By Maxwell Ranasinghe

“facilitating students to realise their fullest potential”

 Management is “a set of activities including
planning and decision making, leading and
controlling directed at organisation’s resources:
human, financial, physical and information, with
the aim of achieving organisational goals in an
efficient and effective manner “– ( R.W. Griffin
-2005)
 Of the five management functions — planning,
organizing, staffing, leading and controlling ,
planning is the most fundamental.
 All other functions stem from planning. Therefore

planning is a major component of management.

 However, planning doesn't always get the

attention that it deserves.

  
 A goal is a desired future state that the
organization attempts to realize in a given
environment.
 A plan is a blueprint for goal achievement that

specifies the necessary resource allocations,

schedules, tasks, and other actions.
 Goals specify future ends; plans specify today's

means of achieving them.

 The word planning in context of management,
incorporates determining the organization's goals
and defining the means for achieving them.
 “If you fail to plan you are planning to fail” Prof.

Peter Drucker
 “ If I had eight hours to chop down a tree I’d spend

six hours of sharpening my axe” Abraham Lincoln

 Therefore, planning is an essential strategic
activity and it is an intrinsic part of efficient and
effective management.

 When it relates to marketing, purpose of planning

is to achieve marketing goals in an efficient and
effective manner
 There are many types of plans in
organizations.
 Strategic Corporate Plans addresses the

entire organization, it emanates from the

corporate vision of a firm.
 Then comes the Business Unit Plans

which addresses the requirements of

specific business units.
 There are other functional plans such as
operations, logistics, HR, Financial, Production
and Marketing which are supporting to achieve the
broader objectives of the corporate plans.
 These plans are internal and they are not divulged

to others.
 Our subject matter here is “Marketing Planning”

and therefore we would deal it in detail

A Marketing Plan is a blue print that
elaborates a systematic, inter connected,
logical step by step processes for
achieving marketing goals.
 It specifies what should be done today to
achieve goals ahead and it is the
marketer’s road map for desired
destination.
 It analyses the:
 internal and external environment,
 markets,
 competitors,
 specifies the marketing objectives, necessary

strategies, tactics, resource allocations,

 schedules, tasks,
 embeds the controls and other actions required in

connection with attaining marketing goals in an

efficient and effective manner.
 Hiebing and Cooper( 2003) succinctly sates that a
marketing plan should be a disciplined, target
market driven, interlocking ( not just integrated)
and comprehensive plan in order to make it a
successful tool in the process of achieving
marketing goals.
 Therefore, it has to be a comprehensive plan that

gives importance to each and every element of a

plan.
 Nothing is taken for granted and nothing or very
little is left for chance.
 Thus they call the marketing plan as

“ Disciplined Marketing Plan” and lists important

steps to follow in the process of marketing
planning.
 This is the background where you develop your
marketing plan. It is called the Situation Analysis
or the Marketing Audit.
 It could simply called “ where are we now” .

 It will analyse the internal and external

environment of the business.
 In the internal analysis, following key factors of
the company are studied extensively

 Managerial, marketing, financial, human resource,

production, technology, systems and controls etc.

 Through this analysis, Strengths and

Weaknesses of a firm can be found well.
 In the external analysis, PESTEEEL
Factors (political, economic, social,
technological, ethical, environmental and
legal factors), competitor analysis and
market analysis etc will be studied in
detail.
 Through this analysis, Opportunities and

Threats to the firm can be found well.

 Combining the Strengths and
Weaknesses and Opportunities and
Threats, a firm can from a SWOT
Analysis, which is a snap shot of the
firms internal and external status.
 
 This indicates the forecasted amount of sales that
the firm expects to meet.

 This is a very vital element of the marketing plan

as most of the other tasks that follows in the
marketing plan are designed to achieve the sales
target.
 
 Marketing success can be measured on several
non financial market metrics.
 It could be about the market share, retention of

current customers, number of customers to

attract, to increase the usage , level of brand
awareness, number of dealers in the distribution
network, etc.
 Ansof’s growth strategy also gives guideline in this

regard
 Objectives should be ( SMART) measurable,

achievable, realistic, time bound.

 A marketing strategy entails how an individual
marketing objective will be reached.
 While the marketing objectives are SMART,

marketing strategies are descriptive.

 They go into detail how objectives are achieved.

 
 1. Target Marketing Strategies – Targeting and
Positioning

 2. Tactical Marketing Mix Tools

( although Ansof’s Growth Strategy is shown in

many books as a marketing strategy, in my view it
could be applicable more to setting marketing
objectives)
 –Segmenting ,Targeting and
Positioning
  
 A market segment means a large identifiable

group of customers within a market with similar

needs and wants, purchasing power, geographical
location, buying attitudes or buying habits.
 If all are having the same need then it could be

considered as the mass market.

 If each and every body’s need is separately

identified and served it is called Mass

Customization.
 Ittalks about grouping customers with
similar needs and serving them with
the appropriate product proposition
 Segmentation is something between

the Mass Marketing and Mass

Customisation.
 Itdoes not talk about serving the
whole market with one product or
serving every individual with a
different product.
 A firm has to segment the market

before it targets which market it

should enter.
 Selecting the Target Market
Review the segmentation done
Now the challenge is to find out what market or market
segments that you are going to serve with what product
or products.
It could be:
 Single Segment
 Selective Segments
 Product Specialization
 Market Specialization
 Full Market Coverage
 Positioning the product
 When the firm knows where it is going to target its
products and services it should also develop a
positioning strategy.
 By positioning, a firm should try to get a special place
in the mind set of the collective customers of the
desired market.
 It could provide a direction to development of
marketing strategies and using specific tactical
marketing mix tools in achieving the expected
positioning in the consumers of the market place.
 Marketing objectives are achieved through use of
Tactical Marketing Mix Tools.

 It could suit the selected target market and the

positioning to be done

 The firm can also use the stages of Product Life

Cycle and use the marketing mix tools to suit the
situation.
 Product,
 Price,
 Place,
 Promotion,
 Process,
 People and
 Physical evidence
 would be used as marketing mix tools to achieve

marketing objectives.
 Budget is a statement that enumerates how much of
funds required to implement the marketing plan and
how much of income it would generate.
 It will detail various expenses under different
headings.
 It will also give the income, expenses and the profits in
summary format and refer the details to notes of the
budget.
 Further it could provide other management information
ratios such as Return on Investment, Pay Back
Period, Financial Ratios etc.
Description Notes Year -2 Year-3
Sales Units 1
Sales amount 2
Less-
Manufacturing cost 3
Less-
Administrative Cost 4
Distribution Cost 5
Financial Cost 6
Other Cost 7
Net Profit 8
Tax 9
ROI 10

Break Even point 11

Once the Marketing plan is developed, execution
of it should happen.
The execution may include specific details about
who is responsible for different activities and when
will it take place.
It could be listed on an action plan or a calendar
of events.
 Action Plans
◦ Who does what and when

Activity responsi Budget Jan Feb March

bility
Market max 20000 xx
analysis
New Nimal 30000 xx
adds
New Jagath 40000 xxx XXX
Brand
name
Marketing controls are important to ensure that the
set marketing plans are carried out as planned.
Importance-
Proper implementation of the plans
Set Key Performance indicators
Deviations could be detected
Necessary corrective actions could be taken
Proactive rather than reactive
Compare and contrast with budgets
Evaluation identifies what really was done
while controlling involves evaluating the
results with expected Key Performance
Indicators and taking remedial actions
without delay to ensure that the plan is on
track and deviations are minimized or
eliminated.
 
 Marketing plan
•Objectives
•Strategies
•Action plans

Set Performance indicators

Corrective yes
action Collect Performance details

Deviation
Compare performances

continue No