?

 Channels: Which online and oﬀline channels will you utilize?

Strategy Recommendation: Plan how diﬀerent plans will integrate

What is a business plan?

As outlined in our Quick Win – Create a multi-channel marketing plan

 New product development

 Means of cost management

When to use a business plan?

 Gaining initial investment as a new-business or startup

 Planning market expansion for an existing company

 Undertaking product development

 Preparing for acquisition

 Gaining or sustaining a competitive advantage

 Evaluating resource allocation and strategic goals

What should a business plan include and how should it be structured?

1. A review of existing financial performance

4. Value proposition (products and services)

6. Marketing tactics including the 7Ps of the marketing mix

10. Potential threats and challenges

A solid business plan has:

 Clear, realistic goals which you can be confident of hitting

 The best strategy to achieve these goals against your competition

 A method to check you are on track with your plans

Which type of business is a business plan most suited for?

Recommended resource: Business plan summary template

Access resource (https://www.smartinsights.com/guides/online-business-plan-

What is a marketing plan?

As outlined in our Quick Win – Create a multi-channel marketing plan

 Business unit based

A marketing plan in a large organization may integrate a number of plans, specific to

When to use a marketing plan

 A strategic marketing planoutlines the overall strategy within a market, connecting

how marketing communications and campaigns achieve targets defined in the

In an organization’s planning process, marketing links:

 Customers’ needs and wants

 Competitor value proposition and actions

Recommended resource: Customer acquisition guide

The guide features a structured approach to creating an online acquisition plan by

Access resource (https://www.smartinsights.com/guides/online-customer-acquisition-

What should a marketing plan include and how should it be structured?

A marketing plan should include:

1. The current position, priorities, and direction of your organization

2. Its position in relation to external environmental factors

3. A critical analysis of your organization’s strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, and

4. Clearly-defined objectives and a way to benchmark their success

5. The means by which to achieve those objectives

7. The finances and resources required and forecasted revenues

8. Regular measurement of progress and outcomes against benchmarks

A solid marketing plan has:

 Clear, realistic goalswhich you can be confident of hitting

 The best strategyto achieve these goals against your competition

 A method to checkyou are on track with your plans

Which type of business is a marketing strategy most suited for?

 Allocate resources and budget

 Manage the performance of staﬀ members and marketing eﬀorts

Larger organizations with clearly-defined management structures and a wealth of resources

Smaller organizations typically have:

 Small market shares