Marketing Indicator 1.01

Understand marketing’s role and function in business to facilitate economic exchanges with customers.

What is marketing?

• the process of planning and executing the conception, pricing, promotion, and distribution of ideas, goods, and services to create exchanges that satisfy individual and organizational objectives.

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• links producers to the customers who buy their goods and services

Marketing Activities (The 4 P’s)

Planning

• Considers the direction in which the firm is heading and how marketing lines up with that direction

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• This thinking process provides the basis for all marketing goals and actions.
• Analyzes who the customers are and what goods or services they need
• Determines which goods or services to produce, sell, or provide

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• Since coordinating all of the pieces of marketing is an essential role of the marketer, thorough planning is necessary.

Marketing Activities (The 4 P’s)

Pricing

• Keeps two pricing issues in mind:
• Customer’s perception of value
• Selling firm’s objectives
• Make a profit?
• Goal is to strike the right balance.

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Marketing Activities (The 4 P’s)

Promoting

• Conducts activities to capture attention about a good or service

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• Each activity involves contact with a customer, whether in person or not.

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• Examples:
• Advertising—e.g., television commercials
• Personal selling—e.g., door-to-door sales, professional sales
• Publicity—e.g., press releases
• Sales promotion—e.g., logo-imprinted giveaways

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• Objectives include informing, persuading, and reminding.

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Marketing Activities (The 4 P’s)

Distributing/Place

• Figures out which steps to take to ensure a timely delivery
• Download it via Internet?
• Transport it? How?
• Store it?

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Items that are marketed

• Broad categories
• Goods
• Durable – e.g., DVD player
• Nondurable – e.g., gasoline
• Services – e.g., delivery services
• Organizations – e.g., labor organization
• Places – e.g., New Zealand
• Ideas – e.g., “Stand” against smoking
• People – e.g., “Shaq Attaq” (Shaquille O’Neal)

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• Almost anything can be marketed.

Where does Marketing Occur?

• Everyday by people, in places, with communication

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• Marketing occurs wherever customers are

Marketing Concept

• A philosophy of conducting business that is based on the belief that all business activities should be aimed toward satisfying consumer wants and needs while achieving company goals.

Elements of the Marketing Concept

• Customer orientation: Do it their way.
• Finding out what customers want and producing those products the way they want them

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• Company commitment: Do it better.
• Make/price the product better than the competition’s model.

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• Company goals: Do it with success in mind.
• Maintain your firm’s purpose while you apply the marketing concept.

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What is Marketing’s Role in a Private Enterprise System?

• Marketing fits into every facet of our lives, whether on a global scale or right in our own neighborhoods.

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• Provides benefits that make our lives better, promoting using natural resources more wisely, and encourage international trade.

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• Without marketing, we would all have to be self-sufficient.

How would consumers and businesses be affected if marketing did not exist?

• Our nation would have difficulty linking producers to consumers.

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• Our own routines would be different because marketing shapes everything we do.
• Ex: Out of milk? Go to the store.

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How Does Marketing Benefit Our Society?

• Marketing visibly benefits our lives, our natural surroundings, and our global trade.

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• Makes our lives better
• Because problem solving is at the heart of marketing, each year we add some new products to our home, often at lower prices.

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• Promotes using the earth’s resources more wisely
• If available resources are used sensibly, benefits can extend well into the future for the marketer, the nation, and the entire world.

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• Encourages trade between nations
• Because resources are valuable to marketers, it doesn’t take them long to pinpoint where a particular resource can be found in abundance.
• If our nation lacks a resource, we can usually trade something to get it.

The Six Functions of Marketing

• Channel management (a.ka. Distribution): identifying, selecting, monitoring, and evaluating sales channels.

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• Marketing-information management: gathering, accessing, synthesizing, evaluating, and disseminating information to aid in business decisions

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• Pricing: determining and adjusting of prices to maximize return and meet customers’ perceptions of value

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• Product/Service management: obtaining, developing, maintaining, and improving a product or service mix in response to market opportunities

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• Promotion: communicate information about goods, services, images, and/or ideas to achieve a desired outcome

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• Selling: determining client needs and wants and responding through planned, personalized communication that influences purchase decisions and enhances future business opportunities

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Channel management (a.k.a.) Distribution

• Responsible for moving, storing, locating, and/or transferring ownership of goods and services

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• Main goal is to move products from the producer to the consumer.

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• Determines who will offer products and where they will be offered

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• Develops relationships with channel members

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• Assesses quality of vendor performance

Marketing-information management

• Provides data that can be used for business decision-making

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• Provides data about effectiveness of marketing efforts

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• Provides data about customer satisfaction, customer loyalty, needs, and wants

Pricing

• Establishes products’ prices

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• Determines whether prices need to be adjusted

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• Sets policies and objectives for prices

Product/Service Management

• Helps to determine which products a business will offer and in what quantities

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• Aids in determining and developing a company’s/product’s image

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• Provides direction for other marketing activities based on changes in a product’s life cycle

Promotion

• Reminds customers about products/businesses

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• Informs customers about products/businesses

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• Persuades customers about products/businesses

Selling

• Creates a following of loyal customers

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• Completes the exchange transaction

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• Provides services for customers

Distribution is important to marketing because

• Gets products from producers to consumers so they are on hand when consumers want to buy.

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• Allows adequate supplies of products in the right place at the right time.

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• This function includes selecting methods of transporting products.
• Some methods are less expensive than others.
• Making the right decision helps to control expenses.

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Marketing-Information Management� is important to marketing because

• Allows businesses to make decisions based on information gathered rather than making guesses

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• Goal is to forecast, or predict, what will be happening that might affect the business in the future.

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• Might lose money because they are not keeping up with the times or selling the right products

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Pricing is important to marketing because

• Affects how well a product will sell and how much profit the business will make

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• Businesses need to set prices that customers are willing to pay.

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• Prices need to cover costs and include sufficient profit.

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Product/Service Management is important to marketing because

• Involves deciding on the products that a business will produce or offer

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• Businesses must offer the products that customers want and need to be successful.

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• Helps businesses decide on the type of image they want customers to have of them and their products.

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• Rely on the marketing-information management function to provide the necessary data.

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Promotion is important to marketing because

• Can create and/or increase consumer demand for products.

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• Promotions inform customers about:
• New products
• Improved products
• New uses for existing products
• Special values on products

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• Helps to create an image or impression of a business.
• A business might want to change its image to attract a different or expanded target market.
• Coordinated advertising and public relations will get the message across.

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Selling is important to marketing because

• This function is important because it involves contact with customers.
• Other marketing functions pave the way for successful selling.

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• Businesses work to meet customers’ needs and sell them the most appropriate product.

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• All businesses have something to sell.

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• Everyone benefits from selling.
• Selling benefits businesses.
• Creates a desire for their products
• Helps get their products into the hands of consumers
• Selling benefits consumers by providing:
• Help with their buying decisions
• Information about new products
• Selling can benefit society.
• Creates employment
• Encourages economic growth

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The interrelationships among marketing functions

• Can’t forget to advertise even if you have a great product
• Can’t forget to have a sufficient supply of those great products in stock for an upcoming sale
• Can’t forget to set prices that are competitive and attract customers
• Forgetting any of these functions means your marketing effort won’t be as effective.
• Your competitors will have an advantage…YIKES!