The answer is simple, they need to let the potential market
know about their product or service, its features and later on develop a
relationship with those customers to create loyalty and retention.
But what is marketing anyway? There are a lot of
misconceptions about what marketing is, the most common answer are: “to sell a
product”, “creating ads” or “the ways a company get the word out”; actually all
these answers are only a part of what marketing is.
Marketing is the process of creating value for customers and building strong relationships to capture value from customers in return.
Marketing encompasses a mix of variables a.k.a. marketing
mix:
Product (or service): the solution to the customer need and
want
Place: where the product or service is available for the
customer, nowadays could be either online or offline.
Price: how much the customer will pay for your product
or service
Promotion: the way you communicate with your customers to
let them know about you and your offering. Do not get confused with sales
incentives also called sometimes “promotions”.
Usually companies do very well in planning and organizing
the first 3 p’s mentioned above: Product, Place and Price; sometimes they don’t even realize these might be considered
part of marketing, and in some cases they might even be performed by other
departments such as finance, logistics or product development.
For many organizations, especially small and medium
companies, the difficult part is to plan and strategize the fourth P:
Promotion. Usually, managers are so focus on the product or service that little or no time is allocated to strategize carefully the communication with their
potential and current customers.
Think about your own company and respond the following questions.
- Has a proper value proposition been defined?
- Does your value proposition reflect only the functional benefit of your product or service? or have you included emotional, and social benefits that your product offer?
- Does your brand align with your value proposition?
- Do you have a solid brand identity and personality?
- Do your promotion material: website, brochures, ads, public relations, etc. reflect your brand identity and most importantly your value proposition?
- Do your advertising plan aligns with your target audience in terms or type of media, timing and creative concept?
If you answer was yes to all the questions you are ahead of
the curve, your business is more likely to succeed. If your answer was no to
many of these questions it is time to step back and strategize how you want to
reach your audience, how you want to be remembered and/or identified.
Nowadays with the increasing competition, you must be well
equipped to gain the battle and win more customers and more importantly make
them come back. That is marketing!.
So why do companies
need marketing? To capture value from their customers in the form of revenue, loyalty or preference. In short, to be able to survive in this competitive market.
