Class 10: Acquisition Marketing
Why is it that many young users trust unknown peers more than recognized experts?
- Teens don’t want to receive information, but want to generate and share it with their peers
- Value of p-2-p, young users trust unknown peers more than recognized experts
- Consumers want decisions to guided by trusted unbiased information (opportunity for more meaningful engagement
Discuss the Internet concept of engaging the right people with the right message rather than attempting to get in front of the most people with the same message.
- Internet to engage the right people at the right time, not CPM exposures (potential for a lot less waste of advertising dollars) fragmented consumer behavior
- Understanding the impact of the Internet is not in technology, but in the behavior of success generations who engage it in new and different ways, e.g., collaboration.
- On-line advertising is valued most for responsiveness, pay-per-click, and an ability to assess return on investment
- Greater industry need for rapid and concise targeting methods, before trade-off between precision and timeliness
- Customer cluster will take on a life of their own, data mining will be a way of uncovering the complex DNA of groups
Class 13: Pricing
What is the relationship between price and demand? Why is it important for a firm to price at the point at which marginal revenue is equal to marginal cost?
As demand increases, the lower the price; the lower the demand, the higher the price (economies of scale). It is important to determine the point of equilibrium in order to determine at what point you will be able to gain profit and lose profit.
Key variables of basic demand-curve pricing:
- Price, Substitute Offerings/ Prices, Complementary Offerings/ Prices, Income, Market Size, Taste, Marginal Revenue, Marginal Cost.
Why should a firm consider fairness when pricing its goods?
• Consumers often think about pricing in terms of how fair the price is.
Three factors are taken into consideration: 1. Past prices, Close-substitute prices, Context (purchase environment)
How has the Internet enhanced opportunities for dynamic pricing strategies?
- Dynamic Pricing is one of the most significant contributions the Internet and the 2Is have made to pricing strategy.
- The Internet has enhanced dynamic pricing in two ways:
o Decreased Menu Costs
o Interactivity
Why would a firm want to implement a price-discrimination strategy?
Price Discrimination
First-degree Price Discrimination
- Involves getting consumers to pay exactly what they are willing to pay for an item.
Second-degree Price Discrimination
- Firm is trying to ascertain how much consumers are willing to pay not only for the first unit of a good, but for each additional good.
Third-degree Price Discrimination
- Most common type of price discrimination.
- Involves classifying consumers by category according to their willingness to pay.
What is the difference between static and dynamic markets?
· Dynamic Pricing is one of the most significant contributions the Internet and the 2Is have made to pricing strategy.
· The Internet has enhanced dynamic pricing in two ways:
o Decreased Menu Costs
§ In a store or a mail order catalog, there are costs associated with changing costs, but on the Internet, this is easy and virtually costless.
o Interactivity
§ The Internet makes it easy and much less costly for buyers and sellers around the world to interact and negotiate.
Class 14: Communication
Why are marketing communications important?
- Goal of marketing and communication is to convey relevant messages to the right consumers at the right time.
o Can be a distribution channel, advertising vehicle or a customer service vehicle, each of which now plays a part in marketing communications.
- Traditional and interactive marketing methods are converging
o Traditionally separate media are bow converging on the Web as the Internet can now be a radio, DVD player and even television.
What is the role of the Internet in a marketing communications campaign?
- Competition and Expectations
o The intense competition and increased expectations of consumers that arise due to the potential for instant response via the Internet demand that firms concentrate more than ever on managing communications with users.
- Transformation of Communication
o Customer service becomes a critical component of marketing on the Internet because users expect prompt fast responses to messages during the exploration and commitment phases.
- The 2Is: The effects of the 2Is are amplified by the Internet, so they affect online levers to a greater degree than the offline levers
o Interactive
- Interaction on the Web helps drive customers through the exploration stage and into the commitment stage where the firm-customer relationship continues to deepen.
- Many banner ads and pop-up type ads try to entice interaction in many ways.
o Individual
- The power of the user to access virtually any information desired and to navigate a site according to personal preference of itself makes the medium individual.
What are the main categories of communication types, and within each category, what are the tools, or marketing levers, that marketers use to communicate with consumers?
- Marketing communications, which includes all the points of contact that a firm has with its customers, can be grouped into four categories:
o Mass offline
§ Broadcast Media: television, radio, outdoor & public relations
§ Print Media: newspapers, magazines, yellow pages, brochures, newsletters
§ Point-of-Purchase Displays
o Personal offline
§ Telemarketing, Direct Mail, Statement Stuffers, Customer Service
o Mass online
§ Basic Online Tools: banners, interstitials, search engines, point-of-purchase displays
§ Applications of Basic Online Tools: partnerships and affiliate programs, sponsorships, chat rooms, serial marketing
o Personal online
§ Personalized Commercial Websites
§ E-mail Marketing: viral marketing, loyalty programs, customer service
What are the six steps in the communication process?
- Identifying the Target Audience
o Information is derived in three ways: experience, demographic information and consumer tracking behavior.
o On websites, requiring visitors to register with personal information is one excellent way of garnering information about the target market.
- Determining the Communication Objective
o Before creating the message, the intent must be clear.
o Objective should be focused on developing one of the four customer relationship stages.
- Developing the Media Plan
o Media plan should meet three criteria: be consistent with the target audience, be consistent with the communication objective, and the different parts of the plan should fit together well as a whole.
o Timing the deployment of the various media to be used in the campaign is another important issue.
- Creating the Message
o Requires significant planning and analysis.
o The theme has to be one that the target audience is receptive to and is also consistent with the objective.
o Message should be tested thoroughly to ensure that the right message is getting across.
- Executing the Campaign
o This involves “making the buy” which refers to buying the media space for the message, whether it is space on the Internet, radio, television, print or some other medium.
o Making the buy on the Internet is also generally based on CPM, but since there is the ability to measure user behavior online, this can be made using other measurements as well.
6. Evaluating the Effectiveness of the Campaign
o One of the things that makes the Internet such a powerful medium for evaluation is its capability to track and measure online behavior.
o Evaluative data obtained online through tracking user interactivity is very valuable because firms can know how the message is being received virtually in real time.
o Not only is it faster and easier to track behavioral data online than offline, it also much faster, easier and cheaper to make necessary adjustments when evaluative data reveal that changes are needed.
What levers are used for the different customer stages?
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Relationship Stage
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Marketing Levers
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AWARENESS
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• Online levers: online billboards, search engines, e-mail, viral marketing • Offline levers: television, magazines, radio, yellow pages, billboards/ outdoor |
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EXPLORATION/ EXPANSION
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• Online levers: online billboards, search engines, e-mail, viral marketing, website, permission marketing, serial marketing • Offline levers: television, radio, newspapers, packaging |
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COMMITMENT
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• Online levers: targeted email/ permission marketing, personalized pages • Online/ Offline levers: loyalty programs, customer service • Offline levers: telemarketing, direct mail permission marketing with personalized offers |
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DISSOLUTION |
• Personalized pages • Termination |
Class 15: Product
How is product defined?
- Can be defined as both tangible goods and intangible services generally created for the purpose of transaction. Through this transaction, products satisfy buyers’ specific wants or needs, and provide sellers revenue or customer goodwill that will ideally provide revenue later down the road.
How do interactivity and individualization affect product?
o The 2Is allow a company to learn more about its customer, personalize a product to meet customer preferences, and offer CRM tools to provide more value for customers and cut costs for product sellers.
o Websites which require customers to register to use the site have access to numerous tools to interact with the user as an individual.
o Once the user has registered, the site can recognize an individual customer both on the first and return visits.
o Using log files, a site can track a specific individual’s click stream, where they go on a site, length of time spent, actual sequence of page views etc.
o Based on such data, sellers greatly increase their ability to develop products based on their customers’ interests and preferences, especially in developing augmented products.
o The Internet has also changed market research – today, syndicated reports can be found, assessed, and downloaded in a matter of minutes. These reports are highly customizable and inexpensive relative to traditional research.
What are the key marketing levers for products?
Development Levers:
- Basic Product
- Packaging
- Attributes and Features
- Customer-Specified Attributes and Features
- Mass-Customized Product
Packaging
• Can be used to make a product stand out from its competitors, appear more appealing, and communicate to prospective customers both consciously and subconsciously.
Attributes and Features
• Individual attributes and features specific to a product are frequently used at the basic product level to differentiate one competitor’s offering from another.
Customer-Specified Attributes and Features
• Key difference is the increased ability to allow customer to specify these attributes and features.
Mass-Customized Product
• Historically allowing for numerous variations was prohibitively expensive; today it is a practical reality.
What does the overall product development process look like?
- Idea generation
- Screening ideas
- Product design
- Prototype development
- Business analysis
- Test marketing
- Commercialization
Idea Generation
•One tactic is divergent thinking whose objective is to conjure up as many new product ideas as possible without filtering them in any way.
Screening Ideas
•Useful for the team to begin screening by outlining a clear set of objectives and metrics for the new product as well as the associated development process.
Product Design
•Modular product architecture allows the product differentiation decisions to shift from producers to customers since customers are the ones designing the products.
Prototype Development
Alpha
•Allows design engineers to develop a high-level and more conceptual prototype without taking the time and resources needed to create an in-depth model.
Beta
•Should be done among a key user group in a relatively controlled environment.
Business Analyses
Key considerations would include:
•Current brand equity, imagery and personality
•Existing product portfolio
•How to leverage existing equity
•Customer base
•Corporate core competencies
•Timing
•Distribution
Test Marketing
•Objective is to learn how a product is likely to perform once introduced on a larger scale and how various combinations of the marketing mix impact the product’s performance.
Commercialization
•Requires a highly complex implementation plan in which timing, required resources, marketing, supply, distribution and the interdependencies between them have to be carefully understood, planned and orchestrated.
How can companies manage their product portfolio?
- New product development
- Enhancements and line extensions of current products and services
- Development of existing products
- Support of current products and services
How can products help enable a customer relationship?
· Two primary techniques:
· Deploying the product development levers that are appropriate for the existing relationship and
· Emphasizing the elements of the value proposition that are most relevant at a given stage of the relationship.
Class 17: Community
What is the definition of community?
A set of interwoven relationships built upon shared interests, which satisfies members’ needs otherwise unattainable individually.
- Relationships imply a higher degree of commitment and intensity between individuals whereas interactions can involve communication at a very basic, non-committal level.
What are the criteria that define successful community?
- Membership is a conscious choice.
- Member base has achieved critical mass and sustainability.
- Members feel a great sense of trust.
- Members achieve benefits in scale.
- Roles are not hierarchical or imposed.
- Effective facilitation and site structure keeps community activities on track.
- A spirit of participation and feedback is clearly cultivated.
- A sense of affiliation is achieved through ownership of equity in the community.
- Efficiency in interaction is maximized.
- The community is easily navigable.
What are the different types of interests that form the foundations of community?
There are three broad types of Communities, differing by their foundation of shared interests.
•Information-driven communities – Built upon shared interests in information. Seek mainly to exchange information such as facts and opinions
- Activity-driven communities – Shared interests in activities
•Commonality-driven communities- From sharing the same profession, ethnicity, life style stage.
What are the different ways in which communities function?
· Real-time systems
o Internet Relay Chat (IRC)
o Web-based chat
o Virtual worlds and MUDs (Multiuser Dimensions)/ MOOs (MUDs Object Oriented)
· Asynchronous systems
o Mailing lists
o Newsgroups (Usenet groups)
o Web-based message boards (bulletin board systems [BBS])
What are the benefits that community can generate for a parent firm?
- Cost Benefits
- Reduced Customer Service Costs
- Reduced Customer Acquisition Costs
- Reduced Costs from Decreased Product Flaws and Marketing Mistakes
- Reduced Marketing Costs
- Revenue Benefits
- Increased Customer Segmentation and Customization
- Increased Branding
- Deepened Customer Relationships
What are the different levels of community?
How to Create a Successful Community:
· Guiding Principles: The Three-Level Macro-Approach
o Nascent
o Formative
o Mature
Nascent Level
•Communities at their inception, typically marked and driven by community founders and a small number of core participants.
Formative Level
•Communities that are growing and developing, typically marked by growing membership and evolving goals and functionality.
Mature Level
•Communities that are near, or at, critical mass and sustainability. Community survival no longer depends on the community founders and core participants.
•Structures exist to ensure feedback, maintenance, and change.
Class 18: Distribution
Is the Internet a distribution channel?
· A distribution channel is the system of organizations involved in the process of making a product or service available for consumption or use. The Internet, as any other marketing channel, has emerged as a way to better serve the needs of one or more customer segments.
What are the functions of channel intermediaries?
- Efficiency: Distribution costs are reduced only if the retailers can perform the required functions more efficiently than the manufacturers could in the direct channel.
- Effectiveness: the ability of the channel to perform functions that creates value for customers.
What is disintermediation and what are its implications for channel intermediaries and customers?
- A strategy that involves the elimination of a channel intermediary.
- Internet has become a driving force for disintermediation
- Overall result is positive because channel works more closely to create value for customers.
Elimination of channel intermediary
•E.g. one hallmark of the new economy is a move from traditional manufacturer-retailer-consumer channels to direct online channels that eliminate the retailer.
Internet – driving force for disintermediation
•Frequency and complexity of communication between buyers and sellers, but tighter links between channel members which facilitates lower inventory and shipping costs.
What are the distribution levers and how do they affect relationships between intermediaries and buyers and sellers?
•Intermediary Type The selection of intermediary type is important because different channel members carry out different combinations of functions that affect the value configuration provided to customers.
•Direct-Firms can go direct via the Internet, telephone or mail.
•Traditional Retailers- A retailer is a business whose sales volume comes primarily from sales to final consumers.
•Virtual Shopping Malls- Especially important for brands with low awareness or brands in product categories where customers want to comparison shop.
•Internet Exchange- Equivalent of virtual shopping malls in the B2B area.
Class 19: Designing a Market space Matrix
What is a buyer-seller relationship? How can it vary?
· A relationship is a bond or connection between the firm and its customers.
· Buyer-seller relationships are based on exchange, where each party expects, or perhaps even demands value for what is given (i.e. money for products).
•Logical bond – realization that a customer simply cannot get a better product elsewhere.
•Greatest potential for strong buyer-seller relationships exists when the product is an important part of consumers’ lives.
•Firms want a relationship with their customers, even though it is not always cost effective.
•Firms must understand that not all committed customers are equal, and relationships that bring no benefit to the firm should be dissolved.
Why is integrated lever selection important in a marketing plan?
· The 2Is allow firms to choose levers that can move customers through the relationship phases faster and more effectively than ever possible.
· The 2Is affect each category of levers differently, but the end results remain consistent across all levers.
· Product, Pricing, Communications, Community and Distribution
•The potential of the 2Is demands that firms leverage the 2Is across the matrix design as much as possible in order to advance customers to the commitment stage.
•Product – Individualization of user pages (Yahoo!) sustains commitment and increases switching costs. Individualization also spurs users to move from awareness to exploration.
•Pricing – Targeted price promotions, which can be both individualize and interactive in the form of a permission email, can advance users from exploration/ expansion to commitment by giving them a price incentive to make the purchase.
•Communications – Interactive targeted banner ads are a classic example of the 2Is influence on communications levers. Banner ads can be targeted at particular segments, and the interactivity of a banner ad allows a user to move from awareness to exploration just by clicking on it.
•Community – In the case of eBay, the strong vibrant community sustains buyers’ commitment by ensuring a constant supply of a wide range of goods. In turn, the large number of shoppers benefits sellers by driving up auction prices.
•Distribution – Interactivity allows for tight linkages between suppliers and buyers, which can facilitate a collaborative relationship that results in benefits in logistics, inventory planning and responsiveness, especially just-in-time production.
What are the four categories of principles for lever selection?
- Awareness
- Exploration/Expansion
- Commitment
- Dissolution
What the key principles for lever selection within the Market space Matrix?
- Which lever should be used?
- Choose Levers to Effect a Change
- Determine Which Levers Have the Most Leverage
- Consider Barriers to Advancement
- Consider the Medium’s Effect on Desired Behavior
- Level of Involvement Matters
- Understand Consumer Learning Trends
- Credibility of the Channel Matters
- The Choice of Levers Must be Consistent with Positioning Choice
- The Medium can be the Message – or the Product
- Matrix Design Must be Adaptive
Choose Levers to Effect a Change
ØFirms must understand the behavioral change they are trying to create. After establishing the desired outcome, the optimal levers will be easier to pick.
Determine Which Levers Have the Most Leverage
ØFirms must understand which levers are decisive in moving customers from one stage to another. While one lever may help generate awareness or exploration, another may prove to be the tipping point from one stage to another. Magazine ads generate awareness, but decisive point is at the cosmetic counter. Firms thus need to move customers to the counter since that is the commitment or dissolution point.
Consider Barriers to Advancement
ØNeed to understand what prevents people from moving from one stage to another. The obstacle that stands in the way of advancement should be the target of a lever.
Consider the Medium’s Effect on Desired Behavior
ØTo advance from one stage to another, the medium used for the awareness stage may be quite different from the one for the commitment stage.
Level of Involvement Matters
ØHigh-involvement purchases will have different marketing levers than low-involvement purchases. To know which lever to use, firms need to understand where the product falls on the involvement spectrum.
Understand Consumer Learning Trends
ØOften different segments learn in different ways. Elderly customers usually do so through offline channels whereas younger consumers usually do so through the Internet. For firms to effectively reach their target customers, they must use marketing levers that are consistent with the preferred learning processes of that particular segment, especially during the awareness and exploration stages.
Credibility of the Channel Matters
ØThe credibility of the channel matters more than the literal message. A message can be ignored when delivered via one medium, but completely absorbed when delivered by another.
The Choice of Levers Must be Consistent with Positioning Choice
ØThe firm’s marketing levers must support the choice of position the firm takes in a certain segment of the market. This would mean that certain levers would be ruled out and others will be more attractive.
The Medium can be the Message – or the Product
ØBy choosing the channel, the firm is already making a choice about what it is saying.
Matrix Design Must be Adaptive
ØA firm must be able to adapt its matrix to respond to evaluation of the campaign and changes in the market. As levers prove ineffective or extremely effective, resources must be allocated in response to these discoveries.
Class 21: Customer Service and Support (Chapter 9)
What is the concept of anticipatory customer service?
- Fulfill Common Requests Before Asked
Class 23: The Wireless Future (Chapter 14)
Explain the nature of the consumer adoption process. How is it different from the concept of diffusion of innovations?
Wireless and converged devices are undergoing the process of adoption and diffusion. It is happening more rapidly in Europe, Asia, and the Pacific Rim and less rapidly in the US.
Consumer Adoption Process:
Awareness-> Interest->Evaluation->Trial->Adoption->Internalization.
Diffusion of Innovations
Product Factors that Affect Innovations:
- Relative Advantage
- Compatibility
- Complexity
- Divisibility
· Communicability
Define “pervasive computing” in your own words.
- In All Areas of Daily Life
· Variety of Wired and Wireless Devices
- Chips Embedded in Everyday Articles
· Access to the Network Any Time, From Any Place
- Devices Communicate With One Another (M2M)
- 6 A’s of Pervasive Computing
- Authorized
- Access
- Anyone
- Any Time
- Anywhere
- Any Internet-Enabled Device
Be prepared to describe the strategic drivers of wireless adoption.
- Context
- Localization, Personalization
- Time Sensitivity
- High Value
- Voice Activation
- One-Click Payment
- Security
- Privacy
· Expanded Permission Marketing
Class 26: Web Metrics (Chapter 11)
Describe the similarities and differences between server log, coded page and panel data. Which do you think is most useful?
Panel data can compare competitors
What are some of the specific metrics that measure Internet traffic, audiences and campaigns. Which ones do you think are most important?
CPM & CPA. The best way to measure depends on your objectives
Exposure vs. Action
- CPM – Cost Per Thousand Impressions
- CPA – Cost Per Action
- Cost Per Order
- Cost Per (Sales) Lead
What kinds of variables are needed to measure the effectiveness of branding efforts on the Internet?
- Traffic, Audience, Campaign
· Reports
· By Single Variable
· By Multiple Variables
· By Day
· By Time
· By Specific Page