The change of marketing concept

With the progress of productivity, technologies, and society, marketing has evolved over the last century and become more complex. To understand what has happened before is important for business to predict and manage market trends and practices. Though the concept of marketing has been constantly changing, it can be divided as the following:

• Production orientation era
• Sales orientation era
• Market orientation era
• Customer orientation era
• Needs-driven era

Production orientation era

     Production orientation era was believed starting from the beginning of

Capitalism to the mid 1950's. At that time, business focused primarily on production,

manufacturing, and efficiency issues, and marketing focused on the physical

distribution function of getting goods to customers. The reason for the predominance

of this orientation is that there was a shortage of manufactured goods during this period so goods sold easily. As Say’s Law indicated: Supply creates its own demand (1821).

Production orientation also has the following traits: 1. Pricing was based on the costs

of production and distribution; 2. Research was limited to technical product; 3.

Packaging was designed primarily to protect the product; 4. Promotion and

advertising was minimal.

Sales orientation era

    The sales orientation era went from the mid-1950s to the early 1970s.

During WWII, the world industry started to accelerate wartime production. When the

war was over, this enhanced productivity turned
to the production of  consumer products. By the mid-'50s, supply was starting to out-pace demand. Businesses had to find out ways to sell their products. Unlike the production orientation era, pricing in
the sales orientation era was usually based on comparisons with competitors, packaging and labeling were used for promotional purposes more than protective purposes, advertising, and sales promotions were starting to be taken seriously.

Market orientation era

         The 1970s and 1980s defined the "market-oriented" era., in this era, most

markets have become saturated. The competition for customers was intensified. To be

use
ful, marketing had to be involved in the strategic level. Business

      started to research markets and consumers to try to understand consumer needs and

allocate organizational resources to meet those needs. The primary issues were

target markets, market segmentation, product positioning, and the promotion

mix. Marketing performance was evaluated on such criteria as market share, market

position, and market growth. Business strategy started to bring the interest of

markets and of consumers into the organization. Manufacturers have to adopt

marketing practice.

Customer orientation era

        Since the customer markets became increasingly fragmented, and growth in primary demand slowed, the competition is further intensified. The significant feature of customer orientation era is that the market research became important.  Companies have been using competitive analyses to determine their market position, and develop new ways to help their organizations meet and exceed customer expectations.  In this era, business must work with customers to form partnerships and customers are integrated into the team for developing new products and services.

Needs-driven era

       The needs-driven era has just started. In this era, customers are more sophisticated, competition is more intensive than ever, the information available and used by customers is explosive, and the number of strategic alliances and acquisitions are increasing. The strategic business marketing in this environment consists of creating and developing new markets or businesses, sometimes with strategic partners. The main components of this process include identifying unfulfilled customer needs, being proactive in pricing and product development strategies, and managing strategic information efficiently and effectively.

 

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