Continued from page 1
7. Implementation and control: consist in
series of activities that must be performed in order to run
marketing plan in accordance to
objectives set by
marketer. At this stage, it is critical to gain
support of all members if
organization, especially when
marketing plan is due to affect
organization from its grounds.
8. Performance measurement: constitutes
last but not
less important stage of
marketing plan, since we can achieve only what we can measure. In order to measure
performances achieved through
marketing plan, we need to constantly monitor each previous stage of
plan.
The marketing plan that has a feedback cycle, from 8th stage back to
4th. That is because sometimes during
planning process, we might need to perform stages 4 to 8 several times before
final plan can be written.
III. The e-marketing plan
The e-marketing plan is built exactly on
same principles as
classical plan. There is no different approach, but there might be some formal differences given by
uniqueness of
internet environment. Many of these differences come from
necessity to ensure a high rate of responsiveness from
customers, since
e-world is moving faster and requires faster reaction from its companies, compared to
traditional offline marketplace.
Even though it is perfectly acceptable and is a common practice to use
8-stage classic model for
e-marketing plan as well, you might want to consider
simplified version proposed by Chaffey, who identifies four major steps to build
e-marketing plan:
1. Strategic analysis: consists in continuous scanning of
macro- and micro-environment. The accent should fall on
consumers' needs that change very rapidly in
online market, as well as on surveying
competitors' actions and evaluating
opportunities offered by new technologies.
2. Defining strategic objectives:
organization must have a clear vision and establish if
media channels will complement
traditional ones, or will replace them. We must define specific objectives (don't forget to check if they are SMART!) and we must also specify
contribution of
online activities to
organization’s turnover.
3. Formulating strategies - we do that by addressing
following essential issues:
- develop strategies towards
target markets;
- positioning and differentiating strategies;
- establish priorities of online activities;
- focus attention and efforts on CRM and financial control;
- formulate strategies for product development;
- develop business models with well-established strategies for new products or services, as well as pricing policies;
- necessity for some organizational restructuring;
- changes in
structure of communication channels.
4. Implementing strategies: includes careful execution of all necessary steps to achieve established objectives. It could refer re-launching of a website, promo campaigns for a new or rewritten site, monitoring website efficiency and many more.
Note: a common strategy to achieve e-marketing objectives is
communication strategy. The steps to built a coherent communication plan will be presented within a further article.
IV. The e-marketing plan (sample titles)
1. Executive Summary a. overview upon present conjuncture; b. key aspects of
strategic e-marketing plan.
2. Situational Analysis a. characteristics of
e-market; b. possible factors of success; c. competitors’ analysis; d. technological factors; e. legal factors; f. social factors; g. possible problems and opportunities.
3. The e-Marketing Objectives a. product profile; b. target market; c. sales objectives.
4. The e-Marketing Strategies a. product strategies; b. price strategies; c. promotion strategies; d. distribution strategies.
5. Technical Issues a. website content; b. website "searcheability"; c. logging security (for customers and staff); d. customer registration procedure; e. multimedia; f. autoresponders; g. order forms and feedback forms; h. access levels to online resources; i. credit card transactions; j. website hosting; k. website publishing; l. technical staff (size, requirements)
6. Appendix
7. Bibliography

Otilia is a certified Marketing consultant with expertise in e-Marketing and e-Business. She developed and teach her own online course in Principles of Marketing (http://class.universalclass.com/emarketing). You can contact Otilia through her Marketing resources portal at http://www.teawithedge.com