Basic Marketing knowledge from AZ for newbies

What is Marketing? Marketing is such a broad definition that most famous authors try to encapsulate it in a few words. Regardless of the form of the description, people try to explain it according to the understanding of the operating context of the business. Let's clarify the most general picture of marketing knowledge for beginners:

What is Marketing Knowledge?

Follow concept by Philip Kotler - an American professor who is considered the "father" of marketing, define about marketing is understood as:

“Marketing Knowledge” is the journey that individuals or groups have been total what they need and would like through the progress create, offer, and freely exchange the value of products and services”

So exactlyWhat is Marketing? Understand in a way that is easy to understandMarketing is marketing and advertising aimed at response customer needs and value creation for personal, enterprise.

This is considered as an extremely popular form of social management to connect and exchange between enterprise and customers, value building and correlation firmly with customers in order to make a profit for enterprise.

The most basic marketing knowledge

1. The transformation of Marketing

From tradition to modernity Marketing also develops according to the formation and development of mankind. Thus, the concept of traditional marketing and modern marketing was formed.

With the traditional concept of marketing, it is a form of passive marketing with the method of "natural scent". Marketing plays the role of a solution to sell out what a business has, and a commodity solution is on top. The business focuses on production. The selling philosophy is formed in the minds of marketers, that is, "sell all you have", handle inventory and maximize profits for the business.

With a modern concept, marketing is an active form of marketing with the method of "good news and rumors". At this time, marketing plays the role of a bridge between customers and businesses. Instead of selling what's available to the business, marketing goes to focus on the market, focus on customers, satisfy needs, wants and provide solutions to solve customers' pain. Since then, Enterprises become more sensitive, flexible and dynamic to the market

So instead of selling what they have, the business turns to selling what customers need, thereby exploiting the market needs to the fullest, bringing profits to the business. In the old days, you would hear words like Marketing is a skillful art of wriggling through competitors to bring products to consumers. But today, marketing is not an art but it is a science, full of formulas, strategies, planning, analysis, research to come up with processes and solutions to satisfy the desires of customers. market.

2. Marketing knowledge concepts

Over 100 years of establishment and development, the content of marketing has changed a lot. Below, the author introduces some basic marketing concepts popularized by organizations, associations and marketing researchers as follows:

“Marketing is the process of organizing and managing the entire business activity, from discovering and transforming consumer purchasing power into actual demand for a particular item, to producing and delivering the product to customers. end consumer. To ensure that the company earns the expected profit” (British Marketing Institute)

“Marketing is a system of business activities designed to plan, price, promote, and distribute products and services that satisfy the wants of target markets in order to achieve organizational goals” (Fundamental of Marketing). )

“Marketing is a human activity directed at meeting consumer needs and wants through exchange process” (Philip Kotler).

Marketing is not only an individual activity but it is a whole process, a collection of activities from the 4P, 7P, 4C model. The combination of such a series of activities is called the marketing mix. Marketing today develops strongly in many fields: industrial marketing, commercial marketing, tourism marketing, service marketing, non-business marketing (political, cultural, social, medical).

3. Factors affecting marketing knowledge activities

The marketing environment creates opportunities, challenges and threats to the business. Environmental research will help businesses determine the right direction when making decisions and forecasting market development trends. Marketing environment includes: Macro environment (demographic, economic, natural, technological, political - legal, socio-cultural), Micro environment (Enterprise, suppliers, parties) intermediaries, customers, competitors). The internal and external environment will create a company's weakness or strength. Therefore, environmental analysis will help managers identify their strengths and weaknesses in the market. The environmental analysis method is called SWOT.

Customer behavior - Researching customer behavior is an indispensable requirement of every business and individual marketer. You must have a deep understanding of customer behavior, customer persona and the factors that influence their purchasing decisions. After drawing customer portraits, businesses must study their behavior through basic forms: complex buying behavior, compromising buying behavior, habitual buying behavior, multiple choice buying behavior . Customers make purchasing decisions according to the diagram: Need recognition - Information search - Evaluation of options - Buying decision - Post-purchase behavior.

Information systems and marketing knowledge research – To evaluate the health of enterprises and marketing activities, not using perception but measuring by value system. Value systems are customized to how the business is setting itself apart from the competition.

To have a successful marketing program, marketers must have a step in market research, business analysis, competitor analysis... The more thorough the research and information system analysis step, the better your marketing program will be. achieve the most optimal performance.

Information system based on: Internal reports, industry reports, reports of third parties, data banks, marketing intelligence, surveys... Marketing research is a research step based on an information system Collected information to make marketing strategies. The purpose of the research is to understand customers, understand competitors, understand the impact of the environment on the business, understand the strengths and weaknesses of the business.

Market Segmentation, Market Selection, Targeting and Market Positioning is that you divide a heterogeneous market into homogeneous market segments to highlight differences in needs, characteristics and behaviors. Market positioning is a consistent product design that is pinned in the mind of the customer. The market is the sum total of many different objects and the capacity of the business is limited, so you must divide that market into different groups, sharing some common buying characteristics. Your business can choose multiple “hit at once” segments with a “divide and conquer” strategy, or your business focuses on the strongest segment you can supply, after this segment you have occupied. After running out of market share, you continue to duplicate the model to hit the next segment.

Sharing is easy, but positioning is difficult, how to make customers remember you and feel your products. According to the rule of leadership, customers can only remember up to 3 brands for a product type, for example instant noodles: Hao Hao, miliket, kokomi... or washing powder: Omo, Arie, For people... are difficult to brand. the fourth brand in the mind of the consumer. Therefore, the battle of marketing knowledge is essentially a battle to position the product in the mind of the customer. In addition to putting the business philosophy into the product, you must be consistent from the principles, images, processes, employees, services, channels, etc., all of which speak to your positioning. According to the author's point of view, the positioning that wants to win must find the unique value that only you can bring to customers, position the difference of the product to pin it for a long time and deepen it. easy in the mind of the consumer.

4. Marketing decisions

Decisions about products, products are the packaging of the values that businesses want to give to customers. It contains the full value system that customers want, products that satisfy customers' attention, acceptance, and loyalty. Decide on product features (Benefits, functions, characteristics, personality), decide on product brand, decide on product packaging, decide on product category.

Price decision: is the sketch of a price chart that fluctuates from price floor to ceiling price. This is a volatile process, so the price structure will change over the product life cycle, over time and according to the distribution object. Pricing methods: Cost-based pricing, customer-based pricing, competition-based pricing, time-based pricing, closed-bid pricing.

Typical types of pricing strategies include: Product portfolio pricing strategy, product category pricing strategy, additional product pricing strategy, and product pricing strategy. , discount pricing strategy, differentiated pricing strategy, regional pricing strategy, promotional pricing strategy, competitor pricing strategy...

Deciding on distribution channels: In the marketing mix, the distribution system must consider many factors such as: distribution objectives. market characteristics, product life cycle, competitiveness, and financial viability. Distribution channels include: Distribution channel for consumer products (Channel 0 level is manufacturer - user, channel 1 level from manufacturer - retailer - user, channel 2 level from manufacturer - seller) wholesaler - retailer - user, 3-level channel from manufacturer - agent - wholesaler - retailer - user), service distribution channel, franchise channel, multi-level selling...

Communication Decision: A group of marketing mix tools that communicate about products and businesses. This is the stage to create trust, convince and motivate them to buy. Communication channels include: Advertising (Any form of appearance that businesses have to pay for such as: Newspapers, magazines, internet, television, radio, billboards, direct mail, email, etc.) mobile, event, sponsorship, charity...), Promotion (sample, coupon, general package, gift, trial, free, subsidy, conference, exhibition, fair, meetings contest), Direct Selling or Personal Selling, Direct Marketing, Online Marketing.

5. Planning, Organizing and Controlling Marketing

The marketing management process is a process of analyzing marketing opportunities, researching and selecting markets, planning marketing programs, and organizing, implementing, and controlling marketing efforts.

The plan will include: Objectives, general situation assessment, strengths and weaknesses, problem analysis, action plan (Including what activities, time, place, measurement), estimated budget , implementing personnel (who is in charge, personnel to be included, list of implementation partners, reporting mode).

Key word: