End of Intro

In undertaking this marketing class, and more specifically this blogging assignment, I honestly didn’t know what to expect. My knowledge of both blogging and marketing were nearly nonexistent in January at the beginning of this spring’s semester. I can now proudly say that I’ve moved into the category of “novice” for blogging, and maybe even slightly past that in terms of general marketing knowledge. Rather than writing another post about random happenings or concepts from the world of marketing, this post will be a reflection of this course overall, and of the blog assignment, in terms of objectives and outcomes that we were expected to experience and gain knowledge of over the course of the past 16 weeks.

To examine and convey basic and emerging marketing concepts and terminologies

            This first and most basic objective is very obvious about its importance to this class, and really is the concept of the class in 11 words. Examining these ideas was not only the purpose of time spent in the classroom, but also the aim of textbook chapters, other external readings, and the major projects of the semester. At the beginning of the course, I would have had a difficult time coming up with even two of 4 P’s that are considered one of the most basic concepts of all marketing efforts. Learning emerging marketing concepts was also well reinforced through the use of a practice marketing simulation where 6 teams competed to sell customized backpacks in a ficticious market. This project forced teams to make decisions regarding advertising, distribution, and price of their backpack using real concepts learned throughout the course. By the way, my team won!

Understand the functions, roles and responsibilities of marketers

            The roles and responsibilities of a marketer are far greater and deeper reaching than I would have believed prior to this course. Of course a marketing manager is expected to make decisions on things like new advertisements, the brand image and positioning, and target markets chosen, but their job goes far deeper than that. Decisions on manufacturing/ production schedules, distribution channels, pricing considerations (one price for all or employ price discrimination to increase revenue from those who are willing and able to pay more?) and future direction of the company and new projects are all decisions that a marketing manager would have at least a say in.

Analyze and evaluate marketing opportunities in the internal and external environment across a variety of settings

            The content that came along with satisfying this course objective was one of the most enjoyable aspects of the course for me. Each class would begin with presentations of two commercials that had previously or were currently in use as television advertisements for a vast variety of products. Daily discussions surrounding these commercials, as well as relevant general marketing news, allowed for conversations that delved further into many intricacies of the world of marketing. Moving from what the commercial showed and said, and into what it actually meant and what the intended outcome of the ad was revealed a lot of industry insight from our professor who still also works in the industry outside of academia.

Use written and oral skills to persuade a target audience

            In addition to commercial presentations, each class began with a presentation of a TedTalk that could be about nearly anything, but that had to also be able to be related to the course in some way. The purpose these presentations was twofold in that not only did they force new content into every class period, but also, and more importantly, they allowed each student to get more comfortable with giving presentations and public speaking. This is a skill that one could never be too good at, and is always worth improving upon.

Participate and communicate as an effective member of a team

            Similar to oral presentation skills, group/ collective project effectiveness is a skill that can, and should, continually be honed. In addition to the aforementioned semester-long practice marketing simulation, many class periods involved small group projects accomplishing things such as creating a fake product and how you would market it, or discussing potential future plans for saving a failing business, or determining where a product currently fell within its product life cycle. Again, the actual assignment is slightly less important than the skills learned during its completion. The backpack simulation required high levels of teamwork to complete different reports and projects (such as filming a commercial for our company) throughout the semester and nearly constantly; there is no substitute to experience in learning soft skills like communication and this course gave me a good amount of it.

These five examples of how course material, projects, and assignments ushered me toward an understanding of some vitally important objectives and learning outcomes are just a small portion of a long list of skills and knowledge learned throughout the semester. In learning these skills, I also learned that a career I would have never even previously considered could be one that I would thoroughly enjoy and potentially even be successful in.

THANKS FOR READING!

The Genius of Stickers

One of the main metrics used to assess the effectiveness of a marketing message is the ratio of customers reached per dollar spent. As stated in other previous posts, this semester has not only taught me many concrete marketing principles, it has also taught me to be more aware of marketing messages in everyday life. Recently, I began to think more deeply about the abundance of stickers that I see every day. They’re everywhere! On cars, signs, doors, laptops, cell phones, water bottles, tables, skis, skateboards, and just about every other receptive surface conceivable. If you look at what happens when a person chooses to stick a sticker on something, it becomes hard to believe that one has to pay for stickers, rather than all companies giving them out for free.

            When I was young, I collected every sticker I could get my hands on, and stuck them haphazardly to my desk, and eventually the back of the door in my bedroom. At that time, I just liked the diversity of colors and shapes and patterns, and that I could decorate my room without artistic talent, because I have none.

What I didn’t realize at the time was that I had created a marketing campaign off all my own favorite things, things I had purchased before, which I saw everyday. Granted, I was the primary viewer of all the marketing efforts.  But, think of the owner of a car covered in bumper stickers, or the girl across the coffee shop whose laptop is advertising everything from her home state to her beloved Tom’s Footwear.  These people have such high brand loyalty that they are willing to advertise for free, or even in some cases, for a price. For example Ski The East, an online community of devoted East Coast skiers, sells sticker kits for anywhere from $3 to $20 depending on size, color, and number of stickers in the kit. So not only is this company generating revenue from selling its stickers, it is also generating revenue from the advertising that comes with having your company’s logo plastered anywhere and everywhere.

            For all companies, reaching consumers outside of its targeted market segment is expensive and ineffective in terms of the amount of customers that can be generated per dollar spent. The use of stickers as a promotional tool in a company’s marketing mix allows for brand images to reach customers it may have never dreamed of reaching.   Even if nine of every ten people who see it have no reaction whatsoever, the company that charges for its stickers is still paid to gain that tenth customer who saw the sticker and decided to check out more about your product.

            In a marketing environment where it seems lately more is better, I find it fascinating to see the success and effectiveness of one of the simplest forms of advertising available.

Product Life Cycle

            Any product brought to market goes through phases and cycles, known as the Product Life Cycle, much like any other living thing. In the product life cycle there are four phases: Introduction, Growth, Maturity, and Decline. The names of the categories are fairly self-explanatory and thinking of a few examples of any isn’t too difficult; perhaps an example for Introduction would be 3D printers for personal consumers, for Growth, GoPro comes to mind, Maturity could be exemplified by Ford, and when I think Decline, I think of something like the market for land-line telephones. Depending on where a product or service is in their life cycle is a major driver in the direction the company should be attempting to go at any point. Production levels, marketing message, pricing strategies, and distribution channel usage are all aspects of your business that come into question depending on your products position in it’s cycle.

            As you can see in the image above, the product life cycle is graphed with sales on the Y-axis and time on the X-axis. (Sales are obviously the most important area to track performance from, but to the businessman/economist in me, this graph would be more interesting by having a typical cost curve as well, that would show profit in a more evident way throughout product life.) This curve shown is a fairly typical shape but not all products will share the same curve; factors such as knowledge of the product class, popularity of the product, and length of popularity will all shape the curve differently. Think of SillyBandz, the shaped rubber band bracelets that saw huge success out of nowhere and for only a short period of time; their curve didn’t look like the one above. It likely spent nearly no time at all in the introduction phase and its curve during growth was extremely sharp. Because SillyBandz would be considered a “fad” product, its decline was likely just as sharp as its growth after spending very little time in the maturity stage. In contrast, try to imagine the product life cycle shape for a product such as Coca-Cola.

            Given that a product is positioned differently in consumers minds depending on its point in the life cycle, the message sent by marketing and promotional efforts needs to fit the time and place on the curve. During the Introduction phase of the life cycle, the marketing message just needs to make consumers aware of the product class in general to create a space for their product. Once in the Growth phase, the emphasis is placed more on getting consumers to recognize your product as the superior option within the class and thus the best options for their hard-earned money. As sales level off and a product moves into Maturity, some of the spending on advertising will be curtailed and what is left will aim to maintain existing customers remind other buyers of the product. Finally in Decline, most spending on advertising will be cut and the product will slowly be phased out completely, hopefully involving some market cannibalization by another of your own products.

Moe's Knows

A recent outing with some buddies in the daily struggle to avoid eating dining hall food led us to Moe’s Southwest Grill.  At Moe’s, a place where I have only eaten a few times before, I expected to be shouted at upon entry to the restaurant (Welcome To Moe’s!!) and I expected to get a decent meal at a good value; what I hadn’t expected was to find inspiration for a Marketing2015 blog post. Taking marketing this semester has certainly lead to a greater overall personal awareness of marketing efforts being put in front of consumers everyday and finding this cup was an example of that.

Almost all competition in any industry is based on one of two factors: price, or quality, and for that reason most marketing campaigns aim to convince consumers of their product’s superiority in one of these two aspects. This cup breaks from that typical formula and instead uses a campaign of functionality to promote the catering side of their business. There are many methods used to promote products such as product line extensions (using a current brand name to enter an new market,) sub-branding (combining a corporate brand with new brand to distinguish a new part of the product line,) brand extension (using a current brand name to enter a different product class,) and co-branding (combining of two brand names on a single product.) This campaign is a particularly good example of brand extension because Moe’s is able to promote a new service, using existing products, directly to customers who have already shown interest in the product just by being at Moe’s in the first place. For these same reasons, this also an example of market modification, which is defined as using existing products to find new customers and/or increase use and use situations among existing customers.

Expanding from their traditional revenue stream that is their brick and mortar retail locations to also include offsite event catering allows them to begin to gain market share in an $8 billion per year industry.¹ Being profitable in the catering industry is largely due to a company’s ability to keep costs at a minimum. Given that Moe’s already knows all of its price points on food costs and other overhead, and that they sell an inherently cheap-to-produce product, they will likely have an opportunity to see a healthy return on investment for any capital they allocate to this side of their business.

What really caught my attention was the sheer simplicity and brilliance of the marketing effort used here to put the line for a name on the cup. Not only does this raise awareness of the catering business to those in the restaurant for a single meal, it also allows for those who use these cups at a catered event to have a nametag of sorts and to tell their drink from others in the vicinity. In a world of over thinking and high complexity, this ad stuck out to me for the fact that it is neither over thought nor complex.  

Works Cited:

Wood, L. (2011, June 17). Research and Markets: 2011 Report on the $7 Billion US Catering Services Industry. Retrieved April 10, 2015, from http://www.reuters.com/article/2011/06/17/idUS178751 17-Jun-2011 BW20110617

Market Economics

To be profitable in any industry is very simple: generate more revenue than cost.  But, in reality, there are many factors that go into getting these numbers to come back with a positive bottom line. Marketing is thought of primarily as a firm’s advertisement strategy and efforts for a product or service but the marketing team has further-reaching consequences on a firm’s net income. Advertising efforts, in conjunction with an understanding of the quantity demanded in the market, allow for closer-to-optimal production levels. This edition of Marketing2015 will explore some theories of supply and demand and why the marketing team should be paying close attention.

Supply and demand is generally considered to be the main backbone and most fundamental concept of Economics, day one material in any 101 level econ class, micro or macro. As seen in the above image, price is on the Y-axis while quantity is on the X-axis. The demand curve starts high on the left and moves in a somewhat linear fashion toward the bottom right; the shape and direction of this curve is telling us that at a high price, consumer demand a lower quantity and that as the price decreases the quantity demanded will rise. The supply curve follows an opposite path: low on the left when price is low, and high on the right when/ where price is higher.  This concept makes a lot of logical sense: when prices are low firms are hesitant to produce many goods because the price will not offset the costs enough to turn a profit but when price is high, they are hoping to produce and sell a high volume of goods to cash in on people demanding their product.

The point on the graph where these two curves cross is referred to as the equilibrium point. This point represents the optimal price where consumers are willing and able to purchase all of the goods that producers are willing and able to make in any given market. This point is also known as the market-clearing price for the same reason. This is where marketers can have an impact on the bottom line.  If the marketing team is able to anticipate this sought-after point, it can be determined ahead of time what the likely demand will be.  Thus, the production team can create an appropriate production schedule that will allow for minimal overhead costs and ideally a complete avoidance of any unnecessary costs for thing like storing the extra, unsought goods, or having to wholesale a large number of them at a cost much lower than MSRP in an effort to at least see some return on the investment of producing them in the first place.

To delve a bit deeper into this concept we can begin to look at things like shifts of the curves, which occur when there is a change in number of consumers, the average income of consumers; and the preferences of the consumers or the prices of related good within the same market. There can also be movements of the equilibrium point along either curve.   These occur when there is a change in either value on an axis, price or quantity. These concepts would be covered in much greater detail if this were an economics blog.