Marketing Management 530

Check Your Understanding:

1. A marketing intelligence system is a set of procedures and sources managers use to obtain everyday information about developments in the marketing environment.

2. A trend is direction or sequence of events that has some momentum and durability.

3. Society shapes the beliefs, values, and norms that largely define tastes and preferences.

4. The last step in the marketing research process is to make the decision.

5. Research that is designed to capture cause-and-effect relationships by eliminating competing explanations of observed findings is called experimental research.

6. Marketing decision support system (MDSS) is a coordinated collection of data, systems, tools, and techniques with supporting software and hardware by which an organization gathers and interprets relevant information from business and environment and turns it into a basis for marketing action.

Exercises:

1. What are the steps a company can take to improve the quality of its marketing intelligence?

As mentioned above, Kotler defines a marketing intelligence system as a "set of procedures and sources managers use to obtain everyday information about developments in the marketing environment". (Kotler) This information allows marketing managers, as well as other upper management executive leaders in the company, to determine current indicators or trends in their customers purchasing behavior or patterns (Agresti, 2002). The data that is collected from several sources such as online website analytics, sales quota reports, discussions with customers/suppliers, and trade publication/related printed material, are then put into a single database, which can then be translated to form a product or service that meet the needs/wants of the market as a whole. Thus, in order to improve and quantify the quality of such data in marketing intelligence, Kotler recommends the following steps in marketing strategy. (Kotler, 69)

* Train and motivate the sales force to spot and report new developments. This may include cross-sales and cross-promotional discussions with current and future customers and projects.

* Motivate distributors, retailers, and other intermediaries to pass along important intelligence.

* Network externally. Networking plays an integral role in the development of professional and company goals. By networking with outside businesses, companies can gain better knowledge of new competition and potential threats in the environment altogether.

Companies may also hire external experts such as website and database analytics in order to incentivize upcoming projects for cross-sale and up-sale opportunities, gaining a better understanding of what type of customers are most profitable.

2. The text describes ten megatrends that help shape the consumer landscape. Name these trends.

Marketing intelligence is associated with collecting information from several sources to measure the effectiveness of a company's current marketing programs, and to forecast future trends. (Turkey, 193) In better understanding the customers' needs and wants, "the analyzed data will lead to a new understanding of the current and future situation...[thus placing] an impact on the business [as a whole]: vision, mission, strategy, planning, operations, and decision-making". (Drieman) Thus it is as important to look at several trends in the long term as it is to look at basic trends in consumer behavior. Kotler defines a megatrend as a "large social, economic, political, and technological changes [that] are slow to form...and influence for some time--between seven and ten years or longer". (Kotler) This is better described in the following main trends below.

Macroeconomic trend

1. Centers of economic activity will shift profoundly, not just globally, but also regionally. Not only will global activities shift from an economic standpoint, but global activities will affect regional developments in trends and growth.

2. Public-sector activities will balloon, making productivity gains essential.

3. The consumer landscape will change and expand significantly. The consumer landscape will include offline and online markets (Ebay, Amazon, Craigslist, etc.), making competition tougher for major brick and mortar stores such as shopping malls and outlets.

Social and environmental trends

4. Technologically connectivity will transform the way people live and interact. To add to the previous bullet point, the advent of the internet has allowed any individual to open a store online and manage it remotely, cutting costs significantly.

5. The battlefield for talent will shift. Talent will grow with the increase in online school programs, and online video instructions and tutorials.

6. The role and behavior of big business will come under increasingly sharp scrutiny.

7. Demand for natural resources will grow, as will the strain on the environment. Good examples are the growing market for alternative fuels for gasoline and energy savings products.

Business and industry trends

8. New global industry structures are emerging. This