A quick-fix guide to marketing for busy practitioners. Malcolm McDonald has pared down the detailed advice in his 500-page text, "Marketing Plans", to give readers a concise introduction to the essentials of what makes a plan work. He sets a challenge for readers to test their own understanding with a series of exercises and looks at the problems of marketing planning and the common obstacles, with advice on how to overcome them. Topics covered include: understanding marketing planning; how marketing planning fits with corporate planning; the marketing planning process and its output - the plan; defining markets and segments prior to planning; understanding products and services; setting marketing objectives and strategies; advertising and sales promotion strategies; sales strategies; pricing strategies; place (distribution and customer service) strategies; information and organization; and making marketing planning work.