milestone 1and2/management strategy tools and practices in emarketing.pdf
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Journal of Knowledge Globalization, Volume 8, Number 2, 2015
Management, Strategies, Tools, and Practices in
eMarketing
Sirous Tabrizi
University of Windsor, Windsor, Canada
Mohammad Kabirnejat
Islamic Azad University, Hashtrood Branch, Iran
Abstract
Globalization has resulted in significant changes in the way business is conducted
all over the world. For instance, outsourcing specialist jobs, alliances among large
multinational companies, and high degree of government involvement in markets
have all forced companies to adjust their structures, practices, and policies. For
marketers, two major changes have influenced their practices: increasingly global
demographic and deeper customer engagement. Since âpushâ advertising is
becoming increasingly irrelevant, companies need to do more outside the
traditional marketing approaches. emarketing is one of the new approaches
towards marketing that shows significant promise, especially given the
increasingly dominant role played by the Internet in society and popular culture.
This article discusses some of the changes necessary to take an e-marketing
approach in a business, and focus specifically on several important instruments
(the SOSTAC and SMART frameworks) that can help develop consistent
strategies. Some conjectured examples are presented to help understand the main
argument.
Keywords: Globalization, eMarketing, SOSTAC, SMART, branding, marketing
mix, emarketing management style
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Tabrizi and Kabirnejat: eMarketing
Introduction
Globalization has resulted in significant changes in the way business is conducted
all over the world. For instance, numerous companies including such as IBM,
Microsoft, and Philips have started outsourcing specialists from various parts of
the world, enabling global movement of people for jobs and requiring structural
changes to the company (Engardio, Bernstein, & Kripalani, 2003). In addition ,
globalization has had a positive effect on the economic situation of many
developing countries, such as China, India and Bangladesh. However, companies
all over the world have to take the practical marketing strategies to give better
services to customers.
Philip Kotler, who is considered as the father of modern marketing, by many,
defines marketing as âthe science and art of exploring, creating, and delivering
value to satisfy the needs of a target market at a profit. Marketing identifies
unfulfilled needs and desires. It defines, measures, and quantifies the size of the
identified market and the profit potential. It pinpoints which segments the
company is capable of serving best and it designs and promotes the appropriate
products and servicesâ (Kotler, 2005; p.10).
In the specific case of e-marketing , a more comprehensive and practical definition
is provided by specialists at CISCO: âElectronic Marketing (E-Marketing) is a
generic term utilized for a wide range of activities -advertising, customer
communications, branding, fidelity programs etc. – using the internetâ (Otlacan,
2007). In other words, E-Marketing is the process of finding, attracting, winning,
and retaining customers through electronic means (Stokes, 2008). Primarily this
is accomplished through the Internet but also through e-mail, social networking,
and various forms of wireless media. Hence, it is not just producing a website but
through facilitating online dialog between consumers and the company (Stokes,
2008).
âE-Marketing is also known as Internet Marketing, Web Marketing, Digital
Marketing, and Online Marketingâ (Levinson & Neitlich, 2011, p. 89). It includes
both direct response marketing and indirect marketing elements, and is a continual
process rather than something which is executed only once. The messages and
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Journal of Knowledge Globalization, Volume 8, Number 2, 2015
stories developed through traditional marketing can be improved through
technology and electronic means in a variety of ways.
eMarketing adds new dimensions and meaning to traditional marketing. Such as
reach, scope, interactivity, immediacy, demographic, supply chain, value chain,
and financial chain.
Reach:
Due to the nature of the Internet, E-Marketing can have a global reach and access
potential customers from all over the world. This can also be performed on a much
smaller budget than what was normally necessary for a comparable reach (Dann
& Dann, 2011).
Scope:
E-Marketing allows a variety of methods for reaching customers and enables a
wide range of products and services that can be offered. Therefore, the marketing
of a product is combined with other areas such as brand formation, public
relations, customer service, and information management in a way that was
traditionally not possible (Dann & Dann, 2011).
Interactivity:
Since E-Marketing is a dialog between customers and companies, there is a degree
of interaction between the two that does not exist in traditional marketing.
Companies can use the responses, complaints, and commendations of customers
to further develop their brands and better their own image (Krishnamurthy, 2006).
On the other hand, customers feel more engaged with the company and can
become empowered to promote the product through their own actions and
discussions. The marketing landscape thus becomes more dynamic, adaptive, and
capable of achieving faster and deeper growth.
Immediacy:
The Internet, being pervasive and always accessible, provides a constant and
continual means through which customers can be engaged and view and buy
products. E-Marketing effectively closes the gap between providing information,
advertising, and buy opportunities and eliciting a reaction from customers
(Krishnamurthy, 2006; Dann & Dann, 2011).
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Tabrizi and Kabirnejat: eMarketing
Demographics:
Generally speaking, Internet users have a significant buying power, as they are
skewed towards the middle-classes, and are often capable of organizing
themselves into focused groupings and sub-populations (Krishnamurthy, 2006;
Dann & Dann, 2011). As such, savvy marketers can find access to desired niche
markets in addition to being able to easily and effective target such groups
(Parsons, & Maclaran, 2009).
Literature
From the very beginning, marketing in the 21st century has been different.
Marketers today have a greater number and variety of choices in support, media
opportunities, and methods of communications but they also face increasing
competition due to the Internet facilitating virtual competition (Andreasen, 2006).
E-marketing is the application of marketing techniques, principles, and practices
using electronic media, especially the Internet (Pride & Ferrell, 2011). It
encompasses all the activities which a company conducts through the Internet so
as to attract new business, retain current business, or develop its brand identity. In
an analysis of e-business components and accepted marketing concepts, Albert
and Sanders (2003) developed this definition:
âE-business marketing is a concept and process of adapting the relevant and
current technologies to the philosophy of marketing and its management. Focused
attention on the areas of e-commerce, business intelligence, customer relationship
management, supply chain management, and enterprise resource planning provide
a framework for effective adaptation. Although the electronic environment
experiences rapid changes, the reliance on proven marketing models, in these
areas, ensures continuity of the marketing process both online and off-line.â (P.
10)
Management for E-Marketing
Management plays an important role in E-Marketing, one which establishes the
system for decision making, improving customer knowledge, efficient targeting
of advertising, and so on (Chan, 2005). The style of management is an important
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consideration when attempting to implement any E-Marketing plan (Chan, 2005).
Generally speaking, there are two kinds of management styles – centralized and
decentralized – though there is a range of styles between those two values (Albert
& Sanders, 2003). Although the approach style depends on the size of the
company and the management context, for E-Marketing it is generally better to
use a decentralized approach.
In a decentralized approach, decision making authority is distributed throughout
a larger group such that lower level individuals have higher authority than they
would in other contexts (Daft & Marcic, 2005). For E-Marketing, this is valuable
for adapting to customer feedback, responding positively to emerging trends, and
providing opportunities for individual employees to engage with customers in a
more natural manner. Given that decision making is distributed across the group,
it also enables customers to be part of the decision-making process without
jeopardizing the authority of the company. Hence, companies can learn the desires
and interests of the customers, so as to better market products to them, while
customers can feel as though the company takes them seriously and are able to
form stronger attachment to company brands (Pride & Ferrell, 2011).
However, a decentralized management style can be problematic in terms of
cooperation. Since all individuals in the decision-making process have similar
authority, they may refuse to cooperate or may go in completely different
directions for solving some problem (Daft & Marcic, 2005). Hence, the role of a
manager becomes one who guides other employees with common vision, goals,
and objectives so that there is cooperation in terms of results. Each individual
should be able to use their own strengths to accomplish the goal. In order to
accomplish this , managers need to understand the strengths and weaknesses of
the employees and be able to create objectives that can be tailor to specific
strengths. Managers cannot do this unless they have the desire to know and
understand others: other employees and the customers (Daft & Marcic, 2005).
This desire to know others, for the purpose of cooperation, is part of what is
commonly called a social-justice leader. Hence, the role of management in E-
Marketing is to provide leadership in cooperation, in understanding the desires
and strengths of others, and being able to guide by objectives and by example.
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Tabrizi and Kabirnejat: eMarketing
Management for emarketing needs different kind of skills set and leadership style
than in-person marketing. In marketing most leadership functions are exerted
through technology rather than face-to-face. There is an absolute need to have a
clear and well defined system of management control for feedback and
motivation. A manager must have online communication proficiency,
comfortable with tools and techniques and must follow etiquette of online
communication. Managers and the employees mush have real-time access to
reports, feedback, updates and guidelines.
Strategy
Once good objectives have been identified it is time to develop a strategy. For
example, consider a company with a 40% market share with their phone card. A
possible objective would be to increase that market share to 45% or to 60%, either
of which will have different hurdles to overcome. What strategy would be
developed? It could be through increasing sales, through building a better brand,
through reducing the price of the product, and so on. However, some strategies
may not be appropriate for the objective. For instance, improving the quality of
the product may not increase market share but instead would be better for an
objective of maintaining a hold on the existing 40%. As well, some strategies may
be more time intensive than others. For instance, consider a brand name of this
phone card as the CC Phone Card. Improving the brand of CC may be difficult in
an English context due to the similarity of the name with the English word âsissyâ,
an already derogatory and insulting name. It may be easier to use a different name
of the card in an English context, and keep the name for a context where the sound
does not have the same connotation. For instance, in Spanish CC is similar to
saying âYes Yesâ, which may have a positive connotation. Hence, the calling card
could be marketed as CC in Spanish areas but something else in English areas.
Tactics
Once the overall strategy has been developed, it is necessary to make that strategy
achievable in a practical sense. Since a strategy is very general and may be meant
for years, it is difficult for individual employees to determine how they can be
involved in accomplishing it. Thus, a series of tactics will be useful. These are
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Journal of Knowledge Globalization, Volume 8, Number 2, 2015
short-term or small-scope sets of actions that employees can perform so as to
accomplish the strategy. While still somewhat general, so that each employee can
apply their own strengths to it, these are far more focused in intention and may be
directed to specific groups of employees or even specific employees.
For instance, consider the strategy of improving the brand name. Some tactics
could involve advertising campaigns, engaging with customer groups, providing
information for blogs to get the name out there in the Internet, monitoring the
response of different groups, and so on. No employee would do all of these things;
they would only focus on one or two while others would engage in the remaining
tactics. Similarly, tactics are meant to change regularly as the strategy is put into
action.
Action
Once the tactics have been identified, employees engage in daily and weekly
actions for implementing them. Therefore, the actions are the realm of each
employee. However, monitoring these actions to identify problems and measure
progress is important. One effective means for doing so is through using Gantt
charts. These charts are meant for identifying how long certain actions may take,
and can be updated regularly by employees so that progress in accomplishing an
action is easily identifiable. Similarly, by allowing employees to monitor their
own progress, it reduces the likelihood of managerial interruption and the negative
aspects of managerial control.
Control
The SOSTAC framework is a continuous one, which involves a cycle of steps.
The final step of control is there to allow reflection, monitoring of results, and a
means of adapting to new circumstances. As progress in implementing an E-
Marketing plan occurs, it is important to identify markers of progress and
problems. In doing so, it becomes possible to take advantage of positive
circumstances for a company (such as a new fad being developed around the
product) and to quickly respond to problems (such as a viral video depicting the
product as bad). Hence, this step is meant to continually monitor the environment
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surrounding the product to ensure progress continues to be made in achieving the
objectives.
Finding
It is important to identify the strengths and weaknesses of the company in different
areas. For instance, what is the product being developed? What strengths does this
company have in developing and marketing that product? What weaknesses are
there and how can the company change to eliminate those weaknesses? While
many possible areas could be examined, Table 2 below contains an example of
critical areas to consider first.
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Table 2: Marketing Strengths and Weaknesses for a Company
Now that companyâs situation is well analyzed, it is time to examine competitors.
This involves researching who they are, how they compete against your company
Marketing Mix Strength Weakness Action Required
Product (Calling Card) High
quality
High quality. Low product
differentiation (not
unique).
Reduce cost of card
possibly through lower
quality.
Decent packaging.
Price ($5.00 CA) Cheaper than some
competitors.
Not leader in
lowest price.
Decrease price to
remain competitive.
Accessible to r
customers.
Place (Distribution through Available in many
stores, and
different chains.
Sales dependent
on store hours.
brick–and–mortar stores) Available in several
countries.
No online
distribution.
Promotion (Word-of-mouth
advertising)
Very low cost. Not innovative
compared to online
options.
Promotional prizes of
discounts for frequent
users.
Service Reliable service. Cards with very
People (Customers and
Employees)
Usable by people
from many different
nationalities and
languages.
Low integration
in non-immigrant
North American
market.
Processes Cards are easily and
efficiently
produced.
Selling through
distributors
distances
company from
customers.
Physicals (the physical
calling card)
Cards do not easily
break. Card is good
size and shape.
Suggestions of
scratch pad on
back being
carcinogenic.
Numbers on back
are hard to read
for many people.
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in terms of products, what overlap exists between products, how market share is
divided between the companies, and what strategies your company has for dealing
with competition.
Table 3: Competition Analysis
Main Competitors Strengths Weaknesses Our Strategy to
Compete
Rechargeable cards.
Rechargeable online,
no need to constantly
buy new cards.
People who have
difficulty using
computers or
Take an analyzer
approach to
competing.
Account summaries of
calls, minutes, costs,
easily accessible.
People who lack a
credit card cannot
be customers.
Engage in horizontal
integration. For
example, combine
reviewing remaining
balance on a card
with other existing
services.
Online purchasing of
cards.
Limited offline
purchasing.
Take a reactive
approach to
competing.
Cost comparison of
different brands on
their website to find
cheapest card
available.
Only available in
major countries.
Ensure our card is
available in same
location as theirs.
Available in a variety
of countries.
expand availability to
other areas. Offline
competition remains
very strong.
Angry Calling Card
BB Calling Card
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Conclusion
E-Marketing allows companies to reach a much wider audience for products and
services that are traditionally possible, and engage in a productive dialog with
customers and the managers that takes the traditional method of marketing to a
newer level. However, developing and implementing an e-marketing plan is very
complex. Not only do we have to come up with appropriate ideas and strategies
but also it is the point where a company discovers whether an idea is actually
going to work in practice. Critical to the success of implementing a plan is the
original objectives setting process. Objectives that are unclear will result in
unfocused and potentially unproductive actions.
Despite the importance of e-marketing in businesses, the theory is difficult to
actualize in practice for companies operating within countries where the citizens
has limited or restricted Internet access. Other cultural or normative practices can
also lead to difficulties. For instance, in a multi-lingual country, such as Iran, the
communication between customers and a company will greatly benefit from
having a variety of languages available for customers to engage in business. If
someone in one part of the country wants to speak with a marketing representative
in Arabic, the company will greatly benefit by having a representative who is able
to communicate in Arabic. However, if management does not see the value in
having alternative languages available, they may lose the opportunity of engaging
with a potentially significant portion of the countryâs population.
The complexity of the E-Marketing environment and the number of variables in
the marketing strategy mean that the company have plenty of choice when it
comes to determining a specific implementation approach. Therefore,
measurement and analysis at all stages is crucial to ensure the plan is on track, to
identify when it falls off track, and how to take action to get back on track and
continue.
Effective E-Marketing requires knowledgeable management and manpower, such
that traditional management models like âtop-down managementâ is not
appropriate.. In addition, the needs of E-Marketing customers should be the top
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priority; engendering customer commitment and loyalty are extremely important.
Hence, management must be even more serious in its attempts to supply the needs
of customers.
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