All lecture clips
Lecture clips week one
Misconception of marketing:
- “You don’t need a good marketing strategy if you have a good product.”
- “Marketing is what you do when your product is not good.”
- “The main goal of marketing is manipulating consumers into products they don’t necessarily
need or want.” consumer-centric approach works nowadays the best. This approach
focuses on long-term customer value, this is based on loyalty.
- “Marketing is just advertising/selling.” it is way broader, it also includes research,
packaging, distribution, analytics, strategy etc.
Marketing is the activity, set of institutions, and processes for creating, communicating, delivering,
and exchanging offerings that have value for customers, clients, partners and society at large. Or
marketing is serving customer needs, profitably.
Rule of thumb: most people are not willing to buy most things at most prices. There is no relation on
how good your product is and how much money you are spending on marketing.
To meet consumer needs profitably we have two tools: strategy and tactics. Strategy: overarching
plan to achieve an objective. This part is below the iceberg. Tactics: actions taken to support the
strategy. This part is visible. Tactics and strategy are complementary, both are needed and help to
reach the goal.
Marketing vs entrepreneurial marketing
Entrepreneurial marketing is not about a particular strategy or set of tactics. It is more about the
mindset. This mindset is defined by a focus of innovation, risk taking, and being proactive.
Entrepreneurs change constraints into opportunities, by being more flexible, creative, free thinking,
easier to change, adjust. Next to that entrepreneurs have also less to lose, there is no weight of an
existing brand that makes it hard to change people’s mind. Entrepreneurial marketing can be
integrated into other business functions compared to usual marketing.
Positioning
Positioning is the basis of your marketing strategy. It is about setting a vision for your company.
Positioning is how your product is seen relative to your competition. It is about the unique value of
your product. There are two key terms about positioning: segmentation and differentiation.
Segmentation is about who: what group of consumers / customers are you targeting? And
differentiation is about what: what is your unique value?
Positioning statement
This is a guideline which defines the position of a company.
Segmentation and differentiation are both expressed in this
,statement. On the right you can see the template for a proposition statement. Reasons to believe
can be:
- Medals, labels, awards
- Invented or real expertise
- Quantifiable information
- Origins
- History / legacy
- Company ethos
Having a reason to believe is smart (think of the copy machine experiment).
The brain rejects complex, confusing and contradictory information. That is why your positioning
should be narrow, simple, and consistent.
Segmentation
Segmentation is the dividing of a group of people which have the same buying patterns, needs and
desires. You should look for cohesive and distinct groups. You want to maximize the similarity within
a group, because the responses to marketing actions will then also be almost the same. We segment
because satisfying needs “on average” satisfies the needs of no one. Segmentation increases
efficiency of marketing and responsiveness of customers. Lastly, products can be sold differently to
different people (pregnancy test example). The goal of segmentation is to see your customer clearly,
so we can make a customer profile.
Bases for segmentation
- Geographic: nations, states, regions, cities. This is a quite weak base.
- Demographic: age, gender, race, family size, income, education. This is not a good base.
- Psychographic: lifestyle, personality, needs. This is a good way.
- Behavioural: user status (nonuser, potential, first-time, regular user), user rate, loyalty status,
occasions (regular vs special occasion), benefits (quality, service, economy, speed)
(toothpaste for cavity or whiteness for example). This is a good way.
Psychographic segmentation: personality, VALS and Big 5
VALS stands for values and lifestyle. This is a quiz or survey to get an idea of the values and lifestyle
of people to put them into boxes. The outcome of the survey is put in a framework as on the left. You
can also segment with the Big 5 method. These are five traits that make up someone’s behaviour.
,Segmentation: A Caveat
Be aware that the buyer may not be the user. Next to buyers and users, you have more roles:
initiator and decider as well. There is only one buyer and multiple users. As a company you should
focus on the users. Buyers and users have conflicting interests for example buying food for your
children.
Best practices for segmentation
- You should describe people the way they would describe themselves. Such as “women
between the age of 18 and 25” is too vague and you also don’t like to be described this way.
- Will the segment actually buy your product? Do they actually find value in it?
- Is the segment big enough to be profitable? And small enough to be cohesive?
- Can you reach your segment?
Self-selection
You want to be able that your customers tell you which segment they are in, for
example a student or staff page or the example here on the right which a picture of
self-selecting for the use of a certain lamp.
Differentiation
Differentiation is all about: What is unique about my product as perceived by the customer? There
are two approaches to differentiation. Vertical differentiation is competing directly with competitors:
More/better/smaller/cheaper/faster. As an entrepreneur you don’t want to differentiate on this
level. Horizontal differentiation is finding a different angle (offering different attributes, selling to
different segment etc). This is typically not associated with quality or price. The key is to achieve a
sustainable value proposition and competitive advantage.
Creating sustainable competitive advantage
Earlier, we thought that we could only obtain a competitive advantage with upstream activities.
Sustainable competitive advantage isn’t found inside your company, it is all about the relationship
that you have with your customers and the value that you create for them (Coca Cola example), so
achieving a sustainable competitive advantage can be done through downstream activities.
Be aware that in the image above, innovation is stated at both up- and downstream activities.
Tips to create this advantage are: listen to your customers (testing and research), choose your
competition (who you are associated with is who you are), choose your criteria (horizontal
differentiation).
, Lecture clips week 2
2.1 Customer value
Customer value = total benefits – total costs. A customer will buy your product when the benefits
outweigh the costs. Costs can be money but also effort and time etc. Benefits can be economic value
(also called price value), functional value (also called performance value) and psychological value etc.
Benefits differ between consumers. Understanding consumer value helps you identify market
opportunities and helps to set a price.
Functional/economic value are the base of the pyramid. This is the base of the company, but this
doesn’t lead to sustainable competitive advantage. These aren’t going to lead to success.
Psychological value does.
Brands that have more of these attributes have more loyal customers and faster revenue growth.
Companies that score high on emotional elements do better than companies that only do well on
functional events. But you need to nail the functional elements before moving on. The best
combination of attributes depends on the industry.
B2B vs B2C elements article. The picture below shows us the elements of value for B2B-
businesses.
2.2 Psychological value
Abraham Maslow is the godfather of motivation. He studied humanistic psychology, this is a study of
the human mind that emphasized positive deviations from the norm human flourishing. There is a
hierarchy of needs, where human needs are categorized. These needs can be split into two types of
needs: growth needs and deficiency needs.
Deficiency needs