Every December one of our clients looks forward to the local paper’s year-round Gardening Guide. Month-by-month prescribed activities help her ensure a beautiful, bountiful garden throughout the following year. Even during rainy January, there is something to do. Keeping a great garden is broken into manageable tasks, and she is rewarded month after month with amazing produce and flowers for her family and friends.

Growing your business isn’t that different from tending a garden. Trying to mow, plow, seed and water and grow in one weekend is impossible. Trying to cram marketing activities into one or two short weeks before you expect them to pay off is stressful and completely unproductive. Three Girls Media & Marketing recommends setting long-term publicity and marketing goals, and breaking them down into manageable activities over time, laying a structural framework. The rewards will follow all year long as your efforts come to fruition.

1. Plan in Advance. If planning 12 months’ worth of publicity activities is too daunting, focus one quarter at a time, say, January through March. Maybe a six-month plan is better for you. Regardless of what time range you choose, choose one and stick to it. It is imperative that you plan your actions in advance not only to stay on track, but because the best publicity opportunities usually don’t happen last minute. They are often fixed in advance, and only those who are prepared will benefit the most.

2. Set Realistic Goals. Perhaps you want to appear on a television show or be mentioned in a major magazine or newspaper. Maybe you want to be picked up by a blog- or website that caters to a specific audience. Social media may be a marketing goal – increasing fans or engagement on Facebook, Twitter or Google+. Maybe you don’t even know what your publicity goals are or what is possible! We highly recommend consulting a PR or marketing professional to determine the full breadth of goals to consider. Three Girls Media & Marketing specializes in matching publicity/marketing activities to specific businesses, and steer clients away from those that don’t make sense for them (See our special offer for a free consultation, at the end of this post).

3. Set a To-Do Schedule. Each publicity placement or marketing success is the result of having completed smaller tasks. Set a realistic schedule for getting grunt work done, whether it is one task per day or three tasks per week. If you take on too much at once, it will be overwhelming and you may give up. The staff at Three Girls Media & Marketing creates month-by-month game plans including step-by-step activities designed for a specific outcome. This kind of well-thought out plan saves time and money while achieving optimum results.

4. Evaluate Your Marketing Efforts Regularly. Every month, quarter or every six months, reevaluate your marketing and publicity efforts. Are they paying off? Did the magazine placement generate the website traffic you envisioned? Do you have more fans or likes on your social media platforms? More readers on your blog? Keep notes and records so you can review progress and change up plans if needed. Do more things that work, and get rid of activities that aren’t producing the results you’d like to see.

We wish you the best year in business yet!

Special Offer: Three Girls Media & Marketing Inc. loves working with small and emerging companies to raise their brand awareness and name recognition. We offer a complimentary 30-minute phone consultation. Email info@ThreeGirlsMedia.com to make your appointment today!

Photo Credit: rachel_titiriga