Marketing is communicating the value of a product, service or brand to customers, for the

purpose of promoting or selling that product, service, or brand.

Marketing techniques include choosing target markets through market analysis and market
segmentation, as well as understandingconsumer behavior and advertising a product's value to
the customer.
From a societal point of view, marketing is the link between a society's material requirements
and its economic patterns of response.
Marketing satisfies these needs and wants through exchange processes and building long-term
relationships.
Marketing blends art and applied science (such as behavioural sciences) and makes use
of information technology.
Marketing is applied in enterprise and organizations through marketing management.
A firm in the market economy survives by producing goods that persons are willing and able to
buy. Consequently, ascertaining consumer demand is vital for a firm's future viability and even
existence as a going concern. Many companies today have a customer focus (or market
orientation). This implies that the company focuses its activities and products on consumer
demands. Generally, there are three ways of doing this: the customer-driven approach, the market
change identification approach and the product innovation approach.[5]
In the consumer-driven approach, consumer wants are the drivers of all strategic marketing
decisions. No strategy is pursued until it passes the test of consumer research. Every aspect of a
market offering, including the nature of the product itself, is driven by the needs of potential
consumers. The starting point is always the consumer. The rationale for this approach is that
there is no reason to spend R&D (research and development) funds developing products that
people will not buy. History attests to many products that were commercial failures in spite of
being technological breakthroughs.[6]
A formal approach to this customer-focused marketing is known as SIVA[7] (Solution,
Information, Value, Access). This system is basically the four Ps renamed and reworded to
provide a customer focus. The SIVA Model provides a demand/customer-centric alternative to
the well-known 4Ps supply side model (product, price, placement, promotion) of marketing
management.

Product

Solution

Promotion

Information

Price

Value

Place (Distribution)

Access

If any of the 4Ps were problematic or were not in the marketing factor of the business, the
business could be in trouble and so other companies may appear in the surroundings of the
company, so the consumer demand on its products will decrease. However, in recent years
service marketing has widened the domains to be considered, contributing to the 7P's of
marketing in total. The other 3P's of service marketing are: process, physical environment and
people.
Some consider there to be a fifth "P": positioning. See Positioning (marketing).
Some qualifications or caveats for customer focus exist. They do not invalidate or contradict the
principle of customer focus; rather, they simply add extra dimensions of awareness and caution
to it.
The work of Christensen and colleagues[8] on disruptive technology has produced a theoretical
framework that explains the failure of firms not because they were technologically inept (often
quite the opposite), but because the value networks in which they profitably operated included
customers who could not value a disruptive innovation at the time and capability state of its
emergence and thus actively dissuaded the firms from developing it. The lessons drawn from this
work include:

Taking customer focus with a grain of salt, treating it as only a subset of one's corporate
strategy rather than the sole driving factor. This means looking beyond current-state
customer focus to predict what customers will be demanding some years in the future, even
if they themselves discount the prediction.

Pursuing new markets (thus new value networks) when they are still in a commercially
inferior or unattractive state, simply because their potential to grow and intersect with
established markets and value networks looks like a likely bet. This may involve buying
stakes in the stock of smaller firms, acquiring them outright, or incubating small, financially
distinct units within one's organization to compete against them.

Other caveats of customer focus are:

The extent to which what customers say they want does not match their purchasing
decisions. Thus surveys of customers might claim that 70% of a restaurant's customers want
healthier choices on the menu, but only 10% of them actually buy the new items once they
are offered. This might be acceptable except for the extent to which those items are moneylosing propositions for the business, bleeding red ink. A lesson from this type of situation is
to be smarter about the true test validity of instruments like surveys. A corollary argument is
that "truly understanding customers sometimes means understanding them better than they
understand themselves." Thus one could argue that the principle of customer focus, or being
close to the customers, is not violated herejust expanded upon.

The extent to which customers are currently ignorant of what one might argue
they should wantwhich is dicey because whether it can be acted upon affordably depends
on whether or how soon the customers will learn, or be convinced, otherwise. IT hardware
and software capabilities and automobile features are examples. Customers who in 1997 said
that they would not place any value on internet browsing capability on a mobile phone, or
6% better fuel efficiency in their vehicle, might say something different today, because the
value proposition of those opportunities has changed.

How to use Segmentation, Targeting and Positioning (STP) to develop marketing strategies
Today, Segmentation, Targeting and Positioning (STP) is a familiar strategic approach in Modern
Marketing. It is one of the most commonly applied marketing models in practice. In our poll
asking about the most popular marketing model it is the second most popular, only beaten by the
venerable SWOT / TOWs matrix. This popularity is relatively recent since previously, marketing
approaches were based more around products rather than customers. In the 1950s, for example,
the main marketing strategy was 'product differentiation'.
The STP model is useful when creating marketing communications plans since it helps marketers
to prioritise propositions and then develop and deliver personalised and relevant messages to
engage with different audiences. This is an audience rather than product focused approach to
communications which helps deliver more relevant messages to commercially appealing
audiences. The diagram below shows how plans can have the flow from
Audience options > Audience selection > Production positioning

STP is relevant to digital marketing too, where applying marketing personas can help develop
more relevant digital communications as shown by these alternative tactical customer
segmentation approaches.
In addition, STP focuses on commercial effectiveness, selecting the most valuable segments for a
business and then developing a marketing mix and product positioning strategy for each
segment.
How to use STP?
Through segmentation,you can identify niches with specific needs, mature markets to find new
customers, deliver more focused and effective marketing messages.
The needs of each segment are the same, so marketing messages should be designed for each
segment to emphasise relevant benefits and features required rather than one size fits all for all
customer types. This approach is more efficient, delivering the right mix to the same group of
people, rather than a scattergun approach.
You can segment your existing markets based on nearly any variable, as long as its effective as
the examples below show:
Well known ways to segment your audience include:

1. Demographics

Breakdown by any combination: age, gender, income, education, ethnicity, marital status,
education, household (or business), size, length of residence, type of residence or even
profession/Occupation.
An example is Firefox who sell 'coolest things', aimed at younger male audience. Though, Moshi
Monsters however is targeted to parents with fun, safe and educational space for younger
audience.

2. Psychographics

This refers to 'personality and emotions' based on behaviour, linked to purchase choices,
including attitudes, lifestyle, hobbies, risk aversion, personality and leadership traits. magazines
read and TV..

3. Lifestyle

This refers to Hobbies, recreational pursuits, entertainment, vacations, and other non-work time
pursuits.
Companies such as on and off-line magazine will target those with specific hobbies i.e.
FourFourTwo for football fans.

4. Belief and Values

Refers to Religious, political, nationalistic and cultural beliefs and values.

The Islamic Bank of Britain offers Sharia compliant banking which meets specific religious
requirements.

5. Life Stages

Life Stages is the Chronological benchmarking of peoples lives at different stages.

An example is Saga holidays which are only available for people aged 50+. They claim a large
enough segment to focus on this life stage.

6. Geography

Drill down by Country, region, area, metropolitan or rural location, population density or even
climate.
An example is Neiman Marcus, the upmarket department store chain in the USA now delivers to
the UK.

7. Behaviour

Refers to the nature of the purchase, brand loyalty, usage level, benefits sought, distribution
channels used, reaction to marketing factors.
In a B2B environment, the benefits sought are often about how soon can it be delivered? which
includes the last minute segment - the planning in advance segment.

An example is Parcelmonkey.co.uk who offer same day, next day and international parcel
deliveries.

8. Benefit

Benefit is the use and satisfaction gained by the consumer.

Smythson Stationary offer similar products to other stationery companies, but their clients want
the benefit of their signature packaging: tissue-lined Nile Blue boxes and tied with navy ribbon!
Market targeting
The list below refers to whats needed to evaluate the potential and commercial attractiveness of
each segment.

Criteria Size: The market must be large enough to justify segmenting. If the market is
small, it may make it smaller.

Difference: Measurable differences must exist between segments.

Money: Anticipated profits must exceed the costs of additional marketing plans and other
changes.

Accessible: Each segment must be accessible to your team and the segment must be able
to receive your marketing messages

Focus on different benefits: Different segments must need different benefits.