TOPIC2: STRATEGIC MARKETING PLANNING

Introduction
Through strategic planning, the company decides what it wants to do with each business unit.
Marketing planning involves deciding on marketing strategies that will help the company attain
its overall strategic objectives. A detailed marketing plan is needed for each business, product, or
brand. The plan begins with an executive summary, which quickly overviews major assessments,
goals and recommendations.

Objectives
Objectives by the end of this topic you should be able to:
 Explain the meaning of marketing planning
 Highlight the main parts of a marketing plan
 Prepare a marketing plan

Learning activities
Learning Activity 2.1: Reading
Read the provided topic notes on Strategic marketing planning.

Learning Activity 2.2: Submitted Assignment

Prepare a Marketing Plan for organization of your choice which features all the elements of a
Marketing Plan

Assessment
The submitted assignment in activity 2.2 will be graded

Topic Resources
i. Laudon, K , Traver, C. (2002) E-Commerce. New Delhi: Pearson Education Ltd
ii. Kotler, P, Armstrong, G. (2008) Principles of Marketing. Upper Saddle River (NJ):
Prentice Hall
iii. Fill, C. (2003) Marketing Communications. London: Prentice Hall

TOPIC 2 NOTES

2.1 MARKETING PLANNING

Through strategic planning, the company decides what it wants to do with each business unit.
Marketing planning involves deciding on marketing strategies that will help the company attain
its overall strategic objectives. A detailed marketing plan is needed for each business, product, or
brand. The plan begins with an executive summary, which quickly overviews major assessments,
goals and recommendations. The main section of the plan presents a detailed SWOT analysis of

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the current marketing situation as well as potential threats and opportunities. The plan next states
major objectives for the brand and outlines the specifics of a marketing strategy for achieving
them. The marketing strategy consists of specific strategies for target markets, positioning, the
marketing mix, and marketing expenditure levels. It outlines how the company intends to create
value for target customers in order to capture value in return.

2.2 THE MARKETING PLAN

A marketing plan is a written document detailing the current situation with respect to customers,
competitors, and the external environment and providing guidelines for objectives marketing
actions, and a resource allocation over planning period for either an existing or a proposed
product or service.

While some firms-particularly smaller ones – do not bother to write their marketing plans, most
organizations believe that “unless all the key elements of a plan are written down, there will
always be loophole for ambiguity or misunderstanding of strategies and objectives or of assigned
responsibilities for taking action. This suggests that even small organizations with limited
resources can benefit from preparing a written plan, however brief.

Written plans also provide a concrete history of a product’s strategies and performance over
time, which aids institutional memory and helps educate new managers assigned to the product.
Written plans are necessary in most large organizations because marketing manager’s proposals
usually must be reviewed and approved at higher levels of management and because the
approved plans provide the benchmarks against which the manager’s performance will be
judged. Finally the discipline involved in producing a formal plan helps ensure that the proposed
objectives, strategy, and marketing actions are based on rigorous analysis of the 4Cs and sound
reasoning.

Marketing plans vary in timing, content and organization across companies. In general,
marketing plans are developed annually, though planning periods for some big ticket industrial
products such as telecommunications or electronics they can be shorter.

2.3 MAJOR PARTS OF A MARKETING PLAN

1. First, the marketing manager details his or her assessment of the current situation. This is the
homework portion of the plan where the manager summarizes the results of his or her analysis of
current and potential customers, the company ‘s relative strengths and weaknesses ,the
competitive situation, the major trends in the broader environment that may affect the product
and, for existing products, past performance out comes. This section typically also includes
forecasts, estimates of sales potential, and other assumptions underlying the plan, which are
especially important for proposed new products or services. Based on these analyses, the
manager also may call attention to several key issues major opportunities or threats that should
be dealt with during the planning period.
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2. The second part of the plan details the strategy for the coming period. This part usually starts
by detailing the objectives (e.g., sales volume, market share, profits, customer satisfaction levels,
e.t.c) to be achieved by the product or service during the planning period. It then outlines the
overall marketing strategy, the actions associated with each of the 4 Ps (the product, price,
promotion, and “place” or distribution) necessary to implement the strategy, and the timing and
locus of responsibility for each action.

3. Finally, the plan details the financial and resource implications of the strategy and the controls
to be employed to monitor the plan’s implementation and progress over the period. Some plans
also specify some contingencies: how the plan will be modified if certain changes occur in the
market, competitive, or external environments.

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The success of a marketing plan depends on effective communication with other parts of the
organizations (such as Production, Engineering, and Research & Development) and a variety of
marketing units, especially those concerned with sales, advertising, promotions, and marketing
research. By using the experience of others (as consultants) in preparing the action programs (for
instance, in-store promotions), the planner not only benefits from the expertise of specialists but
also increases their buy-in to the overall marketing plan, thereby increasing the likelihood of its
success.

The action programs should reflect agreements made with other departments and marketing units
as to their responsibilities over the planning period concerning the product. For example, if a
special sale is to occur in a given month, the production department must commit to making
sufficient product available and to the use of a special package; the promotion group agrees to
develop and have available for use by the sales force in-store displays; the sales force must

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allocate the time necessary to do the in-store work; and so on. Thus, the annual plan serves as a
means of allocating the firm’s resources as well as a way of assigning responsibility for the
plan’s implementation.

EXERCISE
a) Explain the meaning of marketing planning
b) Highlight the main parts of a marketing plan
c) Explain why it’s important for all the departments to work together when preparing a
marketing plan.