The authors of the text expect that the student has had a principles of marketing class and is familiar with the basic concepts of marketing. In this slide we are providing a rough overview of the discipline of marketing. The value chain will be expanded in the next few slides.
This shift in marketing has created organizations that are more customer focused than in past decades. This new focus could do away with a conflict that happens in corporations today which is highlighted in the picture. One department thinks it has a great idea but the marketing department knows it is a bad idea. Because the marketing department was not involved with the decision the company has invested a great deal of resources pursuing an idea that cannot be implemented.
Companies use the marketing mix to create value for customers. As a general rule, value, as perceived by the customer, can be increased in two basic ways. Markets can offer customers an improved bundle of benefits or lower prices (or both!). Marketers may strive to improve the product itself, to design new channels of distribution, to create better communications strategies, or a combination of all three. Marketers may also seek to increase value by finding ways to cut costs and prices. Non-monetary costs are also a factor, and marketers may be able to decrease the time and effort that customers must expend to learn about or seek out the product. If a company is able to offer a combination of superior product, distribution, or promotion benefits and lower prices than the competition, it enjoys an extremely advantageous position. The next slide illustrates the value chain.
This slide illustrates how all employees, at all levels, and in all departments have the opportunity to be involved in marketing.
Achieving competitive advantage in a global industry requires executives and managers to maintain a well-defined strategic focus.
Based in Atlanta, Georgia, Southern Company is the largest producer of electricity in the United States. In response to the globalization of the power industry, its Southern Energy subsidiary is actively acquiring power companies in both Asia and Europe.
The discipline of marketing is universal. It is natural, however, that marketing practices will vary from country to country, for the simple reason that the countries and peoples of the world are different. These differences mean that a marketing approach that has proven successful in one country will not necessarily succeed in another country. Customer preferences, competitors, channels of distribution, and communication media may differ. An important task in global marketing is learning to recognize the extent to which marketing plans and programs can be extended worldwide, as well as the extent to which they must be adapted.
This slide highlights the differences between marketing in a single-country and global marketing. The tabnotes are from the text. Global market participation is the extent to which a company has operations in major world markets. Standardization versus adaptation is the extent to which each marketing mix element can be standardized (i.e., executed the same way) or adapted (i.e., executed in different ways) in various country markets. GMS has three additional dimensions that pertain to marketing management. First, concentration of marketing activities is the extent to which activities related to the marketing mix (e.g., promotional campaigns or pricing decisions) are performed in one or a few country locations. Coordination of marketing activities refers to the extent to which
marketing activities related to the marketing mix are planned and executed interdependently around the globe. Finally, integration of competitive moves is the extent to which a firm’s competitive marketing tactics in different parts of the world are interdependent. The GMS should be designed to enhance the firm’s performance on a worldwide basis.
Coca-Cola’s example of global branding.
Ethnocentrism is sometimes associated with attitudes of national arrogance or assumptions of national superiority.
Company personnel with an ethnocentric orientation see only similarities in markets, and assume that products and practices that succeed in the home country will be successful anywhere.
The term polycentric describes management’s belief or assumption that each country in which a company
does business is unique. This assumption lays the groundwork for each subsidiary to develop its own unique business and marketing strategies in order to succeed; the term multinational company is often used to describe such a structure.
In a company with a regiocentric orientation, a region becomes the relevant geographic unit; management’s goal is to develop an integrated regional strategy.
A company with a geocentric orientation views the entire world as a potential market and strives to develop integrated world market strategies.
The next slide will show the interplay between the driving and restraining forces. This slide outlines what these forces include.
Regional economic agreements, converging market needs and wants, technology advances, pressure to cut costs, pressure to improve quality, improvements in communication and transportation technology, global economic growth, and opportunities for leverage all represent important driving forces; any industry subject to these forces is a candidate for globalization.
Despite the impact of the driving forces identified previously, several restraining forces may slow a company’s efforts to engage in global marketing. In addition to the market differences discussed earlier, important restraining forces include management myopia, organizational culture, national controls, and opposition to globalization. As