Every company must first reflect on its business mission and vision. Meditating on these aspects is necessary to avoid losing focus on what is important in the business. It is clear that these are two concepts that can be reviewed throughout the life of the company and must be adapted to each moment and its specific circumstances.
Let's start by defining what a business's mission and vision are:
MISSION: is the company's reason for being, why it was founded and what it will offer to the market it targets. It is a specific concept that applies for a short period of time.
VISION: This is a more abstract concept that makes the company ask itself what it wants to become in the future and how far it aspires to go. It is more of a future wish than a present reality.
With these points clear, the company's management must embark on the path of strategic planning . This will begin with a prior analysis of the environment that surrounds it (legal aspects, geographic peculiarities, competition or technology applicable to its sector) and undergo an internal diagnosis (human resources available, capital, financial resources, etc.).
You now have the information you need to mix and draw from it objectives and strategies that will help you achieve your goal. But it doesn't end here, as the strategic plan must be deployed across all areas of the company, defining the action plan for each of them.
An organization's marketing department is not exempt from this process. Its manager, together with the members of his team, must define an action plan in line with the company's strategic plan.
We might think that, in essence, the keys to marketing have not changed much since Mc list of colombia cell phone numbers Carthy established the marketing mix in 1960 with his now famous four P's: I have a product, I sell it at a specific price for a market niche, I promote it to attract more customers and I distribute it to get it to the end customer. But it is clear that each point is much more complex than it seems and the rules of the game have changed a lot in recent decades.
Over time, these 4 P's were later joined by 3 more concepts: people, process and physical evidence.
Employees of an organization who have direct contact with customers, whatever the means, are great ambassadors for the organization. The good image of the organization depends largely on their behavior and attitude and can make the difference between a happy or dissatisfied customer.
The process. More and more companies are devoting a large part of their efforts to offering a shopping experience that satisfies the customer. In this era in which there is so much talk about customer or consumer empowerment and where it is easier to have customers leak to other companies, this point must be especially taken care of.
Physical proof refers to the importance of ensuring that the information provided to the customer about the products or services offered is true to the reality that they will encounter once they have received the product or enjoyed the contracted service. Here, increasingly, testimonials from other customers have become the star and their weight in the purchasing decision is fundamental.
But today the most popular terms that drive a company's marketing managers crazy have changed a lot conceptually and have evolved towards a relational approach with the customer:
From the product being the centre of all strategies, we have moved on to putting the focus on the customer. Giving them what they need, trying to get to know their preferences better and better, to the point of almost offering personalised products or services, at least in some part of the sales process.
From pricing as a decision based on the crossing of planets, we move on to using the margin on the cost price, to now thinking in terms of value for the customer. What the target audience is willing to pay for that product or service.
We have seen how promotion, with intrusive advertising, evolved towards communication with customers, who are the ones who find the products when they need them and establish a relationship over time with the brand with which they identify.
Finally, distribution, with the addition of virtual stores , is nothing like what we knew long ago. The counter has given way to the screen and buying in a physical store is starting to seem like science fiction for many.
Well, a marketing action plan should address all of this. Complicated, right? Constant training of the profiles that work in these areas is essential and SMEs must follow trends closely in order not to be left behind.