Uma abordagem à função marketing em PME portuguesas: estratégia de outsourcing versus de integração

The fundamental objective of this article consists in discussing and understanding the referentials of strategic decision that consubstantiate the possibility of SME being able to develop the marketing function without the need for its integration, resorting for that purpose to outsourcing. With that goal in mind, the state-of-the-art on the theme is presented. As a complement, a mail survey was conducted with the SME excellence of the commerce sector in the Lisbon district. The conclusions of this work reveal that these companies already partially resort to outsourcing for marketing related activities, and that the outsourcing of the marketing function may constitute an important tool in the growth and development of SME, by resolving their structural gaps, in terms of know-how and in the ability to implement marketing initiatives.