Marketing Principles: BTEC HND in Business Unit Essay Example

and of the Chartered Institute of Marketing, it can be suggested that they all are in agreement, that one of the main aims of marketing is to provide the right products and/or services to the right customers or audience.

All of the examples above show that although they have a unified approach of how to market products, they have a slightly different perception of what ‘marketing’ is. How to actually put this into action is where they differ. The starting point and the outcome is the same, it is how to actually bring it into effect. The Orientation of Marketing The marketing developed in three main phases and each of these stages features a different mind set. 1900-1930s Production Era The era is characterized by the market demand has exceeded supply.

In order to meet increasing demand, companies increased production, this was their primary concern. The consumers prime concern was the price, ‘the cheaper, the better’ approach. The general attitude towards marketing was that the good product will sell itself. It was the main approach of this era in Western Europe and in the USA up until about the 1930s-40s. When the Eastern European market opened up in the 1980s the demand for products had a sharp increase. To satisfy this demand businesses had to put all their effort into production. The organizations produced acceptable quality goods in mass quantities.

By this time Western Europe implemented marketing orientation. Their market included not just high quality-low priced goods mainly, but high quality-high priced goods as well. CD, DVD players or computers were launched into a high demand Eastern European market. As consumers were mainly looking for good quality but low priced items, only a very few of

these high priced item been sold. The manufactures had to wait for the technology to be improved, so high quality DVD or CD players can produced at a low price, or the high priced item life cycle reaches maturity and its price will drop.

The technological development and the large number of newly formed companies created vast abundance of goods in the market. The production is higher than the market's absorption capacity, the supply exceeded the demand. The primary purpose is influencing consumers. The era’s main characteristics are the use of aggressive sales techniques, promotional programs and increasing strong competition rivalry. Businesses become mainly interested in simulative advertising and personal selling to gain the confidence of the consumers, to persuade them to buy products, even ones that are not essential for them.

Businesses with strong sales orientation – like double glazing companies – are usually commission based and the sellers are targeted. These rewards can drive the sales person to sell as many goods or services as they could, but on the back of these the company cannot build long term relationship with its customers. 1960s-Today Marketing Era The intense competition and a huge range of products are forcing the entrepreneurs to change in attitude.

The new era slogan could be “His Majesty the Customer.   Businesses recognize that one single product is not right for everyone, so consumers are classified into groups -market segmentation - and these groups will then be assessed what are the needs of these consumers. This is called market research. In recent days new marketing orientations developed. Businesses realised they have to look at the bigger pictures. Not just to satisfy their customer needs, but also to consider their wider community, locally and globally. Businesses need to open up to

ethical and environmental commitments to society.

The societal marketing takes into account “the long term interest society or consumers have in preserving the environment and conserving resources” Good example for this is Body Shop International, who declares that its value: “We believe there is only one way to be beautiful, nature's way. ” Green marketing emphasises the use of environmentally friendly operation, like Audi, whose vehicles are recyclable, and Audi also emphasises the use of lead-free petrol.

For an organization to be marketing orientated should have the following characteristics. Strong leadership from the top.  Ensuring that all staff understand that the customer is at the centre of all business objectives. Persuading staff that changes in policies and processes are essential and ensuring that they are implemented.  Introduction of an effective information system that will establish and track customer needs and wants. Possible restructuring.  Effective internal communication.

Strong leadership means not just that the managers are managing people, but they are also a role model for them whom are actively involved with team members, they are inspirational and approachable. A few years back British Telecom (BT) started a completely new marketing strategy, when they have realised their market share is decreasing, as their competitors are intensifying and they are loosing lot of their customers. They have started with internal changes and also had to implement a new approach towards their customers, and had to make sure that the changes are smooth and painless.

BT had a ‘long time’ workforce, who were used to how to go about their job, so it needed to make sure the people will have confidence in the successful implementation and they will not loose their

job. Good communication needed to be maintaining between managers in all levels and the workforce, so they can sell the benefit of the changes to them. BT also had to taken out two layers of management: 2nd line managers and directors; there was no need for them. They were either re-deployed elsewhere in the business, or they could take redundancy.

Probably one of the best examples of how to introduce an effective information system to keep track of customer’s needs and wants is Tesco Club Card scheme. Through this system the segments of their market can easily be identified through monitoring what customers are buying, where they live or do for living. Benefits and Costs If the marketing is successful it can help grow profit and build reputation and customer trust and loyalty. A good marketing plan can help achieve the business’ long term goals.

On the other hand marketing is a cost to the organization and it cannot be predicted how successful marketing will be. To keep ahead of its competition, the business has to do regular market researches, working on new product development and working hard on customer retention by providing excellent goods and superb services. It is not negligible to build long time relationships with the customers, suppliers and distributors. 3 A credit card company, like MBNA spends lots of money on marketing planning, does regular market researches to find out what are the benefits customers are looking for in a new credit card.

It is not enough to get new customers, they need to be retained and build a long term relationship, so the consumer will use the credit card continuously; and that would

make profit to the company. The Marketing Concept The market sellers are well aware of the key marketing principles and they use them in practice (in the summer heat and winter frost). Anyone who has ever been to a market already knows that the vendors are always in the same place and they sell to their already established customers, however there are always opportunities for new ones to enter into the market bustle.

It's no different in the business world either. What to bring to the market? As the market sellers has to be aware with what is demanded by their buyers, so shall an entrepreneur or even a giant company have an intuition what will the consumers look for. Of course, there is the possibility of bringing out a product which is not widely known first-or known at all- and than to expect that it will become popular, with consumers well disposed towards it. However there are risks. There are options to carry out some market research before the product introduction, but this doesn’t guarantee anything.

The market researchers observed that people responded to the question ‘whether you would buy X product? ’ with almost always ’yes’. But when it comes to shopping the numbers are no longer the same… The decision what will be sold, needs to be thought through not just once, but it must monitored what we can sell today, can we sell that tomorrow or even next year. The market trader, selling fruits and vegetables knows he will always have to refresh what is on sale on his stand. If the demand for certain goods decreased, it will be redirected elsewhere.

For example when the spring onion has its season the seller knows that the demand for the ordinary onion will fall. However, most unexpectedly, the declining sales for several months

of certain goods will permanently set. The seller needs to know when a product is matured and need to know when it is time for a change. This regularity is described in the product life cycle graph.

If the seller takes the price that was paid to the producer of the vegetables, plus adds the transportation cost and other cost and lastly his profit, then he constitutes the cost-base pricing ; if he looks around the market and see how much are other vendors are selling the potatoes, and correct his prices for these, then he is forming the prices for his competitors’ prices. What if he wants to sell exotic, rare fruits, nobody has sold on the market before? In this case, he will try to guess how much would his customers would pay for the unusual item, this is called reference pricing.

What can be the solution if the supply and demand has not met each other at a specified price? If the banana is reached its best before date, the only way to sell it quickly by price reduction, discounting. Advertising is a marketing tool. Advertising is the little tablet on the market trader’s stall where he writes ‘honey-sweet oranges’. It is possible that it’s might not be fully true, but these words are affecting us.

It is a martial arts school, which proprietor is a highly trained martial artist from China, learned his skill from a very young age in the widely known Shaolin Temple. This is his unique selling point, as nobody is so highly trained in the North West. This is his greatest strength, and he also has previous business experience as

he had a martial arts school in China, but on the other side, he has no knowledge at all how to run a business in the UK. His biggest weakness is his lack of English language, which he can improve by joining to a course in the local college.

He has good opportunities to widen his business from hiring community or church halls where he is holding the classes to own his own business premises. He can approach the local government by offering his knowledge to help implementing healthy lifestyle programs, to prevent or better illnesses through gentle exercising regime, and to build good relationship with the local school, where he can help raise awareness about ethnic minorities, cultures and traditions of another country. His competitors are mainly all established businesses, who are fully aware all the laws and legislations, has a good network of customers, suppliers.

The recent economic recession made people thinking where they put their hard earned money, and taking up a new sport maybe will not be first in their mind. He has to learn about all the laws and legislation affecting his business, especially the ones regulating working with children and with elderly. Self evaluation This is my second ever assignment has been written. Unfortunately the whole planning went wrong; I had to learn the hard way that all my work have to be saved and backed up onto a reliable source. Unfortunately I have lost all my work, as I have chosen a cheap, low quality USB pen drive.

I have come from an entirely different educational background, where we had books, we had to learn from those books, and nothing else

was expected. I am not really sure if I am doing the right thing in my assignment, I am waiting for the feedbacks to find out what is good about my writing and on what area I need to improve. I have now started to feel a little the essence of writing an assignment, but I still have much to learn. I do believe that assignment by assignment it will become easier to write them, will get clearer what to write and I will even enjoy writing them.