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Marketing
Marketing
Contrary to general belief, marketing is not only about advertising or trying to
sell products. It is a holistic activity. It includes all the activities by which the
needs and wishes of customers are identified and then satisfied – better than the
competitors can do. It includes market research on customers, analyzing their
needs, making strategic decisions about product design, pricing, promotion and
distribution (http://iws.ohiolink.edu/moti/homedefinition.html).
Marketing functions on different levels and uses different strategies for different
targets. For example, it can be directed at new potential customers, at existing
customers, and inside the company in order to motivate the personnel and tell
them what the company is about.
External marketing is directed outwards at the general public, to potential
new customers. It is a way of arousing interest in the company and its products
through publicity campaigns, for example. How would you try to find your new
customers? How would you make your products interesting to new customers?
Interplay marketing takes place during the actual sale, e.g. at a selling point.
Sometimes referred to as “the moment of truth”, it must convince the customer
to buy a product or service. It is extremely important to keep the customer’s trust
because once it’s gone, it’s usually impossible to get it back. Would you like to do
your shopping in a place where the service is horrible? Because of oversupply in
the market and more service-conscious consumers, the importance of personal
selling and customer satisfaction has risen dramatically in recent years. Therefore,
treat and listen to your customers as you would like to be treated yourself. The old
saying “the customer is always right” is very true in the end.
Why marketing
In order to survive, a craftsman also needs to take marketing into consideration.
It is especially important to understand the customer and the customerproduct relationship. The world is full of different products. Why should a
customer buy your product? What makes your product special or desirable? How
will customers find you anyway? How can you find out what kind of person would
or could buy your product?
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You do not need to know everything about marketing to be able to understand
how and where to use it. You can also use experts. But here are some basic
elements which can help you in your work.
Customer first
There are several different approaches to marketing: manufacturing-oriented,
sales-oriented, demand-oriented and customer-oriented. The one we are interested
in is the customer-oriented approach. Marketing can be understood as a series of
activities which all aim at a single purpose: customer satisfaction (Lahtinen
& Isoviita 2001: 11). This kind of approach is called a customer-oriented
approach. It is essential first to determine what potential customers want,
and then to build the product or service around it. The goal in this is to meet
customers’ demands. If your goal is to make your living with your own products,
there is very little sense in making products that nobody buys. After all, it is the
customer who pays your bills.
Just remember that the end-users are not your only possible customers. Retail
dealers (e.g. shop keepers) can be your customers too. You might even distribute
everything you manufacture through retailers. The basics are all the same, no
matter who or what your customer is. If your product is in order and it satisfies
the customer’s need, you are in the clear.
Not everyone is the same
People are all individuals with different lifestyles, needs and opinions. For example,
you do not like the same things as your class mate. How do we find out what
people want? What can we do with all the different opinions? You really cannot
make 5000 versions of one product! The answer is customer research and
positioning.
Customer research is a way of finding out what customers want. You can
produce customer research simply by asking your customers what they think of
your products or services. Why do they buy your products and not those of your
competitors? Is there something special they need? Of course, the more detailed
and carefully planned the questions are, the more detailed the results will be. It is
quite hard to fulfill the needs of customers, if you don’t know them. The goal in all
of this is to find out what the customer wants and to satisfy that need before she
even knows she has it. It is always useful to get information from your customers,
whether they are retailers or private persons.
Positioning is a process by which the product is differentiated from its competitors. It should be
noted that positioning happens inside customers’ heads. They decide how they evaluate your
product compared to the products of your rivals. Nevertheless, positioning can be affected.
You can think of the different qualities of your product and compare them to other similar
products. For example, how bulky is your product? How bulky are other similar products? In
this way you can position your product and compare it with the others. Try to find a proper
“spot” for your product, and it will be more likely to succeed. Below you can find an example
of a positioning table.
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Classy
Distinctive
Product A
Product B
Product C
Modern
Conservative
Product D
Product E
Practical
Affordable
Products located in the top-left corner are conservative in design, quite classy and they stand
out. What are the characteristics of other products?
Consumers can also be divided into different adopting groups. This tells how soon they will
adopt a new product. It can also indicate how extreme a version of a product the consumers
might adopt and how soon. They can be roughly divided into the following groups:
•Innovators - venturesome, educated, multiple info sources, greater propensity
to take risks
•Early adopters - social leaders, popular, educated
•Early majority - deliberate, many informal social contacts
•Late majority - skeptical, traditional, lower socio-economic status
•Laggards - neighbours and friends are main info sources, fear of debt
(Rogers, Everett M. (2003). Diffusion of Innovation, Fifth Edition.)
What kind of products would appeal to different groups?
But how to ensure that your products are seen by customers?
Our world is getting smaller and, at the same time, the number of different
information sources and the amount of information itself is rapidly growing.
How can you stand out with your product? Is it possible to make your product
unique by giving it personality? You can achieve this by opening your eyes to your
own culture and to the stories it bears. Stories and fables can really give your
products the edge that will make them stand out. People want personal products
and products that have stories with them. As a professional craftsman you can
produce these products. And you have the power to react quickly to changes in
the market.
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Nowadays, people know very well what they want and how much they are willing
to pay for it. They are also interested in the product’s overall effect on society
and the environment – for example, where are the raw materials from, and can
the product be recycled? You can really affect these issues and use them to your
advantage when marketing your products.
Marketing is more than an advertisement in a local newspaper!
Sales promotion is one way to make your products known to customers. It’s a
comprehensive way of supporting your sales efforts. For a handicraft company, it
includes the store materials, product samples, participation in exhibitions together
with retailers, etc. It is basically everything you do in order to promote your
products. But marketing is a way of acting. Every entrepreneur or enterprise
needs it in order to survive in tough competition. It is important to plan what you
are hoping to achieve through marketing. You could want more market share or
you could want to promote a new article. Advertisements can give information on
your product to the public, but marketing is a two-way channel. You should know
what your customers want and satisfy that need.
What kind of tools are there?
When planning the right way to market your products or services, you should
take into consideration what you are planning to achieve. The basic assumption
of business economics is that every company wants to expand its business. In
this way a company can keep its vitality. As mentioned earlier, marketing can
be used to achieve this goal. One of the means is the marketing mix. The
marketing mix includes four things that should be taken into consideration when
planning marketing – the product, its placement, its promotion and its pricing
– referred to as the “four Ps” by world famous marketing guru Philip Kotler. A
successful company chooses the right balance between all of them. The marketing
mix consists of the following:
- Product: What is your product and how does it meet the needs of
customers?
- Placement: Where is your product sold (handicraft shop, Internet etc.)?
- Promotion: This includes all advertising, sales promotion, publicity and
personal selling, and it refers to the various methods of promoting the
product, brand or company.
- Pricing: How do you price your product, including possible discounts?
“For a high profile brand increase the focus on promotion and desensitize the
weight given to price” (04.05.2007: http://marketingteacher.com/Lessons/
lesson_marketing_mix.htm).
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SWOT
Every company is an open organization; it must exist in cooperation with its
environment. To know your own strengths and weaknesses, i.e. what you are good
at and what you should develop is essential in order to find a suitable direction
for your company. A SWOT analysis is a useful tool when studying the marketing
environment. The strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threats (SWOT)
of a desired end state are listed and analyzed in order to understand a target
organization or its environment. Each one of these segments should be expressed
as practically as possible. Strengths and weaknesses are internal factors and
the company itself can affect these (products, reputation, etc.). Opportunities
and threats are external factors and they cannot be directly influenced (rivals,
legislation, etc.). Opportunities and threats are dependent on one’s point of view.
A pessimistic person might see something as a threat whereas an optimistic
person might see it as an opportunity. There is no single right answer to these
questions and they are open to interpretation. It’s essential to be honest when
analyzing any of these factors, or otherwise they won’t be of any help to you.
(04.05.2007: http://marketingteacher.com/Lessons/lesson_swot.htm; Lahtinen
& Isoviita 2001: 18).
One crucial thing to remember when using any given marketing tool is that they
exist only to give you ideas. They are only tools. The hand that uses them has
the power to utilize them. Use them to inform your gut feeling. (http://www.
marketingteacher.com/Lessons/lesson_plc.htm).
Lifestyle
“A way of life or style of living that reflects the attitudes and values of a person or
group” (http://www.answers.com/topic/lifestyle). Different kinds of people have
different needs and they often want to represent their way of living through their
behavior. And even through their shopping behavior. You can read more about
lifestyles from: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lifestyle
Added value
“The enhancement added to a product or service by a company before the product
is offered to customers.” (http://www.investorwords.com/5210/value_added.
html). In a craftsman product it can be limited availability, for example, which
makes the product more desirable.
Product family
A product family is a collection of products that are closely related in use, in
marketing and in production requirements. (http://www.answers.com/topic/
product-family). E.g. a set of dining ceramics.
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Selling arguments
Selling arguments are facts or mental impressions about some particular product,
which are used to justify the buying of this product.
More useful information about marketing: http://marketingteacher.com
References:
Retrieved
27.6.2007
from:
http://marketingteacher.com/Lessons/lesson_
marketing_mix.htm
Retrieved 27.6.2007 from:
http://marketingteacher.com/Lessons/lesson_swot.htm
Retrieved 27.6.2007 from:
http://www.marketingteacher.com/Lessons/lesson_plc.htm
Ohiolink. Retrieved 27.6.2007 from: http://iws.ohiolink.edu/moti/homedefinition.
html
Lahtinen & Isoviita (2001). Asiakaspalvelun ja markkinoinnin perusteet. Jyväskylä:
Gummerus kirjapaino Oy.
Rogers, Everett. M. (2003). Diffusion of Innovations, Fifth Edition.
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