A marketing proposal is important if you want to sustain or improve your company’s profit. It gives your team a direction on how to market a business in the coming months or years. However, a lot of people are not used to creating a marketing proposal. And this increases the chance of committing mistakes. We have here a number of tips for you. We collated things which you should NOT include in your marketing proposal. While you can take inspiration from a marketing proposal example online, it’s still best if you know what to avoid. 

 

Avoid These in Your Marketing Proposal 

First of all, you need to identify to whom you are sending your marketing proposal. Are you sending it to your boss? Are you preparing it for your stockholders? Are you writing it for your future investors? This is important so that your tone of writing and even the language will suit your reader. 

And when you are writing, remember not to fall into the following traps. 

 

A Lengthy Executive Summary 

An executive summary must be brief and direct. You don’t need to write a long one because that can instantly turn off your recipients. A lot of experts recommend that you write the executive summary after you completed the rest of your marketing proposal. That way, you can include the most important details. There is no room for long discussion points just yet. Make sure to win your readers with your executive summary. Otherwise, they will just shun it right away.  

 

Unclear Objectives

Objectives are important because it helps you track your business progress. If your objectives aren’t clear and specific, it will be a challenge to write actual marketing strategies. You have probably heard of using the SMART (Specific, Measurable, Achievable, Relevant, Time-Bound) approach when writing objectives. And here are some examples for you. 

• We need to improve brand awareness in the second half of 2020 by increasing website leads through social media platforms.  
• To increase our newsletter subscribers by 25 percent within 5 months by providing coupons and product discounts. 

Unrealistic Goals 

Most are confused about the difference between goals and objectives. So we are going to clear it up for you. 

Think of goals as your end destination while objectives as the things you need to accomplish to reach it. Generally, goals create the bigger picture while objectives are more specific.

You can say that your business goal is to be the “Number 1 supplier of ladies apparel in South East Asia.” It’s too broad and you need to indicate pre-determined milestones (a.k.a. objectives) so that you can achieve your goal. 

The question now is, how can you tell if the business goals aren’t realistic? Well, that’s where research and further study come in. You have to identify your resources, the economic condition, and even the trends. Do you think your goals are feasible or possible? This can take a lot of time and effort and you might need an expert opinion about it.  

 

Technical Terms

If you want to know how to market the business, then you have to widen your language. Perhaps, since you have been spending too much time in that niche, you are too comfortable using industry-terms. 

Avoid a lot of jargon in your marketing proposal. What if your readers do not have the same industry knowledge? How are they suppose to understand everything? 

It is necessary that you simplify your words and make sure that it is understandable. 

 

Cookie-Cutter Strategies 

A lot of people fall into this trap and you have to be very cautious. They think that what might work for others can work for them as well. Thus, they just write common strategies. But if you want your marketing proposal to work and to get approved, then you have to brainstorm and think of unique ideas. Yes, you can find hundreds of marketing examples online but you should never copy it. Always try to improve what has been done. That’s how you can stand out from the competition. 

Yet again, this isn’t an overnight task. It can take months to figure out the best strategies.  

 

Unidentified Marketing Tools

Here’s another mistake that most people do not realize when creating a marketing proposal example – not knowing what the right tools are.  

Remember this, you can’t go to a battle unarmed. It’s the same with marketing. You need the right tools. Perhaps you need a reporting tool or a video production team, or content writers to reach your goal. If you don’t include these in your marketing proposal, expect that you will be frowned upon. 

 

Unsegmented Market

Do you know why most businesses fail? It’s because they were not able to identify their target market. They just hope for the best and believe that their products or services will automatically reach the right audience. But it doesn’t work that way. 

If you look at a marketing proposal example, you will notice that it strongly anchors its marketing strategy on the target market. For example, if they want to win the younger generation, then the use of social media might do the trick. For older people, traditional mail is more effective. So you see, not knowing your market leads to miscommunication. 

 

Outdated Statistics 

When you want to prove a point, then it is always recommended that you back it up with facts. That is why you will see a lot of statistics and graphs in a marketing proposal example. However, if you are to use this technique, make sure that your information is up to date. It should be the most recent report. Or else, it would make no sense. 

 

Unverified Data 

Also, please make sure that your data is real and not from an untrustworthy source. Don’t believe the first thing you see. Always look for additional information that can back up your original data. 

 

Mediocre Samples of Marketing Collaterals 

And lastly, you might want to add marketing examples to your proposal. But you have to make it right. For instance, you can attach a sample of a poster. Create one that will represent the actual material. Thus, we suggest that you work with good graphic designers for your sample marketing collateral.   

 

Conclusion 

When creating a marketing proposal, you need to choose the right words and to include what is only essential. Writing long descriptions is not necessary on most occasions. Also, back it up with facts and real data, and attach samples of marketing collaterals that will impress your audience. 

If you need graphic design experts for your marketing collaterals, then Design Doctor is the best team to reach out to. They can give you unlimited options for a fraction of the cost.