Marketing Process

Marketing Process

Process by which individuals and groups obtain what they need and want through creating and

exchanging products and value with others is termed as marketing process. The marketing process

consists of four steps: analyzing market opportunities; developing marketing strategies; planning

marketing programs, which entails choosing the marketing mix (the four Ps of product, price,

place, and promotion); and organizing, implementing, and controlling the marketing effort.

Marketing is the organizational function charged with defining customer targets and the best way

to satisfy needs and wants competitively and profitably. Since consumers and business buyers face

an abundance of suppliers seeking to satisfy their every need, companies and nonprofit

organizations cannot survive today by simply doing a good job. They must do an excellent job if

they are to remain in the increasingly competitive global marketplace. Many studies have

demonstrated that the key to profitable performance is to know and satisfy target customers with

competitively superior offers. This process takes place today in an increasingly global, technical,

and competitive environment.

The concept of markets brings one full circle to the concept of marketing.

1). Sellers must search for buyers, identify their needs, design good products and services, set prices for them, promote them, and store and deliver them.

2). A modern marketing system includes all of the elements necessary to bring buyers and sellers together. This might include such activities as product development, research, communication, distribution, pricing, and service.

3). Each of the major actors in a marketing system adds value for the next level of the system. There is often critical interdependency among network members.

There are certain factors that can influence the marketing process directly or indirectly termed as,

“actors and forces in marketing system”. Let’s have brief explanation of these actors and forces:

Company or Marketing Organization -marketing plans must accommodate the needs of other

functional areas of the firm to coordinate product/service delivery effectively.

Suppliers - are the firms and persons that provide the resources needed by the company and

competitors to produce goods and services.

Marketing Intermediaries - include various middlemen and distribution firms as well as

marketing service agencies and financial institutions.

Customers -usually consist of consumer, industrial, reseller, government, and international

markets.

Competitors - are usually considered those companies also serving a target market with similar

products and services, although broader definitions may apply.

Publics - may consist of any group that perceives itself having an interest in the actions of the

firm. Publics can have positive as well as negative influences on the company's objectives.

Other than factors above there are certain macro environmental factors that can have impact or

that can affect the marketing process. These forces and environmental factors will be discussed in

more detail in coming Lessons. As described in a fig: important connections with customers,

connections with marketing partners, and connections with the World around us are to be made in

order to perform the marketing process. The main connections required in this regard are

connecting with marketing partners: (These connections occur by (a) connecting with other

marketing departments, (b) connecting with suppliers and distributors, and (c) connecting through

strategic alliances). Marketing companies do not operate in a vacuum. They have to be interacting

with intermediaries that have information to share, ideas to explore, and experiences that are

invaluable. New technologies can bring this information to the decision maker in new rapid ways.

Finally companies need to have information about the competitors and other environmental

factors and are need to have updated knowledge because for success, change adoption with change

occurrence is required otherwise company will not able to stay in this completive era.

What image comes to mind when you hear the word “marketing”? Some people think of

advertisements or brochures, while others think of public relations (for instance, arranging for

clients to appear on TV talk shows). The truth is, all of these—and many more things—make up

the field of marketing because as we have discussed in our last Lesson that marketing is more than

just advertisement or promotion. The Knowledge Exchange Business Encyclopedia defines marketing as

“planning and executing the strategy involved in moving a good or service from producer to

consumer.”

With this definition in mind, it’s apparent that marketing and many other business activities are

related in some ways. In simplified terms, marketers and others help move goods and services

through the creation and production process; at that point, marketers help move the goods and

services to consumers. But the connection goes even further: Marketing can have a significant

impact on all areas of the business and vice versa. Lets have discussion on some basics of

marketing:

• Product—What are you selling? (It might be a product or a service.)

• Price—What is your pricing strategy?

• Place or distribution—How are you distributing your product to get it into the marketplace?

• Promotion—How are you tellingconsumers in your target group aboutyour product?

• Positioning—What place do you want your product to hold in the consumer’s mind?

• Personal relationships—How are you building relationships with your target consumers? So

based upon all this discussion marketing process can be defined as a social and managerial

process by which individuals and groups obtain what they need and want through creating,

offering and exchanging products of value with others

The sum of the above is called the marketing mix. It is important to have as varied a mix as

possible in marketing efforts, since each piece plays a vital role and boosts the overall impact.

Let’s take a closer look at the basic P’s of marketing and particularly at how they might affect what

you do in business.

•  Product

Marketers identify a consumer need and then provide the product or service to fill that need. The

marketer’s job is to pinpoint and understand existing needs, expand upon them, and identify new

ones. For example, because there are more singles and small families these days than in years past,

marketers might see a need for products to be sold in smaller quantities and offered in smaller

packages.

How can this impact other professionals in the business/marketing process? Let’s say your

company has developed a new product that generates enormous consumer demand. Your

marketing department may ask you to find a way to speed up the workflow in order to crank out

more products faster. A year after the product is introduced, however, the market might be

flooded with cheap imitations. Since one marketing strategy is to keep products price-competitive,

a marketer may then ask you to find a way to make the product less expensively.

This relationship works both ways. There may be production and industrial engineers who may see

a way to change the work process that would create additional options for consumers. Those

engineers will also be instrumental in design and development of products for which human

factors and ergonomics are important considerations. Maybe there’s room to add another product

line. For instance, that product X is still blue but new product Y is red. You can suggest this to

your marketing department; it, in turn, would do research to gauge potential consumer demand for

the new line.

•  Price

Ideally, a marketer wants to be proactive in setting price rather than simply react to the

marketplace. To that end, the marketer researches the market and competition and plots possible

price points, looking for gaps that indicate opportunities. When introducing a new product, the

marketer needs to be sure that the price is competitive with that of similar products or, if the price

is higher, that the consumers perceive they’re getting more value for their money.

Various other technical professionals can have an important impact on marketers’ pricing

decisions. Again, you may be asked to determine if productivity can be enhanced so that the

product can be manufactured and then sold—for a lower price.

•  Place or distribution

What good is a product if you can’t get it to people who want to purchase it? When marketers

tackle this issue, they try to figure out what the optimum distribution channels would be. For

example, should the company sell the product to distributors who then wholesale it to retailers or

should the company have its own direct sales force?

Marketers also look at where the product is placed geographically. Is it sold regionally, nationally,

and internationally? Will the product be sold only in high-end stores or strictly to discounters? The

answers to all of these questions also help shape how a product can be distributed in the best way.

Such distribution questions are potentially of great significance to many professionals, including

industrial and other types of engineers in a company. For instance, whether a product will be

marketed regionally or internationally can have enormous implications for package design as well

as obvious areas of the supply chain: logistics, transportation, distribution, and warehousing.

•  Promotion

Promotion encompasses the various ways marketers get the word out about a product—most

notably through sales promotions, advertising, and public relations.

Sales promotions are special offers designed to entice people to purchase a product. These can

include coupons, rebate offers, two-for-one deals, free samples, and contests.

Advertising encompasses paid messages that are intended to get people to notice a product. This

can include magazine ads, billboards, TV and radio commercials, Web site ads, and so forth.

Perhaps the most important factor in advertising success is repetition. We’re all bombarded with

an enormous number of media messages every day, so the first few times a prospective customer

sees an ad, it usually barely makes a dent. Seeing the ad over and over is what burns the message

into people’s minds. That’s why it’s good to run ads as frequently as possible.

Public relations refer to any non-paid communication designed to plant a positive image of a

company or product in consumers’ minds. One way to accomplish this is by getting the company

or product name in the news. This is known as media relations, and it’s an important aspect of

public relations.

As with price, changes in demand created by promotions can have a direct impact on the work of

many other professionals.

•  Positioning

By employing market research techniques and competitive analysis, the marketer identifies how the

product should be positioned in the consumer’s mind. As a luxury, high-end item? A bargain item

that clearly provides value? A fun product? Is there a strong brand name that supports how the

image is fixed in the consumer’s mind? Once the marketer answers these kinds of questions, he or

she develops, through a host of vehicles, the right image to establish the desired position.

This, too, can affect the work you do. If an upscale image is wanted, the materials used in the

product and packaging are likely to be different from those used in a bargain product—a fact that

could make the workflow significantly more complex. On the other hand, with your engineering

knowledge, you may be able to suggest alternative materials that would preserve the desired image

but be easier or less expensive to use.

•  Personal Relationships

In recent years, personal relationships have come to the forefront of marketing programs. Now

even the largest companies want their customers to feel that they have a personal relationship with

the company. Companies do this in two ways: They tailor their products as much as possible to

individual specifications, and they measure customer satisfaction.

The firm’s contribution can significantly impact the area of personal relationships. If the work

processes the firm creates cannot meet the customer time frames, the relationship will be damaged.

If the firm develops manufacturing lines that cannot be tailored to fit individual customer needs, it

will be difficult for the company to give consumers the perception of personal commitment. If

salespeople promise delivery by a certain date, but the product cannot be produced on schedule,

consumers will not be happy.