Writing a Marketing Strategy and Plan – A Practical Guide

Start with a one-page growth blueprint that aligns five core goals, defines the base messaging, confirms spend with a partner, and anchors authenticity across content.

Behind the scenes, consistently focused planning ties five goals to content that radiates authenticity. Your base should align with audience needs, and every piece should connect to the core messaging across channels.

Rely on findings to drive adjustments. Your base must be informed by data from across sources–content performance, channel mix, and audience feedback–and translate into tighter messaging and better delivery.

Partner input speeds execution and accountability. Share the roadmap with a partner, set clear milestones for delivering value, and review the monthly spend amount to stay aligned with goals.

Five practical steps to turn this blueprint into action: publish content consistently, test ideas, refine the base messaging, and track progress against goals. Tie results to partner feedback and stay behind the strongest approaches.

Implementing the 3 Cs: Customer, Competition, and Company in Practice

Recommendation: Run a 60‑minute session to map Customer profiles; capture Competition benchmarks; assess Company capabilities; produce a concise overview plus a 3×3 matrix to guide actions toward the bottom line. Remember alignment across teams to ensure consistency; to deliver useful templates, back results with data; focus on what influences success; prepare for needed inputs; rather than delaying, start now; over the next quarter.

1. Customer: analyze profiles; gather data from public sources; interview users; translate into 3 archetypes; identify buying triggers; describe influences on choice; build understanding of needs; map how each profile moves toward success; ensure data reliability.
2. Competition: analyze top rivals; capture pricing, offers, channel mix; build a competitive map; compute relative strengths; identify gaps where our solutions deliver more value.
3. Company: evaluate internal resources; map processes; list assets; audit readiness; align with 3 Cs priorities; set required investments; ensure consistency with brand messaging across campaigns.
4. Actions: translate into 6 concrete steps; assign teams; set due dates; define success metrics; ensure prepared materials; create mail templates; back results with data; record in a shared backlog; include a launch date in the timeline.
5. Deliverables: produce a one-page overview; a 3×3 matrix; a set of solutions; compile a short video explaining the approach; store in public repository; use mail to distribute overview to teams.
6. Launch measurement: launch a pilot with other teams; track traffic; gather feedback; adjust priorities; maintain trust with stakeholders; share results via mail; update videos as needed; monitor over time.
7. Review cycle: set quarterly schedule; review bottom line results; refine profiles; update public content; ensure consistency across channels; maintain prepared playbooks; gather input from teams.

Define Target Customers: segments, personas, and journey stages

Start with 3 segments based on spend velocity and product interest within shopify stores. Build 2-3 personas per segment, including ezra and shaan as test profiles, and validate against 14 days of behavioral data. Map 4 interaction stages: awareness, consideration, purchase, and loyalty; for each stage assign the channels, messages, and promotions that move users from interest to revenue.

Define themes that drive response: price sensitivity, quality signals, and exclusivity. Build a short update cycle–regularly review at a monthly meeting–to keep messages aligned with competitor moves. Track political and economic signals that influence spend, and map each signal to revised promotions. Use systems pulling data from shopify, analytics, and CRM to create one understanding across channels. Add a mechanical checklist to ensure consistency in execution.

Within this framework, path stages are awareness, consideration, purchase, and retention. Align touchpoints to each stage using channels such as paid search, social, email, and on-site experiences, complemented by meetings and live demos. Ensure content covers value, social proof, and risk reduction.

Gather Customer Insights: needs, pain points, channels, and messaging preferences

Begin by mapping 3 customer profiles; define 5 kpis to measure insight quality; run a 2‑week sprint to collect input from public sources; leverage internal data; conduct direct conversations with customers; keep a baseline of qualitative notes.

Build 3 base profiles anchored in public data; purchase history; service interactions; monitor needs; pain points; channels; messaging preferences within each profile; align processes with feedback.

Use researchusing mixed methods to identify emerging signals around needs; gather feedback from onboarding queries; post-purchase reviews; service tickets; shipping experience.

Channel mapping per profile: list top channels; evaluate reach, trust, cost per interaction; map channel touchpoints to the customer journey; measure rate of response per channel across time; compare performance vs kpis to refine the base plan.

Messaging preferences: tailor authenticity to each profile; emphasize value early; test an innovative voice while keeping reliability; founder shaan says authenticity wins; align shipping communications with real timelines; matt insights suggest timely, transparent updates boost credibility; incorporate messaging elements that resonate with profiles.

Benchmark Competitors: pricing, positioning, and marketing tactics

Begin with a pricing map that aligns value with willingness to pay; collect data from 3–5 top rivals: sticker price, promos, bundles; map shipping costs, delivery times, return policies; define three tiers: entry, standard, premium; set margins: entry 2.0x COGS; standard 2.5x; premium 3.0x; run price elasticity tests on product pages; adjust quarterly.

Positioning leverages distinct strengths: speed, quality, sustainability, design together; craft a tight value proposition in six lines; align visuals, copy, offers; contrast against rivals by highlighting reviews, rating benchmarks; use influencer partnerships to validate claims; ensure messaging aligns across social channels, site, packaging.

Actions to drive traffic include social content, paid media, influencer collaborations; for each tactic, define a bid, a creative brief, a measurable goal; allocate budgeting across channels with a split favoring tested channels; track reviews, clicks, conversions; monitor shipping experience; test free shipping thresholds to lift cart conversion; create UGC campaigns to strengthen trust; maintain talking with customers via post-purchase surveys; hold internal resources in the loop.

Example: brand A priced at $29, $49, $89; shipping 2–3 days; margins around 2.2x; brand B priced at $39, $69, $119; expedited shipping 1–2 days; margins around 2.8x; tactics: three influencer posts per week; reviews average 4.6/5; design yields higher average order value; use this example to calibrate internal benchmarks.

Cadence: monthly reviews; quarterly budgeting; cross-functional workshops; break through noise via consistent design; scalable shipping; deliver reliable service; prevent cart abandonment with transparent shipping terms; compute break-even through cost per order; estimate customer lifetime value; assign owners, KPIs, deadlines; share a dashboard throughout the businesss; communicate via updates with internal resources periodically; these actions drive customer growth.

Evaluate Internal Capabilities: budget, resources, tools, and partnerships

Audit capabilities quarterly and assign a baseline budget by category to close gaps quickly; this establishes a clear starting point and creates an outlined record for leadership review.

Budget: allocate 6-12% of annual spend to tools and training, with 2-4% reserved for external partnerships. Build an outlined cash-flow model that allows access to the latest numbers and enables download of updated figures. This approach improves consistency and better allocation, especially during peaks, and keeps teams lovin the updated clarity of the process.

Resources: define a core team of 5-7 FTEs across data, content, operations, and channel owners; establish cross-functional squads that can respond within 24-48 hours. This completely aligns with deadlines and reduces bottlenecks; roles require annual review.

Tools: prioritize a common toolkit with analytics, CRM, automation, project management, design, and reporting. Popular stacks include GA4, HubSpot, Asana, Figma, and microsoft Power BI. Ensure each tool creates a single source of truth and restricts access to authorized users. A direct, streamlined workflow keeps teams productive and consistency-focused, and admin bloat is minimized. Teams lovin the updated toolkit report higher efficiency. These tools integrate smoothly to reduce duplication across processes.

Processes: standardize onboarding, license requests, renewals, and data governance. Outline a shared data model, naming conventions, and a common glossary. This reduces error rates and accelerates reporting. The processes support a repeatable cadence for campaigns and experiments, especially for cross-team launches.

Partnerships: maintain a small agency roster (2-3 partners) with explicit SLAs, scoped deliverables, and quarterly performance reviews. Define criteria for engagement (cost, quality, speed) and maintain a roster that is easy to access; this ensures significant value and avoids vendor lock-in. Regular reviews refer to results and ROI, and the direct engagement helps keep programs aligned with business goals.

Reporting: generate a monthly report that combines quantitative KPI dashboards with qualitative notes. Provide a download of the report for executives and store the file in a common shared drive; ensure access is controlled and consistency is maintained. The report should be outlined for leadership and operations, and the data sources should be auditable via microsoft tooling. Generated insights provide a dose of data-driven context.

Conclusion: This hands-on approach refers to concrete steps that align internal capabilities with business needs. It highlights how budget, resources, tools, and partnerships interact, and it specifies requirements for professional execution. The approach is accessible to teams of different sizes, with a clear path to scale and a focus on professional delivery.

Create a 12-Month Marketing Plan: goals, initiatives, owners, and milestones

Start by naming 3 core platforms, fixing data sources, assigning owners, plus 90-day milestones to ensure smooth execution. dont rely on vague targets; clear ownership takes discipline.

Define what long-term growth looks like across platforms; set a 12-month target: reaching qualified audience by 30%; increasing engagement; boosting qualified leads.

Q1: designing a scalable content calendar; building a data model; launching a measurement framework.

Q2: scaling targeted content across blog, email, news briefs, talk tracks, youtube channel.

Q3: testing emerging channels; refining creative; tuning targeted offers; expanding print efforts.

Q4: review progress; capture valuable data; adjust owners; redefine milestones.

Ownership map: each initiative lists owner; identified KPI; milestone date; status; companys involvement noted.

Persona focus: what resonates with each persona; Wolfe explains category positioning; reviews show increasingly valuable insights; messages that sold.

Measurement and readouts: execution requires a simple scorecard; read weekly updates; print results where needed.

Platform governance: dont let scope creep dilute category focus; keep a shots list of offers, calls to action.

Next steps: establish quarterly review cadence; adjust based on data; share wins with the companys network; align with youtube, print outputs.

Milestones by month: Jan framework launch; Feb content calendar finalization; Mar publish 10 youtube videos; Apr distribute 120 print pieces; May issue 2 news briefs; Jun reach review; Jul scale paid campaigns; Aug refresh personas; Sep publish 15 case studies; Oct host 6 talks; Nov update data model; Dec year-end review.