Not-for-Profit Marketing - Essay Example

Not-for-Profit Marketing Contents Contents 2 Part one: DESCRIPTIVE 3 Considerations to be given to the marketing environment 3 Target markets or target consumers 5 Part two: EXPLANATORY 5 Marketing audit for the organisation 5 Challenges with digital marketing strategy and links into wider marketing practice 7 Part three: EVALUATIVE 7 Future digital approach for the organisation 7 Ethical considerations in digital planning 8 References 10 Part one: DESCRIPTIVE Considerations to be given to the marketing environment An organization does not operate in vacuum but is constantly influenced by the environment in which the organization operates. There are two different forces that affect the organizations marketing approach. Whereas the external marketing environment or the macro environment is not in the hands or control of the organization, it influences an organization marketing activities none the less. Another environment that influences a marketing decision is the micro environment that the organization faces. The macro environment that affects the marketing decisions is factors like Political/ Legal The political or legal environment of different countries varies from each other. It is important to understand the differences of the political and legal scenarios of the different countries so that UNESCO can design marketing strategies that are catered to the political or legal scenario of that particular country. The political or legal scenario is actually concerned with the monetary and fiscal policies if the different government. Political or legal scenario is important to analyze in matters where UNESCO needs to analyze about the world heritage sites of different countries. Visitors to a country for visiting a world heritage site increases if the country has a stable political government (Sadiki, 2012). This is an important factor that needs to be taken into consideration while going in for digital marketing. Economic Another important macroeconomic factor, which needs to be taken into consideration while a charity organization like UNESCO goes for marketing, is economic factor. Depending on the economic condition of the client the strategy for marketing and way to approach the client needs to differ. Social Another important factor that needs to be taken into consideration is the cultural factor. The culture that forms a part of the social factor needs to be understood very well. The culture of the area or the region in which UNESCO operates is very important to understand and consider for the marketing efforts to succeed (UNRWA, 2012). Technological Another important macroeconomic factor that needs to be considered is the technological factor that also needs to be considered in respect of an organization like UNESCO (UNESCO, 2014). Relation of macro and micro environment (Source: UNESCO, 2010) The micro economic factors that need to be taken into consideration are: Competitive forces, suppliers and customers. The competitive forces that influence the marketing decisions of the company are direct, new entrant, substitutes. Direct competitors that can affect the marketing decisions by a charity like UNESCO are other charities which attract all the funds and so the UNESCO may not be relevant and may not get the funds. New entrant may be a new competitor or charity that may enter and command all the attention due to their work. However a threat originating from a new entrant is very less in case of the charity space. Target markets or target consumers Target market or the target customers of UNESCO are generally Nations. The nations form a main part of the UNESCO’s fund source. So the main part of their marketing activities is directed towards the nations and securing funds from them. Other group of individuals, who from among the target customers of the organization are High net worth individuals or HNIs, public private partnerships and big organizations. All of these aforementioned organizations or individuals serve as the target market of an organization like UNESCO. The target market of UNESCO is actually different for different aspects of a project and UNESCO thus needs different focus in different markets as its action strategy (Kerkhoff, Ahmad, Pittock, and Steffen, 2011). A dynamic marketing plan is therefore required that takes into challenges in each case and the target market and also takes into account the macro and micro environment factors to effectively design a marketing strategy for each of the target market and the target customers. Part two: EXPLANATORY Marketing audit for the organisation Marketing audit of an organization is review or examination of the marketing activities of an organization. It is actually done to compare the marketing plans of an organization with the actual marketing performance of the organization. For performing a marketing audit of an organization it is necessary to identify external and internal marketing environment of the organization along with evaluation of the current marketing strategy of the organization to analyze its suitability with the external and internal marketing environment of the company. UNESCO as an organization under the broad wings of the United Nations has a wide recognition, in fact far wider than any other charity organization for that matter. The various programs of the organizations are funded by governments, HNI, or big organizations. Most of the funding that the UNESCO gets does not require any marketing activities as it has good brand name associated with it and people in its target market recognize the good activities done by the charity. Most of the people and large organizations want to get associated with UNESCO as part of the organization’s CSR activities. The firm additionally recruits fundraisers and marketing personnel for its various programs. The fundraisers have to take into considerations the macro economic factors such as cultural, political factors, economic and technical. These factors are important to consider for an organization like UNESCO as UNESCO has to operate in different countries that vary amongst them in terms of not only language, political and cultural factors. Understanding these factors are important before one tries to raise funds from that particular individual or organization so as to not hurt any of his sentiments and get the work done. There is a no. of charitable organizations that exists in today’s world all working towards a better future. Although charitable organizations do not work for profit the work of charity requires funds and quite a lot of it. All of the organizations require funds in order to function effectively and be able to do the share of the charitable work that the organizations desire to pursue. To seek attention and get the funds for doing effective charitable work requires that the funding should be received by the organization. The factor that UNESCO is successful as an organization and is successful in attracting funds from different sources supports the view that the organization’s marketing strategy is quite effective. Challenges with digital marketing strategy and links into wider marketing practice In today’s generation as more and more people live an online life mostly on face book, twitter and blogs the companies too have to come online in order to engage with the people. The coming of the charitable organizations to online platform is important not only to create awareness about their programs but also raise fund and maintain their brand awareness amongst different people (Ryan, 2014). UNESCO undertakes digital marketing especially on social media platforms in order to increase awareness about their programs with the target audience. For example UNESCO launched a discussion forum on face book that was related to one of their campaigns that they were supporting worldwide (UNESCO, 2013). The group was launched by UNESCO in conjunction with the youth forum regarding the topic freedom of expression toolkit: a guide for students. UNESCO is also present at twitter where it engages with different classes of people in order to let them know about the activities of the organization. The digital marketing activities of the organization are part of the border marketing activities of the organization and forms an integral part of the border marketing environment of the organization (Bird, 2007). Part three: EVALUATIVE Future digital approach for the organisation The UNESCO as an organization needs to go further in the engagement of the new generation of people be it their customers or the sources of fund or just to increase awareness about the several activities that the organizations. The modern generation spends most of the time on social network and so the organizations that needs to connect with their customers or to increase the awareness needs to spend most of their time on social network (Drumwright, 2004). The different ways in which the organizations increase their interactions with people is through engaging with them through social networks and through discussion forums. On face book UNESCO post the several activities that the organization is going to undertake in future. The organization can use face book also as a fund generating source. Additionally the organization can use face book to post videos of their several charity activities so that different people may be aware of the different activities that the organization engages in. The company can also conduct polls on several social networking websites in order to take their feedbacks on the different activities that the organization is currently on. The organizations can also feedback poll to ask the opinions of several people on the list of project or activities that the organization undertakes. The organization can host several competitions and other incentives in order to pull people towards its social networking site. The main factor behind the company coming on a social network is to associate itself with the different classes of stakeholders. Other digital medium that the company can use to increase its communications with the various stakeholders is through blog. The organization can also engage in other forms of digital marketing such as twitter so that it can interact with its customers more often. The main of the digital marketing is to increase the stakeholders’ awareness about the different activities that are undertaken by the organization (Picton, and Broderick, 2009). This is important not only to attract funds for the organization but may also be helpful for attracting talents to the organization in order to work for it. Ethical considerations in digital planning While engages in digital marketing or digital planning there are certain things that the company should keep in mind so as to nut hurt the sentiments of any one nor to criticize others. When an organization engages in digital marketing there are several factors that the organization has to look into. This is because, in the digital marketing world an organization is always subject to scrutiny and any wrong move by the organization can have a severe negative impact on the organization. In the digital world right steps taken by the organization will likely be quickly noticed by the organization. However on the flip side any wrong step is soon likely to be noticed and heavily criticized which may in turn affect an organization’s reputation. The ethical consideration that needs to be taken into consideration while designing a marketing plan is, the marketing plan should not defame or tell something bad about a different organization. In case of an organization like UNESCO which has its presence in different countries an additional requirement is that any of the marketing plan or activity that the organization designs should not say something ill about the culture of different countries. References Bird, D., 2007. Commonsense Direct and Digital Marketing. London: Kogan Page Publishers. Drumwright, M. E., 2004. Company advertising with a social dimension: the role of noneconomic criteria. Journal of Marketing. 60 (10). pp. 71-87. Kerkhoff, L.V., Ahmad, I. H., Pittock, J., and Steffen, W., 2011. Designing the Green Climate Fund: How to Spend $100 Billion Sensibly. [Online] Available at< http://www.environmentmagazine.org/Archives/Back%20Issues/2011/May-June%202011/green-climate-fund-full.html > [Accessed 14 March 2015]. Picton, D., and Broderick, A., 2009. Integrated marketing communications, 3rd edition. Harlow: FT- Prentice Hall. Ryan, D., 2014. Understanding Digital Marketing: Marketing Strategies for Engaging the Digital Generation. London: Kogan Page Publishers. Sadiki, F. A., 2012. Sustainable Tourism Marketing Strategies at UNESCO World Heritage Sites. [Online] Available at< http://digitalscholarship.unlv.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=2478&context=thesesdissertations > [Accessed 14 March 2015]. UNESCO, 2010. Understand the marketing environment. [Online] Available at< http://unesco-nigeriatve.org/teaching%20materials/bam/business%20administration%20&%20management/semester3/BAM%20115%20PRINCIPLE%20OF%20MARKETING/week4.html > [Accessed 14 March 2015]. UNESCO, 2013. UNESCO launches social media discussion page for the Freedom of Expression Toolkit. [Online] Available at< http://www.unesco.org/new/en/communication-and-information/resources/news-and-in-focus-articles/all-news/news/unesco_launches_social_media_discussion_page_for_the_freedom_of_expression_toolkit/#.VQQXOHyUffc > [Accessed 14 March 2015]. UNESCO, 2014. Programme Background. [Online] Available at< http://www.unesco.org/new/en/communication-and-information/flagship-project-activities/memory-of-the-world/about-the-programme/ > [Accessed 14 March 2015]. UNRWA, 2012. United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine refugees in the near east. [Online] Available at< https://en.unesco.org/careers/sites/careers/files/12-FO-RO-09%20Experts%20Roster%20PP%20Various_0.pdf > [Accessed 14 March 2015]. Read More