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The Business Marketing Institute (BMI) was established to build new training and certification systems in response to a greater demand on the part of management in business-to-business companies to hold marketing managers accountable for producing measurable sales results from their company’s marketing programs. The new programs developed by the BMI help assess, train, and certify the practical skills and performance required of company marketing managers, product managers, and marketing staff.

One of the major goals of BMI is to re-connect the sales and marketing departments, and to make company marketing programs more responsive to the company’s sales effort.

According to BMI Managing Director Rick Kean, recent trends show that B2B company marketing functions are now being re-integrated into sales departments, with marketing staff now reporting to company sales executives. Kean says this trend has emerged because “CEOs are now questioning the contribution of their company’s marketing programs to the company’s tangible sales results.”

Further, Kean says that “what we are now seeing is a return to marketing that serves the company’s sales efforts. For marketing managers, this means a greater emphasis on the basic skills and competence required to perform the daily tasks essential to B2B sales success, such as how to produce effective advertising, or how to execute sales-oriented direct mail programs and trade shows. These are the practical skills marketing managers need to drive the content and execution of the company’s marketing program, to increase their company’s sales.”

Both the CRM-FM and MSA/B/C systems also utilize comprehensive print study guides which serve as a self-contained training reference marketing professionals can use to prepare for the CRM-FM or MSA/B/C training and certification programs; these print study guides are included with both training and certification products.