Challenges faced in marketing

Present economic scenario:

Prasanna Perera, Marketing & Management Consultant, Chartered Marketer, Cim U.K.

In the present economic scenario, there are several marketing challenges facing organizations. In this brief article, I will endeavour to address some of them.

Prasanna Perera

1. In a price sensitive market, how often should prices be revised?

It is good to plan out how many prices increases will be effected during the financial year.

Avoid ad-hoc price revisions as it disturbs the marketing and selling operations. Keep a close watch on competitor prices as well.

2. Should a few large price increases be effected or smaller frequent price increases?

The answer to this query depends on several factors namely market behaviour, competitor strategies, the consumption pattern of the product/service to name a few. Smaller frequent price increases are not felt that badly by consumers.

3. It is becoming harder to obtain bank guarantees from distributors and agents. What is the solution?

Some form of security has to be obtained to safeguard the organization’s assets.

In addition to bank guarantees, deeds of land owned, housing mortgages or even gold deposits could be considered, as forms of security. Organizational policy and regulation also needs to be considered.

4. How effective is Digital Marketing in a Sri Lankan context?

Digital Marketing is growing in popularity in Sri Lanka, as the ICT infrastructure keeps expanding. Presently, it is more effective for certain product/service categories.

My advice to marketers is to explore the digital marketing options available and incorporate some of them into their strategies. Certainly, no marketer should ignore digital marketing.

5. There is very high clutter in the market place. How can brands breakthrough this clutter?

Me-too or copying strategies should not be adopted. Instead, differentiate your brand in ways that are meaningful to your customers. Brand awareness and recall levels should be maintained.

6. Is it worthwhile selling, if it is difficult to collect payments?

No sale is completed until the funds have realized.

Sales and collections go hand in glove. Avoid selling to customers who are habitually bad paymasters.

Instead, use these resources to acquire new customers and build relationships with existing, honest and loyal customers. Hence, all customer payment patterns should be tracked.

7. Are customers interested in loyalty programmes or direct price benefits?

It depends on the customer segments being targeted.

High income customer segments generally would prefer loyalty benefits, whilst middle / lower income segments are likely to fancy a direct price benefit.

The nature of the product or service is another factor in the equation.

8. What is the role of “Brands” in price sensitive markets?

My belief is that branding plays a role, even in extremely price sensitive markets.

The exception could be for commodity products and services. In other non-commodity product categories, brands have a role to play in terms of trust, assurance, quality and reliability.

Multi-branding strategies could be adopted to target different segments, rather than trying to stretch existing brands.

9. It is becoming increasingly difficult to recruit good salespersons. Why is this?

“Sales” as a profession has lost some of its glamour. It is also considered a tough profession, given the very competitive nature of the market.

Further, there are many alternate careers available now in Sri Lanka.

Hence, good salespersons should be nurtured carefully and retained. Alternate selling methods may also need to be considered.