Marketing

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, clients, partners, and society at large. The term developed from the original meaning which referred literally to going to market, as in shopping, or going to a market to sell goods or services.

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Marketing practice tends to be seen as a creative industry, which includes advertising, distribution and selling. It is also concerned with anticipating the customers' future needs and wants, which are often discovered through market research. Seen from a systems point of view, sales process engineering views marketing as a set of processes that are interconnected and interdependent with other functions, whose methods can be improved using a variety of relatively new approaches.

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Marketing is influenced by many of the social sciences, particularly psychology, sociology, and economics. Market research underpins these activities. Through advertising, it is also related to many of the creative arts. The marketing literature is also infamous for re-inventing itself and its vocabulary according to the times and the culture.

Essentially the Advertising section of the marketing plan describes how you're going to deliver your Unique Selling Proposition to your prospective customers.

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While there are literally thousands of different promotion avenues available to you, what distinguishes a successful Advertising Plan from an unsuccessful one is focus - and that's what your Unique Selling Proposition provides.

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Marketing is defined as the activity, set of institutions, and processes for creating, communicating, delivering, and exchanging offerings that have value for customers, clients, partners, and society at large.

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Advertising

Advertising is a form of communication that typically attempts to persuade potential customers to purchase or to consume more of a particular brand of product or service.

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Every major medium is used to deliver these messages, including television, radio, cinema, magazines, newspapers, video games, the internet, carrier bags and billboards. Advertising is often placed by an advertising agency on behalf of a company or other organization.

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Essentially, the Advertising section of the marketing plan describes how you're going to deliver your Unique Selling Proposition to your prospective customers. While there are literally thousands of different promotion avenues available, what distinguishes a successful Advertising Plan from an unsuccessful one is focus - and that's what your Unique Selling Proposition provides.

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Direct Marketing

Direct marketing is a sub-discipline and type of marketing. There are two main definitional characteristics which distinguish it from other types of marketing.

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The first is that it attempts to send its messages directly to consumers, without the use of intervening media. This involves commercial communication (direct mail, e-mail, telemarketing) with consumers or businesses, usually unsolicited.

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The second characteristic is that it is focused on driving purchases that can be attributed to a specific "call to action." This aspect of direct marketing involves an emphasis on trackable, measurable positive (but not negative) responses from consumers (known simply as "response" in the industry) regardless of medium.

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It the advertisement asks the prospect to take a specific action, for instance call a free phone number or visit a website, then the effort is considered to be direct response advertising.

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Direct Response Marketing

Direct response marketing is a form of marketing designed to solicit a direct response which is specific and quantifiable. The delivery of the response is direct between viewer and the advertiser, that is, the customer responds to the marketer directly. This is in contrast to direct marketing in which the marketer contacts the potential customer directly.

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In direct marketing (such as telemarketing), there is no intermediary broadcast media involved. In direct response marketing, marketers use broadcast media to get customers to contact them directly. It is direct response marketing because the communications from the customer to the marketer are direct, this differentiates it from simple direct marketing in which the communications from the marketer to the customer are direct, but do not allow for instant feedback.

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Like direct marketing, direct response seeks to elicit action, It is inherently accountable since results can be tracked and measured. Furthermore, direct response campaigns perform best if the underlying strategies and tactics are highly competitive.

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Marketing Strategy

Marketing is a strategy. It is defining how your customers will perceive your company. An effective marketing campaign will shape your customers image of your company in a positive manner.

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In order to have a good marketing campaign, you must first define the image you want to portray. Some of the most successful companies have chosen this wisely. Your image is defined by color choices, font choices, and other factors. It is important that when you decide upon your final strategy, that it be implemented across the board in a consistent manner.

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Every promotional piece you produce should have the same color scheme, same font choice and convey the same message.
Find out what your customers want from your product or service. Use their 'hot buttons' to trigger the response you want from them.
It is important to know who your customers are and what makes them buy.

Research will find that customers will buy from you based on their perception of you. If your marketing materials are sloppy, they are likely to presume that you do poor quality work.

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A marketing strategy is most effective when it is an integral component of corporate strategy, defining how the organization will successfully engage customers, prospects, and competitors in the market arena, corporate strategies, corporate missions, and corporate goals.

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As the customer constitutes the source of a company's revenue, marketing strategy is closely linked with sales. A key component of marketing strategy is often to keep marketing in line with a company's mission statement.

Basic theory:

Target Audience

Proposition/key Element

Implementation

A marketing strategy can serve as the foundation of a marketing plan.
A marketing plan contains a set of specific actions required to successfully implement a marketing strategy.
A strategy consists of a well thought out series of tactics to make a marketing plan more effective.
Marketing strategies serve as the fundamental underpinning of marketing plans designed to fill market needs and reach marketing objectives.

Plans and objectives are generally tested for measurable results.

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Marketing Mix

Marketing Mix, which influence the customer decision to purchase are contained in 4 elements: The 4 Ps - product, price, place and promotion.

 

Product: The product aspects of marketing deal with the specifications of the actual goods or services, and how it relates to the end-user's needs and wants. The scope of a product generally includes supporting elements such as 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 simply be what is exchanged for the product or services, e.g. time, energy, or attention. Methods of setting prices optimally are in the domain of pricing science.

 

Placement: (or distribution or place) refers to how the product gets to the customer; for example, point-of-sale placement or retailing. And, place - the channel by which a product or service is sold, which geographic region or industry, to which segment (young adults, families, business people), etc. also referring to how the environment in which the product is sold in can affect sales.

 

Promotion: This includes advertising, sales promotion, publicity, and personal selling, branding and refers to the various methods of promoting the product, brand, or company.

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Marketing Plan

A marketing plan is a written document that details the specific actions you intend to carry out to interest potential customers and clients in your product and/or service and persuade them to buy the product and/or services you offer. Marketing plans cover between one and five years.

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A marketing plan may be part of an overall business plan. Solid marketing strategy is the foundation of a well-written marketing plan. Solid marketing strategy is the foundation of a well-written marketing plan. While a marketing plan contains a list of actions, a marketing plan without a sound strategic foundation is of little use.

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Marketing Process Model

Marketing & Environment Analysis

Fixing Marketing Target

Setting Marketing Strategy

Marketing Mix

Marketing Controlling
 

Marketing Plan​

Marketing planning aims and objectives which should be directed by: The Mission and The Vision
Basic material for the Plan

Financial data - Facts for this section will come from management accounting, costing and finance sections.

Product Data - From production, research and development.

Sales and distribution data - Sales, packaging, distribution sections.

Advertising, sales promotion, merchandising data - Information from these departments.

Market data and miscellany - From market research, who would in most cases act as a source for this information.

Portfolio planning: The coordinated planning of the individual products and services can contribute towards the balanced portfolio.

80:20 Rule: To achieve the maximum impact, the marketing plan must be clear, concise and simple. It needs to concentrate on the 20 percent of products or services, and on the 20 percent of customers, which will account for 80 percent of the volume and 80 percent of the profit.

4 P's: Product, Place, Price and Promotion. The 4 P's can sometimes divert attention from the customer, but the framework they offer can be very useful in building the action plans.

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Like any Plan, the Marketing Plan should be:

Clear - They should be an unambiguous statement of exactly what is to be done.

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Quantified - The predicted outcome of each activity should be, as far as possible, quantified, so that its performance can be monitored.

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Focused - The temptation to proliferate activities beyond the numbers which can be realistically controlled should be avoided. The 80:20 Rule applies in this context too.

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Realistic - They should be achievable.

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Agreed - Those who are to implement them should be committed to them, and agree that they are achievable.

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Strategy and Plans

To sum up, your marketing strategy is a summary of your company's products and position in relation to the competition; your sales and marketing plans are the specific actions you're going to undertake to achieve the goals of your marketing strategy.

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