Traffic Lights

A tool for creative marketing

As with many of the tools and techniques considered on Marketing Teacher, traffic lights is a simple and effective approach. It's just like the traffic lights that are seen in millions of streets throughout the world, and is a basic metaphor for red, amber and green. Red means 'let's STOP it,' Amber means 'PROCEED WITH CAUTION, but make some improvements,' and Green means 'Go' or 'Let's carry on with this activity.'






Traffic lights is a creative marketing tool that can be used in a number of ways.

* You could conduct a personal traffic lights exercise based upon your own personal or professional development.
* The exercise can be run at any stage of the marketing planning or creative process. So you could run it as you begin marketing, during a marketing campaign, and at the end of a marketing programme as you review or control your marketing activities.

Traffic lights has a number of benefits to marketing managers:

* It encourages a creative approach to marketing
* Traffic lights is simple to use
* Traffic lights is quick to learn
* Traffic lights cross cultures, since most countries use this common approach to traffic control.

* Traffic lights transcend interdepartmental and disciplinary differences so that it is a common platform for decision-making.

The starting point is to decide upon an activity on which to base your traffic lights exercise. Some examples include:

* How do we improve our marketing planning?
* How do we make our marketing communications activities more effective?
* In what ways could eMarketing be made more efficient?
* How could I become a better marketing manager?
* How could I improve my grades?

Traffic Lights, Example - Serendipity

So let's consider a company called Serendipity that markets Ski Wear. Serendipity conducted a traffic lights exercise upon its core marketing activities. Marketing managers and interested individuals from purchasing, sales management, finance and R&D met in a training room, and recorded their views under the headings red-amber-green. The results are as follows:
Red - STOP

* Get rid of any distributors that favour competitor brands over our own.
* Withdraw product lines that make a loss.
* Remove our branding from any none-ski wear clothing.
* Stop sponsoring amateur or low ranking skiers, and enhance the exclusivity of our brand.

Amber - PROCEED WITH CAUTION, and make some improvements.

* Reduce the number of distributors that have Serendipity agency agreements. Start backing our proactive winners that really wish to endorse our brand and make it central to their business.
* Promote or reposition products that are mature.

Green - Go or Let's carry on with this activity.

* Reward our best distributors, and develop as the bases for long-terms relationships.
* Develop and enhance products that are highly profitable.
* Let's continue to sponsor top skiers that enhance our brand values.

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Internet Marketing

Internet Marketing/eMarketing

What is eMarketing?

eMarketing is essentially part of marketing. So the place to begin defining eMarketing is to consider where it fits within the subject of marketing. So let's start with a definition of marketing. The American Marketing Association (AMA) definition (2004) is as follows:

Marketing is an organizational function and a set of processes for creating, communicating and delivering value to customers and for managing customer relationships in ways that benefit the organization and its stakeholders.

Therefore eMarketing by its very nature is one aspect of an organizational function and a set of processes for creating, communicating and delivering value to customers and for managing customer relationships in ways that benefit the organization and its stakeholders. As such an aspect, eMarketing has its own approaches and tools that contribute to the achievement of marketing goals and objectives.This also helps us to differentiate between eMarketing and E-commerce, since E-Commerce is simply buying and selling online.

What is the difference between eMarketing and Internet Marketing?

There is no real difference between eMarketing and Internet Marketing. However, with the arrival of mobile technologies such as PDA's and 3G mobile phones, as well as Interactive Television, both terms tend to be stretched to include these new media technologies. On the other hand, others would see eMarketing and Internet marketing a subtly different, for example Chaffey (below):

Internet marketing is achieving marketing objectives through applying digital technologies. (Chaffey 2006). eMarketing is achieving marketing objectives through use of electronic communications technology. (Chaffey 2006). Whilst this distinction is wholly acceptable, it is difficult to see where the distinction lies between digital technologies and electronic communications technologies, especially with the convergence of technologies such as mobile devices.

What are the eMarketing tools?
The Internet has a number of tools to offer to the marketer.

• A company can distribute via the Internet e.g. Amazon.com.
• A company can use the Internet as a way of building and maintaining a customer relationship e.g. Dell.com.
• The money collection part of a transaction could be done online e.g. electricity and telephone bills.
• Leads can be generated by attracting potential customers to sign-up for short periods of time, before signing up for the long-term e.g. which.co.uk.
• The Internet could be used for advertising e.g. Google Adwords.
• Finally, the web can be used as a way of collecting direct responses e.g. as part of a voting system for a game show.

How do marketers plan for eMarketing?
There are two ways of looking at this.

• An existing organization may embark upon some eMarketing as part of their marketing plan.
• An organization trades solely on the Internet and so their marketing plan focuses purely on eMarketing.

The marketing plan in either case is the next step, whether focused upon eMarketing or all marketing. The next lessons focus upon a tailor-made eMarketing plan which conforms to the acronym AOSTC (from our generic marketing planning lesson).

• A - Audit - An audit of internal strengths and weaknesses, an external opportunities and threats.
• O - Objectives - SMART eMarketing objectives.
• S - Strategy - eMarketing strategies.
• T - Tactics - an eMarketing mix.
• C - Controls - measuring the performance of our eMarketing plan.

Internal Audits for eMarketing.
Where are we now?(internal perspective)

The starting point for any eMarketing planning is the internal audit. We are seeking to answer the question, where are we now? form an internal perspective. This is a consideration of internal resources and the effectiveness of our eBusiness based upon a number of factors, as such as those that follow:

Resources.
* Labour (trained, motivated, retained) Men.
* Capital (investment/cash flow) Money.
* Equipment (servers/software/back up) Machinery.
* Time (project plans) Minutes.
* Raw materials or components (depends on your business) - Materials .
Current effectiveness.
* Page views/sites/hits/page views/income.
* Trends/potential new customers
* Customers - e.g. how many are online? Are there new channel segments emerging?
* Competitors - who are they? What is their online proposition? How successful are they online?
* Distributors - are new, online, intermediaries emerging while old off-line distributors are being wiped out (disintermediation)? What are the potential channel conflicts?
* Current product market strategies of competitors I.e. audit with Ansoff's matrix.

Situation Analysis for eMarketing.
Where are we now? (Inetnal v External Perspectives)

The situation analysis for eMarketing bridges the internal audit and competitor research. It answers the question where are we now in terms of our eMarketing (internal v external perspective)? The analysis literally considers your eMarketing situation by considering the fit between internal and external factors. There are similarities with traditional concepts and techniques, but you need to focus upon digital commerce. Here we consider the 5 S's of Internet Marketing (Smith and Chaffey 2006), the Customer Life Cycle (CLC), and the application of SWOT analysis.
The 5 Ss of Internet Marketing.

Smith and Chaffey (2006) distil the situation of a business using Internet as part of its business under the following 5S's:

• Sell - Grow sales and attract business using digital technologies.
• Serve - Add value through the benefits of the Internet such as speed.
• Speak - Get closer to customers by making your business available to them at home, work or on the go with mobile technologies.
• Save - Reduce costs by using information technologies to make your business more efficient.
• Sizzle - Extend the online brand (or create a new one) - remember sell the sizzle not the sausage i.e. the benefits, aesthetics or value of a product or service rather than its features.

The Customer Life Cycle (CLC).

The Customer Life Cycle (CLC) is a tool that considers the creation and delivery of lifetime value to customers i.e. CLC looks at products and services that customers need throughout their lives. It is market oriented rather than product oriented (e.g. PLC). Key stages of the customer relationship are considered.

SWOT analysis - ranked and weighted.

SWOT analysis is a tool for auditing an organization and its environment. It is the first stage of planning and helps marketers to focus on key issues. SWOT stands for strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, and threats.

Some of the problems that you may encounter with SWOT are as a result of one of its key benefits i.e. its flexibility. Since SWOT analysis can be used in a variety of scenarios, it has to be flexible. To overcome these issues, one should employ a POWER SWOT.

Competitor Research for eMarketing.
Where are we now? (External Perspective).

As you plan for eMarketing and during the plan's implementation, one needs to pay careful attention to the activities of competitors. So competitor research for eMarketing is essential when attempting to answer the question where are we now ( external perspective)? There are a number of approaches that can be employed, with the emphasis on each approach shifting depending upon the nature of our eBusiness and market. Here are some key tools of competitor research for eMarketing:
* Use search engines.
- General topics such as Google, Yahoo!, and MSN.
- Type names of competitors.
- Type industry, product or term.
- Search 'down' into a directory structure e.g Yahoo!
- Search a competitor's web site.
- Product information, press releases, job opportunities.
- Pricing information.
- Distribution information such as where to buy.
(So publish only what you'd give away at a trade show!)
* Hunt for trade associations.
- Search for personal pages or 'Blogs.'
- Different perspective e.g fans, ex-employees.
- E.g. www.blogger.com, www.myspace.com, www.youtube.com
* Ask your target market.
- Send questions to named personnel, newsgroups, personal pages, mailing lists.
- Conduct a survey using.
- Buy secondary reports e.g. Datamonitor, Mintel.
* Newsgroups and post queries.
- Newsgroups on bulleting boards or forums.
- Deja.com (Google).
- Read online financial information.
- Research public companies.
- III.co.uk Ample UK.
- FT.com UK.
* Read online competitive information.
- E.g. Hoovers.com - Paid for, in US.
* Study demographic reports.
- Statistics.gov.uk/census in UK.
- Census.gov in US.
* Original source material.
- Business Source Elite, Newspapers, Kelly's, Kompass.
* Monitor special interest material.
- E.g Marketing Week (BSE) , Campaign (BSE), Marketing (BSE).
* Use a professional researcher.

eMarketing Mix
What is the eMarketing Mix?

The eMarketing Mix is essentially the same as the marketing mix. It is simply the adaptation of price, place, product and promotion to the eMarketing context. Of course one could also include physical evidence, people and process when marketing planning for an online service. Below are a series of lessons that consider how markets can apply the eMarketing mix to their organization's own product, service, brand or solution.

eMarketing Product

We've already considered product as part of the marketing mix. Two previous tools for product decision-making have been introduced - Product Life Cycle (PLC) and the Three Levels of a Product. Both of these tools are equally applicable to the context of eMarketing, and can be easily applied to include eMarketing and product.

eMarketing Price.
Pricing tactics as part of the eMarketing Mix.
What is unique about pricing for the Internet?

The emarketing mix is simply an adaptation of the traditional marketing mix, and 'P' for price. However, the Internet has influenced how online businesses price in a number of ways.

eMarketing Place.
Place tactics as part of the eMarketing Mix.

The eMarketing space consists of new Internet companies that have emerged as the Internet has developed, as well as those pre-existing companies that now employ eMarketing approaches as part of their overall marketing plan. For some companies the Internet is an additional channel that enhances or replaces their traditional channel(s). For others the Internet has provided the opportunity for a new online company.

Internet Marketing and Promotion: Internet Advertising

This lesson looks at ways of increasing the popularity of your website by looking at external sources of Internet Advertising.

1. Pay-Per-Click Advertising. example : Google Adwords.
2. Search Marketing
3. Affiliate Marketing
4. Offline Promotions Strategies

Internet Marketing and Promotion: Website Optimization

This lesson looks at ways of increasing the popularity of your website by looking at the internal optimization of the website itself. It considers many important ways of building your traffic, including Search Engine Optimization (SEO) approaches. Example : Build your traffic.

Alternative strategies could include:

• Encourage other sites to reprint your content (with credit given to you, and links back to your main site).
• Post information about your site in communities, forums and chat groups.
• Set up your own affiliate programme, and pay commission.
• Encourage visitors to bookmark your site.
• Create a mailing list, and send newsletters. Betters still, create a dynamic site that encompasses a CRM strategy.
• Hire professionals to code your site, and to manage Search Engine Optimisation (SEO).

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Marketing Planning

Marketing plans are vital to marketing success. They help to focus the mind of companies and marketing teams on the process of marketing i.e. what is going to be achieved and how we intend to do it. There are many approaches to marketing plans. Marketing Teacher has focussed upon the key stages of the plan. It is contained under the popular acronym AOSTC.

ANALYSIS.

OBJECTIVES.

STRATEGIES.

TACTICS.

CONTROLS.

Stage One - Situation Analysis (and Marketing Audit).

• Marketing environment.


• Laws and regulations.


• Politics.


• The current state of technology.


• Economic conditions.


• Sociocultural aspects.


• Demand trends.


• Media availability.


• Stakeholder interests.


• Marketing plans and campaigns of competitors.


• Internal factors such as your own experience and resource availability.

Also see tools for internal/external audit:

• PEST.
  


• Porter's Five Forces.

Stage Two - Set marketing objectives.

SMART objectives.

• Specific - Be precise about what you are going to achieve.


• Measurable - Quantify you objectives.
  


• Achievable - Are you attempting too much?


• Realistic - Do you have the resource to make the objective
  happen (men, money, machines, materials, minutes)?


• Timed - State when you will achieve the objective
  (within a month? By February 2010?).

it will be too vague and will not be realized. Remember that the rest of the plan hinges on the
objective. If it is not correct, the plan may fail.

Stage Three - Describe your

• Which segment?
  How will we the segment?
  How should we within the segment?
  


• Why this segment and not a different one? (This will focus the mind).
  
  
• Define the segment in terms of demographics and lifestyle. Show how you
  intend to 'position' your product or service within that segment. Use other tools
  to assist in strategic marketing decisions such as
  Boston Matrix,Ansoff's Matrix,Bowmans Strategy Clock, Porter's Competitive Strategies, etc.
  

Stage Four - Marketing Tactics.

Convert the strategy into the marketing mix
(also known as the 4Ps). These are your marketing tactics.

• Price Will you cost plus,
  skim, match the competition or penetrate the market?


• Place Will you market direct,
  use agents or distributors, etc?


• Product Sold individually,
  as part of a bundle, in bulk, etc?


• Promotion
  Which media will you use? e.g sponsorship, radio advertising, sales force,
  point-of-sale, etc? Think of the mix elements as the ingredients of a 'cake mix'.
  You have eggs, milk, butter, and flour. However, if you alter the amount of
  each ingredient, you will influence the type of cake that you finish with.
  

Stage Five - Marketing Controls.

Remember that there is no planning without control. Control is vital.

• Start-up costs.


• Monthly budgets.


• Sales figure.


• Market share data.


• Consider the cycle of control.

If marketing is everything you do to place your product (or service) in the hands of potential customers, how do you do it all -- especially if you're all alone? It helps to have a plan.

A marketing plan is more than your map for success. It's actually a map-making process that when complete will reveal a clear route to your prospective customers.

A good map reveals specific items of information. A good marketing plan should do the same for you. Here are six things your marketing plan should help you accomplish.

1. Prove that you understand your industry. Knowing your product isn't enough.


2. Identify your target market. These are the people most likely to buy your product or use your services.


3. Identify your competition. Who's out there and what are they doing ?


4. Establish your pricing, distribution, and product positioning. How much will it cost plus a fair profit? How will you get it there? And where do you fit into the marketplace?


5. Get someone to subsidize your dream. If you want to attract investors, a written marketing plan is essential.


6. Focus on a single effective marketing concept. Define your strongest strength and lead with that. For example, Little Caesar's "pizza pizza" may not be the most innovative idea ever conceived -- but it's certainly one of the more effective. Why? Because it's simple and consistent.
   

Here are the major components that you should consider when writing your marketing plan.

Mission (or vision) statement:

This is an external communication of your company's values. Like Admiral Stockdale, you're answering the question, "Who am I and what am I doing here".

Company objective:

This section communicates what you want to do, by when, and how (what are your resources?). It is specific, quantifiable, and is inclusive of your entire company. It is not merely a sales goal. If you're an entrepreneur, your company objective might also serve as your marketing objective.

Market analysis:

This section reports on the findings of the extensive research that you have pursued and prepared. You need to discuss various factors of the market environment in relation to your product. These factors include legal, social, political, economic, and technological considerations.

Target audience:

Based on your research, discuss who your customers are and how you can reach them. Here's where you decide whether to niche or not, or to segment your audience either vertically or horizontally.

Competitive analysis:

Your advance research should reveal your competitors, the obvious and especially the others. How does what they're doing relate to your product? What advantages do you have? How can you keep the advantage?

Action plan:

As Shakespeare said, "Action is eloquence". You've made your map. Now you can define the best route to reach your customers. This section of your marketing plan outlines what media mix you'll use to reach your audience. Advertising -- where, how often, and at what cost. Public relations -- specific programs and promotions of interest to the community. Sales strategies -- incentive programs for representatives and distributors as well as prospective customers.

A successful marketing plan is based on research and analysis. But because information can be manipulated to prove almost anything, insight is equally important. As Edward de Bono says, "Proof is often no more than a lack of imagination".

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Market Research

As a famous scientist once responded to a reporter's earnest question: "Research is what I'm doing when I don't know what I'm doing". As entrepreneurial-minded people, we would be well advised to listen to this simple wisdom.

Market research is more than the analysis of raw data. It is the opportunity to look outside your company to factors that may affect your success.

Research often begins with a guess, sometimes an informed guess based upon your observations, experiences, and belief system. Often the process of gathering information can feel counter-intuitive, especially when research indicates something other than what you believe.

Contrary to popular belief, market research is subjective -- and that's o.k. Your entrepreneurial vision becomes both a filter and a framework for reviewing information. The process begins with an idea or a passion. Then we conduct research to determine if the idea has merit. We begin by asking questions. Who are my potential customers? How large is my target market? What's the perceived value of my product? Who are my competitors? How is my idea unique? How can I communicate that uniqueness?

Market research is like a scientist who seeks to prove or disprove a hypothesis through questions, analysis, and observation. But research is much more than the analysis of information. It is a willingness to admit "I don't know". While market research seeks to confirm your idea with information, the admission of "I don't know" affords you the opportunity to discover other, possibly superior ideas.

Primary, or original, research is expensive, but Les Brown, a Detroit motivational speaker and author, suggests an inexpensive and readily available tool for gathering information, called TTP -- or if that fails, TTMP. That stands for talk to people -- and then talk to more people.

University professors, industry analysts, bankers, newspaper editors, and government officials can provide invaluable current information and refer you to additional sources. All you need to do is (1) ask intelligently, (2) recognize their contribution, and (3) show your appreciation. "Asking intelligently" means being prepared before you call, write or fax.

Even though we live in the information age, getting information from and to people is an expensive, sometimes unwieldy process. Here are some or my favorite sources of relatively low cost secondary (previously accumulated) research.

Michigan Information Center, 517-373-2697.

Disseminates U.S. Bureau of Census information.

Michigan Business Ombudsman, 800-232-2727, 517-373-6241.

Where to turn when confused and overwhelmed by the structure of MI state government.

U.S. Chamber of Commerce.

Inexpensive information about factors affecting business.

Dun and Bradstreet's Million Dollar Directory.

Library reference guide with company profiles

Info Power by Matthew Lesko, 301-369-1519.

Guide to free and low cost information.

The Directory of On-Line and Computer Readable Databases, Gale Research, 800-677-7760.

Available through Working Woman Magazine.

On-line information:

University of Michigan Computing, Information Technology Division, 734-764-3518

American Buslness Information, 402-593-4545. Information and list brokers.

Research is a process. Like innovation, it is continuous. Perhaps surprisingly, the answer isn't nearly as important as the act of asking the question.

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How To Develop a Marketing Strategy in 5 Easy Steps

The benefits of a planned marketing strategy are numerous. Business owners often rely solely on their intuition to make business decisions. While this informal knowledge is important in the decision making process, it may not provide you with all the facts you need to achieve marketing results. A marketing strategy will help you in defining business goals and develop activities to achieve them.

Here's How:

1. Describe your company's unique selling proposition (USP).
2. Define your target market.
3. Write down the benefits of your products or services.
4. Describe how you will position your products or services.
5. Define your marketing methods. Will you advertise, use Internet marketing, direct marketing, or public relations?

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Market Positioning

Falling in love! As entrepreneurs, we do it every day. Our passionate belief in, and commitment to, our product (or service) makes all things seem possible. The most successful entrepreneurs learn to transform their passion into position.

Positioning is a perceptual location. It's where your product or service fits into the marketplace. Effective positioning puts you first in line in the minds of potential customers.

As individuals, we continually position ourselves. The responsible older sibling, the class clown, a number cruncher, a super genius are all examples of positioning. These identifiers help us define ourselves and distinguish our abilities as unique and different from other people.

Positioning is a powerful tool that allows you to create an image. And image is the outward representation of being who you want to be, doing what you want to do, and having what you want to have. Positioning yourself can lead to personal fulfillment. Being positioned by someone else restricts your choices and limits your opportunities.

That's why it's so important for entrepreneurs to transform their passion into a market position. If you don't define your product or service, a competitor will do it for you. Your position in the market place evolves from the defining characteristics of your product. The primary elements of positioning are :

1. Pricing. Is your product a luxury item, somewhere in the middle, or cheap, cheap, cheap.


2. Quality. Total quality is a much used and abused phrase. But is your product well produced? What controls are in place to assure consistency? Do you back your quality claim with customer-friendly guarantees, warranties, and return policies?


3. Service. Do you offer the added value of customer service and support? Is your product customized and personalized?


4. Distribution. How do customers obtain your product? The channel or distribution is part of positioning.


5. Packaging. Packaging makes a strong statement. Make sure it's delivering the message you intend.

Positioning is your competitive strategy. What's the one thing you do best? What's unique about your product or service? Identify your strongest strength and use it to position your product.

The product Nyquil was conceived as a superior daytime cough suppressant. Unfortunately, it made people drowsy. Determined to recoup product development costs, the side affect of drowsiness was then transformed into a powerful positioning strategy. Nyquil became "the night time, coughing, sniffling, sneezing so you can rest" medicine. Nyquil created and owned the nighttime cold remedy market.

As the Baptist minister of my childhood would say at the conclusion of a lengthy sermon, "I've said all that to say this". Positioning, when used effectively, can help you be first in the mind. Being first in mind equals ownership. Market ownership allows you to be a big fish in a small pond. When you're a big fish, you can always increase the size of the pond.

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