With Christmas just having come and gone I’m reminded how thankful I am that I continue to be able to help people and companies understand how marketing, communications and PR can help them succeed. For many of us it’s been a challenging year and 2010 looks to be relatively flat (no backslides please) with an uptick (we hope) in the second half.

For those of you with LYS’s and online stores have you planned any last minute gift packages, kits or KAL’s that could help you with sales as the year comes to a close? If not, pull out your calendar and check out this fabulous blog by Kizer and Bender for some ideas. I couldn’t have said it better myself.

Planning 2010 yet? If not take (make!) the time to review your marketing plan and budget. Take stock of what worked and didn’t for the year and how you can improve upon or change all together. Identify your goals and objectives for 2010. I have a running list of about seven (paired down from an unrealistic 15).  Realistically if I can accomplish 4 of them next year I’ll feel not only positive, but that I will have contributed to my bottom line and set myself up for growth past 2010.

If you are in the planning process or beginning one don’t forget to incorporate time for family and friends, your environment and community, thereby enriching not just your life but your employees, community and family.

If you don’t have a marketing plan or budget, why don’t you make 2010 the year that you take the time to create one? If you’re a member of TNNA there are several options in January in Long Beach. If you’re not, check back here in January for some online class opportunities that are in the development stages for launch in 2010.

It’s not the sexiest title. But it works. Was it just me or did last week blow by and I mean blow by?!. Before I new it I was sitting in my Nihon Vogue class Saturday and realized that I’d not posted. At all. So much for good intentions eh?

OK. Here we go. Promotion.  It’s a big topic. One that I’ll cover more in-depth as time marches forward. On the whole, promotion covers aspects that include advertising, public relations, events, social media, blogs, newsletters and much more. When I’m overwhelmed or am working with a client I think of all of these individual components as a toolbox of sorts. One that I can open up and mix and match to fit the clients or my need depending on budget, goals (sales & brand) needs and time available to execute.  As a general rule of thumb, small businesses and new start-ups should commit at least 11-15% of budget to their marketing budget, which includes promotion, sales and research. In larger companies that I’ve worked with, it can be as high as 25-35%.

Regardless of the options and amount it’s important to understand what and which ones will contribute to brand recognition vs. calls to action that result in sales. Key here, blatant sales, sales, sales do not equal sales as much as annoyance. Which I’m sure we can all relate to. Keep this in mind as you develop your promotional plan. Do you want to influence, drive and build your brand and presence (and how) and then what calls to action do you need to do (consistently) to drive sales.

For many in my field, social media is the new, new thing. I must receive at least 5-10 emails a day that try to sell me some call or conference that purports to tell me how I can convert Tweeters, Facebooker’s, etc. into sales. My take. You can’t. YOU CAN use them to build your brand, create individual identities and in general build a network of followers that might or might not be interested in you for the long haul. That’s not to say a few won’t be driven to you’re web site (BTW… this is a must in this day and age!) and then make a purchase. But the conversion rate is minuscule. And I mean minuscule.

It’s the tried and true tools of advertising, newsletters, website content (SEO), blogs, weekly shop specials, Ravelry and events that will drive recognition AND sales. The ‘mix’ hits your customer (me & you) in ways that we are most comfortable with subliminally. I (like many) purchase from a company or website that’s a referral or has specialty items that I want and/or need. These referrals are usually friends, blogs I follow, Ravelry groups, magazine I read and trust, etc… you get the picture.

Here’s the catch. You need a plan AND you have to execute on it consistently. Experience and research demonstrates it takes about 18-months to two years for small businesses to show success, sales improvement and sustained business when implementing a marketing program. Sometimes it’s less, but not often.

For those businesses and people that invest the time and money, it’s worth every minute and dollar. Bar none.

I’ll jump right in. Understanding and applying the 4 P’s can lead to an effective marketing plan, however it an integrated based process.

I was directly reminded of this, this week as I spent the week listening and helping a friend start a business in the knitting community. With lots to do, those opening the business and I started by making a list to sort out all the actions that are needed to start a business quickly and efficiently. One of the first orders of business was/is to get a handle on current product/inventory to determine what she has and what they’ll need in the next 6-months for current orders, several upcoming events and for new development for the future. Did I mention this was all on a very small budget?

In this case product is everything. Knowing that we’ve all been developing spreadsheets to catalog existing inventory to know what inventory they’ll have at opening with the goal that they’ll be able to make decisions on what they’ll need for current and upcoming orders.

We’ve started out by looking at the multiple manufacturer’s, then we sorted by types within the manufacturers, line within the manufacturer, grams and number of skeins. Ideally we should be building in a point-of-sale software, however the cost exceeds the budget.

We’ve also cataloged furniture, shelving, etc. Our next step is to determine the cost of the current inventory and the day-to-day operating costs so that we can sort out not just the product cost, but also the sale price of the product so that the business can sustain itself, pay bills and make a profit. We’ll also be able to build in projections for new product.

This is a simple example of the first of the 4 P’s that can be expanded at a scale to develop and understand a product. It can be the most labor intensive and time consuming. It’s critical that you do. By understanding this you’ll be able to directly link your cost of product and materials to your cost of doing business to includes sales and marketing spend efforts. You’ll also be able to track trends, product that might or might not be moving and make critical buying decisions for the growth of ones business. We’ll get into this next week in pricing. The second of the 4 P’s.