Category Manager - Industrial Grouts/Plasters & Mortars

Location: Andheri, Mumbai

Reporting to : Assistant Vice President- Marketing

Designation: Manager

Required Work Exp.: 4-8 Years

Qualification: Post Grad. MBA

Key skills: Category management, Product Categories of "Industrial grouts" & "plasters & mortars"

Product Categories: 1. Industrial grouts, 2. Plasters & Mortars

Key Responsibilities:

1. Business Strategy

- Understanding own business strategy , model ( distribution channels , products / services etc ) and structure.

- Conducting a comprehensive SWOT analysis of own business as against market and competitor activity

- Estimating the impact of market forces on current business strategy and devise business plans that are agile and responsive

- Identifying current key contributing channels, products/services to business as well as the future contributing sources.

- Scanning markets for sourcing as well as for business development opportunities

2. Industry & Environment Tracking

- Understanding macro and micro drivers of demand and supply in the market - domestic and international wherever applicable

- Building a market data collection strategy, templates, process , measurements etc.

- Drawing conclusions and determines the implications of market/competitive data to own company's product mix, strategic plan and value proposition

- Understanding performance drivers of own industry/sector as well as allied industry/sector

- Benchmarking projects/case studies and is able to pick up relevant techniques and apply at own business

3. Competitor Tracking

- Understanding the competitor products , market spread, structure , performance etc.

- Assessing the Customer Value Proposition of the competitor , estimate possible next moves and assess their impact on market climate & on own business

- Understanding competitor intelligences to create differentiators for own business in the market

- Identifying the strengths and weak areas of the Competitor

4. Voice of Customer/ Market Research Understanding

- Understanding quantitative and qualitative methods of market research, their applications and outcomes

- Knowledge of sampling techniques/ tools and their deployment basis the purpose of the research

- Managing large scale research programs

- Understanding and applying a wide range of descriptive and inferential statistical methods

5. Innovation Strategy

- Understanding stages of innovation and its management process (familiar with models like the Stage Gates model and McKinsey Horizon model etc )

- Building an innovation pipeline for business and commercial innovation basis the needs of the customer

- Managing the innovation funnel using risk assessment , investment vs opportunity assessment etc.

6. Pricing Strategy

- Understanding various product pricing methods - competitor based, market based ,cost based pricing

- understands the application of each and their impact on brand positioning and sales .

- Selecting and developing a pricing mix ( bundle , premium, economy . penetration ,. psychological pricing etc.) that aligns with the positioning of the product and the strategic intent of the organization to optimize margin and maximize realization of the additional value created

- Assessing commercial viability and impact of a wide range of pricing strategy in the context of product / go to market channel and macro market conditions

- Identifying potential areas to reduce cost where enough customer value is not being created

7. Solutions/Experience Design

- Understanding buying behaviour and patterns of customers, identifies and capitalizes on information/ signals from customers to upgrade products, services and co-create minimum viable product/solutions

- Continually improving the products and services and re-engineer sales process to create differentiated customer value

- Understanding elements of visualization, testers, trails(For example making marketing campaigns available on a limited basis before a wider release) etc. that can help customers experience the product / service

- Creating discerning differentiations in offerings to suit local market conditions

8. Mission Happiness (other customer metrics)

- Understanding different customer matrices such as customer retention, customer churn, SAT, Subscriber-Circle Revenue, Visitor Location Register, net add (telecommunications).

- Developing and Deploying customer feedback mechanisms

- Defining key metrics for assessing customer engagement ,loyalty and advocacy (like Net Promoter Score )

- Developing targeted strategies to enhance Net Promoter Scale and other customer engagement indices

9. Commercial Acumen

- Understanding costs associated with the sales and marketing activities and their variables, conducts commercial feasibility of initiatives, plans and decisions

10. Demand generation

- Understanding buyer black box- characteristics and decision process, demand centres, Value proposition of a product, consumer decision making model in the purchase cycle

- Creating and deploying targeted marketing programs to drive awareness and interest in a company's products and/or services - example the principles of inbound marketing based on consumer personas

- Understanding which stage is the customer in his/ her journey and plants targeted marketing programs using the right channel to engage with them

- Creating specific top, middle and lower funnel marketing to address various points of the buyer cycle (researcher , consideration , decision)

11. Solution selling

- Marrying the own business/brand proposition with customers implicit and explicit needs

- Understanding customer's profile (basis customer segmentation ), business scenario, current opportunities /challenges, market condition & is able to co-create a solution for the customer

- Enabling the customer to articulate their needs, pain points and expectations through probing questions

- Showing the customer the complete value chain of service offerings and the value they will add to his/her business growth and differentiation

- Creating ROI for own business solution in the customer's business context

- Building self as a trusted advisor and partner to the customer

12. Product Knowledge & Application

- Knowledge of product features and technical specifications -how it is manufactured, how it will be delivered, how it needs to be maintained and serviced etc

- Responding to inquiries related to possible product applications, conditions of use, after sales services and benefits to customers

- Understanding product life cycle and deploys a varied set of pricing , go to market, competitive positioning strategies aligned with the stage of life cycle the product is in - to maximize gains

13. Value Chain Management

- Understanding the customer's journey across all partners in the value chain

- Determining where the best value lies with customers, and expand or improve value

- Integrating communication and increase cooperation between value chain members in order to decrease delivery times, reduce inventories and increase customer satisfaction

- Integrating customer insight data and information across the chain