For many of us in Marketing, this is now the business end of the year. Plans and budgets have been prepared, strategies decided, now it's time to execute.

When I come to execute a marketing campaign, I need to have the confidence to push through the anxiety that inevitably comes with having your work in front of the market. One of the most effective ways I’ve found is an old checklist I have.

I use this to assess whether we should start a campaign or not. Having something concrete like this gives certainty that I haven’t forgotten something and that what I am doing is a good idea.

Here’s the list I use every time I kick off a marketing campaign.

1. Are we aligned with our business?

Ultimately as marketers, we’re part of a bigger team. If we aren’t aligned with what the product team is building, the sales team are selling and the client team is supporting - we won't get the buy-in from those teams to help make the campaign a success.

2. Do we have a specific focus?

The narrower our focus as marketers, the better our understanding of our audience and the more effective our message will be. An industry is a good start, a group of similar companies is better, one company is ideal and one person is perfect.

3. Do we have a measurable goal & KPI’s?

This should almost go without saying, but too often a campaign will either lack an overarching goal, a series of smaller key performance indicators or a way to measure both. An overarching goal is a focus, the KPI’s help us to understand why a campaign performed the way it did.

4. Are we bringing value to customers?

Is what we are putting in front of the market going to be useful. Are we delivering something that will help their understanding of their problems? If the answer to this is no, then the campaign probably needs to be rethought.

5. Do we have a follow-up plan?

Whatever kind of campaign you’re running, you’ll need a follow on plan. Running social ads? What’s your follow up to the people that like and comment? Or perhaps you’ve got a whitepaper just published - how are you going to convert that into leads?