Essentials to building a marketing roadmap

A roadmap can be a powerful tool to provide strategic and clear direction for the year ahead… only works if the organization uses it.

In my experience roadmaps cannot be created in silos, because then you get several paths but not one clear one. 

As a result: 

• Misalignment between departments, sometimes even friction  

• No clear vision 

• Several priorities but no “real” priorities 

• Working on too many things, but not moving the needle  

However when done right, gives you the blueprint you need to move the business forward.

Here are the essentials to building a marketing roadmap:

• Alignment with business goals

  • Your roadmap is meant to be a plan to show how marketing activities will support the business. It’s important as a marketing leader to work with other business leaders to thoroughly understand and align on what the core business goals are for the year. These should be set before creating the roadmap. Realistically that isn’t always the case so in those instances align on what the priorities are for a set duration (eg 6 months) or which priorities are the biggest bets. Marketing can best support business growth when it's crystal clear on business priorities.

    
    

• Prioritizing is key

  • It is easy to get caught up in “smaller tasks”, but those take time. Don’t be focused on volume, but impact. Within your roadmap consider creating themes or buckets where you capture key business priorities. That should be the foundation of your document. From there, start to plug in all the activities that will help you support the business. What I do is have a running list of all the projects we worked on in the previous year as well as expected upcoming ones and start plugging them into those buckets. You should aim to have everything map back to a business goal and if it doesn’t fall into a bucket, have a conversation on where it may sit.

    
    

• Cross-functional alignment

  • A great way to build collaboration with cross functional teams such as Sales and Technology is to share your roadmap. I have done this in the past and it helps to create trust and transparency. They can see what marketing has in the pipeline for the year and have an opportunity to share what is on their radar as well. No surprises and helps your departments come from a place of understanding and ensure you are on the same page. 

With 15+ years leading growth, digital, and brand strategy across B2B and B2C organizations, I partner with companies to build smarter marketing functions, align strategy to business goals, and drive measurable impact. If you’re looking for a fractional or full-time marketing leader who brings both strategy and execution to the table, let’s connect.