Unlock Your Marketing Potential: 22 Free Marketing Plan Templates

There’s no right or wrong when it comes to marketing plan templates. But where do you start? In this article, I’ve collected 22 free marketing plan templates to help you get those marketing juices flowing, and reach that target market with ease.

Don’t Start Your Marketing Plan Without Picking a Marketing Strategy

Before you explore these marketing plan templates, I wanted to share a simple hack that will make your marketing plans simpler and easier to implement.

The key is to choose your strategy first (you can do this by taking the Marketing Superpower Quiz)

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Your marketing strategy will define your primary lead generation marketing and distribution channels as:

• Paid Advertising: You’re going to use advertising to generate leads. This is best for business owners who would prefer to work directly with clients.
• Content marketing strategy: This marketing strategy is best for subject matter experts who use inbound marketing and content marketing to help their prospects and customers choose the best option for them.
• Direct marketing strategy: This marketing strategy is also good for experts, but in this case, the expert has a focus on a specific target audience, that suffers from a specific problem and the business has a specific solution to their problem.

After you’ve chosen your marketing strategy, you can choose the specific marketing channels or vehicles that you’re going to use in your marketing plan to deliver your marketing value proposition or message as defined by your marketing strategy.

So, if you decide to use content marketing as your marketing strategy, you’ll automatically want to use some element of search engine optimization so that your target target market finds you when they are searching for solutions online.

This simple marketing strategy process will work no matter which marketing plan template you choose.

Every Marketing Plan Needs a Unique Selling Proposition

Developing a unique selling proposition (USP) is an essential step when it comes to creating an effective marketing plan that’s more likely to reach your target audience, potential customers, and your marketing goals.

A strong USP allows your target audience to easily identify why they should choose your brand over another, and it will also help them remember you when making purchasing decisions. By highlighting the features perceived value and benefits that make your product or service better than the rest, consumers will be more likely to feel an affinity towards your brand and commit to buying from you instead of someone else.

You Have to Go Through the Marketing Process BEFORE You Create Your Marketing Plan

If you’re feeling overwhelmed by marketing overall and not sure where to focus, just follow the marketing process.

The first step for any marketing plan is to do some research. Research will help you identify your target market and choose your target customers. Doing competitive analysis will also help you understand what alternatives your customers have so that you can ultimately develop offers that people will want to buy.

Ultimate Marketing Plan Template List

These are very basic marketing plan templates. To do these marketing plans, I recommend that you choose a marketing strategy first.

 1. Small Business Trends

• General
• Direct Download, No signup/info needed.
• File: Free digital marketing plan template Word Document (.docx)
• 2 Marketing Plan Templates, with a mockup and a blank template

Small Business Trends understands the different struggles small and medium business owners go through. Featured on their site are two different one page marketing plans that can be used by any marketer or entrepreneur from any industry.

Aside from the templates, mockup samples are also available for download to guide you in making your own plan to reach your marketing goals.

I’m not being biased here (?) but this is the marketing plan I’ve been using for more than 20 years. I created two free marketing plan templates that you can download and use right away.

We’ve recently updated this marketing plan template so that you can read the article, fill out the simple marketing plant template form and download it for your own use.

2. Hubspot

• General
• Info Needed: Name, Email, Phone Number, Company Name; Onsite Download
• File: Word Document (.docx)

Hubspot offers several free marketing plan templates.

You’ll get a 5-step guide to creating a marketing plan to help you visualize your company’s goals business objectives and strategies into a coherent plan.

Aside from their free marketing plan template, the article also explains what makes each step essential in achieving marketing success.

3. Venngage

• General
• Sign-up required
• File: PNG and PDF (for free account), Interactive PDF and Microsoft Powerpoint (for Business Account)

Even if you’re not a pro at image editing, Venngage can help you make a beautiful and well-defined marketing plan. After signing up, you can head over to their wide selection of free and paid templates that you can use for your business and other online marketing campaigns.

I’m a BIG fan of visual marketing plans. And these free marketing plan templates are ideal if you’re visual too.

4. More Business

• General
• Info Needed: Name, Email, Download Link sent to Email
• File: Word Document (.docx)

The sample marketing plan made by More Business features seven (7) main components. As you go through each segment, you can see it’s filled out with a mobile gaming company as the sample presenter. Their free marketing plan templates are available in Word File and you can fill each section to create a solid structure to further your marketing goals.

5. Aha!

• General
• Direct Download, Optional Sign Up for 30-day Free Trial for More Templates
• File: Excel (.xslx) and PowerPoint (.pptx)

Aha offers a variety of free marketing plan templates that will fit different programs or marketing campaigns. With a lot to choose from, you can form the marketing plan that meets your needs and uses your marketing tactics to an advantage. In addition to this, you may also go for Aha’s free 30-day trial to access their web-based approach templates.

6. Talkwalker

• General
• Info Needed: Name, Email, Company Name; File sent to email
• File: PDF, Microsoft Word, Microsoft Excel

Talkwalker’s free bundle includes 8 free marketing plan templates with key elements such as a marketing plan, social media management, and content management. Their guide to marketing initiatives features the 12 essentials of a winning marketing plan suitable for both B2C and B2B.

7. Moosend

• General
• No info needed, Direct Google Sheets Access
• File: Google Sheets

Moosend’s marketing plan guide makes sure that you understand everything you need to know. It’s a great read for marketing newbies and a good refresher for most of us.

Their marketing plan template is readily accessible online and is already designed to make each section easy to comprehend.

8. Team Gantt

• General
• Optional Free Sign Up, Info Needed: Name, Email, Company Name
• File: Google Docs Direct Access; Web-based (in free account)

Team Gantt’s free strategic marketing plan template is fuss-free. It starts as a 4-page document with self-explanatory sections that guide you what information or data are needed. You can download it to have it on the go and you can also work on the marketing plan online with your marketing team.

9. Slite

• General
• Sign Up Required, no CC needed; Free Basic Account
• File: Web based, Can import data from Microsoft Word, Evernote, Google Drive, Confluence, as well as .html and text/markdown files

Slite’s free marketing plan templates are pretty straightforward, giving you a clean overview of every segment. What’s interesting is you can integrate their other free templates, such as the competitor watch, user persona, and launch checklist, into your main marketing plan examples. If you’re still not sure where to start, go through Slite’s quick guide to creating a marketing plan before experimenting with the platform.

10. Smartsheet

• Generel, Multi-Industry
• Direct Download; Free Sign Up is optional but requires company email
• File: Excel, PDF, Word, Google Doc, Smartsheet (Web-based)

Smartsheet features 8 different free marketing plan templates. Among these, you’ll find a one page marketing plan, a fully comprehensive business plan, and several industry or product specific templates. Smartsheet’s article will definitely be able to help any solopreneur, small business, or growing company make a well constructed plan.

11. Airtable

• General, Web Based
• Sign Up Required, no CC needed; Initial free Pro Trial but Regular Account is Free
• File: Web-based, Can import existing data from Google Sheets, Microsoft Excel, and other files in several formats

Airtable has a premade web-based marketing plan template that you can tweak. Their free account already has a lot to offer, with essential features such as app download for desktop and mobile, real time collaboration, and even the ability to add rich field types like dropdowns, attachments, and checkboxes.

12. Think Business

• General, SMB, Startups
• Direct Download
• File: Microsoft Word (.docx)

Think Business has a dedicated article on why you need a marketing plan and how you can create one to make sure your own marketing budget and your marketing efforts, don’t go down the drain. They also linked within the file other resources from their site that you will find useful for each step. This is a great starting point for startups or businesses seeking to get additional finance.

13. Xtensio

• Sign up to access save feature
• File: PNG with Xtensio watermarks

Explore Xtensio’s collaborative workspace and get to construct an engaging marketing plan with an elegant design and layout. Even with the free template, you’ll be able to add sections and modules as you please. There are numerous module options such as adding a SWOT analysis, task list, different charts, and even a user persona layout.

Digital and Social Media Marketing

14. Vital

• Digital Marketing
• Info Needed: Name, Email, Company Name, Number of Employees, Industry; Onsite download
• File: Zipped file, Microsoft Word (.docx) for the Template, Microsoft Excel (.xlsx) for the Planning Guide

Vital’s guide to writing a marketing plan is a comprehensive one. From tackling why you need one in the first place, what kind of research is needed, to how you should structure your plan, they got  you covered. Their free marketing plan template is available for download onsite.

15. Smart Insights

• Digital Marketing,
• Sign Up Required; Info Needed: Name, Email, Company Profile (Nature, Number of Team Members, Etc); No CC needed
• File: PDF

Smart Insight’s free digital marketing plan template is based on their RACE planning system which features the six pillars of effective digital and marketing planning. Once you’ve downloaded the file, you’ll see that Smart Insight’s template contains questions under each pillar regarding your digital marketing activities.  Sure, signing up for the free membership is required but it only takes less than 5 minutes and you’ll have access to their other free digital marketing resources.

16. Mayple

• Digital Marketing
• No info needed, Direct Google Sheets Access
• File: Google Sheets

Mayple’s free template comes with a very handy guide, covering the basics down to the more advanced details of a marketing plan. Some of the subsections in the template are pre-filled to serve as examples. 

Has videos to explain. Their marketing plan template is truly comprehensive yet remains to be organized and easy to adapt.

17. Instagantt

• Digital Marketing
• Sign Up required for 7 Day Free Trial; No CC required
• File: Web-based software

It’s Instagantt’s goal to make progress become visual for everyone involved in the same project or team. Signing up for a 7-day free trial  is required before you can access Instagantt’s digital marketing plan template but it is worth it. There are two main options which are Instagantt Standalone and Instagantt for Asana and you can also choose to start with an example project with sample data to get you more familiar with the platform.

18. Hootsuite

• Social Media Marketing
• Info Needed: Email, Name (Direct Online Access to Template)
• File: Google Slides

Perhaps you already have your mind on a specific marketing strategy that you want to focus on. Head over to Hootsuite’s 8-step guide to creating a plan for your social media strategy. You wouldn’t have to worry about getting lost as you build your plan because the slides are pre-structured but each content explains what you need to fill it in with.

Products and Services

19. Zoho Marketing Plus

• B2B
• SaaS Bundled Apps

Unified Marketing Platform for Marketing Teams | Zoho Marketing Plus

An outstanding overall marketing tool for small business owners. You can run your entire marketing plan from this single dashboard and integrated tools; social media, email, marketing automation and more

Buy NowWe earn a commission if you click this link and make a purchase at no additional cost to you.

20. Sumo

• B2C
• Direct Google Sheets Access
• File: Google Sheets

Sumo features 3 marketing plan templates that you can use depending on your marketing goal whether it’s to increase blog traffic, build an email list, or grow ecommerce revenue. Along with the templates, the article guides you step-by-step through the campaign plan and 12-week time frame.

21. Five Star Content

• Hotel Marketing
• Info Needed: Name and Email; File sent to email
• Format: Powerpoint or Google Slides (.pptx)

This one does stand out from the bunch as it covers a marketing plan for hotels. Five Star Content not only covers how to make a solid marketing plan specific to the industry but they also have an article addressing the strategy dilemmas when reopening during Covid 19. You’ll find the marketing template very easy to work on as the template is flexible and there are pre-made slides for SWOT analysis, pricing strategy, and channel marketing mix.

Conclusion

Overwhelmed? Don’t be.

Pick a template that feels the most comfortable for you and start filling in the blanks. Don’t be afraid to experiment or try out new strategies- after all, that’s what a marketing plan is for! And if you get stuck along the way, feel free to email me with your questions (ivana@diymarketers.com). So go forth and market away!