I. Promotion-Expenditure Strategy Definition: Determination of the amount that a company may spend on its total promotional effort, which includes advertising, personal selling, and sales promotion. Objective: To allocate enough funds to each promotional task so that each is utilized to its fullest potential. Requirements: (a) Adequate resources to finance the promotion expenditure. (b) Understanding of the products/services sales response. (c) Estimate of the duration of the advertising effect. (d) Understanding of each product/ market situation relative to different forms of promotion. (e) Understanding of competitive response to promotion. Expected Results: Allocation of sufficient funds to the promotional tasks to accomplish overall marketing objectives.

II. Promotion Mix Strategy Definition: Determination of a judicious mix of different types of promotion. Objective: To adequately blend the three types of promotion to complement each other for a balanced promotional perspective. Requirements: (a) Product factors: (i) nature of product, (ii) perceived risk, (iii) durable versus nondurable, and (iv) typical purchase amount. (b) Market factors: (i) position in the life cycle, (ii) market share, (iii) industry concentration, (iv) intensity of competition, and (v) demand perspectives. (c) Customers factors: (i) household versus business customers, (ii) number of customers, and (iii) concentration of customers. (d) Budget factors: (i) financial resources of the organization and (ii) traditional promotional perspectives. (e) Marketing mix factors: (i) relative price/relative quality, (ii) distribution strategy, (iii) brand life cycle, and (iv) geographic scope of the market. (f) Environmental factors. Expected Results: The three types of promotion are assigned roles in a way that provides the best communication.

III. Media-Selection Strategy Definition: Choosing the channels (newspapers, magazines, television, radio, outdoor advertising, transit advertising, and direct mail) through which messages concerning a product/service are transmitted to the targets. Objective: To move customers from unawareness of a product/service, to awareness, to comprehension, to conviction, to the buying action. Requirements: (a) Relate media-selection objectives to product/market objectives. (b) Media chosen should have a unique way of promoting the business. (c) Media should be measure-minded not only in frequency, in timing, and in reaching the target audience but also in evaluating the quality of the audience. (d) Base media selection on factual not connotational grounds. (e) Media plan should be optimistic in that it takes advantage of the lessons learned from experience. (f) Seek information on customer profiles and audience characteristics. Expected Results: Customers are moved along the desired path of the purchase process.

IV. Advertising-Copy Strategy Definition: Designing the content of an advertisement. Objective: To transmit a particular product/service message to a particular target. Requirements: (a) Eliminate “noise” for a clear transmission of message. (b) Consider importance of (i) source credibility, (ii) balance of argument, (iii) message repetition, (iv) rational versus emotional appeals, (v) humor appeals, (vi) presentation of model’s eyes in pictorial ads, and (vii) comparison advertising. Expected Results: The intended message is adequately transmitted to the target audience.

V. Selling Strategy Definition: Moving customers to the purchase phase of the decision-making process through the use of face-to-face contact. Objective: Achievement of stated sales volume and gross margin targets and the fulfillment of specific activities. Requirements: (a) The selling strategy should be derived from overall marketing objectives and properly linked with promotional objectives. (b) Decision on maintenance of existing accounts versus lining up new customers. (c) Decision on who should be contacted in customer’s organization. (d) Determine optimal size of sales force. Expected Results: (a) Sales and profit targets are met at minimum expense. (b) Overall marketing goals are achieved.

VI. Sales Motivation and Supervision Strategy Definition: Achieving superior sales force performance. Objective: To ensure optimal performance of the sales force. Requirements: (a) Motivation financial and nonfinancial. (b) Adequate compensation package. (c) Evaluation standards. (d) Appropriate territory assignment, activity control, and communication. Expected Results: Business objectives are met adequately at minimum expense.

Global Market Strategies One of the most significant developments in recent years has been the emergence of global markets. Today’s market provides not only a multiplicity of goods but goods from many places. It would not be surprising to discover that your shirt comes from Taiwan, your jeans from Mexico, and your shoes from Italy. You may drive a Japanese car equipped with tires manufactured in France, with nuts and bolts produced in India, and with paint from a U.S. company. Gucci bags, Sony Walkmans, and McDonald’s golden arches are seen on the streets of Tokyo, London, Paris, and New York. Thai goods wind up on U.S. grocery shelves as Dole canned pineapple and on French farms as livestock feed. Millions of consumers worldwide want all the things that they have heard about, seen, or experienced via new communication technologies. Firms today are enmeshed in world competition to serve these consumers, no matter where they live. A number of broad forces have led to growing globalization of markets.These include

1. Growing similarity of countries Because of growing commonality of infrastructure, distribution channels, and marketing approaches, more and more products and brands are available everywhere. Similar buyer needs thus manifest themselves in different countries. Large retail chains, television advertising, and credit cards are just a few examples of once-isolated phenomena that are rapidly becoming universal.

2. Falling tariff barriers Successive rounds of bilateral and multilateral agreements have lowered tariffs markedly since World War II. At the same time, regional economic agreements, such as the European Union (EU), have facilitated trade relations.

3. Strategic role of technology Technology is not only reshaping industries but contributing toward market homogenization. For example, electronic innovations have permitted the development of more compact, lighter products that are less costly to ship. Transportation costs themselves have fallen with the use of containerization and larger-capacity ships. Increasing ease of communication and data transfer make it feasible to link operations in different countries. At the same time, technology leads to an easy flow of information among buyers, making them aware of new and quality products and thus creating demand for them. The impact of these forces on the globalization of markets may be illustrated with reference to a few examples. Kids everywhere play Nintendo and stroll along the streets to the sound of Sony Walkmans. The videocassette recorder market took off simultaneously in Japan, Europe, and the United States, but the most extensive use of videocassette recorders today is probably in places like Riyadh and Caracas. Shopping centers from Dusseldorf to Rio sell Gucci shoes, Yves St. Laurent suits, and Gloria Vanderbilt jeans. Siemens and ITT telephones can be found almost everywhere in the world. The Mercedes-Benz and the Toyota Corolla are as much objects of passion in Manila as in California. Just about every gas turbine sold in the world has some GE technology or component in it, and what country doesn’t need gas turbines? How many airlines around the world could survive without Boeing or Airbus? Third World markets for high-voltage transmission equipment and diesel-electric locomotives are bigger than those in developed countries. And today’s new industries robotics, videodisks, fiber optics, satellite networks, high-technology plastics, artificial diamonds seem global from birth. Briefly, these forces have homogenized worldwide markets, triggering opportunities for firms to seek business across national borders. For U.S. corporations, the real impetus to overseas expansion occurred after World War II. Attempting to reconstruct war-torn economies, the U.S. government, through the Marshall Plan, provided financial assistance to European countries.

As the postwar American economy emerged as the strongest in the world, its economic assistance programs, in the absence of competition, stimulated extensive corporate development of international strategies. Since then, many new players, not only from Europe but from Southeast Asia as well, have entered the arena to serve global markets. Asian competitors have been particularly quick to exploit new international competitive conditions as well as cross-cutting technologies to leapfrog well-established rivals. Global markets offer unlimited opportunities. But competition in these markets is intense. To be globally successful, companies must learn to operate and compete as if the world were one large market, ignoring superficial regional and national differences. Corporations geared to this new reality can benefit from enormous economies of scale in production, distribution, marketing, and management. By translating these benefits into reduced world prices, they can dislodge competitors who still operate under the perspectives of the 1980s. Companies willing to change their perspectives and become global can attain sustainable competitive advantage.