Strategic Marketing

Chapter 1: Marketing and its history

Marketing is usually considered only as advertising and sales.
In reality, advertising and sales are only the top of the iceberg.
Marketing is more than just one thing, it’s a wide concept.
The history of marketing can be seen as a process with different key moments.
The first real moment of marketing is considered to be the Mesopotamian age.
After that, a lot of key moments shaped the history of marketing.
The invention of the printing press, the advent of radio and tv Ad, the Apple’s products (iPod
and iPhone). But also the advent of Google and Social Media, such as Facebook, which
started influencing politics.
It’s thanks to Social Media that social movements, such as #BlackLivesMatter and
#LikeAGirl , became viral and caught the attention of a lot of people.
An Advertisement that contains a “gaffe” could be very dangerous for the company that could
face a management crisis.
Covid-19 has also been a crucial moment in marketing. That’s because marketing also needs
to look after the emotions people have. example: during C-19, a lot of people suffered solitude
and most of them were vicitms of suicide. Stromae, who struggled against solitude, launched
a positive message during one of the most viewed French TV programmes.
One of the technologies which is going to change the entire world also in terms of marketing,
it’s Artificial Intelligence.
ChatGPT is increasing its users more and more.
example: Heinz Tomato Ketchup has already launched their first marketing campaign, all
created with AI.

marketing is the ability to hit the target.

“Marketing is the activity set of institutions, and processes for creating, communicating,
delivering and exchanging offerings that have value for customers, clients, partners, and
society at large”

In order to obtain customers’ loyalty and brand love, companies should work with
authenticity, transparency and relevance.

Nowadays, Marketing is also all about the story you tell. Storytelling is gaining a lot of
importance.

Despite all this, Raja Rajamannar, CEO of Mastercard, defined 5 paradigms of Marketing
that could help marketers better face the challenges of the marketing.
➔​ Product Marketing
➔​ Emotional Marketing
➔​ Data-Driven Marketing
➔​ Digital & Social Marketing
➔​ Quantum Marketing
Chapter 2: Strategic Marketing
Strategic Marketing is the way a firm effectively differentiates itself from its competitors by
capitalizing on its strengths - both current and potential- to provide consistently better value
to customers than its competitors.
Strategic Marketing is necessary to create a
competitive advantage.
​
Every product has a value that is the result of
the perception of customers.
Basically, we have to take in consideration three
factors:
●​ Customer Perceived Value: the value customers give to a certain product
●​ Price: the market price a product has. The price customers have to pay to buy the
product
●​ Cost: the total amount of costs for creating a product with a certain value.

The difference between the price and the cost is called margin.
example: Ryanair offers a service whose price is low. The margin between price and cost is
not too big. They act like that in order to augment their market shares.

Innovations are fundamental in nowadays marketing. Companies should be ready to catch

each opportunity, in order to change the rules.

What’s a Marketing Strategy?

A marketing strategy is the combination of all the business’s decisions and actions to
increase sales and achieve a sustainable competitive advantage by understanding and
fulfilling the needs and wants of the customers.

A marketing strategy is an achievable and actionable focused set of steps devised by

marketers to achieve a marketing objective.
Companies using a detailed Marketing Strategy have 414% more chances to be successful.

Devising a Marketing Strategy means creating a plan that could help a company make
different choices about:
●​ target market (through segmentation);
●​ business offering;
●​ competitive advantage;
●​ goal;
●​ communication strategy;
●​ KPI (key performance indicators).
What is Operational Marketing?
Operational marketing is the set of action-oriented processes that extend over a short to
medium-term time plan and that address the targeted markets or segments.
It is the execution, the roadmap of tactical marketing efforts that help you achieve your
marketing goals.

Strategic Marketing and Operational Marketing are complementary

Marketing Plan Processes

Thanks to Strategic Marketing, companies can define a marketing strategy following precise
steps:
STEP 0: Purpose and Branding
The purpose is the "WHY" question: “why does the organization exist?
The branding isn’t just a logo. The branding is the deliberate, continuous process of
creating a strong, distinctive, positive perception of a company, its products and
services in the customer’s mind by developing & combining various assets.

STEP 1: Vision and Mission

With the term vision we can define the “where I want to be”. Where the company is
headed, what it wants to become, in accordance with its purpose.
The mission is the steps and actions to be taken to achieve the vision.
The mission explains the “what” and “how” the company works to reach its vision and
purpose.
example of mission: Patagonia : “We are in business to save our home planet”

STEP 2: Situation Analysis

The second step of the strategic marketing process is to evaluate internal and
external factors that affect the business and market.
Situation analysis provides a clear, objective view of the health of the business, the
current and prospective customers, industry trends, and the company’s position in the
marketplace.
Different tools can be used during this stage:
​ SWOT Analysis:
Swot Analysis is one of the tools used to investigate external and
internal factors that could influence the firm’s work.
SWOT is an acronym → Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities,
Threats.
Strengths and Weaknesses are internal factors, under the
company’s control.
Nevertheless, Opportunities and Threats are external factors.
​ 5C Analysis: It is another way to evaluate the market environment.
Like SWOT, it includes an internal analysis as well as an exploration of external factors.
This analysis takes in consideration 5 external and internal components that influence
the market:
➢​ Customers → Who are the customers? What needs does the customer seek
to satisfy?
➢​ Company → What special
competence does the firm
possess to meet those
needs?
➢​ Competitors → Who
competes with the firm in
meeting needs?
➢​ Collaborators →Whom
should the firm enlist to help
it and how can the firm motivate them?
➢​ Contex → What are the external factors that we need to take into account?

​ PESTEL Analysis: this method provides a comprehensive analysis of external

factors that could affect your company.
A PESTEL analysis is a strategic framework commonly used to evaluate the business
environment in which a firm operates.
The PESTEL framework is intended to help understand the broad macro-environment
that a company is operating in.
➢​ Political: decisions made by the government, including decisions on the
legality of various industries, taxation policies, or environmental standards;
➢​ Economic: the impact the state of the economy can have on the company,
including the availability and cost of capital for firms, economic growth rates, or
exchange rates;
➢​ Social: the impact of changing demographics and social trends;
➢​ Technological: the impact of new technologies on companies;
➢​ Ecological: how the factors such as weather, climate, natural disasters, and
pandemics influence companies;
➢​ Legal: how laws are implemented and enforced – for example, consumer
focused laws, anti-trust legislation, environmental laws, and employment laws
that companies must follow.

​ Porter’s Five Forces: Porter’s Five Forces is a framework to understand the

industry that a firm operates in.
It helps highlight how the relative powers of buyers and suppliers, as well as
competition from new entrants, substitute products, and rivalry between competitors,
influences the extent to which an industry is able to capture the value that is created.
➢​ substitute products: the extent to which there is competition from substitute
products.
➢​ threat of new entrants: how easy it is for new firms to enter the industry,
potentially increasing the levels of competition within an industry over time.
➢​ buyer power: the extent to which buyers are able to put pressure on the price of
the good, potentially due to their size or importance.
➢​ supplier power: the ability of suppliers to increase the costs of input.
STEP 3: Marketing Strategy
After having analyzed the market environment, a company needs to make some
choices about the marketing strategy.
There are different tools that help a company choose the best move to do.
●​ ANSOFF Matrix: this matrix helps plan and evaluate growth initiatives.

*Diversification is a strategy used to expand market share or enter new markets by launching or
acquiring new products. It allows a company to grow by expanding market share in an existing
market or by developing a new market presence.
There are three different typologies of Diversification Strategy:
➢​ Related Diversification: it occurs when a firm moves to a new industry that has
important similarities with the firm's existing industry or industries.
➢​ Unrelated Diversification: it occurs when a firm moves to a new industry that has
nothing to do with the firm's existing industry.
➢​ Geographic Diversification: it occurs when a firm moves to a new geographical zone.

●​ BCG Growth Share Matrix: this matrix helps companies decide how to
prioritize their different businesses.

To get the most out of the matrix for successful experimentation in the today’s business
environment, companies need to focus on four practical imperatives:
1.​ accelerate: it’s critical to evaluate the portfolio continuously
2.​ balance exploration and exploitation: this requires having an adequate number of
question marks while simultaneously maximizing the benefits of both cows and pets.
3.​ select rigorously: companies must carefully select investments as well as divestments
leveraging a wide range of data sources and developing predictive analytics.
4.​ measure and manage portfolio economics of experimentation: understanding the
experimentation level required to maintain growth is important for long-term
sustainability.
 ●​ STP- Segmentation, Targeting, Positioning
In order to satisfy their customers, companies need to segment the marketplace and
find the right target customers for their products.

How to set goals?

A company needs specific, measurable goals with milestones that measure your progress.
The goal a company sets should specify how much the firm wants to grow the sales number,
and the timeframe for meeting that target.
Each goal should be actionable and attainable through tactics you control.
With each goal, list the tactics or steps the firm will take to achieve it.
SMART → Specific, Measurable, Achievable, Relevant, Time-Related

How to set a budget?

The firm’s budget will outline all the expected costs for implementing the marketing plan,
including advertising, online content, branding, public relations, staffing costs, and more.
Depending on the size of the budget, a firm may have to make some tough choices about
which goals and tactics are the top priorities. Or the firm may have to adjust your tactics until
you reach a budget that’s affordable.
By creating the budget, you can finalize and stick to your plan.
 STEP 4: Marketing Mix
The model of the 4Ps can be used when you are planning a new
product launch, evaluating an existing product, or trying to optimize
the sales of an existing product.
A careful analysis of these four factors—product, price, place, and
promotion—helps a marketing professional devise a strategy that
successfully introduces or reintroduces a product to the public.
Nowadays we have 7Ps.

The current trend goes in the direction of infinite P’s.

STEP 5: Implementation and Evaluation

Once having launched and started the marketing campaign, companies need to keep
up with the results.
There should be a constant review of the obtained results.
It allows the company to modify the marketing strategy in the works.

Chapter 3: Customer Insight

Marketing is about providing valuable benefits for the customers.
Purchasing a product and then using it creates the satisfaction of the customers, which is
based on what the product enables the customers to do.

In order to create a valuable benefit for customers, companies should hear their clients.
There are different types of needs and wants that companies try to satisfy:
●​ LATENT needs: something a customer could need without knowing;
●​ IMPLICIT needs: something that customers need because are basics needs;
●​ EXPRESSED needs: needs that are directly expressed by the customers.

It’s important for companies not to create hype in the expectations of a product.
That’s because the impact of broken promises can be terrible for the company itself, leading
the client to choose a competitor instead of the company.

In order to better meet customers’ needs, companies can use customer insights.
Customer insights are fresh understanding of customers and the marketplace derived from
marketing information that become the basis for creating customer value and relationships.

In order to gather the most information possible, companies can devise VoC programmes
(Voice of Customer programmes). VoC is a continuous cycle of 4 activities: listen, interpret,
act, monitor.
Customer Exeprience, User Exeprience and User Interface
Making this information important is necessary for companies to improve the Customer
Experience (CX).
Customer experience is the overall impression that your customers have of your business and
your brand → BRAND PERCEPTION1.

There are different elements that influence the perception a customer has of a brand.
Companies need to be focused and take care of each touchpoint during the whole customer
experience.
Nowadays companies are operating in a digital market , where customers are buying more
and more on apps and websites.
For this reason, User Interface and User Exeperience become fundamental in terms of
Customer Experience.
User Interface is what users interact with directly, everything they see, touch and hear within a
piece of software or a website.
UI is concerned with designing the graphical layout of an application or website.
User Experience is a holistic term encapsulating each and every different kind of touchpoint a
user has with a product.

UI is what a website or app looks like and UX is how it feels to use it.

And eventual bad customer experience can have a terrible impact on the company.
A bad CX could damage the brand reputation, lead to a loss of sales and revenue, decline
brand loyalty and customer retention…

Customer Centricity
As clearly understood, we are living in a big worldwide market where the customer is the
center of every action. This is called Customer Centricity.
Companies need to make efforts to satisfy customers’ needs.
In orderto better meet their needs and make them happy, companies need to analyze
consumers’ behavior.
There are different elements that influence a consumer when deciding to purchase a
product:
●​ Culture: it’s the set of basic values, perceptions, wants and behaviours learned by a
member of society from family and other important institutions.
●​ Social Factors: when making a buying decision, everyone is influenced by their
acquaintances' opinions.
●​ Personal Factors: personal characteristics also have an influence on consumer buyer
behaviour. These characteristics can be the person’s age and life-cycle stage, the
person’s occupation and economic situation, but also lifestyle and personality2.
●​ Psychological Factors: there are different psychological factors influencing a
consumer, such as needs, perceptions, learning or beliefs.
1
brand perception: created by customers, communications, processes, marketing of the company. It’s
how relevant, reliable, available and adaptable you are in the eyes of your chosen audiences
2
personality: it’s the unique psychological characteristics that distinguish a person or group.
B2C Purchase Decision Process

Step 1: Recognize a Need

A purchased product is useful for a consumer
to fulfil the lack of something, to satisfy his
need.
There are two main types of needs: utilitarian
need and hedonic need.
Despite this, in order to have a more precise
scheme of human needs, we can refer to
Maslows’ Pyramid of Needs.

Identifying Unmet Needs in a Digital Age:

Innovation is all about identifying and filling people’s
unmet needs.
Customers want products and services that can solve
their problems better, faster, or more cheaply than
existing offerings can.
In order to catch the customers’ unmet needs,
companies must diversify how and where they look.

Step 2: Information Research

It’s fundamental to gather information about a certain product or service in order to be sure
that that product can satisfy a need.
It’s all about the involvement of the customer.
Involvement is most frequently conceptualized as perceived personal relevance of the object
based on their inherent needs, values, and interests.
There are different types of buying decision behavior:
●​ complex buying behavior: it’s characterized by high consumer involvement in a purchase
and significant perceived differences among brands. The buyer will pass through a learning
process, developing beliefs and attitudes and then a purchase choice will follow.
●​ habitual buying behavior: it’s consumer buying behavior characterized by low consumer
involvement and few significantly perceived differences. Repetition of advertisements can
create brand familiarity, which can lead to habitual purchases.
Step 3: Evaluation of Alternatives
When evaluating different alternatives, there are various factors that influence consumer’s
choice.
The first 3 elements influencing the buying process are beliefs, attitudes and behaviours.
A belief is an idea a consumer holds to be true. example: “This Coke can is red”
An attitude is the positive or negative tendency that a consumer has towards a product.
example: “I like this Coke”
A behaviour is how the consumer acts. example: “I buy this Coke”.

There are also other elements influencing a customer’s choice, such as:
➢​ product attributes: each product is seen as a bundle of attributes.
➢​ brand beliefs: each consumer develops an attitude towards a brand.
➢​ total product satisfaction: consumers have an expectation of their satisfaction after
having purchased and used a product.

Step 4: Purchase Decision

The purchase decision rests on 3 elements: cognition (think), conation (do) and affect.
There are two different models that concerns this step:
❖​ Compensatory Model: a compensatory decision-making strategy weighs the positive
and negative attributes of the considered alternatives and allows for positive attributes
to compensate for the negative ones.

❖​ Non-Compensatory Models: A non-compensatory decision-making strategy

eliminates alternatives that do not meet a particular criterion.
●​ Conjunctive: “must have at least this much of these”
●​ Disjunctive: “Ok I’m flexible, either this or that”.
●​ Lexicographic: “I will take the best on the most attribut
●​ Elimination by aspects : “At least this much of the most”

Compensatory strategies are used when there are only a few alternatives.
Non-compensatory decision making is used when there are many alternatives to choose
from; it allows people to quickly narrow down the number of options to one or a few.

Step 5: Post-Purchase Evaluation

In this phase, customers send feedback about the purchase, with the companies always
ready to help the customer in case of need.
The importance of Customer Journey
Despite this, we should know that these steps are not a linear process.
Step by step, customers create their own Customer Journey, with the relative Customer
Journey Map.
Customer journey maps are a way of visualizing the entire experience. They document
everything a user thinks, feels, does, interacts with and experiences from a brand across all
touchpoints.

Product managers must offer customers a compelling series of experiences, a customer

journey, to keep them coming back for more.
The design of customer journeys is the new marketing battleground.
In order to help marketers attract customers so that
they will come back to the company, experts have
created the Customer Journey Matrix.
It includes four archetypes. None of the archetypes is
universally superior to the others; all four can be used
to keep customers returning frequently::
➔​ a routine is effortless and predictable: simple
procedure for completing a recurring task and
typically involves a trigger for an activity that
produces a reward. example: Starbucks coffee

➔​ a joyride is effortless and unpredictable:

amusing journeys that allow people to escape
the tedium of everyday routines.
example: TikTok’s ForYou Page

➔​ a trek is effortful and predictable: predictable journeys in which customers labor to

achieve challenging long-term goals.
example: Babbel / MyFitnessPal’s food diary

➔​ an odyssey is effortful and unpredictable: challenging, thrilling, and unpredictable

adventures that are fueled by a customer’s enthusiasm, determination, and sense of
purpose.
example: CrossFit workouts
B2B Purchase Decision Process
The business buying process has 8 stages:
Need Recognition and Item Description
1.​ Problem recognition: someone in the company recognises a problem or need that
can be met by acquiring a good or a service.
2.​ General Need description: it’s the stage in the business buying process in which a
buyer describes the general characteristics and quantity of a needed item;
3.​ Product specification: it’s the stage in the business buying process in which the
buying organization decides on and specifies the best technical product characteristics
for a needed item.

Supplier Selection
4.​ Supplier search: it’s the stage in which the buyer tries to find the best vendors;
5.​ Proposal solicitation: it’s the stage in which the buyer invites qualified suppliers to
submit proposals;
6.​ Supplier selection: it’s the stage in which the buyer reviews proposals and selects a
supplier or suppliers. Involvement of procurement.

Purchase and Evaluation Process

7.​ Order-routine specification: it’s the stage in which the buyer writes the final order
with the chosen supplier(s), listing the technical specifications, quantity needed,
expected time of delivery, return policies and warranties.
8.​ Performance review: it’s the stage in which the buyer assesses the performance of
the supplier and decides to continue, modify or drop the arrangement.

The B2B Elements of Value Pyramid by Bain

Marketers have understood that it’s important to understand which are the needs of a client
when making a decision during a B2B
purchase process.
In B2C, we’ve analyzed the Maslow
Pyramid of Needs, analyzing which
are the basic needs for a customer.
When it comes to B2B, Mr. Bain
created a similar pyramid that shows
what are the values that influence a
company’s decision when buying from
a supplier.
The pyramid is composed by 5
stages:
➔​ TABLES STAKES
➔​ FUNCTIONAL value
➔​ EASE-OF-DOING-BUSINESS value
➔​ INDIVIDUAL value
➔​ INSIPIRATIONAL value
The Marketing Funnel
A marketing funnel describes the customer’s journey with a company.
It contains all the stages that a consumer goes through.
It’s important for a company to know the relationship between a customer and the brand, in
order to ease his customer journey during the various touchpoints.

The Marketing Funnel is composed of different stages, during which the customer gets in
touch and knows for the first time a brand (awareness), augments his interest and
considerations (interest and consideration), evaluates (evaluation) the possibility of a
purchase, buys a product multiple times (decision, purchase and repeat) and becomes loyal
to the brand (loyalty and advocacy).

Customer Experience Measures

In order to be sure that customers are satisfied during their Customer Journey, companies
need to evaluate and keep up with all the steps.
Different CX metrics can be useful to evaluate customers’ satisfaction during the CX.
Here are four top metrics used by CX professionals to track customer experience over time:
●​ Customer Effort Score (CES):
Customer Effort Score measures the experience with a product or service in terms of
how ‘difficult’ or ‘easy’ it is for your customers to complete an action.
example: “How easy was it to get your issue resolved today?’ and a rating scale going
from ‘1: very difficult’ to ‘7: very easy”.

●​ Net Promoter Score (NPS):

Net Promoter Score is a customer loyalty score that estimates the number of
promoters and detractors of a brand.
example: “On a scale from 0 to 10,
how likely are you to recommend this
product/company to a friend or
colleague?”.

There are three types of NPS scores:

➢​ Experience NPS;
➢​ Relationship NPS;
➢​ Competitive Benchmark.
 ●​ Customer Satisfaction Score (CSAT):
CSAT surveys measure customers’ satisfaction with the product or service they
receive. CSAT focuses the customer’s attention on specific touchpoints they were
satisfied or dissatisfied with.

●​ Time to Resolution (TTR):

TTR is the average length of time it takes customer service teams to resolve an issue
or ticket after it’s been opened by a customer.
The shorter the TTR is, the higher the chances customers will not experience
frustration when they reach out for help.

Chapter 4: Market and Competition

Blue Ocean Strategy is a strategy that allows companies to create uncovered market
spaces.
Companies are always trying to avoid concurrency, which is all concentrated in the red
oceans.
For this reason, Blue Ocean Strategy’s goal is to make the competition irrelevant, creating and
capturing uncontested demands.

Blue Oceans allows companies to break the value-cost trade-off, delivering products with a
higher value, investing less than expected (differentiation + low cost).
​
The 4 Actions Framework
This framework is designed to help organizations
break out of red oceans and create new,
uncontested market space, the blue cceans,
The Four Actions Framework involves four key
questions that challenge conventional industry
assumptions and encourage companies to rethink
their strategies. Here are the four actions:

In order to improve the possibilities of success, these

countermeasures need to be taken simultaneously.
Chapter 5: BRAND & PURPOSE
PURPOSE
A company’s purpose is the answer to the WHY question: “Why does the organization exist?”.
More specifically, a company's purpose is an aspirational reason for being which inspires
and provides a call to action for an organization and its partners and stakeholders and
provides benefit to local and global society.

In marketing, one of the most important concepts about Brand Purpose is the Golden Circle.
The Golden Circle is the result of three subsystems:
●​ What: What the company does to fulfill that core belief. The result of the
WHY.
●​ How: How the business fulfills that core belief. Your process. Specific
actions taken to realize your WHY.
●​ Why: The “WHY” in a company is the core belief of the business.
It’s why the business exists, its purpose and its motivation.
Brand purpose should provide a certain emotional attachment toward
customers.
The WHY is the result of the choice of the Limbic Brain, and not the
Neocortex.
It’s fundamental for companies to touch the innermost part of customers, in order to
touch their emotions.

Only after having chosen its purpose, can a company go through vision, mission, values and
positioning.
Let’s have a more detailed look to these definitions:
●​ Purpose: why your company or brand exists;
●​ Vision: where you want to get to by a specific point in timeline with the Purpose;
●​ Mission: what bold moves do you need to take to achieve the Mission;
●​ Values: how you behave as a brand, wht behaviors and attitudes you display;
●​ Positioning: how all of the above is encapsulated to occupy a distinct place in
people’s minds.

Profit for a company is like oxygen for a person: if you don’t have enough of it, you’re out of
the game.
Despite this, it’s crucial to understand that profit is not the only thing that matters.
In order to be successful, brands should focus not only on profit, but also on economical,
social and political issues.
Meaningful purposes attract customers.

More specifically, a brand purpose usually has 3 senses:

➔​ competence: the function that a product serves
➔​ cause: the social good to which a company aspires
➔​ culture: the intent with which a company runs its
business.
Purpose-driven Marketing strategy
As clearly understood, profit and brand purpose are concepts that
work together.
It’s important for a company to find the right equilibrium of both profit
and purpose orientation.

It’s important not to focus only on the profit, in order to avoid social
problems, but it’s also crucial to avoid being a good samaritan.

Profits are equally as important as purpose. Companies don’t need

to choose one over the other.

Companies can also develop a Purpose-driven Marketing strategy, that aims to create a
stronger relationship with its customers, by creating authentic and emotional bonds based on
shared values.
Things go wrong when a brand claims a commitment to a cause without translating into reality.
This is the case of purpose-washing, a term that comes from greenwashing.
Purpose needs to have authenticity, substance and actions.

Qualities for a great purpose

In order to be successful and be memorised by customers, a brand purpose should be:
➢​ inspiring: it should be aspirational. example: “through sport, we have the power to
change lifes” - Adidas., but also precise: a great purpose statement is aspirational but
not vague. example: “to inspire and develop the builders of tomorrow” - Lego
➢​ short: short and most importantly, memorable. example: “to give wings to people and
ideas” - Red Bull.
➢​ relevant: it should have a role and an outcome. example: to help people save money
so they can live better” - Walmart
➢​ flexible to evolvement: tt should evolve and grow with the company over time, and as
the context around it changes. example: ”We exist to accelerate the planet’s transition
to sustainable energy” - Tesla

Where Purpose affects Companies?

Purpose can have an impact on four business agendas. To determine what that is, the
following questions shall be asked :
●​ Demand Generation: how can purpose increase consumers’ preference for products
and services?
●​ Employee Engagement: how can purpose strengthen the connection that employees
feel to the work and to one another?
●​ Governance and Sustainability: how can purpose help reinforce a company’s
reputation as a good corporate citizen and a strong ESG performer?
●​ Strategy and Business Valutation: how can purpose enhance opportunities for
profitable growth and reduce business risk?
BRANDING
A brand is defined as the term, name, sign, symbol, design, or a combination of them
intended to identify a company's product or services from a seller and to differentiate them
from those from competition.
Branding isn’t just a logo. Branding is the deliberate, continuous process of creating a strong,
distinctive, positive perception of a company, its products and services in the customer’s
mind by developing & combining various assets.
Building a powerful brand is crucial, also because brands carry values and give meaning.
The Brand Image of a product or a company corresponds to the way it is perceived by
consumers.
The Brand Personality is a process of attributing an individual's personality traits to a brand.
The personality of a brand is evaluated based on the perception that consumers have of it.

The result of having a powerful brand is called Brand Equity.

Brand Equity refers to the value a company gains from its name recognition when compared
to a generic equivalent.
Brand Equity has four dimensions each providing value to a firm in numerous ways :
●​ brand loyalty;
●​ brand awareness;
●​ brand associations;
●​ perceived quality.

Elements that shape a Brand

A slogan is a catchphrase used in advertising to grab the attention of consumers as part of a

marketing campaign.
Slogans specifically refer to the goals or aims of a certain product and service, while taglines
refer to the overall brand without pointing fingers to specific products.
example: “Just Do It”, Nike

A tagline is a short phrase that adds context to a brand and goes hand in hand with corporate
vision.
The main purpose of taglines is to provide consumers with additional information about a
brand, such as their purpose, benefits or values.
Namely, taglines are used to describe a brand at large, not specific products or services.
example: “Think Different”, Apple

A character can be a human, animal or other personality created by a brand. The character is
alive, embodying a brand's attributes or values.
example: Bibendum, Michelin man
Brand Key Model
In order to
understand
if a brand
can be
successful,
marketers
have
developed a
Brand Key
Model.
Chapter 6: Transformative Marketing
Transformative Marketing is a concept that refers to the way in which marketing practices
can change over time to adapt to new technologies and consumer demands for more
meaningful engagement to create more value.

More in general, transformative marketing can be defined as the agile and informed
amalgamation of marketing components for delivering valuable responses to dramatic
changes in the marketplace.
example: Covid19; the commercialization of Internet; AI

One of the most impactful changes that are influencing our days is sustainability.
The term Sustainable Marketing refers to the advocacy of eco-friendly goods and services
as well as morally upright corporate ethos.
There are different strategies that a company can adopt to be more eco-friendly and diminish
its carbon footprint:
●​ creating new products: reducing the environmental footprint of manufacturing and
distribution;
●​ new packaging: using renewable or recycled materials;
●​ promoting sustainable consumption & lifestyle choices.

In this context, CSR (Corporate Social Responsibility) refers to the way through which a
company achieves a balance of economic, environmental and social imperatives, while at
the same time addressing the expectations of shareholders and stakeholders.
CSR mainly addresses consumers and the public.
On the other hand, ESG (Environmental, Social and Corporate Governance) refers to a a
range of targets for a business to meet in order to improve its sustainability and lower its risk
level across various factors.

Even though every company can choose the strategies to adopt in terms of environmental
impact, the United Nations have defined 17 SDG (sustainable development goals) that should
provide a better future, achievable within 2030.
Around 40% of the world’s biggest companies currently use SDGs as part of their reporting
processes.

Worldwide companies have the responsibility to influence consumers in order to change their
behaviorus in terms of carbon footprint.
COP28 established that gas emissions need to be cut 43% by 2030.
Marketing ADVs will be fundamental to influence people, pushing them to change the
demand.
The problem is that people don’t really believe companies when they advertise something
about sustainability, due to greenwashing. example: 59% of the campaigns show one or
more characteristics of greenwashing.

In order to communicate efficiently in terms of sustainability, there are some drivers that allow
a credible sustainable communication → honesty, commitment, urgency, shared value,
clarity through details.
Chapter 7: Digital and Social
Social media are online communication channels through which users create communities to
share information, ideas, personal messages, and other content.
They include social networking sites, video sharing platforms, blogs and microblogging
platforms, forums and messaging platforms.
example: Facebook, Instagram, X, Youtube…

The Social Media landscape is dominated by big players that dominate the market.
These big players are a real opportunity for companies to launch a marketing strategy.
There are more and more users on Social media, that means that the possible coverage is
increasing.

Trends and Social Media in a marketing approach

➔​ TREND #1: Community is key to connecting and engaging with your audience on
social media.​
Most social media marketers say building an active online community is critical to
success in 2023.

➔​ TREND #2: Consumers are discovering new products on social media more than
anywhere else.​
Most social media marketers say consumers buy products directly within social apps
more often than on brand websites or through third-party resellers.
Marketers need to establish brand trust if they want to sell on social media.

➔​ TREND #3: Social search is becoming more popular than search engines, and SEO
has entered social chat.​
Almost a quarter of consumers aged 18-54 already go to social media first to search
for brands. This shoots up to 36% among Gen Z.

➔​ TREND #4: Brands swap out celebrities for microinfluencers.​

Microinfluencers allow a company to build a true relationship, demonstrating a
coherence to the audience. Microinfluencers are also cheaper than a sponsorship with
influencers.
 ➔​ TREND #5: AI has reached the masses and is changing how we create.
AI is creating some interesting possibilities for companies.
Nowadays, it’s possible with AI to create text and visual contents, optimizing a
marketing campaign.
Despite this, there are some risks that AI puts on the table:
➢​ the possibility of algorithmic bias, which may result in the unjust treatment of
particular groups of individuals;
➢​ Regulatory frameworks and ethical guidelines still have to catch up, leaving AI
developers and social media companies to confront complex ethical and legal
issues alone.

Social Media is a great opportunity for companies, because they allow them to gain traction in
different sectors.
Infact, Social Media can help companies enhance their reputation, build a community and
advertise their products.

DATA: 4, 32% → the average reach of an organic post on a Facebook page

Nowadays, more than ⅓ of the total global digital ad spend came from social media.

Social Media Marketing: Paid VS Organic in Social Media

Social media organic reach is very dependent on the social media algorithms → ORGANIC
REACH.
Organic Reach is the number of unique accounts (~ people) who have seen your content
through unpaid distribution.

Each social media network has a proprietary algorithm that defines how organic content is
distributed on the platform.

Platforms highlights & creative assets

Tiktok is an entertainment platform powered by the community.
The thing that pushed TikTok being one of the most important social media is the ForYou
page (DATA: 87% of the time spent on TikTok is on the FYP).

TikTok is based on 4 mindsets that helped the platform having a great participation of users:
➔​ ENTERTAIN: users enjoy scrolling their TikToks because they are entertained.
➔​ PARTICIPATE: TikTok community is the key that power the platform. Data say that 3 out 4
users feel comfortable expressing themselves on the platform.
➔​ UPLIFT:
➔​ DISCOVER: people are always discovering new contests, being more willing to buy stuff they
saw on the platform.

IMPORTANT: every social platform needs different assets

Consumers are going through a deterioration of their attention level.

39% only sees the first 2 seconds of a Facebook/Instagram ad in an average campaign.
Chapter 8: Emerging technologies influencing marketing today
The simple term marketing has been displaced by the term Quantuum Marketing.
This concept determines the total reinvention of marketing and the ecosystem of marketing.
The speed, scale and impact of Quantum Marketing are unprecedented.
Thit total reinvention is now driven by exponential disruptions in consumer’s lives, caused by a
deluge of emerging technologies.

With the term emerging technologies, we refer to the scientific knowledge and its application
in the early adoption cycle for firms and consumers with the potential to influence all marketing
processes.
Quantum Marketing has a toolbox that includes emerging technologies such as Infinite Data,
Artificial Intelligence, Augmented Reality and Virtual Reality, Blockchain, 5G.

The new tech is made possible by the maturity of six enablers:

➢​ computing power;
➢​ open source software;
➢​ the Internet;
➢​ cloud computing;
➢​ mobile devices;
➢​ big data.

Thanks to the use of big data, companies can collect mountains of insights to extract to
finetune the segmentation & targeting.
Despite this, it’s not the raw data that provides competitive advantage, but the ability to play
with, analyse and act on data.

ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE
Aritifical Intelligence is concerned, it’s defined as the science and engineering of making
intelligent machines.
AI is usually spliced into two subcategories:
➔​ Narrow AI: a learning algorithm is designed to perform a single task. Of the two
subcategories, Narrow AI is the most tangible and measurable. Most AI advancements
occur under this category: Machine Learning, Deep Learning, Natural Language
Process, Computer Vision, Speech Recognition.
example: Google Assistant

➔​ Artificial General Intelligence (AGI): AGI is the ability of an intelligent agent to

understand or learn any intellectual task that a human being can. It can be seen as the
creation of a machine with human-like intelligence.

Despite this, nowadays there's an advanced form of AI, called MultiModal AI.
This AI is able to analyze and interpret multiple modes of data simultaneously, allowing it to
generate more accurate and human-like responses.
Multimodal AI can combine information from different sources, such as images, sound,
and text, to create a more nuanced understanding of a given situation.
example: ChatGPT
INFINITE DATA
The greatest side product of digitalization is Big Data.
The breadth and depth of data are increasing exponentially.
All these are mountains of insights to extract to finetune the segmentation & targeting.
It’s not the raw data that provides competitive advantage, but the ability to play with, analyse
and act on data.

AUGMENTED REALITY
Augmented Reality is a technology that enhances a real-life environment by layering
threedimensional artificial objects on top of it.
example: L’Oréal has used AR technology to help people virtually test millions of beauty
products, discover new products and buy them online or find them in stores.

VIRTUAL REALITY
Virtual Reality is a computer-generated simulation that visually immerses a person into
another reality or environment.
Brands can use virtual reality as an integral part of storytelling.
example: Lexus customers can use VR to test drive a car around a virtual race track

5G
Superfast download speeds, 5G can connect to more devices at once and has very low
latency.

THE INTERNET OF THINGS (IoT)

IoT can be defined as the extension of internet connectivity into physical devices and
everyday objects which in turn provide data to marketers.
There are currently more than 23 billion internet-connected devices globally.
example: Samsung has created fridges that can be connected with embedded screen
Chapter 9: Agility and Adptability
The future success of marketing rests upon its ability to continuously anticipate and deliver
against the fast-changing expectations of the connected customer.
Today's marketing requires velocity: speed with direction.

In order to be organized and improve the possibilities of success, companies need a

Marketing Operating Model (MOM).
An operating model describes the way an organization does business today.
The marketing organisation structure depends heavily on the size of the company, the type
of industry the company is in, the business goals it has and the way the company wants to
communicate with its audience.

five of the most common types of marketing organisation structures:

●​ Functional Structure: it organizes employees into groups
based on their job positions, skill sets and duties they perform. ​
Specialised functional groups can promote consistent work and
speed up work performance since they don't involve employees
outside of their function.

●​ Product-Based Structure: this

structure assigns employees into
groups or divisions that focus on
each individual product line.​
It’s mostly ideal for a company
selling a variety of products or
services.

●​ Geographical Structure: it divides employees into teams based on geographical

regions. Breaking down marketing by
territories and regions is beneficial for
focusing on specific regional
audiences and engaging with local
markets.

●​ Market-Based Structure: it can be helpful to divide marketing teams, according to

different criteria, such as: industry, markets, business size, or another type of
customer segment.​
For each segment of customers, a
different team is responsible for
understanding their needs and
creating tailored marketing
strategies & programmes that
appeal to different consumers.
 ●​ Customer Stage Structure: it’s used to
assign marketing teams to different
customer stages such as building brand
awareness, customer acquisition,
customer conversion, and finally
customer retention.

VUCAH World
Companies need to match the speed of customers shifts and outpace the competition at the
same time.
Agility has been the new name.
That’s because companies are operating in a VUCAH world → volatility, uncertainty,
complexity, ambiguity, hyperconnection.

Agile working is a combination of both incremental and iterative development. An

incremental process is one where products and services are designed, built and delivered in
pieces.
An iterative process is one that improves a product or service through successive refinement.
In order to be sure that a product can be successful, it’s crucial to build a Minimum Viable
Product (MVP).
The MVP does not yet have all the desired functionality, but through successive feedback
rounds with customers the product or service is improved.

What is Agile Marketing?

Agile marketing is the application of agile
values and principles to manage the way a
marketing team gets work done.
At its core, an agile approach values flexibility,
iteration, and speed.
 FOCUS
Sponsorship: how to engage customers and prospects for brand and sales impact
Sponsorship is one component of the marketing communication mix, impactful and rarely
used at its full potential.
Through sponsorship, a brand connects emotionally with people via thier passions and
interests, offering an impactful brand experience and interaction in the field, leading to higher
brand consideration, reputation engagement and contributing to commercial objectives.
Sponsorship is a commercial deal based on a negotiation where a brand pays for a set of
rights related to a property, sold by the rights holder and detailed in a contract.

At the rights holders side, companies look for sponsors to generate profit, limitate loss,
raise funds and/or activate business.
Companies that are looking for sponsors should choose the sponsor that better fits the
companies' values.
A complete package fitting the brands priorities usually contains visibility and activation,
hospitality and digital content.

On the other hand, we have partnerships, collaborative arrangements between two or more
entities that come together to work toward common goals, share resources, and collectively
address challenges. ​
A company can develop both internal partnerships and external partnerships.
➔​ Internal partnerships refer to collaborative relationships and synergies that occur
within an organization itself, involving different units, departments, or teams working
together toward common goals.

➔​ External partnerships refer to collaborative relationships and alliances that an

organization forms with entities outside of its immediate structure.
There are different types of external partnerships:
●​ AGENCY Partnerships: the Institute of Practitioners in Advertising (IPA)
identifies 5 core relationship models for effective marketing:
❖​ Titan: a brand chooses one single external body to provide all
marketing.
❖​ Engineer: one body handles strategy while multiple agencies execute
that strategy.
❖​ Coalition: strategy and execution is undertaken by several agencies.
❖​ Hybrid: a combination of in-house client services and external agencies
for strategy and execution.
❖​ In-house: the vast majority of a brand’s marketing is handled in-house.

●​ INNOVATION Partnerships: not only with large companies offering new tech,
as well as with start-ups and scaling-up, hungry for growth and very agile.

●​ TECHNOLOGY Partnerships: using or having external partners offering or

creating solutions that marketers should be able to use on their own.

●​ MEDIA Partnerships: media has been traditionally a core area of marketing.

 ●​ PASSION Partnerships - sponsoring: partnership with sports, music, dining,…

●​ PUBLIC-PRIVATE Partnerships: not only charitable and not-for-profit

initiatives also for profit.

●​ INDUSTRY and TRADE Partnerships: working together on standards for

interoperability avoiding inconsistency and incompatibility helping shape the
policies and define the parameters for the industry.

●​ LOCAL COMMUNITY Partnerships: local communities are becoming an

increasingly important focus for customers.

Co-Marketing, Co-Branding and Co-Creation

The partnership of two or more companies can lead to the creation of ture collaborating
processes, such as:
➔​ Co-Branding: it’s when two or more brands combine their brand equity—their logo,
name, and reputation in the market—into a single product or service.
The success of co-branding relies upon the choice of the brand to partner with and the
reputation of all brands involved.
Both brands should have a shared set of values and work towards similar goals.
example: Adidas x Parley for the Oceans: the two companies created a line of
eco-friendly shoes. Milka x Oreo. Doritos x Locos Tacos.

➔​ Co-Marketing: it’s the alignement of marketing efforts of two brands that doesn’t
result in the creation of a new product or service.
The goal is to promote a shared offer around each other’s brand image and existing
products or services.
Co-marketing is veru useful to widen the audience, increase brand awareness.
The two brands need to have similar audiences, setting mutual goals.
Furthermore, co-marketing allows brands cutting costs and selling more products,
generating a wider press coverage.
example: Spotify x Starbucks; Mastercard x ApplePay.

➔​ Co-Creation: it’s the practice of involving a brand’s audience in the creation of a new
product or service, name, slogan or advertising campaign.
The goal of collaborative co-creation is to promote the culture of sharing ideas.
Co-creating helps companies to develop a strong customer-centric strategy, that allows
building a powerful community.
example: Lego Ideas, a platform that allows LEGO enthusiasts to submit their own
ideas for new LEGO sets.
 Emerging Technologies: House of Marketing
When we talk about emerging technologies, we must talk about Artificial Intelligence.
Nowadays, the concept of Generative AI is gaining more and more importance.
Generative AI describes algorithms that can be used to create new content.
example: creation of audio, images, texts, videos…

Generative AI has the potential to

make a significant impact on both
organizational operations and
customer experience

More in general, Artificial

Intelligence can be taken in
consideration as part of the big
trend of Web 3.0
Web 3.0 is currently a work in progress concept, which is not yet defined.
It is often refered to as the next generation of the internet.
It involves emerging technologies such as AI, blockchain, cryptocurrencies, NFTs and
virtual universes.

The evolution of technologies finds its origins in the accumulation of data over time.
More in particular, we can define 4 types of data:
●​ Zero Party Data: data proactively shared by the customer;
●​ First Party Data: data collected during transactions
●​ Second Party Data: data purchased from another company
●​ Third Party Data: data collected from random sources.

Whenever we enter a website, we are asked to accept “cookies”.

Cookies are small bits of information that a website stores on your computer.
Nevertheless, we are moving to a cookieless world, in order to protect the privacy of
customers.
It will make marketing strategies much more complicated to devise.
There will be a lack of signals for the advertising algorithms.

In order to try to replace cookies, companies are trying to move towards first party data.
 Market Trends and the importance of Customer Experience
As already seen before, companies are now operating in a VUCAH world.
As a demonstration, there are a lot of new trends influencing the market.
Companies need to deeply analyze them in order to find the best strategies to gain a
competitive advantage.

●​ Blurred Industry Lines: most of the time, companies are constantly looking for
innovation. When we talk about “blurred industry lines”, we are referring to the concept
according to which firms operating in specific industries extend their activity mix and
include activities that were previously performed by actors in other industries, thanks to
digitalization.
example: Proximus could be afraid that Amazon in 3 years could find a solution to
provide internet all over the world, becoming their first competitor.

●​ Zero Thinking Behaviour: in a world of “too much”, consumers feel lost, under
pressure and overwhelmed. They expect technology and companies to pressure from
their shoulders.
Companies that make the lives of their customers easier are on the rise. This asks for
reinventing customer journeys and even challenging your company’s mission.

●​ The rise of AI: AI is the ability of a machine to display human-like capabilities such as
reasoning, learning, planning and creativity.
It can process large amounts of data and is able to do things such as recognize
patterns, male decisions and judgment like humans.
AI has the potential to impact our world in many ways. It can help us work more
efficiently, learn better and gain a better understanding of the world around us.
However, AI can also bring some risks.
example: Coca Cola is addressing AI to find a new recipe for its drink, to create the
drink of the future.

All these new trends have a common goal: improve the customer experience.
Customer centricity demands that the customer is the focal point of all decisions related to
delivering products, services and experiences to create customer satisfaction, loyalty and
advocacy.
It’s all about creating a relationship between the company and its customers.
Most of the most successful companies all over the world are customer centric.
example: Apple, Amazon or Starbucks.
Despite this, it could happen that a delivery gap is created.
Delivery gap is the difference between a company's perceived given experience and
customers’ perceived received experience.
It’s impossible to find something that can easily positively impact the delivery gap, but there
are some relevant factors that are called CX success factors:
➔​ Outside-In strategy: the outside-in approach is guided by the belief that value
co-creation with the customers is the key to success. ​
Innovation processes involving customers, especially lead users, are more likely to
succeed in the marketplace since customers have better and more creative ideas than
internal product developers. The impact the customers have on a company’s choices
is called Voice of the Customer.

➔​ Test and Data Strategy: companies need to test their customers, in order to
understand their preferences and their needs. ​
When it comes to communicating and promoting a service or a product, companies
need to understand which way of communication is much more efficient, according to
their customers.

➔​ End to End Strategy: each company all over the world is formed by different
departments, each one having its goals to reach. ​
Despite this, when a company wants to adopt a customer centricity approach, every
department must share and be focused on the same goal: customer satisfaction.

Some DATA about the importance of Customer Experience

➔​ 32% of customers will STOP doing business with a brand after only 1 negative
experience
➔​ 62% of people say that share their bad experience with others
➔​ 46% of people said they would pay more for a friends and welcoming experience
➔​ 32% of people they would pay more for a fast and efficient service
 Brand Archetypes
Nowadays customers want to negotiate with humanized brands.
Brands need to act as a person who succeeds in satisfying customers’ needs.
For this reason, Jung created the 12 brand archetypes model.

HERO: the HERO is on a mission to

change the world with their product by
tackling societal problems. example:
Tesla.
Hero Brand Strategy:
➢​ inspirational messaging, content
that helps people take action;
➢​ need to constantly create
products that have a “wow” factor;

FREEDOM: the EXPLORER is a pioneer

with an indipendent spirit who is always
looking to explore new possibilities. A
risk-taker that inspires its audience to
lead a more adventurous life. example:
Red Bull.
Explorer Brand Strategy:
➢​ risk-takers;
➢​ dislike being confined to a stable
and safe environment;
➢​ enable customers to go out, explore the world.

SOCIAL: the CITIZEN wants to blend in with the rest of the society. These brands are
tipically affordable, inclusive and target the masses. example: Ikea.
Citizen Brand Strategy:
➢​ comfort zone for its customers
➢​ cost leadership strategy

ORDER: the RULER knows that the best thing to do to avoid chaos is to take control. A
commanding, refined and articulate brand reaffirming status and wealth,depicting a luxurious
lifestyle. example: Rolex
Ruler Brand Strategy:
➢​ audience willing to pay a premium for products that will make them look richer.
 Digital Strategy and the Impact of AI
A revolution doesn’t happen when society adopts new tools, it happens when society adopts
new behaviors.
Nowadays there are some trends related to the shift in consumers’ behavior that companies
need to be aware of.
Even though people spend almost 5 hours and a half on the Internet, people don’t want to
spend more than a few seconds on ADVs.

Nowadays, youngsters are using their smartphones more and more than a laptop, consuming
a lot of snacking contents.
Despite this, in recent years, people are looking for the “best” solution, and not the “cheapest”
one.
This trend can be analyzed through Google research.
As a result of this, younger generations are more and more looking to engage brands doing
something for the planet, rather than to established brands, whose target is older consumers.

​
In order to be more efficient, companies need to analyze their customers, creating buyer
personas.
Once created buyer personas, companies will have a clearer framework of the situation.
Only by analyzing their customers, companies can understand how to communicate with
them.
With the advent of Social Media, companies have a lot of possibilities to communicate with
customers.
In order to better understand which channels can be used by a company to advertise its
product, there’s a model that summarizes all the strategies: the POE Model.
 Apple Sustainability, Mother Nature ADV
Apple is one of the most engaged companies all over the world
in terms of sustainability.
As a proof of their involvement, Apple published an ironic video,
through which the company explains the achieved goals and
the ones for the future.

Improvings in terms of materials

●​ Apple affirmed that the company aims to get rid of plastic in packaging by 2024.
●​ Apple succeeded in reducing by -100% the use of aluminium in the enclosures of
devices.
​
Improvings in terms of electricity
●​ Apple is operating with 100% clean electricity.
●​ Apple offices are already carbon neutral.
●​ Over 300 suppliers have committed to using 100% clean renewable electricity.

Improvings in terms of transportations

●​ Apple’s shippings are mostly made by ocean rather than air
●​ This shift allowed a -95% reduction in transportation emissions.

Improvings in terms of Earth care

●​ Apple is investing in projects that protect earth’s soil, plants and trees.
●​ Apple contributed to the plantation of forests.
●​ Apple is aiming to remove carbon from the atmosphere.
●​ Apple reduced the use of water by -63 billions of gallons.
●​ By 2030, all Apple devices will have a zero climate impact.
 Ansoff Matrix examples
Diversification Focus
The Ansoff Matrix is a tool that helps companies to consider possible growth opportunities by
looking at two key factors: products and markets.

Coca Cola Ansoff Matrix

●​ Market Penetration: increasing market
share within a country. example:
Christmas CocaCola
●​ Product Development: offering new
flavors of Coca Cola. example:
CocaCola cherry
●​ Market Development: offering existing
products to address new markets.
example: CocaCola Zero
●​ Diversification: CocaCola developed a double diversification.
-​ related diversification: Vitamin Water CocaCola
-​ unrelated diversitifcation: CocaCola clothing merch

Apple Ansof Matrix

●​ Market Penetration: increasing market share within a
country.
●​ Product Development: introduction of new products.
example: AirPods
●​ Market Development: expanding the market to a new
country. example: in Africa
●​ Diversification: launching a new product for new
countries. example: iPhone SE

DIVERSIFICATION focus
Diversification is a strategy used to expand market shares or enter a new market by
launching or acquiring new products.
Diversification is based on innovation and market disruption, and it’s used to mitigate risk,
increase profits and as a competitive defence.
​
Three types of Diversification:
●​ Related Diversification: differentiate in a new market with a lot of similarities with the
older one. example: Honda produces both cars and motorcycles.
●​ Unrelated Diversification: differentiate in a new market, with zero similarities with the
older one. example: Starbucks tried to produce also fornitures.
●​ Geographic Diversification: enter new markets with established and powerful
procedures. example: KFC
 The impact of Social Media in everyday life
The advent of the Internet and the growing importance of Social Media have changed our
daily routine.
People are spending more and more time on their mobile phones consuming snacking
content.
The snack content is a short, punchy content, which must go straight to the point in order to
transmit its message effectively.
This shift towards snacking contents is due to a low people’s level of attention.
An average person keeps his level of attention high for 8 seconds.
Despite this, on social media, people are usually focused on an ADV for 2 seconds.

According to Belgian research, 11,03 million people are Internet Users (94,5% of Belgian
population).
9, 44 million of Belgians are active social media users (80,9%).
The average time spent using the internet is 5h27m.
Facebook is still the most used social media.

Social Media had an impactful influence on different generations.

Baby Boomers appear to have changed their media consumption the least as a result of the
outbreak, with an increase in watching broadband TV most apparent.
Gen X have increased their TV watching more than any generation, but are also watching TV
online.
Millennials have started consuming, or are consuming more content across several media
types including online video, online TV and broadcast TV.
Over half of the Gen Z age group are consuming significantly more online video content than
before the Covid19 outbreak.

As far as the most important platforms in terms of potential reach, Facebook, Youtube and
Instagram are the three main platforms.
1.​ Youtube → 9,44 M
2.​ Facebook → 6,3 M
3.​ Instagram → 4,6 M

In order to better understand the importance of social media in consumer’s behavior and
decision processes, we can affirm that 21% of social media users aged 18-54 have made a
purchase based on an influencer’s recommendation in the last three months.
 Global Guidance on Environmental Claims
The World Federation of Advertisers has developed a Zero Greenwashing Guidelines in
accordance with the Paris Agreement and the European Green Deal, to encourage best
practices at all stages of the marketing value chain.
The guidelines are adapted to all members of the CommToZero platform, an alliance of the
biggest players in the marcom sector.
The main goal is to create a trusted marketing environment.

The Zero Greenwashing Guidelines are built around six principles:

●​ Honesty: claims must not be likely to mislead, and the basis for them must be clear.
●​ Evidence: marketers must hold robust evidence for all claims likely to be regarded as
objective and capable of substantiation.
●​ Information: marketing communications should not omit material information. In some
cases, it is possible to use alternative means to make the information readily
accessible.
●​ Full Lifecycle: marketers must base general environmental claims on the full lifecycle
of their product or business.
●​ Comparisons: products compared in marketing communications must meet the same
needs or be intended for the same purpose.
●​ Compliance: marketers must include all information relating to the environmental
impact of advertised products that is required by law or self-regulation codes applied
by the JEP.

After having analyzed the concept of greenwashing and the principles to avoid it, it’s important
to take a look at another similar concept: Woke Washing.
Woke Washing is the act of co-opting for commercial gain without making real contributions.
 2023 Meaningful Brand™ Research
In 2021, the research showed that consumers were attracted by personal benefits to enhance
their well-being. This was called the Age of Cynicism.

After two years, in 2023 things have changed. People expect businesses to play a larger
scoietael role in supporting people and the planet.
Infact, the climate crisis is now acknowledged as the most important issue the world is
facing.
68% of people think that the world is going in the wrong direction and ¾ people think we are
living in an environmental crisis.

More specifically, 72% of people in 2023 said that collective equity -being good for the planet
was important.
The study shows that there’s a new set of demands within customers that are rewarding the
brands who deliver.

Moreover, this global crisis is affecting people’s wellbeing.

People reported they are feeling the effects of crisis within their everyday life.
⅓ people reported to have been personally affected by at least one crisis and ½ of them feel it
impacts them in a multitude of ways.

As far as mental and physical health are concerned, 71% of people feel that brands should be
doing more to improve and support people’s health and wellbeing.

8 ways for Meaningful Brand™ to grow in 2023

1.​ Make mental and physical wellness universal
2.​ Enable people to do and feel more
3.​ Respect and celebrate differences
4.​ Let the joy shine through
5.​ Make it all super seamless for customers
6.​ Unlock accessibility: affordability is the new inclusion
7.​ Become a platform: enable people to make purpose personal
8.​ Do good without drama

People want to be part of changing evolutions.

We are now living in the so-called ME-conomy.
EXAM QUESTIONS 8.​ The “CommToZero” global
1.​ “On a zero-to-10 scale, how likely is guidence on environment claims
it that you would recommend this highlights 6 principles to avoid
company to a friend or colleague?” greenwashing in commercial
is a typical question asked in which claims: honesty, evidence,
of the following measures?​ information, comparisons,
NPS (Net Promoter Score) compliance and…​
Full lifecycle
2.​ What are the various steps of the
purchase decision process? ​ 9.​ In the Meaningful Brand report
recognition of need, information 2023, the trend shows that
search, evaluation of alternatives, compared to previous studies…
purchase decision, post purchase people expect businesses to play a
decision larger societal role in supporting
people and the planet
3.​ How would you describe the
customer journey landing on TikTok 10.​Several product/market extension
FYP?​ strategies exist. Which
Unpredictable and effortless product/market extension strategy
(JOYRIDE) can we identify as X? (existing ;
existing)
4.​ The four-part framework indicates Product Penetration
that you talk about a kaleidoscope
when: ​ 11.​Which of the following statements is
Focus broadly on users outside correct once we address the
your core importance of the different social
media platforms in Belgium?​
5.​ While a valuable planning tool, a With more than 80% of the Belgian
problem with using the BCG matrix population active on social
is that it focuses on: networks, Facebook, Youtube and
profit instead of the customer Instagram are the three platforms
with the most potential reach
6.​ According to a new report from the
IPA, identifying five core 12.​Looking at the blue Ocean strategy,
relationship models for effective what are the 4 ways to differentiate
marketing which one has the away from competition in a Red
highest growth potential? Ocean? ​
The Hybrid Eliminate, Reduce, Raise and
Create
7.​ Which of the following terms would
a marketer use to describe a 13.​The American Marketing
specific mix of human traits that association defines a ___ as “a
may be attributed to a particular name, term, sign, symbol, or
brand? design, or a combination of them,
Brand Personality intended to identify the goods or
services of one seller or group of
 sellers and to differentiate them manager, and a customer-service
from those of competitors? manager. What type of organisation
Brand Harcourt has implemented?
Functional Structure
14.​The average reach of an organic
post on a Facebook page is 21.​Whilce covering the 5 types of
around?​ analytics, which analytics show
None of the above (4,32%) what should be the best course of
action?
15.​The B2B elements of values identify Prescritive Analytics
40 discrete elements of value which
fall into five categories. In which 22.​Looking at customer satisfaction
category would ethical standards metrics, how do you calculate an
fall? ​ NPS?​
Table Stakes None of the above (percentage of
promoters minus percentage of
16.​Taking short and simple detracors)
explanations, which one of the
following statements is the right 23.​There are four ways in which new
one?​ technologies impact marketing: new
UI is what a website looks like, UX forms of consumer & firm
is how it feels to use it and CX is interactions, Marketing innovations,
defined by every single interaction New Strategic Frameworks, and the
created between a company and fourth one concerns?​
the outside world, both digital and New Data & Analytic Methods
beyond
24.​According to the simple five-step
17.​What is third party data?​ model of the marketing process, a
A data coming from random company needs to ___ before
sources / platforms designing a customer-driven
marketing strategy. ​
18.​What’s the biggest impact of a Understand the marketplace and
cookieless world for marketers?​ customer needs and wants
The way targeting and segmenting
for digital advertising is done will
change 25.​MAC Cosmetics launched their first
NFT collection in collaboration with
19.​ //////////////////////// The Keith Haring Foundation. This
NFT Collection includes the work of
20.​Harcourt Studios, a chain of 42 legendary artist and activist Keith
portrait stores in five European Haring. The launch was on 10 April
countries, has a plan to further 2022, which is National Youth
expand its retail presence. Harcourt HIV/AIDS Awareness Day in
has organized its marketing America, which coincides with The
organization into groups headed by Keith Haring Foundation's mission
a sales manager, an advertising to help those infected and affected
 by HIV/AIDS. Which of the following 29.​Concerning the purchase decision
strategies has been used? process B2C, which of the following
Co-branding statements is wrong?
Compensatory strategies are used
26.​Regarding the Ansoff matrix, which when there are many alternatives
of the following strategies is
considered as the riskiest one? 30.​The marketing specialist’s goal is to
Diversification increase online conversions thanks
to social media. Which metric
27.​“By serving low-income families should the marketing specialist use
with free online educational to measure the campaign’s success
services” ( MISSION) ​ if she selects the conversion
“Inspiring individuals to greatness objective?
and feeding their souls” ( conversions
PURPOSE) ​
mission 1; purpose 2

28.​Customer’s perspective is key and

shall be taken into consideration
carefully. Out of the following facts
on customers' experience, which
one is wrong? ​
48% of unhappy customers actually
complain (only 1 out of 26)
 TRUE OR FALSE
1.​ Strategic Marketing is the way a 5.​ ////////////////////////
firm effectively differentiates itself
from its competitors by capitalising 6.​ Spotify offers users personal
on its strengths - both current and listening statistics at the end of
potential - to provide consistently each year in a story format called
better value to customers than its Spotify Wrapped. The success of
competitors these can be considered one of the
TRUE near-perfect modern examples of
World-of-Mouth marketing
2.​ A brand purpose and a brand TRUE
tagline describe the why of a
company, are used in various 7.​ Deciding what position a company
commercial materials and are easily wants to occupy in these segments
interchangeable​ is called targeting FALSE
FALSE
8.​ Woke washing is the act of
3.​ Environmental, social and co-opting causes for commercial
governance responsibility gains without making real
advocates force companies to take contributions
position in the public area on issues TRUE
that may have nothing to do with
the company’s actual business 9.​ NFTs are objects that live on a
activities ​ blockchain and represent
TRUE ownership of unique objects, they
are therefore certificates of
4.​ For most marketers, customer ownership related to digital objects
relationship management (CRM) is TRUE
exclusively a matter of customer
data management FALSE 10.​Having a Purpose can have an
impact on four business agendas:
Demand Generation, Employee
Engagement, Governance and
Sustainability, Strategy and
Business Valutation
TRUE