Professor Malcom McDonald shares us his 25 years of experience of working with international companies regarding the role of world class strategic marketing planning. The objectives of this marketing planning course cover the challenges that world class companies deal with, their need for marketing planning and the starting point of implementing the marketing strategy. Companies are asked to identify their key target markets , their marketing objectives and their resources to create differential advantages against competitors. In essence, marketing planning teaches us how to plan the use of these resources to achieve the marketing objectives.