Home Budget 2007 Company Profile Services Accountancy Zone Business Zone Tax Zone IR35 Update News Articles Feedback Search Legal Notice How To Find Us Business plans - Sales and marketing It's difficult to sell what you want to sell, but it's very easy to sell what your customers want to buy. You need to be aware of what your customers actually want and how they want it delivered. This section of your business plan describes both the strategy and tactics you will use to get customers to buy your products or services. Strategy Your strategy may be only a few sentences in length, or it can be a couple of paragraphs. Important elements for a sales and marketing strategy include how you will find your prospects and, once you find them, how you plan to educate them about your product/service. For instance, if you are using direct mail, you might want to talk about what kinds of mailing lists you plan to purchase. Also, what features of your product or service will you emphasise to get customers to notice your product/service. Will you focus your efforts locally, regionally, nationally or internationally? Do you plan to extend your efforts beyond your initial region? Why? Method Describe available distribution channels and how you plan to use them. How will you get your products to the end user? Will you be selling directly to your customers? Will you be using sales representatives, distributors, or brokers? Do you plan to have a direct sales force in place? Don't make the mistake of confusing sales with marketing. Sales focuses on how you get your products into the hands of your customers. Marketing is concerned with how you educate your potential customers about your product or service. Many small businesses assume that a sales effort can be set up quickly with minimal effort and expense. This is not the case. It can take as long as a year for a sales person to become acquainted with a product and territory. Consider creating an incentive structure that will encourage your sales network to promote your products/services and describe how such an incentive would work in practice. Advertising and Promotion Your advertising and promotion campaign is how you communicate information about your product or service. This section should include a description of all advertising vehicles you plan to use - newspapers, magazines, radio or business directories - as well as your public relations program, sales/promotional materials (such as brochures and product sheets), package design, exhibitions and so on. Make sure that your advertising and promotion tactics support your sales tactics. For example, if you use a field sales force, you will need to consider what promotional materials they will need. If you are providing a business-to-business service, some areas to cover in this section include trade shows, trade magazine advertising, publicity, direct mailings, product sheets, and other promotional materials. For consumer products, you should also discuss the types of advertising and promotion you will do to introduce the product and what kinds of sales aids will be provided to dealers. [ Business Zone Home · Previous - Business Plans - Operational Factors · Next - Business Plans - Management ]