What is marketing management? The ultimate guide for 2025

Marketing management is essential for driving growth, aligning teams, and proving impact—and the stakes have never been higher. According to our Marketing trends report, 88% of marketing leaders are now responsible for revenue, up from 79% just last year.

It’s no surprise: when managed well, marketing can fuel pipeline and accelerate conversions. But turning strategy into results is no small feat—especially as AI continues to reshape the marketing landscape. More than half (55%) of marketing teams already use AI in their daily workflows, and the pressure to keep pace is only intensifying.

To help you succeed, we’ll break down the marketing management process, explore how AI is changing the game, and share real-world examples.

What is marketing management?

Marketing management is the process of planning, organizing, implementing, and analyzing marketing activities to meet customer needs and drive revenue.

As marketing leader Philip Kotler famously said: “Marketing is the science and art of exploring, creating, and delivering value to satisfy the needs of a target market at a profit.” Marketing management is the process of strategically planning, executing, and optimizing marketing activities to deliver that value.

At its core, marketing management focuses on a few key functions:

In 2025, the discipline is evolving fast. Digital transformation and AI are reshaping how marketers work, automating manual tasks, accelerating insights, and enabling real-time adjustments. Today’s marketing leaders must not only master traditional strategy, but also embrace AI marketing tools to stay agile, efficient, and results-focused.

Why is marketing management important?

Effective marketing management pays off. Here are a few key benefits.

What are the types of marketing management?

Here's a breakdown of 11 widely recognized types of marketing management approaches that reflect how organizations can structure or prioritize their efforts.

1. Product marketing management: Focuses on positioning, messaging, and go-to-market strategy for individual products or product lines.

2. Brand marketing management: Manages brand perception, identity, voice, and long-term equity across all channels and customer touchpoints.

3. Digital marketing management: A digital marketing strategy includes online channels like SEO, paid media, email, and social to drive traffic, engagement, and conversions.

4. Content marketing management: Content strategy is the process of planning, creating, and delivering valuable, relevant content that attracts and engages your target audience at every stage of the buyer journey. It often includes planning social media marketing campaigns, managing editorial calendars, and optimizing marketing asset management.

5. Growth marketing management: Uses data-driven experimentation to quickly test, optimize, and scale tactics that drive user acquisition, activation, and retention.

6. Performance marketing management:Focuses on measurable, ROI-driven campaigns (think: PPC, affiliate, paid social) with a direct link between spend and outcome.

7. Field and event marketing management: Field and event management handle in-person or virtual events, field programs, and experiential activations to generate leads and build relationships.

8. Partner and channel marketing management: Collaborates with external partners (resellers, agencies, affiliates) to co-market and extend reach into new customer segments.

9. Customer marketing management: Targets existing customers with campaigns aimed at retention, upsell, loyalty, and advocacy—maximizing lifetime value.

10. Campaign marketing management: Campaign marketing management focuses on the planning, execution, and measurement of various marketing activities and strategies aimed at achieving marketing goals.

11. Integrated marketing management: An integrated marketing campaign is like a well-choreographed dance. It brings together different marketing channels to send a unified message to your target audience.

What are the processes of marketing management?

Marketing management isn’t just about running campaigns; it’s about building a repeatable, strategic system that drives results. Whether you’re launching a new product or optimizing existing channels, the following core processes form the backbone of effective marketing management.

1. Market research: It all starts with insight. Conducting market research helps you understand your audience’s needs, track competitor moves, and spot trends before they go mainstream. This foundation informs every decision that follows.

2. Goal setting: Marketing efforts are only as strong as the goals behind them. Set clear, measurable objectives to ensure every tactic serves a bigger purpose, whether that’s increasing brand awareness, generating leads, or driving revenue.

3. Segmentation and targeting: Not every audience is created equal. Use segmentation to break down your market into meaningful groups, then target the ones with the highest potential for impact.

4. Positioning and messaging: Once you know your audience, craft messaging that speaks directly to their needs. Strong positioning sets your brand apart and gives every campaign a clear, consistent voice.

5. Strategy and planning: This is where vision turns into action. Invest in marketing project management and develop a marketing strategy that outlines your chosen channels, key tactics, budget allocations, and timelines.

6. Campaign execution: Put your plan into motion. Launch coordinated campaigns across content, social, paid media, email, and other key channels for your audience.

7. Performance tracking: Monitor your campaigns in real time. Track KPIs like CTR, conversion rates, and customer acquisition costs to gauge what’s working and where adjustments are needed.

8. Optimization: Marketing is never “set it and forget it.” Use data to refine your approach, run A/B tests, and adapt quickly to changing conditions or customer behaviors.

Trends in marketing management

Based on insights from 550 senior marketing leaders, here are five key trends every team should watch. Download our Marketing trends report for more.

1. Revenue responsibility is rising—without added visibility

88% of marketing leaders are now responsible for meeting revenue goals, up from 79% the previous year. Yet only 25% report high visibility into ROI. The pressure is on to not just execute, but to prove impact.

2. Martech overload is backfiring

Marketing teams use an average of 19 tools, and 43% of leaders say up to half of their data is duplicated across systems. Rather than creating clarity, sprawling tech stacks are creating silos and making ROI harder to track.

3. AI isn’t replacing marketers, it’s empowering them

96% of marketers now use AI tools, and those who integrate AI into daily workflows are more likely to meet revenue goals, grow headcount, and scale impact. AI is fueling faster insights, improved asset usage, and content generation at scale.

4. Workflow efficiency is the new marketing edge

Highly efficient teams are 2x more likely to meet revenue goals. These teams minimize manual tasks, connect cross-functional workflows, and have clearer visibility into performance data, turning speed and structure into a competitive advantage.

5. Successful teams connect, focus, and scale

The most effective teams connect marketing to company revenue, focus ruthlessly on high-impact work, scale project capacity with flexible resourcing, and fully own their martech stack. No-code tools and AI are helping them get there faster.

What does a marketing manager do?

A marketing manager oversees the strategy, execution, and performance of marketing initiatives that help a company attract, engage, and retain customers. Their job is to ensure marketing efforts align with business goals and deliver measurable impact.

Key responsibilities include:

In 2025, the role is more data-driven and tech-enabled than ever, with many marketing managers also overseeing AI tools and revenue accountability.

What are examples of marketing management?

Marketing management shows up in countless ways, across industries, campaign types, and teams. Below are real-world examples of how top brands use marketing management to plan smarter, move faster, and drive meaningful results.

1. Coordinating product launches and brand storytelling

At West Elm, the marketing team uses Airtable to manage product launches from concept to campaign. With a unified system that connects merchandising, photography, and content, they streamline timelines and ensure every launch is aligned across channels.

Read the full story.

2. Managing multichannel campaigns at scale

DPG Media, one of Belgium’s largest publishers, manages more than 200 annual marketing campaigns. With Airtable, their team centralizes planning, coordinates teams across departments, and keeps everything on schedule—even in a fast-paced newsroom environment.

Read the full story.

3. Aligning global teams around high-impact initiatives

Virgin Group uses Airtable to unify brand, marketing, and comms across its portfolio companies. By managing briefs, campaign assets, and reporting in one place, Virgin accelerates approvals and ensures consistent messaging worldwide.

Read the full story.

How to create a marketing management strategy

Building an effective marketing management strategy in 2025 requires more than just campaign planning. It means driving revenue, proving ROI, and adapting fast in a rapidly evolving landscape. Here’s how to build a strategy that aligns with the way high-performing teams operate today.

1. Start with business goals, not just marketing metrics

With 78% of CEOs banking on CMOs to drive growth, marketing can no longer operate in a silo. Anchor your strategy to core business objectives like pipeline growth, customer acquisition, or retention, then build campaigns around those outcomes.

2. Centralize your tools and data

Most marketing teams use an average of 19 tools, which often leads to siloed workflows and duplicated data. In fact, 43% of leaders report that up to half of their data is duplicated across systems. A solid strategy requires a unified system to manage planning, execution, and performance tracking, so your team can act fast and make data-informed decisions.

3. Prioritize efficiency and adaptability

Today’s top teams don’t just move quickly—they move intentionally. According to our Marketing trends report, marketing teams with very efficient workflows are more than twice as likely to meet revenue goals compared to inefficient teams (89% vs. 43%). That means optimizing for speed, automation, and high-impact work, not just volume.

4. Incorporate AI in daily workflows

AI is no longer optional. Fifty-five percent of teams use it in their daily workflows, and those that do are more likely to scale their impact and hit their goals. Use AI to surface insights, automate manual tasks, and personalize content at scale.

What are challenges in marketing management?

Based on our insights from 550 senior marketing leaders, it’s clear that modern marketing teams are under pressure to do more, prove more, and connect more than ever before. Here are six of the most pressing challenge, and how high-performing teams are solving them.

1. Low visibility into ROI

Only 25% of marketing leaders have high visibility into ROI, down from 33% the year prior.

How to solve it: Choose marketing tools that seamlessly integrate with one another. By unifying campaign data, performance metrics, and operational insights in a single system, you can gain real-time visibility and tell a complete, data-driven ROI story.

2. No single source of truth

73% of marketing leaders consult 5 to 15 different sources just to get current campaign data.

How to solve it: Centralize your planning, briefs, and reporting in a connected workspace that keeps teams aligned and informed.

3. Duplicated, disconnected data

81% of teams have 30% or more of their marketing data duplicated across multiple sources.

How to solve it: Eliminate redundancy by integrating systems and using a relational database, like Airtable, to centralize your data. With connected tables and automated syncing across tools and workflows, you can ensure consistency, reduce duplication, and give your team a single source of truth.

4. Soaring content and campaign volume

92% of marketing leaders saw a surge in requests last year, with many reporting a 50–99% increase.

How to solve it: Standardize intake and asset creation with scalable marketing templates to speed up production without sacrificing quality.

5. Tool sprawl and siloed information

The average team uses 19 tools daily, each one increasing the risk of siloed decisions.

How to solve it: Consolidate your martech stack and empower your team with no-code tools that connect data, teams, and processes in one place.

Features of marketing management

Here are the core features and aspects that define an effective marketing management organization.

1. Goal-oriented

Marketing management is focused on achieving specific business objectives, like increasing revenue, growing market share, or improving customer retention. Every strategy and campaign is built around these goals.

2. Customer-centric

At its core, marketing management prioritizes understanding and meeting customer needs. This involves market research, segmentation, and delivering value through targeted messaging and solutions.

3. Strategic and structured

It follows a defined process, from planning and positioning to execution and measurement. A strong marketing management approach ensures that activities are aligned, coordinated, and repeatable.

4. Data-driven

Modern marketing management relies heavily on data to make informed decisions, track performance, and optimize campaigns. It uses KPIs, analytics, and AI insights to refine strategy and prove ROI.

5. Cross-functional

Marketing doesn’t happen in a vacuum. Marketing management involves collaboration across departments, like sales, product, and operations, to ensure unified messaging and aligned execution.

6. Adaptive and agile

With changing market conditions and customer behavior, marketing management must be flexible. Agile planning, quick iteration, and continuous learning are key to staying competitive.

Marketing management templates

Templates are a great way to streamline your marketing management strategy and ensure you're following proven best practices. Here are three top picks to get you started today.

Content calendar template

This content calendar template helps marketing and content teams plan, track, and manage every piece of content in one centralized workspace. With customizable views, built-in workflows, and cross-channel visibility, it streamlines collaboration from ideation to publication.

Marketing strategy template

Our marketing strategy template provides a structured framework to define your brand positioning, target audience, goals, channels, budget, and metrics, all in one centralized base. It helps marketing teams translate big ideas into actionable plans by organizing strategy, stakeholder collaboration, and performance tracking in a visual, flexible workspace

Marketing plan template

This template serves as a comprehensive framework for building and executing a strategic marketing plan, from setting objectives and mapping audiences to defining campaigns, budgets, and KPIs. Designed for clarity and flexibility, it combines familiar spreadsheet views with powerful relational features, making it easy to visualize initiatives by timeline, stage, or team while ensuring alignment across goals and execution.

The best marketing management software

The right marketing management software can be the difference between scattered execution and strategic impact. With Airtable's marketing management software, you get a unified platform that connects your entire marketing supply chain, linking goals, timelines, resources, and campaign workflows with shared, reliable data.

Airtable gives you a holistic view of all marketing activities while making critical information accessible, reusable, and actionable for every team member. And with intuitive, scalable AI built in, your team can move faster—from generating campaign ideas in seconds to personalizing outreach at scale.

See what's possible by watching a demo.