At the top of a company, sales do not matter, profits do not matter, even return on investment is a secondary concern. What matters is share price and what drives share price is the creation of shareholder value. Many marketing directors, obsessed with branding and other promotional tactics, miss this fundamental truth of modern business and so destroy the wealth of their company's ultimate owners. By failing to consider and manage the business risk associated with their strategies, they deliver returns below the cost of capital and neglect the firm's raison d'etre. The board needs a way of holding these marketers to account. Marketing Due Diligence is a new process which has emerged from years of research at Cranfield, one of Europe's leading business schools. It blends proven ideas from strategic and financial management with new concepts about organisational effectiveness to create a process that directly connects marketing strategy to shareholder value. CEOs and CFOs cannot afford to operate without Marketing Due Diligence. Bad marketing directors cannot afford to work with it.* Top level Cranfield based author team utilising latest Cranfield in-company research* Connects marketing plans and investment to the valuation of the firm and how it can contribute to increasing stakeholder value* Systematic and practical approach so that it can be used by both practitioners and students

MA(Oxon), MSc, PhD, D.Litt. FCIM FRSA, until recently was Professor of Marketing and Deputy Director Cranfield School of Management, with special responsibility for E-business. Malcolm is a graduate in English Language and Literature from Oxford University, in Business Studies from Bradford University Management Centre, and has a PhD from Cranfield University. He also has an Honorary Doctorate from Bradford University. Malcolm has extensive industrial experience, including a number of years as Marketing Director of Canada Dry.

A note for busy people: How to get the best out of this book
Part 1 What is Marketing Due Diligence?
Chapter 1: Why Chief Executive Officers must demand a revolutionary new approach from their Chief Marketing Officers
Chapter 2: A process of Marketing Due Diligence
Chapter 3: The implications of implementing Marketing Due Diligence
Part 2 The Marketing Due Diligence Diagnostic Process
Chapter 4: Assessing market risk
Chapter 5: Assessing share risk
Chapter 6: Assessing profit risk
Part 3 The Marketing Due Diligence Therapeutic Process
Chapter 7: The key role of market definition and segmentation
Chapter 8: Creating strategies that create shareholder value
Chapter 9: Managing high risk marketing strategies
Chapter 10: Fast Track
Afterword: What to do now
References and further reading