Marketing Philosophy and Strategy

Marketing Philosophy and Strategy

Sunday June 10, 2012

Abstract

There are many challenges to marketing research for new products. Some of those challenges will be discussed in this research paper. Another issue that will be researched in this paper will be the role that technology has played in marketing planning and research; along with the legal and ethical issues faced today in today's marketing strategies. The look at these challenges and issues will help to address the problems and dilemmas for today's marketing managers and help develop new ideas for the AIBC conference to present to marketing executives and planners.

Marketing Philosophy and Strategy

Introduction

Marketing strategy for products, whether new or improved, can be difficult to plan. Marketers today need to think of many issues; there are the 4P's: Product, Price, Place, and Promotion (or marketing mix) (Internet Center for Management and Business Administration Inc, 2010); technology and how its influence affects the strategy, and the legal and ethical aspects of a campaign. Many marketing managers today need to address each of these concepts in a strategy and campaign to make a product launch successful.

Challenges in New Product Launches

New product development has some unique challenges in terms of marketing. There are problems with public perceptions when products are completely new—confusion on the part of the consumer the product is meant for, price-value perceptions and developing a business model for projections needed for funding and operations (Greenberg, 2003). There can also be other issues to address: recession hit wallets and the advent of social media marketing.

Challenge # 1:

Dealing with a new product idea is problematic when trying to address a price-value perception. The advent of digital cable programming faced this issue when developing a marketing strategy for new offerings (Greenberg, 2003). Consumers need to understand that the product will make life better, easier, cheaper or more convenient to feel as if the cost is justified. In the case of digital cable the new strategy for marketers was to show the added convenience of digital cable versus the old analog cable; so marketers shifted the focus from cost to better features of digital. The added channels and ability to record shows without a separate device and the HD quality are all digital cable advantages to promote to consumers. That was the strategy that cable providers have used to provide value to its current consumers and future ones also; to implement this idea into a new marketing strategy for a new product one would need to accentuate the concept of better, more convenient, and easier for the target market to ensure that consumers feel product price-value.

Challenge # 2

Another challenge for new product development in terms of marketing would be reaching a target market, how to get consumers to recognize the product and the value of the idea. The new focus comes from the emotions consumers feel toward a company not the product purchased (Mitchell, 2003). A company needs to develop an emotional connection to the consumer that can be developed into a marketing campaign to ensure that a company has success.

Challenges # 3

The other new product complication could be the lack of business model for financial operations of the company. Making projection into the future for a new product on the market could be complicated; there may be no viable financial data to work with. Therefore, companies need to develop models that are as close to their product as possible. If the product or service sometimes it can be predicted what markets the product or service will do best in which segmentation. Another possible suggestion is software developed to help new concepts predict new product/service development success (Wind, 1997).

Technology and New Product Development

Technology affects new product development by allowing consumers to easily access information at anytime; to be more selective with their product choice because of online purchasing power; and companies to market worldwide with a cheaper budget. By the year 2015, more than $250 billion will be spent on internet marketing worldwide (Oppenheim, 2010), this means that companies and consumers alike will need to regulate what products are advertised and to whom they are advertised and why they are advertised to that particular target market. Technology will also change the way that marketers reach the public; with Quick Response codes and GPS devices (Wasserman, 2010).

Technology Affects Information Availability

The increased applications of the internet make information gathering easier and quicker for consumers. Now consumers can access information about products anytime day or night from company websites and search engines, something that did not exist as readily in 2005 (Green, 2008). Now consumers can gather information about products and companies and compare that information, which makes them much more informed; in previous decades consumer were only capable of information gathering by articles and product pamphlets or television advertising.

The distribution of corporate information to consumers from websites and other sites is handled quickly and without intrusion into the consumer's life, but through "cookies" and other tracking devices marketing executives can find out this information and use it to better market to the consumer (Green, 2008). Companies like Kayak.com and Amazon.com use the information about consumers that their sites gather to better offerings to those same consumers; which is a competitive advantage for companies.

Technology Affects Purchasing

Technology allows companies to offer consumers products for purchase online without having to have a brick and mortar storefront. Companies like Amazon.com and Best Buy have strong direct sales numbers that overpower their brick-and-mortar sales numbers (E-tailers Claim Top 100 Turf., 2006). These retail numbers lead to many marketing managers looking at multi-market presences to remain competitive and to plan marketing strategies to take advantage of the consumer sales.

Technology Affects Campaign Strategy

Technology can affect the campaign strategy also; managers use predictive analytics and programs to determine marketing campaigns (Hoffbrand, 2008). These predictive analytics reduce the risks and make decisions more justifiable to executives and stockholders. It also affects strategy by allowing human emotions to be eliminated from the decision making process and giving marketing managers a method to respond quickly in today's time-sensitive business processes. Technology can be used in conjunction with experience and intuition to create unforgettable and profitable marketing campaigns like in the case of Coca-Cola.

Legal and Ethical Implications in New Product Development

It is important to exercise ethical integrity and social responsibility in marketing research. There are laws to govern behaviors in marketing campaigns but the ethical issues can be trickier. Some companies fabricate findings or misrepresent data to please sponsors or objectives; this is not only unethical but also illegal. There are also issues of privacy and security to consider and copyright infringement issues.

Legal and ethical implications example # 1

British American Tobacco in 2000 funded a research study at Nottingham University which is in conflict because the study results directly affect the sponsor. Because of the conflict many researchers quit the study and the Cancer Research withdrew its funding of 1.5 million dollars; the study as a result has no relevant implications in the academic community (Alsmadi, 2010). While the monetary loss was great, the ethical implications to the research were even greater; an academic community lost valuable data and dollars and will need to restart the project with new funding and sponsors.

Legal and ethical implications: example # 2.

The most deplorable ethical and legal issue