Does your firm have a marketing plan? Do you know where it is? If your firm's marketing plan is sitting on a shelf, if you aren't getting the new business results you want, if you have a plan and don't know what to do with it - read on. A well-developed marketing plan can put you on the road to results.

Like any other good instruction manual, we must start at the beginning. Let's get rid of any misconceptions you may have.

What A Marketing Plan Is

A well-defined marketing plan is your firm's road map to results. It will guide you from your current destination to your target destination. It should be a document that is used and revised as needed (no one says you have to live and die by what you decide to do today). You can develop an effective marketing plan by following a tried-and-true series of steps.

What A Marketing Plan Is Not

A marketing plan isn't some fancy, intelligently written (although it should be clearly communicated) 100-page document that "wows" people. It isn't a document that will take months to create. It isn't going to take the latest and greatest desktop publishing software available to create. A marketing plan that works isn't something that only the marketing director and the marketing partners understand.

Stay tuned - the next part covers:

· Where are you now?
· Where are you going?

This is the first part of a three-part article that will help you develop a great marketing plan that really gets results. This article series is meant to be a hands-on tool that allows you to immediately impact your firm.