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MARS COM Exercise for Assignment #2

Marketing Strategy Planning

Introduction

This MARS COM Exercise is an opportunity for you to apply marketing principles covered in the chapter indicated by reviewing various examples of marketing communications. You then will develop written responses to describe your analysis of the items as they apply to various chapter topics. An example is provided below.

Example MARS COM Advertisement

Appeared in Toledo Blade as a Free-standing insert

Example Requirements

Review the following marketing communication examples. Develop written response for each example for each of the following:

1) Describe who you feel the target market customer is.

2) Does the marketing strategy represented by the product appear to be a production-oriented or marketing-oriented approach? Discuss.

3) Which elements of the marketing mix are presented in the example? Discuss.

Example Response

1) The target market customer most likely is the individual in a Toledo household whose role it is to decide what to purchase in this product category, i.e. household cleaning products. The primary decision maker for this product is more likely the female in the household although male household members are a secondary decision maker. The target is also likely to be price-sensitive since there is a coupon included and if seen suggests the decision maker invested time to look through the Sunday ads.

2) This is an example of a mass marketer who is trying to carry out the marketing concept and being marketing rather than production oriented. The marketer is using target marketing to reach a large market, i.e. households needing cleaning products in a specific geographic area.

3) Three elements of the marketing mix are present in this example. The physical Product is featured prominently. The Product is a physical good and the package is also featured. The example also is part of the Promotion element of the marketing mix. It is part advertising and also a sales promotion in the form of a coupon. The Price is not stated directly but a financial incentive is offered by the savings offered with the coupon.

Requirements

Review the following marketing communication examples. Develop written response for each example for each of the following:

1) Describe who you feel the target market customer is.

2) Does the marketing strategy represented by the product appear to be a production-oriented or marketing-oriented approach? Discuss.

3) Which elements of the marketing mix are presented in the example? Discuss.

Item 1

Ad appeared in New Yorker magazine.

Item 2

Ad appeared in Girls Life magazine.

Item 3

Ad appeared in Parents and Good Housekeeping magazines. See also http://www.clorox.com/classrooms/

Item 4

Ad runs on network TV. View here:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IHHpC7LTLRM

If Ctrl+Click does not take you to the video, copy and paste this link above into your Browser and hit the Enter Key on your keyboard.