Customer Marketing Manager - Category Manager (Non-Chocolates) & Channel Manager (GT)

Location: Mumbai, Maharashtra , India

Position Title:Customer Marketing Manager - Category Manager (Non-Chocolates) & Channel Manager (GT)

Summary

The Category Manager will report to AVP Customer Marketing & GTM Transformation (Sales Function) and is responsible for non-chocolate category (Hershey’s Adjacencies, beverages and Confectionery brands) growth stories including category Strategy & 5P’s across RE’s and the horizon is M+6 & beyond. They are the primary contact point for demand plan process for their categories.
He/She is also responsible for Hershey Portfolio growth stories including Channel Strategy for the horizon of M+6 & beyond (For GT) + Trade Spends (All channels). He/She would be responsible for actively designing impactful promotions & activations to deliver Channel Plans month on Month and FY. He/She would be primary contact point for channel trade spends and demand planning process. The Manager acts as a liaison between different functions Marketing, Sales, Finance, Supply Chain and Customer Marketing

Summary of major duties & key responsibilities 

Category Strategy (Non-Chocolates)
•    Develop Category/RE strategy with a clear understanding of “Where to Play” & “How to Win” across Invested Brands
•    Developing 5P Tactics for the Category/Channel/ RE
•    Deliver Category/ Channel/ RE Targets by Month/QTR/year (Category KPI tracking & analysis)
•    Develop impactful programs/activations in coordination with the Marketing / Customer activation team 
•    Working closely with the Region/channel Teams on Activations / bringing in regional nuances in the National Plans
•    Developing Picture of Success for the Category/ Channel/ RE for all activations to enable last mile execution; Create POB solutions for the Category/ Channel/ RE solutions that enable successful execution
•    Track category and competitor KPI's (Distribution, MS, ND, WTD)

Commercial Planning General Trade (GT)
•    Deliver plans by Month/QTR/year (Category KPI tracking and analysis)
•    Design impactful promotions/activations with coordination with the Marketing / Customer activation team 
•    Analyze Trade Spends Effectiveness and onboard team to fine tune future revenue management & spends with higher ROIs
•    Responsible for GT Channel Profitability 
•    Plan and implement effective in-store brand visibility activities including display, racks and POS materials
•    Liaise with brand teams and local sales teams, to ensure clear integration between agreed plans in the areas of merchandising, trade promotions, in-store execution and point-of-purchase materials

Innovations and Process
•    Building end-to-end activation plans for all innovations for the Category (Non-Chocolates)
•    Co-ordinate with Supply Chain / Regional + Channel Teams on Brand / Innovation forecasting

Demand Process
•    Demand planning by category/Channel/ RE co-ordination for forecasting (rolling 12 months)
•    Building end-to-end activation plans for all innovations for the channels General Trade (GT)

Dimension - (INR, Units, Employees)

Personnel supervised  - None
Revenue managed (non-chocolates category) - Rs. 600 Cr. 
Budget Managed (Trade Spends) - Rs. 80 Cr.

Minimum knowledge, skills and abilities required to successfully perform major duties/responsibilities:  

-    This role requires leadership and communication skills across multiple business partners including Region Heads, Brand Managers, Consumer insights, Supply chain, Finance and external partners
-    Highly develop ability to recognize market trends and organize information
-    Excellent team player, team leader
-    Demonstrated ability to be accountable for sales and income results
-    Strong verbal and written communicator to wide breadth of audiences including senior management
-    Skillful usage of Microsoft Office in business document development and presentation, including Word, Excel and PowerPoint

Competencies:  

-Excellent Customer Marketing skills

Good knowledge of Shopper marketing/thinking, General Trade (GT), 5 P’s tactics, Brand activations & New Product development / Innovation

-Customer and market-oriented

Demonstrate the breadth and depth of general trade retail landscape / marketplace knowledge; Demonstrate the ability to understand customer insight and attribute that to business decision making 

-Excellent Project Management

Identifies the processes, time and resources required to accomplish project tasks; prioritize steps and tasks to enable efficient workflow; utilizes best practices to organize people and activities; measures result against key metrics; uses resources efficiently; able to deal with multi-tasks & perform under pressure

-Strong analytical & problem-solving skills

Use a systematic process to solve difficult problems including gathering and examining information from a variety of sources; identifying the root cause of problems; drawing appropriate conclusions; generating viable solutions; and weighing the pros and cons to arrive at a final decision.

-Good interpersonal skills

Establishes and maintains constructive and effective relationships built upon trust. Uses diplomacy and tact to diffuse even high-tension situations. Works to find common ground and mutually beneficial solutions to conflicts. Relates well to all kinds of people, up, down and sideways, inside and outside the organization. Can represent his/her own interest and yet be fair to other groups. Viewed by others as team players.

Minimum Education and Experience Requirements:   

Education:

MBA (Reputed Institute)

Experience:

5 to 7 yrs of Experience. Definitely worked as GT Customer Marketing for 2-3 yrs and alteast 2-3 years as ASM in GT channel (Sales)