These are the topics for you to research and read:

1. Study the meaning of Marketing.

Marketing refers to the activities of a company associated with

buying, advertising, distributing, or selling a product or service.

Marketing involves researching the target audience, advising clients

how to develop their products to suit consumer desires, determining
product pricing structure, selecting effective channels through which
to communicate with your customers, and developing and
implementing promotional strategies.

Marketing is a process in which goods and services move from a

manufacturer to the customer.

2. Functions of Marketing

1.Promotion

Promotion fosters brand awareness while educating target audiences on a brand's

products or services. It emphasizes introducing potential consumers to your brand.
This function of marketing varies in form, and marketing professionals tailor each
form to relate to a particular product, brand or target audience. Promotion may
include any of the following strategies:

 Email marketing
 Social media advertisements
 Public relations
 Digital or print advertising
 Content marketing
 Brand partnerships
 Influencer marketing
 Events

2. Selling

Selling is a function of marketing that comprises communicating with potential

customers and pursuing sales leads. It's important for marketing professionals to
pursue sales leads with subtlety, which helps them build relationships with
potential customers. As communication with a potential customer progresses,
successful marketers may introduce their product and answer questions customers
may have. Effective selling techniques can help you distinguish your brand from
competitors. Marketers and salespeople may collaborate to determine how to best
position their product within their market and sell it to potential customers.

3. Product management

Product management includes the development, design and improvement of

products or services. The role of a marketer in product management is to ensure
that a finished product meets customer needs. This includes examining the overall
visual of the product, its usefulness and how it's delivered. Some product
management strategies include:

 Analyzing competitors: Researching and analyzing your competitors equips

you with information to develop a product that rivals or surpasses theirs.
 Communicating with customers: This strategy provides helpful insight into
ways to improve your products before they reach the market.

 Implementing feedback: It's important for marketing professionals to gather

feedback from several areas—both inside and outside their organization—to
improve their production processes.
 Conducting market research: Researching similar products helps a marketing
team determine what customers want and how to satisfy them.
 Coordinating with other departments: Collaborating with other teams in your
organization prepares your entire company to release a product, generate
ideas for distribution and deliver products seamlessly.

4. Pricing

Establishing a price for a product incorporates several factors of cost and value.
Ideally, marketers find a price between customers' perceptions of a product's value
and the actual cost of producing it. Other factors include the price your competitors
set and the amount customers might pay for your product. Marketing professionals
consider these elements when deciding how to price a particular product or service.

5. Marketing information management

You can optimize your marketing strategies when you focus on data and
information. It's important to collect and store data, such as customer preferences
and demographics. Often, this data directly relates to your target audience for your
products and services. This also can inform effective business decisions for the
entire company, so consider sharing your data and findings with other departments,
as well.

You can gather relevant information from various marketing tools, such as:

 Surveys
 Online reviews
 Social media engagements
 Market research reports

6. Financing

Financing is a marketing function that involves securing funding—either internally

or externally—to create marketing campaigns. It's important for marketing teams
to secure enough availability in their annual budget to improve previous marketing
campaigns and remain updated with industry trends.

7. Distribution

Distribution is the process of transporting your company's products or services to

your customers. There are several physical and digital methods of distribution,
including:

 Online stores
 Catalogs or magazines
 Sales calls
 Retail stores
 Wholesalers

3. Market - characteristics and elements

1. One commodity:
In practical life, a market is understood as a place where commodities
are bought and sold at retail or wholesale price, but in economics “Market”
does not refer to a particular place as such but it refers to a market for a
commodity or commodities i.e., a wheat market, a tea market or a gold
market and so on.
2. Area:
In economics, market does not refer only to a fixed location. It refers to the whole
area or region of operation of demand and supply

3. Buyers and Sellers:

To create a market for a commodity what we need is only a group of potential

sellers and potential buyers. They must be present in the market of course at
different places.

4. Perfect Competition:

In the market there must be the existence of perfect competition between buyers
and sellers. But the opinion of modern economist is that in the market the situation
of imperfect competition also exists, therefore, the existence of both is found.

5. Business relationship between Buyers and Sellers:

For a market, there must exist perfect business relationship between buyers and
sellers. They may not be physically present in the market, but the business
relationship must be carried on.

6. Perfect Knowledge of the Market:

Buyers and sellers must have perfect knowledge of the market regarding the
demand of the customers, regarding their habits, tastes, fashions etc.

7. One Price:

One and only one price be in existence in the market which is possible only
through perfect competition and not otherwise.

8. Sound Monetary System:

Sound monetary system should be prevalent in the market, it means money

exchange system, if possible, be prevalent in the market.

9. Presence of Speculators:
Presence of seculars is essential just to supply business information’s and prices
prevalent in the market.

4. Factors affecting a market

Economic Factors:

There are various economic factors that affect marketing such as inflation, interest
rates, exchange rates, recession and taxes.

 Inflation: Inflation can be defined as the rise in the prices of various items
over a period of time. A rise in the prices of goods is directly proportional to
the input prices for producing the goods and services. In case of inflation,
the market analysts and the fund managers will consider the total impact on
the margin of that particular product.

 Interest rates: Less interest rate means more money to spend. When a
consumer pays less in terms of interest, it means he is left with more money
to spend on, which in turn, creates a ripple effect of high spending
throughout the economy.

 Exchange rates: Exchange rates have a symbolic effect on companies that do

business globally. When the business enterprises exchange goods or services
across borders involving two or more currencies, variation in exchange rates
can result in profit or loss for a particular business.

 Recession: Business firms affected by recession spend less cash on

advertising and marketing a product; as a result, consumer faith fades away,
perpetuating the recession.

 Taxes: Taxes mitigate both demand and supply of a product, and prompts
the market equilibrium to a price that is higher than without the tax and a
quantity that is lower than without the tax.

 Income level: The varying income levels in a particular company determines

the pricing strategy of the products and services in the market. This will
estimate that whether people will purchase your products or not.
 5. Explain the meaning of Marketing Management

Marketing management is a process of controlling the marketing aspects,

setting the goals of a company, organizing the plans step by step, taking decisions
for the firm, and executing them to get the maximum turn over by meeting the
consumers' demands.

6. Objectives of marketing management

1. Creation of Demand:

The marketing management’s first objective is to create demand through various

means. A conscious attempt is made to find out the preferences and tastes of the
consumers. Goods and services are produced to satisfy the needs of the customers.
Demand is also created by informing the customers the utility of various goods and
services.

2. Customer Satisfaction:

The marketing manager must study the demands of customers before offering them
any goods or services. Selling the goods or services is not that important as the
satisfaction of the customers’ needs. Modern marketing is customer- oriented. It
begins and ends with the customer.

3. Market Share:

Every business aims at increasing its market share, i.e., the ratio of its sales to the
total sales in the economy. For instance, both Pepsi and Coke compete with each
other to increase their market share. For this, they have adopted innovative
advertising, innovative packaging, sales promotion activities, etc.

4. Generation of Profits:

The marketing department is the only department which generates revenue for the
business. Sufficient profits must be earned as a result of sale of want-satisfying
products. If the firm is not earning profits, it will not be able to survive in the
market. Moreover, profits are also needed for the growth and diversification of the
firm.

5. Creation of Goodwill and Public Image:

To build up the public image of a firm over a period is another objective of
marketing. The marketing department provides quality products to customers at
reasonable prices and thus creates its impact on the customers.

7. Marketing management concept

8. Marketing management process
9. Four steps involved in the marketing process