Managing Marketing Information
to Gain Customer Insights
Chapter: 4
Marketing Information
• Customers can’t tell what they want, you have
to guess
e.g.1) Apple’s Ipod
2) Tide stick
3) Hand Sanitizer
• Information is available in abundance but to
utilize that information properly is an art
• Customer insights is important
Marketing Information
• Company can
create more
value for
customer by
looking at useful
information
• Company should
not become
customer
controlled
Marketing Information
• Marketing Information system
People and procedures for assessing information needs,
developing the needed information, and helping decision
makers to use the information to generate and validate
actionable customer and market insights
The marketing Information System
Marketing Managers and Other Information users
Obtaining customer and market insights from marketing information
Marketing Information System
Developing Needed Information
Assessing Analyzing
Internal Marketing Marketing
Information and using
Databases Intelligence Research
needs Information
Marketing Environment
Target Marketing Competitors Publics Microenvironment
Market Channels forces
Assessing Marketing Information
• MIS primarily serves Marketing and other
managers, but external partners can also take
information
e.g. Wal-Mart’s Retail Link give information to suppliers on
customers buying patterns and inventory
• MIS balances the information users would like to
have against what they really need and what is
feasible to offer
• Too much information can be as harmful as too
little
• At times the company cannot provide enough
information because of the limitations
Assessing Marketing Information
• The cost of obtaining, analyzing, storing, and
delivering information can mount quickly
• Information should be worth the cost
Developing Marketing Information
• Internal Databases
Electronic collections of consumer and market
information obtained from data sources within the
company network
• Marketing department: buying behavior,
transactions etc.
• Consumer Service Department: satisfaction/
problems
e.g. Mobilink Call center
• Accounting Department: losses, profits, costs, sales
etc.
• Operations Department: production, shipment,
inventory
Developing Marketing Information
Developing Marketing Information
• Limitations in Internal Data
- Collected for other purpose
- Maybe Incomplete
- Maybe Leading in wrong direction
- Data ages quickly
- Managing mountains of information
Developing Marketing Information
• Marketing Intelligence
The systematic collection and analysis of publicly
available information about customers, competitors, and
developments in the marketing environment
- Improve strategic decision making
(consumers, competitors, threats, opportunities)
- The process has grown dramatically
- Helps in gaining insights into how customers talk about
and connect with their brand
e.g. Ford employs BrandIntel for marketing intelligence
Developing Marketing Information
• Competitive intelligence: to monitor competitors activities
- early warnings of new moves
- new product development
- strengths and weaknesses
• Competitive Intelligence can be collected from people
inside the company, suppliers, reseller or customers
• Observing competitors or monitoring their published
information
• Internet
Developing Marketing Information
• Online Databases
e.g. Karachi Stock Exchange – Financial records of
companies
e.g. P&G and Unilever
• Increase in the number of ethical issues
