Brand Marketing Solutions | Marketing Strategy Akurdi

About Us

Fulcrum use fun interactive experiences to increase engagement by at least 300% against other comms methods.

People’s behaviour and how they interact with organisations, and the channels they prefer to use, has changed. This is true for consumers and employees alike. Many brands, however, continue to push messages out in the hope they get noticed at the right time and in the right place.

To deliver the kind of experiences that individuals want, deserve and engage with, a marked-change is required; a change that sees organisations delivering communications that not only capture an audience’s attention, but which audiences actively want to participate in and engage with and consumers actively want to engage with brands of their choice.

Fulcrum’s marketing platform allows brands’ teams to create , interactive campaigns that drive positive consumer behaviour by rewarding consumers for their actions. These engaging experiences give consumers something new and exciting to do and re-engage lapsed customers, keep a brand front of mind in between visits, increase acquisition and ultimately, drive greater footfall and revenue, even on those quieter days.

Brand Marketing Solutions | Marketing Strategy Akurdi

employment Solutions in pune

Hey, you deserve a chance to find a good job. To work on your terms. To better your situation. To be appreciated. To be a provider. Now, maybe you’ve tried staffing agencies before. But this is different. We have thousands of jobs across the country. And you just need one good one. So, what are you waiting for? Find it today and get to work!

Accounting & Finance Jobs

You’re really good with money—counting it, managing it, turning it into more money. That’s great because we know a lot of companies who are looking for skills like yours. From Big  firms to smaller start-ups. Just check out our accounting and finance jobs, find the right one for you and then get to work. So you can make some money of your own.

Manufacturing Jobs

There are a lot of great manufacturing and industrial jobs in America. At a lot of great companies. How do we know? Well, because we have our very own huge list of great manufacturing and industrial jobs at great companies. Check them out.

Office, Clerical & Admin jobs

Finding an office job is not the same thing as finding a job in the right office. Shouldn’t you work someplace where you love the people, location and atmosphere? We think so. Apply for some of these office, clerical and administrative jobs and let us help you find the best office for you.

Human Resources Jobs

You know a thing or two about jobs, recruiting, interviewing and hiring. Hey, when you have an HR job, that’s what you do. And we’re into all that, too. Looks like we have a lot in common. It also looks like we have a lot of HR jobs. Check them out.

Retail & Sales Jobs

Shopping for a job? Feel free to browse through our sales and retail jobs below. Or you can always send us an application and we’ll help you find something that fits you really well. Whatever works for you. Just look around and let us know if you need any help. Thanks. Have a great day!

Call Center & Customer Service Jobs

Are you a quick thinker? A good communicator? A problem-solver? A conflict resolver? Oh yeah, and are you friendly? Being friendly is really important. You’ve got to be friendly and stay positive—even when some callers are frustrated. If that’s you, then great call center or customer service jobs are standing by. Apply now!

Hospitality Jobs

Welcome. How can we help you today? Oh, you’re looking for jobs in hospitality? Excellent. We’d be happy to show what we have. If you see something you like, please feel free to apply. Is there anything else we can do for you? Well, thanks for checking out our hospitality jobs. It’s been a real pleasure.

Creative & Marketing Jobs

You’ve got to think strategically in your job. But you’ve also got to think strategically about it. What’s your next move? Well, we’ve got some great creative, marketing, communications and digital marketing jobs here. Freelance and permanent. At some excellent companies. See if any of them fit your career strategy.

In this era of cutting edge technological advancements and an increasingly digital society, People Profilers is at the forefront of enabling our clients’ to stay on top of the latest digital trends and reach greater heights through the right human capital solutions. With a proven track record of successful placements of IT & Telco professionals, Fulcrum is well equipped to meet the high demands in this emerging market.

Our IT & telecommunication portfolio covers organization from SMEs, statutory boards, and multinational corporations. We assist our clients in providing specialized recruitment in the domains of project management & service delivery, business development & account management, system/network design & administration, enterprise systems analysis & integration, data centre/NOC management, and Voice (VOIP)/telephony.

Our team of consultants are industry leaders equipped with the training and expertise to understand emerging technologies and trends and the ability to offer our clients insight into the market and source the right talents for their roles.

Fulcrum have an illustrious history of providing human capital solutions in the logistics and transportation industry. Our clients are world leaders in their field, specializing in international freight forwarding, supply chain management, transportation and logistics.

They are mostly third party logistics like freight forwarders, courier companies and other companies integrating & offering subcontracted logistics and transportation services. These companies typically specialise in integrated operations, warehousing, and transportation services, which can be scaled and customized to customer’s needs based on market conditions and the demands and delivery service requirements for their products and materials.

As a leading Recruitment Agency in the logistics industry, we understand the sizeable manpower required by our clients in this industry. Our consultants play an important role assisting our clients in specialised recruitment for areas in supply chain management, logistics and freight forwarding.

Fulcrum views the media and publishing industry as expansive and highly competitive. Our specialist consultants in this field partner with organisations to identify strategic steps for manpower support and to find them the most innovative talent to implement solutions. It is our knowledge of the unique trends and developments within the industry that make us peerless within recruitment circles. Our Recruitment Agency is dedicated to providing each and every client with a personalised service backed by our unrivalled expertise to ensure a successful outcome.

We understand that the success of media and publishing companies is largely dependent on product development, marketing expertise, and experienced leadership. With the help of our media and publishing search team, our clients can maximise profitability by finding and retaining exceptional talents. It’s a win/win situation for both of us.

Fulcrum’ rich database is matched only by our precision, experience, and systematic search and close processes. Our unique methodology and team-based approach, combined with our insider knowledge of the ever-changing media and publishing landscape, ensures clients and placements return to us again and again for both open and confidential searches.

Fulcrum have worked and built promising relationships with a diverse group of real estate clients including acclaimed property developers, international contractors and property consultancies. Our real estate specialists adopt customized search methodologies to source and attract the right talents that perfectly meet our clients’ recruitment requirements.

Our real estate and property portfolio covers residential, industrial, commercial, integrated developments, hospitality businesses and Real Estate Investment. Fulcrum understands that real estate development and the property management market can be highly complex. However, our experienced consultants comprehensively understand the real estate and property market. We are able to provide expert recruitment advice and support to our valued clients, for the purpose of establishing a long-term working relationship with them.

Our specialized consultants support the real estate & property industry across a range of subsectors which includes real estate development & project management, property & estate management, consultancy services, fund & asset management, and REITs.

Like many First World countries, Pune’s healthcare system has become increasingly specialised. While this has improved care delivery within the respective specialty domains, Fulcrum is very well aware of the focus and challenges in helping our clients to search for the right skilled talents in providing healthcare and medical services for our aging population.

We cover recruitment and specialist search for national hospitals, Singapore government restructured hospitals, specialists, private hospitals, medical clinics, as well as multinational corporations dealing with generic or brand medications and medical devices. Fulcrum’ team of professional consultants are dedicated to providing a full range of recruitment solutions including permanent placements, temporary staffing on contracts and payroll administration. Our staff have successfully supported the recruitment needs of our healthcare clients from entry level all the way to senior management positions across medical, nursing, administration and ancillary divisions.

Fulcrum have been heavily involved in the medical and healthcare recruiting sphere across Singapore. Armed with an extensive recruiting network and an in-depth understanding of the healthcare industry, we are capable of serving your every business needs. With updated and fresh resumes deposited into our database regularly, Fulcrum is ready to impress.

Fulcrum has considerable experience providing construction recruitment services to commercial and industrial contractors. Our construction clients include government agencies, small and medium private enterprises, as well as multinational corporations who can be main or sub contractors, architectural companies, construction raw materials, and equipment manufacturers.

Our construction recruiters have gained significant experience and expertise for a wide range of civil engineering projects of differing scales and complexities, as well as building a construction job force with a wide variety of trades and positions. These include areas of architecture, civil engineering, project management, quantity surveying.

Fulcrumare highly capable of offering the right human capital solutions to businesses in the construction and civil engineering industry, and meeting their sourcing and hiring requirements.

Hey, you deserve a chance to find a good job. To work on your terms. To better your situation. To be appreciated. To be a provider. Now, maybe you’ve tried staffing agencies before. But this is different. We have thousands of jobs across the country. And you just need one good one. So, what are you waiting for? Find it today and get to work!

Accounting & Finance Jobs

You’re really good with money—counting it, managing it, turning it into more money. That’s great because we know a lot of companies who are looking for skills like yours. From Big  firms to smaller start-ups. Just check out our accounting and finance jobs, find the right one for you and then get to work. So you can make some money of your own.

Manufacturing Jobs

There are a lot of great manufacturing and industrial jobs in America. At a lot of great companies. How do we know? Well, because we have our very own huge list of great manufacturing and industrial jobs at great companies. Check them out.

Office, Clerical & Admin jobs

Finding an office job is not the same thing as finding a job in the right office. Shouldn’t you work someplace where you love the people, location and atmosphere? We think so. Apply for some of these office, clerical and administrative jobs and let us help you find the best office for you.

Human Resources Jobs

You know a thing or two about jobs, recruiting, interviewing and hiring. Hey, when you have an HR job, that’s what you do. And we’re into all that, too. Looks like we have a lot in common. It also looks like we have a lot of HR jobs. Check them out.

Retail & Sales Jobs

Shopping for a job? Feel free to browse through our sales and retail jobs below. Or you can always send us an application and we’ll help you find something that fits you really well. Whatever works for you. Just look around and let us know if you need any help. Thanks. Have a great day!

Call Center & Customer Service Jobs

Are you a quick thinker? A good communicator? A problem-solver? A conflict resolver? Oh yeah, and are you friendly? Being friendly is really important. You’ve got to be friendly and stay positive—even when some callers are frustrated. If that’s you, then great call center or customer service jobs are standing by. Apply now!

Hospitality Jobs

Welcome. How can we help you today? Oh, you’re looking for jobs in hospitality? Excellent. We’d be happy to show what we have. If you see something you like, please feel free to apply. Is there anything else we can do for you? Well, thanks for checking out our hospitality jobs. It’s been a real pleasure.

Creative & Marketing Jobs

You’ve got to think strategically in your job. But you’ve also got to think strategically about it. What’s your next move? Well, we’ve got some great creative, marketing, communications and digital marketing jobs here. Freelance and permanent. At some excellent companies. See if any of them fit your career strategy.

 

Marketing Strategy Akurdi

Brand Marketing Solutions, Marketing activation Companies , Fieldwork marketing Program , retail marketing Strategy

Fieldwork marketing Program , retail marketing Strategy, door to door marketing Strategy , local marketing Strategy , Feet On Street marketing Strategy , school Marketing Strategy , Theater Marketing Strategy, B To B marketing Strategy

 

door to door marketing Strategy | Marketing Strategy in pune

Fulcrum Marketing Services in Pune are the catalyst to bringing your advertising vision to life. While many ideas start in a boardroom, you need experienced marketers on the ground who are able to conceptualize, plan and execute a well thought-out marketing campaign in the field.

we supply the experience, connections, relationships, and knowledge needed to maximize the potential return on investment for each of our clients as well as help identify and pursue select market opportunities as they come available, door to door marketing Strategy | Marketing Strategy in pune. Our local insight allows us to create exceptional investment potential for our partners and clients and enhanced living experience for our residents.

CREATING COMMUNITIES WHERE PEOPLE ARE EAGER TO LIVE AND RELUCTANT TO LEAVE

We define and position apartment homes for success. We are passionate about the residential experience and the qualitative and quantitative points that drive us to make strategic decisions that inform what a home should be — specific to its marketplace.

Results are realized through both the speed of lease-ups and financial performance of the on-going stabilized investment.

MARKET RESEARCH
We crunch the numbers, ask the questions, assess current trends and forecast future trends with detailed, up-to-date research to understand our markets; Ensuring our clients have the right data points to make the best decisions going forward.

MARKET POSITIONING
What’s the experience living here? What’s the story and name of this place? Our experience and insight allows us to identify and position each project’s distinctive offerings as its market niche. We provide an understanding that goes deeper than looking at trends. We create sought-after, thoughtfully executed apartment communities that are compatible with their surrounding neighborhoods.

MARKETING STRATEGY
Overall success relies on a thoughtful marketing strategy. In a constantly changing environment, we develop and implement each marketing initiative specific to your audience and budget. Reaching consumers in a way that educates and informs; ultimately creating product desirability and excellent rates of return.

 

 

Outbound Calling

REACH OUT TO CLIENTS, PROSPECTS, AND CUSTOMERS WITHOUT REACHING DEEP INTO YOUR POCKET

Let our experienced team help you sell

Do you want to take advantage of the same sales force that many of the top lead generation companies use to build their market share? Executive  sales and outbound calling will help your business grow. Our telemarketing agents have the experience to make your outbound sales and telemarketing campaign a success. We have talented script writers who know how to market to your customers, and we use the newest dialing technology to make sure your agents are on the phones selling and not waiting for their calls to connect. we work hard to make sure we exceed your expectations. Major lead generation and data collection companies trust Executive  to make their calls. Why should your business be any different?

Outbound Call Center Services

  • Sales Lead Generation
  • Telemarketing
  • Schedule Appointments
  • Market Research
  • Surveys
  • Data Verification
  • Fundraising
  • Post Sales Follow-Up

Experience

Executive Boutique has highly skilled agents with years of experience selling products and telemarketing over the phone. We tailor programs that fit your needs and offer the best in script writing, quality control, and outbound call training. And our detailed reporting lets you be sure your campaign is running the way you expect. Executive Boutique works with some of the largest lead generation companies in the United States and we provide our clients with fresh sales opportunities daily

Value

With Executive  offshore call center you get more value for your outbound calling campaigns. Our comprehensive support ensures high sales ratio, customer service and the best return on investment. Our telemarketing teams have helped our clients in various market sectors including: Health Care Products, Nutritional Products, Online Marketing, Medical Equipment, Subscription Renewal, Educational Training, Work-From-Home, Franchise Expansion, Student Loans, Mortgage Loans, Payday lending, Health Insurance, Income Tax Preparation, Legal Marketing, and Direct Response Follow-up.

Fulcrum pricing is both competitive and flexible. With no long-term commitments, our month-to-month agreements give you the flexibility to add agents to projects fast. Our onsite training and quality control ensures that your expectations will be met.

Technology

Fulcrum uses the newest and most advanced predictive dialer technology to make sure your outbound campaigns run at maximum efficiency. Research indicates that predictive dialing can increase call center efficiency by close to 300%. We offer onsite monitoring and call recording of our agents and outbound call center activity to optimize sales conversions and call outcomes.

 

door to door marketing Strategy | Marketing Strategy in pune

 

Marketing Strategy, B To B marketing, Brand Marketing Solutions, Marketing activation Companies, Fieldwork marketing Program, retail marketing Strategy, door to door marketing Strategy, local marketing Strategy, Feet On Street marketing Strategy, school Marketing Strategy, Theater Marketing Strategy, hospital Marketing Strategy , B To B marketing Strategy , Flyer Delivery Strategy, pune , mumbai

Privacy Laws

Module 5: Ethics and Social Responsibility

Reading: Privacy Laws

Introduction

Drawing of a computer keyboard. All the keys are blank except seven in the center row, which spell the word PRIVACYWhat does privacy mean in today’s world? Privacy is the ability of an individual or group to seclude themselves, or information about themselves, and thereby express themselves selectively. Most of us expect some level of privacy, but the boundaries around privacy can differ depending on the individual and the situation.

The right-to-privacy issue has gotten more complicated as our culture has come to rely so heavily on digital communication—for everything from social networking to education to conducting business. Marketers have been quick to capitalize on the potential of digital technology to yield creative, aggressive techniques for reaching their target buyers. Sometimes these aggressive tactics cause a public backlash that results in new laws. For example, intrusive telephone marketing activities led to the passage of the the Do-Not-Call Implementation Act of 2003, which permits individuals to register their phone number to prevent marketing calls from organizations with which they don’t have an existing relationship. The act was intended to protect consumers from a violation of privacy (incessant sales phone calls particularly during the evening hours), and it closed down many businesses that had used telephone solicitation as their primary sales channel.

What follows is an overview of important privacy laws that have a particular impact on marketers. These are areas in which marketers need to be thinking ahead of the law. While there are plenty of perfectly legal marketing tactics that utilize personal information, if they are a nuisance to prospective customers, they are probably not good marketing and may be affected by future legislation when the public decides it has had enough.

Email Spam

Have you received email messages without giving permission to the sender? The Controlling the Assault of Non-Solicited Pornography and Marketing (CAN-SPAM) Act, passed in 2003, establishes federal standards for commercial email.  Consumers must be given the opportunity to opt out of receiving future solicitations, as in this opt-out notice provided by the clothing company Abercrombie & Fitch:

This is a product offering from Abercrombie & Fitch. You have received this email since you submitted your email address to our list of subscribers. To unsubscribe, please click here and submit your email address. Please see our Website Terms of Use, and to know how we use your personal data, please see our Privacy Policy.

Despite its name, the CAN-SPAM Act doesn’t apply just to bulk email. It covers all commercial messages, which the law defines as “any electronic mail message the primary purpose of which is the commercial advertisement or promotion of a commercial product or service,” including email that promotes content on commercial Web sites. The law makes no exception for business-to-business email. That means that all email—even, for example, a message to former customers announcing a new product line—must comply with the law. Each separate email in violation of the CAN-SPAM Act is subject to penalties of up to $16,000, so non-compliance can be very costly. The good news is that following the law isn’t complicated.

Managing Customer Data

Graphic representing tech privacy. Silhouette of a person on the right. Surrounding the person are various logos for online sites and activities (e.g., Facebook, Twitter, Google).

Sometimes companies and organization possess personal data about their customers that is collected during the course of doing business. The most obvious examples are medical organizations that keep confidential patient records, financial institutions that capture your financial data, and educational institutions that record student test scores and grades. Other companies might know your contact information, your purchase patterns, and your Internet-shopping or search history. These organization all have important legal responsibilities to protect your data.

The Federal Trade Commission (FTC) gives access to an important source of information about the necessity of securing sensitive data: the lessons contained in the more than fifty law enforcement actions taken by the FTC so far. These are settlements—no findings have been made by a court—and the details of the orders apply just to the companies involved, but learning about alleged lapses that have led to law enforcement actions can help your company improve its practices. Most of these alleged practices involve basic, fundamental security missteps or oversights. Without getting into the details of those cases, below are ten practical tips that we can learn from them. Distilling the facts of those cases down to their essence, here are ten lessons to learn that touch on vulnerabilities that could affect your company, along with practical guidance on how to reduce the risks they pose.

  1. Start with security: only collect customer data when necessary; be transparent; and treat the data with extreme care.
  2. Control and restrict access to sensitive data.
  3. Require strong, secure passwords and authentication; protect access to sensitive data
  4. Store sensitive personal information securely and protect it during transmission: use best-in-class security technology.
  5. Segment your network and monitor who’s trying to get in and out
  6. Secure remote access to your network: put sensible access limits in place.
  7. Apply sound security practices when developing new products; train engineers in security and test for common vulnerabilities.
  8. Make sure your service providers implement reasonable security measures: write security into contracts and verify compliance.
  9. Establish procedures to keep your security current and address vulnerabilities that may arise; heed credible security warnings.
  10. Secure paper, physical media, and devices—not all data are stored digitally.

These may seem like overly technical considerations that aren’t important to someone working in a marketing organization, but in the same way that it is important for a marketer to protect its company from product liability suits, it is important to protect customers from security breaches related to the company’s products, services, and marketing activities.

Protecting Privacy Online

The Internet provides unprecedented opportunities for the collection and sharing of information from and about consumers. But studies show that consumers have very strong concerns about the security and confidentiality of their personal information in the online marketplace. Many consumers also report reluctance to engage in online commerce, partly because they fear that their personal information can be misused. These consumer concerns present an opportunity for marketers to build consumer trust by implementing sound practices for protecting consumers’’ information privacy.

The FTC recommends four Fair Information Practice Principles. These are guidelines that represent widely accepted concepts concerning fair information practice in an electronic marketplace.

Notice

Consumers should be given notice of an entity’s information practices before any personal information is collected from them, including, at a minimum, identification of the entity collecting the data, the uses to which the data will be put, and any potential recipients of the data.

Choice

Choice and consent in an online information-gathering sense means giving consumers options to control how their data is used. Specifically, choice relates to secondary uses of information beyond the immediate needs of the information collector to complete the consumer’s transaction. The two typical types of choice models are “opt-in” or “opt-out.” The opt-in method requires that consumers give permission for their information to be used for other purposes. Without the consumer taking these affirmative steps in an opt-in system, the information gatherer assumes that it cannot use the information for any other purpose. The opt-out method requires consumers to affirmatively decline permission for other uses. Without the consumer taking these affirmative steps in an opt-out system, the information gatherer assumes that it can use the consumer’s information for other purposes.

Access

Access, as defined in the Fair Information Practice Principles, includes not only a consumer’s ability to view the data collected but also to verify and contest its accuracy. This access must be inexpensive and timely in order to be useful to the consumer.

Security

Information collectors should ensure that the data they collect is accurate and secure. They can improve the integrity of data by cross-referencing it with only reputable databases and by providing access for the consumer to verify it. Information collectors can keep their data secure by protecting against both internal and external security threats. They can limit access within their company to only necessary employees to protect against internal threats, and they can use encryption and other computer-based security systems to stop outside threats.

In June 1998, the FTC issued a report to Congress noting that while more than 85 percent of all Web sites collected personal information from consumers, only 14 percent of the sites in the FTC’’s random sample of commercial Web sites provided any notice to consumers of the personal information they collect or how they use it. In May 2000, the FTC issued a follow-up report that showed significant improvement in the percent of Web sites that post at least some privacy disclosures; still, only 20 percent of the random sample sites were found to have implemented all four fair information practices: notice, choice, access, and security. Even when the survey looked at the percentage of sites implementing the two critical practices of notice and choice, only 41 percent of the random sample provided such privacy disclosures.

In the evolving field of privacy law there is an opportunity for marketers build trust with target customers by setting standards that are higher than the legal requirements and by respecting customers’ desire for privacy.

Product Liability

Module 5: Ethics and Social Responsibility

Reading: Product Liability

Introduction

Product liability is the legal liability a manufacturer or trader incurs for producing or selling a faulty product.

There is not a single federal law or code that covers all product liability. Fourteen states have adopted the Uniform Commercial Code, which governs business transactions between states. Specifically, Article 2 of the code includes the requirements for contract formation and breach, which are important in many product liability cases. In general, product liability laws come about as a result of civil court cases being prosecuted at the state level.

The courts are increasingly holding sellers responsible for the safety of their products. The U.S. courts generally maintain that the producer of a product is liable for any product defect that causes injury in the course of normal use. Liability can even result if a court or a jury decides that a product’s design, construction, or operating instructions and safety warnings make the product unreasonably dangerous to use.

Types of Product Defects

There are three types of product defects that incur product liability: design defects, manufacturing defects, and defects in marketing.

Design Defects

Design defects exist before the product is manufactured. There is something in the design of the product that is inherently unsafe, regardless of how well it is manufactured. Since “product” is one of the primary elements of the marketing mix, the marketer bears responsibility for ensuring that the design results in a product that is safe and that the product will fulfill the promises of the other aspects of the marketing mix such as promotional commitments.

Red, self-balancing, two-wheeled scooter shown with someone wearing Nike sneakers standing on it.

Hoverboard

Let’s look at a current example of a product design going awry. One of the hottest holiday gift items in 2015 is the hoverboard self-balancing scooter. The premium models often cost more than $1,000, but several companies have created less expensive versions by using lower-cost board components. One expensive component that has been downgraded in the cheaper models is the rechargeable lithium-ion battery. Many less expensive boards use a lower-quality (and lower-priced) mass-produced battery cell. These cheaper batteries are more likely to have quality issues that might cause them to break and burst into flame when they are repeatedly bumped, which is a regular occurrence during the normal use of the scooter. After more than ten reported fires, the U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission opened a case to investigate the hoverboard fires.

Manufacturing Defects

Manufacturing defects occur while a product is being constructed, produced, or assembled. Specifically, when a product departs from its intended design, even though all possible care was exercised in the preparation and marketing of the product[1], it is a manufacturing defect. The manufacturer may be very careful with the design, the material selection, the development of the manufacturing process, and the quality-assurance guidelines. Nevertheless, if a poorly manufactured product leaves the manufacturers facility and causes injury when used for any of its intended purposes, then there is a defect in manufacturing.

Photo of McDonald's Restaurant sign (with the famous golden arches) that reads underneath, "Blazing hot coffee, 69 cents."

It might seem that manufacturing defects occur only in product sales and not in the service industry, but there’s a very well-known case in this category: the McDonald’s coffee case.

On February 27, 1992, a seventy-nine-year-old woman named Stella Liebeck went to McDonald’s with her grandson, Chris. They got the coffee, and Chris pulled into a parking space so that Stella could add cream and sugar. Since the car had a curved dash and lacked cup holders, Stella put the cup between her knees and removed the lid. When she did, the cup fell backward, burning her groin, thighs, genitalia, and buttocks. Liebeck was taken to the hospital, where it was discovered that she had third-degree burns on 6 percent of her body and other burns on 16 percent of her body. She required multiple skin grafts and was in the hospital for eight days. Liebeck spent two years recovering from the injury, lost 20 percent of her bodyweight after the accident, and was left permanently scarred by the ordeal.

Liebeck wrote a letter to McDonald’s asking them to pay her medical bills, which totaled around $10,500 in 1992 (approximately $16,110 today). The company offered her $800. Liebeck and McDonald’s exchanged several more letters, but the company refused to increase their $800 offer, so Liebeck hired a law firm.

Liebeck’s lawyers conducted a study of coffee temperatures. They discovered that coffee brewed at home is usually served at 135–145°F and coffee served at most fast-food restaurants is in the 160–175°F range. McDonald’s, however, served its coffee at 190°F, which can cause third-degree burns on human skin after two to seven seconds of contact. No safety study of any kind was undertaken by either McDonald’s or the consultant who recommended the hotter temperature.

Moreover, Liebeck’s lawyers also discovered more than seven hundred other burn claims—many of them for third-degree burns—from McDonald’s customers between February 1983 and March 1992. In court, McDonald’s quality-control manager, Christopher Appleton, testified that McDonald’s served around 20 million cups of coffee a year and that seven hundred incidents during nine years was statistically insignificant. While this was factually accurate, the jury did not like to hear that McDonald’s considered seven hundred burned customer to be insignificant.

The jury found in Liebeck’s favor. They awarded her $200,000 in compensatory damages, but that amount was later reduced to $160,000 because they felt that the spill was 20 percent Liebeck’s fault. The jury made headlines when it came to the punitive damages, however, which they settled at $2.7 million. The jurors defended the amount, saying that it was to punish the company for its callous attitude toward Ms. Liebeck and the 700+ other McDonald’s customers who had suffered burns. Although it sounds like a lot, $2.7 million represented only two days’ worth of McDonald’s coffee sales, and the jurors felt that was fair.

The judge agreed, accusing McDonald’s of “willful, wanton, and reckless behavior” for ignoring all the customer complaints.

McDonald’s process for making coffee constituted a manufacturing defect, which resulted in many customer injuries and generated significant product liability for the company.

Marketing Defects

Marketing defects result from flaws in the way a product is marketed. Examples include improper labeling, poor or incomplete instructions, or inadequate safety warnings. Often marketing defects are referred to as a “failure to warn.” It is important for the marketer to think not only about the warnings that the user might need when using the product as intended but also about other, potentially dangerous uses for which the product was not intended.

For example, fabric used in children’s sleepwear must meet certain flammability requirements to prevent the risk of injury from fires. Certain comfortable children’s clothing that does not meet the flammability requirement can be confused with sleepwear. For this reason, such clothing will often contain a warning label that reads, “Not intended for sleepwear.”

Over time, product liability has shifted more to the side of the injured product user. Consumer advocates like Ralph Nader argue that, for too long, product liability favored producers at the expense of the product user. They assert that it’s the threat of lawsuits and huge settlements and restitutions that force companies to make safe products. While a discussion of all aspects of product liability is beyond the scope of this course, it is clear that liability has and will continue to have a tremendous impact on consumers and manufacturers alike. These two groups are not the only ones affected, either. Retailers, franchises, wholesalers, sellers of mass-produced homes, and building-site developers and engineers are all subject to liability legislation.

 

Regulatory Laws

Module 5: Ethics and Social Responsibility

Outcome: Regulatory Laws

What you’ll learn to do: explain the laws that regulate marketing

While there are situations in which we expect individuals to act according to higher moral laws, at a basic level we always expect business professionals to follow the law. Most of the laws that impact marketers fall into a category called consumer protection. Consumer protection laws are created to ensure the rights of consumers and to create a fair marketplace for consumers.

The History of Consumer Protection

Historically, consumer protection laws in the United States have been specific formal legal responses to address public outrage over the disclosure of industry abuses and crises. For example, in 1905 a man named Upton Sinclair exposed the terrible worker conditions in the American meat-packing industry. His work sparked public outrage and, in turn, led to the creation of the Food & Drug Administration and the first comprehensive inspection and regulation of food safety in the United States.[1]

Similarly, in the 1960s consumer advocate Ralph Nadar took on automobile safety, highlighting the immense profits made by auto companies relative to their investment in customer safety. In 1966 Congress unanimously passed the National Traffic and Motor Vehicle Safety Act, and the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration gained consumer protection powers. The number of vehicular deaths in the U.S. reached a high of 50,000 in 1960 and have continued to fall despite a larger number of drivers on the road.

Graph showing the steady decline of automobile deaths per 100,000 people, 1975–2013.

Source: http://www.iihs.org/iihs/topics/t/general-statistics/fatalityfacts/overview-of-fatality-facts

Government Consumer Protection and Enforcement Agencies

A number of governments agencies are charged with protecting consumers. The U.S. Federal Trade Commission (FTC) was created in 1914 and is charged with protecting America’s consumers and promoting competition. The commission includes individual divisions that oversee a range of activities that are of importance to marketers, including the following:

  • Privacy and identity protection
  • Advertising practices
  • Marketing practices
  • Financial practices

The FTC’s Bureau of Consumer Protection stops unfair, deceptive, and fraudulent business practices by collecting complaints and conducting investigations, suing companies and people who break the law, developing rules to maintain a fair marketplace, and educating consumers and businesses about their rights and responsibilities.

In addition to government-based agencies, consumer associations and other nonprofit entities also play an important role in protecting the consumer.

As a marketer, it is important to understand the current laws and consider where there are risks to consumers that might lead to new legislation.

The specific things you’ll learn in this section include:

  • Explain product liability and its impact on marketing
  • Explain privacy law and its impact on marketing
  • Explain fraud in the marketing process and its impact

Learning Activities

The learning activities for this section include the following:

  • Reading: Product Liability
  • Reading: Privacy Laws
  • Reading: Fraud in Marketing
  • Self Check: Regulatory Laws

Putting It Together: Marketing Strategy

Module 4: Marketing Strategy

Putting It Together: Marketing Strategy

Since Southwest Airlines is a familiar example by now, let’s do a more complete review of its strategy to help with your assignments in this course.

In this module we have focused on the following aspects of marketing planning:

  • Evaluate marketing strategies for alignment with the organization’s corporate strategies
  • Show how common analytic tools are used to inform the organization’s strategy
  • Explain inputs and components of a marketing strategy
  • Give examples of corporate strategies
  • Explain how the development and maintenance of customer relationships are an essential part of an organization’s marketing strategy

The summary below shows one analysis of the planning process for Southwest Airlines:

Corporate Strategy

Southwest Airlines’ strategy is driven by its mission.

The mission of Southwest Airlines is dedication to the highest quality of Customer Service delivered with a sense of warmth, friendliness, individual pride, and Company Spirit. [1]

Note: Southwest Airlines’ mission is not limited to a focus on leisure travel or even air travel. Rather, the company is driven by a mission to provide the best customer service across all sectors.

Fortune magazine article describes Southwest’s unique profile in the airline industry:

Starting with just four planes flying to three Texas cities on June 18, 1971, [co-founder Herb] Kelleher built a maverick operation that prided itself on charting a different route from other airlines. It wooed passengers with ultra-friendly onboard service, squeezed more flights a day from every plane, and made money not by raising fares but by lowering them—and hence filling seats with folks who could never before afford to fly. Along the way Southwest evolved from an upstart to a colossus that last year carried 134 million passengers in the U.S., more than any other airline and some 20% of the total. In an industry in which every other major company has gone through bankruptcy, Southwest has never gotten close to Chapter 11 and has made money for 42 straight years. [2]

Despite this success, Southwest airlines found its revenue per customer to be low, so it launched a strategy to attract higher-revenue business customers.

Objective: raise the portion of business customers on Southwest from 35% to 40% during the five-year period from 2014 to 2019.

Note: In a competitive industry such as the airlines industry, it is remarkably difficult to gain 1% of market share. Often organizations track .1% and .01% changes.

Analysis Tools

In order to achieve the company objective Southwest needs to bring its strengths to new customers in a way that addresses both its own weaknesses and those of competitors (which create opportunities).

SWOT Analysis

Southwest’s SWOT analysis, below, identifies a number of opportunities and challenges:

Strengths

Exceptional customer loyalty among price-conscious leisure travelers.

Strong customer service culture throughout organization.

Dominance among regional airports and short trip segments.

Weaknesses

Lower revenue per passenger than competitors.

Limited offerings on lucrative “long-haul” flight routes.

Low awareness among business travelers who exhibit strong loyalties to airlines with frequent traveler programs.

Product offering emphasizes convenience at the expense of fringe benefits.

Opportunities

Low customer satisfaction ratings of airlines that serve business travelers. [3]

Increasing monitoring of corporate travel costs by boards and shareholders as an example of excessive perks.

Increasing costs (threat) have less impact per customer if Southwest can attract new segments of customers that competitors are already serving.

Threats

Competitor dominance of business hubs such as Atlanta, Minneapolis, and Chicago.

Increasing fuel costs and labor costs impacting the industry.

Risk of price wars as existing providers drop price to hold on to lucrative business travelers.

Note: How do airlines compare their performance to peers’? Sites like SkyWriter Aviation analyze and report performance data.

Strategic Matrix graphic

Strategic Opportunities Matrix

With its objective to raise its share of business customers, Southwest decided to enter a new market. Is this a market development or a diversification strategy? Is the business traveler buying a different product, or benefiting from different promotion and pricing? In this case, Southwest made the choice to pursue a market development strategy that emphasized pricing, promotion, and distribution rather than making significant changes in its product (by refitting planes to add first-class seats or creating new flights for business travelers, e.g.).

Southwest’s company mission likely played a guiding role in arriving at this decision. The airline’s focus on providing great customer service means that it’s less interested in bringing a new product to market than in taking “amazing customer service” to a new market—i.e., the business traveler.

Components of the Marketing Strategy

In order to appeal to corporate customers, Southwest must focus all elements of the marketing mix on a new target customer that is less cost-conscious and less patient with the inconveniences of travel.

Marketing Mix

Southwest did not implement a separate strategy for each of the four Ps. Instead, it brought the elements of the marketing mix together into major initiatives that touch all aspects of the marketing mix. We are going to explore two of those marketing strategies here.

The Business Select Offering

Southwest’s Business Select provides an additional layer of service that emphasizes the convenience and comfort that business travelers require, at a higher price. A traveler from Los Angeles to Norfolk, Virginia, can select a budget fare of $351 or a Business Select fare of $583. For the higher price the customer gets early boarding, access to faster check-in and security clearance, a free alcoholic beverage, and extra frequent-flyer points. The price is $232 higher for travelers who are willing to pay for these conveniences. For a lower price, travelers can buy only EarlyBird check-in, which moves them to the front of the boarding line but does not include the additional features.Screenshot of Business Select information page, showing a man in an airport checking his phone. Text reads “The fare that rewards you—before, during & after your trip.” An info box titled “Upgrade Your Flight” is on the left, and a list of items appears next to that with the title “Upgrade to Business Select & Get Great Perks.”

The marketing mix includes a new price point, and a series of new services that are packaged in one new offering. It is worth noting that competitor airlines provide these benefits to their frequent flyers through free first-class upgrades for unfilled seats in first class. On those airlines, first-class passengers also get a higher class of customer service. Southwest has found a way to introduce a higher price and provide a comparable set of benefits to business travelers, while leveraging the customer service it provides to all travelers.

SWABiz

For leisure travelers, Southwest only sells tickets through its own distribution channel—its phone line and Web site. Many other airlines also sell through distributors such as Expedia, Hotwire, and CheapTrips, which all require additional discounting to cover their mark-up on the ticket price. Instead, Southwest has kept its fares lower and drawn customers to its own Web site to make purchases.

In the SWOT analysis, we see that Southwest does not have good awareness among business customers. How can it draw business customers to its Web site or get to the places where business travelers will book? SWABiz was the solution. SWABiz provides a free travel-booking and management tool for companies that do the majority of their travel on Southwest. It provides companies that often book travel for their employees (or direct employees to a single place to book) with a tool to manage flights, hotels, and car rentals. SWABiz also enables participating companies to monitor spending and enforce corporate travel policies.

Southwest also expanded its distribution network for corporate travelers. The company sells flights through Concur, which is a travel-booking and management system used by many corporate travel organizations that want to book across many airlines.

SWABiz is a new distribution strategy that creates an opportunity to promote its business offering to corporate travel offices and managers.

Through these marketing strategies Southwest is building a network of business customers who have a relationship with the airline. Southwest’s frequent-flyer program creates an opportunity to track customers’ purchases and preferences and to bring this understanding into future strategies and plans.

Evaluation

Are these strategies successful? Southwest Airlines is actively monitoring its progress in attracting business travelers and adjusting its strategy accordingly. As with most aggressive strategies that span multiple years, the results are mixed, and there is room for new approaches.

Southwest’s chief operating officer, Robert Jordan, sees the potential: “The combination of these factors has led to “double-digit growth” year-after-year in managed corporate bookings.” He adds, “[O]ur [Southwest’s] corporate business is growing faster than our base business.”[4]

CEO Gary Kelly acknowledges that there is still work to do, noting that it is not yet adding enough business travelers to its fare mix. From the first half of 2012 to the same period in 2015, Southwest’s average passenger fare increased just 6%, to $158, even though it was adding longer flights to lure business customers.” [5]

Southwest has begun a strategy of adding more long-haul flights to its schedule, entering new airports, and competing head-to-head with its competitors in America’s busiest airports. The work of defining, implementing, measuring, and adjusting strategies is never done.


Customer-Relationship Strategies

Module 4: Marketing Strategy

Reading: Customer-Relationship Strategies

Mosaic illustration of the Facebook "LIKE" button. Shows the iconic "thumbs-up" graphic.

Introduction

A situation analysis can reveal whether a company’s relationship with customers is a strength to be exploited or a weakness that needs to be addressed. In many cases it’s a bit of both. For instance, a company might have loyal customers in one demographic but fail to hold the attention of customers in another demographic.

The question, then, is how do companies evaluate the quality of their customer relationships, and what approaches do they use to develop and maintain strong customer relationships? We will explore the answers to these questions in greater depth throughout this course. For now, we’ll touch on an approach that companies use to incorporate their customers in strategic planning and some of the tools they use to connect with them.

Buyer Personas

The basis for a strong relationship is getting to know and understand someone well enough to form a connection. The same is true for company relationships with customers. The trouble is that companies rarely have a chance to personally connect with individual customers—much less with all of their target customers.

Marketers use something called “buyer personas” to get a more accurate picture of the customers they’re trying to connect with and also to help them think of customers as real people. Buyer personas are fictional, generalized representations of a company’s ideal, or typical, customer. They help the marketer understand current and potential customers better. As a marketer, knowing whom you’re trying to reach and attract makes it easier to tailor your content, messages, product development, and services to the specific needs, behaviors, and concerns of different groups. For example, instead of sending the same email message to all potential customers, marketers will create a unique message for different buyer personas that aligns better with their personal interests and values.

Example of buyer persona write-up: Kyle Fisher: Potential Drake Motors Small SuV Buyer. Includes photo of smiling middle-aged man with the caption "I want a vehicle with outstanding fuel economy, smart features, and enough space for me and my family." Personal profile: Kyle is a 42-year-old and owner of a late-model Ford Escape. He's an active father of two, still plays team sports and is always connected to friends and the family through the internet and his mobile phone. Kyle is looking for a vehicle that offers outstanding fuel economy since he commutes approximately 90 miles round trip each day. He's also considering the Ford Escape Hybrid, Toyota Highlander, the Honda CR-V and the Ford Flex He uses a variety of review and third-party print research sites in addition to dealer catalogs. Kyle's product-content needs: information supporting fuel economy; photos and video that highlight vehicle's technology and stylish features; guidance, education, and reassurance that the brand can be trusted; competitive comparisons to his current vehicle; ability to gather and share information easily. Background: 42-year-old Caucasian male; father of two; plays drop-in hockey 3 mornings a week; uses vehicle daily for commuting, picking up kids from sports, weekend coaching and vacations; drives long distances and puts 20,000 miles on vehicle every year. Attributes: upper-middle class; smartphone and laptop user; influenced by online reviews, heavy user of print; iPod and Smartphone user; spends time reading in social media researching, but less time contributing.

Figure 1: Buyer Persona

Typically, a buyer persona will have a name and a story, as in Figure 1, above. The story will include information about how the persona spends her time and details about her interests, her concerns or fears, and her goals. Often, the write-up will explain what the persona wants from the company and its products to help marketers to use the information consistently. Each of these details helps the marketer focus on developing relationships with real people, and that results in a more personalized marketing plan.[1]

The strongest buyer personas are based on market research—both the information that is broadly available and information the company gathers through surveys, interviews, and observations of customer behavior.

 

Customer Relationships

Module 4: Marketing Strategy

Outcome: Customer Relationships

What you’ll learn to do: explain how the development and maintenance of customer relationships are an essential part of an organization’s marketing strategy

If you are getting the impression that an organization’s planning around marketing strategy, tactics, and objectives is very complex, you are perceptive. There are a lot of variables for companies to consider, align, and track, and occasionally an important part of the planning process gets overlooked: the customer.  In this last section, we’ll return to the customer and explain why customer relationships are such a crucial part of the marketing strategy and plan.

Let’s pause for a moment and put the customer into our discussion of market growth opportunities. We discussed the market for high-end skin-care products for older Americans. Imagine the woman who might buy a Proctor & Gamble antiwrinkle cream. She is standing in front of a shelf of products and chooses Proctor & Gamble’s cream. Who is she? Why is she there? What is her story? Our customer is hoping to stop the aging process and it is a personal, vulnerable moment. She doesn’t care about the SWOT analysis or the size of the market. She wants to find a product that “understands” what she needs and helps her.

In this section you’ll see how marketers address such issues and keep the customer at the center of the planning process in a very personal way.

The specific things you’ll learn in this section include:

  • Describe how businesses use buyer personas to better understand the target customer
  • Define customer relationship management

Learning Activities

The learning activities for this section include the following:

  • Reading: Customer-Relationship Strategies
  • Video: Harley Davidson Customer Relationships
  • Self Check: Customer Relationships

Diversification Example

Module 4: Marketing Strategy

Reading: Diversification Example

Disney

Diversification: create new opportunities by creating new products that will be introduced in new markets

Photo of Disneyland Toontown.

Disneyland Toontown

When you hear the word Disney, what comes to mind? Many people think of Disney movies such as Cinderella and Beauty and the Beast or theme parks like Disneyland and Disney World. Disney’s product portfolio also includes Marvel Comics, television network ABC, and cable sports channel ESPN. The company has pursued a diversification strategy, which means purchasing other companies that enable it to bring new products into new markets while remaining true to Disney’s origins.

Today, 54% of Disney’s revenues—but only 32% of its profits—come from movies and parks.[1] Its most profitable growth comes from new products in new markets.

Strategic Business UnityPercent of 2014 revenuePercent of 2014 profits
Studio entertainment

Films in theater, home and TV

18%12%
Parks and resorts

Theme parks, cruises

36%20%
Media networks

TV stations and advertising

51%56%
Consumer products

Licensing characters for products

10%10%
Interactive

Game platforms and games

3%1%

An industry analyst explains:

This wide diversification is what has allowed Disney to be so successful recently; Disney owns some of the biggest names in the entertainment world: ESPN, ABC, Disney theme parks, Disney cruise lines, and Pixar, just to name a few. Unlike many entertainment companies, Disney does not solely rely on films, TV, or parks; it is well diversified and relies on its wide reach to create one of the most recognized and popular brands in the world.[2]

Disney’s diversification identifies new products and markets that are close enough to its core business that the company can leverage its internal strengths to create business growth. Following the acquisition of ABC, Barry Diller, the former head of QVC Inc. and the man credited with creating the Fox network, said, “Taking nothing away from the senior management at the other networks, this will be the only one where the senior executive is trained true in the creative process.”[3]

Check Your Understanding

Answer the question(s) below to see how well you understand the topics covered in this outcome. This short quiz does not count toward your grade in the class, and you can retake it an unlimited number of times.

Product Development Example

Module 4: Marketing Strategy

Reading: Product Development Example

Nissan Motors

Product development: create new products that can be sold in existing markets

Showroom photo of the Nissan Leaf.

Nissan was the first major automaker to commit to the mass production of an electric vehicle (EV). In 2008, it made good on its promise with the launch of the Nissan Leaf. Industry analysts immediately recognized the significance of this major move. The Economist had this to say:

Within the industry, the adjective most often used to describe Mr. Ghosn’s plan to make the Renault-Nissan alliance the first big manufacturer of zero-emission vehicles is “bold”—in other words, somewhere between very risky and certifiably mad.[1]

In 2011, industry watchers reported the following:

When announced in 2008, Nissan’s EV [electric vehicle] program was lauded by environmentalists and derided by the auto industry in equal measure. Nearly three years on . . . it has precipitated a seismic shift towards EVs in the auto industry, with all the other automakers now following suit. But will Nissan’s heavy EV investment program deliver the environmental benefits and market share that it hopes for? It is too early to tell, but it is undeniably exciting.[2]

Eight years after the Nissan Leaf was introduced, it’s fair to say that the company’s gamble paid off. Nissan saw two unmet needs in the market that it sought to address. It recognized that the zero-emissions Leaf would appeal to the environmentally minded consumer concerned about climate change. With oil prices on the rise, Nissan saw that their electric vehicle would also appeal to the cost-conscious consumer who wants to save on fuel expenses.

Today, the Nissan Leaf is the world’s top-selling, highway-legal, plug-in electric car, reaching global sales of nearly 200,000 vehicles in September 2015.[3] The company’s product development strategy enabled it to move into a leadership position among EV manufacturers, while successfully fulfilling unmet needs in its existing markets.

 

 

 

 


  1. Mr Ghosn bets the company. The Economist, October 17, 2009. http://www.economist.com/node/14678942 
  2. http://www.thecrowd.me/sites/default/files/NissanCaseStudy.pdf 
  3. Jeff Cobb (2015-09-16). “One Million Global Plug-In Sales Milestone Reached.” HybridCars.com. Retrieved 2015-09-16. Cumulative global sales totaled about 1,004,000 highway legal plug-in electric passenger cars and light-duty vehicles by mid-September 2015.