Managing Markets and Customers

More and more managers are looking for customer focus to help fight the pressures of rising costs, global competition and falling sales. But it’s not simply a case of trying to get closer to your customers. There are more strategic decisions that if made can make your marketing more lean, more focused and more successful. Managing Customers and Markets explores what market orientation means and the key things you need to be able to do as a manager to make a difference. Understand market orientation and what it means for you Recognise ways you can contribute to customer value in your organisation. Explore how to improve customer satisfaction and customer relationships Evaluate your competitive advantage and changes that could be made to structure, products and services to enhance the offer Identify techniques for developing new markets and products.

Table of Contents:
Theme 1 Customer value – internal and external customers – creating a customer culture Links to F 11 management standards - F11. Manage the achievement of customer satisfaction Find out how to transform the customer’s experience You must be able to do the following: 1 Ensure that colleagues are briefed on and understand the expectations of customers and their own roles and responsibilities in meeting these expectations, including any agreed standards of customer service. 2 Empower colleagues to deliver good customer service, including identifying and addressing their learning needs and providing other resources. 3 Ensure that clear and effective processes are in place to support customers and sort out their problems. 4 Ensure that the day to day behaviour of colleagues matches the organisation's customer focused values. 5 Develop a culture which nurtures, respects, values, recognises and rewards `front line’ colleagues who work with customers. 6 Establish and operate suitable processes for monitoring levels of customer satisfaction. 7 Make recommendations and propose plans to improve the level of customer satisfaction. 8 Demonstrate increasing levels of customer satisfaction with the organisation’s products and/or services and processes. Theme 2 The Market led organisation – profit drivers – what do you charge customers for – does it meet customers needs – the marketing mix Links to F4 management standards - F4. Develop and review a framework for marketing The learner will be able to: 1 Identify and assess the customer groups and needs you want to serve and the benefits to the customer of using your products and/or services. 2 Set out your aims, targets and conditions for success. 3 Evaluate the need for branding or a special identity, including values, to capture a niche position in the market or a premium price. 4 Identify the specific products and/or services you are going to sell and how they are going to be priced. 5 Identify the ways in which you are going to sell your products and/or services and communicate 6 Identify the main phases of activity that you are going to go through to get started, and any priority actions. 7 Identify the areas in which you will need specialist expertise help in marketing and/or selling. 8 Identify the type and quantity of physical and financial resources needed and where to find these. 9 Identify any risks associated with marketing and selling your products and/or services and how to manage these. 10 Identify a process for regularly reviewing and updating the framework. Theme 3 Roundup of marketing techniques This theme covers some of the key topics in marketing The learner will be able to understand the key principles of: Relationship marketing – * Managing interaction amongst networks & stakeholders * Metrics to support relationship marketing : customer value, customer equity, retention/defection * Managing relationships across multiple channels, e.g. multi-channel integration * Customer relationship management and integrated marketing communications Internet marketing - http://www.knowthis.com/internet.htm Guerilla/warfare marketing The living brand - HBR Six sigma marketing - ??? Theme 4 Exploiting changes - Competitor analysis – products and services – exploiting industry /sector changes / legal requirements F6 - F6. Build your organisation’s understanding of its market and customers The learner will be able to show that they are aware of: a major competitors of your organisation; b the effects of legislation on the performance of your organisation; c the implications of a change of structure, products or services for your organisation; d the implications of other market place activities on your organisation. In addition you will need to demonstrate that you know and understand: 1 what your customers’ rights are and how these rights limit what you are able to do for your customer; 2 the specific aspects of: * health and safety * data protection * equal opportunities * disability discrimination * legislation and regulations that affect the way the products or services you deal with can be delivered to your customers; 3 industry, organisational and professional codes of practice and ethical standards that affect the way the products or services you deal with can be delivered to your customers; 4 any contractual agreements that your customers have with your organisation; 5 the products or services of your organisation relevant to your customer service role; 6 the guidelines laid down by your organisation that limit what you can do within your job; Theme 5 Customer challenge – what you need to do to help solve customer problems F6 The learner will be able to understand: 7 the limits of your own authority and when you need to seek agreement with or permission from others; 8 any organisational targets relevant to your job, your role in meeting them and the implications for your organisation if those targets are not met; 9 how to communicate in a clear, polite, confident way and why this is important. You will also need to show that you know and understand: 10 organisational procedures and systems for dealing with customer service problems; 11 how the successful resolution of customer service problems contributes to customer loyalty with the external customer and improved working relationships with the internal customer; 12 how to negotiate with and reassure customers while their problems are being solved.