Ramkkasturi's Career Prospects In Marketing

If you are going to Business school and you are thinking about  specializing in Marketing here is something that can help you.

Marketing has a wonderful future.It is one of the highly preferred specializations. There is lot of competition in the market and many very competent marketing persons are needed. More and more new companies are coming up every day. Many of the companies are now going into international makets as they need to grow and Markets like China and India are growing very fast. Also many service industries are now realizing that they need marketing badly. Thereofore, many service sector organizations now have qualified maketeers; banks, insurance companies. air lines, tourism , hotel all of them have a need for markeitng people because there is intense competition in the market . Even non-profit organizations are particular about marketing. Social Marketing and Green marketing are growing areas too.

Many times people mistake that marketing and sales are synonymous. No sales is a part of marketing. In marketing there are other subfunctions like advertising, market research and similar areas. But sales is a very important area of marketing because most everything depends on sales and without sales a profit making organizations cannot get anywhere. Selling is ofen misunderstood to be something associated with lack of integrity and is not so respected in some places, but that was longtime back. It is pretty respected profession now.

If you start in marketing there is no definite rule that you must have worked in sales, though it helps a lot because it takes you close to the customers and you get to know the realties of the market. It is always expected that marketing guys understand their customer needs and the market including the competition thoroughly. Quite a few persons have risen up in the organization without having handled sales. Sometimes in the initial stages you are rotated through the various functions and you may work in the sales department for sometime before you are given some other responsibilities in the marketing. Many companies also look for good marketing persons to become chief executives, because if they know the market they can make the company grow faster.

The following are some electives that would be useful if you wish to pursue your marketing career.

A course in sales management helps you to understand the process of selling and the different modles of selling. It also familiariazes you with all facets of the sales function like the managing the sales people, sales planning , developing a sales strategy and, developing appropriate incentive systems. Initially you will be engaged in selling , you will be expected to achieve the targets given to you, keep in touch with the channels and give regular reports and information to the company. It is not an 8-5 pm job. You will be expected to tour the territory to meet the customer and sell. An interesting and challenging job. Sales persons can earn a lot of money because if you achieve the target or manage to exceed the target you get incentives and if you can do that consistently you will get special mentions in many places. Some good sales guys like their job so much that they prefer to remain in the field and will not accept anything else

An Elective In Brand Management is useful:

Brands are very important for companies. They are the main assets of the company. Brands are the products carrying the company name and are carefully nurtured and protected by the company. Many companies have brand manager jobs. A brand Manager specializes in one or more proucts (brands) and develops the strategy for them after market research. He also develops a communcation strategy (media plans) . He laises with all the concerned persons in the company. To a great extent the responsibility for the success of the brand is on him. Many times young MBAs from good schools may start as assistant brand managers. The salary is good. This is not a line job; it is a staff position and you generally work from the Corporate head quarters. It is expected that you will know quite a bit about market research, advertising and similar areas required for good brand management. In technical product areas like engineering and pharma, or chemicals it is helpful to have a technical back ground, because you will need to work with Research and Development closely during product development.

Marketing Research

One of the fast growing areas is marketing research. It is highly useful and deals with a lot of techniques. Market research now is very essential in many situations, especially,when new products are launched. If you are a brand manager you cannot avoid marketing research, You can be a marketing research person for the company or you can work for a marketing research organization engaged in carrying out market research for their clients.It will be useful to be strong in math and statistics for this. If you intend to set up a marketing research company it is advisable to get a Ph.D too so that you have very good knowledge of the analytical aspects.You must be comfortable with mathematics and statistics.; particularly statisitcs.. You also must be familiar with computer and applications.

Advertising

Is a very fascinating field. It helps to take an advertising course and be familiar with the subject. There are many advertising agencies that do the advertising , media planning and communication planning for companies. Some companies have their own internal advertising group because the volume of advertising they need to do is very high. Consumer product people are very intense in advertising. The account executives, creative jobs and copy writing are some jobs. Account executive is quite demanding and good. You will be expected to meet clients and develop accounts. With adequate expertise threre is a good possibility of starting your own ad company. Not all clients go for big agencies. There are enough small guys who need the help and who cannot afford the big agencies, .

Sales Promotion

Helps in developing sales promotion schemes to the consumers and channels. If the compnay is large it would need some one specialiazing in it and develop various discount and incentive schemes to promote the product. Sales promotion managers do this.

Distribution/logistics/channel management

Is a function that looks after making sure that the product/brand reaches the final consumer through the distributors or a channel. it is very important position and involves appointing the channlel members and managing them Logsitics deals with the location of the warehouses and movement of product too. In the companies manufacturing bulk products like steel or tansporting coal it is very very major function. Now a days the logistics people are also handling reverse logistics, like recalls, that is taking back a product if there is a problem. Some recycling also is handled. This function needs a lot of investment therefore many companies are prefering to outsource this aspect.

Marketing Strategy/strategic Marketing

Is aubject which is worth studying. This is something we all need to do, develop a strategy. Generally strategy is developed at the top, but with the inputs and participation of the different levels. This subject is something I would strongly recommend as it gives you exposure to strategy formulation and also gets you familiar with strategy techniques. Brand Managers are very involved in  strategy formulation for the products/brands they handle.

Some sector specific electives

These give an intense exposure to specifc sectors. Similarly some new aspects like energy nd environment , green marketing are also there. This would depend on your interest and your future plan.

One should make sure  to choose  the best of business school .Before you opt for the Marketing specialization make sure that the right elective subjects are being offered . It helps to know who is teaching the subject and what the course involves, including some good exposure to real world and techniques.

Some times the electives are overlapping like product planning or new product development. They could have different titles. Read the course description and talk to the instructor if needed so that you will not land yourself in a wrong class.

I was once amused to see a  student landing in product managment course thinking that it production management !!