Chapter 0 - Preface

[MUSIC]. Hello, I'm Noel Capon, and welcome to Capon's Marketing Video Book, more specifically, the preface to Capon's Marketing Video Book. Before I get into the content of the book, let me explain to you why I've prepared this video book. Firstly I believe that successful business enterprises are amazing entities for creating wealth.

But successful business enterprises are only successful to the extent that they deliver value to their customers. And the marketing function is that part of the organization that has the responsibility for figuring out what that value should be and helping design and then get it delivered to customers.

So that's the first reason. The second is it clear that the technology of education is changing dramatically. It's not that long ago, if you wanted to learn about any topic at an advanced level you had to go to a physical building and sign up for a course and/or read a hard copy printed textbook.

Now certainly in recent years with the growth of the Internet you can now secure your textbook not just in printed version but online in a PDF form or on e-readers like Kindle, Nook, and on an iPad. But it's clear that many people like to improve their intellectual capital by video.

So hence this is a marketing video book where rather than read the printed word you'll be able to see me talk about the ex-series of issues in marketing accompanied by a set of slides so that you can easily follow through the several topics in the sections and chapters of the book.

Thirdly for many years now I've been very concerned about the high cost of education, specifically that of textbooks. And in the marketing fields certainly the prices of many textbooks are between $100 and $200 and on many occasions they're actually above $200.

So a few years ago I started developing conventional textbooks which are sold through Axcess Capon at much lower prices. And this marketing video book is priced at under $50, which means that the price of the videos is between $1 and $2 per hour. And I believe that it is important if we're going to improve the wealth creating capacity of enterprises around the world, that the people in marketing, or who're considering into getting into marketing, or want to know about marketing could in fact do that at fairly low cost.

So the price of this video book will be under $50. So now let's get in to look at what is in this book As I said, it's the preface and here is the road map that we're going to go through, first the table of contents, then learning materials, and then related content. So the book comprises of five sections: marketing and the firm, fundamentals for strategic marketing, then a transition to strategic marketing, strategic marketing itself in Section III, implementing the market strategy and then finally in Section V some special topics in marketing.

So let's go through the section so I can give you a feel of what's in the various chapters. So in Section I, we start off in Chapter 1, Introduction to Managing Marketing, where we lay out a set of very important fundamentals or what I term the six imperatives of marketing and four principles Four principles and then marketing as a philosophy.

In Chapter 2, we move beyond the notion that customers are important and to try to put dollars and cents on the value of customers, and then we move to talking about customer relationship management and customer loyalty Clearly marketing people have to know a lot of what's going on outside the firm, what's going on in the world.

We divide this into several chapters. In the first chapter we talk about market, market insight, one of the factors that drive market growth etc. How can we divide up markets, so that we can better understand what's going on. In Chapter 4 we focus on customers, trying to understand customer's needs and the process through which customers go in making their purchase decisions.

In Chapter 5, we focus on competitors--competitors, because the firm is only going to be successful to the extent that it delivers customer value better than its competitors. So we need to know a fair deal about the competitors. And then in Chapter 6 we talk about marketing research methodologies , the ways we might go about collecting some of the data we've talked about in those earlier inside chapters.

So those four chapters in fact form--what one might call--the situation analysis in a marketing plan. But then we move beyond situation analysis in the transition to strategic marketing where we develop a set of assumptions on which to build the market strategy. Now I noted at the beginning that we develop marketing based on a set of imperatives, and in strategic marketing, I gave you three imperatives, first of all to determine and recommend which market to address, second to identify and target market segments Second, to identify and target market segments.

And thirdly, to set strategic direction and positioning. So those three imperatives comprise the content of Section III, strategic marketing. And we start with Chapter 7 on identifying and choosing opportunities. Then we move on to market segmentation where there are two major issues.

One is figuring out how best to segment the market and second of all is to figure out which segments to target. Third, which is probably in some sense the heart of the book, for me really the core chapter, and that is market strategy, where we integrate firm efforts for marketing success.

In this chapter, we lay out the core elements for market strategy and such that any strategy which does not contain any of these elements is not in fact a full strategy. We then move on. After all at various stages in life cycle we have to think about the world very differently, and finally in this section we focus on branding because I'm sure you know brands have become exceptionally important in marketing and for the firm as a whole the last few years.

And we devote an entire chapter to branding. Then we move on to the second set of three imperatives--implementing the market strategy--and here we focus on imperative four, design the market offer. Imperative five, secure support from other functions in the organization so that we can deliver that value to customers. And imperative six, monitor and control, so we can make sure the resources that we're allocating are in fact getting us the results that we want.

So Section IV, then I divide into four different parts all to do with designing the market offer. Chapter 12 then managing the product line, which is the first chapter in the providing customer value part. Then we move on to managing services and customer service and finally in this part developing new products in Part B, communicating customer value.

Chapter 15 focuses on integrated marketing communication. Chapter 16 on mass and digital communication of course digital communication has grown much more important and will continue to grow in importance as we move forward. And Chapter 17, directing and managing the field sales effort.

Chapter 18, on distribution decisions, focuses on delivering customer value. And then in Chapters 19 and 20, Part 4, we focus on getting paid for customer value 19, we focus on critical underpinnings of pricing decision, then in Chapter 20, we move into actually setting prices.

Chapter Section IV continues with Chapter 21, ensuring the firm implements the market strategy. And implementing the market strategy concludes with Chapter 22 monitoring and controlling firm functioning and performance. Then finally in Section V, we have just a single chapter in the special topics area of the international regional and global marketing.

So that's the content if you can say it's a fairly significant amount of content, divided up among 23 chapters in five different segments. Now in terms of learning materials, the videos are divided into these five sections and 23 chapters, each of which will show partly talking and partly will show the overheads as we are doing in this preface.

Now you have a number of options. The first option for each chapter will be to watch the full length video from beginning to end. And most videos are around getting close to 90 minutes there are a couple that are under an hour, but ballpark 90 minutes for the average video. So if you have the time and you want to watch the video right away through you could just watch, just do so.

On the other hand, that may be too much to get it all one time. You might want to still check how you're absorbing or understanding the material. So each chapter is also divided up into a set of segments. Roughly 15 minutes worth of video is a segment more or less 15, 20 minutes, something like that.

So if you want pace yourself through each chapter, at the end of each segment there's the opportunity for review. So what I've done is to prepare a set of questions on the segment that you just watched, one page when I have the question, the next page you have the question and the answer.

So you can think through your answer to the questions then check those out on the next slide. You'll also have the opportunity for the presentation decks the actual slides that are part of the chapter they are there available for you to download, print out and use as you want. And you have online access to all the chapters of the book once you've signed on. The learning materials, there is related content. That said, I've been working on text books for some time to offer these at very reasonable prices.

So the video--in fact the video book--is redeveloped out of my textbooks. So there is Managing Marketing for the 21st Century which is a 600-page textbook. There's also a student's study guide for that textbook, then there's somewhat shorter book Capon's Marketing Framework of 350 pages and also a student's study guide for that book.

Then relatedly there's a book called the Virgin Marketer, which is really a marketing planning workbook to help you develop your marketing plan. There's also a book to help you develop your marketing plan. There's also a related book to the textbook, Marketing for China's Managers, Current and Future.

So if you're thinking of doing business in that part of the world, that may help you. It's a book that's an adaptation of my other books but directed purely on the China market. Then there a couple of books that I've written with traditional publishers, The Marketing Mavens with Crown Business, and just before that, Total Integrated Marketing with The Free Press.

So there is a lot of support material I know many people like to read textbooks, I think that a lot of people would like to see the video but if you want to pair that with a textbook, these are available. Now in terms of these related materials, the textbooks available as printed books PDF you can read on your computer, and they are also available on your iPad so you have a number of different options.

Both of those books, the Capon's Marketing Framework, and Managing Marketing in the 21st Century are priced below $50 for both the printed hard copy and the PDF, special features of this textbooks, the introductory videos, a few minutes of me introducing both the book and the sections and then the individual chapters, there are also series of interviews with leading marketing experts.

You can access these videos by PC and tablet. Or you could do this also by cellphone because the videos are coded by QR codes, and you can just simply scan them and they're right there on your cellphone. Other related material, the other areas where I spend a lot of time in is managing strategic accounts.

So there's also a video book for managing global accounts, which is also available to you. Then there are series of printed books which are also available in PDF, Managing Global Accounts, Key Account Management, which is published by Free Press, a series of case studies in managing key strategic and global customers. A planning book for strategic accounts and strategic programs, called Strategic Accounts Strategy, and a book called, Compensating the Sales Force. We looked at the table of contents then for Capon's Marketing Video Book, five sections and 23 chapters.

A set of learning material, a way that you will be able to use this book, and then a set of related content both the marketing content and then an adjunct if you like on managing strategic and key and global customer. So I hope you will take a look at the Capon's Marketing Video Book.

As far as I know this is the only video book of it's type in the business world, it's firstly the only video book per se and I'm hoping that those of you who like to learn both by video in addition to or instead of the printed word will find this book very useful and

very helpful to you in your careers as marketing people, whether or not you're an entry level marketing person and currently in a college program or MBA program, or whether you're a practicing executive. Because I think far too often we get tied up in the minutia of marketing and are unable to step back and see the really big picture and understand the key fundamentals of what makes marketing executives successful.

So thank you very much for your attention, and good luck. [MUSIC]

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