Here's a tip for systemizing and increasing the profits of virtually any business: Create and use a marketing calendar.

As P.T. Barnum reportedly said, "Without promotion something terrible happens: Nothing." Since marketing is one of the most critical components of business success, a marketing calendar helps ensure that time is regularly set aside for it.

Just as with money, if time isn't budgeted properly it's more likely to be wasted or spent on less important things.

Without advance planning and preparation, marketing opportunities are more likely overlooked, less time is available to take advantage of them, and quality decreases as mistakes increase, according to the adage, Haste makes waste.

A marketing calendar helps systemize planning and preparation, minimizing such problems.

How To Create Your Marketing Calendar

Some develop their annual marketing calendars near the end of the year, in preparation for the next. Regardless of the time of year, if you're not currently using one now is a good time to start.

To create your marketing calendar you can use an Excel sheet (my preference), a desk or wall calendar, a day planner, or any other tool or system you're comfortable with. How you set it up is less important than that you set it up, and that you use it.

What you might record on your marketing calendar:

1) Specific day, week, or month assigned to each marketing project.

2) Project description.

3) Project cost.

4) Project notes or comments.

5) A rating of the results of each project (A = Excellent, B = Good, C = Fair, and D = Poor).

You don't have to list each task of multi-step projects on your calendar. Instead, you can describe projects briefly on the calendar and list the individual tasks comprising each one on a To-Do list (which you probably keep anyway if you're a productivity minded person).

Or you may assign different tasks of a project to separate consecutive calendar dates.

Give priority to proven marketing avenues that pay off best for you, allowing them ample time for completion.

Periodically add projects related to marketing avenues you haven't tried before. You may discover some that yield dramatically better results.

What's more, marketing diversification reduces risk. Just ask those whose businesses have nosedived as a result of adverse changes in an advertising medium they've relied too heavily upon.

For best results, include projects related to testing new approaches to marketing avenues you're now using, or have used before. Small changes can yield substantial response increases at little or no extra cost, possibly turning C- and D-rated projects into A- and B-rated ones.

Locate your marketing calendar for easy access. Consult and update it regularly, as needed.

When creating next year's calendar, recycle winning elements of your current one, especially A- and B-rated projects. Expand on what works, and test and tweak, or eliminate, what doesn't. As you develop, improve, and use your calendar it will become an increasingly valuable business asset.

Now that you understand the value of a marketing calendar, create and implement one right away and start enjoying better business results from it.