Developing Marketing Capabilities Process

Question: Discuss about the Developing Marketing Capabilities Process. Answer: Introduction: Phone belongs to S-series brand of the company and was launched in February 2016 together with its sister brand galaxy S7. The two had combined total sales of over 48 million mobile phones sold in 2016 and together with its accessories the sales figures hit over 90 million in the same year under review according to the sales reports provided by the company in Q4 of 2016. Galaxy S7 edge is a flashy aesthetic phone with desirable specs such as long battery life, high microprocessor speed as well other features. (Mihart, 2012) The respondents were two male University undergraduate students aged 20 and 21 respectively. Apart from studies the first respondent who is aged 20 sales branded T-shirts in local town and to fellow students while the second respondent who is aged 21 is one of the student union leaders and after lectures he has to dedicate his spare time in resolving students welfare issues in the university. The two respondents purchased Samsung galaxy S7 edge phone. For both respondents the purchase was limited decision making process because both have had personal experiences with many types of phone and through friends and people close to them. They therefore did not have dig extensively deep for information regarding this purchase. (Yap and Yazdanifard, 2014) Analysis of the decision making process For the first respondent his phone battery life couldnt run a whole day without needing recharge. He does most of his T-shirt sales in social media and this means he constantly engaged in his social media accounts to reply to customer enquiries and close sales. When his battery goes down it meant he doesnt move from one point to another doing deliveries and marketing instead he has to wait for the phone to charge before he can continue with his work. This meant he either purchases a power bank which he will need to recharge it before starting the day and use it to recharge his phone when the battery goes down or purchase a phone with longer battery life. The latter was easier for him and he decided to go for a phone with superior battery life to solve this problem. (Kanagal, 2016) For the second respondent he receives a lot of calls from students who need one or two issues fixed for him or her. The University population is large and so does the number of issues arising from the students. He also needs to keep up with the lectures and other academic activities. This lead to his phone running out of the battery even before the day ends. He also considered purchasing a power bank and retaining the same phone but that meant extra work for him recharging the power bank daily and carrying it with him wherever he goes. He therefore went for purchasing a Smartphone phone with longer battery life that can run a whole day without needing recharge. In the information search stage the two case studies marries well with the literature in that the two respondents utilized ways of searching information such as asking friends, personal experiences and search engines. The Both respondents drew heavily on friends and search engines for information search. They both had prior experiences with various types of phones and did not therefore take much time seeking relevant information that they thought were going to help them resolve their problems. The cost for information search was not significant as they got most of the information for free from friends and past experiences with phones. At this stage they began their risk management in that they listed the pros and cons of buying the new phones. The first criteria was choosing a phone that had long battery life that can withstand a long day activities of calls and browsing without needing recharge. Most of the phones that they had used before averaged a half day usage before needing recharge. They had battery capacity range of between 1800mAh to 2000mAh. This meant that for them to have a phone that can comfortably run their day smoothly the battery capacity of the new phone they intended to buy has to have at least over 3000mAh battery spec. The other criterion was the phone had to have strong capability in terms of speed and processing information fast enough without hanging. They also liked to have an aesthetic phone something that appeal to other students especially for the first respondent as this shows he has good taste of fashion and his brands on his T-shirts have good appeal and acceptance among the young generation which is huge part of his customer base. Both respondents had a number of mobile brands in their sele ction sets. The first respondent considered purchasing Xiomi Mi max with battery capacity of 4850mAh and Gionee Marathon M5 plus with battery capacity of 5020mAh. He made his decision based on the strength of the brand as well as availability of the support service and accessories of the phones. While the other two phones in the consideration set had superior battery life compared to Samsung galaxy S7 edge at 3600mAh first respondent decided to strike a balance between good battery life and availability of support services. The Second respondent considered buying Samsung galaxy S7 but compared with the edge it battery capacity was still less impressive to him at 3000mAh. The edge also had bigger display which appealed to him more than S7 brand. (Kanagal, 2016) The first respondent purchased his phone via online store where you can view the product pictures online as well the specifications. Having gone through the selection criteria had made up his mind about the phone he was going to purchase and that was Samsung galaxy S7 edge. While he was online doing his T-shirt business he come across and advert that was advertising the same phone he wanted to buy. The advert contained an offer for the same phone at 20% discount and this offer was limited. He made the decision to buy promptly through the advertising online store to take advantage of the offer. The second respondent visited the mobile phones shop in the local town. The shops were running different offers ranging from loading free one hour mobile talk time to your mobile line if you purchase from them to having one year warranty if the phone doesnt work as expected and its not buyers fault. He bought the phone at the place where he was given one year warranty of the phone it case it do esnt function as expected. (Guenzi and Troilo, 2006) After the purchase both respondents were satisfied with the performance of their new phones given that they could go about their normal business day uninterrupted with low battery in their phones. This was their problem. They indicated they will try and a maintain Samsung brand next time they need to upgrade their phones. Comparison with existing literature Comparing the two respondents purchase decision making process with what is available in the literature, there is a number of similarities and differences. In the fast step of what triggered the problem the two cases were already faced with a challenge of deciding if they wanted to go for power bank or buy a new phone altogether. (Jaakkola, 2007) This decision was made before the other steps of the consumer decision making procedure were reached. In the criteria stage these cases also resembled what is captured in the literature in that the respondents were guided by the need to resolve a particular problem in this case short battery life as well as other criteria such aesthetic and processing speed. In the purchase stage both case exhibited similarities with literature available for this stage. (Kanagal, 2016) The respondents were affected by the environment such as exposure to advert and promotional incentives warranty that lead them to purchase the phones. On the post purchase sta ge the respondents returned a satisfied verdict in that the phones performance were as expected and further alluded to maintaining the same brand of Samsung phones when they will consider upgrading these gadgets in future. This is also what is captured in most literature concerning consumer decision making process. Conclusion In conclusion the consumer decision making process is real concept that best captures the process through which a consumer makes a decision when in need of purchasing any item as we have seen with the first and the second respondent in this paper. Traders or business people should acquaint themselves with this process so that they can develop effective marketing tool or campaign to boost their sales. References Guenzi, P. and Troilo, G. (2006). Developing marketing capabilities for customer value creation through MarketingSales integration. Industrial Marketing Management, 35(8), pp.974-988. Jaakkola, E. (2007). 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