Lesson Note
Subject: Marketing
Topic: Types of market
Class: SS1
Lesson Objective: by the end of the lesson, the learners should be able to:
- State the meaning of market.
- Define consumer market.
- Distinguish between consumer
- markets and organizational markets.
MEANING OF MARKET
A market is simply a combination of
buyers and sellers. These two groups can meet in a physical place (a shop, for example) or can meet across miles, aided by telecommunications (increasingly, the internet). They meet to buy and sell goods or services. The term “Market” is simply a short hand for “any place or situation where two or more people meet to exchange goods or services.
A set up where two or more parties engage in exchange of goods, services and information is called a market. The two parties involved in a transaction are called seller and buyer.
The seller sells goods and services to the buyer in exchange of money. There has to be more than one buyer and seller for the market to be competitive.
If you are in busines selling a good or a service, you need to know about the market you are selling in; is it a busy one with lots of competitors (other businesses trying to sell the same product), or are there very few competitors? The type of market you
operate in will have a big influence on your success.
TYPES OF MARKETS
1. CONSUMER MARKET
An individual who buys products or
services for personal use and not for manufacture or resale is a consumer. A consumer is someone who can make the decision whether or not to purchase an item at the store, and someone who can be influenced by marketing and advertisements. Any time someone goes to a store and purchases a toy, shirt, beverage, or anything else, they are making that decision as a consumer.
The consumer market represents
individuals and families purchasing goods and services for personal consumption.
CHARACTERISTICS OF CONSUMER MARKET
The consumer market pertains to buyers who purchase goods and services for consumption rather than resale. However, not all consumers are alike in their tastes, preferences and buying habits due to different characteristics that can distinguish certain consumers from others.
These particular consumer characteristics include various demographic, psychographic, behaviorialistic and geographic traits. Marketers usually define these consumer characteristics through market segmentation, the process of separating and identifying key customer’s groups. Which are:
a. Demographic Characteristics:
Characteristics of consumer markets based on demographics include differences in gender, age, ethnic background, income, occupation, education, household size, religion, generation, nationality and even
social class. Most of these demographic categories are further defined by a certain range. For example, companies may identify the age of their consumers in the
18 to 24, 25 to 34, 35 to 54, 55 to 65, and 65+ age groups. Companies often identify these demographic characteristics through market research surveys used to discover which demographic groups comprise the majority of their customer base.
Companies can then target their advertising towards these demographic groups. For example, a new cell phone may be targeted toward 18 to 24-year-olds with incomes between 325,000 and 350,000.
b. Psychographic Characteristics:
Consumer market characteristics can
be psychographic in nature. Psychographic characteristics of consumers include interests, activities, opinions, values and attitudes. Obviously, many magazines are geared toward a consumer’s interest. For example, prenatal magazines target expectant mothers who are interested in learning more about caring for a baby. Additionally, consumer activities can include participation in martial arts or basket weaving. Opinions and attitudes can be both specific or general. A company may better understand
consumer opinions and attitudes after
conducting a focus group, and can use that information to tailor advertising or marketing campaigns. Consumer values can pertain to how a group of individuals feels about certain social issues, which can be of interest to nonprofit or charitable organizations.
c. Behaviouralistic Characteristics:
Behaviouralistic characteristics can also be garnered through marketing research. Behaviouralistic characteristics of consumer markets include product usage rates, brand loyalty, user status or how long
they have been a customer, and even
benefits that consumers seek. Companies like to know how often their consumers visit their restaurants, stores or use their products. Company. marketing departments usually try to distinguish between heavy, medium and light users, whom they can then target with advertising. Marketers like to know which customers are brand loyalists, as those consumers usually only buy the company’s brand.
d. Geographic Characteristics: These are often based on market size, region, population density and even climate. A small retailer may find
opportunities in a small market in which larger competitors have no interest. Companies that sell beachwear will likely sell more products in warmer climates.
Consumers in different regions of the
country also have different tastes in food and style.
See previous lessons in Marketing
2. ORGANIZATIONAL MARKET:
These are individuals and companies who purchase goods and services for some use other than personal consumption.
The organizational buying process is
entirely different from the consumer
buying process. While buying decisions are made relatively easily and quickly by individual customers, organisational buying involves thorough and deep analysis. Organizations purchase products
ranging from highly complex machinery to small components.
In an organization, the purchase decisions are influenced by several individuals and are not made in isolation by an individual.
Organizational buyers are more concerned about the price and quality of the product along with the service being provided by the vendor. Price plays a major role, since the price of the raw materials is the investment from which profits are generated. Thus, price is a major factor which affects the profitability of the firm.
Service also plays an important role, because no organization would like to buy goods from a vendor who cannot provide timely and efficient service.
Organizations adopt certain methods for buying products such as checking a sample before the actual purchase. Most organizational purchases involve purchase of products in large lots. So it is not feasible to individually inspect each and every item in the lot. In such situations, a sample is checked assuming that this sample represents the entire lot. Like the consumer markets, organizational markets also possess certain demand characteristics.
The organizational demand for products or services may be inelastic, derived, joint or fluctuating in nature. Organizational Organizational markets normally purchase the goods or services for producing other goods and services, using these as raw materials.
There are also resellers, who purchase the products to sell directly to other customers without any modifications. Apart from producers and resellers, there are also government and institutional customers who buy the goods. Government buys goods for public utility or for use in their
departments or for production purposes.
The buying decisions of organizations are influenced by environmental factors, organizational factors, social factors and personal factors. Participants in the organizational buying process play as many as seven different roles, namely those of initiator, influencer, user, decider,
approver, buyer and gatekeeper. Although organizations differ significantly from
cach other in their purchasing process, the various stages of industrial buying
comprise problem recognition, general need recognition, product specification, value analysis, vendor analysis, order routine specification, multiple sourcing and performance review. Marketers need relevant information about the characteristics of the industries for marketing their goods and services effectively. To search for such information, the prime sources are government and industrial publications.
TYPES OF ORGANIZATIONAL
MARKETS
a. Producer: These are businesses
that make or create goods or services. Producers buy raw materials and machinery, often from other producers but sometimes from resellers.
Marketing to producers requires
technical expertise and a knowledge of the producer’s operations. Typical marketing strategies involve identifying problems in the producer’s industry or particular operations and proposing solutions that are cost-effective. Producers have a long-term view of markets since their needs change slowly. As a result, marketing to producers is usually based on long-term relationships.
b. Reseller: Resellers buy finished goods and resell them to the next level in a given distribution channel. Resellers do not normally transform products that they sell. The product usually is re-sold without any modifications to the next channel member.
However, there may be some value
added by resellers. Occasionally
resellers will bundle products from
multiple manufacturers together.
For example, a computer reseller
may bundle together computer
hardware and software and then
offer the total package at a
discounted price to the consumer.
The key factor for marketing to
resellers is to be aware of their
added-value proposition. If the
reseller is a wholesale company
offering low prices for high volume, marketers must develop proposals which address this characteristic. If the company buys specialized equipment according to
specifications and re-sells it to
customers based on high quality
and reliability, the marketing will
be different.
c. Government market: The
government market consists of
government units at federal, state
and local levels. Agencies at all levels purchase goods and services used in performing critical government functions. Governments are huge customers of all kinds of products.
See previous lessons in Marketing
Lesson Evaluation / Test
- Define market.
- What is consumer market?
- List and explain the various characteristics of consumer market.
- What is organisational market?
- List and explain types of organisational market.
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