If you’re launching a new product, designing a sale or getting your business ready now for your version of Black Friday or Small Business Saturday, there are series of steps that you need to include in the planning process in order to create the most effective campaign.

1) What do we want our customer to do 30 days after the purchase?

This is such a great place to start because it lets you begin with the end in mind. So often all we think about is how to get the sale. This question forces you to think about how you get the result, the next sale or the referral and puts the emphasis squarely on creating a total customer experience.

2) What message will create the most interest?

For the most part no one really wants to buy what you sell, but they do want to achieve a result, save money, vanquish a demon, make money and feel more in control. How will you tell the story that helps them understand that’s what you’re selling? Get your messaging right, focus it on a narrowly defined ideal customer and start the process of education.

3) How many formats and delivery vehicles can we create for the message?

Would your message benefit from a series of supporting video messages, an eBook, blog posts, an online seminar? These days prospects have grown to expect a full suite of educational information to accompany a sales message. How will you let your prospect sample the results or the process they are considering?

4) What are the ways our message can intersect with our prospects?

Now it’s time to put your message in front of the prospect. How will you employ advertising, public relations, referral generation, email, partners and social networks to create the greatest amount of awareness, repetition and consistency of message aimed at your ideal target customer?

5) What is the ultimate pathway we want our prospect to travel?

Go through the precise “ideal” way you want a prospect to become aware of your campaign and then design how you intend them to move from know, like and trust to try and buy. What small steps do you intend them to take to move closer to the decision to buy.

6) What is our call to action mechanism at each point along the way?

How are you going to motivate your prospects to take each progressive step? What words, buttons, links and value exchanges will you employ to keep your prospect engaged?

7) What is the next thing we intend to sell?

Some might find this last step a bit crass at this point, but you don’t have to think about it that way. If your products and services deliver a positive result, you should always be thinking about new ways to do that. Your campaigns should always have an integrated product or service suite element that automatically upsells, introduces additional options and even downsells when a prospect decides they aren’t ready to make a decision on your current campaign.

For example, as you offer a new consulting service, you could either offer some additional “done for you” add ons for those that decide to buy or a $79 DIY program for those that pass on your initial offer.

I think the point here is that you adopt a routine and process that makes you stop and consider this holistic approach to campaign design. Often, by simply stopping for moment to consider these powerful questions you’ll find ways to make any offer much stronger and much more customer focused.