Designing an ideal extensive long-term marketing strategy is easy in theory, but is usually futile when implemented. Technological changes, shifts in customer habits, and even spontaneous regional issues may arise. It is common to find that your long-term marketing plan has to be flexible after six months due to the outdated nature of the assumptions you made at the start.
A 90-day marketing plan offers a far more practical solution. A marketing plan that spans three months gives you enough time to see results, but is not as inflexible as practices that are committed to goals for a full year.
If you own a small business, a regional tour, or a boutique hotel, for example, you will benefit from the greater focus, agility, and momentum that comes with breaking down your year into four 90-day periods.
Why 90 Days Is Best
Having 90-day time periods to work within creates much more immediate accountability. Instead of stretching yourself too thin by spreading the budget and time across too many things, you are forced to select what is most important.
- Agility: you do not have to tear apart an entire yearly plan to accommodate off-season dips or local events.
- Focused execution: instead of pushing your website, every social platform and email at once, you commit to just two or three goals for the quarter.
- Measurable output: three months is enough time to collect real campaign data and adjust before a lot of resources have been wasted.
Building Your 90-Day Marketing Plan
Do not let the word strategy scare you. Building a marketing plan is simple and can be accomplished with an hour of uninterrupted time.
Step 1: Set 1 to 2 Specific Goals
More often than not, vague goals lead to vague results. Pick one or two outcomes that will impact your revenue or outreach for the next quarter. Example: increase direct online bookings from X to Y.
Step 2: Pick a Focus Area
Working on everything at once leads to nothing. Give each quarter a single focus area so your daily activities tie to one large outcome.
- Quarter 1, strategy and positioning: re-evaluate the target audience, refine key brand messaging, assess the efficacy of current marketing efforts.
- Quarter 2, digital assets and conversion: improve the website and user experience, implement lead magnets.
- Quarter 3, visibility and outreach: run local ads, reach out to regional media, collaborate with local influencers.
- Quarter 4, campaigns and direct sales: run seasonal campaigns, holiday packages and booking incentive offers.
Step 3: Define Your Core Audience
You cannot speak to everyone at once. Define the specific buyer you are serving for the quarter. Focus on what they are searching for, what their pain points are, and what you offer to solve them.
Step 4: Choose Your Key Initiatives
Campaigns need to be designed to encompass a 90-day period. If your goal is increasing direct bookings, your campaigns for the next 90 days could include:
- A Book Direct and Save campaign presented to your customers.
- An email automation sequence targeting first-time visitors to your site.
- A locally targeted search campaign for weekend travel.
What You Should Track
It is easy to lose focus and become distracted by vanity numbers. Instead, track numbers that show actual interest and actual dollars earned.
- Website performance: total visits, bounce rate on key offer pages, and inquiry or booking conversion rate.
- Audience growth and engagement: post click-through rate, email list growth, and direct messages from customers.
- Campaign ROI: ad spend against gross revenue, cost per acquisition, and lead quality.
Make Your Plan Work in Practice
- Keep it simple: if your plan exceeds a page, it probably will not get executed.
- Review monthly: track your key metrics every 30 days and make small adjustments along the way instead of one large correction at the end.
- Cut what does not work: at the end of the quarter, honestly keep what generated leads or revenue and cut what did not.
A plan you can hold in your head is a plan that ships. Everything else is a wish list.
Ready to Build Your 90-Day Plan?
You do not need a 30-page document to run a successful marketing strategy. The best plan is one you can print, place next to your desk, and follow every day without getting overwhelmed.
I created a clean, one-page marketing template designed to help you outline your target buyer, core promise, quarterly bets, and primary metrics on a single sheet. Download the free one-page 90-day marketing template at decantdigital.com/content-marketing-planner and start planning your next quarter with clarity and confidence.