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It is very important for any business to scan and analyze their marketing environment by continuously monitoring what is going on in the marketing environment. Marketing decision makers must collect, analyze and diagnose information about the environment. These actions of marketing decisions are explained under:
Environment scanning-it is the process of collecting information about forces in marketing environment; environmental analysis-it is the process of assessing and interpreting the information gathered through environment scanning; environmental diagnosis- it is the process of making decisions by accessing the significance of threats and opportunities. The following are importances of scanning marketing environment:
- To understand elements of the environment.
- To observe and understand the changes which are occurring in the environment.
- To analyze market situations
- To fit the organization properly into the environment so that effective strategies can be developed.
Any person venturing into any kind of business must be aware of his/her business environment. It is therefore very important for business to be positioned and be designed in a way that its image is in distinctive place in the market. It must thrive to provide best quality, best service, best value, lowest price and more advanced technology. When a business understands its environment correctly there is no doubt for it to achieve success and become profitable throughout its running.
SWOT analysis is an overall evaluation of a company's strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threats. It involves monitoring the external and internal marketing environment. SWOT analysis assumes that organization will achieve success by maximizing strengths and opportunities and minimizing weaknesses and threats. It is very important for a company to indentify its weaknesses and opportunities as the information provided will help in informing the managers of the company on the various developments in the external and internal environment that have taken place. Also it leads to improved organizational performance and the company can also be in a position to framework its current and future positions.
A SWOT analysis is a procedure for identifying and examining opportunities and strengths, weaknesses and threats facing the business. It gives insight into company's position in the competitive arena. When carrying out SWOT analysis to determine how you rate against a competitor, the following should be used (Kottler,2002)
Strengths -consider your company's strong points, this should be both from your own and your customers, don't be modest but be realistic, consider distinct advantages that your company offers; what customers say, do they enjoy doing business with you; is there anything you currently offer that cannot be copied by a competitor now or in future.
Weaknesses-evaluate your company weaknesses, not only from your own perspective but also from your competitors.
Opportunities - consider the areas in your market that offers a room for your company to grow; opportunities can come from changes in technology and markets on both broad and narrow scale, changes in government, policy related to your industry, changes in social patterns, demographic and customers lifestyle changes.(Lydon,2005)
Threats - although we don't like to think about them, we all face threats in our businesses, many times they are out of control e.g. downturn in the economy, shift in market demographics or perhaps a new mega corporate opening in your local area.
After the research was conducted on telemarketing, the following threats and weaknesses facing it were found:
- Lack of experienced personnel.
- Inadequate fund for them to promote their services.
- Change of technology which requires them to train their employees now and then.
- Demographic changes of their target customers.
Equally they had some opportunities and strengths that have held them up high on their market, they are:
- They have strong brands that sells world wide.
- They have employed penetration method of pricing.
- They have very strong sales team.
- They have corporate image all the whole world.
To maximize their profit telemarketing industry should apply the following strategies to run successfully, they are:
Marketing planning-this involves overall strategies of marketing that helps company achieve its overall objectives. It is a tool for improving performance and it leads to development of standards for control. Marketing planning will help this industry to instill discipline in time and the management team will have a control mechanism for detecting future problems. Marketing planning provides on opportunities and threats, weaknesses and strengths of accompany. It works as a warning mechanism by making a company alert and sensitive to the environment.
Marketing communication-this involves communicating to the target market basically to inform about the product and influence them to buy their products. Marketing communications creates awareness of the existence of a product; and remind and reassures the customers so that decision they make while buying a product is effective. By communicating to their customer's a favorable climate for future sales is created and competitive difference through careful choice of word.(Gelb,2003)
Use of promotional mix-this comprises of five elements, advertising, sales promotion, personal selling, public relations and direct marketing. It is also necessary to conduct marketing audit, this involves comprehensive, independent and periodic examination of a company's or business units, marketing environment, objectives, strategies and activities with a view to determine problem areas and opportunities. It is a plan of action to improve the company's marketing performance.
