Have you ever been up late at night, watched a TV commercial for a business and

Question

Have you ever been up late at night, watched a TV commercial for a business and wondered why that company had produced a TV commercial at all? There is a Midwestern company that manufactures manhole covers--apparently quite good manhole covers. Once in a while they will produce a TV commercial about their great company and their great manhole covers. But how many potential purchasers of manhole covers are watching TV late at night, between the Weather report and the Agriculture news? If your guess is “not many,” you would probably be right!

The trick to avoiding marketing errors like this is to carefully “segment” the market into groups who are more likely or less likely to buy. You can segment customers by age, by geography, by gender, by income, by product use, and in many more ways. There are a lot of reasons why we would go through this effort, but primarily the idea that the more you can know about your customers the more you can target the product and the message to those customers specifically.

If you have ever shopped at Amazon you have seen the other side of this process. Amazon watches your buying behavior (and browsing history) to give you suggestions tailored to you. That sales approach puts the customer’s expressed needs at the core of Amazon’s marketing. They can avoid promoting books or products to you that you are not interested in by making a decision about what you would like.

There are certainly advantages and disadvantages of either approach. If you make all your products (or all of your ads promoting those products) completely the same, you save on both manufacturing and promotional cost. The problem with the “one size fits all” approach is the products are frequently bland or boring, and your products are more vulnerable to your competitors imitating them.

If you concentrate your product and your product’s promotion to a smaller segment, you likely will see better results. You may not be able to compete with the biggest and most successful nose to nose, but you may be able to find small markets the larger companies choose to ignore, and exploit those opportunities. There are a couple of potential problems with this approach. The segments selected may be too small or to changing to be of use. Generally costs go up with smaller production runs as well.

Occasionally companies go after several segments at once, which is called Multisegment Target Marketing. This is a more difficult tactic for a number of reasons, not the least of which is identifying and isolating distinct segments that you wish to target. While this tactic can be successful, it is used cautiously because of generally higher costs, and the possibility of cannibalization. Cannibalization is where you introduce a product that is successful but that you find the product’s success comes at the expense of another. Your goal generally is to try to take business from competition and not from yourself. However, there are times you need to introduce a product that will cannibalize your product before your competition can.

The more specific you can be in describing your customer, the better job you can do of designing, promoting, and pricing that product, and of eliminating wasted promotional activities.

Selling products or services across national borders has been a highly successful strategy for many marketers. Even American icons like McDonald’s now report 60% of their revenues coming from locations outside the U.S.

McDonald’s is an excellent example of a marketer who has successfully adapted the marketing mix to meet the needs of international consumers. The McDonald's Global Menus show how the familiar Quarter-Pounder with Cheese has morphed into the McArabia Grilled Kofta in Egypt, or the Focaccino con Mortadella in Italy.  

How do U.S. marketers become knowledgeable enough about global markets to expand internationally? Part of the answer lies in the specific strategy chosen to enter the global markets; many firms simply export products originally designed for U.S. consumers (think Caterpillar, or John Deere) while others offer franchises to businesspeople who reside in the new market (like our friends at McDonald’s). Either approach allows U.S. firms to tap the potential of international markets while minimizing financial risk.

An interesting variation on global marketing is when U.S. consumers choose to travel outside the U.S. to purchase products or services. An excellent example of this is the phenomenon of “medical tourism,” when a U.S. citizen travels to India (or any other foreign country) for hip replacement surgery (plenty of other procedures are available). The cost savings on a single hip replacement ($7500 in India, versus $33,000 in the U.S.) is enough to fund travel costs, recuperation, plus sightseeing, shopping and other tourist activities.

Other firms take a much higher-risk approach by building production and distribution facilities around the world. Ford Motor Company, with assembly plants from Argentina to Vietnam, is just one example. Regardless of the global strategy chosen, and the degree of financial risk accepted, every global marketer must take pains to fully understand the countries and the cultures in which they do business. Let’s take a look at two valuable tools that can help marketers get acquainted with new markets around the world.

CIA World Factbook

The U.S. Central Intelligence Agency may be best-known for its role in supplying international security information to U.S. government policymakers, but it also transforms its fact-finding expertise into profiles of 267 different countries, known as the CIA World Factbook. Each country profile addresses geographic, social, demographic, economic, energy, communications and transportation issues that can help marketers to select locations with the strongest market potential and the most stable economies/governments.

Hofstede’s Cultural Ratings

On a more academic note, Dutch professor Geert Hofstede has dedicated his career to intercultural comparative research. He developed a model to compare national cultures on five distinct categories of culture:

Power distance – the degree to which the least powerful in a culture accept their status, and accept that power is distributed unequally. The U.S. scores very low on this attribute, believing instead in “liberty and justice for all.”

Individualism – the degree of interdependence among the society’s members, or whether it is an “I” or “We” society. Not surprisingly, the U.S. scores as highly individualistic.

Masculinity/Femininity – Hofstede’s model defines a masculine culture as focusing on competition and success, while a more feminine culture values caring for others and overall quality of life. The U.S. scores as a moderately masculine culture, primarily due to our propensity to assign high values to work, monetary rewards and achievement.

Uncertainty avoidance – this factor addresses a culture’s approach to the future: does it just happen, or do we attempt to control it? How accepting are we of ambiguity? American society is seen as welcoming uncertainty, which contributes to a strong track record of innovation and change.

Long-term orientation – the degree to which a culture focuses on issues further into the future, versus short term results. Clearly, the U.S. is a short-term society, seeking quick results and even reporting business performance every 3 months.

By using tools such as the CIA World Factbook and Hofstede’s cultural ratings, marketers are better able to tailor their marketing mixes to the needs of individual countries, and ultimately to win at the intricate game of global marketing.

In this writing assignment, you will complete the following steps:

Write at least two marketing objectives to be accomplished by this marketing plan. Be sure that your objectives are stated in a way to meet the criteria for “S.M.A.R.T.” goals, which means they are:

Specific -- answer the who, what, when, where, why questions

Measurable – include a numeric objective (“increase sales to $10 million”)

Attainable – within your reach, even if optimistic (you are willing to commit)

Realistic – have a reasonable likelihood of being met (you are able to commit)

Timely – have a deadline or time period attached

Based on your analysis of the market data, and a comprehensive understanding of the customer and the buying processes, write a 2-3 page description of the major segments of the market and the specific target market segment you have chosen to serve. Be sure to include a discussion of demographic and psychographic factors if you are targeting a consumer segment, or for business targets, a discussion of whether you are serving a producer, reseller, institution or government unit. Include your reasons for concluding that this is the target market segment that is most likely to be served profitably by your firm.

Please combine all sections of this draft (Marketing Objectives and Target Market Strategy) into a single document, along with citation of sources.

Explanation / Answer

Most of the organisations are using different type of approaches for influence in the customer as well as a specifically targeting customer segment targeting requires proper approach of implementation of strategy as well as availability of options that an organisation can implement.

Some of the major factors that are used by the organisation to target a market are as follows.

Behavioral segmentation

Behavioural segmentation can be defined as a marketing strategy with which customer is segmented according to their buying behaviour. It directly divide the overall market in several groups which is decided in form of the knowledge and attitude of the customer towards any specific product.

Spending money as well as buying patterns are observed for proper segmentation of the customer into specific segments. Other Lifestyle factors are also measured for proper segmentation of the customer.

Basically market segmentation is done to increase the overall influencing factors for different type of customers and to design advertisement and the target forecast promotional strategies accordingly.

There are several type of behavioral segmentation some of them are as follows.

Finest example for the behavioral segmentation is the greeting card segments from Archies. Archies create the specified segment for each and every occasion and the buyer decision totally depends on the choice of the customer. Targeted customer is defined with the help of the specific thing regarding the equation. Customers are given the choices of different cards by perfection towards their expression as a gift.

Customer Analytics

Customer analytics has always been a very vital part of a business marketing strategies. By analysing the customers abroad can easily identify their needs and can provide best to the customers. By having an understanding of the customers requirement of brand can grow towards be specific goal for providing best services to their customers as well as regaining the best profits.

Previously the customer analytics was totally analogue and dependent on the human capability which made it a bit inefficient as compared to the today is human resource management system which is called as CRM.

Technological advance customer relationship management systems are Highly Effective and provide an analytical interface which can measure vast amount of information in very short time.

By implementing the customer relationship management in your organisation you can easily organise your customers according to their needs as well as their behaviour analysis. By taking multiple feedback from the customers as well as getting information by different mediums is really helpful in improving the profits for your organisation as well as services for the customers.

Technology has played a vital role in changing the customer analytics process as now the process is most and more efficient than the previous times because of the vast reach of the technology towards the customer.

Just like today the customer relationship management is very essential for a company it would be more essential for a company as the world is going to delete digital. Moving the employee customer relationship as well as understanding your customer segment would literally require customer analytics. By being dependent on the customer analytics and company could easily identify their goals and their specialities in the business market. In the very future customer Analytics would be a mandatory thing for most of the organisation no matter give their small or big because the technology is over taking every single segment Around The World.

Limitation of marketing planning is one of the most important part of any organisation to align its availability of operational capabilities to achieve the specific goals and outcomes.

There are 6 steps in Integrated Marketing planning

Knowing the target audience

By knowing your target audience you can easily implement the Integrated Marketing strategy into your organisation and can provide the most effective way of the integration. Badminton your audience you can easily apply Different techniques as well as communication model into different integrated marketing strategies for taking out a better outcome.

Developing the situation analysis

Best specific term is generally defaulter SWOT analysis for the organisation. By carrying out a SWOT analysis we can easily increase the brands internal strength as well as assessment of the business and can be provided. This specific strategy provide the base and support for the organisational determination of opportunities and threats as well.

Determine the communication objectives

Determination of we can implement the needed strategy into the organisational structure. Determine the goal that what you want to accomplish with her specific Integrated Marketing Communication strategy can increase the overall effectiveness of your plan's term.

Determination of the budget

By determining the overall require budget for the organisation and calculating the available funds can easily help you in determining the correct strategy according to your budget for the betterment of the organisation. This is specific step is necessary to determine the overall size of the applicable strategies.

Applying studies and technique

After selecting the budget one should be easily able to apply the selected strategy and tactics and to the organisational communication. To accomplish the objectives you need you can apply the strategies as well as tactics on specific actions by providing the budget selected.

Evaluation and measurement

After applying detecting and overall steps which we have followed evaluation of the effectiveness of the IMP strategy is very necessary. For looking is each and every step of the plan is working out efficiently and correctly evaluation and measurement of the specific strategic is very necessary. By measuring and evaluating you can easily determine the errors in the specific IMP strategy and can provide a better support for the marketing environment.

Social Media Marketing

Social media works in business to business market place as it provides adequate information about the company background and helps in research for increasing the trustworthiness of a company regarding other companies. It is not very widely used in B2B marketing but still social media plays an important role of providing adequate information about the trustworthiness as well as social standard of the company which could be very beneficial while making deals with the company in terms of social marketing as well as by creating good relations with other company and project in your company as an ethical to avoid any specific consequence of joining or collaborating with any company which is not socially respected.

Some basic Strategies for the social media marketing would be as follows

• Identification of the business goals

• Identification of the ideal customers

• Researching the competition

• Choosing the different channel as well as the advertisement tactics

• Creating content according to the company's profile

• Allocation of budget as well as resources

• Deciding a medium to advertise.

Example - United Airlines

Behavioral segmentation
Customer Analytics

Behavioral segmentation

Behavioural segmentation can be defined as a marketing strategy with which customer is segmented according to their buying behaviour. It directly divide the overall market in several groups which is decided in form of the knowledge and attitude of the customer towards any specific product.

Spending money as well as buying patterns are observed for proper segmentation of the customer into specific segments. Other Lifestyle factors are also measured for proper segmentation of the customer.

Basically market segmentation is done to increase the overall influencing factors for different type of customers and to design advertisement and the target forecast promotional strategies accordingly.

There are several type of behavioral segmentation some of them are as follows.

Benefit sought
Occasion
Usage rate
Brand loyalty status
User status
Buyer readiness stage
Finest example for the behavioral segmentation is the greeting card segments from Archies. Archies create the specified segment for each and every occasion and the buyer decision totally depends on the choice of the customer. Targeted customer is defined with the help of the specific thing regarding the equation. Customers are given the choices of different cards by perfection towards their expression as a gift.

Customer Analytics

Customer analytics has always been a very vital part of a business marketing strategies. By analysing the customers abroad can easily identify their needs and can provide best to the customers. By having an understanding of the customers requirement of brand can grow towards be specific goal for providing best services to their customers as well as regaining the best profits.

Previously the customer analytics was totally analogue and dependent on the human capability which made it a bit inefficient as compared to the today is human resource management system which is called as CRM.

Technological advance customer relationship management systems are Highly Effective and provide an analytical interface which can measure vast amount of information in very short time.

By implementing the customer relationship management in your organisation you can easily organise your customers according to their needs as well as their behaviour analysis. By taking multiple feedback from the customers as well as getting information by different mediums is really helpful in improving the profits for your organisation as well as services for the customers.

Technology has played a vital role in changing the customer analytics process as now the process is most and more efficient than the previous times because of the vast reach of the technology towards the customer.

Customer relationship Management has following benefits
It improves the informational organisation
CRM enhances communication
It improves the overall customer service
It helps in automation of daily tasks
Provide better efficiency for multiple teams
It increases the level of analytical data reporting
Just like today the customer relationship management is very essential for a company it would be more essential for a company as the world is going to delete digital. Moving the employee customer relationship as well as understanding your customer segment would literally require customer analytics. By being dependent on the customer analytics and company could easily identify their goals and their specialities in the business market. In the very future customer Analytics would be a mandatory thing for most of the organisation no matter give their small or big because the technology is over taking every single segment Around The World.

Limitation of marketing planning is one of the most important part of any organisation to align its availability of operational capabilities to achieve the specific goals and outcomes.

There are 6 steps in Integrated Marketing planning

Knowing the targeted audience
Developing the situation analysis
Determine the communication objectives
Determination of the budget
Applying Strategies and tactics
Evaluation and Measurement
Knowing the target audience

By knowing your target audience you can easily implement the Integrated Marketing strategy into your organisation and can provide the most effective way of the integration. Badminton your audience you can easily apply Different techniques as well as communication model into different integrated marketing strategies for taking out a better outcome.

Developing the situation analysis

Best specific term is generally defaulter SWOT analysis for the organisation. By carrying out a SWOT analysis we can easily increase the brands internal strength as well as assessment of the business and can be provided. This specific strategy provide the base and support for the organisational determination of opportunities and threats as well.

Determine the communication objectives

Determination of we can implement the needed strategy into the organisational structure. Determine the goal that what you want to accomplish with her specific Integrated Marketing Communication strategy can increase the overall effectiveness of your plan's term.

Determination of the budget

By determining the overall require budget for the organisation and calculating the available funds can easily help you in determining the correct strategy according to your budget for the betterment of the organisation. This is specific step is necessary to determine the overall size of the applicable strategies.

Applying studies and technique

After selecting the budget one should be easily able to apply the selected strategy and tactics and to the organisational communication. To accomplish the objectives you need you can apply the strategies as well as tactics on specific actions by providing the budget selected.

Evaluation and measurement

After applying detecting and overall steps which we have followed evaluation of the effectiveness of the IMP strategy is very necessary. For looking is each and every step of the plan is working out efficiently and correctly evaluation and measurement of the specific strategic is very necessary. By measuring and evaluating you can easily determine the errors in the specific IMP strategy and can provide a better support for the marketing environment.

Social Media Marketing

Social media works in business to business market place as it provides adequate information about the company background and helps in research for increasing the trustworthiness of a company regarding other companies. It is not very widely used in B2B marketing but still social media plays an important role of providing adequate information about the trustworthiness as well as social standard of the company which could be very beneficial while making deals with the company in terms of social marketing as well as by creating good relations with other company and project in your company as an ethical to avoid any specific consequence of joining or collaborating with any company which is not socially respected.

To build a relationship with the business buyers I would definitely use social media as a main marketing tool. By targeting the specific market segment and projecting my products using different tools available over the social media would be the most appropriate way to create a relationship with the business buyers. This type of approach would help my company to go more productively as well as to assess statistics gained by the social media and implementation of life simulation of available trends which would affect my company's sale by a huge margin.

Some basic Strategies for the social media marketing would be as follows

• Identification of the business goals

• Identification of the ideal customers

• Researching the competition

• Choosing the different channel as well as the advertisement tactics

• Creating content according to the company's profile

• Allocation of budget as well as resources

• Deciding a medium to advertise.  

Example - United Airlines

United Airlines has been consistently growing in American environment. Their availability of low cost operational approach in the American government has definitely availed them to maintain better standard by using their physiological segmentation.

This is specific type of approach is essential for United Airlines to maintain better standard operation as well as to provide their vast available services in United States as well as in the international environment. United Airlines has been very successful in its operating structure.

Expansion of the services on the basis of basic economy as well as expanding the economic classes to economy Plus and providing rewards to the customers has been the Prime motivating as well as business orienting criteria of united Airlines to create a strong customer base. Buy separately operating United Express as a branch of United Airlines in United States of America they have strictly captured the market segment. Holding world best segments in business operations and operating Polaris business as well as premium + type of plants in their flight has increased their profit margin buy used scale. This type of availability is maintained by a fleet of 754 flights in operation for United Airlines.

This approach enables United Airlines to generate revenues from their high paying customers and to directly follow the physiological segmentation by creating value for the economy customers as well as improving the availability of market operations by using high paying customers as a tool for revenue generation.

All in all we can say that united Airlines has successfully created a change in its operating environment by benefiting the environment in a positive manner for providing better availability of approaches increasing adaptability towards the culture of United States of America as well as changing trends in international environment for changing its business.

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