Mastering Marketing: Strategies, Branding, and Innovation
Understanding Marketing: Business Orientation and Development
Marketing is a management process responsible for identifying, anticipating, and satisfying customer requirements profitably.
Types of Business Orientation:
- Market-led: Company driven by market factors, but customer focus may vary.
- Production-led: Focus on operational schedules and economies of scale.
- Product-led: Focus on product features as a key advantage.
- Sales-led: Transactions based on short-term goals.
- Technological: Driven by new technologies, often anticipating customer needs.
- Societal: Prioritizing the good of humanity and society.
Marketing as a Business Philosophy: The Customer’s Role
Companies understand marketing as a core function, responsible for identifying and meeting customer needs, not just sales support.
Customer Needs:
- Quality, benefits, and future needs covered.
- A “fair price” from the customer’s perspective.
- Product knowledge and information on how it works.
- Product availability.
Product as the Core of the Marketing Mix: Lifecycle and Portfolio
A product is anything offered in the market, extending beyond tangible goods.
Levels of the Product:
- Basic Product: Core benefit.
- Actual Product.
- Augmented Product: Additional benefits.
Product Life Cycle:
- Introductory Stage.
- Growth Stage.
- Maturity Stage.
- Declining Stage.
Product Portfolio:
- Product Category: Mobile device.
- Product Line: Samsung mobile device.
- Product Depth: Basic phones.
- Product Mix: Tablets.
New Product Development (NPD) Process and Innovation
NPD Process:
- Idea Generation.
- Initial Screening.
- Concept Development.
- Business Evaluation.
- Product Development.
- Market Testing.
- Commercialization and Launch.
Innovation Adoption Life Cycle:
- Innovators (2.5%)
- Early Adopters (13.5%)
- Early Majority (34%)
- Late Majority (34%)
- Laggards (16%)
Types of Innovation and Strategies in Marketing
Types of Innovation:
- Continuous Innovation: Incremental improvements on existing products.
- Dynamically Continuous Innovation: New solutions to old problems, without radical lifestyle changes.
- Discontinuous Innovation: Radically new products that transform lives.
6 Types of Innovation Strategies:
- Offensive
- Defensive
- Imitative (copying other companies)
- Dependent (led by bigger companies)
- Traditional (annual model updates)
- Opportunistic (unintentional inventions)
Brand and Branding: Building Brand Equity
A brand is a name, term, design, mark, symbol, logo, or feature identifying a seller’s goods. Branding distinguishes a company’s product offering from the competition.
Brand Forms:
- Manufacturer (Corporate Brand): Identifies the producer (e.g., Coca-Cola).
- Own-Label (Distributor Brand): No manufacturer association (e.g., Rimi, Tesco).
- Price Brands: Compete with own-label brands.
- Generic: Minimal packaging and information (e.g., potatoes, sugar).
Brand Building Techniques:
- High Budget: Advertising plays a key role.
- Limited Resources: PR, direct marketing, merchandising, and digital marketing are crucial.
- Content marketing is a key brand-building technique.
Brand Architecture and Strategies: Rebranding for Success
Brand Architecture:
- Branded House (Corporate Brand): Single master brand with sub-brands (e.g., Boeing, IBM, Virgin, Disney).
- House of Brands (Multi-branding): Independent brands with no outward connections (e.g., General Motors, Procter & Gamble).
Branding Strategies:
- Brand Stretching: Extending the brand into unrelated markets (e.g., Virgin, M&S, Tesco).
- Brand Extension: Using the brand name for new products in the same market.
- Multi-branding: Introducing additional brands in the same category.
- New Brands: Creating a new brand for a new product category (e.g., Lexus).
Rebranding:
Adapting or completely changing an existing brand.
Reasons:
- Rejuvenate.
- Appeal to a new, wider audience.
- Enter a foreign market.
- Address negative perceptions.
- Merger or acquisition.