When you try to learn something about writing a business plan, you are constantly hit with words that sound like acronyms, like SCOMS, SUCUTS, AMBERS, and others. These words are not actually acronyms for business plans, as far as the author knows.
A lot of business experts are trying to sell you a ready-made answer that should work for any company, no matter what it does or how it makes money.
As with all ready-made answers, the outcomes are, at best, average.
Because the digital marketing niche is so fluid and new, this kind of strategy is almost certain to fail for a digital marketing firm. You should instead get down to business, make a huge pot of coffee, and get to work.
Because we live in the year 2024, there are also certain things to keep an eye out for.
For whom?
When writing a business plan, new business owners almost always forget the most basic and timeless truth: the audience counts. It might not seem important, but this difference will have an effect on all choices that come after.
For example, you might be writing a business plan that will only be used by people inside your company. People who work for you will be told about your goals and how you plan to reach them. These people will be told what you expect from them and what level of success is good enough. It will also try to keep them on board by telling them how the business is doing.
A business plan that focuses on the company itself is also a great way to see where you really stand, which is something that digital marketing services often struggle with.
A different type of business plan is made for partners and clients. This type of business plan is meant to make them trust and believe in your digital marketing firm even more. This kind of business plan will, of course, be very financial and deal with cold, hard numbers.
Last but not least, your business plan may be aimed at both current and future clients. You will essentially use marketing techniques to let people know about all the great things you plan to do and the tools you plan to use. It’s also a good way to get the word out about all of your services and promote new ones. For instance, if you’re new to growing your business and now offer digital marketing strategy services, your customer-focused business plan is the best way to let people know about it (to use a term from the pharmaceutical industry).
As it is now 2024, your business plan should also start to include words and ideas that will be important in digital marketing in the future. For example, A.I. in digital, natural language processing, data analytics, account-based marketing, and so on. Being big-picture in your business plan is fine, especially if you’re writing it for investors and possible buyers.
Numbers. Numbers. Numbers.
No matter what kind of people are reading your 2024 business plan, you will have to be very exact with your numbers. A business plan is never just words, if you look closely. It has to do with the numbers.
How many customers do you have right now? How many more people do you hope to get? How are you making sure you keep your clients? How much does it cost to keep your clients? How much do you pay the people outside your business? What kind of growth do you think will happen? How do you plan to get people to buy your services? How much are they going to sell for? Are you going to get a loan for your new business? How many of your employees leave each year?
There needs to be proof for all of this and a lot more.
No one will believe you if you don’t have numbers to back up what you say. Not your employees, not possible investors or business partners, and not your customers.
They will notice if you don’t use numbers, and the first thing they will think is that you are trying to hide something.
One word of caution: this doesn’t mean you should tell everyone everything about your money. That being said, being honest about your numbers can help a lot.
Think about people
The people in the heading above are your workers.
They are writing an article about a business plan for a digital marketing agency in 2024 because they hope that this will be the year when the owners and managers of digital marketing agencies finally understand how valuable the people who work for them are.
Employee loyalty is almost nonexistent these days, and this may be even more clear in the “faster” business of digital marketing than in some others. On top of that, people are finally talking about how bad it is for businesses when a lot of employees leave because they don’t think their employers value them.
All of these things mean that your people need to be a big part of your business plan. Of course, this is especially true if your business plan is focused on the inside.
You should list all the things you’ll do to keep your best employees and help them do their work better. Make a list of all the money you’ll spend on them and on making your business a better place to work. For both hiring and training, you should make sure your rules are clear and based on results.
Anyone who sees your plan should know that you are a digital marketing company that values its workers more than anything else and knows how the workplace of today is changing.
Word to End
If you were hoping to find a foolproof, step-by-step business plan template for your digital marketing service, this is not it. The author is sorry. That doesn’t describe this piece because there isn’t a template like that to use.
The author instead tried to list the most important things to think about when making a business plan for a digital marketing service in 2024.
You’ll have to do the rest.
