In the previous chapter, you learned about the core and basic concepts of marketing. In this chapter, we will talk more deeply about the marketing practices of Bangladeshi organizations based on their culture, goal, target, and vision.
Because most of the organization must have a future plan to grow that will help them to achieve something in the industry. As most of the organizations are profit motivated, they must try to formulate such strategies that will help them to attract, retain, and grow customers.
Think of Grameen Phone (GP), the market leader (Having maximum market share/largest number of users) in the mobile telecommunication industry of Bangladesh. Now on Friday of the whole of July, your call charge to GP Numbers is only half compared to other days of the week.
Why they are offering this even after beings a market leader? The answer may be to retain and grow customers. That is what we call a strategy undertaken by GP, Grameen Phone started their journey on November 28, 1996. At that time Pacific telecommunication was doing a monopoly business in the private mobile telecommunication industry of Bangladesh.
The package rate and call rate was very high and beyond the capability of mid-class people. But with the service and other facilities, GP has successfully grabbed the mobile telecommunication market of Bangladesh has now more than 2.8 million subscribers. It is definitely a remarkable success for a late mover in such a technology-oriented competitive industry.
How did they become the leader in the industry? Of course by satisfying customers and adding good values to the customers with the largest coverage throughout Bangladesh. But their better strategy formulation and vision helped them achieve that success.
When you think of a fantasy Kingdom, you first think of a theme park full of joy and entertainment. After introducing Ashu and Lia, two cute dolls in the park with new rides, the park positioned itself as the first theme park in Bangladesh. Though the cost of enjoying rides was initially very high, it was successful to establish itself as the best amusement park in Bangladesh.
After that, Nandan Park has come up with almost the same ideas. Still, fantasy is leading the industry with its services and new features. They have a long-term projection (vision) with this project and they are heading towards fulfilling their goals and attracted their customers? How are they leading the industry? Well, all these are their good and proper objective setting and the use of market-oriented strategies.
In the previous chapter, we mentioned that marketing is a managerial process. In this chapter, we will elaborately explain the managerial tasks of the marketing people mainly called decisions about product, price, place (distribution), and promotion which will ensure the ultimate goal of the organizations of making a profit. All companies must look ahead (as GP did) and develop long term strategies to meet the changing conditions in their industries and ensure long-term survival.
The hard task of selecting an overall company strategy for long-run survival and growth is called strategic planning. In this chapter, we will first look at the organization’s overall strategic planning. Then we discuss how marketers, guided y the strategic plan works closely with others inside and outside the organization to serve customers in a better way.
A model of a marketing plan is included in this chapter to guide the students about how to choose customers and please them. These two chapters will provide a basic idea of marketing to the readers. After studying this chapter, students will be able to:
- Explain companywide strategic planning and its four steps
- Discuss how to design a business portfolio and develop strategies for growth and downsizing
- Assess marketing’s role in strategic planning and explain how marketers partner with others inside and outside the firm to build a profitable customer relationship
- Describe the marketing process and the forces that influence it
- List the marketing management functions
- Know how to prepare a marketing plan that is essential for business development
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