In real estate, everyone knows it's location, location, location, and almost everyone knows that in marketing it's the right product at the right price in the right place. While that's certainly true, there's more to it than that. In a bad economy, home owners are finding that even the best location won't guarantee a sale, and in marketing even the biggest and best can stumble, and sometimes embarrassingly so. Business studies help in understanding the role of marketing, and hopefully avoiding blunders. The key to successful marketing is in proper promotion-that's the fourth "P" in the four P's of marketing: product, price, place, and promotion.
But how can one determine what the right promotion is? After all, we've seen some marketing disasters of epic promotions (remember "New Coke"?) and even lavish spending does not guarantee success as, for example, Microsoft found out when it spent millions on a campaign that teamed Bill Gates himself with comedian Jerry Seinfeld. Consult with business resources such as case studies to see examples of what works and what does not.
While adequate financial resources certainly help, good marketing depends not only on good ideas and sound decision-making, but also on solid market research. So how does a marketing department go about it all?
First and foremost, it's the task of any marketing department to find out who their customers are, what products they want and need, and how those needs are best met. This is usually done via quantitative research--such as collecting and processing large amounts of data via questionnaires and other types of surveys-and qualitative research, via working with small focus groups that represent typical customers. This is all somewhat more complex than it sounds. For example, people will often say what they think the researchers want to hear, resulting in wrong conclusions and decisions. To find out how people really feel, marketing departments need to design their surveys and interviewing methods in accordance with social science survey technologies that reveal how people really feel about an issue.
Finding out what customers want, however, is just one part of a marketing department's responsibilities. Students and teachers of marketing know that determining the precise target audience, figuring out how to best approach them, how to appeal to them, how to retain them, and how to best package and sell the product are all important. That means adding three more "P's" to the four mentioned above. They are:
Physical layout, as customers these days want attractive, engaging stores (and that include online virtual stores and websites!).
Provision of customer service, as word of uncaring, incompetent, or non-existent customer service quickly gets around).
Processes, as in having well thought-out processes for all aspects of product marketing, such as handling inquiries, handling complaints, identifying customer needs, and so on.
While businesses are complex structures consisting of many parts that all rely on each other for overall success, marketing will always be a key component, and anyone engaged in business studies should make certain to understand all aspects of proper marketing.
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Chris Robertson is a published author of Majon
International. All Rights Reserved. Copyright 2009 (Sun May 17 2009)
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