Marketing Of Services- Music Retailers - Essay Example

Marketing Of Services- Music Retailers Service marketing differs significantly from product marketing as a result of various factors. A service is characterised by the following factors: intangibility, inseparability, variability and perishability and these determine the marketing strategies that can be used to market different services (Kotler and Armstrong, 2010). However, the fact that services differ from other tangible products means that they require additional marketing approaches to successfully sell them. As such, this paper seeks to discuss the concept of services marketing and it will mainly focus on the music retailers in the UK. The paper starts by giving historical background information about the retail music service sector in the UK. The paper will outline the trends and characteristics of this sector in the UK and it will also discuss in detail some of the factors that impact on it. The music industry in the UK is quite complex and the complexity has been heightened by developments in the field of new information and communication technology (ICT). The existence of certain sites that stream music for free has impacted greatly on the musical industry in the UK. For instance, Deezer’s Europe vice-president Gerrit Schumann said: “A lot of people are not willing to pay for music, but they’re engaged with it, and that’s the first point. We see a lot of people coming to us who don’t buy CDs anymore,” (Dredge, 2015). It is very easy to get a free trial of music and this has impacted on the music retail sector. The other element that is impacting the music industry in the UK is piracy. Through the use of computer aided communication technology, the pirates can copy original music and make counterfeit copies that often find their way on the market through the back door. This practice has significantly impacted on copyright infringement of the musicians and it has become a challenging task for the artists, marketers and distributors of music to operate viably in the face of such malpractices taking place in daylight. The other issue is that it is pretty difficult to curtail piracy and a lot of money in this industry is lost through such unorthodox channels. It can be seen that the music retailers are faced with different challenges in their operations though the industry still remains a source of revenue in the economy. The service challenges likely to be faced in this sector vary depending of each characteristic of the service going to be discussed in detail below. Strydom (2004) has observed that one of the characteristics of a service is that it is intangible. It is quite challenging to convince the customers about the benefits they can obtain from something they cannot hold. This means that the marketers ought to make the service tangible in one way or the other to send the right signal about quality (Kotler and Armstrong, 2010). The other characteristic of a service is its inseparability where it cannot be separated from their providers. Service variability is another characteristic of a service and this means that the quality of the services depends on who provides them as well as when, where and how they are provided (Kotler and Armstrong, 2010). Service perishability is another component that should be taken into account by the marketers. These characteristics make it challenging to market services but a services marketing triangle can be used to try to solve some of the challenges. Fig 1: Three types of services marketing Business Internal marketing External marketing Interactive marketing Employees Customers As illustrated in the diagram above, it can be seen that different marketing strategies are ideal for dealing with different challenges that may be encountered when marketing a service to different groups. One notable thing that should be taken into account is the fact that these different marketing strategies cannot be applicable to all scenarios. The appropriate measure of service quality for the face-to-face interaction between provider and potential customer that can be implemented is interactive marketing strategy. According to Kotler and Armstrong (2010, p. 259), “interactive marketing entails training service employees in the fine art of interacting with the customers to satisfy their needs.” This means that service quality depends heavily on the quality of the buyer seller interaction during the service encounter. The service marketers who care about the people are likely to implement interactive strategies that are designed to satisfy every need of the potential customers. Unlike tangible products which can be physically experienced by the customers, it can be seen that the potential customers of services need to be persuaded so that they can buy the musical products offered in the market. One important thing that should be taken into account when marketing music is that the customers have different tastes. This means that the customers may not all like the same type of music. Interactive marketing is likely to change the behavior of the targeted customers if they are provided with information about the qualities of the genre of music. According to Cant (2006), customer behaviour is influenced by different factors such as attitude, lifestyle as well as culture among other factors. In case of music, it can be seen that elements such as lifestyle mainly determine the customer preferences of the type of music they can listen to or buy. As such, the service marketers ought to take this into consideration when they design their marketing strategies to attract the customers to buy their products. Through interaction with the prospective customers, the service marketer is in a better position to appeal to their interests as a result of the fact that they can readily provide all the information they may require about the service offered (Reynold, 1994). It is easier to convince a customer to buy a particular product in a face to face communication situation. The other advantage is that information about a service can be exchanged freely and this situation is likely to create mutual understanding between the marketers and the buyers of the service offered. The other issue that should be taken into account is that there have been numerous advancements in the field of information and communication technology (ICT) and these have impacted on different aspects of business across the whole spectrum. This notion is succinctly put by Kotler and Armstrong (2010, p. 259) who state that “in today’s marketplace, firms must know how to deliver interactions that are not only ‘high-touch” but also “high-tech.” for example, customers can log onto different websites of the music retailers in the UK to access the information they may require about different services offered. The consumers now have great control about selecting the products and services they desire through the use of different websites. Social media is also another new communication tool that can enhance interaction between the marketers and the customers where they can exchange information of interest (Strydom, 2004). There are different types of social media such as Twitter, Facebook, YouTube as well as Instagram among others. It can be observed that social media has created a new element in the promotion mix and it enables the marketers to communicate in real time with their prospective customers who may be located in geographically dispersed places. In the music industry, social media can be used to develop fan-artist relationships and these are very important in as far as marketing of the service offered is concerned. Margiotta (2012) states that internet-based social media have become an increasingly very important aspect of marketing communications throughout all industries and the music industry has also benefited from it. This new media enhances the exchange of information between the customers and the marketers of different services. It can be seen that the music industry has significantly changed over time and the interaction mix has aided this particular change. The customers now have the ability to ‘self manufacture’ the service through the adoption of technology into the delivery of the service. It can be seen that digital marketing has significantly taken center stage in the marketing of music during the contemporary period. Platforms such as Instagram, Google Music and YouTube among others are gaining prominence in as far as marketing music is concerned (Taylor, 2014). Historically, it can be seen that before the advent of the internet, brick and mortar strategies were used to market different types of music. Musical products were distributed by the recording companies and other designated retail outlets. Music was also marketed through the airplay it received on the radio and it can be seen that this industry was well organized these days. There were few loopholes in the industry and the artists were guaranteed of getting their royalties from the companies that were responsible for marketing and distributing their services. However, the changing trend in ICT has heralded a new era in the music industry. It is now easy to market and distribute music through the use of digital technology. Taylor (2014) has observed that mobile devices such as iPads and cellphones are now frequently used to access different types of music. These devices can also be used to transfer music and it can be copied to several people. Marketing of music can also be done through the same devices as long as they can connect to the internet. The music industry as noted above is becoming complex as a result of the use of sophisticated information and communication technology. The marketers in this sector need to be technologically savvy in order for them to achieve their desired goals of attracting many customers to the services offered. Specially designed websites are increasingly being used by music retailers since this has become the widely used platform for conducting business by different people from various sectors of the economy. The extended marketing mix is comprised of the following: price, product, promotion, place, people, process, positioning and performance (Smith and Media, 2015). These are mainly applicable to services marketing. These factors are applied by two music retailers in the UK namely Amazon and HMV. According to Ruddick (2015), “HMV has reclaimed its position as the biggest retailer of physical music in Britain after a rise in Christmas sales.” This section compares how the two retailers implement the extended marketing mix in their operations. The interesting thing about the marketing mixes of the two is that HMV use face to face while Amazon uses digital marketing strategies. Both companies offer musical products and HMV sells compact discs. HMV uses the third less shop as its place to distribute its product and the price is determined by the demand. On the other hand, Amazon uses online stores to market the products and the price is fixed. HMV use personal selling for promotion while Amazon uses online advertising. For both retailers, the people are the targeted consumers while the process of marketing the products involves face to face for HMV and online marketing for Amazon. HMV’s positioning strategy involves physical stores while Amazon relies on the internet. The performance for both retailers is determined by the totals sales recorded and in this HMV is performing better than Amazon in terms of sales recorded. It is recommended that Amazon should take promotion of music seriously in order to boost its sales. The company can try personal selling which is more effective given that it involves face to face interaction. Over and above, it can be seen that services marketing differs from product marketing in that the strategies used to market the two are not the same. A service is intangible and this makes it quite difficult to market it. The changing trends in ICT have also dramatically changed the music industry. Digital technology is now commonly used to market music in the UK. Though there are benefits from using this technology to market music, it can be seen that there are also challenges posed by using the same technology in marketing music. These technological advancements have heralded a new era where unorthodox practices such as piracy are aided by the same technology. The most challenging thing is that it is difficult to curtail piracy and it infringes on the copyright issues of the producers. References Cant, J. 2006. Marketing perspectives. CT: JUTA. Dredge, S. 2015. “Free streaming is 'killing music industry': Ministry boss.” Viewed 15 March 2015, from: http://www.theguardian.com/technology/2015/mar/11/ministry-of-sound-streaming-switch-off-free Kotler, P. & Armstrong, G. (2010). Principles of marketing. CT: Pearson Education. Langer, E. 2014. “What’s Trending? Social Media and its Effects on Organizational Communication.” UW-L Journal of Undergraduate Research XVII. Viewed 15 March 2015, from: http://www.uwlax.edu/urc/JUR-online/PDF/2014/Langer.Emily.CST.pdf Margiotta, M. 2012. “Influence of Social Media on the Management of Music Star Image.” The Elon Journal of Undergraduate Research in Communications. Vol. 3, No. 1. Viewed 15 March 2015, from:: https://www.elon.edu/docs/e-web/academics/communications/research/vol3no1/01MargiottaEJSpring12.pdf Reynolds, L. 1994. Introduction to marketing. London: Prentice Hall. Ruddick, G. 16 January 2015. “HMV reclaims its position as Britain's biggest music retailer.” The Telegraph. Viewed 15 March 2015 from: http://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/newsbysector/retailandconsumer/11348287/HMV-reclaims-its-position-as-Britains-biggest-music-retailer.html Smith, S. & Media, D. 2015. “Applying the Eight P's of the Marketing Mix in the Service Industry.” Viewed 15 March 2015, from: http://smallbusiness.chron.com/applying-eight-ps-marketing-mix-service-industry-58585.html Strydom, J. 2004. Marketing. CT: JUTA. Taylor, M. 2014. “Digital marketing and the music industry: six key trends for 2014.” Viewed 15 March 2015, from: https://econsultancy.com/blog/64051-digital-marketing-and-the-music-industry-six-key-trends-for-2014/ Read More