How to Create a Dynamic Marketing Plan -- Part II: Breaking Down Your Goals - Now that you’ve got a list of your goals for the
upcoming year, take a good look at them. You
are most likely feeling a combination of
exhilaration and trepidation with a little
overwhelming sensation mixed in for good
measure.

It’s okay, you’re not the first or only one to
experience this. The next step is to break down
each goal into manageable objectives. It’s as
simple as the answer to the riddle “How do you
eat an elephant?”

The answer is: One bite at a time. And that is
how you tackle your goals small managable
pieces – categorize them in to groups as to
whether they are 10 years , 5 years or one year
goals.

Let’s assume one of your goals is to make
$100,000 in the next year. By itself, it may
seem overwhelming, but let’s “take it one bite at
a time.”

1. Make it present tense.

It’s important to change the language of your
goal so it reads as if you’ve already achieved it.
This will activate your subconscious and let it
know that you are serious about your goal.

2. Get emotional.

Make each goal your own by personalizing it and
give it an emotion.

Watch what happens when we take the original
goal of “My business will make $100,000 in the
next year” and, factoring in numbers 1 and 2
above, change it to the following: “It’s December
31, 2007, I made $100,000 this year doing what
I love in my business and I feel on top of the
world!”

WOW what a change! See how alive
your goal becomes?

3. Work backwards.

Start with your largest goal (in this case, ours is
one year) and break it into smaller time periods
that you can measure. For our goal, will you
make $25,000 per quarter? Or, do you need
time to ramp up so you anticipate making
$5,000 in quarter one and then more for each of
the last three quarters? Remember the goals
have to be measurable and realistic and plan
accordingly.

4. Know your target audience.

In order to reach your goals, you must know your
target audience. And if you think
that “everyone” is your target audience, you are
wrong and wrong in a way that will cost you
significant time, trouble and money

Assuming you have limited marketing dollars,
you want to spend them wisely. If you own a
wedding gown boutique, which would be the
more profitable thing to do: Send flyers
announcing a sale to everyone in your town OR
send flyers only to those women who subscribe
to bridal magazines, have hired a wedding
planner or booked a hall?

The answer is obvious. Defining your target
audience matters. It matters more than most
anything else you will do.

5. Where are they?

Knowing your target audience isn’t enough. You
must know where they hang out, what they like,
what they dislike and you need to be able to
speak with them in THEIR language.

So where does this leave us?
A brief summary to pull it all together:

You’ve written your goals in present tense
You’ve added emotion
You’ve broken your goals into smaller timeframes and
You’ve identified your target audience and where they hang out

We’ll pull it all together in Part III when we add
the daily and weekly action steps that will get
you well on your way to accomplishing your
goals.

© 2006 Sandra P. Martini

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Business Manager & Entrepreneur, Sandra
Martini, publishes the 'Effective Entrepreneur' as
a weekly e-zine. She also coaches small
business owners to more efficiently manage
their businesses while increasing profits and
having fun. Sandra's coaching programs are
available via teleconferencing, emails and
telephone calls.