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The first-quarter numbers are in. How’s business? For many firms, their marketing starts out with a bang in January, but by now the grind of the day-to-day has reduced the bang to a whimper.

Re-examining your marketing plan shouldn’t only happen in December. A quick quarterly check allows for small course corrections that will keep you on goal all year long.

Pull out your marketing plan for 2009. What’s on track? Have you tried to do too much and stretch yourself too thin? Or did a surge of business keep you from being consistent? Are you guilty of trying something once or twice and then declaring it a failure without giving it the time and room to bloom?

What, in your plan, hasn’t gotten off the ground? Is it still a viable idea or has its time passed?

What is the one thing you had planned on doing that you most regret not getting to? Is the opportunity still there?

Overall, what letter grade would you give your marketing efforts so far this year? Be brutally honest. Did you meet your own objectives? Did you protect your brand? Did you build in marketing efforts that continued no matter how busy or overcommitted you became?

Use the following four criteria: effectiveness, consistency, frequency and ROI. Make a quick list of the key audiences you want to communicate with. Now grade yourself for each key audience. Make sure you don’t forget your employee base in that list. Then average the grades. How did you do?

Don’t get discouraged if you couldn’t give yourself an A or even a passing grade. The good news is there’s plenty of time to make an improvement as we move through ’09.

Drew McLellan is Top Dog at McLellan Marketing Group and blogs at www.drewsmarketingminute.com. He can be reached at Drew@MclellanMarketing.com. © 2009 Drew McLellan