Marketing Essays - Marketing Management Plan
The role of Marketing Management is to plan, organize, implement and control the whole marketing process (Elliot et al 2008, p.24). Kotler and Keller (2006, p. 31) summarized Marketing Management to be the art and science of choosing target markets and getting, keeping, and growing customers through creating, delivering and communicating superior customer value.
There are six main areas to Marketing Management – Marketing research and analysis, Marketing strategy, Implementation planning, Project, process and vendor management, Organizational management and leadership AND Reporting, measurement, feedback and control systems (Kotler and Keller 2006m p. 31). Through these processes the marketing manager will need to conduct market analysis, design strategizing, implementation, execution, internal sell, acquire feedback and placing control systems.
Elliot et al (2008, p. 5) defines marketing from a managerial viewpoint. It is to be the process encompassing planning and executing the conception, distribution, promotion and pricing of goods, services and ideas. All these activities will facilitate the exchange relationships with customers in a dynamic environment. The customer is the focal of the marketing journey – from market research (input from customer) to the purchase point (where it concludes with an exchange). This is marketing’s role in business and society.
Marketing management is an art simply because management is an art. Drucker (cited in Wartzman 2009) opinioned management is a liberal art. He explained further with ‘liberal’ dealing with humanity and ‘art because it is practice and application’.
Art is defined as the “process or product of deliberately arranging elements in a way that appeals to the senses or emotions.” It does not need a set of defined rules to dictate the steps to be taken and it changes as fast. Standford Encyclopedia of Philosophy notes a fact about art under its article The Definition of Art (2007) that art has a complicated history of new genres and art-form development, evolving taste and change of aesthetic properties over time. Like art marketing management has a complicated history of Pro-science era, Pro-sciences era and Anti-science era (Brown 1996).
At the other extreme is the debate that says marketing management is a science. Science refers to a system of acquiring knowledge via the organized body of knowledge people have gained using observation and experimentation (Science Made Simple 2006). It further described ‘is often used to describe any systematic field of study or knowledge gained from it.’ The purpose of science is to produce useful models of reality. Based on that definition, Marketing Management can easily qualify as a science. There is a field of classification to this aspect of science behind Marketing Management - Social sciences which is ‘the systematic study of human behaviour and society’.
Marketing management is when the science behind the creation (a winning product) is pollinated with the ‘art’ of marketing strategy and implementation. The discipline manages the whole product’s life cycle – from product introduction to deletion. Throughout this cycle, the fundamental of ALL marketing issues can and must be related to the marketing mix. Strategic Direction (2006) cites Marketing to be an art. Today marketers hear 5Ps and even up to 7Ps. But it all began with Kotler who coined ‘the 4Ps’ – Product, Price, Placement, Promotion.
Product
A successful Product is one where the branding, packaging, product adoption process and product life cycle are carefully planned. One way for a marketer to verify the Product’s probability to succeed is via conducting a Marketing Research and Analysis. Marketing research and analysis is often conducted to gain an accurate marketing analysis of the five Cs – Customer, Company, Collaborator, Competitor and industry Content. Marketers run marketing research before a new product goes into the market (Hill 1988). It tells companies which type of products or services would be profitable to introduce to the market (Nylund 2008).The rationale behind it is to reduce the risk of a doomed product. The questions that could be answered could possibly save companies millions in the advertising and promotion budget.
The process to run Market Research itself is scientific. A scientific approach would require the research to run in specific manner – observation/research, hypothesis, prediction, experimentation, conclusions (Science Made Simple 2006). Therefore, Market Research is a science because it adopts a systematic approach in its data findings.
Mattel conducted a market research before introducing Barbie back in the early 1950’s because they suspected hostility from mothers towards the doll (Wolf 2000). In an era of baby dolls, naturally many women were disgusted by the sexy clothing and one participant even called it ‘daddy dolls’. The results polled from the marketing research and analysis confirmed Mattel’s obvious suspicion, that Barbie is simply too sexy for the Americans. The doll negated the society’s condemnation with clever marketing and targeting. The 1950’s post war era saw the introduction of television and the rise of middle class suburban families. Mattel recognized this opportune time and thus Barbie made her first appearance TV ads on the Mickey Mouse Club. This targeted their immediate audience - children who had spending power. Mattel sold 351,000 Barbies in her first year. If Mattel had followed the market research, the world today would not have known Barbie.
Often the perceived risk differs from the real risk due to the buying capability of the consumer (Cristache et al n.d.). Even scientific polls on a topic may seem inconsistent. (Nancarrow et al 2004, p.651). Consumers are searching for something that is not always compatible with the notion of rationality and utility (Cristache et al n.d.). Barbie was created to project “every little girl’s dream of the future”. Mattel continuously researches on societal trends to keep Barbie relevant with the times which had seen Barbie gone through five facelifts (Cook 2003). Mattel’s success with this product is the company’s ability to allow Barbie to change with the times
Science cannot pervade the analytical portion of Marketing Research. The many variables are simply too dynamic for science. The challenge is in communicating the research results and interpreting the options available. In this case study, art has trumped science even though the company practiced the scientific approach of marketing research and analysis.
Price
Hoek and Roelants (1991) noted that most times price discounts do not have a permanent effect on consumers’ brand preferences. Within their paper about Price Discounting on Discounted and Competing Brands’ Sales, they are of the opinion that market share gained during the promotion could be as temporary as the promotion itself. Therefore it only disrupts consumers’ short term purchase behaviour and eventually it resumes normalcy.
In 2005, Delta air lines’ changes its pricing structure significant, and perhaps changed the standard against what air lines measured by (Thomaselli 2005). “Simplifares” was introduced in Delta’s long term plan to reinvent itself to rival discount carriers like JetBlue, Southwest and AirTran Airways. CMO Paul Matsen reported that sales was up by 40% when Delta carried out a test run in late 2004.Under Simplifares, prices were cut by up to 50%. Other price offerings implemented were lower walk-up travel fares and capped fares like one-way first class at USD599. Internet search engine Yahoo reported searches on “Delta Airline Reservations” rose by 611%(Thomaselli 2005). Therefore according to Hoek and Roelants’s (1991) paper, Delta has done well with adjusting its overall pricing structure and made it into a long-term implementation. Suffice to say, pricing strategy as demonstrated by Delta’s timely execution was creative (an art) and a calculated approach (science) based on the test run.
Placement
Hill (1988) tabled his findings in his paper ‘Research Contribution to New Product Development’. Brands Crocodillo (a drink) and Prelude (a snack) adopted the same systematic approach with focus groups to collect data. As a result both brands had impactful ads and the right packaging. However only Prelude went on to garner whopping success in its market while Crocodillo faltered. The striking difference was that Prelude went a step further by implementing a ‘project team approach’ to safeguard the market analysis relevance by speeding up timetable to market place launch. Crocodillo’s competitor launched Green Dragon as a ‘spoiling tactic’. Suffice to say, market research does have its limitations. The product elements may be right but extraneous factors like distribution levels and competitive reaction will affect the true end-result.
Promotion
Companies are fast realizing that their employees are their best marketing ambassadors (McEwen 2002). Internal branding is usually highly practiced in the services sector. Brands hold values that make promises about unique experiences (de Chernatony, cited in Vallaster et al 2005, pp185) and it is the good employees who are ultimately responsible for delivering its promise. Thomson et al (cited in Vallaster et al 2005) said: Good communication leads to the internalization of brand values which encourages employees’ alignment and the commitment to behave in a brand supporting manger.
JetBlue adopts internal branding as its strategic concept. ‘Organizational citizenship’ has been one of the founding pillars to its business model (Leberecht n.d., p.14). JetBlue employees ‘live the brand’. JetBlue promotes the brand promise to the employee base. The connection between brand promise and brand delivery is easily understood. The company involves employees in decisions that concern them. Interpersonal communication is practiced whereby the company hosts open forums monthly. The CEO boards the planes to experience the crew’s performance in person and also be in contact with the employees. When asked to describe the JetBlue brand the managerial and employees responses were almost exactly the same, down to the wordings. This is proof for successful effective internal branding. Passengers of this air line will enjoy the ‘JetBlue Experience’ which extends to all service levels, from reservation, check-in to flying. (Leberecht n.d., pp.18-24). What a holistic way to carry out promotions of the brand. It is one that cannot be easily copied and requires a transparent company. The methods can be copied but it may not reap the same benefits for another company. Therefore, art prevails in this case.
Conclusion
If marketers stick to the ‘science approach’, it leads to “me too” strategies (Strategic Direction 2006). If marketing management is to be strictly either art or science it would create marketing myopia. There are many academicians today who still argue that Marketing Management is largely an art. The dynamic market is constantly changing, more so in the past decade when the age of internet has fragmented the media landscape. Advertising landscape today is punctuated with social media influences like Twitter, Nuffnang, and Facebook.
In conclusion, I stand by this statement that Marketing is more of an ‘art’ than a ‘science’. Everything and Anything is managed and marketed, from religion to politics, fiction or fact, sports, people etc. So how does one market Everything and Anything? That is the art of marketing management.
References
Brown, S 1996, ‘Art or Science?: Fifty Years of Marketing Debate’, Journal of Marketing Management, Vol. 12, issue 4, pp.243-267, viewed 12 August 2009, EBSCOHost Database, Business Source Premier-Publication, item: AN 5480471
Cook, B 2003, Barbie what a doll, Behind the brand: The triumphs and tragedies, 2003 issue, viewed 22 August 2009, <http://www.brandchannel.com/features_profile.asp?pr_id=160>
Cristache, N, Susanu, I & David, S 2008, The influence of product value during the process of purchase decision, Management & Marketing, issue 1, pp.139-144, Viewed 16 August 2009, EBSCOhost Database, Business Source Premier.
Elliot, G, Waller, D, Rundle-thiele, S & Paladino, A 2008, Marketing: Core Concepts and Applications, 2nd edn, John Wiley & Sons Australia Ltd, Milton Qld, Australia.
Hill, P 1988, ‘The Market Research Contribution to New Product Failure and Success’, Journal of Marketing Management, no.3, pp.269-274. EBSCOhost Database, Business Source Premier.
Hoek, J & Roelants, L 1991, Some Effects of Price Discounting on Discounted and Competing Brands’ Sales, Marketing Bulletin, Vol.2, pp.55-50, Viewed 15 August 2009, EBSCOhost Database, Business Source Premier.
Kotler, P & Keller, LK 2006, Marketing Management, 12th edn, Pearson, Upper Saddle River, New Jersey.
Leberecht, T n.d., True Blue: Internal branding as a strategic corporate communications tool. A case study of JetBlue Airways, viewed on 23 August 2009, <http://www.brandchannel.com/images/Papers/210_True_Blue.orig.pdf>
McEwen, WJ 2002, Customer Engagement: Beware of Empty Promises, Gallup Journal, viewed on 23 August 2009, EBSCOhost Business Source Premier, Item: 6779600.
Nancarrow, C, Tinson, J & Evans, M 2004, Polls as Marketing Weapons: Implications for the Market Research Industry, Journal of Marketing Management, vol. 20, pp639-655, Viewed 10 August 2009, EBSCOhost Database, Business Source Premier.
Nylund, LN 2008, ‘Marketing research becoming the answers for profits’, Caribbean Business, 18 December, p.41, viewed 22 August 2009, EBSCOhost Database, Business Source Premier.
Science Made Simple 2006, Science Definition, viewed 23 August 2009, <http://www.sciencemadesimple.com/science-definition.html>
Standford Encyclopedia of Philosophy 2007, The Definition of Art , Metaphysics Research Lab, CSLI, Stanford University, viewed 22 August 2009, <http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/art-definition/>
Strategic Direction 2006, ‘The battle for marketing’s future: Will rationality or intuition prevail?’, vol. 22, no. 10, pp.26-28, viewed 17 August 2009, Emerald Insight, Academic Search Premier, item: 0258-0543.
Thomaselli, R 2005, Delta sets the stage for a marketing war, Advertising Age, Vol.76, Issue 2, viewed 16 August 2009, EBSCOhost Database, Academice Search Premier, item: 00018899.
Vallaster, C & de Chernatony, L 2005, Internationalization of Services Brands: The Role of Leadership During the Internal Brand Building Process, Journal of Marketing Management, vol.21, issue pp.181-203, EBSCOhost Database, Academice Search Premier, item: AN 16062992
Wartzman, R 2009, The Drucker Difference: Management as a Liberal Art, Business Week, weblog, viewed 20 August 2009,<http://www.businessweek.com/managing/content/aug2009/ca2009087_146668.htm>
Wolf, E 2000. Barbie: The Early History. Viewed 20 August 2009. <http://www.honors.umd.edu/HONR269J/projects/wolf.html>
