Holistic Marketing

Holistic marketing means marketing function taking a integrated approach rather than an individualistic view. This is a critical success factor of modern marketing where marketing collaborates with internal and external factors to deliver better customer capturing value from customers.

Holistic marketing includes 04 main dimensions and they can be described as follows:

• Internal marketing-

This is where the company focuses on internal organization and carries out marketing activities internally. This include 03 sub elements

such as

1. Marketing department- Marketing department should consist of people who understand wide aspects of marketing and they should be able to carry out marketing function within the marketing department by understanding the need of department as whole and individual needs of the workers.
2. Senior management- Senior management should be well aware of the marketing concept and they should support the concept by making decisions in favor of marketing for marketing to occur within the organizations. Many organizations fail in marketing due to lack of the commitment from the senior management in making marketing as a strategic function.
3. Other departments- In making marketing as a strategic function other department should support the concept of marketing and they should work collaboratively with marketing department. As an example production department should understand the needs of customers and produce goods based on requirement which can be marketed by the marketing department.

• Integrated marketing-

This is where the factors include in marketing plan are made interconnected to deliver better customer value. In other words product, place and promotion of the marketing plan are designed in an integrated manner to give a holistic view to marketing.  Product has to be designed based on customer needs and it should have the ability to satisfy customer needs. The product offering has to be communicated to the customer using appropriate promotional methods and product has to be made available to the customer making it convenience for purchase.

• Relationship marketing-

This is where the firm manages its relationship with suppliers to customers in an effective manner while considering long term benefits rather than short term profits. Managing relationships have 03 aspects.

1. Customers- Customers include relationship with internal (inter departmental relationships) and external customers (customers at market place) of the product. Organization should attract customers who are profitable and build long tern relationship with them by identifying and satisfying their needs accordingly. Customer retention is given more priority as attracting new customers is expensive.
2. Channels- This includes every organization who are involved to delivering goods to customers and it includes the suppliers as well. Organization should build good long term relationship with suppliers and dealers as they play a major role in making the goods available to customers. Failure in dealers or suppliers can result in loss of customers and reputation of the organization and firm should manage relationships effectively providing win-win situation.
3. Partners- This is where the firm has to manage its relationship effectively with people who provide finance for them. Basically it means managing relationship with its shareholders and other fund providers and marketing department should take necessary steps to achieve their objectives as well (that is achieving high profits)

• Socially responsible marketing-

This where the firm carries out its marketing activities in a way that it fulfills its responsibilities towards the society. Making only profits will not let the company survive in long run and they should be a good corporate citizen and build good public image of the company which will ultimately motivate consumers to purchase goods. Failure to be socially responsible can result in bad word of mouth, loss of reputation, loss of customers in to future, imposing penalties and loss of license to continue the business.  Conducting socially responsible marketing includes:

1. Being ethical- The Company should do the right thing in a right manner in a way which results in less negative impacts to the society. Mainly company should refrain from manipulating product benefit and use ethical advertising to promote the product.
2. Environment friendliness- The firm should not harm the environment in carrying out marketing activities and they should participate in environment protection. This is basically known as green marketing.
3. Abide by law- Company should respect the law of the country and should not engage in law breaking activities in carrying out marketing activities.
4. Community- The firm should respect the values and beliefs of society and should not carry out marketing activities which can cause unreasonable disturbance to the society. Failure to do so can result in protests and bans which will ultimately result in loss of reputation and closure of operations.

• business
• marketing