How to Write a Marketing Plan Summary
A marketing plan is essential when launching a new business or product because it helps you define your overall marketing goals. This plan guides your marketing activities, which can include building brand awareness, establishing your competitive advantage, growing your customer base, and attracting new leads.
Marketing plans can be complex documents, as they provide many details about your overall marketing goals and supporting activities. That’s why it’s important to also write an executive summary for your marketing plan.
What is an executive summary?
As the name suggests, an executive summary provides a brief overview of your marketing plan. In one or two pages, it describes the main results of your marketing research and provides an overview of your brand objectives, marketing objectives and related activities. Its objective is to present the most important information for your short and long term marketing plans.
FOR YOUR INFORMATION: An executive summary is usually one or two pages that outline the marketing plan.
Importance of executive summary in a marketing plan
A marketing plan has several advantages:
- It helps you understand the needs of your target audience.
- It allows you to market your products to meet the specific needs of your customers.
- It determines the content you need to produce to support your marketing efforts.
- It describes your competitive advantage and your unique selling points.
The marketing plan is your guide to effectively marketing your business. The executive summary highlights the most important goals, actions, and research findings of your marketing plan. It’s designed to grab readers’ attention and make sure they quickly understand where your business is going and how it plans to get there.
What to Include in a Marketing Plan Summary
The executive summary should cover the main parts of your marketing plan, as well as information about your company and brand, your products or services, the market, and your general direction. While the marketing plan is usually written in sections separated by subheadings, the executive summary is usually written as a series of paragraphs, with each paragraph focusing on one section of the marketing plan.
In addition to your business name, location, and contact information, include the following information in your summary:
introduction
Your summary should begin with an introduction that briefly explains what the reader can expect. It provides valuable context and will make the following points easier to understand. Briefly explain the project, the purpose of your marketing plan and the main benefits for potential customers. Keep the introduction simple, short and direct.
Example: This plan is presented for the XYZ company, which sells widgets for the computer industry. We have created a new widget for the health sector, and our marketing plan will show that we have a unique opportunity to expand into a new market.
Description of your company and your team
Briefly describe your business, including its history, structure, customer base and sales figures. List the key people involved in the business, including their positions and responsibilities, their respective skills and experience, and their responsibilities in achieving your marketing goals. Include relevant external service providers (eg accountants, marketing experts and suppliers).
Example: XYZ Company has been around since 2010 and is based in Anaheim, CA. We sell widgets for the IT industry, which are designed to increase energy efficiency and reduce operating costs.
Description of market drivers and trends
Describe the market and industry sectors in which you sell your products and services, as well as the main trends affecting them. List the factors influencing the market, the innovations taking place and the major drivers or players involved.
Example: There are several large companies and a few smaller, specialized companies that sell similar widgets to the IT industry. Innovations in this market can cause disruption, but only when they offer significant benefits in terms of savings or efficiency.
Description of the products or services marketed
Describe your products or services and explain their key features and benefits. Describe the unique selling propositions of your products or services to show how they differ or are better than competitors’ offerings.
Example: We have created a new widget for the health sector, which is outside of our current market. This new product offers healthcare companies greater efficiencies and cost savings not currently offered by existing products. There are similar products designed for other industries, but there are currently no widgets designed specifically for the healthcare industry.
Description of your customer base and related marketing activities
Describe the key aspects of your target audience, as well as how you identify those customers. Briefly explain where you find your target customers and how you will reach them. Describe your promotional strategy, including its main objectives and related timelines. Describe your top marketing priorities and how they relate to specific business activities (eg, entering a new market, creating new products). Explain the methods you will use to distribute your products or services.
Example: Our target market is large healthcare companies, including hospitals, clinics and healthcare device manufacturers. We plan to do a marketing campaign through direct sales and social media marketing.
Summary of financial planning and projections
Clearly define key financial information related to short-term and long-term marketing activities. Provide line-by-line budget details for individual activities and related metrics to determine their success.
Example: Our marketing budget for the year is $100,000, which will be allocated to the following marketing activities.
Summary of General Objectives and Related Strategies
Briefly describe the objectives of the project and the strategies that will be used to achieve these objectives. Conclude with a few sentences that will encourage the reader to revisit your marketing plan.
Example: We have developed a marketing plan that will help us quickly reach the major players in the healthcare industry and become the leading provider of widgets in this market. We will use our experience in selling to the IT industry to showcase the benefits of our widget.
Tips for writing an executive summary
These tips should help you create an effective summary of your marketing plan:
Write the executive summary last.
The executive summary is a brief overview of your marketing plan. Write the complete marketing plan before providing a summary of this plan. Once you have all the information you need for your marketing plan, you can decide what is important enough to include in the executive summary. Tell your story.
Anyone who reads the summary should come away with a complete understanding of your marketing goals. Tell your story. Explain what your business does and why you chose to do what you do. Talk about what matters to you, who helps you achieve your goals, and what you want to achieve with your marketing.
To take notes.
Take note of everything that comes out when you create your marketing plan. This could include interesting statistics, memorable moments, key findings about your competitors, anecdotes from management, ideas to support promotion, and newsworthy events. Find out what your favorite brands are doing, jot down anything interesting you’ve read in a blog or article, or remember an interesting tool or technology you can apply to your business. These ideas can be a source of inspiration for your summary.
Do your research.
Your executive summary should contain key data and conclusions, including an analysis of the market and your competitors, as well as budgetary and financial considerations. Your marketing plan will provide more detail, but the summary should contain important research data to engage your reader in your marketing plan.
Watch your words.
An executive summary is a professional document, so you should write it professionally. However, it should also reflect who you are as a person and as a business.
Your executive summary tells your story. What is your style ? What is the style of your audience? The tone of this document should match the tone of your marketing materials and your business.
Avoid clichés and hyperbole, as they seem inauthentic and can rub readers the wrong way. Clichés tend not to match the reality of your situation because they can promise too much of what you can actually deliver. Is your company best in class among all competitors? What determines the “best”? Make sure any affirmations you make are specific and measurable.
Remember marketing.
The summary is part of your marketing plan, so remember that its purpose is to get the word out about your business. Think about how you can position what you’ve written in the marketing plan in a concise way that will entice the reader to read on. Include a brief explanation of the most important and interesting information, as well as key takeaways, that will be important to the reader.
Keep it up to date.
Your marketing plan should change over time, as should your executive summary. Include any updates to your products, services or technologies, or any significant changes to your market and competitors. For example, COVID-19 has forced many companies to change their marketing strategies and business practices. Your executive summary should reflect the changes your company has made to its marketing plans to address market changes.
Marketing Plan Summary Templates
These templates will help you get started writing your marketing plan summary:
A marketing plan summary gives readers an overview of your company’s market opportunities and how you intend to pursue your target audience, in detail and with financial projections whenever possible. With these tips and templates, you can create a detailed marketing plan summary that articulates your company’s value proposition and a clear plan for turning leads and prospects into customers.
