Why is activity not a plan?
Most owner-led businesses run on activity. A post when there is time, an ad because a rep rang, a newsletter when someone remembers. Each piece is fine. Together they add up to nothing in particular, because nothing connects them to a result, and at the end of the year the owner cannot say what worked.
A plan fixes that in three ways. It puts one number at the top, so every decision has a test. It limits the work to the two or three strategies most likely to move that number, so the owner stops doing twelve things badly. And it gives each week a short list, so the marketing happens on Tuesday morning rather than in a panic at the end of the quarter.
What is in a marketing plan?
Three layers, from the top down.
| Layer | What it says | How often it changes |
|---|---|---|
| Direction | The goal: one number, dated. Who the customer is and what pain the business solves for them. | Once a year |
| Plan | Two or three strategies, each with the number it moves and the evidence it was chosen on | Every quarter |
| Tactics | The steps under each strategy, with a cost in dollars and in the owner's hours, and a date | Every week |
Anything else in the document, the mission statement, the SWOT, the competitor pages, is there for the reader's comfort. The three layers are the plan.
What does a cafe's plan look like on one page? (example figures)
A cafe in Melbourne takes $9,000 a week and wants $12,000 by June. The plan on one page:
- Goal: $12,000 a week in takings by 30 June, from $9,000. The gap is $3,000 a week, about 230 extra covers at the cafe's $13 average spend.
- Strategy one: lunch trade from the four office buildings within 500 metres. The number it moves is weekday lunch covers, 140 a day today.
- Strategy two: repeat visits from the 1,400 people on the email list, most of whom come once a month. The number it moves is visits per customer.
- Tactics this week: a Tuesday email with a lunch offer ($0, one hour); a Meta ad to a 1 km radius on weekdays from 11:00 am to 1:00 pm ($20 a day, one hour to set up); a count of lunch covers by day on Friday (ten minutes).
That is the whole plan for the week. The owner does the three tactics, reads the Friday count, and the next week's list comes from what the count said.
What plan does Cora write?
In CoraVision, the plan Cora writes is a 12-month strategy in the three layers above, direction, plan and tactics, built around one number you choose to chase, with a weekly check-in. Cora writes it after the first call, which takes about 25 minutes, and after reading your Google Ads, Meta and Google Analytics 4 numbers once they are connected. The plan lives in the app, under Marketing Plan, and each strategy becomes a project with its own action plan.
Questions
What is the difference between a marketing plan and a marketing strategy?
A strategy is one route to the goal, such as winning repeat orders. The plan holds the goal, the strategies and the tactics together, with the dates and the numbers. A plan has strategies in it; a strategy on its own is a good idea with no schedule.
How long should a marketing plan be?
One page for the direction, one for each strategy, and a week-by-week list of tactics. If an owner cannot find this week's tasks in under a minute, the plan is too long or too vague.
Can ChatGPT write my marketing plan?
It can write something plan-shaped from what you type. It cannot see your numbers or your accounts, so the plan starts from your description of the problem, and the gap between the description and the cause is where most plans go wrong.