Principles of Marketing

The Marketing Environment

Marketing does not exist in the vacuum but rather in a complex and a changing environment.

Different kinds of the environment

Micro Environment: The actors close to the company that affect its ability to serve its customers i.e. the company, suppliers, marketing intermediaries, customer markets, competitors and publics Macro Environment: This consists of larger societal forces that affect the microenvironment i.e. demographic, economic, natural, technological, political and cultural forces.

MICRO ENVIRONMENT

The Company Suppliers - They provide resources needed by the company to produce its goods and services, their problems can seriously affect marketing. Marketing Intermediaries They help the company promote sell and distribute their goods to the final buyers. They incluse resellers, physical distribution firms, marketing services agencies and financial intermediaries. Customers These consist of consumer markets, business markets, reseller markets, government markets and international markets. Competitors Publics any organization that has an actual or a potential interest in or an impact on an organizations ability to achieve its objectives. These may be financial, media, government, citizenaction, local, general or internal publics.

MACRO ENVIRONMENT

Demographic The environment in terms of size, density, location, age, gender, race, occupation and other statistics. Economic The factors that affect the consumer spending and purchasing pattern and power. Natural these are the inputs (natural resources) that are required by the marketers. Technological These are the forces that create new technologies leading to new market opportunities. Political These are the laws, government agencies and pressure groups that may influence or limit the functioning of an organization. Cultural Institutions and other forces that affect society's basic values, perceptions, preferences and behaviors.

CONCLUSION
There are three kinds of companies: those who make things happen, those who watch things happen and those who wonder whats happened although some of the environmental forces may be uncontrollable, smart marketing managers take a PROACTIVE, rather than a REACTIVE approach to marketing management.

Principles of Marketing
Managing Marketing Information

MIS

Marketing Information System (MIS) consists of people , equipment and procedures to gather, sort, analyze, evaluate and distribute needed, timely and accurate information to marketing decision makers A good MIS balances the information users would like to have against what they really need and what is feasible to offer.

Developing Marketing Information

This is composed of: Internal data electronic collections of information obtained from data sources within the company. For e.g. the accounting dept prepares financial statement, the sales forces reports on reseller reaction and competitor activities. Marketing Intelligence The systematic collection and analysis of publicly available information about competitors and developments in the market place. Techniques range form quizzing the companys own employees and bench marking competitors products. Marketing Research This is a systematic design, collection, analysis and reporting of data relevant to a specific marketing situation facing an organization. Marketing Research can help ,marketers understand customer satisfaction and purchase behavior.

Marketing Research Process

Defining the problem and research objectives

Developing the research plan for collecting information

Implementing the research plan collecting and analyzing data

Interpreting and reporting the findings

1) Defining the problem and research objectives

This is the hardest step in the research process, you have to know the exact problem. There are three kinds of research here: exploratory: where the objective is to gather preliminary information that will help define the problem and suggest hypotheses. descriptive: where the objective is to describe things, such as the market potential for a product or the demographics and attitudes of consumers who buy the product. causal research: The objective here is to test the hypotheses about cause and effect relationship. For e.g. would reduction in the price of a product increase the sales so that the reduced profit is compensated.

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b)

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2) Developing the research plan for collecting information

Researchers must determine the exact information needed, develop a plan for gathering in efficiently and present the plan to management. The Research plan should be presented in a written proposal, it may constitute of either primary data ( info collected for the specific purpose at hand), secondary data ( info that already exists somewhere having been collected for another purpose) or both. Gathering Secondary data Researchers usually starts by gathering secondary data, the company's internal data base provides a good starting point, online data basis are another good source. The info collected should be: Relevant Accurate Current Impartial

a) b)

c)
d)

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Gathering Primary data This data is collected through the following research approaches: Observational Research test marketing a product, this can only happen in the field Surveys widely used and best suited for gathering descriptive information, major advantage of survey research is its flexibility Experimental best suited for gathering causal information. Contact Methods Info can be collected by mail, telephone, personal interviews online. Mail questionnaires are not very flexible, telephone interviewing is one of the best methods of providing info quickly and it provides greater flexibility. Personal interviewing takes two forms, individual and group; Group interviewing involves focus group.

1) 2) 3)

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Sampling Plan A sample is a segment of the population selected to represent the population as a whole. Three questions must be answered here Who is to be surveyed ( what sampling unit) How many people should be surveyed ( what sample size) How should the people in the sample be chosen ( what sampling procedure, probability and non-probability sampling) Research Instruments Questionnaire this is very flexible and most commonly used research instrument ( close end and open ended) Mechanical Devices These are used to measure physical responses e.g. check out scanner to record shoppers purchases.

3) Implementing the research plan collecting and analyzing data: The Researcher now puts the created research plan into action, this involves:

a) Collecting
b) Processing

c) Analyzing the information

4) Interpreting and reporting the findings The Market Researcher must now interpret the findings, draw conclusions and report them to the management The marketer must be careful not to go off track and must only report the information and findings that are useful in the major decisions made by the management.