13. My speciality. Marketing manager

Lead-in:

1. business dealing – угода

2. demand – попит

3. target market – цільовий ринок

4. marketing mix – комплекс маркетингу

5. joint-venture – спільне підприємство

I am a student of the faculty of Marketing, Trade an Customs Activity at Donetsk State University of Economics and Trade named after M. Tugan-Baranovsky. There are 3 departments here: the department of Marketing, Goods Management and Customs Activity.

My speciality is Marketing Manager. It seems to me that our speciality is the most interesting and necessary for people engaged in trade. I am going to specialize in marketing.

M arketing is an activity that includes different kinds of business dealings with the movement of goods and services from producer to consumer. It surrounds our everyday life.

The students who graduate from our department deal with market research. The ability to know some new wants and demands of customers, to recognise new trends and developments is very important in marketing. Those who produce must know what goods and services, where, at what prices, why, for what purpose their customers would like to buy. Marketing research in this respect helps producers very much.

But it is a poor strategy to try to produce something for everybody or to serve all customers. You cannot satisfy everyone. That is why, to be successful, businesses usually select certain customer groups on which to concentrate their attention, i.e., groups of population that have something in common and with whom a certain product or service is most likely to succeed. Examples of such groups may be: middle-aged housewives, or university students, or retired people, etc. Every such customer group is called a target market. Obviously, different marketing approaches (for instance, different advertising) may be needed to attract people from different target markets to the same product or service.

To be a good Marketing Manager means to know the ABC of marketing (so-called Marketing Mix). It includes the Four P's: product, price, place and promotion. So in order to be specialists the future marketing managers study special subjects. We must know if there is any demand for the goods, what the market potential is, what sort of competition we’ll meet, i.e. how the price of our goods compares with other competitive products, local conditions and preferences, local trading customs and habits, what seasonal factors should be taken into account and the like.

Besides, great attention is paid to foreign languages, mathematics, history, philosophy and so on. After graduating from our faculty we are sent to work at the shops, at the joint-ventures, at the advertising companies, at the marketing departments of different enterprises, companies and firms. I like my future speciality, and I think that we, young specialists, must do all we can to meet the requirements of the popula­tion in full.

Questions for comprehension check-up and discussion:

1. What is the name of your faculty?

2. What are the names of your faculty’s departments?

3. What is the name of your speciality?

4. What is the work of Marketing Manager connected with?

5. What customer groups do you know?

6. What does it mean to be a good Marketing Manager?

7. What subjects do you study?