The business environment

What comes to mind when you think of the word ‘environment’? You probably think of surroundings, and the conditions and influences of the surroundings. Similarly, the business environment refers to an organization’s surroundings – its external surroundings, as well as its internal surroundings.

Customers and customer service

This module starts by looking at customers and how they make decisions about their purchases.What factors do they think about when buying a chocolate bar,vegetables, a book, a refrigerator or a house? How do businesses decide which company to use when buying a new computer system?Before you can start to market to people you must have some clear ideas about how they think, and understand the attributes and benefits that they are looking for.

Marketing mix

In marketing, a company is faced with two kinds of variables. First, there are the variables associated with the external environment; the environment surrounding the organization, made up of the macro-environment (the broad environment consisting of political, economic, socio-cultural,technological dimensions) and the micro-environment (the competitive structure of the industry in which the company operates). A company has no direct control of these external variables. The second set of variables contains operational variables; factors over which a company has full control.

Marketing and sales planning

Marketing and sales are fundamental to business,whatever the sector. In the private sector, it is accepted that marketing and sales planning is essential to achieve profitability and market success.In the public sector and in the charitable sector, the focus is not on profit making but on customer(or more broadly, stakeholder) satisfaction. Marketing is increasingly playing a key role in the non-profit sector to build awareness of issues and promote causes, taking the perspective of not just customers (recipients) but also donors.

IT in business

There is clear evidence that Information Technology provides competitive advantage, whatever the business sphere an organisation operates it. To gain advantage, managers must know how IT can be used in internal and external processes to deliver better value to the end customer.

Managing and using marketing

This module will provide you with a comprehensive introduction to marketing. It is intended to be relevant to the management and operation of organisations in many different areas of the economy,including those which do not operate for profit.

Customers and their needs

The aim of modern marketing is to identify and then satisfy each customer’s needs and wants. This is often done by building relationships with customers and using these relationships to create a two-way communication between the two parties. The customer communicates his or her preferences,and the business communicates information about products that will satisfy the customer’s needs and wishes.

E-marketing communications

The success of the World Wide Web and the proliferation of the Internet and associated technologies have revolutionised the way organisations conduct their business. The most apparent change has been the support provided through technology to a number of traditional operations,such as sales, communications, customer services and marketing.

High performance sales

An organisation’s success depends on a number of factors including its operations, its marketing strategy, its human resource management and its sales. One of the most common criteria used for assessing the organisation’s success is sales growth. This is an indication that the organisation manages to maintain its existing customers but also attract interest followed by sales from new markets.

Marketing strategy

How then do organizations develop strategies in a complex marketing environment? How do they assess opportunities and threats? Which markets and segments do they target and why? Which market positions play to an organization’s strengths? What product portfolio should be maintained for long-term value? These are some of the questions we shall address.