Many businesses and companies use marketing communication in order to promote their product. Market communication is one way through which companies create information in the market about their products and services; it is the biggest factor that determines either the success or failure of a business entity. JM’s company can therefore not be left out on such an important avenue of making its products known to both existing and potential customers.
Market communication has lots of advantages especially in an industry where there are many players. According to The Chattered Institute of Marketing (2010:1) it provides the target groups with information so as to positively motivate them to purchase the products on offer. Market communication is vital in achieving the company’s sales objectives, without proper market communication the company cannot assume that the customers will discover the products in the market by themselves and expect their number to increase (Trottier, 2009:67). With many players in the market and not having intense market communication, the company will not be able to achieve its sales targets, increase the number of customers, and also establish a portfolio in the market.
Through market communication the company is able to determine the performance of the business in the market and also discover the strategies that work effectively and those that do not. Communication will enable the company to know the size of its customers that occupies the market segment at a given time. Through customers’ response it is possible to tell who buys the products and the reason some will avoid purchasing the product. This, in turn, will help the company in improving the quality of its products to attract more customers (Trottier, 2009: 78). Another important rationale is to retain the existing customers, the company is able to continuously remind and inform its customers about changes and improvements in its goods and services. When more customers are attracted through proper communication, the company will make marginal profits; this means that an increase in the number of customers due to persistent market communications will result in marginal revenues. Market communication has the potential of leading the company into discovering new advantages in the market. These advantages includes but not limited to competitive advantages, new –product areas, helps the company to outline strategies for generating finances for daily functions and also identification of specific customers’ new demands. In the process of product promotion the strategies involved are push, pull, and profile strategies.
There are many alternative products to those of the company; to attract the customers it uses the push strategy; push strategy will help in launching the new product into the market, it is appropriate in the case where the company is going to display the product so as to induce some customers into impulse buying and also because most consumers are aware of the presence of our products in the market. Since a sustained mass advertising is very expensive and inflates cost, the company finds it cheap to use push factor in its market communication plan (Moschis, 1994:17).
The wholesalers who buy direct from the company are given some percentage discount; the wholesalers in turn are encouraged to offer retailers some attractive percentage discounts. In other words push strategies aims at working with intermediaries, the intermediaries are induced to order for the products from the company and then promote and make them available to the final consumers. According to Stegelin (2010: 4) using media interviews, syndications of contents and use of conference speaking will ensure that large audience for the company’s communications is reached at low costs; this may also include having the company representatives attend various relevant conferences in order to establish new contacts and also learn new ideas. The company needs to adopt some short term strategies that are time bound; this can easily be done with push strategy since it lessens the cost.
The pull strategy will involve the use of certain advertisements and promotion of customers. In this case the company will seek to deal directly with the customers (Stegelin, 2010: 2). This is a reversed form of push strategy. Instead of the intermediaries being induced to order for the products and then take them to end users it is the end users who are induced to order from the intermediaries. The customers are stimulated to demand the product in the market; they then go to retailers who in turn go to wholesalers and the wholesalers finally comes to the company to order for the demanded products.
By dealing directly with the customers in some instances, the company will reduce cost on distribution by cutting on discount rates. Through this strategy, the company will also be seeking to ensure that customer satisfaction is met in order to create customer loyalty. Pull strategy will be beneficial to the company in the essence that it allows for communication mix intended to establish customer pull; these may include use of sweepstakes, coupons, gifts, rebates, and rewards.
The company will also focus in engaging all stakeholders plus the affiliates of the support network in order to promote its general goals. In this case the needs of all the stakeholders are put into consideration. For the company to be able to achieve its goals and objectives, the attitude and perceptions of all these stakeholders should be positive towards the company’s products and its ways of operations. The stakeholders have a great potential of contributing to the growth of the company and establishing a well-built relationship with customers hence attracting customer loyalty. The motivations to the company stakeholders may include but not limited to financial benefits, appropriate dividends to shareholders, engaging into corporate social responsibilities and participating in local community activities. Profile strategy is closely related to public relations where the company is concerned with establishing a good image with the public so as to increase trust and attachment amongst the stakeholders and the customers (Moschis, 1994:11). Use of profile strategy will reaffirm the stakeholders that the company is not only concerned with profit making but is also ready to address issues affecting them and also those in the society.
Reference
Moschis, P. (1994) Marketing strategies for the mature market. Greenwood Publishing Group. ISBN 0899308872, 9780899308876
Stegelin, E. (2009) Department of Agricultural and Applied Economics. Marketing – Demand Push or Demand Pull or Both? The University of Georgia.
The Chattered Institute of Marketing. (2010) Marketing Communication [Online]. Web.
Trottier, R. (2009) Middle Market Strategies. How Private Companies Use the Markets to Create Value. John Wiley and Sons. ISBN 0470464577, 9780470464571.