How Online Media Will Change Marketing Strategies

Is the world of marketing changing? The advent of online marketing has adjusted the basic assumptions of marketing and the way in which companies reach potential customers. A longitudinal study by Valos, et. al. (2010) looks at the perceptions of 40 senior marketing executives and attempts to understand how things have evolved. The study provides implications for future marketing strategies.

No doubt the Internet has changed the very way in which people obtain information from their environment and how they make choices between different types of products. Each purchase is based upon a range factors that includes social impression, product understanding, ease of purchase, information attainment, benefits vs. costs, and consumer personality.  

The Internet has become a new catalyst in putting these factors together in a way that leads to positive purchase decisions. Today’s advertisers are moving away from mass marketing approaches and seeking to be more exact with their marketing dollars to increase conversion rates. 

Why spend a fortune canvassing a large market when you can focus on those customers most likely to purchase? The Internet is offering the ability to customize marketing directly to motivate buyers based upon specific customer profiles. Messages are becoming more focused to appeal to core consumers.

Related research indicates that marketing will become more akin to engineering through database-driven decisions (Peltier, et. al. 2006). As marketing becomes increasingly interactive and able to reach specific subgroups it will require higher levels of analysis and development. 

The way in which companies put together their marketing mix will evolve to maximize emerging technologies. Imagine how a highly motivated market segment may be attracted to specific videos, language, graphics, key words, and displays. The way in which companies develop their marketing mix will naturally have an influence on attracting the selective attention of their most lucrative customers. 

The authors conclude that the increase in niches will make marketing increasingly complex. It will be beneficial to coordinate diverse media, marketing objectives, and marketing metrics. Personalization of marketing will likely grow and emerging technology needs to be incorporated into a company’s marketing mix. As customer touch points increases a greater emphasis is placed on using behavioral data and attitudinal data to fine tune marketing components. Mass marketing that serviced the mass manufacturing systems of the past are likely to become more expensive and be viable for certain types of businesses.

Peltier, J., et. al. (2006). Interactive IMC: The relational-transactional continuum and the synergistic use of customer data. Journal of Advertising Research, 46(2), 21-28.

Valos, et. al. (2010). Practitioner prognostications on the future of online marketing. Journal of Marketing Management, 26 (3/4).

Creating Successful Global Marketing Strategies

Companies moving onto the global scene are conducting business around the world 24/7. Increased trade requires new research to help understand the factors that make the difference.  Research by Akkrawimut, et. al. (2011) of 154 Thailand jewelry exporters helps define what makes some companies successful global marketers. Their strategies can are used to encourage other executives to formulate their own approaches.

 Global marketing strategy is important for reaching those customers most likely to purchase products. It can be defined as the marketing activities a company uses to turn global through standardization and integration (Cavusgil, et. al 2004). Focus shifts from domestic to a dynamic global far-reaching approach. 

Companies cannot engage in global marketing without some capabilities. Teece et. al. (1997) defines these capabilities as the firm’s ability to integrate, build, and reconfigure competencies (internal and external) to address shifting market needs. The company will become more complex and adjustable to address global marketing needs of varying countries. 

Global marketing and company capacities should come with a global marketing strategy. Global marketing strategy can be defined as the role of strategic management in the integration and coordination of marketing activities across international markets (Johansson, 2000). Executives have the intelligence and ability to make good judgment out of truckloads of information contained in each market. 

Of course strategy is not likely to be successful unless there is some experience in its formation and use. Foreign marketplace experience can be conceptualized into knowledge and applied to solve problems and weigh alternative options to achieve long-term objectives (Hsu and Arun, 2008). This formalization process may be seen as applied knowledge where experience and theory work together to create transactional functionality. 

The study found that global marketing strategy and firm survival had an impact on the success of the company. The factors are executive global vision, entrepreneurial culture, technology advancement and competitive relationships. The full extent of these factors is moderated by technology adaptation and international experience. In other words, when companies have a sound global strategy and can create an entrepreneurial culture, adopt enhancing technology and can use international experience they are likely to be more successful.  

Akkrawimut, et. al. (2011). Dynamic global marketing strategy and firm survival: evidence from exporting jewelry businesses in Thailand. International Journal of Business Strategy, 11 (2).  

Cavusgil, S. et. al. (2004). The framework of a global company: A conceptualization and preliminary validation. Industrial Marketing Management,33(8):711-716.

Hsu, Chin-Chun. and Pereira, Arun. 2008. Internationalization and Performance- The Moderating Effects of Organizational Learning. OMEGA International Journal of Management Science, 36(2): 188-205.

Johansson, Johny K. 2000. Global Marketing: foreign entry, local marketing & global management. Boston: Irwin McGraw-Hill Companies Inc.

Teece, David J., G. Pisano and A. Shuen. 1997. Dynamic Capabilities and Strategic Management. Strategic Management Journal, 8(7): 509-533.

Managing the Complex Web of Global Subsidiaries

Global firms often work with a number or partners in order to move their products into multiple markets. Global firms use subsidiaries to help them promote and distribute their products. Research by Homburg, et. al. (2012) seeks to categorize the varying types of firms available on the market to help multinational organizations do a better job at managing across countries, cultures, and markets.  Their research finds five different types of firms that have their own benefits and detractors.

Global firms attempt to maintain competitiveness by using subsidiaries to create effective international reach. These firms are more aligned with regional and local differences in market characteristics. Problems result when global marketing loses a level of efficiency and effectiveness in the development of methods of managing these multiple distribution fingers. 

Drawing from configuration theory of organizations it is possible to use subsidiary archetypes to understand the varying nature of firms.  The majority of marketing researchers have advocated for additional customization but this can create difficulties in global management and in turn impact sales.  Global marketing requires a different way of viewing subsidiary management. 

It is possible that moving beyond subsidiary characteristics to find value-added functions helps to create efficient archetypes. These archetypes enhance the effectiveness of decision-makers to make strategic considerations due to their ability to conceptualize complex information. Knowing how each type of firm can help in the branding and distribution of products is helpful in developing efficiencies.

The research used three steps to categorize firms:

-Conceptual Domains: Value-added scope, influence, and competence are common.

-Core Domain Constructions: Structure, subsidiary size, value-added scope, strategy, strategic influence, strategic competence, strategic importance, etc…

-Cluster Descriptive Variables: Performance, environment, communication, coordination, etc…

In this study they used surveys and random samples of multinational companies across various service sectors. They were able to categorize a variety of different market clusters to help define each type of company. Knowing cluster characteristics should encourage managers to think more strategically about which types of firms they are using and why they are using them for global and regional marketing. They are as follows:

Saturated Administrators:  These are the larger firms that have done well in the beginning of the globalization process. They are moderately effective but maintain name brand and strong purchasing power. They have difficulty effectively making their way into local markets and are relied on by a majority of companies seeking a global presence. 

Universal Champs: These are high performing firms that focus on certain industries in which they can maximize profits. They are seen as effective and seem to do well with high value added products/services.  Due to the nature of the customers they seek wealthier nations where the economic system is stable and maintain purchasing power. 

Important Dependents:  They are strategically important but small. They exist in a number of Asian countries and are relatively passive but have high value-added services. They provide local access to markets other firms may have a hard time reaching. 

Promising Aspirants:  These are small firms that are self-sufficient and work out of an entrepreneurial approach. They are beneficial in terms of their ability to work in fast growing markets that require cognitive flexibility. They offer generally low value-added services but work well in risky markets.

Flexible Implementers:  Small and young clusters. Very few value added activities with low influence and low competence. They move products and services along to local markets with high standardization.

Homburg, C., et.al. (2012) Ensuring international competitiveness: a configurative approach to foreign marketing subsidiaries. Journal of the Academy of Marketing Science, 40 (2).

Successful College Strategies for Marketing to International Students

A paper by Vik Naidoo and Terry Wu in the Journal of Marketing Management seeks to expand the discussion and understanding of college marketing geared toward international students.  Reviewing colleges in the U.S., UK, Australia and New Zealand they have been able to narrow down their understanding to implementation related outcome variables, commitment dimension, strategy, and role factors. The work adds to the body of literature on key concepts related higher education marketing and its success. 

The trend in global educational services appears to be growing. Educational services range from the actual education to textbooks. It also appears to be growing as an export trend making it an industry with huge future potential. Both traditional and non-traditional education has seen increases in exportation of services to full-paying foreign students due to declining governmental budgets.

Due to the changing nature of marketing from domestic to international education, organizations have been implementing new marketing strategies. Failure is associated more with implementation than with the actual strategy. Conceptually, organizations can find a marketing strategy but often fail to take into account details of the environment when implementing such a strategy. 

Like other marketing strategies the failure to align the internal operations within the organization to the marketing promises can create a misalignment between the message and the actuality. This problem can become even more apparent in large traditional universities where large bureaucratic structures with a large swath of competing interests can slow change. It is this large bureaucratic structure that continues to maintain strategies even though they may not be competitive.

The study used the four countries in their analysis as it represents around 45% of all international recruitment. A total of 570 mid level marketing managers were included in the study in order to assess overall strategy.  To be successful organizations must emphasis strategy, role commitment/performance, strategy implementation success, and fit vision with strategic initiatives. There should be an alignment between the strategy, the behaviors that are needed to achieve that strategy and the ability to implement that strategy within the organization’s vision. 

Marketing managers seemed to have difficulty understanding how the implementation of the marketing strategy fit within the overall vision of the organization. There should be a heavy amount of communication about how the marketing managers and their teams fulfill the strategy as well as how this strategy fits within the goals mission. It is an alignment between vision, strategy, role, and action. 

The overall strategy and vision should be well-known among the senior administrative and college leadership in order to ensure that actions are not obstructed by misunderstanding or poor activity alignment. Administrators may be able to encourage the implementation of the strategy through proper systematic adjustments while deans will be responsible for the fulfillment of the strategy when new students arrive. Without a clear understand actions can be wasted and counterproductive. 

The report does not indicate this concept but like in companies, a successful strategy and its implementation make systematic changes throughout the organization. It is not enough to work in silos as this creates haphazard service implementation. Those who make decisions within the organization should be fully aware of the strategy and how it fits within their operations. The alignment of all of the organizations parts creates a more efficient and consistent production that fulfills the needs of students.

Naidoo, V. & Wu, T. (2011). Marketing strategy implementation in higher education: a mixed approach for model development and testing. Journal of marketing Management, 27, (11/12).