Marketing Fundamentals

Right from the time we get up in the morning to the time we go to bed, we use several products to satisfy our different needs. These products are manufactured and marketed by different firms. These firms undertake various activities to stimulate the demand for their products and earn profit by satisfying customer’s needs and wants. People purchase products because these satisfy some of their needs.

Several activities are performed by the marketers to facilitate the exchange of goods and services between producers and the users of such products. These activities are referred to as marketing activities.

Marketing

The term marketing has been described by different people in different ways. Some people believe that marketing is the same as ‘shopping’. Whenever they go out shopping for certain products or services, they describe it as marketing. Some other people confuse marketing with ‘selling’ and feel that marketing activity starts after a product or service has been produced.

“Marketing takes a day to learn. Unfortunately, it takes time to master.” — Philip Kotler

In this respect, marketing has been referred to as the performance of business activities that direct the flow of goods and services from producers to consumers. In modern times, the emphasis is placed on describing marketing as a social process. 

Taking the social perspective, Phillip Kolter has defined marketing as "a social process by which individual groups obtain what they need and want through creating offerings and freely exchanging products and services of value with others"

What can be Marketed?

Physical Products: DVD player, Motor cycle, ipods, Cell phone, Footwear,Television, Refrigerator.

Services: Insurance, Health Care, Business Process Outsourcing, Security, Easy Bill service, Financial Services (Investment),Computer Education, Online Trading.

Ideas: Polio Vaccination, Helpage, Family Planning, Donation of Blood (Red cross), Donation of money on Flag Day (National Foundation for Communal Harmony).

Persons: For Election of Candidates for Certain Posts.

Place: ‘Visit Agra – ‘City of Love’, ‘Udaipur – ‘The City of Lakes’, ‘Mysore – The City of Gardens’, ‘When Orisa celebrates, Eleven the God Join In’.

Experience: Customised Experiences as Dinner with a cricketer (say Dhoni); Lunch with a celebrity (say Bill Gates or Aishwarya Roy) or experience of Baloon Riding, mountaineering, etc.

Properties: Intangible rights of ownership of real estate in financial property (Shares, Debentures).

Events: Sports events (say Olympics, Cricket series), diwali mela, fashion show, music concert, film festival, elephant race (Kerala Tourism).

Information: Production packaging and distribution of information by organisations such as by universities, research organisation, providing information as market information (marketing research agencies), technology information.

Organisations: For boosting their public image organisations such as Hindustan Lever, Ranbaxy, Dabur, Proctor and Gamble, communicate with people. Example, Phillips says, Let’s make Things Better’. 

Role of marketing in Economy

Marketing plays a significant role in the development of an economy. It acts as a catalyst in the economic development of a country and helps in raising the standards of living of the people. Development of a nation can be judged by the level of standard of living of its people. Marketing can play a significant role in the economic development of a nation.

It can inspire people to undertake new activities and to set up enterprises for producing goods that are needed by the customers. Marketing can help in overcoming obstacles posed by high prices due to imbalances in the levels of production and consumption. This linkage between the business and consumption centres accelerates the economic activity leading to higher incomes, more consumption and increased savings and investment.

GLOBAL AD SPENDING STATISTICS

                                                                                                                                                                                    source: www.webtrainings.in

Traditional Marketing vs Digital marketing

 There are countless ways of marketing products and services.

 Traditional marketing methods include print advertisements, such as newspaper ads, billboards and flyers, as well as television commercials and radio spots.

 Digital or online marketing methods, which are becoming increasingly popular, include websites, ads on social media, YouTube videos and search engine optimization (SEO), among many others.

What benefits do digital marketing have that traditional marketing does not:

 i) Greater exposure: Traditionally, it was possible to quite effectively reach a local audience. Digital marketing now enables business to reach people all over the world, 24 hours a day.

ii) Cost-efficient: As the image below shows, digital marketing can save one’s company lots of money.

iii) Easy to measure: Through tools such as Google Analytics, it is easy to keep track of the traffic to your website as well as conversion rates, among other things, and you can adapt your marketing strategies accordingly.

iv) Customer engagement: Traditional marketing tends to be unidirectional. On the internet, however, communication goes both ways and digital marketing can be very interactive. 

vi) Greater brand development: Branding can be defined as “the marketing practice of creating a name, symbol or design that identifies and differentiates a product from other products.” This is much easier to do online than offline.

Marketing Funnel

INTEGRATED DIGITAL MARKETING

Branding

 A product is something made in a factory; a brand is something that is bought by the customer. A product can be copied by a competitor; a brand is unique. A product can be quickly outdated; a successful brand is timeless. — Stephen King

A very important decision area for the marketing of most consumer products are whether to sell the product in its generic name (name of the category of the product, say Fan, Pen, etc.) or to sell them in a brand name (such as Pollar Fan or Rottomac Pen). 

Brand the name helps in creating a product differentiation, i.e., providing basis for distinguishing the product of a firm with that of the competitor, which in turn helps in building customer’s loyalty and in promoting its sale.

A brand today is an entity (product. service, company, person, technology, etc.), that offers a set of value exchange measures between what the owner/ market seeks and the price he is willing to pay for. It has always seemed to me that your brand is formed primarily, not by what your company says about itself, but what the company does"— Jeff Bezos

Celebrities’ Influence on Brands’ Performance

Example of ad campaigns featuring celebrities, which resulted in brand building

and growth in volumes.

Cadbury’s and Amitabh Bachchan: The commercial, a testimonial by Bachchan on a factory visit, was launched to rebuild the trust in the brand. Twelve weeks after the campaign was launched, the sales reached 90 per cent of volumes prior to the worm crisis. Big B’s presence helped the company to get media coverage that added to the campaign’s impact.

Santro and Shah Rukh Khan: Shah Rukh was roped in Santro ad to strike an immediate bond with the consumers. Shah Rukh Khan is an unconventional superhero with a quirky acting style that matched the image of Santro.

Titan and Aamir Khan: Both are considered to be Indian icons and have made a mark internationally; the obsession with detail is common to both, as also a sense of style. The Mangal Pandey look, which was unconventional, made the advertisement stand out, along with the fact that Aamir is less exposed than the other celebrities.

Munch and Rani Mukherjee: The campaign for Munch was aired on TV roped Rani Mukherjee to give "a big brand feel". The company got an incredibly good result in recall and the ad was a big hit with kids. Rani was used as a consumer and not as a filmstar.

Sachin Tendulkar and Boost: Research indicated that the brand’s association with Sachin has consistently been successful in strengthening the brand’s core values and building brand stature. Kids look up to Sachin as a true hero, want to emulate everything that he does and can’t seem to get enough of him.

Source: Adopted from Indian Journal of Marketing, Oct. 5, 2006