BUSINESS TOOK THE WRONG LIFE CYCLE FROM BIOLOGYMerle Crawford, C.
doi: 10.1108/eb008100pmid: N/A
Business has struggled for many years in an effort to utilize the product life cycle concept in marketing and business planning. Controversy has swirled around the concept, particularly in recent years, and business has pretty much decided that the concept is as dangerous in many situations as it is helpful in others. Several authors have encouraged its abandonment.
NEW CRITERIA FOR CONCEPT EVALUATIONTauber, Edward M.
doi: 10.1108/eb008101pmid: N/A
Traditional concept testing has reached a plateau. Researchers have learned to successfully predict trial but have not discovered a way to determine marketplace success or failure at the concept stage. The key to making progress in this area is to define an opportunity prior to concept evaluation. This article elaborates on ways for defining such opportunities.
LINKING FUTURISTICS WITH MARKETING PLANNING, FORECASTING, AND STRATEGYMichman, Ronald D.
doi: 10.1108/eb008102pmid: N/A
Throughout the 1960s the marketing concept was a dominant guideline that became a pervasive force within the entire organization. Strategic planning, with its emphasis on the formulation of the business mission, the identification of strategic alternatives, and contingency planning, became the direction of the 1970s. Therefore, it is surprising to find, after all this emphasis on the identification and satisfaction of customer needs and the necessity for planning and strategy, that few organizations have found a way to link future planning with marketing planning and strategy. Futuristics is the science or art of anticipating and planning for the future. In most firms, strategy is still developed for less than a threeyear period. There are only a small number of companies that have been able to link planning with the development of strategy in a time frame of more than five years. These firms have come to realize that Business decisions have grown more complex as a result of a changing marketing environment, The only way to ensure profitability and survival is to provide an organizational structure that can develop longrange planning.
USING CONSUMER EXPECTATIONS AS AN INPUT TO PRICING DECISIONSFunkhouser, G. Ray
doi: 10.1108/eb008104pmid: N/A
Marketing textbooks tend to follow economic theory in their discussions of pricing, but in the real world pricing is an alchemical mixture of costs, competition and consumer psychology. This paper presents experimental evidence that, for at least some purchase situations, consumers' expectations of what a thing ought to cost may be a better predictor of choice between offerings than are the predictions from two wellknown theories relating price to consumer behavior. The paper discusses sources of consumer price expectations and ways they are influenced, and it suggests how to improve profits by basing prices on consumers' expectations.
THE UNDETECTED CAUSES FOR NEW PRODUCT FAILUREGrayson, Robert A.
doi: 10.1108/eb008106pmid: N/A
If marketers generally know why new products fail, after the fact, and can hypothesize why most products fail, before the fact, why then are there so many failures The author makes the case for fundamental weakness within the new product development process, mostly invisible and certainly unattended, that often preordains failure. The basic theme is summed by this thought, Instead of researching the reasons a new product failed, we should be examining the system that allowed that to happen
BETTER PRODUCT STRATEGY THROUGH ALERT CHANNEL MANAGEMENTRosenbloom, Bert
doi: 10.1108/eb008107pmid: N/A
Getting product strategies to work out as planned is a tough job. One of the most frequently overlooked factors needed for effective product strategy implementation is channel member support at the wholesale andor retail levels. Without strong support and followthrough by these channel members, product strategies are much less likely to be successfully implemented. This article discusses five product strategies commonly used by consumer goods manufacturers, and discusses the channel management implications associated with each. By being alert to these product managementchannel management interfaces, many of the problems of poor channel member support and followthrough can be avoided.
The Critical Communication LinkUp In Global MarketingDeRose, Rodger
doi: 10.1108/eb008109pmid: N/A
Efficient global communications are essential to a worldwide company. Johnson's Wax, with 45 overseas companies employing 12,000 persons recognizes the importance of an effective communications link between its headquarters in Racine, Wisconsin and its marketing managers across the globe. In meeting this communication challenge, the company employs principles and strategies that include timetested techniques for marketing products between companies and a wellstructured international communications network. Enhancing the communication linkup our regional marketing support managers and an ongoing program of transferring marketing personnel between headquarters and overseas companies.