The more challenging the task, the more critical the plan. Effective marketing is increasingly difficult in today’s world because there is so much noise competing for your client’s attention. Attention spans have dropped and skepticism toward advertising is up. In spite of this, few businesses invest the time to build a great marketing plan. Many businesses have trouble understanding how to create a workable plan for today’s challenging environment and a surprising number simply never build a plan at all, applying the fly-by-the-seat-of-your-pants marketing method. In a nutshell, this is why marketing plans fail.

Too often I’ve arrived at a business to help only after they’ve spent a small fortune trying to reach clients with little or no response. I will share with you what I find to be the most common marketing mistake so you can build a powerful plan and turn marketing into a competitive advantage instead of a headache.

Let’s assume you want take control of your business’s growth, you know marketing is important and you have committed to build a solid plan. How do you build a plan that will work? Why do so many plans fail to generate growth?

A quick Google search on marketing planning will illustrate the problem.  There are great articles from very reputable sources many of which will tell you the same basic thing: Start with some form of situational analysis, list your target audience and goals, and then develop your tactics. Several of the articles state that tactics are the heart of your marketing plan.

Not surprisingly most businesses focus their marketing plans on tactics. Why shouldn’t they? Tactics are exciting. They are what most people think of when they think of marketing. Tactics are the part of marketing you can see, touch, and feel: the advertising, the gimmicks, the design work, the website. Unfortunately, tactics are not the heart of a functional marketing plan, they are the byproduct.

Effective marketing is best thought of like an iceberg. What you see floating on the surface is supported by a much larger body of work and thought hidden underneath. There is a recent Under Armor commercial featuring Michael Phelps training intensely.  It states, “it is what you do in the dark that puts you in the light.” This is especially true of marketing.

The heart of your marketing is developing and clarifying a meaningful unique value proposition and translating it into the language of your customers. It is about having something valuable to say.  If you do not have a compelling message, it doesn’t matter what tactic you use to deliver it.  Most business need to spend more time on the What and Why, before they worry about the How and where of marketing. If you understand this simple truth you will be ahead of most of your competitors.

Great marketing planning begins with great questions. If you want to develop a meaningful unique value in the language of your customer you must ask the right questions.

To help you dig deeper and get more out of your marketing plan here are some key questions to explore:

People usually answer with demographics (example: males 35-55 years old) which is often meaningless.  Instead pretend you are an actor preparing for a major role by getting in the mind of your customer.  What drives them?  Do they care about speed, quality or status? What are their fears, their desires, their like and dislikes? The more deeply you understand who your customers are (and who they are not), what they have in common, and what makes them tick, the better.

First, ask them.  It is amazing how few businesses actually ask their clients what they want. What do they like or dislike about their experience? What would they improve? Why? Don’t just assume you know.

Second, dig in and take the time to think about what you learned. What do they really want and how can you innovate to give it to them?  Henry Ford famously said “if I asked my customers what they wanted they would have said, faster horses.”

So many businesses think they have a unique value until I get them to secret shop their competitors. They are shocked to realize that their competitors look and sound a lot more like them than they want to admit. When you are in your business everyday it is easy to forget that your customer may know very little about you or your industry. If you don’t have a clear honest view of how your competitors appear to your clients, you cannot find specific ways to differentiate yourself that are compelling.

What is normal in your industry? What problem might your customer have with the status quo? How do you solve that problem for them?

Thoughtfully answering these questions will put you light years ahead of most of your competition. This is a big topic and we can go much deeper but I hope this will start on a journey of deep exploration and continual improvement with your marketing.

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Scott Mitchell is the Director of Growth Gizmo , a training firm specializing in marketing consulting and executive coaching for entrepreneurs.

For more than 15 years, Scott has worked in marketing and executive coaching with over three thousand businesses in more than 100 industries in at least 14 states. These experiences have allowed him to develop a deep understanding of the patterns that lead to success or failure in business.