“Marketing is selling goods that don’t come back to people who do”
“Marketing is the identification, establishment, maintenance and enhancement of relationships with customers and other stakeholders, at a profit, so that the objectives of the parties are met.”
“Marketing is the process of planing and executing the conception, pricing, promotion and distribution of ideas, goods and services to create exchanges that satisfy individual and organizational objectives.”
“Marketing involves the integrated analysis, planning and control of the marketing mix variables (product, price, promotion and distribution) to create exchanges and satisfy and satisfy both individual and organizational objectives.”
Question 2: Marketing has evolved and changed over the last 50 years:
The marketing era has been evolving dramatically from the mid twentieth century. Even marketing term is generally defined from long time ago, not all companies operate according to the marketing concept; many still have either a production orientation or a sale orientation. The evolvement of marketing in the last 50 years can be considered as follows:
- Production orientation:
Before 1960, most firms has a production orientation- that is, their concern was to produce as much as possible, as efficiently as possible. This orientation is not surprising, since there was a large unmet demand for the basic necessities of life just after the world wars. As a result, production orientation was drawn into the success of firms. The aim was simply to produce staples (such as textiles to make clothing, transportation, food and shelter) at the lowest possible cost. Firms that prospered during that period were those that made major advances in production technology and could lower production costs as a result. This orientation is most likely to succeed in a seller’s market- that is, where demand exceeds supply. This orientation came before the marketing concept which becomes a major part of production. Manufacturers who focus their attention on existing products and pay little or no attention to the changing needs and wants of the marketplace are in danger of one day they discovering that they have no customers. Such firms suffer from what is often termed “marketing myopia”. This is a very short-sighted viewpoint where firms are so busy concentrating on their products that they fail to take customer’s requirements into account. When there are many providers offering customers varying opinions and where production is greater than demand, this orientation immediately fails and that had happened after world wars when many countries became strong after their economies have been recovered.
- Sales orientation:
In a sense, sales orientation was a conceptual step forward because, although goods and services were still produced with little regard to customer requirements, at least it was realized that products did not sell themselves as a matter of course.
By the 1960s, consumers had a relatively large choice of brands. Many firms were producing more than the customer really needed or wanted. Thus, the emphasis soon became that of selling. It was a result from the recession of production orientation as mentioned above. With a sales orientation, firms aggressively use the promotional tools, such as advertising and sales people, to convince the customer to purchase the firm’s products, regardless of whether the customer wants or needs the products. This is a short-sighted approach, because if consumers feel that they have been pressured into buying something that they really don’t want or need, they then will probably form a poor opinion of the organisation and may well avoid it in the future.
Firms with sales orientation concerned with customers only in terms of how to get them to buy what the firm produces. This is the major difference between sales orientation and marketing concept. For the evolving process of how to get customer buying the product, the marketing concept has been developed and changed the viewpoint of producers and in which, it has clearly defined since 1980s and still a “marketing myopia” till present day.
- Marketing orientation:
The marketing concept holds that the key to achieving organisational goals is to determine the needs and wants of target markets and to deliver satisfactions more effectively and efficiently than competitors.
Under the marketing concept, it is the customer who takes the central place on the business stage. It is the satisfaction of customers that is seen as the key to prosperity, growth and survival. A marketing-oriented firm produces goods and services that customers want to buy rather than what the firm wants to make.
The international situation has changed from a seller’s market, where there was once a virtually insatiable demand for everything produced, to a buyer’s market. Today we have a large number of producers competing to supply a finite market. Modern industry, as we have seen, is based on the process of mass production which necessitates mass consumption. Today, in order for a product to be commercially successful, it must be produced in sufficient volume. In order for producers to achieve a sufficient level of demand, they must produce products that the market wants to buy. Simply to produce is no longer enough. To become competitive, firms not only have to take the needs and wants of the market into consideration: they have to start with them.
The six stages of strategic Marketing process have been identified as follows:
Stage One: Identifying and Evaluating Opportunities
- Situation analysis – Internal and External
- Environment scanning and monitoring
- Competitor analysis
- Internal capability
Stage Two: Analysing Market Segments and Selecting Target Markets
Stage Three: Market Positioning and Marketing Mix Strategy
Stage Four: Preparing a formal Marketing Plan
Stage Five: Executing the Plan
Stage Six: Controlling Efforts and Evaluating Results
Of the six stages in development of marketing management, Fred Fahr is operating in stage One, which is identifying and evaluating opportunities. These are the reasons to support the above idea:
- Fred Fahr had not gone far enough to stage two, which is analysing market segments and selecting target markets. The fact that he said the new product which he called “hot breakfast” has been tried by “his family” and all agreed it was quite nice. He actually has not done any segments for this new product. For a “hot breakfast”, not all people would use it for breakfast. He has not formed his targeting group of customers at this point.
- Fred Fahr has come with an excellent idea anyway. That is he can use the left over after supplying the extra-length fries to Beefies Hamburger Chain. However, he hasn’t scanned the external environment to see whether any effects may become the threat on this new product. This scan would provide the overall capacity for a start success into the market. Therefore, we can still say that he was actually at the beginning of stage one.
- Fred actually has worked with people in the production line which he stated at the meeting about packaging machinery. However, the fact that he asked people in the marketing department name the new product was going far enough for a potential profitable product. The positive point of his idea was using the internal capacity in which the factory can have a package of 24 burgers in a box and the leftover of material.
- At the meeting, Fred didn’t mention any competitors in the market. This is quite important because it will hold the key issue for the success of product. Competition is always considered a big step for a new product, even with a substitute also should be scanned to see whether the new product can be survived.
- As we can see at stage one, Fred Fahr has not stated a comprehensive or detailing S.W.O.T analysis about the company and the potential product that is the negative point to lead to an important decision whether that new product can be made and survived in the market. All the idea about the new product just began from him without doing enough to prove that this potential product would be successful.