Marketing Management – Introduction Notes

Marketing is the process of satisfying the needs of a consumer. It starts with the identification of needs and wants of a market and continues till the needs and wants are satisfied.

Market – A market is an actual or nominal place where buyers and seller meet to trade goods and services.

Marketers – A marketer is a person seeking resources from someone else and is willing to offer it to someone else in lien of some value in exchange. – Phillip Kotler

Marketing – It is a total system of interacting business activities designed to plan, price, promote and distribute, want satisfying goods and services to present and potential customers. – W J Stanton

According to AMA – Marketing is the process of planning and executing the conception, pricing, promotion and distribution of ideas, goods and services to create an exchange that satisfies individual and organizational objectives.

Demarketing – It refers to marketing activities which deal with discouraging customers or a certain section of customers to purchase a particular product or like a particular brand. It consists of all efforts that are made to reduce the demand for a product. Demarketing may be carried out on a temporary or permanent basis.

What is marketed?

• Goods – Tangible Products
• Services – Intangible Products
• Experience
• Event
• Person
• Place
• Property
• Information
• Organization
• Idea

Classification of Markets

Market

Nature of Transactions

• Spot or Cash Market
• Future or Forward market

Geographic Area

• Local Market
• Regional Market
• National Market
• International market

Competition

• Perfect Market
• Imperfect market

Volume of Exchange

• Wholesale Market
• Retail Market
• Industrial Market

Nature of Goods

• Consumer Market
• Agricultural Market
• Stock Market
• Bullion Market
• Industrial Market

Position of Sellers

• Primary Market
• Secondary Market
• Terminal Market

Articles of trade

• Product market
• Service market

Time period

• Short-term market
• Long-term market

Objectives of Marketing

• To satisfy the needs and wants of the customers
• To identify what is demanded in the market
• To plan and develop goods and services according to customer demand
• To spread awareness and disseminate information about a product or service
• To increase sales and profits of an organization
• To enhance the brand and goodwill of the organization
• To organize, direct and control all marketing activities
• To establish a reporting and feedback mechanism to develop new products and making informed decisions

Nature of Marketing

• Economic function – It involves mobilization of economic resources for production and distribution of ideas, goods and services
• Creative function – It involves innovation and implementation of ideas, frameworks and processes to satisfy customers.
• Integrated function – It involves communication and integration with various business activities to make effective marketing strategies.
• Managerial functional – It involves analysing market opportunities, planning marketing strategies, implementing marketing plans and setting up a control mechanism to achieve organizational objectives.
• Dynamic process – Marketing plans are reviewed from time to time with the changes in the marketing environment.
• Social process – Marketing aims at customer satisfaction and welfare of the society.
• Goal oriented activity – It aims at profit making and customer satisfaction to meet business objectives
• Universally applicable – It is applicable to all types of organizations from business for profit motive and to non-profit organizations.
• Customer oriented – Marketing starts with identification of customer needs and wants and ends with satisfaction of those needs and wants
• System – It is a system of subsystems namely input (4P`s) – process (motivation) – output (increased sales and revenue)
• Process – It involves a series of inter-related functions.
• Marketing is a science as well as art – As a science, it makes use of frameworks and methods for segmentation and targeting. As an art, it requires creativity to create demand for a product and understand consumer behaviour.

Marketing and Utility

Marketing adds value to products and services by providing the following utilities:

• Place Utility – It adds place utility to products by transferring the products from the place of production to the place of consumption i.e. making products available at the right place.
• Possession Utility – It adds possession utility to products by enabling transfer of ownership of a product from the producer to wholesaler to retailer to the final consumer.
• Time Utility – It adds time utility to products by ensuring that products are available to customers at the time of need or when they want to buy it.
• Form utility – It adds form utility to products by producing and supplying finished products to the consumer in the form they can use and benefit from.

Scope of Marketing

The scope of marketing lies in the following:

• Study of consumer needs and wants
• Study of consumer behaviour
• Segmentation, Targeting and Positioning
• Product planning and development
• Product packaging and branding
• Developing pricing policies
• Promotion and distribution of goods and services
• Consumer satisfaction
• Sales management
• After sale services
• Enhancing corporate identity and goodwill

Marketing Functions

Exchange functions:

• Buying
• Pricing
• Selling

Physical functions:

• Assembling
• Transport and handling
• Storage and Warehousing
• Processing and packaging

Facilitating functions:

• Financing and risk-bearing
• Grading and standardization
• Market information
• Demand and supply creation
• Market research

Other Functions:

• Identifying market opportunities
• Promoting products and services
• Strategic Marketing Planning

Importance of Marketing

To the society

• Encourages better standard of living
• Helps in creation of utility – form, place, time, possession
• Aids in consumer protection by keeping customers informed
• Provides consumer choice (variety of products)
• Introduction of new products and services

To the firm

• Helps in product planning and new product development
• Helps in Increasing profit (sales & revenue)
• Acts as a link between business and society
• Enhances goodwill and brand value
• Reducing cost of sales and production

Difference between Marketing and Selling