Q4 is the season for holidays, but also a time for developing annual marketing plans and budgets. Planning and budgeting doesn’t have to be like doing the Thanksgiving dishes -- a huge task that you put off as long as possible because you don’t know where to begin. By taking a methodical and practical approach, you can ensure maximum market impact in 2008.

1. Clearly define your 2008 goals.
   Are you trying to seed the market with credible accounts, drive sales leads and market share, bolster awareness, shift market perception, build value pre-acquisition or pre-IPO, or achieve some other goal? Start your plan by quantifying the results you intend to achieve. Get your whole team involved for more brainpower/ideas. Show your clarity of vision by documenting these goals in your plan.
2. Get input and buy-in early from key internal stakeholders.
   Our effectiveness as marketers is directly tied to sales. Including Sales leaderships’ input in the goal-setting and budgeting process is critical to your success (not to mention your relationship with Sales). Supporting the achievement of 2008 sales targets should be a primary marketing goal and those quarterly sales numbers should appear in your marketing plan. Sales is important, but it doesn’t stop there. Marketing supports the entire company – get input from various members of the executive team before you finalize your goals (i.e., what’s the new product launch schedule look like for 2008?).
3. Get behind the eyeballs of your target audience.
   Now that you’ve clearly defined what marketing must achieve in 2008, spend some time empathizing with your targets. See things the way they do – their goals, their struggles, what they read, what events they attend. Now, how can you make their lives better? How can you communicate solutions to them in a way they’d like to receive it? Jot down all the tactics you can think of – you can separate the wheat from the chaff later. Think beyond your customers when you think target audience. You’ll need to consider analysts, media, investors, employees, partners and other audiences as well.
4. Give some thought to what your competitors could be thinking.
   Fortunately for us, mediocrity abounds. The bulk of your competitors are probably hoping to get the same budget they got last year and will probably spend it much the same way they did last year. But there will be one or two hard-charging competitors in the mix that are thinking very strategically and creatively about how to win in 2008. Think: if you were the head of marketing for each of your competitors, what would you do? Take that into consideration when you build your plan. You must outthink, outpace and outperform them at every possible turn!
5. Draft a calendar of activity based on your resources.
   Plotting potential activities on an annual calendar month by month ensures you’re mapping your activities to your resources. It also ensures the right activities are timed to key company milestones including new product launches, earnings announcements, and major promotions and events. Doing this also shows you where your dark periods or holes are. Create an aggressive activity plan that includes your entire wish list, then identify which tactics will have the biggest impact and highlight them in bold. You can scale back from there based on reality, but don’t cut out anything you feel will have a dramatic business impact just because you haven’t had the appropriate budget or resource in the past. If you feel strongly about it, sell the cost/benefit. Be smart and be bold about asking for what you need. That’s the way we marketers can make a real impact.
6. Estimate resource requirements (budget).
   Are you trying to seed the market with credible accounts, drive sales leads and market share, bolster awareness, shift market perception, build value pre-acquisition or pre-IPO, or achieve some other goal? Start your plan by quantifying the results you intend to achieve. Get your whole team involved for more brainpower/ideas. Show your clarity of vision by documenting these goals in your plan.
7. Finalize your plan and submit your budget.
   A well thought out marketing plan will get funded. But don’t just submit it via email and hope someone reads it. Plan to present it confidently and invite all your key internal partners to the presentation. “Here’s what marketing intends to do in 2008. Here’s what it will cost. Here’s what we’ll achieve.”

Good marketing fuels and builds value into technology companies more than anything else. By following these steps, if your CFO doesn’t see the merit of your plan, you’ll still have the support of Sales, Product Management and the CEO whom you’ve worked with along the way. If you still don’t get the budget you want/need, you can easily show what activities and results will fall out of the plan as a result of reduced funding, everyone’s expectations are in sync, and you and your team have a strategic plan to follow before the year even begins. And that alone will put you miles ahead of your competitors!