Public Relations

Not only must the company relate constructively to customers, suppliers, and dealers, it must also relate to a large number of interested publics. A public is any group that has an actual or potential interest in or impact on a com­pany’s ability to achieve its objectives. Public relations (PR) includes a variety of programs

1 Comments

MARKETING EXCELLENCE EVIAN

Evian is one of the most famous mineral water brands owned by the French food-products group Danone. Each year, approximately 1.5 billion bottles are sold in more than 140 countries across the world. According to the market research company Millward Brown, the Evian brand can be valued at $1,027 million. The success of the

1 Comments

MARKETING EXCELLENCE GILLETTE

Gillette knows men. Not only does the company un­derstand what products men desire for their grooming needs; it understands how to market to men in different countries, cultures, and languages around the world. Today, Gillette holds a commanding lead in the shaving and razor business with a 70 percent global market share and $8

1 Comments

Online Marketing

As described in Chapter 1, marketers distinguish paid and owned media from earned (or free) media. Paid media includes company-generated advertising, publicity, and other promotional efforts. Earned media is all the PR and word-of-mouth benefits a firm receives without having directly paid for anything—all the news stories, blogs, and social network conversations that deal

Social Media

An important component of digital marketing is social media. Social media are a means for consumers to share text, images, audio, and video information with each other and with companies, and vice versa. Social media allow marketers to establish a public voice and presence online. They can cost-effectively reinforce other communication activities. Because of

1 Comments

Word of Mouth

Social media are one example of online word of mouth. Word of mouth (WOM) is a powerful marketing tool. AT&T found it was one of the most effective drivers of its sales, along with unaided advertising awareness. Some brands have been built almost exclusively by word of mouth.46 SODASTREAM SodaStream, a product that allows

1 Comments

Mobile Marketing

Given the presence of smart phones and tablets everywhere and marketers’ ability to personalize messages based on demographics and other consumer behavior characteristics, the appeal of mobile marketing as a communica­tion tool is obvious. 1. THE SCOPE OF MOBILE MARKETING Wharton’s David Bell notes four distinctive characteristics of a mobile device: (1) It is

1 Comments

MARKETING EXCELLENCE FACEBOOK

Facebook was founded in 2004 by Mark Zuckerberg, a Harvard University student at the time. Zuckerberg recalls, “I just thought that being able to have access to different people’s profiles would be interesting. Obviously, there’s no way you can get access to that stuff unless people are throwing up profiles, so I wanted to

MARKETING EXCELLENCE UNILEVER (AXE AND DOVE)

Unilever—manufacturer of several home care, food, and personal care brands—uses personal marketing com­munications strategies to target specific age groups, demographics, and lifestyles. The company has devel­oped some of the most successful brands in the world, including Axe, a male grooming brand, and Dove, a per­sonal care brand aimed at women. The Axe brand launched

1 Comments

Direct Marketing

Today, many marketers build long-term relationships with customers. They send birthday cards, information materials, or small premiums. Airlines, hotels, and other businesses adopt frequency reward programs and club programs.2 Direct marketing is the use of consumer-direct (CD) channels to reach and deliver goods and services to customers without using marketing middlemen. Direct marketers can

1 Comments

Customer Databases and Database Marketing

To conduct direct marketing, marketers must know their customers.16 And to do that, they must collect information and store it in a database from which to conduct database marketing. A customer database is an organized collection of comprehensive information about individual customers or prospects that is current, accessible, and actionable for lead generation, lead

2 Comments

Designing the Sales Force

The original and oldest form of direct marketing is the field sales call. To locate prospects, develop them into customers, and grow the business, most industrial companies rely heavily on a professional sales force or hire manufacturers’ representatives and agents. Many consumer companies such as Allstate, Amway, Avon, Mary Kay, Merrill Lynch, and Tupperware

Managing the Sales Force

Various policies and procedures guide the firm in recruiting, selecting, training, supervising, motivating, and evaluating sales representatives to manage its sales force (see Figure 22.3). 1. RECRUITING AND SELECTING REPRESENTATIVES At the heart of any successful sales force are appropriately selected representatives. One survey revealed that the top 25 percent of the sales force

1 Comments

Principles of Personal Selling

Personal selling is an ancient art. Effective salespeople today have more than instinct, however. Companies now spend hundreds of millions of dollars each year to train them in methods of analysis and customer management and to transform them from passive order takers into active order getters. Reps are taught the SPIN method to build

1 Comments

MARKETING EXCELLENCE PROGRESSIVE

Progressive Corporation is among the largest providers of auto, motorcycle, boat, and RV insurance in the United States. The company was founded in 1937 and is con­sidered one of the most innovative in the industry. From the beginning, its philosophy has been to approach auto insurance “like no other company had.” Progressive attracts new

5 Comments

MARKETING EXCELLENCE Victoria’s Secret

Victoria’s Secret is the largest retailer of lingerie in the United States. Roy Raymond founded the company in 1977 because he thought retailers offered only “racks of terry-cloth robes and ugly floral-print nylon nightgowns.” In 1982, Raymond sold the company to Leslie Wexner, creator of Limited Stores Inc., for $1 million. At the time,

1 Comments

Trends in Marketing Practices

With globalization, deregulation, market fragmentation, consumer empowerment, environmental concerns, and all the remarkable developments in communication technology, the world has unquestionably become a very different place for marketers.2 Table 23.1 summarizes some important shifts in marketing realities. In making all these shifts in marketing and business practices, firms also face ethical dilemmas and perplexing

1 Comments

Internal Marketing

Traditionally, marketers played the role of intermediary, charged with understanding customers’ needs and trans­mitting their voice to various functional areas.5 But in a networked enterprise, every functional area can interact directly with customers. Marketing no longer has sole ownership of customer interactions; it now must integrate all the customer-facing processes so customers see a

1 Comments

Socially Responsible Marketing

Effective internal marketing must be matched by a strong sense of ethics, values, and social responsibility.22 Taking a more active, strategic role in corporate social responsibility is thought to benefit not just customers, employees, community, and the environment but also shareholders. Firms feel they also benefit in different ways, as Figure 23.4 illustrates. The

1 Comments

Marketing Implementation and Control

Table 23.5 summarizes the characteristics of a great marketing company, great not for what it is but for what it does. Great marketing companies know the best marketers thoughtfully and creatively devise marketing plans and then bring them to life. Marketing implementation and control are critical to making sure marketing plans have their intended

6 Comments