What is a marketing strategy?
A marketing strategy is the thinking behind your marketing. It answers four questions: who are your best customers, what do they need, why should they pick you, and where will they find you. Everything else, from your website to your leaflets, follows from those answers.
It sits inside your wider business plan. The UK government's guide to writing a business plan describes it as a written document that covers objectives, strategies, sales, marketing and financial forecasts. The marketing strategy is the part that explains how the customers in your forecast will actually arrive.
Without one, marketing becomes a string of one-off tries. A post here, an advert there, and no way to tell which one brought in work.
What goes into a marketing strategy?
A small business strategy should be short enough to read in ten minutes. It needs six parts, each written in plain words you could explain to a new member of staff in a minute.
- Goals: what you want marketing to achieve this year, such as more booked jobs in one area or more repeat customers.
- Target customer: who buys from you, what problem they have and how they choose a supplier.
- Positioning: why a customer should pick you over the other options. Our guide to what a unique selling point is helps you find yours.
- Channels: where those customers look, such as Google search, Google Maps, email, social media or word of mouth.
- Spend: what you will put in, in money and time each month, and on which channels.
- Measures: the numbers that show whether it is working, such as enquiries and the cost of each new customer.
If one part is missing, the rest gets weaker. A clear spending plan is no help if you have not decided who you are trying to reach.
What is the difference between a marketing strategy and a marketing plan?
The strategy is the why and the what. The plan is the how and the when. Your strategy says you will win more local homeowners through search and reviews. Your plan lists the jobs that make it happen, with dates, costs and a name beside each one.
Most owners need both. The strategy changes rarely, perhaps once a year. The plan changes every month as you learn what works.
How do you write a marketing plan for a small business?
Start from your strategy, then break it into steps small enough to finish in a week. Write down what you do today before you add anything new. Here is a simple order to follow.
- Write one sentence each for your goal, your target customer and your reason to choose you.
- List every way customers find you now, and ask your last 20 customers how they heard of you.
- Pick two or three channels that match where your customers look. Drop the rest for now.
- Decide what you will put into each channel each month, in money and in hours.
- Turn each channel into tasks with a date and an owner. For example, "publish one helpful guide a month" or "ask every customer for a review".
- Choose how you will measure each channel, and put a date in the diary to review it.
Our list of small business marketing ideas can help you fill in step three. Keep the plan short enough that you will actually read it again.
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What does a marketing strategy look like for a small business?
Here is an illustrative example, not a real firm. Sam runs a two-van plumbing business in Bristol. Most work comes from word of mouth, which is steady but slow, and the diary has quiet weeks in summer.
- Goal: more boiler servicing work, booked ahead, to fill the quiet summer weeks.
- Target customer: homeowners within a short drive who want a reliable firm and will pay for a tidy job.
- Positioning: fixed-price servicing, a booking slot within the week and a text reminder each year.
- Channels: a fast website with a clear booking form, the Google Business Profile, and reviews after every job.
- Measures: servicing bookings each month, where each one came from and how many customers book again.
The strategy makes the next steps obvious. Sam writes one helpful guide on boiler care, asks every customer for a review and sends each servicing customer a reminder. Nothing on that list needs a bigger team.
Why does a good marketing strategy take real skill and time?
Writing a first draft takes an evening. Making it work takes months, because the hard part is testing what really brings in customers, then doing more of it. That needs research, steady work on each channel and care with the rules.
- Research: finding out who your best customers are, what they search for and what makes them choose one firm over another.
- Content and search: content marketing and a search engine optimisation (SEO) strategy take months of regular work before they bring in steady enquiries.
- Advertising rules: the Committee of Advertising Practice (CAP) writes the UK advertising code. The CAP Code is the rule book for adverts, sales promotions and direct marketing, and it includes rules on evidence to prove your claims.
- Email and text marketing: the Information Commissioner's Office (ICO) guide to electronic mail marketing sets the rule. You must not send marketing emails or texts to individuals without specific consent. There is a limited exception for your own previous customers. This is general information, not legal advice; check the ICO guidance for your case.
- Measuring: tracking where each enquiry came from, so you stop paying for channels that do not work.
- Upkeep: reviewing the plan when prices, services or customers change.
All of that has to fit around quoting, doing the work and running the books. It is why so many owners write a strategy once and never look at it again.
How do you know if your marketing strategy is working?
Watch the numbers your strategy named, not the ones that are easy to find. Likes and page views matter less than enquiries, booked jobs and repeat customers. Check them once a month and compare each channel against what it costs you.
- Ask every new customer how they found you, and write it down.
- Count enquiries by channel: your website form, phone calls, your map listing and referrals.
- Work out the cost of each new customer for every paid channel.
- Follow the steps from first contact to booking, as in our guide to customer journey mapping, and fix the places where people drop out.
If a channel has had a fair trial and still brings nothing, move that time and money to one that works.
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Yes. Buzzozo is a premium, done-for-you service for UK small businesses. We build your strategy around your customers, then do the work: your website, search engine optimisation, local search, AI search and ads. You get one team that knows your business, so you can get on with the jobs that pay.
See what we do and what it costs. Your managed website comes designed, written and built for you. Hosting, security, on-page search engine optimisation and UK support by phone, WhatsApp and email are all included.
Website plans start at £149 a month, at the founding price for the first 100 businesses. Marketing work such as search engine optimisation and ads is quoted around your goals. Compare the plans and prices, or start your free 14-day trial. No card needed, no contract, and you can cancel any time.
Common questions
How long should a small business marketing strategy be?
Short is better: most small businesses need only a few clear paragraphs. It should name your goal, your target customer, why they should choose you, your main channels, what you will spend and how you will measure results. If it is too long to read in ten minutes, nobody will use it.
How often should you review your marketing strategy?
Review the strategy once a year, or sooner if your prices, services or customers change. Review the marketing plan that sits under it every month. Look at enquiries and bookings from each channel, then move time and money towards the channels that bring in work.
Do you need a marketing strategy if you get work by word of mouth?
Yes, if you want to choose your work rather than wait for it. Word of mouth is a channel too, and a strategy helps you grow it with reviews and follow-ups. It also gives you a second source of customers for the weeks when referrals go quiet.