 Hi, welcome. My name is Dr. Marcy Stone, and this is Unit 1 on marketing planning process for your strategic marketing course. Here is your course layout. So in this course, we have six units. We have Unit 1, which is the marketing planning process, which this presentation is going to be about. And then we have Unit 2 on marketing research, Unit 3 is on consumer behavior, Unit 4 is on brand strategy, and then we have marketing communications. Here are the learning outcomes for Unit 1. So we have explained the importance of marketing, of the marketing planning process for a marketer. Relate the environmental analysis methods of SWAT and PESTL to the marketing planning process. Apply the four P's of marketing. Relate segmentation, targeting, positioning, and differentiating to marketing for specific groups. And then apply the concepts of ethics and social responsibility. So why are learning outcomes important? So each of the learning outcomes ties back to the course materials and content. They're also tied into all of the assessment questions and then also in the test preparation part of your course. Here are the Unit 1 overview topics for this presentation. So we have the marketing planning process. We're going to be looking at SWAT and PESTL. We have the four P's of marketing. We have segmentation, targeting, positioning, and differentiation. And then we have ethics and social responsibility. Here is the list of the marketing planning process vocabulary. And we will be talking about each of these in the presentation. Okay, so first we have the marketing planning process. So a good marketing strategy begins with a solid plan. Nothing can be completed until a strategic marketing plan is put into place. It's important to take the time upfront to develop a solid plan before beginning to work on the marketing planning process. So a marketing strategy also includes goals from a corporate strategic plan. It's important that these goals are aligned with the company and the marketing planning process. The marketing planning process includes several steps. And depending on the organization and the strategic plan, these steps may change and be more or less elaborate. The basic steps of the marketing planning process include developing a strategic plan, listing what resources are needed to complete the plan, and an emphasis on how goals of the plan are aligned with the overall organization. So when you're developing the marketing planning process, it's important to consider the potential for future growth and sales. So a strategic marketing plan will give you the focus that you need and the steps about how you should move forward. Okay, now we have the environmental analysis methods of SWAT and PESTL. To begin developing the strategic plan, you have to consider the strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threats or SWAT. When each of these steps are considered, so they will help you to develop and then think through the entire marketing process. By reviewing strengths and weaknesses of a product or a service, you can better understand how to market a specific product. A thorough SWAT analysis gives you an overall picture of the product and marketing plan. By making a list of potential opportunities, you may be able to see various ways to market a product. And by reviewing potential threats, you are setting yourself up to adjust or accommodate for those threats in the marketing. Another method to consider when you begin to develop your marketing is the PESTL analysis. PESTL stands for political, economic, social, technological, legal and environmental. So by reviewing each of these areas and how it relates to your product, you will not only better understand your market or service or product, but you will be prepared for any issues that might arise during the process of putting together your marketing plan. This type of analysis will help to identify environmental issues that may arise and need to be considered. Then we have the four Ps of marketing. These are probably things you have heard about for quite a while, but we're going to review them here anyway. So we have product, promotion, place and price and these are the four Ps of marketing. And there's a reason that marketing has focused on the four Ps for decades. So these four areas are a thorough way to consider what marketing might be needed for your product or service. By understanding and utilizing each of the four Ps, you are essentially creating value for the consumer, which will then translate to sales and potential growth. So the first one here is product. You want to think about the product as it relates to the consumer. What are their needs and wants and does this product address those issues? So why would the consumer be interested in buying the product? What are some benefits of the product? Is the product unique or does it have a benefit that might stand out from competitors? And then next we have price. So is the price in line with similar products or are the features and benefits so different that a premium price might be appropriate? Will any discounts be available? And if so, how easy will it be for the consumer to obtain any discounts? Can this product be combined with any other product for a discount? So for example, if you buy both an iPad and an iPhone, then we have place. So some things to consider for place is where, sorry, will this product only be sold online or can the consumer try it out in person before they buy it? If they can only be purchased online, can it be returned if the consumer does not find it useful? And then we have promotion. So how can you promote this product? How will the company communicate any features and benefits to consumers? How easily can the consumer interact with the company if they have questions about the use of the product? And can influencers promote the product before it's available for sale? All right. So now this slide is extremely useful in the sense of that's giving you some strategies to think about as you review the marketing mix. So again, we have product, price, promotion, place. In the middle there we have your target market because once you look at these four at the four Ps, then you have to figure out how are we going to market this product to our target market. So under strategies there, you have to think about, so aim for tech product management roles. So if you're looking at key features, are we looking at what language? Are we looking at different tech industry? This one's based on the tech industry. Are we looking at different tech industry knowledge? Do we have any early adapters to the product? That's one of the reasons that I mentioned would a consumer influencer look at it and review it. So there's quite a few people. Apple asks influencers to look at their new iPhones, for example, before they come out. So they'll send them to them like one to two weeks in advance. Allow them to use them and then they can write product reviews that come out on the same day that the iPhone is being released. And so these are your early adapters and when you are adopters and when you see these people, you really are looking for more information. Like how is this product useful to me? How can I use it? They'll create small videos about certain aspects of it and then post those as well. And then you've got promotion. So you're looking at different things. In this case, they're looking at different tools and tactics. So you might be using your resume. You might be looking at a LinkedIn page. You might have an employer's job site that you go directly to. So it's giving you a different product, but we're looking at promotion here. And then as we look over and in this case for this promotion, we're looking at promoting yourself. And then for price, we're looking at different strategies that might look at cost and benefits. We're looking at, are there any safety requirements that we have to consider? Sometimes that can be expensive, depending on what they are. So all of these things, and we're looking at different benchmarks too. So all of these things account for the cost of something. And so sometimes it isn't just, you know, oh, we look at the overall cost of this product and then we market up 50%. It isn't always done that way, depending on what the product is. And so you might want to look at your particular product and say, what is a reasonable price for this? If this has some key features that others on the market do not have, then how are we going to price this appropriately? And sometimes, not always, but sometimes it is a good idea to price your product above others in the marketplace because then consumers may think that's just a better product overall if they're charging more for it. It is something to consider when you're looking at price. And then of course we have place, what are we going to be looking at? Where is it going to be promoted? And in this case they're looking at, again, like the key features of if you are sending out your resume, that kind of thing, you're the product in this case. But it's looking at things like where can we, what kind of tools can we use and where can we post our resume and how can we get it out there, we can attend job fairs, things like that, or go to professional need-ups. It's a good little slide that kind of gives you an overview of different products but also how do you promote those when you're considering things like your price, your place, your promotion, your product for your specific target market. Okay, so now we have segmentation, targeting, positioning, and differentiation. In addition to the four P's, you're also going to consider segmentation, your target market, positioning of a product and how you might differentiate that product from others on the market. When you understand these four areas, you can better develop your strategic marketing plan to focus on who you're selling to, your target market, and then how you intend to reach that market. And so it helps you think through the process of here's where I want to be and now how do I get there. And then you use these tools, segmentation, you think about your target market, how are we going to position it, just that. And then segmentation, it breaks down your target market into demographics so that you can better focus your marketing efforts on that market. So demographics might include age, race, gender, home ownership, or people in a specific income range. So for example, if your target market is white-collar males between 25 and 40 years of age, then demographics will allow you to segment your target market and then focus your marketing on males in that age group. It's important to narrow down your target market as much as possible so that your marketing is focused on that specific customer. I've seen quite a few things in marketing where they assume that their target market is all ages and everybody, and that's a mistake because it isn't. The only products really that I can think about that might work for that, might be like Pepsi or Coke, but overall you've got a very specific market for your product and it's really important to narrow that down. Typically, if you can get it within a 10 to 15 year age difference, that's probably a pretty good way of narrowing it or maybe a specific generation. And then positioning is the place that you want to put your product within the target market. So the more focused that your positioning is, the better. An excellent example of positioning is silk-soymilk, and this story is actually quite interesting. I think I heard about this through, I want to say, maybe it was the tipping point when I read about this, but essentially for a long time, silk-soymilk was on the shelf. It didn't need to be refrigerated, and they started to really think about their product like, how can we promote this better? What can we do? And ironically, it was positioning. So they ended up moving it into the refrigerated section of a grocery store and sales multiplied tremendously. It was actually a really interesting story. It is not something that needs to be refrigerated, but since they have seen sales increase so much, it was an interesting thing to see how just repositioning something can really help. By considering where the product was placed in the grocery store, marketing was more effective when consumers saw this product next to milk. Interesting. If your product has additional features than others on the market, then you must consider how you will differentiate your product from the rest. For example, we already talked about this a little bit, but you may want to increase the price of your product so that buyers are aware that your product has additional features. You can also use differentiation by creating marketing that's different from similar products on the market, or your marketing may focus on a specific product or feature of the product. You can also differentiate it that way. All right. So this one is, this is just a little slide that kind of gives you an idea of how segmentation works. So when you're looking at, and it just depends on your market, you're looking at maybe age, family status. You're looking at types of people. In this case, they've got the board empty nesters, usually a little bit older. And then you've got the busy families. These are usually your 25 to 50 year olds, mostly married with kids, that kind of thing. And then you've got your hipster wannabes that are typically 15 to 35, mostly single. They're usually free on evenings and weekends. And so you're really looking at, you're trying to break down your segmentation and your demographics as narrowly as possible, mostly so that you can focus and target your marketing. And so let's say, for example, in this one, we were looking at selling condos. And so really your board empty nesters, could that be part of your market? Maybe because they might be living in a 5,000 square foot house that used to have eight people living there. And now it's just the two of them. So maybe they would be in line for a condo. A busy family most likely wouldn't be because you've got a bigger family you want to grow. There probably need to be sprawled out in the house somewhere that might give them three to 5,000 square feet. And then your hipster wannabes, maybe if they can afford it, if it's your higher end condo, maybe not. But that's how you go through when you look at these things. So what are they interested in? What kind of events do they attend? You're really looking and trying to segment your market as much as possible by using demographics and looking at these things and saying, hey, how can we narrow this down even farther? Or how can we look at some of these numbers or do we need to look at income? That kind of thing. I actually read just this morning an interesting article about, and it was a home company that conducted a research study. And they were looking at where do the people who make $150,000 a year or more, where do they work? And they broke it down. It was mostly computer professionals. They had lawyers in there, maybe doctors in there. And it was really interesting to see a company that sells and promotes home products to really want to look at how they were going to target certain markets. And so I thought it was really interesting to go through. And then it would list 6% or in higher education. And 15% of them are in law or some kind of legal services, that kind of thing. And so it's interesting when companies perform these studies because then they can really focus in on who their target market is and how are we going to narrow this down as much as possible. All right. Then finally, we have ethics and social responsibility. So over the last few decades, ethics and social responsibility has become a staple in our language. So when you're developing a marketing plan, it's important to consider these two things. Because we have an ethical obligation when conducting marketing research and ensuring that these products are promoted appropriately. So consumers take ethical issues very seriously when they're purchasing a product. And it's important to consider that companies that respond with ethically produced products and marketing that focuses on social responsibility. One example is the creator of the Keurig coffee machines. The creator did not really take into consideration that the initial cake cups were not recyclable. And it wasn't even anything that he thought about. And then these coffee machines just took off. And now they're in every Walmart and Target and sometimes even in your grocery store where you can buy them. And he didn't really think about that. And the impact that a non recyclable cake cup would have on the environment. And so I think I read something once that said that if you were to put the cake cups that were sold in, I don't know if it was the first year or five years or something. But if you were to put them back to back, they would have circled the globe like five times. And that's really telling. That's a visual thing when you hear that in your mind that you're like, whoa. And they were just going to be in the ground for the next 20 years. And so I remember reading the story just being like, whoa. So even though the company worked quickly to make the change and make the cake cups recyclable, the media jumped all over it. They really questioned the process. They questioned the company. Whenever he was interviewed, he was asked about it. And then later, after being frequently questioned about this, the Keurig owner actually said he wish he had never created the product in the first place. So that's how important that hopefully this story kind of shows you how important social responsibility really is when we're developing products and when we're putting together marketing to promote those products. An example of an ethical violation in marketing may be targeting products that are unhealthy for teenagers. So vaping is one of them that has been in the news and getting quite a bit of backlash from parents. It gets quite frequent backlash when it comes to any situations that have to do with younger adults having access to certain content on their website. So these are things to just consider, consider the ethics, consider the social responsibility before you work on your marketing plan. It needs to be included in the marketing plan. Okay, so just a little slide here on social responsibility and ethics. And so what we're looking at is some of these things you've got to think about under corporate social responsibility. You have to think about people and the society. You have to think about employees. You have to think about the planet. And what, how that is related to profit. And then also any employee related outcomes. When you're looking at things like job satisfaction, you're looking at commitment attractiveness. If you have a product that the media is constantly questioning, then employees may not be as comfortable in their job if they have to handle those types of questions. And then you have moderators. So you have your age, things to consider age. Gender is a big thing these days. You have to consider culture, any individualism. If you're using he, she, pronouns, that's a big thing to consider these days when you're putting together marketing that has to do with social responsibility. All right. So in conclusion, these are the learning outcomes that we covered in this presentation. So we looked at the marketing planning process. We looked at the different environmental analysis methods. We looked at the four P's of marketing. We looked at segmentation targeting positioning differentiation. And then we also looked at ethics and social responsibility. And what's next. So the next unit is on marketing research. And my name is Dr. Marcy Stone, and I just wanted to say thank you.