Marketing
Overview
Marketing is a business discipline that involves the process of creating, communicating, delivering, and exchanging offerings that have value for customers, clients, partners, and society at large. It is a critical business function for attracting customers. From a societal point of view, marketing provides the link between a society's material requirements and its economic patterns of response More on Economic Patterns.
History of Marketing
The concept of marketing has been in existence since 1450, when Greeks practiced a form of marketing to sell their products in different regions. In the 21st century, marketing has evolved into a strategy-oriented process, focusing on attracting, retaining, and satisfying customers More on Customer Satisfaction.
Marketing Concepts
Marketing concepts are overarching themes that guide the work of marketing professionals. These concepts include the production concept, the product concept, the selling concept, the marketing concept, and the societal marketing concept.
Production Concept
The production concept is the idea that a business should focus on those products that it could produce most efficiently and that the creation of a supply of low-cost products would in and of itself create the demand for the products.
Product Concept
The product concept proposes that consumers will prefer products that have better quality, performance and features as opposed to a normal product. The concept is truly applicable in some niches such as electronics and mobile handsets.
Selling Concept
The selling concept is the idea that consumers will not buy enough of the firm's products unless the firm undertakes a large-scale selling and promotion effort.
Marketing Concept
The marketing concept is the philosophy that firms should analyze the needs of their customers and then make decisions to satisfy those needs, better than the competition.
Societal Marketing Concept
The societal marketing concept is the idea that a company should make marketing decisions by considering consumers' wants, the company's requirements, consumers' long-term interests, and society's long-run interests.
Marketing Mix
The marketing mix is a foundation model in marketing. The marketing mix has been defined as the "set of marketing tools that the firm uses to pursue its marketing objectives in the target market". The marketing mix traditionally consists of the 4 Ps: Product, Price, Place, and Promotion.
Product
A product is an item that is built or produced to satisfy the needs of a certain group of people. The product can be intangible or tangible.
Price
Price is the amount a customer is willing to pay for a product or service. The cost of producing a product can have a direct impact on the price of the product.
Place
Place represents the location where a product can be purchased. It is often referred to as the distribution channel.
Promotion
Promotion represents all of the communications that a marketer may use in the marketplace. Promotion has four distinct elements: advertising, public relations, personal selling and sales promotion.
Marketing Strategies
Marketing strategies are the result of a meticulous market analysis. A market analysis forces the marketer to become familiar with all aspects of the market so that the target market can be defined and the company can be positioned in order to garner its share of sales.
Market Segmentation
Market segmentation is the process of dividing a market of potential customers into groups, or segments, based on different characteristics. The segments created are composed of consumers who will respond similarly to marketing strategies and who share traits such as similar interests, needs, or locations.
Marketing Plan
A marketing plan is a comprehensive document or blueprint that outlines the advertising and marketing efforts for the coming year. It describes business activities involved in accomplishing specific marketing objectives within a set time frame.
Branding
Branding is the process of giving a meaning to specific organization, company, products or services by creating and shaping a brand in consumers’ minds. It is a strategy designed by organizations to help people to quickly identify their products and organization, and give them a reason to choose their products over the competition’s.
Digital Marketing
Digital marketing is the marketing of products or services using digital technologies, mainly on the Internet, but also including mobile phones, display advertising, and any other digital medium. Digital marketing channels are systems based on the internet that can create, accelerate, and transmit product value from producer to the terminal consumer by digital networks.
