First, here's something that is fast becoming the most fundamental aspect of marketing to get right, especially if you want to build a truly sustainable high-quality organisation (of any size) in the modern age. Ensure the ethics and philosophy of your organisation are good and sound. This might seem a bit tangential to marketing and business, and rather difficult to measure, nevertheless... Price is no longer the king if it ever was. Value no longer rules, if ever it did. Quality of service and product is not the deciding factor. Today what truly matters is ethical and philosophical quality - from the bottom to the top - in every respect - across every dimension of the organisation. Modern consumers, business buyers, staff and suppliers too, are today more interested than ever before in corporate integrity, which is defined by the organisation's ethics and philosophy.Good sound ethics and philosophy enable and encourage people to make 'right and good decisions and to do right and good things. It's about humanity and morality; care and compassion; being good and fair. Profit is okay, but not greed; the reward is fine, but not avarice; trade is obviously essential, but exploitation is not. People naturally identify and align with these philosophical values. The best staff, suppliers, and customers naturally gravitate towards organisations with strong philosophical qualities. Putting a good clear ethical philosophy in place, and communicating it wide and far lets people know that your organisation always strives to do the right thing. It's powerful because...

Your business should have something unique about it that sets it apart from the competition. If your business appears to be just like every other business in your industry, then there will be very little reason for customers to choose you as opposed to one of your many competitors. When competing businesses have no distinguishing benefits to set them apart, when they all offer basically the same products or services, the same customer service, etc. thencustomers will tend to compare those businesses based on price alone-the lowest price wins. Here are some of the ways you can set yourself apart: 1. Focus on a Particular Niche. Perhaps you are a supplier of plastic conversion equipment selling injection and blow moulding machines. An area to specialise on could be material handling in supplying blending and drying systems. Maybe you are in the service industry like IT  where you can focus on supplying an SMS service rather than the installation and repairs of PCs. If you are a fitness instructor, you could focus on helping keep business employees fit, or you could be the personal fitness instructor that focuses on high-level business executives. 2. Become the Low-Price, or the High-Price Leader Design your business to provide good products for an extremely economical price. Your company would be committed to providing excellent savings for your customers. Or you could take the opposite route and become the high-price provider. Obviously, you would have to target a completely different market segment than the low-price leader. 3....

"Good companies will meet needs; great companies will create markets," says Philip Kotler, the worlds pre-eminent marketing thinker. Stuart Crainer talks to Philip Kotler. Should marketing move up higher on the board room agenda?Marketing is poorly understood by businesses and the public. Business leaders largely view marketing as a promotional function.In too many companies marketers have become "1P marketers, the P being promotion. Their responsibility and control and other IP's - product, price and place (distribution) - has weekend and is handled more actively by others. One factor is that many CEOs view marketing as the marketing budget, which is largely spent on promotion. Persons in other departments work actively on the other Ps: product (R&D), price (finance) and distribution (the sales force). Where is the unified vision that starts with defining target markets and their needs and carries this all the way to preparing integrated solutions?Businesses that grasp the true role and potential of marketing will use it as the driver of their business strategy, and not simply as a tactical compliment. Marketing must also gain a seat on the board which is too rarely found. Is CRM living up to its promise?Customer relationship management (CRM) remains one of the most promising new marketing developments in recent years. CRM can be tremendously effective when it is used properly. The more a company knows about its customers and prospects the more effectively it can compete.Too often, CRM is imported as a technology before the company has adopted a genuine customer culture....

Business influence through marketing communications can be done through words, pictures, symbols, spokespersons and special channels. The advertiser (source) of interpersonal communication may be formal or informal. Informal sources include friends, family, neighbours, who speak with the receiver/target audience regularly. Formal sources include salespersons, political candidates who are compensated in a way to influence consumers to act in a certain way. Impersonal sources are usually oganisations that want to promote an idea, product, service or image to a consumer. The message can be transmitted through the mass media such as television, radio, billboards and the personal media such as direct mail and sales promotion. The creditability of the sourceThe perceived honesty and objectivity of the advertiser (source) of communication have a huge influence on the acceptance of the message. If the source is well respected and highly thought of by the intended consumer (audience), the message is much more likely to be believed. The creditability of informal sources is built on the perception that they have nothing to gain from the recommendation, e.g. an opinion leader. The creditability of formal sources is based on intention, reputation, expertise and knowledge. Consumers judge commercial sources based on their past performances, the kind and quality of the service, the quality and image of products offered, and their position in the community. When the intentions of the source are clearly profit-making, then factors affecting creditability include reputation, expertise and knowledge. Factors affecting these are: Creditability allows companies to market new products with less risk. Manufacturers...

How to "Position and Re-position your Brand" Positioning strategy is about where you compete and how you compete.The brand could be a product, service or organisation.Positioning is normally done for a particular product and only uses two features from the product to analyse its position.It is usually best to rely on positioning approaches when they are part of a broader analysis, which in turn helps to ensure that the whole marketing mix (personal sales, sales promotion, general advertising, public relations and sponsorship) is positioned for competitive advantage. A positioning strategy has two components. The first is to know who you are targeting and the second is to differentiate the brand. The positioning statement has a creative platform that can project its image, such as the Outsurance statement "You always get something out" Once you have done some market research you may find that you need to reposition the brand because of;1. the target market is too small, declining or too competitive.2. the quality and features of the brand have no appeal.3. product costs are too high. There are several re-positioning optionsIntroduce New BrandA new brand could be a fighter brand (cheap clone to maintain a foothold in the mass market) such as a new shampoo or it may even be more specialised like a scientific instrument with slightly less features but targets a new segment that only needs the basic instrument. A new brand could be an update of the old one with new features and sold with a new name...

The company should try is to create a sustainable competitive advantage (SCA) in the market in which it competes. An SCA is a perceived difference that leads customers to prefer one offering to another. Why do people prefer Coca-Cola to Pepsi?The difference may be based on a superior product such as Nokia or better service support such as Toyota or lower price such as Game.When you can create an SCA, it creates a higher market share and develops a barrier for entry for new competitors and the ability to defend attacks from existing ones. For a sustainable competitive advantage there are four criteria's:1) Customer benefits - the offering must be seen as something important to them2) Unique - cannot be obtainable from any other firm3) Sustainable - Difficult to copy - patents, - economies of scale - the more you produce the cheaper it becomes4) Profitable - to offer a product or service with a price, cost and volume structure that makes it profitable - customers must be willing to pay for your profit. Searching for differential advantage begins with understanding what the customer values. The customer value is the perceived total satisfaction from the offering minus the price paid, minus the operating costs incurred over the life of the product/service. It is a mixture of economic, rational and subjective image factors.The factors that increase value and therefore a sustainable competitive advantage are product, service, personal, image and cost. Product DriversThe physical product can be differentiated by design to make it appear better or...

The core idea of the customer-led company is to focus on needs and not products. The central idea of marketing is that customers want to meet a need or solve a problem and not to buy a product. The concept and why the different mindsetWhat is your operation now - Questions to ask yourselfDo you manufacture products and supply a service to a target market?Do you supply a variety of products?Do you sell your services so your clients buy from you?Once your client gives you a job, do you work for that job? “Selling tries to get the customer to want what the company has”The whole focus is job/product orientated you only work on the job without asking about the customer needs. For example, you are manufacturing an automotive part and the client needs 100 units within 3 days. The order is large and you have to assign a whole line to fulfil the order which you regularly do because he is an important client. A customer-led company would spend a bit of time to ascertain the client specific need and find out that he requires 20 units a day to fulfil his overseas orders. With a bit of research, the company could introduce a "Just in Time" order programme that would provide a solution to everyone's needs. Businesses that are good at satisfying customer needs can grow and satisfy all concernedShareholders - value in the company Managers - pro-active instead of reactiveCustomers - satisfactionEmployees - securityCreditors - high credit rating...