marketing

Definition

Marketing is defined by the American Marketing Association as “the activity, set of institutions, and processes for creating, communicating, delivering, and exchanging offerings that have value for customers, customers, partners, and society at large.” ^[5] The term of the original meaning of the term of reference From a sales process engineering perspective, marketing is “a set of processes that are interconnected and interdependent with other functions” of a business. ^[6]

The Chartered Institute of Marketing defines marketing as “the responsible management process for identifying, anticipating and satisfying customer requirements profitably.” ^[7] A similar concept is the value-based marketing which states the role of marketing to contribute to increasing shareholder value . ^[8] In this context, marketing can be defined as “the management process that seeks to maximize returns to a competitive advantage.” ^[8]

Marketing practice, which includes advertising , distribution and selling . HOWEVER, Because The academic study of marketing extensively Makes use of social sciences , psychology , sociology , mathematics , economics , anthropology and neuroscience , the profession is Now Widely Recognized As a science, ^[9] Allowing Numerous universities to offer Master-of-Science (MSc) programs. ^[10]

The process of marketing is that of bringing a product to market. As such, the steps include, broad market research; market targeting and market segmentation ; distribution distribution, pricing and promotion strategies; developing a communications strategy; budgeting; and visioning long-term market development goals. ^[11] Many parts of the marketing process (eg product design , art management , Brand management , advertising , copywriting etc.) Involve use of the creative arts. One product can be marketed in several different ways such as billboards, commercials on radio or television, pop ups on social media, etc.

The marketing concept

The term ‘marketing concept’ pertains to the fundamental premise of modern marketing. This concept is intended to satisfy the organizational objectives, and it should anticipate the needs and wants of consumers and satisfy these more effectively than competitors. This concept originated from Adam Smith’s book The Wealth of Nations, but would not become widely used until nearly 200 years later. ^[12] Marketing and marketing concepts are directly related.

Given the centrality of customer needs and wants in marketing, a rich understanding of these concepts is essential: ^[13]

Needs : Something necessary for a healthy, stable and safe life. When needs remain unfulfilled, there is a clear adverse outcome: a dysfunction or death. Needs can be objective and physical, such as the need for food, water and shelter; or subjective and psychological, such as the need to belong to a social group and the need for self-esteem.

Wants : Something that is desired, desired for or aspired to. Wants are not essential for basic survival and are often shaped by culture.

Demands : When they want to be backed by the ability to pay, they have the potential to become economic demands.

Marketing research, conducted for the purpose of new product development or product improvement, is often concerned with identifying the consumer’s unmet needs. ^[14] Customer needs are central to market segmentation, where they are concerned with dividing markets and separate groups of buyers. ^[15] Needs-based segmentation (also known as “customer segmentation “) “places the customers” at the forefront of a company’s designs and markets or services. ” ^[16] Although needs-based segmentation is difficult to do, it has been proven to be more effective than market segment.^[17] In addition, a great deal of advertising and promotion is designed to show how a given product is going to meet the customer’s needs. ^[18]

Marketing orientations

An orientation, in the marketing context, relates to a perception or attitude to a firm’s position towards its product or service, essentially referring to consumers and end-users. There exist several common orientations:

Product orientation

A firm employing a product orientation is mainly concerned with the quality of its own product. A firm would also assume that it was a product of a high standard, people would buy and consume the product.

This works best for the customer and their needs and desires, as for example in the case of Sony Walkman or Apple iPod, whether these derive from intuitions or research.

Sales orientation

A firm using a sales orientation primarily focuses on the selling / promotion of a particular product, and Hence, this entails simply selling an already existing product, and using promotional techniques to attain the highest sales possible. ^[19]

Such an orientation may follow scenarios in which a firm holds a claim, or it is a product that is in high demand, with little likelihood of changes in consumer tastes.

Production orientation

A firm focusing on a production orientation. Thus, this means a firm exploiting economies of scale , until the minimum efficient scale is reached.

A production orientation can be deployed when a product or service exists, coupled with a good certainty that makes it easy to change.

Marketing orientation

The marketing orientation is perhaps the most common orientation used in contemporary marketing. It involves a firm essentially basing its marketing plans around the marketing concept, and thus supplying products to new consumer tastes.

As an example, a firm would use a market researcher to gauge consumer desires, use R & D to develop a product, and use it to promote product knowledge. The marketing orientation often has three prime facets, which are:

Customer orientation

A firm in the market economy can survive by producing goods that are willing and able to buy. Consequently, ascertaining the consumer demand is vital for a firm’s future viability and even existence as a going concern. One way of keeping the demand is the most flattering and the most invasive possible way, using social media is extremely helpful in this way. Showing business or just a picture of what is being marketed on a social media page. However, a key point that should be taken into consideration is flexibility and the ability to keep the customer’s attention and wants. ^[20]

Organizational orientation

In this sense, a firm marketing is often seen as of prime importance within the functional level of an organization.

Information from an organization’s marketing department would be used to guide the actions of other departments within the firm. As an example, a marketing department could ascertain (via marketing research) that consumers desired a new type of product, or a new use for an existing product. With this in mind, the marketing department would inform the R & D department to create a prototype of a product / service based on consumers’ new desires.

The production department would then start the product, while the marketing department would focus on the promotion, distribution, pricing, etc. of the product. Additionally, a firm’s finance department would be consulted, with respect to securing appropriate funding for development, production and promotion of the product.

Inter-departmental conflict may occur, should a firm adhere to the marketing guidance. Production may contrast the installation, support and servicing of new capital stock, which may be needed to manufacture a new product. Finance may oppose the required capital expenditure, since it could undermine a healthy cash flow for the organization.

Mutually beneficial exchange

In a transaction in the market economy, a firm gains revenue, which thus leads to more profits / market share / sales. A consumer on the other hand gains the satisfaction of a need / want, utility, reliability and value for money from the purchase of a product or service. As in the market economy marketplace, firms need to buy goods with contemporary marketing ideals.

The Four Ps

In the early 1960s, Professor Neil Borden at Harvard Business School identified a number of company performance actions that can influence the consumer’s decision to purchase goods or services. Borden suggests that all of these shares of the company represented in ” Marketing Mix “. Professor E. Jerome McCarthy , at the Michigan State University in the early 1960s, suggests that the Marketing Mix contains 4 elements: product, price, place and promotion.

Product

The product aspects of marketing deals with the specifications of the goods or services, and how it relates to the end-user’s needs and wants. The scope of the product is as follows: warranties, guarantees, and support.

Pricing

This refers to the process of setting a price for a product, including discounts. The price need not be monetary; it can be simply exchanged for the product or services, eg time, energy, or attention. The price is the cost of a country for a product – monetary or not. In the field of pricing science .

Investment (or distribution )

This refers to the product gets to the customer; for example, point-of-sale gold investment retailing . This third has also been referred to as a place , referring to the channel by which product or service is sold (eg online vs. retail), which geographic region or industry to which segment (young adults, families, business people), etc. . Also referring to the environment in which the product is sold.

Promotion

This includes advertising , sales promotion , including promotional education , publicity , and personal selling . Branding refers to the various methods of promoting the product, brand , or company.

These four elements are often referred to as the marketing mix , ^[21] which is a marketing tool .

Criticism of the Four P-Model

Morgan, in Riding the Waves of Change (Jossey-Bass, 1988), suggests that one of the greatest limitations of the 4 Ps approach “is that it unconsciously emphasizes the inside-out view (looking from the company outwards), while the essence of marketing should be the outside-in approach “.

Some authors suggest extensions of the 4P model (not widely shared by academic researchers and in need of further verification):

• Industrial or B2B marketing would be required for the long term contractual agreements that are typical in supply chain transactions. Relationship marketing efforts to do this by looking at a business relationship rather than individual transactions.
• Marketing services would be required for the unique nature of services. In order to Recognize the different aspects of selling services , as Opposed to Products , some authors advocate Seven Ps ^[22] for the service industries: Process – the way in qui orders are handled, customers are satisfied and the service is Delivered. Physical Evidence – is tangible evidence of the service of customers (for example a holiday brochure). People – the people meeting and dealing with the customers.
• Some authors cite a further P – Packaging – this is thought to be part of Product , but in certain markets (Japan, China for example) and with certain products (perfume, cosmetics) the packaging of a product has a greater importance – maybe even than the product itself.
• Due to an increase in social media coverage, they are likely to be able to offer the four P-Model needs to be compared. Studies carried out in the Journal of Interactive Marketing suggests that the furnace should not be affected by this issue. For example, according to these studies, the behavior in the early stages of Internet use is positively correlated with luxury-brand image in comparison ^[23] .

The marketing environment

The term “marketing environment” refers to all of the factors (whether internal, external, direct or indirect) that affect a firm’s marketing decision-making / planning. A firm’s marketing environment consists of three main areas, which are:

• The macro-environment
• The micro-environment

The macro-environment

A firm’s marketing macro-environment consists of a variety of external factors that manifest a large (or macro) scale. These are typically economic, social, or political phenomena. A common method of assessing a firm’s macro-environment is via a PESTLE (Political, Economic, Social, Technological, Legal, Ecological) analysis. Within a PESTLE analysis , the key macroeconomic conditions, health and indicators (such as economic growth, inflation , unemployment, etc.), social trends / attitudes, and the nature of technology’s impact on its society and the business processes within the society.

The micro-environment

A firm’s micro-environment includes factors relevant to the firm itself, or stakeholders closely connected with the firm or company.

A firm’s micro-environment typically spans:

• Customers / consumers
• Employees
• Suppliers
• The Media

By contrast to the macro-environment, an organization holds a greater degree of control over these factors.

A 2014 article in The Journal of Interactive Marketing wrote that social media proves “an unparalleled platform for consumers to publicize their personal assessments of written products and thus facilitates word-of-mouth communication”. However, in recent years, more platforms have been created for marketing to be used. Specifically, due to it’s growing popularity, the social media has completely changed the mindset for many marketers and all of the new strategies have been created. Some of the newer strategies used relates to showing all of the benefits of a product first and make the price was secondary care for the consumer, INSTEAD of showing the price first qui has-been done in past years ^[24] .

Marketing research

Marketing research is a systematic process of analyzing data which involves conducting research in support of marketing activities, and the statistical interpretation of data into information. This information is then used by managers in marketing, marketing, marketing and marketing.

A distinction should be made between marketing research and market research. Market research pertains to research in a given market. As an example, a firm may conduct research in a target market, after selecting a suitable market segment. In contrast, marketing research refers to all research conducted within marketing. Market research is a subset of marketing research.

Scientific researchers use statistical methods (such as quantitative research , qualitative research , hypothesis tests , Chi-square tests , linear regression , correlation coefficients , frequency distributions , Poisson and binomial distributions , etc.) to interpret their findings and convert data into information. ^[25]

The Marketing Research Process

Marketing research spans a number of internships, ^[26] including:

• Define the problem
• Develop a research plan
• Collect the data
• Interpret data into information
• Disseminate information formally in the form of a report

Market segmentation

Market segmentation consists of taking the total heterogeneous market for a product and dividing it into several sub-markets or segments, each of which tends to be homogeneous in all significant aspects. ^[27]

The purposes of market segmentation

Market segmentation is conducted for two main purposes, including:

• – A better allocation of a finite finite resources
• – To better serve the world of tastes of contemporary Western consumers

A firm only possesses a certain amount of resources. Accordingly, it must make choices (and appreciate the relative costs) in servicing specific groups of consumers.

Moreover, with more diversity in the tastes of modern consumers, firms are taking advantage of the service of multiplicity of new markets.

Overview of segmentation process

The steps of segmentation are Segment, Target, Position (abbreviated STP).

Segment

Segmentation involves the initial splitting up of consumers in the face of needs / wants / tastes.

Commonly used criteria are used for segmentation, which include:

• Geographical (country, region, city, town, etc.)
• Psychographic (eg personality traits or character traits which influence consumer behavior)
• Demographic (eg age, gender, socio-economic class, education, etc.)
• Behavioral (eg brand loyalty, usage rate, etc.)

Target

Once a segment has been identified, a firm must ascertain whether the segment is beneficial for them to service.

The acronym DAMP (meaning Discernable, Accessible, Measurable and Profitable) are used as a guide to the viability of a target market. DAMP is explained in more detail below:

• – Discernable – how a segment can be differentiated from other segments.
• – Accessible – how to reach a segment via Marketing Communications produced by a firm
• – Measurable – can the segment be quantified and its size determined?
• – Profitable – can a sufficient return on investment be attained from a segment’s servicing?

The next step in the targeting process is the level of differentiation involved in a segment serving. Three modes of differentiation exist, which are commonly applied by firms. These are:

• Undifferentiated – where a company produces a product for a market segment
• Differentiated – in which a firm produced slight changes of a product within a segment
• Niche – in which an organization forges a product to satisfy a specialized target market

Position

Positioning concerns in the minds of consumers.

A firm often performs this by producing a perceptual map, which denotes products produced in its industry according to consumers perceive their price and quality. From a product’s positioning on the map, a firm would tailor its marketing communications with the product’s perception among consumers.

Marketing communications

Marketing communications is defined by the actions of a firm to communicate with end-users, consumers and external parties. Marketing communications encompasses separate oven subsets, which are:

Personal sales

Oral presentation given by a salesperson who approaches individuals or a group of potential customers:

• Live, interactive relationship
• Personal interest
• Attention and response
• Interesting presentation
• Clear and thorough.

Sales promotion

Short-term incentives to encourage buying of products:

• Instant appeal
• Anxiety to sell

An example is gold coupons. People are given an incentive to buy, but this does not build customer loyalty gold encourages future repeat buys. A major drawback of sales promotion is that it is easily copied by competition. It can not be used as a sustainable source of differentiation.

Public Relations

Public Relations (or PR, as an acronym) is the use of media tools by a firm in order to promote goodwill from an organization to a target market segment, or other consumers of a firm’s good / service. PR stems from the fact that it can not seek to antagonize or inflame its market base, due to incurring a demand for its good / service. Organizations undertake PR in order to ensure consumers, and to forestall negative perceptions towards it.

PR can span:

• Interviews
• Speeches / Presentations
• Corporate literature, such as financial statements, brochures, etc.

Publicity

Publicity involves attaining space in media, without having to pay directly for such coverage. As an example, an organization may have a new product covered by a newspaper or TV news segment. This benefits is in the nature of a product of its product, and does not require payment.

Advertising

Advertising occurs when a country directly has a media channel to publicize its product. Common examples of this include TV and radio adverts, billboards, branding, sponsorship, etc.

Marketing communications “mix”

Marketing communications is a “sub-mix” within the promotion aspect of the marketing mix, as the exact nature of how to apply marketing communications depends on the nature of the product in question.

Accordingly, a given product would require a unique communications mix, in order to convey successfully information to consumers. Some products may require a focus on personal sales, while others may need more focus on advertising.

Marketing Planning

The area of ​​marketing planning involves a plan for a firm’s marketing activities. A marketing plan may also pertain to a specific product, as well as to an organization’s overall marketing strategy.

Generally speaking, an organization’s marketing planning process is derived from its overall business strategy. Thus, when the top management is devising the firm’s strategic direction / mission,

Marketing Planning Process

Within the overall strategic marketing plan, the stages of the process are listed as:

• Mission Statement
• Corporate Objectives
• Marketing Audit
• SWOT (Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities, Threats) analysis
• Assumptions arising from the Audit and SWOT analysis
• Marketing objectives derived from the assumptions
• An estimate of the expected results of the objectives
• Identification of alternative plans / mixes
• Budgeting for the marketing plan
• A first-year implementation program

Levels of marketing objectives within an organization

As stated previously, the senior management of a firm would formulate a general business strategy for a firm. However, this general business strategy would be considered and implemented in different contexts throughout the firm.

Corporate

Corporate marketing objectives are typically broad-based in nature, and pertain to the general vision of the firm in the short, medium or long-term.

As an example, if one pictures a group of companies (or a conglomerate ), top management may increase sales by 25% over a ten-year period.

The Journal of Interactive Marketing wrote that social media proves “an unparalleled platform for consumers to publicize their word of mouth communication” strategic business unit

Strategic business unit (SBU), in this case, means strategic business unit. An SBU is a subsidiary within a firm, which participates within a given market / industry. The SBU would embrace the corporate strategy and its own particular industry. For instance, an SBU may be partake in the sports goods industry. It thus would be ascertain how it would attain additional sales of sports goods, in order to satisfy the overall business strategy.

Functional

The functional level is related to SBUs, such as marketing, finance, HR, production, etc. The functional level would adopt the SBU’s strategy and determine how to achieve SBU’s own objectives in its market.

To be successful, the marketing department would be in charge of marketing plans, strategies and communications to help the SBU achieve its marketing aims.

Product Life Cycle

The Product Life Cycle ^[28] (or PLC , for short) is a tool, especially relating to sales / revenue accrued over time. The PLC is based on a few key assumptions, including:

– A given product would have an introduction, growth, maturity and decline stage. – No product lasts perpetually on the market. – A firm must employ differing strategies, according to where is product is on the PLC.

Introduction

In this stage, a product is launched on the market. To stimulate growth of sales, the use of advertising may be high, in order to heighten awareness of the product in question.

Growth

The product’s sales / revenue is increasing, which encourages marketing. More entrants enter the market, to the top of the market.

Maturity

A product’s sales, and an increasing number of entrants to a market produce price falls for the product. Firms may use sales promotions to raise sales.

Decline

Demand for a good start to be cut off, and the firm may opt to discontinue manufacture of the product. This is so, if it is going back to the product of efficiency savings in production, to the actual sales of a good / service. However, if a product service is niche market, it is complementary to another product, it is a product of the product, despite a low level of sales / revenue being accrued.

Customer focus

Many companies today have a customer focus (or market orientation). This implies that the company focuses on its activities and products on consumer demands. There are three ways of doing this: the customer-driven approach, the sense of identifying market changes and the product innovation approach.

In the consumer-driven approach, consumers are the drivers of all strategic marketing decisions. No strategy is pursued until it passes the test of consumer research. Every aspect of a market offering, including the nature of the product itself, is driven by the needs of potential consumers. The starting point is always the consumer. The rationale for this approach is that there is no point spending R & D funds developing products that people will not buy. History attests to many products that were commercial failures in spite of being a breakthrough. ^[29]

A formal approach to this customer-focused marketing is known as SIVA ^[30] (Solution, Information, Value, Access). This system is basically the product of a customer’s focus.

The SIVA Model provides a request / customer centric alternative version to the well-known 4Ps supply side model (product, price, place, promotion) of marketing management.

Product	→	Solution
Promotion	→	Information
Price	→	Value
Placement	→	Access

Product focus

In a product innovation approach, the company’s product innovation , then tries to develop a market for the product. Product innovation drives the process and marketing research is conducted primarily to ensure that the market segment exists for innovation. The rationale is that we may not know what we are going to be in the future. However, marketers can aggressively over-pursue product innovation and try to overcapitalize a niche. When pursuing a product innovation approach, marketers must ensure that they have a varied and multi-tiered approach to product innovation. It Claimed That is if Thomas Edisonhe would have made larger candles than inventing light bulbs. Many firms, such as research and development focused companies, successfully focused on product innovation. Many purists doubt whether this is really a form of marketing orientation at all, because of the ex post status of consumer research. Some even question it is marketing.

• An emerging area of ​​study and practice in internal marketing , or how employees are trained and managed to deliver the brand in a way that positively impacts the acquisition and retention of customers ( employer branding ).
• Diffusion of innovations researches explores how and why people adopt new products, services and ideas.
• A relatively new form of marketing is the Internet and is called Internet marketing or e-marketing , affiliate marketing , desktop advertising or online marketing . It tries to perfect the segmentation strategy used in traditional marketing. It targets its audience more precisely, and is sometimes called personalized marketing or one-to-one marketing.
• With consumers’ eroding Attention span and willingness to give time to advertising messages, marketers are turning to forms of permission marketing Such as branded content , custom media and reality marketing.
• The use of herd behavior in marketing.

The Economist reported a recent conference in Rome on the subject of the simulation of adaptive human behavior. ^[31] It is a shared purchase to increase impulse buying and getting people “to buy more by playing on the herd instinct.” The basic idea is that it will be more popular, and it will be more likely to be used by other people, including smart-cart technology and the use of Radio Frequency Identification Tag technology. A “swarm-moves” model was introduced by a Florida Institute of Technology researcher, which is appealing to supermarkets because it can “increase sales without the need to give discounts.”

Marketing is also used to promote business and is a great way to promote business.

Other recent studies on the “power of social influence” include an “artificial music market in which some 14,000 people downloaded previously unknown songs” ( Columbia University , New York); a Japanese chain of convenience stores which orders its products based on a Massachusetts company exploiting knowledge of social networking to improve sales; and online retailers who are more popular about “which products are popular with like-minded consumers” (eg, Amazon , eBay ).

See also

Types of marketing

Marketing orientations or philosophies

References