Marketing & its Relation To Marketing Myopia

Marketing Myopia

The term marketing indicates the technique of drawing the target market’s attention to a certain business’s offerings. The process of marketing encompasses several other techniques such as market research, market analysis, and comprehending the customer’s preferences (Gervase, 2009). Marketing takes into account every facet of a business which includes idea generation, product development, methods of distribution, promotion, advertising, sales, and after sales services. In traditional selling, the relation between the buyer and seller starts with transferring the ownership of the items from the seller to the consumer simultaneously with the transfer of price from the buyer to the seller. The selling process ends once the goods are handed over to the buyer and the price is settled by the buyer. The modern concept of business starts from the idea generation phase itself.

Marketing plays a vital role in defining the modern business scenario. The techniques of marketing mostly stands on four Ps- product, price, promotion, and place. Product implies, crafting the definite category of product that has demand in the market. This pillar of marketing helps the marketer to study the market closely and then come up with a product that can meet the needs of the customer. This process is in contrast to the primitive methods of businesses where, the product used to be manufactured first and then the means of promotion used to be implemented. Likewise, the price pillar assists the marketer to set the right price for the specific market. The promotion aspect of marketing aids the marketer to incorporate several strategies for promoting the product or service and direct it towards the market for which it has been created. Place refers to the logistics and distribution part of the marketing process. The products once created need to be made available to the customers through proper retail outlets or else the end result would be hard to achieve.

However, marketers often fail to keep up with the constantly changing trends in the industry. They fail to have a bigger picture of the circumstances based on which, grave marketing decisions are made. This triggers marketing myopia. To be precise, the inability of businesses to cope up with the futuristic changes are widely referred to as marketing myopia. Theodore Levitt rightly explained marketing myopia citing the example of the transportation industry (Dodd, 2019). He stated that to be in competition, the railroads should have undergone innovation and up gradation. Marketing myopia is similar to the myopia we experience regarding vision. A myopic patient is not able to get a distant view of things. The same thing happens in marketing myopia as the marketer fails to view the future trends surrounding his products.

An ideal example of marketing myopia can be cited with the failure of Kodak to compete with Sony. Once, Kodak used to lead the camera industry and it used to be a market leader. However, with the advent of digital cameras, Kodak gradually started to lose its market share to Sony. A similar situation arose when Nokia came up with its range of smartphones. It rapidly started to lose its market share to android and ios. Another classic example can be cited when Hindustan Motors’ ambassadors got obsolete with the entry of new variety of cars. To avoid marketing myopia, it is also necessary that the marketer maintains a wide range of offerings without sticking to one particular variety (Ng, 2016).

Hence, it becomes important for the marketer to keep up with the changing marketing environment. In marketing, customer is treated as the king and hence, the market is indirectly governed by the needs and preferences of the customers. To stay in the race, the marketer must ensure that it is flexible enough to change with the transformations happening in the environment.

References

Dodd, D. (2019). Marketing Myopia Revisited. Retrieved from http://customerthink.com/marketing-myopia-revisited/

Gervase, C. (2009). What Is Marketing? Retrieved from https://www.researchgate.net/publication/278241959_What_is_Marketing

Ng, Luke C. (2016). Marketing Myopia – An Update (How Theodore Levitt Changed Our World? A Look at the Impact on Corporate Management after Five Decades). Journal of Marketing Management, Vol. 4, No. 2, pp. 24-34.

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