What is marketing management? It is a process of researching a market, determining the target audience and planning, promoting and evaluating marketing activities. It meets the customers’ needs with products, services and business objectives.
Marketing management encompasses more than just advertising. It concerns product decisions, pricing, distribution, branding, relationships with customers and measurement. The American Marketing Association describes marketing as creating, communicating, delivering and exchanging offerings that satisfy a person’s needs. Marketing management arranges activities in a manageable plan.
What Does Marketing Management Mean?
Marketing management is the work of planning, organizing, implementing and reviewing marketing activities. An organization uses it to understand the customers, decide upon the value it can provide and communicate it effectively.
For instance, a small bakery can research the demand of customers in the local area and plan to offer breakfast boxes, set prices and advertise on social media platforms to encourage pickups or deliveries. Marketing management guides the choices of an organization and evaluates them to see if it can meet its targets.
The purpose is not to sell as much as possible in the short term. Instead, effective marketing management considers customers’ needs and the business’s objectives, and makes the best decision based on research and analysis.
Main Functions of Marketing Management
| Function | Description |
|---|---|
| Market research | Gathering the information about the audience and competitors |
| Planning | Setting marketing objectives and preparing practical actions |
| Product and service decisions | Making the offer appealing to the target audience |
| Pricing | Setting realistic prices for the goods and services |
| Promotion | Making the offer known and engaging the clients |
| Distribution | Ensuring availability of the products and services |
| Measurement | Reviewing the outcomes and improving the marketing activities |
Market research and customer understanding
Before launching a marketing campaign, an organization must conduct market research to determine the potential audience and their values. The activities can include talking to people, surveys, analyzing sales data, website traffic or competitors’ offers.
The research helps the business discover customer segments that share similar characteristics and choose its target audience. OpenStax states that market segmentation is a process of dividing a market into useful subgroups that have common needs or characteristics.
Marketing strategy and planning
A marketing plan is a document that puts the business goals into practice. It can outline the target audience, product positioning, promotion and measurement activities. An organization uses it to meet its marketing objectives and communicate them to relevant stakeholders.
In addition, the document can help marketing managers to align the efforts of various departments in the firm, such as sales, customer service and distribution networks. It can also give directions to each group, such as the time of a product launch, and who will be responsible for what.
Product, price, place and promotion
The marketing mix is a conceptual structure that combines different sets of marketing activities. It is often divided into the four Ps, which are:
- Product: The offer that meets the customers’ needs.
- Price: The amount a customer is willing to pay for the product.
- Place: The location and availability of a product.
- Promotion: Communicating the value of an offer to potential customers.
The marketing mix ensures that a product offering is attractive to customers. A high-quality product, for example, should have an appropriate price, distribution and promotion strategy.
The Marketing Management Process
Marketing management is a cyclical process that involves continual research, planning, implementation and evaluation. OpenStax argues that the marketing process involves planning, analyzing, implementing and adjusting marketing strategies.
1. Analyze the market
An organization conducts market analysis to understand its environment. It considers the customers’ requirements, competitors’ strengths and weaknesses and the firm’s capabilities. This can enable a company to see the possibilities and threats in the market and how to overcome them.
2. Set marketing objectives
The company sets realistic and relevant marketing objectives that it can achieve within a certain timeframe. The goals should be aligned with the firm’s overall objectives. For instance, it can decide to increase the number of qualified website visitors by X% or boost sales of a certain product.
Choose the measures that correspond with the objective
The marketing manager picks the most appropriate performance measures to monitor the progress. These should be based on the objective. If a firm wants to increase revenue, for example, it can track total sales and revenue. In another case, when a business wants to build awareness, it can monitor brand impressions, reach and brand-related survey questions.
3. Choose a strategy and prepare the plan
The marketing team decides on the target audience, value proposition and marketing channels. It also sets the budget, time frame, deliverables and responsibilities. The team prepares a marketing plan that is used to follow up the activities throughout the year.
4. Put the plan into action
The organization executes the marketing activities, such as publishing content, advertising, updating product descriptions. Effective marketing management ensures that everyone knows their role and works together.
5. Measure results and make adjustments
Managers review the performance of their marketing mix and adjust it when necessary. If a certain channel is ineffective, for instance, the marketing team can eliminate it and invest in a more profitable one. In addition, this enables firms to monitor whether the campaign is having an impact on the intended audience.
Marketing planning normally consists of a situation analysis, objectives, strategy, action programs, implementation and evaluation.
Why Is Marketing Management Important?
Marketing management helps an organization make informed decisions to achieve its marketing objectives. It ensures that the firm has a clear understanding of its customers’ needs and the market in which it operates. The process can benefit a company because it:
- Focuses the firm’s efforts on achieving specific objectives.
- Maintains consistency of the organization’s messages and actions.
- Coordinates the marketing activities with other departments, such as sales representatives and customer service.
- Ensures that the firm measures the impact of its marketing mix on the business objectives.
- Helps the company to respond to changes in the market and customer behavior.
Without a marketing plan, a business can have scattered efforts and fail to measure what works and what does not. An organized approach to marketing allows firm to review their strategies, analyze their performance and take corrective actions.
Who Is Responsible for Marketing Management?
In large organizations, marketing managers are individuals who plan, execute and evaluate marketing activities. Their team can consist of digital marketers, brand managers, content marketers, advertisers, PR agencies, customer researchers and marketing analysts. They are responsible for carrying out market research, developing campaigns, setting budgets, tracking progress and making recommendations.
In small businesses, the owner can take up these roles or hire a marketing agency. A marketing manager can have a team of varying sizes depending on the company’s size, sector, goals and budget. Normally, the person or team will fulfill the same functions: researching the market, planning, implementing and evaluating marketing activities.
Frequently Asked Questions
1. What is marketing management in simple words?
Marketing management is the procedure of understanding the customers and promoting an offer based on their needs. A firm monitors and evaluates the marketing activities to ensure they meet the business objectives.
2. What are the main functions of marketing management?
The main functions of marketing management are: market research, planning, product and service decisions, pricing, promotion, distribution, measuring performance and reviewing activities. These are essential in successful marketing management.
3. Is marketing management the same as advertising?
No, advertising is just a promotional activity. Marketing management entails a lot more than just ads. It includes research, planning, positioning, promoting, distribution and evaluating marketing activities.
4. What are the 4Ps of marketing?
The 4Ps are product, price, place and promotion. They are a theoretical marketing model that assists businesses in making key marketing decisions.
5. What is the main goal of marketing management?
The primary objective of marketing management is to create and deliver value to the customers and support the business goals.
Conclusion
What is marketing management? It is a coordinated process of analyzing a market, researching the audience, setting marketing objectives and monitoring the outcomes. Marketing management goes beyond advertising. It involves making product and pricing decisions, implementing promotion and distribution strategies and conducting market research. Organizations that are customer-oriented can benefit from marketing management by being able to respond to their clients’ demands.
