The principles of marketing

. Meeting the needs of the customers.

This is the most fundamental principle of marketing. If a manufacturer were to produce a product that was neither wanted nor needed by the consumer then it would simply not be bought. It is also important to research the needs of potential customers in order to ensure your businesses successes in the future. A business can find out about what customers current and future require through market research, this can be primary or secondary research. Primary researches are operations such as, questionnaires, comment cards or looking at your own sales record to see what products or ideas have been successful. Secondary research can be bought from organisations that carry out such tests for companies, such as keynotes or mintell for around £100. I intend to continue with all current aspects of the magazine as it fulfills the current demands of it customers, I simply wish to add to the magazine in order to widen it's appeal. To see if my new ideas are popular amongst vogue's long-term subscribers I would run a survey within the magazine for the reader to fill in, the questions for example would be along the lines of:

* Would you like 'vogue' to provide fashion ideas that are available at affordable prices

Yes ............. No.............

The results will allow me to make educated modifications.

2. Understand and keep ahead of the competition.

If a business is completely unaware of what their competition business procedures then it can easily be overtaken, in the ever-moving marketplace. In order to maintain an advantage over your competitors, you must primarily assess what you as businesses are doing, and weather or not you can improve on it. Analysing and understanding your rivals will help in adaptations to your business. You can look at what has been successful and unsuccessful for their business to order to help with your decisions and to stop you from making similar financial and marketing mistakes. My alterations to the magazine have steamed from features that are prevalent in other highly popular magazines. My intention is to create a 'ultimate women's magazine' of sorts, in which I incorporate an array of characteristics so it will not be need to buy another magazine, keeping ahead of my competition, and broadening my target market.

3. Communicate effectively with your customers.

This principle ties heavily in with the first. It is impossible to meet the needs of your customer if you cannot communicate with them to know what they want. The business needs to correspond with both current and potential customers in-order to make sure that they are satisfied with the quality. If a business neglects this part of their strategy or underestimates their customer's expectations they are likely to produce a product that will be unproductive to them and will not sell. There are several ways in which customers can express their views to a company such as; phone lines, questionnaires, comment cards and suggestion boxes. My decision to put a survey inside the magazine is an effective way to receive feedback form customers, another ideas is to post a message in the magazines website so that any body can comment through e-mails.

4. Coordinating the separate functions within marketing effectively.

A business needs to assure that they co-ordinate the separate functions within marketing effectively in order to meet their overall marketing aims. A business needs to be clear about what they are striving to achieve, and their precise objectives, and their plan to attain them. Every member of a team needs to be clear about their roles within an organization's hierarchy and the level of responsibility that they hold. This means that it is left to the management to guide their employees in to a functioning team, and tell then specifically what they must do to make their strategy work. This is important but will not be a problem in this assignment, as I will be working alone. Timescales are also crucially important to be effective in any form of marketing campaign. Because of the nature of the business that we are marketing more emphasis should be put on timescales and deadlines than usual, it would have a catastrophic effect on sales if we were to put the magazine on sales several days late, as the magazine is bought so the customer can receive the latest fashions if it is not available the customer could easily buy a similar magazine.

5. Being aware of any potential threats to the marketing campaign.

It is imperative to be aware of any potential threats to your marketing campaign or product launch. These are perceived constraints that can be internal and external. Internal constrains are those that can be identified within the business such as financial difficulties, or employee problems. External constrains are recognized out side the business, such as topical events in the news that could be linked to your product, or rises and falls in the economy and stock market. Both forms of constrains could have a substantial negative impact on the performance of your business and the success of your product. It is fundamental that we identify with these impending threats so that there effects can be minimized. For a magazine the threats could be failing to cover an important issue or get an exclusive, a demise in the overall sales of magazines or perhaps fail to meet a deadline due to staff issues.

In conclusion it is crucial that a business is entirely aware of all the theoretical aspects of a marketing strategy and apply them to their own situation. I intent to make sure that I do to overlook any of these principles as failure in one could mean the failure of the entire strategy. I have contemplated all of these points when deriving my plan and hope that I have produced a coherent mix of strategies to meet my customer needs.

Fiona Wood, The principles of marketing, business studies, Mr. Scally