MARKETING EVOLVING AS A SUPER SCIENCE

What  do you want to do in Marketing?? Do you want to be a Salesman??Why don't you become an engineer or a doctor or the least try for a Goverment Job. These were the words that echoed my ears everyday while I was still studying in my college. Though there was ample democarcy at home yet the comfort or the confidence in their only son learning Commerce was low & to add the irrelevant opinions of relatives would further add to my vows & misery. Yet I knew that it was Marketing that I understood & loved the most & there was no choice but to take Commerce as my specialization stream as Science & Maths at that point to me were alliens & distant cousins whom I could only admire but never follow or understand.

"All Is Well That Ends Well", today as I write this post I reallise that there has been paradigm shift in Traditional Marketing & means / modes of Communication  which have become more precise, specific & accurate. Marketing has evolved as a comprehensive Science without which organizations would fail to evolve as brands or leaders in their compettitive categories. What has not changed are the Fundamentals of Marketing which remain as the Laws of Marketing for any Organization to understand & follow.

Every new organization or a evolving one should identify their Niche which is core to their Success. They must clearly have a vision for the future & define their goals in a timely phased manner. Unless the Niche is defined & your short term & long term are Goals fixed, an organzation might just the ALICE who would still be in the Wonderland. Niche defines your strength & clearly lays down a road map for an organization to move forward.Marketing has moved away from Selling though Sales is an integral part of Marketing,  it has formulated to be a bigger & wider science with Sales just being on  top of the Iceberg. As a succesful Marketer, organizations today are aiming at identiying  the needs, wants & demands of people & simealtaneously working on these to evolve & suggest a comprehensive solution for the persisiting Business Problems. Brand Narendra Modi is  a classic example as BJP & RSS were instrumental in identying the dire need of a Mass, Stable, Successful, Strong  & a  leader with proven track record who would be a potent force in days to come.  never before were Youth  more involved in Indian  politics & 2014 was the year Brand NAMO was born.

   However what  Organizations should also realise is that customer has ample brand choices today across segments & categories & brand loyalty is something that they cannot bask upon. Shifting trends of brand loyalty across segments are a common feature & brands need to be cautious about the same through effective after sales service.Trust plays as a pivotal role in the success of any Brand & marketers aim at building Trust to ensure Customer Brand Loyalty.  Product should always be at the core  , Marketing can launch it in the orbit  , however it needs to sell on its own. It is important that any Segment that an organization enters should be compettive segment. Hoever despite a brand not being the Leader yet could only be the one whch could provide the right solution in its niche segement. For eg: Mysore Sandal Soap, has a niche segment of  Naturally made soaps from sandalwood. However despite the costs being higher compared to normal soaps yet considering the utlity & the brand strength it draws a cult following for  being the only one in the segment delivering world class natural sandalwood soaps.

 For every Organization through its Marketing campaigns it is only imperative that the message sent across to the Target Audience is clear, simple & precise. Hence mediums of Comunication become important. Good communication is much more than english vocabulary but specific message aimed at the right person at the right time. 

Every organization or an entrepreneur should understand the basics of Ecnomics & it is extremely important to relate this with Marketing strategies to ensure  optimal results. A country like India which has  a huge a youth population of 440 million(Appx) today would soon in years to come have 60 %  of its total poulation under the Yout category. Average age of the Population  is directly propotional to the growth of the Nation.  Hence youth stimultes income to the Nation as there is more earning into every household thus increasing the total income. Debt creates money & in a country like India with overall population hovering at 140 crores, availability of Loans have now become a easier task. Debts create money , as loans borrowed from a bank would get invested elsewhere reaching to the merchant bank and then the bank again lending  the same money to other & hence the liquidity in the market increases. As the repayment starts and starts excedding the lending, central governement reduces the interest rates to only encourage people to take more loans at attractive rates to keep a check on the liquidity in the system. 

Digital Marketing today is the Toast of the town & most organizations have moved into the same. However digital marketing is built on the Traditonal offline marketing platforms  which till date remain relevant and critical in a country like India where TV Viewing Pooulation is roughly around 210- to 220 million. Eg: OTT platforms like Netflix & Amazon do offline Marketing campaigns alongith ATL Campaigns despite having E Marketing as their common platform for Marketing. Phonepay & GPay both have designed a strong BTL & ATl Marketing campaign to ensure higher usage of the UPI Interface. 

 While it is important to identify the NICHE in your business, an organization or a venture should understand and imbibe the CATT Funnel & Framework.

WEALTH=n ^ CATT

 CATT Funnel is built on the premise that your WEALTH & Success depends on the NICHE(n) selected by you & which is related & based on C-Content, A-Attention, T-Trust & T-Transaction.

Hence first you need to define you NICHE & then ensure that Content that is created by you is attractive to people through Blogs, Posts, Videos & Live Webinars. This will ensure your Niche is showcased well & it is being worked upon.  ATTENTION is an important function of this funnel 7 hence can be achieved by driving high traffic for your CONTENT using tools like SEO, SM , Pais ads & referrals. Once ATTENTION has been achieved  then the TRUST building process starts with Target Audience & this is critical to ensure brand loyalty. Once TRUST has been achieved people trust a brand or an organization & start TRANSACTING with them. All the Four finctions are interrealted to each other & require to work in tandemn to each other thus ensuring creation of Optimum wealth which can be measured as a success tool.

It is critical to ensure that you select the Right Niche which can be be identified only by having a deep assesment of where you are & where you wish to be down the line . Hence to identify your NICHE you need to first develop the TALENT to define the right NICHE & if there is PASSION about that NICHE an organization or a brand are bound to succeed.

For Eg: A Top badmonton Player who has now decided to become a coach needs to first identify his NICHE which is critical to ensure that he is a successful Brand & a coach. All good players need not  be good coaches & some have bited the dust. As a good  player you  can get  good students to start with but for them to be great performers a Coach needs to be extremely passionate and focussed. Hence the Badminton Coach who alrready has abundance of TALENT with him needs now focus on coaching methodologies & make coaching as his PASSION. He needs to inculcate patience and calmness to ensure he becomes a great coach. 

A digital Marketing campaign will  not be succesful unless it is a Integrated model & can never be succesful if implemented in psylos. Hence a Brand needs to have a combination of all or most tools of Digital Marketing. 

A brand should ideally advertise the CONTENT(CONTENT MARKETING) on PAID ADVERTISING& generate a good E-mail database. Once the E-mail database is generated, mailers to be sent continously & regularly to the E-mail Database which is called as EMAIL MARKTING which will ensure enquiries are generated. Meanwhile you need to list your CONTENT through SEO & SEO will generate traffic back for ypour content. This Content can then be advertised in SOCIAL MEDIA(SM) which eventually may be published by others in their pages. Further content can be Sold & customer be Converted.

Heence Integrated Digital Marketing Framework is the need of the hour to offer complete holistic

 soultions to the clientele which will hep resolve their Business problem.

Personal Branding   is extremely critical  for every Entrepreneur & one needs to focus on that. Personal branding will also ensure your business sky rockets and does not limit you to a certain dimension or segment. You can evolve and start new businesses  through Personal Branding  which is critical for the evolution of a brand or Business. 

 As a Brand if you need gain the Mass Trust of your Target Audience its imperative that you create a Perosnal Brand  working in your Niche by Learning continously the concepts and mastering your niche which is a ongoing continous process & Concepts learnt should be applied at work succesfully to ensure optimal results. This should follow Blogging which would ensure your communicating the message to a wide range of people about the concepts learnt & work executed. Further you must take up consulting as you are now good at concepts, Execution through Work and you have enquiries for consultation to be done. This will help lot of businesses benefit to solve their business problems. 

Marketing in today's world has evolved to be a Super Science & not many organizations can ignore it any level. Sales should not be the immediate goals but brand building & gaining Target Audience trust should be the objective of any Marketing Campaign. Campaigns devised should be  measurable and be devised based on right message to right audience.