The Key Social Influences in Marketing - Assignment Example

Marketing Table of Contents 2A 2B 2C 2D References 2A There are key social influences that allow certain business firms and organizations, such as Tower.com and Motorola, as well as media organizations such as Oprah, to connect with their target markets and customers. For Oprah for instance, key social influences relate to the way Oprah herself has morphed through her long years of intimate connections with women and in mothers to become an opinion leader, whose musings, preferences and recommendations have become strong suggestions for continuing to connect with the Oprah brand and its shows and offerings (Harpo Productions Inc., 2014). In the case of Motorola, the site makes explicit reference to the company being a Google firm, also connecting with its customers via the brand cachet of Google and its massive influence in technology and in the decision-making of technology buyers and enthusiasts. The Motorola brand and organization, in this case, leverages the strong brand image of Google among not just that subculture of smart phone users that are heavily into technology in general and in Android and smart phones in general, but also the general mass of consumers who are intimate with Google as both a provider of search and of advertising related to search. Here the Motorola brand makes use of the wide reach of Google through its popular mass media properties too, chief among them YouTube, to also further reinforce its attempt to lure in the mass market customers in different parts of the world. The marketing mix element of price, which is deliberately set low for its mass market phones, is reinforced by its leveraging the Google name in its web pages (Motorola Mobility LLC, 2014). In the case of music marketers like Tower, on the other hand, the key social influences relate to the way the site leverages music icons such as Michael Jackson, who by their stature even post-death constitute a heavy influence on the opinions of music consumers, to lure in a wide demographic of music lovers into its site (Tower.com, 2014). 2B The literature states that certain products lend themselves to heavier advertising than others, because of various aspects of the product, such as the product’s being new; the complexity factor associated with the product and its features and benefits; the need to highlight differentiating factors of the product; intense competition; the novelty of the product requiring intensive education and explanation; and the product being of wide appeal to many different market segments for different purposes, requiring different advertisements that cater to those differing market segments. An example of the latter is smart phones, where aspects relating to imaging, for instance, may have wide appeal to one audience, while aspects relating to apps may appeal to another set of audience, requiring heavier advertising to reach those differing segments of the market. New product introductions, such as those around new variants of existing soaps, for instance, may also require new and more intensive advertising. Where competition is intense too, for instance when differing firms jostle for a tight market for shampoo, then different shampoo brands may need to invest in heavier advertising in order to stand out from the crowd of alternatives. On the flip side, products that have monopoly market share, such as Windows software for instance, may require lighter advertising, because the product is known and is important, but at the same time people have really few viable options owing to the monopoly power of Windows software in PCs (Kokemuller, 2014). 2C The general thinking is that movies and their evaluation can benefit from both qualitative and quantitative research, as is the case for many other pursuits and disciplines. In social marketing research, for instance, the thinking is that both types of research methods have their place in being able to understand the dynamics of specific social activities and phenomena. For instance, qualitative research can provide macro views of a social problem, and pave the way for the identification of key issues. Quantitative research can then substantiate the findings and the parameters/issues that have been identified in the qualitative research, by way of drilling down into the specifics in order to cull insights from the numerical data and analysis that are tied to the quantitative methods. One can extrapolate this overall process of using both types of research in the evaluation of movies as well. For instance, in a sample population that has watched a particular movie or a particular group of movies for a research undertaking, qualitative research methods can identify broad categories of analysis that can apply to all of the movies, and can also identify general population reactions and thoughts relating to the movies, in an exploratory and open-ended manner. Once the categories of discussions have been unearthed in the exploratory qualitative research, quantitative research methods can then be used to further investigate the movies along the lines of the established categories from the previous step, in order to draw more detailed conclusions and insights relating to the movies (Weinreich, 1996). 2D Fund allocation for advertising for a real estate development undertaking is optimized when it flows from a more rigorous marketing strategy, one that takes into consideration the target markets for the development. The fund allocation then would be one that reaches the core target market, so that advertising spend has the most impact in terms of attracting those who are most likely to buy, and has the most impact in terms of generating the most sale. This allocation therefore is dependent on the target market composition. If the target market is young and technology-savvy, then it makes sense to allocate more advertising money to advertising in online and social media platforms, in order to reach that target market optimally. On the other hand, another target market would be better reached by advertising in more traditional print media and radio, thus affecting the ad budget allocation accordingly to be heavily weighted to those media channels. This is true for instance where the target market is older and less dependent on modern technology such as the Internet and social media in general (Tracey, 2007). 1 2 3 References Harpo Productions Inc. (2014). Oprah. Oprah.com. Retrieved from http://www.oprah.com/index.html Kokemuller, N. (2014). What Product Characteristics Encourage Heavy Advertising? Chron. Retrieved from http://smallbusiness.chron.com/product-characteristics-encourage-heavy-advertising-58784.html Motorola Mobility LLC (2014). Motorola - A Google Company Motorola Homepage. Retrieved from http://www.motorola.com/us/home Tower.com (2014). Welcome to Tower.com. Tower.com Homepage. Retrieved from http://www.tower.com/ Tracey, M. (2007). 3 Marketing Budgets, 3 Great Plans. Realtor Mag. Retrieved from http://realtormag.realtor.org/sales-and-marketing/feature/article/2007/05/3-marketing-budgets-3-great-plans Weinreich, N. (1996). Integrating Quantitative and Qualitative Methods in Social Marketing Research. Weinreich Communications. Retrieved from http://www.social-marketing.com/research.html Read More