<ol><li>Research market opportunities</li><li>Choose your target market carefully</li><li>Decide on a unique positioning</li><li>Implement marketing tactics, and </li><li>Audit the results. </li></ol>This method forms a circular process, which you can continually put into action to adapt your marketing strategy to the ever-changing market.

5 steps to turn into a marketing success

All marketing can be categorized into one of three types: responsive, anticipative, or need-shaping.<ul><li>The invention of the washing machine is an example of responsive marketing fulfilling a pre-existing, laborious task of washing clothes.</li><li>Perrier, a French company mass-marketed bottled drinking water seeing a growing public awareness of the adverse effects of soda drinks.</li><li>A great example of need-shaping marketing is the Sony Walkman. No one had a need for – and could hardly even imagine – a portable music device until Sony convinced using innovative marketing how Walkman nourishes one's life.</li></ul>

Discovering and marketing a product idea

﻿Marketing’s job is never done. It’s about perpetual motion. We must continue to innovate every day.

If you intend on bringing a new product to market that claims to fulfill a consumer need, then you actually need to know what that need is. This is the method that Toyota used when it deployed researchers to hang around supermarket parking lots and watch customers load groceries into their cars. Based on the observed difficulties people were having, Toyota redesigned their cars’ trunks to have more space and allow for easier sliding of bags.

Research is crucial to identifying marketing opportunities

If you supply menstrual products, then your marketing is obviously only going to be effective on part of the population; it’s this group that you want to target. If the target market you choose is too narrow, you risk not having enough customers to be able to service the market profitably. The profitability of a target market depends on a number of factors – like how many people belong to that market, what their average income is, and how well their needs are currently being met.

Focused marketing campaign by selecting a target market

<ul><li>Do you want to be the low-cost leader or the luxury provider?</li><li>Align your product to a specific benefit. For example, the Head & Shoulders shampoo brand positions itself as good for eliminating dandruff, which makes it appealing to consumers looking to fix a flaky scalp.</li><li>Position your product by its application. That’s how Nike positions its products – it designs unique shoes for particular sports. </li><li>Position your product for specific occupations, like Apple does, by marketing its software as good for design</li></ul>

Make your product more appealing by positioning it uniquely

_Build something 100 people love, not something 1 million people kind of like_

The old 4 Ps framework must now be replaced by the 4 Cs framework focusing on customer value, cost, convenience and communication.<ul><li>Customer value: Forge long term enviable customer base. One such example could be Apple.</li><li>Cost: Price of the product is not the only cost. Effort and time involved in acquiring, setting up, using, storing, and disposing of a product is as important. Lower it.</li><li>Convenience: Make your product as easy as possible for the customer to purchase and acquire.</li><li>Communication: Ensure that the relevant information reaches the right consumers</li></ul>

Customer is king

It’s essential to figure out what went wrong and what went right in order to make corrections and improvements in the future. The most rigorous and effective way to do this is to perform a marketing audit. To begin a marketing audit, start by making a list of all the marketing activities your firm engages in. Some areas to consider could be “targeting”, “product pricing”, “product management,” and so on. Auditing about 8 such categories should give one a good idea as to how one's marketing could bring success to the product and ultimately to one's company.

Improve your long-term marketing strategy

If you fail to plan, you are planning to fail

Since 1969, Philip Kotler's marketing text books have been read as the marketing gospel, as he has provided incisive and valuable advice on how to create, win and dominate markets. In KOTLER ON MARKETING, he has combined the expertise of his bestselling textbooks and world renowned seminars into this practical all-in-one book, covering everything there is to know about marketing. In a clear, straightforward style, Kotler covers every area of marketing from assessing what customers want and need in order to build brand equity, to creating loyal long-term customers. For business executives everywhere, KOTLER ON MARKETING will become the outstanding work in the field. The secret of Kotler's success is in the readability, clarity, logic and precision of his prose, which derives from his vigorous scientific training in economics, mathematics and the behavioural sciences. Each point and chapter is plotted sequentially to build, block by block, on the strategic foundation and tactical superstructure of the book.

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Since 1969, Philip Kotler's marketing text books have been read as the marketing gospel, as he has provided incisive and valuable advice on how to create, win and dominate markets. In KOTLER ON MARKETING, he has combined the expertise of his bestselling textbooks and world renowned seminars into this practical all-in-one book, covering everything there is to know about marketing. In a clear, straightforward style, Kotler covers every area of marketing from assessing what customers want and need in order to build brand equity, to creating loyal long-term customers. For business executives everywhere, KOTLER ON MARKETING will become the outstanding work in the field. The secret of Kotler's success is in the readability, clarity, logic and precision of his prose, which derives from his vigorous scientific training in economics, mathematics and the behavioural sciences. Each point and chapter is plotted sequentially to build, block by block, on the strategic foundation and tactical superstructure of the book.

Philip Kotler is an American marketing author, consultant, and professor emeritus; the S. C. Johnson & Son Distinguished Professor of International Marketing at the Kellogg School of Management at Northwestern University. He is known for popularizing the definition of marketing mix.

Philip Kotler

Kotler On Marketing

<ul><li>People live not only in the physical world, but also in an inner world made up of their thoughts and feelings.</li><li>Some people are more prone to negative emotions. This is called "dispositional negativity."</li><li>There are ways people can begin to change their disposition to negativity, such as by approaching their minds with acceptance and compassion.</li></ul>

Negative thoughts are natural

Bodily needs for happiness, research shows aren't much:<ul><li class="ql-align-justify">Sufficient sleep</li><li class="ql-align-justify">A balanced diet</li><li class="ql-align-justify">Exercise</li><li class="ql-align-justify">Social connect</li></ul>These are the 4 pillars on which our mind rests happily. Optimizing our bodily health to the best of our ability should be a priority for anybody who wants to inhabit a more pleasant emotional climate.

Take care of one‘s body

Experiencing negative emotions is not a problem, in and of itself. <ul><li>Although it is completely understandable that we might at times beat ourselves up for this predisposition, it is essential not to blame ourselves. </li><li>This does not mean that we do not take actions that will help us deal with difficult emotions. It only means learning to become more comfortable with having these emotions—allowing them to exist for the moment, instead of waging an exhausting and futile war against them.</li></ul>

Do not fight your emotions

People with higher levels of dispositional negativity often are quick to attend to negative stimuli in their environment and interpret things in a pessimistic style.<ul><li>Become aware of them in the moment and then endeavor to replace them with more constructive responses.</li><li>One technique that could be employed is Mindfulness - paying attention to what is going on in our minds, our bodies, and the surrounding environment</li><li>The meta-awareness and the non-judgmental manner that characterize mindfulness are great tools for any habit change attempt in our lives.</li></ul>

Keeping the mind in the Now

<h3 class="ql-align-center">﻿Your present circumstances don’t determine where you can go; they merely determine where you start.</h3>

Kotler On Marketing

3 Ways to Curb Negative Mental Habits

Govind Menon