HOW TO TAKE A PRODUCT OR SERVICE TO MARKET.
- Ten through sixteen

10. ARE THE MARKETING PROGRAMS INTEGRATED?
A promotion program exists but is not integrated with the selling process. A distribution program is in place but is in conflict with direct sales. Marketing departments must make the pieces fit together. Managers should probe the most important programs and interfaces and assure themselves that they are compatible. There are, of course, numerous other areas where programs and projects can get out of step. So many creative marketing people have so many good ideas that there is a tendency for individuals to do their own thing. In the end, the effectiveness suffers from incoherence in the market place. Unless all the ancillary activities are in step, the effectiveness of any product marketing program is bound to be impaired.

11. IS MARKETING IN TOUCH WITH THE CUSTOMER BASE?
Young marketing groups tend not to spend enough time talking with customers. The only way to find out what is going on out in the market place is to be there. That means making sales calls, visiting retail outlets, observing the customer behavior, and listening to customers when they visit the factory.

12. DOES MARKETING RESPECT SALES AND VICE VERSA?
I have seen good marketing departments take weak products and turn them into successes by owning up to the problem and working with the sales force to target the product on niche where it can succeed. Where there is real teamwork between sales and marketing, great products become more successful and even the weaker ones can be made to succeed.

13. DOES MARKETING DRIVE THE ORGANIZATION?
Marketing is a coupling of customer and company. It is the organization charged with understanding the market. It must drive the company to respond to the customer. Marketing is the organization that must make development groups aware of the customer's needs and the manufacturing organization knowledgeable about capacity and cost issues. Marketing must be active in planning the company's products.

14. ARE PRODUCTS MANAGED THROUGHTOUT THEIR LIFE CYCLES?
Usually great emotional and professional rewards are to be gained from establishing new markets and watching sales ramp up. Less attention is paid to the more mature products. They need love too. When they don't get it, they die of marketing starvation or, worse, become problem children. Good marketing departments are constantly aware of the status of the entire product line and manage both the new and the old products throughout their life cycles.

15. IS A FORCASTING SYSTEM IN PLACE?
Unless there is a good forecasting system in place, problems are bound to be caused by changes in demand. It is extremely difficult to develop good forecasting systems. Customers never really know what they are going to buy, and salespeople are notoriously shortsighted in their outlook. A good forecasting process operates on a regular basis and makes use of the best specific customer intelligence available in both sales and marketing.

16. DOES MARKETING HAVE QUALITY CONTROL?
It has become increasingly obvious that marketing processes are amenable to the same quality control system used elsewhere in a company. In marketing departments, as in manufacturing organizations, there are really three types of functions. The first are repetitive functions that can be measured against absolute standards; second are regular functions whose evaluation is subjective; and the third are the activities that occur at relatively intervals.

Hire The Oxford Group to ensure your marketing program will be an effective one. Contact Bill Oxford at 760-942-1100.