Marketing Channels -Airways

Marketing Channels connect producers with consumers for a product. The main point of marketing channels is to make the product available for consumer needs.Marketing Channels is involved with one of the 4 P's of the marketing mix and is a useful tool for management. Marketing channels affect promotion as well as advertising. For an Airline they can have many different channels to get the plane tickets to the customers inclduing: travel agents, calling the airport/airline, airline offices, online websites(ex. kayak), or at an airport. In the airline industry these marketing channels are extremely important. You see a lot of commercials advertising airline tickets, not necessarily specific companies but different websites such as kayak or expedia. A main advantage that an airline company would have is that the marketing channel doesnt take nearly as long to get from the producer to the consumer because the company usually directly sells the tickets to individual consumers.

Marketing Channels are a very important part of every business.Which one of the above listed marketing channels is the best for an airline company? Why?

Response to Drews Phone Question

Do you think you would be able to live without technology now that we depend so much on using it? How often do you use your smart phone? Daily? Hourly? Every minute?

I feel that in todays world people rely very heavily not only on their technology but on their cell phones. People are on them nonstop all day. In my case I always have my phone on me and check it about every hour, although there are times when I can be on my phone for hours. I could live without it but it would be hard to communicate with friends/family without it. Since obtaining a smart phone Ive only had to go without it a couple of times with the longest being two weeks because I was out of the country. I would say that it was pretty easy without it but only because I knew that it did not have service, therefore it was useless. If I were to be without it for two weeks while at home I think it would be a lot different and weird in some ways. With how much technology is being put into phones its not hard to see why people fall in love with them so quickly.

With the iPhone dominating the smart phone world, and Tmobile recently adding its own version, do you see a monopoly of the product coming?

Advertisings effect on the market

Seeing as St. Patricks day just passed, I figured I would talk about the importance of advertising for specific companies. Companies such as Anheuser Busch or MillerCoors advertise especially hard for instances such as New years, the Super Bowl, St Patricks Day, and The 4th of July. The reason is these four dates are known for partying and the companies see this as a prime time to market there product and hit a larger audience by commercials, flyers, posters, billboards, and even free merchandise. (Ex: Bud light beads for St pattys day) Advertising has become a major competition in recent years as the markets have been fighting for the consumers. Todays day and age is all about the social networks and companies have taken advantage of this with ads on virtually every website that you go onto while on the internet.

People tend to have their own tastes and generally stick with that. Do you believe advertising a product in the beverage industry influences a consumer enough to purchase a product?

Response to Will's post on Spring Break

Do you think the idea of spring break is marketed to students?

The idea of spring break is constantly marketed to students. With the technology and social media that is present in our society today, it makes it even more of a big deal. With facebook, twitter, and other social media networks all marketing the perfect spot for spring break such as cancun or even southern florida. I agree with Will when he states that this has become treated almost as a national holiday with companies and organizations banking in on these students who are willing to spend large amounts of money in order to party and be in the warm weather exclusively while being with a group of friends and/or family. I have personally gone to Florida twice now for spring break and both times I have gone the prices of alcohol as well as food have been substantially higher during spring break than in any other week. The reason being is the bars and restraunts know that spring break is a high demand week and no matter what the price is, the consumers will buy it with the idea that "hey its spring break".

What marketing techniques should these bars and restraunts use to be more effective?

Corporate Branding taking over America

This article was very interesting and made me really think about what I look for when purchasing a product or service. The world as a whole has come to be all to familiar with popular brands as we buy what we like. The example about the coffee shop that Starbucks had opened up was good evidence that people buy (or dont buy) products because of a certain brand name. If that starbucks had its name on the front it would have lost some customers, but also it would have gained a bunch more due to its popularity. I believe that even if some of the most popular brands and products used this strategy, there wouldn't be a significant change in the sales because people are already familiar with the product and already know whether or not they like it. In America anything with a popular brand or logo on it will sell. Some of the most successful companys have the most popular brand names or logos. Nike has the "swoosh", Gatorade has the "G" symbol with a lightning bolt, and Red Bull energy drinks have the two bulls going head to head at one another.

What do you think the results would be if a smaller company such as Dr. Pepper would try a strategy like this?

Response to Nicoles Dr Pepper entry

I agree with your statement that clearly the target market for this product is men because the promotional side of the product has been pushing to TV stations as well as magazines that are more masculine based. I also agree with the notion about people not wanting to drink diet as opposed to the real thing because studies have shown that diet soda is in fact "worse" for you than regular soda. In general, men are more likely to drink soda than woman so in that regard I believe Dr. Pepper is marketing to the right people by trying to create a product just for men. I don't think its a bad thing to target just men in this scenario, however to market that the product is only intended for men is going to hurt them.

What would happen if Dr. Pepper introduced a product that was "for women" or "not for men".

Product Concepts

As discussed in chapter 10 of the book, there are many ways for a company to "brand" a product to the market. The most common way would be individual branding which would mean using different brand names for different products, but within the same company. For example Nike makes several different sneakers under different brand names such as, Nike Air Force, Nike Air Max, and Nike Air Huarache. There is also family branding in which a company markets several different products under the same brand name, example being Apple which uses its brand and logo to help consumers find its product easier. The last branding strategy would be co-branding, when two or more brand names are on a single product. An example of co-branding would be a box of Betty Crockers brownie mix, which markets that every box conatains hershey's chocolate syrup.

Which of the three discussed forms of branding would be the most successful in a target market for Generation Y's?