Basic Concepts of Marketing
In these weeks’ module and coursework, we read about the basic concepts of marketing and how the marketing function has changed considerably in an organization since the time of its inception. This week topics like the management of marketing in a competitive market with various dynamics like that of company, context, competitors and industry were elaborated upon, and our main reading was based on the article by McKenna written in 1991 which states various dynamics of marketing on a whole (McKenna 1991). Hence, this journal will be discussing a reflection on the impact of technology on marketing and the manner the different marketing concepts have been greatly affected and what is the present scenario as compared to that of the scenario which is mentioned in the given article. According to Bresler and Lubbe (2014), the concept of marketing has changed considerably and made the transition from traditional means of advertising to the modern means. The use of smartphones which came into the view much after 1991, have changed the manner in which the different customers are reached out. I believe that as the use of smartphones by the different customers made on a 24 *7 basis has bought about a considerable change in the marketing forms and the medium used by the companies to take out information from the customers has also changed.
According to Chernev (2018), marketing was not a function but a manner in which business is conducted, it can be essentially described the manner in which the design of product is done and how a systematic procedure has been developed. The marketing in 1991 was based on customer relationship buildup but at present it is all about gaining the maximum market share in order to ensure that the firm is successful in its operations (McKenna 1991). I had read a book on marketing management and it reflected that at present a business without marketing will not be able to survive appropriately. Moreover, I believe that the very definition of technology was also very different back in 1991. The technology earlier was based on just the use of telephones and the different options to attract the customers and provide them with return facilities however, at present the technology in marketing has advanced considerably.
Technology has bought about a new form of marketing with respect to mediums like e-mails, text messaging, social media techniques and other facilities like push notifications which shall ensure a larger market share and appeal. In addition to this, it is my belief whereas the focus was on mass marketing in the past which gradually shifted to customized marketing, at present, the same is done by sending the different customers an advertisement which caters to their own individual needs at large. In addition to this, the use of video advertisements along with website advertisements has also improved (Marshall 2014). Before undertaking the coursework, I had a perception that earlier just the traditional form of marketing was used, however, at present it is my belief that the change from the year 1991 to the present 2018, is much different than I expected and now the aim of marketing in a firm is to reach out to all the customers but making them feel special at the same time.
Management of Marketing in a Competitive Market
Segmentation strategies can be essentially described as an effective component in marketing, whereby a company aims to divide a market into different segments which would then make it easier for the organization to target the customers in the particular segment at large. In this week`s module we learnt the essential function of marketing which involves Segmentation, Marketing and Positioning. The week’s material talked about the essence of marketing information and how the sources of information have changed considerably. I remember that the different companies often used physical surveys and phone call methods to understand the requirements and the needs of the customers. However, as per my reading of Kinnear and Taylor (1987), the method of the collection of marketing information has changed considerably and at present marketing information essentially deals with the use of sophisticated data collection and analysis techniques to understand the different needs of the customers. This thereby leads to the customer insights which then provides the companies a better information for the segmentation strategies. According to the Cross, Belich and Rudelius (2015) text which was used in the module, I learnt that Segmentation forms the first move of a marketer and that a right segmentation strategy will go a long way in ensuring that the firm is successful in its operations in the long run.
Segmentation refers to dividing the market into smaller segments and then targeting some customers in those segments. In the week`s module, I learnt that there are four basic Segmentation strategies which a marketer can make effective use of. These are demographic segmentation, behavioral segmentation, psychographic and the geographic segmentation (McDonagh and Prothero 2014). The demographic segmentation deals with the factors like age, gender, income, occupation and education. I believe that this is the most common type of segmentation strategy used by the various companies. For example, a wedding planner would essentially target young population, who is single and capable enough of having a grand wedding. The second strategy of segmentation is the Geographic segmentation whereby the different customers are targeted on the basis of their Geographic segmentation. According to my reading of the Shaw (2016), the Geographical segmentation was taken into importance earlier but now because of Globalization, the boundaries between the different regions and the countries have come down which shall then lead to a larger geographical target audience.
The week reflected that psychographic segmentation is another strategy which is essentially adopted by the different companies in order to measure lifestyle and personality traits of the different customers and design products for the customers as per their unique needs. The last segmentation strategy which we learnt in this module was the behavioral segmentation which considers factors like the urgency of demand, purpose of the use and other factors for segmentation. Hence, after analyzing the different segmentation strategies available it can be stated that any company which aims to achieve success in the long run needs to have a considerable segmentation strategy in place. Earlier, I was under the belief that the company divides the target market based on their needs and capabilities but after analyzing the given strategy, it can be stated that any organization segments the market based on the customer characteristics and according to me, the best strategy which can be adopted by a company is demographic and behavioral segmentation strategy. After the market has been segmented, then the company forms a targeting tactic.
Impact of Technology on Marketing
In the fourth week of our coursework, we discussed various topics like the four pillars of a marketing strategy and the manner in which the different marketing strategies were essentially formed in order to ensure long term success. It also discussed the concept of marketing planning and the business models. The aim of the given journal is to reflect upon my learnings and other practical experiences based on one of the readings as present in the given weeks module. I have chosen the topic of Marketing Planning for my reflection. Marketing planning can be essentially described as the process which an organization undertakes in order to understand the current positioning of a company in the market and to form a series of strategies as well as tactics in order to assist the organization in achieving their time frames (Ingenbleek, Meulenberg and Van Trijp 2015). Foxall (2014), describes the marketing plan as an essential document which takes into consideration the internal environment of the business, the external market conditions, the target markets to be served and a strategy for each of these segments. I believe that a marketing plan needs to be flexible in nature and needs to be necessarily based on the needs of the organization at large. This is because in case there exists any changes in the latter stage of the operations, the marketing plan can be adjusted accordingly.
According to my readings based on the Bresler and Lubbe (2014), there are a large number of benefits of the formation of a marketing plan such as fulfilling the needs of the target market, evaluation of the results which are achieved based on the objectives as well as the strategies, planning procedure of a firm, competitive information and others. I had read a case study based on Mc Donald’s which seeks to ensure that it is successfully able to expand its marketing and thereby ensure that they engage in the formation of a marketing plan which will go a long way in ensuring that the company is able to achieve success in the long run. The process of a Marketing Plan is very simple in nature and during this week I learnt that, the first step involves situational analysis, which is then followed by the target market and segmentation analysis, the third part involves the marketing objectives and formation of the relate strategies and the last part of the formation of a marketing strategy involves implementation and control (Sargeant and Macquillin 2016).
Changing Marketing Concepts
Moreover, I believe that along with the formation of a successful marketing plan, it also becomes very important for any business to ensure that they evaluate the marketing plan successful. Before undertaking the analysis, I was under the belief that a marketing plan and the entire procedure of marketing planning is not very crucial for the success of the firm and that it is the offering which matters, however, after analyzing the materials, I understood that marketing planning and the documents serve as a guiding path towards organizational success, the formation of which is unique for any marketing success.
In this week, we viewed a documentary named No Logo by Naomi Klein which emphasis on the increasing use of brands and how logos are all around the globe (Goworek, McGoldrick and McGoldrick 2015). However, very often the different brands find themselves the target of the anti-corporate campaigns and thus Naomi has presented this documentary to reveal why there is a backlash against the popularity of these brands and also analyses how these different brands like that of Gap, Tommy Hilfiger and Nike became mere brand symbols not because of the products they were manufacturing but because they created brand identities which lured the different customers to adopt their lifestyle (Youtube.com. 2018). According to me, the video shows the reason, these brands have been following the wrong approach of attracting the different customers and that instead of competing on the basis of the products they are selling but on the basis of the identities they are creating through their branding activities.
I believe that the main message behind the documentary was to reflect upon the commercial takeover of the space of the public and destroying the different choices of the consumers. Along with this, the larger brands have also replaced the real jobs with temporary work and impacted the general audience at large (Olson et al. 2018). Before, viewing this video, I did not possess a deep understanding of the ill effects of branding as undertaken by these large brands and I was unaware of the raging backslash which these brands were receiving and how there is a movement by certain activists which wants the companies to stop this movement. However, one of the key messages which attracted my attention in the video was the message of `No Choice`. From the video I could understand that brands often use their size and influence to make the choices available to different customers limited in number and display market dominance or invasion of a region. As per my understanding after reading of the text, I came to the conclusion that Walmart makes use of market dominance and that Starbucks makes use of considerable invasion of region.
The reason why they engage in this activity is that they want to gain a dominant force and prevent the competition from taking in their market share. However, as per the business practices, this can be considered to be wrong and thereby it is important to put the activities of the company to a stop (Sargeant and Macquillin 2016). Moreover, I also understood how different companies tend to work in an agreement with one another in order to maintain their image. I am in support of the activists as this is a simple case of brainwashing of the different customers at large and that the brands need to improve their measures. Hence, from the documentary I reflected upon how the real branding of giant corporates differs from the one of the book based theory and how all the customers and governments are required to come together in order to put an end into this activity at large.
References
Bresler, M. and Lubbe, I., 2014. Marketing management. Pearson
Chernev, A., 2018. Strategic marketing management. Cerebellum Press.
Marshall, G., 2014. Marketing management. McGraw-Hill Higher Education.
McKenna, R., 1991. Marketing is everything. Harvard business review, 69(1), pp.65-79.
Kinnear, T.C. and Taylor, J.R., 1987. Marketing research: an applied approach. McGraw-Hill Companies.
Shaw, S., 2016. Airline marketing and management. Routledge.
McDonagh, P. and Prothero, A., 2014. Sustainability marketing research: Past, present and future. Journal of Marketing Management, 30(11-12), pp.1186-1219.
Cross, J.C., Belich, T.J. and Rudelius, W., 2015. How marketing managers use market segmentation: An exploratory study. In Proceedings of the 1990 Academy of Marketing Science (AMS) Annual Conference (pp. 531-536). Springer, Cham.
Bresler, M. and Lubbe, I., 2014. Marketing management. Pearson
Foxall, G., 2014. Strategic Marketing Management (RLE Marketing). Routledge.
Ingenbleek, P.T., Meulenberg, M.T. and Van Trijp, H.C., 2015. Buyer social responsibility: A general concept and its implications for marketing management. Journal of Marketing Management, 31(13-14), pp.1428-1448.
Sargeant, A. and Macquillin, I., 2016. Marketing for nonprofit organizations. In The Marketing Book (pp. 555-576). Routledge.
Goworek, H., McGoldrick, P.J. and McGoldrick, P.J., 2015. Retail marketing management: Principles and practice. Harlow, UK: Pearson.
Olson, E.M., Slater, S.F., Hult, G.T.M. and Olson, K.M., 2018. The application of human resource management policies within the marketing organization: The impact on business and marketing strategy implementation. Industrial Marketing Management, 69, pp.62-73.
Sargeant, A. and Macquillin, I., 2016. Marketing for nonprofit organisations. In The Marketing Book (pp. 555-576). Routledge.
Youtube.com., 2018. No Logo Documentary HD Channel Official [online]. Available at: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6ZpnZ6s6NWM (Retrieved on: 29 Oct. 2018).
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