The Marketing Center Münster (MCM) at the University of Münster has a long and distinguished tradition. Its roots date back to 1969, when Prof. Heribert Meffert was appointed Germany’s first university professor of marketing. Since then, the MCM has established a strong international reputation for cutting-edge marketing research and high-quality education.
Our research is published in leading international academic journals and contributes to understanding how companies can create value for customers through market-oriented management. At the MCM, we combine rigorous marketing science with close collaboration with renowned companies. We investigate emerging and enduring challenges in marketing and market-oriented management, respond to rapidly changing market environments, and generate insights that matter to businesses, consumers, and society.
Outstanding education is equally central to who we are. We equip our students with state-of-the-art knowledge across a broad range of marketing topics and provide numerous opportunities to apply what they learn to real-world challenges. We challenge students to think critically, analyze complex problems rigorously, and engage in informed debate. Throughout their studies, they exchange ideas with researchers, business leaders, and fellow students, experiencing marketing as a discipline that connects academic insight with managerial decision-making. Reflecting the international nature of marketing and our global outlook, our advanced Bachelor’s courses and the entire Master’s program are taught in English.
Our ambition extends beyond preparing students for successful careers in marketing and general management. We foster their intellectual and personal development, encouraging them to think critically, act responsibly, develop their own perspectives, and navigate a changing world with confidence.
Why does the MCM view of marketing as market-oriented management matter for every organization?
Every organization operates within a network of stakeholders - most prominently customers, but also employees, investors, policymakers, and society at large. Effective decision-making therefore requires organizations to understand both what is happening in their external market environment and what is happening inside the organization.
How do we at the MCM see the role of marketing as market-oriented management in an organization?
Marketing brings an outside-in perspective to organizational decision-making. It helps organizations understand customers, markets, competitors, and other external stakeholders—and use these insights to create sustainable value for both the organization and its stakeholders.
From a marketing perspective, current and potential customers are a central stakeholder group. For companies, customers generate revenue through their decisions to buy—and continue buying—the products and services a company offers. Acquiring new customers, retaining existing ones, and developing customer relationships therefore contribute directly to a company’s financial performance.
What do we at the MCM see as the key questions that “good” marketing needs to address?
Marketing as market-oriented management helps organizations answer a number of fundamental questions. At the MCM, we consider the following particularly important and give them a central role in our curricula:
- What do current and potential customers value and desire in products, brands, and relationships?
- How can managers effectively acquire new customers?
- How can managers retain existing customers and develop these relationships over time?
- How can managers develop and successfully launch new offerings while making effective use of new technologies and responding to highly dynamic market environments?
- What specific requirements does “good marketing” need to meet in industries such as services and entertainment?
- What are customers willing to pay?
Superior products do not automatically translate into superior market performance and these questions help explain why. Some companies succeed even though their products are not objectively superior to competing alternatives. Others struggle despite offering products of comparable or even superior quality.
At the MCM, we believe that market success requires an organization to understand customer value and to create, communicate, deliver, and capture that value effectively.
Because the purpose of business is to create a customer, the business enterprise has two—and only two—basic functions: marketing and innovation. Marketing and innovation produce results; all the rest are costs.
Peter Drucker (1909-2005) | Management thinker and pioneer of modern management education
How do we at the MCM see marketing contributing to organizational performance?
Understanding customers is essential for firm growth. There is no sustainable growth without compelling market offerings that create value for customers. But understanding customers is only the first step. Organizations also need to determine whether their marketing decisions create measurable value.
This requires connecting customer and market outcomes (e.g., awareness, consideration, satisfaction, customer acquisition, and retention) to financial outcomes such as revenue, profitability, and ultimately firm value.
Marketing therefore connects three perspectives: Market and customer insights → managerial decisions → organizational performance
“Marketing is too important to be left to the marketing department.”
David Packard | Co-Founder HP
Why do we at the MCM consider marketing relevant even if you do not want a career in marketing?
If you want to pursue a career in marketing, the importance of understanding customers and markets is obvious. But marketing knowledge is equally valuable for careers in general management, human resources, accounting, finance, consulting, and other management functions.