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The Importance of Marketing Strategies

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Table of Contents
Introduction ............................................................................................................ 3

1.1 Production concept & Marketing concept similarities and differences ..................... 3

1.2 Advantages & Disadvantages of both concepts ..................................................... 4

2.1 Individual customers VS Organizational customers ................................................ 5

2.2 Types of consumer behaviour .............................................................................. 5

2.3 Factors influencing customer behaviour ............................................................... 6

2.4 Stages of the consumer decision-making process .................................................. 7

2.5 Characteristics of organizational customers .......................................................... 8

2.6 Factors influencing organizational purchasing behavior ......................................... 9

3.1 Intangible services in organizations .................................................................... 10

3.2 The characteristics of service ............................................................................. 11

4.1 The importance of staff in delivering the organization’s offering ........................... 13

4.2 The elements of the ServQual model & recommendations ................................... 13

Conclusion ............................................................................................................ 15

References ............................................................................................................ 16

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Introduction
Marketing plays an important role in business; it is an outstanding strategy that aids
businesses thrive. Customer interaction is the core of any succeeded business. To
maintain long relationships with customers and deliver organization promise to
customers, marketing strategies and concepts need to be used by an organization to
deliver the organization promise to customers (Auh et al.,2012).

1.1 Production concept & Marketing concept similarities and differences

Production orientation which considered to be the oldest concept in business, it
focuses mostly on enhancing output and lowering costs by the utilization of mass
production and reducing costs. Finally, attain the purpose of growing benefits. While,
Marketing Orientation which revolves on customers' needs and requirements by
satisfying their wants (Kohli et al.,1990). The production Orientation concept revolves
on production techniques, it concentrates on decreasing the cost of units rather than
targeting the market's needs and requirements. Furthermore, organizations which
followed the production orientation presumes that customers would buy the product
if it is obtainable and affordable to own it. On the other hand, Marketing Orientation
concept revolves in organizations that work conformably to the customer needs or
wants, it concentrates on meeting the satisfaction of the customer by selling the
products and services that customers want. Marketing Orientation characterizes your
product in a method that’s showing its advantages to the customer. On the other
hand, Production Orientation characterizes your product in a method that shows
precisely how it works in a physical way (Narver et al.,1990). Organizations that
employ the production concept believes that customers mostly need products that
have a reasonable price and attainable. The production concept relies on the way that
an organization could raise supply as it reduces its costs. As well, the production
concept spotlighted that businesses could decrease costs by using mass production.
Organizations tended across production have belief in economies of scale, in which
mass production could lower cost and increase earnings. Overall, the production
concept is tended towards operations. On the other hand, organizations that have a
belief in the marketing concept put the customer at the core of the organization.

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 Activities are directed towards the customer. The goal is to perceive the needs of a
customer. Marketing strategy performs depending on market research starting from
product conception to sales. The marketing concept asserts the “pull” strategy”. which
means customers prefer strong brands rather than other brands (Houston, 1986).

1.2 Advantages & Disadvantages of both concepts

Marketing Orientation focused more on customer. While, Production Orientation
focused more production output (Langerak,2003). The below table indicates some
differences between the two concepts.

Table 1: The differences between production concept and marketing concept (Grunert
et al.,2002).

Production Orientation Marketing Orientation

focused more on production output
Sell with lower cost
Not focus on advertising (belief
customer will buy if affordable)
focused more on customer
Respond to market research. (customer
needs)
Cultivate brand in customer's mind.
(influence and attract customer to buy)

Marketing orientation concept has many advantages and disadvantages. In term of

advantages. Firstly, marketing orientation can supply customers with their needs
efficiently. Thus, building loyalty and trust. Secondly, it can build an active relationship
between organizations and their customers through marketing processes. Finally,
marketing orientation can understand customers' needs through a process we call it
customer-oriented. On the other hand, in term of disadvantages of marketing
orientation. Firstly, the increasing costs due to the usage of new technologies and
research. Secondly, marketing orientation demands more researches as a result of
imposing new marketing strategies, this process is costly. Finally, the competition
between competitors who use different marketing strategies is highly aggressive. Thus,
an organization which uses marketing orientation should be aware and alert. While the
advantages of production orientation. Firstly, the production concept is oriented

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toward economies of scale, this means expansion of operations. Secondly, the
production concept uses high efficiency, this means high quality. Finally, low cost to
customers. On the other hand, production orientation has disadvantages. Initially, it
does not focus on customer needs and wants this means it will not satisfy buyers taste.
Secondly, usually, the set-up costs are high. Finally, competitors might exceed your
product in term of quality and price (Avlonitis et al.,1999).

2.1 Individual customers VS Organizational customers

An organization can serve both individual customers and organizational customers.
However, both types of customers have different behavioural aspects. Individual
customers are customers who buy goods or services for personal consumption,
individual customers purchase the day to day to satisfy their daily needs. On the other
hand, organizational customers are organizations that buy goods or services to utilize
for production of products and services that are sold, hired or provided to others. Both
individual customers and organizational customers have similar aspects, these aspects
influence their buying decision making. There are different types of customers
organization serves each customer has different needs and triggers for purchasing. An
organization should understand its customers' needs in order to succeed in its business
(Peter et al., 1999).

2.2 Types of consumer behaviour

Consumer behaviour aspects are complex in needs, an organization should segment
them according to customers behaviour. There are four main types of consumer
behaviour. Firstly, complex buying behaviour which involved consumers who buy
expensive products infrequently, this type of consumers is highly engaged in the buying
process and consumers’ research before they commit to an investment. Secondly,
Dissonance-reducing buying behaviour which involved consumers in consumers who
are engaged in the buying process but have difficulties finding the variation among
brands. ‘Dissonance’ could happen when the consumer concerns about their choice.
Thirdly, Habitual buying behaviour which involved in consumers who are characterized
by the truth that the consumer has very small participation in the product or brand
class. Fourthly, Variety seeking behaviour which involved in consumers who buy
different products seeking variety (Sharma, 2014).

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2.3 Factors influencing customer behaviour
There are factors that influence customers behaviour and finally their decision-making
as figure 1 indicated (McLeod, 2007). Initially, Psychological factors which revolve on
consumer needs, Maslow's hierarchy of needs has indicated them, Maslow's hierarchy
pyramid consist of a five-stage model includes:

1. Physiological needs such as food, drink, shelter, sex, sleep.

2. Safety needs such as security, law, feeling safe.

3. Social Needs for belongingness and love such as family, and romantic relationships.

4. Esteem needs and status such as independence, prestige and respect from others.

5. Self-Actualization needs such as self-fulfilment, seeking personal growth and peak

experiences.

Figure 1. Maslow's hierarchy pyramid (Weatherill, 1996)

Furthermore, consumer perception, learning, beliefs and attitudes. The second

influencing factors are cultural factors which influence consumer behaviour such as
culture which is an important character of a community that identifies it from other
cultural groups. The main factors of each culture are the values, language, myths,

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customs, rituals, laws, and the artefacts, or products that are inherited from one
generation to the next (Lamb et al., 2011). Secondly, the subculture factor this means
Courses on culture and behaviour of individuals with comparable values created smaller
groups are called sub-culture (Durmaz et al., 2011). Thirdly, social class, this means the
social structure the society possess (Shah, 2010). There are six classes within the social
structure W. Lloyd Warner’s has identified them the upper-upper, lower-upper, upper-
middle and lower-middle classes, followed by the working class and lower class. Class
rankings are determined by occupation, income, education, family background, and
residence location (Boone et al., 2013). Thirdly, social factors include different aspects.
Initially, reference groups have an impact from one individual to other groups.
Secondly, the family has a strong influence by a member of a family. Finally, roles and
status refer to the role of each person in the society to which he or she belongs. The
last point which is personal factors consists of five aspects. Age, occupation in economic
status this refers to the customer financial situation, the lifestyle of the consumer this
refers to customers interests, customer personality which means customers
characteristics for example aggressiveness and dominance and stages in the life cycle
for the customer (single, couple, family, etc), (Rani, 2014).

2.4 Stages of the consumer decision-making process

There are five stages of the consumer decision-making process these stages determine
what products or services would fit consumer needs Firstly, problem recognition or
recognition of the unsatisfied need this means customers understand their wants and
needs. Thus, they can achieve that want or need (Bruner et al., 1988). Secondly,
information search in this stage customers do research and browse for the wanted
product or service they might browse through physical locations or online resources
such as Google or customer reviews (Crotts, 1999). Thirdly, alternatives evaluation in
this stage of the consumer decision-making process, consumers have developed
standards for what products or services they needed or wanted. Therefore, customers
in this stage would evaluate and compare their alternative choices. Fourthly, purchase
decision in this stage, consumers have made their final decision after they gathered all
the information about their targeted product or service, consumers have arrived at the
logical conclusion on the product or service to buy. Finally, post-purchase evaluation

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involves in the reflex from both the customer and the seller whether the customer has
a positive or negative experience (Huitt, 2007).

2.5 Characteristics of organizational customers

Organizational customers are customers that buy products and services to use them in
operation or organization as figure 2 indicated. Moreover, for manufacturing other
products. Furthermore, to resale them to others. Unlike individual customers who buy
products and services for personal usage. As a result of this organizational buyers have
different characteristics and behavior than individual buyers. These characteristics
affect the purchases process, these characteristics are the complexity of buying, nature
and size of customers, economic and technical choice criteria, buying to specific
requirements, risks, derived demand, reciprocal buying and negotiations (Webster et
al., 1972).

Figure 2. Characteristics of organization buying (Wind et al., 2014)

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2.6 Factors influencing organizational purchasing behavior
There are factors that influence organizational purchasing behaviour as figure 3
indicated. Firstly, the buy class which can be classified into a new task, straight rebuy,
and modified rebuy, a new task happens when the company is thinking of buying a
product for the first time. Hence, the company is not aware of its accurate functions. As
a result of this, the company requires to learn about the product functions before they
buy it, high information needed. While straight rebuy happens when the company is
thinking about buying a product which it has already bought in the past. Thus, the
company is aware of the product functions, littler information needed. Modified rebuy
usually involves production managers and engineers, the decision-making process in
this stage is longer than other stages due to the buyer changing classes from straight
rebuy to a modified rebuy to a new task, average amount of information needed. The
second factor is the product type which consists of four classes. Firstly, product
constituents which are materials used for the production process such as Aluminium.
Secondly, MRO which refers to services and products for maintenance, repair and
operations. Thirdly, product facilities which are parts that are combined in the
terminated product such as Headlights. The last factor which is the importance of the
purchase, it plays an important role in the purchase process, this stage revolves on how
important for a company to purchase a product or service, in this stage the company
determine on which product wants to purchase, the decision making process is long in
this stage due to the extensive search and analysis of the wanted product (Hill et al.,
1977).

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 Figure 3. (Hill et al., 1977)

3.1 Intangible services in organizations

All organizations have some intangible services which consider to be one of the most
controversial issues in service marketing. Organizations have been trying to tangibilize
their services in order to help customers perceived the benefits of their services. Among
different authors, intangibility is an acceptable concept, it is the main element that
distinguishes products and services (Zeithaml et al., 2000). The aspects of intangibility
play an important role in how organizations produce their services and manage them
and how strategies formed (Bowen et al., 2002). Therefore, the problem of intangibility
cannot be estimated and it has a direct impact on customer perception. One of the main
issues the intangibility of services has is the fact that customers frequently face difficulty
to realize or understand them mentally. one the most influential way in the marketing
literature deal with the problem of intangibility is to raise the level of tangibility to the
service offerings. The challenge of intangibility and facing the issue of how to deliver
the ‘intangible’ standards to the customers has been one of the considerable challenges
of service-providing organizations (Wakefield et al., 1999). Service offering

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organizations need to deal with intangibility by ‘tangibilize’ their service offerings in
order to deliver them in a better customer perception towards their offerings (Santos,
2002), minimize the customer's perceived risk and improve the quality of services
(Nepomuceno et al., 2012).

3.2 The characteristics of service

The characteristics of service consist of four types: Intangibility, Inseparability,
Variability and Perishability (Kotler et al., 2007). Intangibility refers to things that cannot
be seen or felt. Therefore, the customer could not assess it. This increase levels of
uncertainty in order to minimize this factor, customers seek the signs of service quality.
In this case, the service provider should tangibilize the service. Thus, service marketers
propose the quality of their intangible service (Kotler et al., 2007). Santos (2002) argued
that although intangibility is a significant characteristic of service, the role of tangibility
is more significant in the service domain. "Intangibility can be reduced by using strong
messages in advertising and publicity in order to support a clear position" (Davies,
2013). Zeithaml and Bitner (1996) mentioned that intangibility decides if the offering is
a product or a service. However, Bowen (1990) argued that intangibility becomes
overemphasized and it is hard to perceive. Secondly, Inseparability character of service
means the services are created and used simultaneously. Thus, they cannot be
detached from their suppliers, whether the suppliers are machines or people (Kotler et
al., 2007). Inseparability distinguishes services with products due to the same time
production and consumption (Sierra et al., 2005). Kotabe and Murray discovered that
the inseparability of services accomplished by pure service suppliers was remarkably
greater than non-pure service suppliers and argued that due to the technological
progress, some service activities might be formed separable (Kotabe et al., 2004). Taher
and Basha found that the inseparability supports the service suppliers to cut the price
on the main service in order to drag traffic into the facility and this made opportunities
for the attentive marketers (Taher et al., 2004). Edvardsson argued that inseparability
can make problems more than chances for service suppliers due to the introduction of
uncertainty (Edvardsson et al., 2005). Inseparability could become complex if the
customers are uncertain about their needs. Thus, the service sector might train their
employees who deliver service to help customers by articulating their needs to choose

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suitable services (Davies, 2013). Thirdly, Variability in variability Service is changeable
and hard to control due to the great dependant on who supplies the service also where,
when and how they are supplied (Kotler et al., 2007). Thus, controlling quality becomes
serious and to attain that, service sector should employ the right people, standardize
services and check customers satisfaction. The service sector has to be careful when
hiring service employees. Furthermore, the service company have to invest and supply
training for the new staff so they can deliver decent services to their customers. In
addition, training staff for necessary skills would improve their job performance in a
specific service area, particularly staff who are in the front and have direct contact with
customers (Langford, 2009). Also, the service sector has to standardize the services in
the organization, encourage their staff and check customer satisfaction. Organizations
can observe customer satisfaction by using different metrics such as surveys and
complaint/suggestion system. Over and above, rewarding staff financially and non-
financially would encourage the staff to provide the greatest level of service (Langford,
2009).

Fourthly, Perishability service which has several characteristics, one of the main
characteristics of it is that it cannot be stored for later use or sale. In perishability, when
the demand is stable, then Perishability of service is not an issue. However, the service
sector faces a large issue when demand rises and fall irregularly (Kotler et al., 2007).
Due to the inability to store the services customers may wait for a long period or may
not be served at all. Also, time concepts and techniques are usable to the service sectors
as well as they are the process (Canel et al., 2000). The service sector on demand-side
can charge a different price for a different term of time relying on the demand.
Moreover, while the service sector on the supply side can employ part-time employees
in peak hours or time period (Langford, 2009). In perishability, the process becomes so
important while providing the service, the process of treating customers at the place
where they encounter the service includes the transaction process and ease of
payment.

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4.1 The importance of staff in delivering the organization’s offering
Providing high-quality service is one of the prime challenges organizations encounter in
the service sector. Quality is the key to reach customer satisfaction. In business,
customers are linked with the product or service an organization carries through staff
(Tornow et al., 1991). Thus, staff play an important role in the relationship they have
between customers. The service quality model, based on (Parasuraman et al., 1988), is
the organization capability to suit or exceed customer expectations. It expresses the
total perceptions customers have towards the service performance (Zeithaml et al.,
1996). Providing high-quality service is heavily dependent on staff skills and efficiencies
(Elnagal et al., 2014). Staff are the worthiest part for an organization as they are always
an origin of knowledge and power that competitors cannot imitate them. Staff are a
very remarkable part of the organization and the accomplishment of any service
organisation is relied on how they deliver the organisation promise (Shah, 2011).

4.2 The elements of the ServQual model & recommendations

The SERVQUAL model was formed by (Parasuraman et al., 1985; 1988). The service
quality model describes the difference between the expected level of service and
customer understanding of the level received (Parasuraman et al., 1985). The
SERVQUAL model consists of five elements: Tangibles, Reliability, Responsiveness,
Assurance and Empathy. Firstly, Tangibles refer to the physical facilities, equipment and
appearance of personnel. (Morgan, 2015) has stated that the staff working
environment which is the physical place the staff can see, touch, taste, and smell. He
stated that staff well-being is strongly linked to staff productivity and performance
which can be done by using certain types of equipment and facilities staff need in their
job (BizFilings, 2017). Furthermore, using advanced technological equipment can
facilitate the work between customers and staff (Ramney, 2012). Moreover, the
physical appearance of attractive staff improves perceived service quality to the
customers (Lee et al., 2012). Secondly, Reliability refers to the capability of the staff
who deliver the service to do the promised service reliably and precisely to the
customer. Delivering accurate services by staff would maintain trust between
customers and organization and this lead to the establishment of customer relationship

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(De Chernatony, 1999). Therefore, reliability works as a substantial element in
promoting loyalty to customers by delivering accurate services. Thirdly, Responsiveness
which means the willingness or readiness of staff to deliver service swiftly and on the
right time (Parasuraman et al., 1988). The customer would have higher satisfaction if
the customer experiences a shorter time than predicted. In contrast, if the waiting time
for customers is too long, organizations which deliver services might lose transactions
because of customers consider waiting time is a sacrifice to receive the service (Bielen
et al., 2007). Fourthly, According to Parasuraman et al., 1988), assurance composed of
competence, courtesy and credibility of the staff as well as their capability to urge
confidence to the customers. Assurance clarifies that customer acquires the trust from
staff who deliver the requested service securely and competently (Auka et al., 2013).
Furthermore, the influence of assurance promotes customer loyalty (Timney, 2017), it
can be done from the first customer contact to the staff by showing courtesy
(Steenkamp, 2015). Staff need to make sure the true information dissemination in order
to make up trust and confidence with the customers. Moreover, organizations should
deliver their expertise and competencies over and over before they start work in order
to build customer relationship (Arlen, 2008). Finally, Empathy refers to the care and
personal attention an organization delivers to its customers (Parasuraman et al., 1988).
In this dimension, an organization should deliver an excellent satisfying experience to
the customers as they look forward from the service supplier (Fluss, 2016).
Personalizing staff services is a significant indicator of customer satisfaction.
Furthermore, staff should not deliver services to customers in a way that discomfort
customers due to the strong effect on customer satisfaction (Parasuraman et al., 1988).
Staff should have a great understanding level of customer needs when staff understand
these needs, they will have positive and satisfied, customers (Ariani, 2015).

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Conclusion
In conclusion. We found that organizations who educate their staff about marketing
would not have difficulties in delivering organization promise due to the use of
marketing concepts and strategies which facilitate the route that ends with customer
satisfaction and finally to a successful business. Secondly, understanding customers'
needs by an organization staff is a very important element in service marketing. Thirdly,
marketing plays a major role through its perceptions and realization to customer needs.
Penultimately, in marketing customers, are classified and studied according to their
type and their behaviour. Thus, staff can satisfy all sorts of customers. Finally,
understanding and employing marketing concepts by an organization in its business
would ease the path to fulfil customers' needs as well as delivering the organization
promise to customers.

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