Download the marketing department

UNIT 10: MARKETING, COMPETITION AND
THE CUSTOMER
THE MARKETING DEPARTMENT
STRUCTURE OF A TYPICAL MARKETING DEPARTMENT
The bigger the company, the more people will be employed in the Marketing department
SALES DEPARTMENT is responsible for the sales or the product
MARKET RESEARCH DEPARTMENT is responsible for finding out customers’ needs, market
changes and the impact of competitors’ actions
PROMOTION DEPARTMENT deals with organizing the advertising for products
DISTRIBUTION DEPARTMENT transports the products to the market
THE ROLE OF MARKETING
 Identify customer needs (what kind of products or services they want, the prices they
want to pay, after- sales service
 Satisfy customer needs (to achieve sales of their goods or services)
 Maintain customer loyalty (building customer relationships)
 Gain information about customers (to meet their changing needs and to establish long
term relationship with them
 Anticipate changes in customer needs (by identifying new trends in customer demand
or gaps in the market so the business can produce goods and services that are not
available at the time
BUSINESS SHOULD MEET ONE OR MORE OF THE FOLLOWING OBJECTIVES:
 Raise customer awareness of a product or service of the business
 Increase sales revenue and profitability
 Increase or maintain market share
Market share is the percentage of total market sales held by one brand or business
UNDERSTANDING MARKET CHANGES
Why customer/ consumer spending patterns change
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Consumer tastes and fashions change
Changes in technology
Change in incomes
Ageing populations
Why have some markets become more competitive?
 Globalization of markets has meant that products are increasingly sold all over the world
 It is now easier to get products from one part of the world to another part of the world
 Internet is a way to connect well with and promote to customer
How can businesses respond to changing spending patterns and increased competition?
 Maintain good customer relationship
 Keep improving its existing product
 Bring out new products to keep customers’ interest
 Keep cost low to maintain competitiveness
Mass market is where there is a very large number of sales of a product
Advantages:
 The sales to these markets are very large
 The firm can benefit from economies of scale
 Risks can be spread
 Opportunities for growth of the business due to large potential sales
Disadvantages:
 High levels of competition between firms
 High costs of advertising
SUSIE
IGCSE1
Niche market is a small, usually specialized, segment of a much larger market
Advantages:
 Small firms are able to sell to niche markets as large firms may not have identified
them but concentrated on the mass markets instead
 The needs of consumers can be focused on and therefore targeted by the firm in a
niche market
Disadvantages:
 Niche markets are small and therefore have a limited number of sales, which means
only small business can operate in these markets
 Often businesses in a niche market will specialize in just one product
Market segment is an identifiable sub- group of a whole market in which consumers have
similar characteristics or preferences
Segmenting a market can help a business to:
 Make marketing expenditure cost effective by producing a product which closely
meets the needs of these customers and only targeting its marketing efforts on this
segment
 Enjoy higher sales and profits for the business, because of cost- effective marketing
 Identify a market segment which is not having its needs fully met, and therefore
offer opportunities to increase sales
Ways of segmenting a market
 By socio- economic group
 By age
 By region/ location
 By gender
 By use of product
 By lifestyle