Have you set marketing goals or objectives for your business? If you haven’t don’t worry you are not alone. Whilst most business owners realise the importance of business goals or objectives, it is common for entrepreneurs to have skipped over setting marketing goals or if they have set goals they are often undefined or not directly supporting the overall business objectives. Setting marketing goals for your business is so important. In fact, I would say that until you set your marketing goals you shouldn’t implement another marketing tactic because you could potentially be wasting your time. With that in mind keep on reading and find out how you can set marketing goals for your business.

 

THE RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN MARKETING GOALS AND BUSINESS GOALS

Your marketing goals should be directly related to helping you achieve your business goals so before you sit down to write your marketing goals you will need to have your business goals.

 

 

THE DIFFERENT TYPES OF MARKETING GOALS

When it comes to setting marketing goals you can set goals on different aspects of your marketing.

The most common area is sales. Most people started a business to make money so it isn’t surprising that sales is a primary marketing goal. However, you can still dig deeper. You should be setting a goal that outlines exactly what revenue you want to generate or the level of profit you want to achieve.

Whilst having an overall sales goal is important it doesn’t necessarily help you to focus your marketing activity. Therefore you should have other goals that are directly related to achieving your sales goals but specifically focused on the marketing activity you are doing to achieve those goals.

Some examples are:

• Number of website visitors
• Conversion rates on sales pages
• Return on investment of advertising
• Number of clients / customers
• Number of leads (via discovery calls / enquiries etc)

 

MAKING SURE YOUR GOAL ARE S.M.A.R.T.

Once you have decided what areas you want to set goals for it is time to make sure that your goals are S.M.A.R.T.

You can use the S.M.A.R.T. acronym for setting goals both personally and professionally and different people use different words, but the model I use is Specific, Measurable, Actionable, Realistic and Timely.

 

S is for SPECIFIC

This means that you don’t have a lofty goal, but a goal that someone else can clearly know whether you have achieved it or not.

 

M is for Measurable

Is your goal quantifiable? Especially when you are setting a marketing goal there should be specific numbers so your goal and progress towards your goal can be easily measured.

 

A is for Actionable

Have you set a goal that you can identify the actions you need to take. At the beginning, you might not know all of the actions you need to take, but can you name some of the actions?

 

R is for Realistic

Do you feel that the goal is realistic? For you to wholeheartedly work towards a goal you have to believe it is possible. Now I am not saying you should be easy on yourself. This isn’t about creating an easy goal, but ask yourself that if you fully committed to achieving the goal do you think it is possible.

 

T is for Timed

Have you set a deadline on your goal? All good goals are time-bound. This will also help you to put in review points if necessary.

 

So go back to the areas you wanted to set goals for and use the S.M.A.R.T framework to write yourself some amazing marketing goals

 

ENSURE YOU REFER BACK AND REVIEW YOUR GOALS

Once you have written your goals the important thing is to remember them. Whenever you are making a choice about your marketing you should be checking if it will help support your goals. This is particularly useful if you are someone who is constantly interested in the latest marketing tactic. In those situations, you can refer back to your goals and ask yourself “Would this new tactic help me to achieve my goals?”.

In addition to referring back to your goals, you should also review your progress at regular intervals.

There is a popular quote in the world of business,

 

“What gets measured gets improved.” – Robin S. Sharma

If you want something to improve you need to be measuring it and regularly. So depending on the length of your original goal decide what is an appropriate review timescale. For most digital metrics I would recommend once a week and for longer goals or metrics that require gather multiple bits of information review monthly.

 

READY TO SET OR RESET YOUR MARKETING GOALS?

Hopefully, you are now in a position to set or reset your marketing goals. If you have found this post helpful I would love to know in the comments below what one of your current marketing goals is.

And if you would like 1:1 support to help you set and achieve your marketing goals then you can check out how to work with me by clicking here.