Step 3: Marketing Implementation—Executing the Marketing Plan

Abstract

Implementation of the marketing plan is the real test for all your analysis. Basically, the marketing plan is about creating and retaining relationships to your current and new customers. Customer Relationship Management (CRM) aims at optimizing profitability by organizing your company around your most attractive customer segments. With Key Account Management (KAM) you try to achieve long-lasting relationships to your most important (national) customers. Global Account Management (GAM) focuses on dealing with the needs of your most important global customers, which have a global network. By utilizing this network you can get ‘global’ very fast. Marketing budgeting is an organization process that involves estimating (forecasting) the financial consequences based on the proposed marketing plan. The final, but often neglected stage of market planning, is the control process. Not only is control important to evaluate how we actually performed, against our budget, but it completes the circle of planning by providing the feedback necessary for the start of the next planning cycle. A proactive feed-forward control system monitors variables other than performance; variables that may change before performance itself changes.