MARKETING MANAGEMENT

Marketing management facilitates the activities and functions which are involved in the
distribution of goods and services.

According to Philip Kotler, Marketing management is the analysis, planning, implementation and
control of programs designed to bring about desired exchanges with target markets for the purpose of
achieving organizational objectives.

It relies heavily on designing the organizations offering in terms of the target markets needs and
desires and using effective pricing, communication and distribution to inform, motivate and service the
market. Marketing management is concerned with the chalking out of a definite program, after careful
analysis and forecasting of the market situations and the ultimate execution of these plans to achieve
the objectives of the organization.

To sum up, marketing management may be defined as the process of management of marketing
programs for accomplishing organizational goals and objectives. It involves planning, implementation
and control of marketing programs or campaigns.

Importance of Marketing Management:

Marketing management has gained importance to meet increasing competition and the need for
improved methods of distribution to reduce cost and to increase profits. Marketing management today
is the most important function in a commercial and business enterprise.

8 Main Functions of Marketing Management

The marketing process performs certain activities as the goods and services move from producer
to consumer. All these activities or jobs are not performed by every firm.
1. Selling:
It is core of marketing. It is concerned with the prospective buyers to actually complete the
purchase of an article. It involves transfer of ownership of goods to the buyer. Selling plays an important
part in realizing the ultimate aim of earring profit. Selling is enhanced by means of personal selling,
advertising, publicity and sales promotion. Effectiveness and efficiency in selling determines the volume
of companys profits and profitability.

2. Buying and Assembling:

It involves what to buy, of what quality, how much from whom, when and at what price. People
in business buy to increase sales or to decrease costs. Purchasing agents are much influenced by quality,
service and price.

3. Transportation:
Transportation is the physical means by which goods are moved from the places where they are
produced to those places where they are needed for consumption. It creates place, utility. Transportation
is essential from the procurement of raw material to the delivery of finished products to the customers
places. Marketing relies mainly on railroads, trucks, waterways, pipelines and air transport.

4. Storage:
It involves holding of goods in proper (i.e., usable or saleable) condition from the time they are
produced until they are needed by customers (in case of finished products) or by the production
department (in case of raw materials and stores); storing protects the goods from deterioration and
helps in carrying over surplus for future consumption or use in production.
5. Standardization and Grading:
The other activities that facilitate marketing are standardization and grading. Standardization
means establishment of certain standards or specifications for products based on intrinsic physical
qualities of any commodity.
This may involve quantity (weight or size) or it may involve quality (color, shape, appearance,
material, taste, sweetness etc.) Government may also set some standards, for example, in case of
agricultural products. A standard conveys a uniformity of the products.

6. Financing:
It involves the use of capital to meet financial requirements of agencies dealing with various
activities of marketing. The services to provide the credit and money needed, the costs of getting
merchandise into the hands of the final user is commonly referred to as finance function in marketing.

7. Risk Taking:
Risk means loss due to some unforeseen circumstances in future. Risk bearing in marketing refers
to the financial risk interest in the ownership of goods held for an anticipated demand including the
possible losses due to a fall in prices and the losses from spoilage, depreciation, obsolescence, fire and
floods or any other loss that may occur with the passage of time.

8. Market Information:
The importance of this facilitating function of marketing has been recognized only recently. The only
sound foundation on which marketing decisions may be based is correct and timely market information.
Right facts and information reduce the aforesaid risks and thereby result in cost reduction.
Modern marketing requires a lot of information adequately, accurately and speedily. Marketing
information makes a seller know when to sell, at what price to sell, who are the competitors, etc.
Marketing information and its proper analysis has led to marketing research which has now become an
independent branch of marketing.

The major issues which can have an impact on effective market management are listed here and
summarized in this section.
1. Appropriate control of assets
2. Necessary powers and authority
3. Effective agreements with market users
4. Compliance with market rules, contracts and agreements
5. Economic viability and sustainability
6. Effective relationships with market users, service providers, government agencies and other
markets
7. Operational and managerial efficiency
8. Effective decision-making structure
9. Trained and disciplined staff
10. Marketing confidence - Integrity of wholesalers
11. Politics and finance

PERSONNEL MANAGEMENT can be defined as obtaining, using and maintaining a satisfied

workforce. It is a significant part of management concerned with employees at work and with their
relationship within the organization.

Importance of Personnel Management

1. Staying competitive
 Part of personnel management is developing training for employees and providing the
resources they need to stay upto-date on their jobs some of those resources include an on-site
library of industry information encouraging employees to continue their education by subsidizing
tuition costs and notifying employees of seminars and classes that would assist in the
development of their job skills.
2. Retention
Human resources professionals focus on personnel manager from the employees first
interview through the rest of employees tenure a competition pay plan and benefits package
entice employees to work for your company ongoing administration of benefits, employees
carrier advancement and an interactive review process by departmental managers help the
employee to develop to her maximum potential when personnel management is effective for each
employee from the beginning of employment, it result in a higher retention rate.
3. Team work
Effective personnel management creates strong bonds between the company and the
employee and it also encourages employees to develop a sense of teamwork. Team building
exercises help employees learn to work together, and that works together with the focus on the
individuals to create a stronger personnel framework employees understand their role within the
company and they learn to respect the roles of others company decision follow their proper
channels and the structure of the organization in strengthened.

4. Managerial effectiveness
One of the more importance relationship for any company is the one between a manager
and an employee by developing the employee and the team the staff understands how its action
affect the productivity of the entire department when employees take a personnel interest in the
productivity of their department his helps managers to focus more on departmental procedures
and employee development while having to focus less on administrative responsibilities such as
dispute resolution and employee turnover.

Elements/Factors of Personnel Management

Following are the elements of Personnel Management:
1. Organization- Organization is said to be the framework of many activities taking place in view of
goals available in a concern. An organization can be called as a physical framework of various
interrelated activities. Right from manpower planning to employees maintenance, all activities
take place within this framework. The nature of the organization is dependent upon its goal. The
business concern goal being profit- making. Clubs, hospitals, schools, etc. their goal being service.
The objective of consultancy being providing sound advice. Therefore, it is organizational
structure on which the achievement of goals of an enterprise depends upon. In personnel
management, a manager has therefore to understand the importance of organizational structure.

2. Job- The second element, i.e., jobs tell us the activities to be performed in the organization. It is
said that the goals of an enterprise can be achieved only through the functional department in it.
Therefore, seeing the size of organization today, the nature of activities are changing. In addition
to the three primary departments, personnel and research department are new additions. Various
types of jobs available are :
Physical jobs Intellectual jobs
Creative jobs Consultancy jobs
Proficiency jobs Technical jobs

3. People- The last and foremost element in personnel management is people. In a organizational
structure, where the main aim is to achieve the goals, the presence of manpower becomes vital.
 Therefore, in order to achieve departmental goals, different kinds of people with different skills
are appointed. People form the most important element because :
The organizational structure is meaningless without it.
It helps to achieve the goals of the enterprise.
It helps in manning the functional areas.
It helps in achieving the functional departmental goals.
They make a concern operational.
They give life to a physical organization.
The different types of people which are generally required in a concern are:
Physically fit people
Creative people
Intellectuals
Technical people
Proficient and skilled people
In personnel management, a personnel manager has to understand the relationship of the three elements
and their importance in organization. He has to understand basically three relationships:
Relationship between organization and job
Relationship between job and people
Relationship between people and organization.

Challenges of Modern Personnel Management

Changing Mix of the Work Force
Tough each person of unique and consequently present a challenge to our general understanding,
one can also appreciate broader problems by categorizing personnel to delineate and highlight trends.
Among the major changes in the mix of personnel entering requiring greater skills, (1) increased number
of minority members entering occupations requiring greater skills, (2) increasing levels of format
education the entire work force, (3) more female employees, (4) more married female employees. (5)
More working mothers, and (6) a steadily increasing majority of white-collar employees in place of the
blue-collar.

Changing Personal of the Work Force

The changing mix of the work force inevitably leads to introduction of new values to organizations.
In the past and continuing in the present, the work force of America has been heavily imbued with a set
of values generally characterized by the term work ethic, work is regarded has having spiritual meaning,
buttressed by such behavioral norms as punctuality, honestly , diligence, and frugality. Ones job is a
central life interest and provides the dominant clue in interpersonal assessment. A work force with this
set of productivity, efficiency, and effectiveness.

Changing Expectations of Citizen-Employee

These are increasing signs that external rights of citizenship are penetrating the boundaries of
business enterprises in the interest of improving the quality of work life. Two prominent illustrations are:
(1) freedom of speech, and (2) the right to privacy. Should employees be allowed to speak up and
criticize the organizations management and its product without jeopardizing their job security? In public
organizations, this right of whistle blowing is fairly well protected. Tough some private firms have
voluntarily adopted policies favorable to employee freedom of speech, others have been forced to such
practices through court cases.
Employees are also becoming more concerned with the information they must provide in order to
obtain and hold jobs. They feel that many questions are an invasion of privacy, such as whether one is
pregnant or not, drinking habits, kinds of friends, type of neighborhood in which one lives, records or
arrests, ability to pay bills, and whether the job applicant has ever received psychiatric counseling.
Changing Levels of Productivity
Perhaps the most serious current problem facing all managers, not just personal managers, is the
declining productivity of the economy.

1. There have been many reasons proposed for the recent declines in productivity:

2. Numerous federal regulations and laws have added to the cost of doing business without
enhancing productivity in the short run, such as environmental protection, health and safety,
affirmative action, and so on.

3. Such laws have led to increased numbers of employees new to the business environment. The
influx and minorities may have resulted in less productivity during the introductory period.

4. American managers typically have a short-term profit orientation in making business decisions.
With pressures from stockholders, stock markets, and financial institutions, they tend to
postpone vital research, development, and new plant investments in the interest of short-term
showings. The leads to declining productivity over time. It is also contended that various tax
laws have discouraged innovations and new plant investment.

5. With maturity, our economy has increasing become more of a service, rather than
manufacturing, type of system. Achieving gains in productivity when providing services is
considerably more difficult than becoming more efficient in production processes.

6. Adversarial relationship with labor unions reduce cooperative effort that would enhanced
productivity. Numerous union-negotiated work rules designed to protect job and income in the
short run have disastrous results when employers must compete on the world market.

7. Employee alienation leads to refused to refusal to collaborate in the interest of improving

productivity. It has been suggested that poor employee attitude have been caused such factors
as high job insecurity, narrow and meaningless jobs, and autocratic, managers who deny
significant employee participation in decision affecting the work and the quality of work life.

MANAGERIAL ACCOUNTING is the process of identifying, measuring, analyzing, interpreting and

communicating information for the pursuit of an organization's goals. This branch of accounting is also
known as cost accounting. The key difference between managerial and financial accounting is
managerial accounting information is aimed at helping managers within the organization make
decisions, while financial accounting is aimed at providing information to parties outside the
organization.

Managerial accounting encompasses all fields of accounting aimed at informing management of

business operation metrics. Managerial accountants use information relating to the costs of products or
services purchased by the company. Budgets are also extensively used as a quantitative expression of
the business plan of operation. Individuals in managerial accounting utilize performance reports to
note deviations of actual results from budgets.

The Importance of Managerial Accounting in Decision-Making

Managerial accounting helps managers, within an organization, make decisions that benefit the
organization. Analysis, interpretation, identification and communication are all important parts of the
managerial accounting process. All businesspersons have to make decisions based on the long-term
benefit of the company. The information provided through managerial accounting can improve the
process of decision-making exponentially. Therefore, in order for a business to be a success, every
manager must be thorough with how management accounting benefits decision-making.

Factors Affecting Managerial Management

1. Quality of Information
When you devote sufficient time and attention to creating and maintaining an accounting
system, the information it provides will be accurate and genuinely relevant to company
operations. Managerial accounting systems are affected by the quality of their inputs. A chart of
accounts that breaks down company activities into categories that fully reflect your operation will
provide more useful information than a generic template. An accountant who isn't sufficiently
familiar with your business may enter expenses or income in the wrong categories, yielding
inaccurate information.
2. Timeliness of Information
A management accounting system that is maintained daily or weekly will provide more
useful information than one that is six months out of date. Timeliness affects management
accounting systems by providing feedback quickly enough for proactive responses and effective
planning. If your system is not regularly maintained, you may be responding to outdated
information or failing to react to current challenges because you don't fully understand their
impact.
3. Availability of Resources
No matter how good the information your business obtains through management
accounting, you won't be able to use these insights to implement strategic change unless your
company has the financial resources to fund strategic projects. No matter how clear or ambitious
the plans are that you make based on management accounting systems, they won't yield results
if you don't have sufficient personnel. Successful management accounting also depends on the
engagement of company leaders, who must prioritize suggested changes and enlist broad-based
support.
4. Effective Feedback
Effective feedback for management accounting relies on creating standards and company
culture geared toward gathering relevant information. Create log sheets to track the information
you most want to know, such as how many hours employees devote to specific types of tasks or
how much product is wasted at the end of each day. Train staff to enter information regularly,
and share results to engage them in the process of making improvements.

Challenges on Managerial Accounting

Facts
Management accounting challenges usually involve collecting, recording and reporting financial
information from several divisions or departments. Cost allocation methods require information for direct
materials, production labor and manufacturing overhead. This information is needed for multiple
production departments. Management accountants are responsible for reviewing this information to
ensure only the production costs are allocated to goods and services. Including non-production costs can
distort individual product costs.

Features
Budgeting is another important tool of management accounting. Small businesses often use
budgets to plan future expenditures for operations. Owners typically conduct a budget planning process
annually. This poses a challenge for management accountants to review historical financial information
to prepare an accurate budget for the subsequent business year. Budgets ensure that the owner and
managers act responsibly when spending money to improve operations.

Time Frame
 Management accounting does not rely on individual accounting periods when recording financial
information. It is a continuous accounting process that must be properly managed by owners and
employees. Financial information should be carefully separated to ensure that only timely, valid and
relevant information is included on management reports. This process can involve the creation of internal
management accounting policies that employees must follow when reporting information to the owners.

Considerations
Owners should consider implementing business technology software as part of the management
accounting process. Specialty software captures financial transactions electronically and sends it to
individuals responsible for interpreting the information. Owners also can create financial reports so that
the software automatically creates financial reports. Using business software can shorten the amount of
time spent preparing financial reports. However, it forces management accountants to be responsible for
reviewing the information to ensure its accuracy.

Expert Insight
Public accounting firms and professional accountants offer small business owners several
important resources when setting up a management accounting process. Professional accountants can
outline the specific management accounting challenges for the company. These accountants also can
work with owners to create specific responsibilities that management accountants should follow. This
professional advice ensures that owners capture all necessary financial information for future decisions.