Strategic Marketing (StratMark I)

StratMark is a movement that aims at increasing the understanding as well as raising the perceived value of marketing in Finnish business and thereby permanently increase the international competitive power of Finnish business. StratMark is a research project conducted jointly between Hanken, the Swedish School of Economics and Business Administration and HSE, Helsinki School of Economics. The financers and collaborating partners of the project are Tekes (Finnish Funding Agency for Technology and Innovation), Amer Sports that took the initiative to the project, Componenta, Konecranes, Sinebrychoff, Suunto and MARK (Markkinointiliitto). One driver behind the StratMark project has been that the knowledge of marketing has traditionally not been at a very high level compared to technical knowledge in Finland. This is partly due to an under-appreciation of marketing and a focus of the operative role of marketing at the cost of the strategic role of marketing. The situation is worrying since the focus and knowledge of marketing is essential when it comes to transforming technological innovations into internationally successful business. In order to increase the competitive power of our country and society we must aim at studying the quality of marketing knowledge in Finnish companies and based on the results start a discussion and development activity with the aim of increasing strategic marketing competence in the long run. The content and the focus of the development activity will be developed in close collaboration and discussions with managers. The aim with the project is to produce practical knowledge based on research regarding the present competence of strategic marketing in companies, to develop methods for measuring the effects of marketing and to develop marketing competence for Finnish business. A second important aim is to start a discussion regarding the strategic role of marketing among decision makers in business and society and in doing so increase the perceived value of marketing. The StratMark project creates valuable knowledge both from a theoretical point of view and a practical point of view in order to benefit the financers’. The theoretical contributions will be presented in international conferences and in journals while the practical tools created will be presented for a broad audience of business representatives and students through seminars, publications and an intensive public debate. The aim is to increase the competitive power of Finnish companies internationally by improving the strategic marketing competence. The project is one of the most important project conducted so far regarding development and research of Finnish marketing knowledge. Research teams: The HSE team in StratMark consists of : Docent Petri Parvinen as the responsible Director for the Project Professor Henrikki Tikkanen is on of the project Directors Professor Kristian Möller is on of the project Directors M.Sc. (Engineering) Antti Vassinen is a doctoral student at HSE. M.Sc. (Econ.) Erik Pöntiskoski is a doctoral student at HSE. M.Sc. (Econ.) Matti Santala is a doctoral student at HSE. M.Sc. (Engineering) Matti Jaakkola is a doctoral student in the project at HSE. The Hanken team in StratMark consists of : Professor Christian Grönroos is on of the project Directors Professor Tore Strandvik is on of the project Directors Ph.D. Robert Wendelin is a post-doc-researcher at Hanken in the project. M.Sc. (Econ.) Henrich Nyman is a doctoral student at Hanken Organisations in the cooperation: HSE, Helsinki School of Economics and Hanken, Swedish School of Economics and Business Administration