New company branding: $12,300, new website to match brand: $8,650, new commercial campaign for brand: $16,900, not knowing if these efforts will pay off for your business, priceless…… for your competition!

Knowing if your marketing will pay off is all about understanding the relationship between expected returns and cost, or in other words knowing your expected ROI (return on investment). Knowing this relationship saves you tons on money on wasted marketing gimicks and has the added benefit of breeding optimism within a company. This is why the savvy company takes time to evaluate return on investment scenarios. The benefits include:

You’ve done your work, spent the time, and cranked out a great strategic marketing plan, well done. Pat yourself on the back and take a deep breath, because only half the work is done. Implementation can be just as daunting as putting together the strategic marketing plan itself. Without successful implementation the best plan becomes useless. This short article will outline 5 key steps to successfully implementing a strategic marketing plan.
First Things First
Let’s clearly get a hold of what implementation entails. In a most technical sense it involves managing change.

One of the biggest headaches in marketing is caused by not knowing. Not knowing if your marketing investment will pay off; not knowing if your campaign will reach the intended audience; not knowing if you have wisely spent your marketing dollar. Let’s face it, not knowing is what stops businesses from trying new things, engaging new strategies, and putting forth continual marketing effort.
If we could eliminate or control the unknown factor in our marketing, we could alleviate this big headache. This is easier said than done, because marketing is complex,

I was at one of my favorite restaurants Phuket, a great little Thai food spot, when I noticed something wonderful. My water glass stayed full. This was amazing, because I was more than thirsty after coming from working out.
You see, the glasses they use at the restaurant were not big enough to hold a lot of water. They also were more than half full of ice. This made the job of keeping them filled with water harder than it had to be. Why not use bigger glasses, I thought? Why

Internet Retailer Top 500 Guide (Recommend Resource)
If you are looking to go into business online, or are trying to improve your online businesses take a look at the Internet Retailer Top 500 Guide. This guide is an invaluable resource that ranks the top 500 ecommerce retailers each year. You get all the information you need to understand trends, best practices, and what all the big players are doing in the online market.
Pros:

great overview of who is doing what
good information about