A. The Marketing Mix and Target Marketing

What is MARKETING?
There are many definitions of Marketing, but I like the following:

Marketing is the management process responsible for identifying, anticipating, and satisfying customer’s requirements profitably. – Chartered Institute of Marketing in the UK

Simply put, Marketing deals with some basic ideas –

a)   What do people want, and can we make one?

b)   Can we make one that will sell at a price that is both attractive to customers and profitable for us? 

c)  Can we use advertising, personal sales, and other promotions to help us sell our product, even if it is higher priced than competitors? 

d)  Are there channels of distribution (places we can offer our product for sale to customers) that will help us get our product to customers cheaper or more efficiently than competitors?

In essence, Marketing is THE primary function in a business.  Without a product to sell (or a service to offer), what is the business about?  No business survives solely because it has a great accounting or finance department!  All other functions in the business SUPPORT the marketing effort; to lose focus on this is to begin to fail.  That’s why I looked at your Mission Statements for a clear picture of what you are selling in the business.  Without that, you aren’t in business.

The Marketing Mix
When we looked at the development of a Business Plan, we discussed how a Marketing Plan, as a component of the overall Business Plan, is a key element.  The Marketing Plan must cover four main areas – often referred to as the “Marketing Mix”. 

These are:

·         PRODUCT (or service)

·         PRICE

·         PROMOTION

·         PLACE (distribution

 In the lessons to follow this week we will go into detail in each of these areas, and we will see how they “mix” or interact with each other. 

Target Marketing
First, however, is a crucial concept in Marketing:  Target Marketing.    Through proper use of Target Marketing we will be able to identify customers most likely to want our product or service, and then tailor the Marketing Mix to focus on this group.   The following article on Target Marketing was written by Stephen Hutchens of Creighton University in 1998.

Target Marketing

First you segment a market.
Then you target one or more segments.

In performing market segmentation you identify the major groups you face in the environment, defining them in terms of criteria that are pertinent to our organization. You can then identify a segment of customers that will be your Target Market.

Philip Kotler, a marketing guru, defines a target market as a well-defined set of customers whose needs the organization plans to satisfy. He suggests that the target market may be the total focus of the organization or it may be viewed as only a starting point for later expansion to other market segments. The point is, he recognizes that there are many groups and you probably won't target them all.

After you've identified all of the groups you face, you evaluate each group in terms of:

• 1) How important the group is to accomplishment of your organizations objective(s); and
• 2) How likely is it that you can satisfy the individuals in the group given the resources you have available (program, human, financial, etc.).

The culmination of this exercise is to emerge with a Target Market identified.  You are then ready to begin developing the strategies and tactics that mold the Marketing Mix into a viable Marketing Plan.

In your Mission Statements most of you identified your Target Markets.   I read sentences like: “all glass artists in the Seattle area”, “young, fashion-forward trend setters”, “girls at the edge of becoming women”, and “young outdoor enthusiasts”.  This is an important first step in Marketing because, as the old saying goes, “you can please all of the people some of the time, or some of the people all of the time, but you can’t please all of the people all of the time”.  (Well, I think they were talking about “fooling” people, but you get the idea.)

In our Marketing focus we want to please some of the people all of the time, and we do so by tailoring the Marketing Mix to focus on that group.

                                            Back to Top.