Proposals Messing Up Your Marketing Plans

We’ve worked with a few general contractors lately to get their marketing calendars in order for 2015. Together, we plot out the year with tradeshows, conferences, ad deadlines, company milestones, and even personal vacations. We do this in order to schedule out specific goals and action items to be completed by them and our team throughout the year.

Most of the time, this is the company’s first attempt at planning out their marketing for the year since the industry is known for “shooting from the hip”. Usually, our clients get excited and plan to get everything they’ve ever dreamed about doing completed within six months. We work to make their goals and workload more flexible because we know things pop up. In particular, proposals pop up.

As they say, the best-laid plans often go awry (adapted from Of Mice and Men). When proposals are due, they take precedence, and long-term marketing needs have to move to the back burner temporarily. Unfortunately, many companies pursue way too many proposals so that temporarily postponement gets shoved to never-ever-going-to-happen. They don’t appear again until it’s time for an annual review, and you realize you’ve gotten nothing accomplished for the year.

It is important to remember that the unexpected happens, and proposals will take you away from your day-to-day and long-term plans, so account for those proposals in your plan. Figure out how many proposals you’ve pursued the past few years and determine a monthly average. For easy numbers, let’s say your firm goes after 24 bids annually, so you have two proposals a month to plan around. Block off your time to get these proposals done and still have time for your long-term plans.

The key is to plan your time conservatively. If you only have one proposal due, move your action items up a few weeks and knock them out, so you’re ready to tackle three bids simultaneously the next month. Also, people get sick [on bid day], and new plans will pop up too. If you’re planning more than three months out, make sure to plan 10-15% of your time to new endeavors, even if that time is just for research. Many professionals get stuck working on today’s tasks that they miss key opportunities and ways to become more efficient for the long-term [e.g. proposal template, marketing automation, or building out a system].