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If you’re thinking about developing a marketing program, you need to begin with a marketing plan.Having been in marketing for more than a decade, I have seen my share of marketing plans.Some are short and to the point, others are hundreds of pages thick and cost thousands of dollars to produce.

The irony is that many of the expensive marketing plans end up on a shelf and rarely get implemented.The simple plans, if researched and implemented effectively, have the greatest impact.

Regardless of the scope of your marketing plan, you must keep in mind that it is a fluid document.Every business needs to begin with a well structured plan that is based in thorough research, competitive positioning and attainable outcomes.Your plan should be the basis for your activities over the coming months.However, you should always be willing to enhance or redirect your plan based on what proves successful.

Marketing Plan Basics

1. Market Research
Collect, organize, and write down data about the market that is currently buying the product(s) or service(s) you will sell. Some areas to consider:
•Market dynamics, patterns including seasonality
•Customers – demographics, market segment, target markets, needs, buying decisions
•Product – what’s out there now, what’s the competition offering
•Current sales in the industry
•Benchmarks in the industry
•Suppliers – vendors that you will need to rely on

2. Target Market
Find niche or target markets for your product and describe them.

3. Product
Describe your product. How does your product relate to the market? What does your market need, what do they currently use, what do they need above and beyond current use?

4. Competition
Describe your competition. Develop your “unique selling proposition.” What makes you stand apart from your competition? What is your competition doing about branding?

5. Mission Statement
Write a few sentences that state:
•”Key market” – who you’re selling to
•”Contribution” – what you’re selling
•”Distinction” – your unique selling proposition

6. Market Strategies
Write down the marketing and promotion strategies that you want to use or at least consider using. Strategies to consider:
•Networking – go where your market is
•Direct marketing – sales letters, brochures, flyers
•Advertising – print media, directories
•Training programs – to increase awareness
•Write articles, give advice, become known as an expert
•Direct/personal selling
•Publicity/press releases
•Trade shows
•Web site

7. Pricing, Positioning and Branding
From the information you’ve collected, establish strategies for determining the price of your product, where your product will be positioned in the market and how you will achieve brand awareness.

8. Budget
Budget your dollars. What strategies can you afford? What can you do in house, what do you need to outsource.

9. Marketing Goals
Establish quantifiable marketing goals. This means goals that you can turn into numbers. For instance, your goals might be to gain at least 30 new clients or to sell 10 products per week, or to increase your income by 30% this year. Your goals might include sales, profits, or customer’s satisfaction.

10. Monitor Your Results
Test and analyze. Identify the strategies that are working.
•Survey customers
•Track sales, leads, visitors to your web site, percent of sales to impressions

By researching your markets, your competition, and determining your unique positioning, you are in a much better position to promote and sell your product or service.By establishing goals for your marketing campaign, you can better understand whether or not your efforts are generating results through ongoing review and evaluation of results.

As mentioned earlier in this article, be sure to use your plan as a living document.Successful marketers continually review the status of their campaigns against their set objectives.This ensures ongoing improvements to your marketing initiatives and helps with future planning.

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The market goes in one direction. It has a correction. Then it continues back in its trend direction. It has another correction and so on. Even in sideways or choppy market, there are ups and down in the price action.

It is like the continuous ebb and flow of the tides. You must learn to ebb and flow with the tides in the market. Setting stops on the key levels of price support are crucial. These key support levels represent significant market realities occurring with enough trade volume to warrant a stop loss level.

How do you reduce the possibility of getting stopped out of a perfectly good trend by the normal ebb and flow of the market? The market will continuously fluctuate. The answer lies in the current price, volume and volatility of the market.

The stops need to protect you from risk but they also need to allow the market freedom to fluctuate. You will need to ensure that your trading system and approach take these factors into consideration so as to allow your stops to ebb and flow with the markets.

If you know how to listen to the market, the market will tell you where to set your stop loss. To choose a random exit that does not include the crucial information the market is giving you at any time is ignoring what the market is telling you.

You need to learn how to identify the correct stop loss based on the market dynamics. Then learn to adjust your trade size to manage your dollar loss. Never ever use an arbitrary dollar amount like, “I will get out of the trade when it goes against me $200.”

A stop loss protects you from different types of risks. The value of having the stop loss in place prior to entering the market is that you can unemotionally determine the best exits possible for the different types of risk like the trade risk, the market risk, the liquidity risk, the margin risk, overnight risk and the volatility risk.

Your stop loss position is determined by how much risk you are willing to take. The position of your initial stop should be based on the rule of 2% risk on your trading account. For some advanced traders it is sometimes beneficial to risk more than 2% of their trading account on a single trade. However, the amount these traders risk must be carefully calculated depending on their proven historical performance statistics.Try Netpicks forex signal service free for two weeks. First practice on your forex demo account. Know these candlestick patterns.

One of the greatest challenges for any trader is to finally come to the point where he/she firmly believes that a sound money and risk management program is vital. Placing stop loss correctly is an important part of the money and risk management program. Remember the saying that there should be some method to your madness. Learn the yin and yang of trading.

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Position your stop loss in relation to the market activity. Many traders incorrectly choose a stop so their loss is the same amount each time they are stopped out. Don’t pick an arbitrary place to put your stop loss.Develop your own forex trading system. Read about trend forex system. Try Netpicks forex signals free for two weeks.

You need to place the stops in accordance with the market conditions. If you use an arbitrary place for your stops, you are completely disregarding the meaningful market support and resistance levels where the stops should be placed.

Try to set your initial stop 3% below the support level. The important thing in this method is to correctly identify the support area. Test this method and see if it works for you.

Suppose you have a trading system that can determine an entry point but does not provide an exit based on the market dynamics. First you need to identify the support area. Set your stop loss 3% below the support area.

For example, suppose that the support level in a bullish trend is $30. You should set the stop loss at 3% below the support level in a bullish trend if you have an area of support at $30. The formula that you will use is $30 (support price)*0.97 (3 percent less) = $29.1 (Initial Stop Loss Level).

For example to say that you are willing to lose $200 in a trade is to disregard the current market conditions. Do not use arbitrary stops based on flat dollar amounts that you are willing to lose.

Another approach can be to set your stop loss one tick below the support in a bullish trend or one tick above the support in a bearish trend. If you do not use stops at all, you are inviting failure.

For example in trading stocks, you are in trouble if you do not use stops and hang on to a losing trade to the point that you emotionally feel that the loss is so large that you cannot exit the trade.

Some professional traders use mental stops only. In the currency market it is better not to put the stop actually in the market when you have the position on. Your broker will see your stop and if there are enough similar stops, the broker may try and hit your stop. This way the broker makes money and you do not.

In such a market like the currency market, you can set a mental stop and get out quickly if you are hit. But this will need psychological toughness and discipline to get out when you are supposed to get out.

Never move your stop for emotional reasons especially when it is your initial stop. As new trailing stops are determined, you can move your stops to lock in profits. In case you add on to your winning trade by increasing your trade size, you must adjust your stops to keep your risk in relation to your trade size.

When adjusting your stop due to an increase in trade size, always move the stop closer to the current position to lower the risk in relation to your larger trade size.

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