How to Set SMART Marketing Goals in 5 Steps

It pays to be smart – SMART about your goals, anyway. If your current marketing goals are just “I want to make money,” it’s time to sit down and come up with some tangible goals. 

Defining goals is the best way to track your marketing success and get the most bang for your buck. And the best type of goals are SMART goals.

What Are SMART Goals?

SMART goals are:

1. Specific – Your goal needs to be unambiguous and clear.
2. Measurable – You should define a concrete way of measuring progress toward your goal.
3. Attainable – It needs to be realistically achievable for your team.
4. Relevant – Your goal needs to make sense for your business and overall business goals.
5. Timely – It’s important to set a time limit on goals to keep them in check.

With these criteria, you can go beyond a vague idea to something more solid. By setting SMART goals, you can most effectively track your success and ROI. 

How Do I Set SMART Goals?

This is where you can integrate your goals directly into your inbound marketing strategy. We’ll use BizzyWeb as an example. We have a download we’ve created as part of our inbound strategy. A SMART goal for the download might look like:

“We want to see at least 20 downloads of the checklist and at least 5 warm leads from the checklist within one month.” 

It checks off all the requirements for a SMART goal:

1. Specific – “At least 20 downloads of the checklist”
2. Measurable – “At least 5 warm leads”
3. Attainable – Our team could use this base to create more marketing materials, like online ads and email drip campaigns.
4. Relevant – Since this checklist appeals to our target market, it’s relevant to our business goals.
5. Timely – “Within one month.”

Now that you’ve got your SMART goals, you can create new marketing strategies to help them come to life.

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Stay on Target with Our SMART Goals Template

The first step to any digital marketing or Growth-Driven Design project is setting the right SMART goals. SMART is a methodology that helps you establish concrete and achievable goals. SMART stands for: Specific Measurable Attainable Relevant and Time Bound. Use our FREE template to set your SMART goals and grow your marketing.

Need a new digital marketing or web design plan? We are a Minneapolis SEO, digital marketing, social media marketing, web design and HubSpot inbound marketing agency. We’re located just outside of Minneapolis. Stop on by and get started – and while you’re here, pick up a free honey stick (yes, we love our bee-related theme).

Note: This blog was originally published 2/9/2018, updated 4/19/2019 for accuracy