Marketing in business is a crucial factor for the success of a business. Marketing bridges the distance and connects customers and organisations. Marketing not only helps a company to sell its products/services and increase sales but also helps in maintaining a healthy everlasting relationship with its customers.
Before we explore more about marketing and understand its types and strategies let us know where marketing takes place. For marketing, we need a platform and that platform is known as the market.
WHAT IS A MARKET?
A place where two parties (producer and consumer) meet to exchange. Producers exchange products, services or communication for money or information. EX: A farmer (producer) sells his crops in exchange for money to the customer.
MARKETING IN BUSINESS
Dr.Philip Kotler, affectionately known as the “Father of Modern Marketing,” defines marketing as “the science and art of exploring, creating and delivering value to satisfy the needs of a target market at a profit.” Marketing identifies unfulfilled needs and desires. It defines measures and quantifies the size of the identified market and the profit potential.
To put things in a simpler manner marketing can be defined as “promotion of a brand/product/service to earn economic benefits or to achieve growth in a company. Demand in a market gives rise to marketing. Need for a product/service encourages companies/entrepreneurs to develop a product/service and meet the demand within the stipulated time. Time is a crucial factor in business because of the demands/needs of people change with time and place. EX: Demand for an automobile increases it creates demand for plastic components, tires, casting and this in return creates demand and growth of rubbers, plastics and forging industries.
TYPES OF MARKETING IN BUSINESS
There are two types of marketing In business
a) Inbound marketing – Measurable medium
b) Outbound marketing – Non-measurable medium
We will focus only on outbound marketing in this blog.
1. GUERRILLA MARKETING
The term guerrilla marketing was popularized by Jay Conrad Levinson in 1984 in the book “Guerrilla Marketing” Guerrilla marketing is a technique where marketing is done in open places like parks, beaches, shopping centre etc. It also involves very little expense when compared to other marketing techniques. People play a vital role in guerrilla marketing because when there are banners, posters, paintings, graffiti etc. in public places these things attract people towards them, and when people find attractive things like these, the message easily passes from mouth to mouth.
2. DIGITAL MARKETING (INBOUND MARKETING)
These days with rapid change in technology the use of internet in the field of marketing is ubiquitous. Social media sites like Facebook, Instagram etc. aid managers and entrepreneurs to market their products/services to a larger audience within a short period. Marketing done on digital platforms is called as digital marketing. It includes mobile phones, display advertising, electronic hoardings etc. Digital marketing can make use of the internet if required but can be also done offline.
Digital marketing has become quite prevalent with rapid developments in technology. Digital marketing attracts a lot of customers because maximum people have access to digital services and devices. A product/service can be easily promoted and with digitalization and easy access to online services people can watch a video or an ad on their devices during leisure.
3. GREEN MARKETING
Green Marketing is need of the hour today, with environmental challenges that we are facing it has become a difficult task to maintain balance in nature.
Marketing focused on selling products/services to protect the environment and maintain ecological balance is called as green marketing. Green marketing produces goods considering various environmental factors. Green marketing uses recycled products to manufacture goods. Green marketing does not use toxic products. Green marketing promotes the use of renewable sources. A good example of green marketing is the use of paper bags instead of plastic bags by McDonald.
STRATEGIES IN MARKETING
1. PRICING STRATEGIES IN BUSINESS
A business can adopt a variety of pricing strategies to sell their product or service. A business usually tries to maximize the profit on each product or service that is sold. The right pricing strategy might also help a business to prevent loss in sales whenever a new business/ product enters the market. Every business needs to adopt a flexible pricing system because with the level of competition the price of a product or service may increase or decrease.
Customer care about the price of a product because if the same product is available in vicinity at a lower price than the business may find it difficult to maintain its customer base hence a product or service must be sold at the right price considering all these factors.
2. COMMUNICATION METHODOLOGIES IN BUSINESS
Communication methodologies help a business to grow when utilized properly. It also helps to keep the focus on the target audience. There are various communication methodologies such as print media which include radio, television advertising, public advertising and online advertising. Using the above resources may help a business to reach its target and the audience. A business needs to research the target audience and conduct surveys to understand its customer needs and what encourages them to buy a product.
3. PROMOTION IN MARKETING
Promotion in marketing refers to the communication strategies used to persuade target audiences of relative merits of a product service or brand. The promotion aims to increase awareness to generate sales and create brand loyalty.
4. MEASURING RESULTS
Measuring performance is an important strategy to know what when where the business needs to focus more and improve.
A few key points in measuring results:
- RETURN ON INVESTMENT: Return on investment measures the sales revenue of the campaign brings on every rupee spent. Example: Ravi spent 10,000 rupees on a campaign that generate 50,000 rupees in sales the return of investment is 40,000 rupees or 400%.
- COST PER WIN (SALES): Cost per win measures the expense of each sale. EX: Ravi did a campaign and it resulted in 4 sales with a budget of rupees 2000, that is rupees 500 per sale. It is an important metric that compares the campaigns to each other.
- COST PER LEAD: Cost per lead measures the cost-effectiveness of marketing campaigns. EX: let us say five sales resulted from ten leads with a budget of rupees 1000 that is a cost of rupees 100 per lead.
Marketing is important for businesses. Marketing plays a crucial role in determining the sales and success of a business. Using latest marketing techniques like social media marketing, email marketing, marketing through online ads etc… will help a business to compete with its competitors and identify its target audience easily.
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