FREE ESSAY ON INTERNATIONAL COMPETITION

INTERNATIONAL COMPETITION

Consumer Behaviour 
Consumers have so many choices to make compared to ten or even twenty years ago. Today as
always, business growth depends heavily on loyal customers who return because they are
satisfied with the product and/or service they have received. But first companies have to
bring consumers into the stores. The companies bring consumers into the store by
marketing their product. The average consumer would probably define marketing as a
combination of advertising and selling. It actually includes a good deal more. Modern
marketing is most simply defined as directing the flow of goods from producers to
customers. In order to answer this question fully we must define consumer goods which
means goods that are used or bought for use primarily for personal, family, or household
purposes. The paper outlines the contributions of marketing through fast moving consumer
goods. Promotion, which works hand in hand with marketing a product, allows the product
to be relayed to the right consumer through campaigns. A Market research must be
completed to find a target audience which is used for promotional and advertising
reasons. The last part of the scheme is the actual advertising of the good which pulls
the consumer into the store. Marketing has had an influential impact on fast moving
consumer goods through abroad range of activities including, promotion, market research,
and advertising. Promotion is used to communicate information about goods and services to
target market audiences thereby facilitating the exchange process. Promotion plays an
important role in informing, educating, persuading and reminding customers. The
promotional mix is adjusted according to the organizations promotional objectives and its
marketing situation. Generally, in consumer's services, marketing and advertising will be
by far the main component and the most expensive. Promotion is essentially about
communication. Target audiences need to receive information about goods and services
before they can begin to consider making a purchase. The promotional objectives will
influence the nature of the promotional message and the type of appeal used to get the
message across. One of the key tasks in designing and executing promotional programmes is
the selection of appropriate media for advertising and other forms of communication. The
range of possible media choice is extensive but will ultimately be governed by factors
such as the budget available and the target audience profile. The development of an
effective promotional campaign involves combining the promotional mix elements in the
most appropriate way to meet the organizations communications objectives. Evaluation and
monitoring is important and one method of evaluation is by completing marketing research.
(Woodruffe 1995149,163-4) An advertisement, or a campaign of advertisements, is planned
in much the same way a successful salesperson plans the approach to be used on a personal
call. The first stage is working out the strategy. This requires a thorough analysis of
all available market research, personal discussions--or focus groups--with typical
prospective buyers of the product, and knowledge of all competitive products and their
advertising. Based on the understanding and insights derived from this information,
advertising professionals write a strategy that defines the prospects that constitute the
target market to which they must direct the message and what must be communicated in
order to persuade the prospects to take the action that is desired. With this strategy as
a guide, copywriters and art directors begin to create the advertisements. At this second
stage they try to come up with an idea that involves the prospect, pertains to his life
or problems, and is memorable. The idea can take the form of an unexpected set of words
or a graphic symbol. It also can be a combination of words and graphics, and even music.
An advertising idea works best when it is a totally unexpected yet thoroughly relevant
fulfillment of the strategy. The third stage is the execution of the idea. This means
turning the idea into some form of communication that a prospect can see or hear. For
print advertising, execution involves writing text, taking photographs or commissioning
drawings, arranging elements on the page (layout), setting type, making photo engravings,
and so on. For broadcast advertising, it may mean writing dialogue and composing music,
hiring actors and recording voices, filming in a studio or on location. Throughout all
three of these stages, research plays an active role. Market research provides the
information on which the strategy is based. Copy research may test the relative strength
of several ideas on small groups of consumers or larger national samples. Focus groups
may uncover communications problems in various headlines, photographs, actors, or musical
compositions along the way. Research remains active after the advertisement has been
executed. Often a finished print ad or broadcast commercial is tested before it appears
in print or on the air, and it is not unusual to track the effect of advertising in the
marketplace during the course of a campaign. The objective of any advertisement is to
convince people that it is in their best interests to take an action the advertiser is
recommending. The action may be to purchase a product, go to a showroom to try the
product, use a service, vote for a political candidate, make a contribution, or even to
join the Army. Like any personal salesperson, the advertisement tries to persuade.
Advertising companies are keeping the pulse on contemporary culture, surging with new
innovative marketing techniques that are imputed through promotion. Currently, consumers
"expectations need to be exceeded for commercial success so that customers are delighted
with the outcome." (Jobber 1998: 13) Companies take pride in developing advertising that
breaks through the media clutter and creates lasting impressions on potential buyers
minds. It is essential to be seen on TV, magazines, and other media in order to show
potential buyers that your product is worth investing in. Today, media is so integrated
into the society that it dominates the culture. Therefore, media presence is crucial in
influencing consumers. The worlds' cultures are growing increasingly visual. People spend
less time reading and more time watching. Advertisers want to engage the viewer using
highly simplified concepts that are a fusion of visuals and words. They want their ideas
to communicate linguistically in seconds, yet stay imprinted on the mind of the buyer.
"Companies need to avoid the mistake of setting customer expectations too high through
exaggerated promotional claim since this can lead to dissatisfaction if performance falls
short of expectations". (Jobber 1998: 12) Finding out what the customer wants is one of
the problems marketing research tries to solve. Marketing research has been defined as
trying to analyze marketing problems scientifically. It studies people as buyers and
sellers, examining their habits, attitudes, preferences, dislikes, and purchasing power.
It often studies specific segments of a population, such as teenagers, high-income
groups, or senior citizens. Marketing research also investigates distribution systems,
pricing, promotion, product design, packaging, brand names, and almost every aspect of
the seller-buyer relationship. Marketing research is divided into a number of sub areas.
Advertising research attempts to find out the effectiveness of advertising. It also seeks
to learn the best media for advertising specific products: television, newspapers, radio,
magazines, billboards, and others. Market analysis tries to identify and measure markets
for specific products and to estimate sales potential. Markets may be differentiated by
population groups or by geography. Some types of clothing are more likely to sell in
Florida and California than in the northern Midwest. Some cosmetics will appeal more to
black customers than to white customers. Marketing research is an expensive undertaking,
and its costs are built into the prices of products. Almost every company in the United
States that manufactures a product, that provides a service, or that sells products or
services through retail outlets uses advertising. Those that use it most are companies
that must create a demand for several products or services among many people residing in
a large area. While advertising brings the economies of mass selling to the manufacturer,
it produces benefits for the consumer as well. Some of those economies are passed along
to the purchaser so that the cost of a product sold primarily through advertising is
usually far less than one sold through personal salespeople. Advertising brings people
immediate news about products that have just come on the market. Finally, advertising
pays for the programs on commercial television and radio and for about two thirds of the
cost of publishing magazines and newspapers. Consumer goods are those that are sold to
final users, the customers. These goods include food, clothing, automobiles, television
sets, appliances, and all those things people go to stores to purchase. To sell a product
or good successfully you must appeal to the consumer. Companies use advertisement to
entice them to go into stores and purchase products. For instance, coffee is a very
popular and fast selling consumer good, which will always be in demand. A popular
commercial and slogan was used by Maxwell Coffee to differiante them from other coffee
companies. "A Cup of Instant Culture" was the slogan the company used earlier this
decade. With coffee drinking on the wane, coffee makers can no longer simply offer
satisfied faces grinning over cups of steaming java. Coffee, like lifestyles, must be
exotic and sophisticated. P&G's Folger's and Kraft General Food's Maxwell House have
spent bundles not only to keep their jingles alive but to show that they fit into a
thirty something mindset awash with babies, careers and an amateur's appreciation for
those fresh-roasted grounds. Ironically, the most efficient performers were two Nestle
brands that don't offer the fresh-ground variety: Nescafe and Taster's Choice. Both
reduced their spending and increased their efficiency dramatically. For Taster's Choice,
the trick may have been its allusions to elegance: Is this one too good for your guests?
A handsome neighbor asks a well-coiffed hostess who's looking to borrow some coffee.
Nescafe evokes the exotic with scenes of tropical splendor. Hills Brothers, which kept
both spending and efficiency relatively static, goes even further, taking viewers on a
jungle expedition filled with toucans and rain forest haze, all to the strains of
melodies familiar to fans of Paul Simon. To improve the selling of consumer goods
companies are reevaluating their advertising techniques and promotions. Online
advertising revenue grew 66 percent between the first and second quarters of this year,
with significant gains made in the consumer-goods business. Those are among the findings
of a report based on a survey of major advertising sites that the Internet Advertising
Bureau released last week. The study, conducted by Coopers & Lybrand's New Media Group,
found that total spending rose to $214.4 million in the quarter ended June 30, up from
$129.5 million in the March quarter. These are the strongest results we've seen yet, said
Rich LeFurgy, chairman of the IAB and senior vice president of advertising for
ESPN/ABCNews Internet. The advertising bureau is a trade group whose primary members are
sites that are ad-supported. The bureau's numbers reflect self-reported revenue figures
from more than 800 sites, each of which has at least $5,000 a month in online ad revenue.
The survey gets a 90 percent response rate, according to Peter Petrusky, who oversees the
study for Coopers & Lybrand. The growth of ads for consumer goods was particularly
noteworthy given that ads for computers and related products had been dominant since the
Web's inception. Ads for consumer goods were responsible or 30 percent of revenue in the
second quarter, up from 17 percent in the first quarter. Following consumer goods were
financial services (22 percent of total spending), computer goods (21 percent), and new
media and telecommunications (7 percent each). LeFurgy said the growth demonstrated that
consumer-goods companies were moving out of an experimental mode and into a commitment
mode on the Web. In conclusion, the client above used this information to evaluate the
effectiveness of the advertising. They determined that the advertising was memorable, but
that the public tended not to recall the message the client was trying to portray. They
were able to make changes to the advertising to better communicate the intended message.
All of these types of marketing are attempts to find and reach the elusive and demanding
consumer. However, one of the most interesting of these responses is it grows out of the
conviction that the only way for marketing to be effective with the consumer of today is
to radically change and become subversive. The marketing techniques, advertising, and
promotion used by today's companies help consumer goods and services sell quickly. 
Bibliography 
Atiyah P.S. The Sale of Goods London: Pitman: London, 1990. Dobson A.P. Sale of Goods and
Consumer Credit. London: Sweet & Maxwell Limted 1989. Jobber, David Principles and
Practice of Marketing. London: McGraw Hill 2nd ed, 1998 Mowen, John C. and Minor,
Micheal. Consumer Behaviour 5th ed New Jersey: Prentice Hall, 1998 Woodruffe, Helen
Services Marketing. M&E Pitman: London, 1995