Strategic marketing planning: Theory, practice and research agendas

This paper reviews the development of strategic marketing planning from the early 1960s to 1995. Whilst it focuses on the scientific planning model, which dominates research and teaching during this period, it also briefly reviews other planning models. In evaluating the legitimacy of the universal belief in the efficacy of marketing planning, a number of contradictions are apparent, which surface in studies of marketing planning failures. The reasons for these failures, however, are not linked to any general “theory”, but seem to cluster around the cultural and cognitive dimensions of planning. These dimensions are explored in detail and an agenda for future research is suggested.