Creating and building marketing concepts often takes more time than first anticipated. As a marketing agency dedicated to delivering high quality campaigns we wanted to put together an article that brings to life the importance of dedicated some planning time to scheduling your marketing activities for the year ahead. With the financial year end coming up at the end of next month it provides another opportunity to align marketing spend to a well structured marketing schedule for the next financial tax year.

One thing we do want to mention before we talk about the merits of planning is that a campaign that is reactive is also very powerful and a proportion of your marketing budget needs to be put aside for these campaigns. An example would be reacting to a certain unplanned situation or new opportunity such as Britain winning the Davis Cup with an immediate campaign on social media, TV, radio and print. As an agile marketing agency we specialise in reacting to our clients needs and this relies on very clear communications and collaborate across client and agency teams.

Now back to year ahead scheduling, every business no matter how big or small can start getting ahead of its competitors by considering the events and opportunities to align well targeted campaigns towards. By booking media, planning campaign design and execution the best results can be achieved and lasting brand advocacy can be achieved.

Importantly, as all the brand managers reading this will know is alignment of the right causes, events, opportunities are key to making sure your brand values and image are consistently delivered.

So here are 10 reasons why scheduling now for the next tax year are key to building your brand and optimising your business performance:

1. Getting more from your marketing budgets

This pretty obvious but if for example we are providing a client video services we can reduce our production costs if our crew can capture a few campaigns on one shoot as our client is very clear on what they are trying to achieve across multiple campaigns.

2. Managing your marketing and advertising agency

By clearly understanding your goals for the year ahead you can set objectives for your agency and this will help in developing very effective relationships. Multiple workstreams can be put into GANT charts and work flow programs to generate the highest quality of campaign outcomes. It also frees up time for creativity, more creativity leads to more campaign effectiveness. This leads to more sales revenue which can be reinvested in your agency relationship. This is the “circle of success” and stems from effective planning in partnership with your marketing agency.

3 . Delivering brand consistency

By looking at your annual program ahead you can consider your brand alignment objectives. It also means that campaigns are aligned and consistently delivered across different media to give your target audience a clear view of what your brand stands for.

4. Allowing more time for reactive marketing opportunities through the year

There is nothing worse than chasing all year around, ideally, we want our clients focusing on day by day opportunities to differentiate their brand based on potential campaigns while the business as usual campaigns are already planned. This means as a marketing agency we can react to opportunities along with our clients to tailored bespoke ad hoc campaigns.

5. Managing your marketing teams performance

By knowing your goals for the year it makes meetings with your marketing agency much more effective. More of meeting time can be devoted to proactive campaigns and relationships often flourish.

6. Creating roadblock campaigns and true integrated marketing campaigns

With everyone in a business now in the marketing department through the onset of social media it means that your colleagues can get behind the campaigns and share in a consistent fashion. Not only this but all media and communications are aligned to your objectives.

7. Alignment of hospitality and sales teams to focused events

Sales teams often excel when they know what is coming up in the diary, make a clear marketing campaign for the year ahead that is well communicated internally can really drive sales and improve customer relationships.

8. Creating excitement

Marketing and PR is often about creating excitement, sometimes eluding to the type of event or campaign can create excitement. You don’t always need to tell everyone but create the excitement in a concept. Little do people know that you have locked the media down and it’s being printed two months ahead.

9. Time management

The modern world is very distracting these days, with so much online engagement it can be difficult to focus on completing tasks with a clear mind. By scheduling your time and marketing budgets at the start of the year it reduces stress and makes sure you get the best from your working week.

10. Setting up tracking and monitoring mechanisms to track ROI

Once you have a plan our digital team can then set up the campaign analytics to make sure ROI is properly considered. Field marketing research and online surveys can also be built ready to assess performance. This always help in justifying future budgets and 2017 planning. Our marketing agency believes this is a key area for modern digital marketing professional.

To start discussing your scheduling for this financial year please call the deVilliers Communication team or visit click here.