PART SIX MARKETING

Pulling and Pushing Marketing Strategies in a Market-Oriented System

The main obj ective of any organization is survival.For a market-oriented business, the route to that survival, in the long run, is the successful marketing of its products and services at prices which absorb its full costs of operations including a financial reward to its owners and a sum permitting it to sustain its growth. A business can exist in the short run through obtaining State subsidies, receiving preferential tax treatment, or through net borrowing, the sales of its assets, default on its payments liabilities, the neglect of challenging opportunities, or resort to other non-growth options.In the final analysis, however, the continuing viability of a business is the satisfactory marketing of its goods and services to meet the economic desiderata of the market place.It can do so either through PUSHING its goods and services to consumers through distribution channels or through PULLING its goods and services to consumers by means of promotional efforts designed to motivate consumers to choose its particular goods and services.Its pulling strategies rely on sales promotions, personal selling and salesmanship, public relations, and advertising in all of its forms including sky writing, air borne streamers, “sandwich boards”, hoardings or billboards, poster displays in buses, trams and trains, in taxis, leaflets, T-shirts, packaging materials, match boxes, and word-of-mouth, to name the most widely used.

The pull strategy can also include cooperative advertising by which the costs of advertising are shared by manufacturers and retailers on an agreed percentage basis.It is most prominently practiced in North American markets. Cooperative advertising sometimes makes use of fold-in inserts in newspapers and magazines, particularly when readers'profiles match a retailer's clientele. An unusual form of pull strategy, also prevalent in the United States, is an arrangement between manufacturers and film studios or sports organizers to display products（e.g., Pepsi Cola, Marlboro cigarettes, Budweiser beer）either in film scenes or outdoor displays of the products themselves or their identifiable logos. As such the promotions are blended into the background of the film or sports contest and viewed by viewers or spectators as part of everyday life.

Whether push or pull strategies are employed is a matter of the category of goods and services to be promoted, the willingness of channel occupants to participate, the size of the budget, market traditions and national or local culture, brand recognition, trade practices, consumer sophistication and buying behavior, stage of the product life cycle among other factors. Ordinarily both sets of strategies are necessary for optimum results.

Push Strategies

Push strategies rely on a wide variety of in-channel methods to induce, motivate, coerce, or otherwise bring about alliances and cooperative pushing efforts involving retailers, wholesalers, brokers, agents, and other middlemen to help ensure that the seller has his goods and services pushed to consumers. The thrust of the push strategy is toward middlemen, those who are in the distribution chain linking producers to final users.Push strategies include giving rebates cash payments, payments in kind, or other awards to wholesalers and retailers who push the suppliers'ware and services on to consumers.Such rewards are given to cooperating distributors who stock or prominently display the supplier's goods or services. The cash payments can be in the form of prizes or goods to be sold by distributors who design awardwinning store or window displays of supplier's products.They are also awarded to distributors who give preferred shelf space, store space, or store location to the supplier's products.Sometimes, the award takes the form of a“spiv”or extra commission to distributors who“push”the supplier's particular brand on to buyers.Beer companies notably often arrange extra payments to bartenders who push their brands to the drinking patrons.

Pull Strategies

The pull strategies are directed at final users and are aimed at motivating them to ask for specific products or services by brand name or service identification.

The pull strategies comprise four thrusts:

* To discover new users or find new market segments of existing products or services；

* To exploit existing products or services by finding new uses；

* To increase product or service usage by motivating customers to use products or services more often or to use more of each during usage occasion；

* To modify existing products or services so as to extend the product or service life cycle.

The most prevalent among the pull strategies are quizzes, questionnaires, contests, or sweepstakes.These pull strategies account for over 50% of all sales campaigns.The most notable among them in the United States is the decades-old Pillsbury Bake Contest in which entrants'cooking recipes are judged, in a nationwide television show, by a panel of“experts”to determine winners of large cash prizes and other awards.Contests can also be won through supposed impartial judgment of best entries containing an answer to a quiz question such as“I like Chinese Dynasty Wine because...（in 25 words or less）.”

Sales Promotions

Sales promotions, accounting for about 30% of marketing campaign expenditures aimed directly at consumers, can take place as part of in-store demonstrations.Free samples are given to potential customers to encourage them to try the product before adopting it.The samples are usually foodstuffs, beverages, laundry powders, and other non-durables.Domestic electrical appliances are also offered, but on a use-it-at-home short term trial basis. Promotions can also be in-the-home trials, with sales personnel demonstrating the proper use of such products as vacuum cleaners, cookware, ovenware, glassware, electrical juicers, and cosmetics.The promotions are launched through direct request from potential users who respond to direct mail, fill in newspaper or magazine coupons, respond to door-to-door canvassers, or telephone prospectors.Avon products relies almost exclusively on door-to-door selling of its beauty products by trained cosmeticians.

A variation of this kind of promotion is the offer of a membership in a“trying and buying”club.Prospects are invited to apply for membership in order to be granted club privileges to buy products at special introductory low prices.The promotions include book subscriptions or credit cares.Usually members receive a numbered membership card, a free subscription to a periodical which describes the club's special promotions, and contains offers of products specially discounted for club members.In the case of cosmetics clubs, members are invited to arrange“make-up”lessons and to buy low-priced facial, body, and hair products.Airlines award members certificates based on paid air miles flown which entitle members to free travel upon the completion of a specified number of air miles flown.A British credit card company offers its members a two-day free hotel stay in selected hotels in the United Kingdom.Publishers and cassette companies offer members free or low-priced books or discs as an inducement to join.The variety of membership awards is almost endless.

The clubs are promoted through media campaigns, television, radio, magazines, newspapers, direct mail, outdoor advertising, mail box stuffers, on-the-street handouts, word-of-mouth, in-flight literature, or brochures at check-in counters or hotels.Another technique in the sales promotion mix is to stage a premium campaign in which prospective customers are asked to return labels or tops of food boxes or to supply other evidence of purchase in order to qualify for cash prizes, merchandise awards, discounts on purchases, free air travel, or holiday resort free accommodation .

Two other kinds of sales promotion which are not widely administered outside North America are：

* The giving of redemption stamps at points of purchase；

* Offering discount coupons to shoppers or potential shoppers.

The number of stamps given is based on a certain percentage of the monetary value of in-store purchases.The stamps are able to be redeemed at special shops which stock a wide variety of popular merchandise items which are available at no extra charge.The discount coupons can be redeemed either for free items or items at lower prices than prevailing one.The coupons are distributed as part of in-store promotions, through the mail, or as newspaper“flyers”or inserts, or located inside or outside the package.Coupons are also offered as a combination or package deal. These so-called“cross promotions”offer a brand item together with a non-competitive brand or product.A biscuit company, for example, may offer its brand product in combination with cheese at a special price, or a cake mix company may offer its product with a companion box of icing.

The coupons are judged to be legal contracts so that whether they are sponsored by manufacturers or retailers, their redemptions must be guaranteed in accordance with the specifications stated in the coupon offer.

In summary, the creation, design, implementation of pull and push strategies are the hallmarks of a successful enterprise destined to survive.The appropriate selection and execution of specific marketing strategies represent the challenges inherent in marketing management.However, no matter which of the above strategies are pursued, for optimum results, they must be integrated into a company's total marketing policy and its organizational obj ectives so as to ensure a company's success.

By John E.Weinrich

KeyTerms and Concepts

market-oriented system a system in which price, output, and volume decisions are made through the interaction of supply and demand market forces rather than by a central government authority.

economic desiderata desired economic benefits resulting from the interaction of market supply and demand forces.

sky writing legible smoke trails from an airplane in which vapors spell out words or promotional phrases.

sandwich boards an advertising message on an attachment of two knee length flat pieces of wood which are suspended over the shoulders of a person.

packaging materials paper, cardboard, and other wrapping or containers for goods on which messages are written.

word-of-mouth messages given vocally by one person to another.

cooperative advertising an arrangement by which the costs of advertising are shared by the retailer and the manufacturer.

payments in kind payments in goods or services not in money.

spiv U.S.A.advertising jargon to describe secret payments to salesmen for manipulating customers to buy a specific brand.

Pillsbury Bake Contest a contest staged by a leading U.S.A.flour manufacturer in which contestants'baked cookies, cakes, bread, are judged for their taste, nutrition, look, and economy.

mail box stuffers printed advertising messages inserted in letter boxes in apartment complexes or residential homes.

on-the-street handouts leaflets containing messages given to pedestrians asking them to buy a particular product or service.

flyers a general terms for mail box stuffers, on-the-street handouts, or other one page printed messages directed to consumers.

cross promotion coupons on packages which offer a combination of products involving the advertiser's brand and a non-competing brand or product, usually at a reduced price.

consumer sophistication a degree of consumer awareness, whereby advertising messages are judged by their rationality, factual reality, and truthfulness rather than fancy or falsity.