9/10/2024

What is marketing?

• Organizational function and a set of processes for creating, communicating, and delivering value to customers, and for managing customer relationships in ways that benefit the organization and its stakeholders

  • This includes advertisement, and creating demand for products and services

  • The goal is to communicate some type of value for your specific product

  • You want the get a customer to make a first purchase, but the goal is also to deliver to their expectations and create long-lasting customer relationships

Delivering Value

• A company may:

  • Develop an entirely new product that performs better than existing products (Ex. seasonal items, like pumpkin spice lattes at starbucks)

  • Keep a store open longer hours during a busy season (Ex. Macy’s)

  • Offer price reductions (Ex. coupons and discounts

  • Offer information that explains how a product can be used in new ways

Goods and services

• Goods

  • Physical products purchased by consumers for personal use (Ex. phone, food, etc.)

• Services

  • Products having nonphysical features, such as information, expertise, or an activity that can be purchased (Ex. haircut, car wash, etc.)

The external environment

• PEST analysis

  • Framework and strategic planning tool for analyzing the external environmental factors affecting business objectives and strategies

• P - political factors

  • Political-Legal Environment

    • The relationship between business and government, usually in the form of government regulation of business (Ex. A McDonalds would need to comply with food safety standards for the safety of customers)

    • Includes any law influencing business activity, e.g. health and safety at work, consumer protection, employee protection

• E - economic factors

  • Economic Environment

    • Relevant conditions that exist in the economic system in which a company operates including factors such as gross domestic product (GDP) growth, unemployment, and inflation

• S - social factors

  • Sociocultural Environment

    • The customs, mores values, and demographic characteristic of the society

    • Includes population size and structure, lifestyle, age groups, and education levels

• T - technological factors

  • Technological Environment

    • State of the technological advancement and introduction of new technologies

9/13/2024

Purpose of Packaging

• Protection

  • Transportation without spoiling or breaking

• Convenience

  • Ease of use and decision making

• Image

  • Brand awareness, product/company value

• Sustainability

  • Reduction of environmental impact

9/17/2024

Target Marketing and Market Segmentation

• Product Positioning

  • Process of fixing, adapting, and communicating the nature of a product

    • We need to figure out who our buyers and consumers are so we can target out product towards them

• Target Market

  • Group of people who have similar wants and needs and can be expected to show interest in the same products

    • Ex) Students would be a target market for whiteout

• Market Segmentation

  • Process of dividing a market into categories of customer types, or “segments”

• Identifying Market Segments – variables in a segmentation strategy :

  • Geographic variables

    • Geographic units

      • In the US, some ways to break it down would be states, the coast, midwest, counties inside NJ, etc.

  • Demographic variables

    • Characteristics of populations

      • Age, race, gender, religion, etc.

      • *** Check chart on schoology ***

  • Psychographic variables

    • Consumer characteristics such as lifestyles, opinions, interests, and attitudes

      • Athletes (athletic wear, energy food/drinks health foods)

9/24/2024

Market Research

• Study of what customers need and want and how best to meet those needs and wants

Research Data

• Primary Data

  • New data collected from newly performed research

• Secondary Data

  • Data already available from previous research

Research Methods

1. Observation

   1. Obtains data by watching and recording consumer behavior (Ex. vacuum company like Roomba observing customer complaints, like vacuum not going under small places, or needing to be around when it is vacuuming)

2. Survey

   1. Collecting consumer data using questionnaires, telephone calls, and face-to-face interviews

3. Focus Group

   1. Using a group of people from a larger population who are asked their attitudes, opinions, and beliefs about a product in an open discussion (Benefits: people being more honest, bouncing off of other peoples’ ideas creates more diverse set of data)

4. Experimentation

   1. Using a sample of potential consumers to obtain reactions to test versions of new products or variations of existing products (Ex. Starbucks CEO testing out pumpkin spice latte in only one location in NYC, and seeing what customers say there before implementing it everywhere)

9/27/2024

Strategy: The Marketing Mix

• Combination of strategies used to market products

  • Product

    • Good, service, or idea that is marketed to fill consumers’ needs and wants

    • Product Differentiation

      • Creation of a product feature or product image that differs enough from existing products to attract customers

    • The Product Mix

      • Disney has become a swelling collection of media and entertainment businesses

    • Product Line

      • Group of products that are closely related because they function in a similar manner or are sold to the same customer group who will use them in similar ways

    • Product Mix vs. Product Line

      • Apple

        • Phones, watches, headphones, laptops – Product

        • Iphone 14, iPhone 15 etc… – Product line

  • Pricing

    • Process of determining the best price at which to sell a product

  • Place

    • Part of the marketing mix concerned with getting products from producers to consumers

  • Promotion

    • Aspect of the marketing mix concerned with the most effective techniques for communicating information about products

10/1/2024

QUIZ

• Marketing environment - PEST

• Target Market/Segmentation

• Packaging

• Market Research

• Marketing Mix

• Product

Product Life Cycle (PLC)

• Series of stages in a product’s commercial life

Stages in the PLC

1. Introduction

   1. ex) Commercial space flights

   2. Starts at a loss because there are no customers to start

2. Growth

   1. ex) Handheld computers and smartphones

   2. More customers start using product

3. Maturity

   1. ex) Social networking services

   2. Peak of people using product

4. Decline

   1. ex) Land-line phones

   2. ex) Brick & Mortar DVD rental stores

   3. Customers slowly go down