Table of Contents Introductory Material How IBM's Strategic Marketing Contributed to Its Success How eBay's Strategic Marketing Contributed to Its Success References Bibliography
Introduction
In the 21st century, privatization, liberation, and globalization of organizations have increased significantly. These factors, coupled with the development of information technology, have resulted in a highly competitive business environment. Due to increased innovation, product life cycles have been shortened, and as a result, macerating difficulties have increased dramatically. Numerous businesses are trying to find strategies and action plans that will assure their survival and expansion. In today's rapidly shifting socioeconomic climate, the consumer is a true moving target. Highly desirable is product segmentation based on consumer insights. The issue for marketers is to use the branding and price options at their disposal to ensure that their brand represents the most valuable package in the customer's opinion. Developing cooperative and collaborative relationships with customers is the most prudent strategy to monitor shifting client expectations.
The classification of services, customisation to recoup lost clients, differentiation techniques to charge premium prices, and gastronomy methods to provide consumers with a large quantity of engagement and personalization are among the most popular customer relationship management strategies. The market research should be represented as a sequence of informational building pieces required for strategy creation. Therefore, marketers must prioritize strategic marketing of their products/services if businesses are to remain competitive in a dynamic business environment. The marketing strategy of a company is more effective when it is an integral element of the business strategy that describes how the company will engage with its consumers, prospects, and competitors. Therefore, such a marketing plan must be derived from business strategies, missions, and objectives.
As the client is the source of a company's revenue, marketing strategy and sales are intrinsically related. Keeping marketing in line with a company’s main mission statement is frequently a crucial element of marketing strategy. (Knight, Tom, 2005)
Therefore, strategic planning can be defined as the process of planning and executing the conception, pricing, promotion, and distribution of ideas, goods, and services in order to produce exchanges that satisfy individual and organizational objectives. Numerous tactics are employed by marketers to determine how, when, and where product information is provided to consumers. Their objective is to convince consumers to purchase a specific brand or product. It has been shown that effective marketing methods generate product desire. Therefore, a marketer must comprehend consumer likes and dislikes. In addition, marketers must understand what information would persuade consumers to purchase their product and which information sources they view as reputable. Some marketing methods utilize fictional characters, celebrities, or experts (such as doctors) to sell items, while others use specific assertions or “health claims” that state the benefits of using or consuming a certain product or food (Bickart 2001).
Large corporations such as IBM and eBay have mastered this and have capitalized on the development of strategic marketing plans, which have enabled them to function exceptionally effectively on a worldwide scale.
How IBM's Strategic Marketing Contributed to Its Success
IBM's Marketing Department is responsible for developing and implementing customer-focused strategies, programs, and capabilities that contribute to the company's brand value. This enables IBM to achieve market dominance, strong client loyalty, and great customer happiness. IBM's objectives include: 1. positioning the company as the world's leading provider of integrated technology solutions for e-business on demand and the industry's leading technology innovator; 2. improving the competitiveness and market performance of IBM offerings; and 3. leveraging IBM brand equity to increase revenue, increase profit, and improve IBM's reputation.
IBM has implemented particular areas to increase their marketability in order to accomplish these goals. These industries include Marketing management is accountable for designing marketing strategies and implementing IBM's marketing plans and program management. Direct marketing, event marketing brand identity, the usage of sponsors, and media marketing tactics are promoted through integrated marketing communications. The IBM marketing department has built a marketing intelligence system that facilitates customer satisfaction surveys and the identification of new business prospects. For their marketing strategy to be highly effective, the company has ensured the existence of a marketing operations body that evaluates marketing effectiveness and recommends appropriate measures to be implemented by the marketing department to ensure IBM products and services continue to be in high demand.
IT has capitalized on growing its visibility via the internet and electronic media as a result of IBM's successful marketing efforts. The IBM company has tailored its marketing to target medium-sized enterprises and specific demographics. IBM has assured the development of highly effective casting rules for their global advertising agencies in order for individuals to positively respond to these benefits. IBM has accomplished this through sponsoring particular social activities, such as Black Family Technology Awareness Week during African, Hispanic Heritage Month, and by placing adverts in Gay, Lesbian, and Bisexual publications during their special occasions, such as Gay Pride Month. These advertising increase interest in IBM's products, so bolstering their brands across all cross-cultural and cross-social distinctions.
IBM has mastered the art of product promotion with commercial partners. A move that has facilitated its success across international borders. IBM chooses the most effective partner to engage with prior to determining the best strategy to reach individuals in order to increase their advertising at the constituent level. Therefore, IBM's partners aid in the marketing of IBM's products and services by generating demand and selling IBM solutions to government and commercial organizations. For instance, source System and Integration, one of IBM's Northern California-based partners, has facilitated the sale of IBM software and hardware-based solutions around the country. This is because this partner offers IBM business solutions to government and commercial clients in California. These collaboration relationships have enabled IBM to be successful on a worldwide scale by allowing all communities in the globe to choose IBM as their brand (Tom Knight 2005).
How eBay's Marketing Strategy Contributed to Its Success
EBay Company's performance in the U.S. and other markets has been significantly aided by a strategic marketing approach. Initially, eBay's activities were limited to the United States and all of its business operations were conducted there. Through their strategic decision to implement online selling on eBay, eBay's competent management significantly boosted the company's performance. This decision to use eCommerce allowed the organization to expand its global operations. This is due to the rapid expansion of its companies in Europe, Asia, and the United States. eBay's choice to participate in international marketing through the use of internet sales was a strategic one. Since then, its foreign business activity have significantly increased. The corporation has created multiple sites in Brazil, China, and Germany, among other global markets.
eBay's excellent performance has made it one of the world's major electronic marketers. Its successful performances are mainly based on its carefully crafted playbook. These eBay playbooks are comprised of hundreds of WebPages containing the collective knowledge of eBay's managers from America, Asia, and Europe. These playbooks are routinely updated. The playbook provides the formations that aid managers in their daily business operations at eBay. They provide details about online marketing, management, and community outreach. (O’Brien & Marakas2008, 323-324) Through internet sales, the corporation has been quite successful in establishing new sites in Asia and Europe outside the United States. Initially, the corporation expanded into Germany and China before going on to other countries. Today, eBay is by far the largest worldwide website, with yearly sales of over $70 billion. This sale is significantly greater than the $20 billion sale realized from the United States. The expansion of eBay into European countries such as the United Kingdom, the Netherlands, and Italy has been made possible by the marketing department's effective marketing methods.
The company's effective marketing methods have contributed to eBay's strong performance. In the past, eBay's advertising efforts were limited to television exclusively. The marketing department concluded that this strategy for promoting their services was ineffective. As a result, they modified their advertising strategy to include Internet-based product and service awareness campaigns. This was highly effective, and eBay now advertises its services and products widely on the Internet. Therefore, the company's performance has been significantly enhanced by the Internet advertising. This is due to the fact that the Internet generates a significant deal of exposure, which has allowed the organization to acquire many more clients worldwide. (O’Brien & Marakas 2008, 326) eBay's highly effective marketing division has assisted the corporation in establishing an effective system for resolving cross-cultural disagreement.
eBay typically adapts its business practices to the culture of the region in which it operates. In Germany, for instance, eBay is typically structured to accommodate German culture. All conversations are conducted in German. This is also the situation in China and Italy, among other countries. This assists the company in being perceived as a local business and not as an American brand. Therefore, all nations that host eBay services recognize eBay as their community's brand. This strategy has enabled the organization to operate exceptionally well on the international market by overcoming the common cross-cultural cultures and cross-cultural communication hurdles in international marketing (Chaffey 2003, 115). When eBay launches a site in a country, its administration initially focuses on marketing its services to the local populace via the Internet and other advertising channels. This allows the business to attract more customers to the website. The organization then moves on to perfecting specific category management or launching pay Pals. This considerably enhances and simplifies the company's operations (Carrol 1992).
eBay's local and international popularity can also be attributed to its simple URL and efficient electronic money transfer mechanisms, such as PayPal, E-gold, and others. This is due to the fact that Internet businesses require much more than an online storefront to be successful. A simple URL is one of the most important requirements for a successful online business. If your URL is too long, few people will remember it, and they will likely visit a more memorable site instead. Therefore, eBay has adopted a simple URL so that their clients may easily remember it. A good Internet business also requires a shopping cart so that clients may select things, continue shopping on your website, and keep track of their spending (Chaffey 2003, 116). eBay provides its consumers with a sufficient number of these amenities to facilitate shopping.
Internet retailers may also require a service that enables them to accept credit cards, such as PayPal or other merchant account providers. It is quite difficult to operate an online business if you just accept checks and money orders. People are increasingly paying for internet transactions with credit cards, electronic cheques, and virtual currencies such as E-gold. If you enable your business to take various forms of payment, you will increase the likelihood that people will make purchases from your website. All eBay websites have effectively handled this issue by integrating PayPal to increase their online sales internationally. There are also significant benefits to being online; from my perspective, these are the two most significant: These are the technological contrasts; purchasers in one nation can afford to purchase high-tech goods at a lower price than in their own nation. This is because distinct market developments have occurred. The other factor is the difference in currencies; persons from the United Kingdom or the United States can purchase goods at a lower price than in their home nation due to the strength of their currency. Therefore, internet shopping enables clients to purchase things at a discount, which is what the bulk of online shoppers seek. This is the reason why eBay has been so successful at selling thousands of jewelry, watches, and electronic items like as computer software. (Chaffey 2003)
Conclusion
Effective marketing tactics are crucial because they improve the performance of firms. Therefore, business organizations must guarantee that they develop effective marketing strategies that will enable their products to compete effectively with those of other enterprises. This can be secured by the marketing department advising the management of their companies on how to increase the sales of their products and services. Establishing websites for the purpose of promoting the company's products or services is one of the marketing tactics that businesses can adopt. The construction of the website also aids the company in marketing and selling its products or services online, allowing it to serve customers across a larger geographical area at a reduced cost. Good marketing techniques should also enable businesses to effortlessly advertise their products and services across all cross-cultural barriers by localizing services across borders, allowing international consumers to adopt the firm's products as their own brand. These are the techniques adopted by IBM and eBay, which account for their outstanding performance (Jackson 1985).
References
Internet forums as powerful sources of consumer information, Bickart, B. (2001). (Journal of International Marketing, Vol. 15 No.3).
The myth of customer retention, authored by P. Carrol in 1992 (Journal of retail banking, Vol.15 No 2.).
Tools of Marketing Strategies, New York: Prentice Hall, 2003, by Chaffey, K.
12–20 in David Campbell and George Stonehouse, Business Strategy, Oxford University Press, London, 2004.
Growing the e in security Virtual Business volume 5, by John A.
O'Brien, J. A., and G. M. Marakas (2008) Management information systems McGraw-Hill/Irwin, Boston.
Jackson, B. (Harvard: Business magazine Issue Vol 4 No.6).
Tom Knight, Strategic marketing approaches, volume 5, page 8 (September 9, 2005)
Chaffey, A. (2003). International Marketing. New York: Prentice Hall.
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