Marketing Projects

Olivier Mesly

• Verlag: Auerbach Publications
• Jahr: 2020
• ISBN:
  9781351987523
• Auflage: 1
• Thema: Betriebswirtschaft
• Thema: Projektmanagement

Marketing is about placing a new product or service into the market. Projects are about delivering new products and services. The merger of these two fields holds great promise for delivering value to organizations and their clients. Project managers can serve many markets ranging from investors who fund projects to that of clients who use new products and services. Marketing Projects is a guide for helping project managers have projects funded or deliver value to end users. It is also a guide for marketing managers new to the world of project management.

The book begins by presenting the basics of both marketing and project management and highlights the aspects that are unique and relevant to both areas. It then explores marketing project feasibility and presents tools for assessing feasibility, which include the 6Ps of project management strategy:

• The project 4Ps: plan, processes, people, and power

• PRO: pessimistic, realistic, and optimistic scenarios

• POVs: points of vulnerability

• POE: point of equilibrium

• POW: product, organization, and work breakdown structures

• PWP: work psychodynamics

This book illustrates how to use these tools to market new projects to potential sponsors and investors. It then explores marketing projects to end users. Crucial to the success of projects are the relationships between project managers and clients and the way marketing experts implement their strategies. This book explains how project managers can develop meaningful relationships with clients to foster trust and have positive interactions.

Project managers excel at managing the processes for delivering new products and services. Marketers are keenly aware of latent, or unconscious needs, as well as those developing and emerging, and can provide project promoters and managers with exciting ideas. This book will help improve the mutual understanding between marketing and project managers, an effort ultimately benefiting end users, whether they be investors or customers. A better work atmosphere and a closer fit between marketing and project management objectives can only serve the interests of investors and end users, for whom marketers and project managers conceive and realize projects, one way or the other.

Chapter 1

What Is Marketing?

An eco-friendly building in Strasbourg, France. The surrounding community envisions an entire area of such eco-friendly buildings.

1.1 Introduction

This chapter briefly reviews the main concepts pertaining to the marketing field and that are relevant for project managers. We do not pretend to cover everything there is to know about marketing; in fact, we even challenge some preconceived ideas, but do so for the benefit of harmonizing the roles of the two experts: the marketing and the project managers. We resort to a short-and-sweet approach, as our goal is to briefly present the topics and not delve into them too deeply.

The learning objectives of this chapter are to understand what marketing is, to recognize marketing activities and concepts in daily life, and to make the link between marketing and project management.

1.2 What Is Marketing in the Context of Project Feasibility?¹

According to the American Marketing Association (AMA), marketing is “the activity, set of institutions, and processes for creating, communicating, delivering, and exchanging offerings that have value for customers, clients, partners, and society at large.”² Some books state that marketing is about the creation of value. We believe this is “arguable,” at least from a project management perspective. Operating a machine is also about creating value, for that matter. In fact, many products people put in the market have little or no value at all, or even have a negative value. What about blinds containing lead that poison kids when put in their bedrooms? What about opioids becoming a considerable problem in North America? It is hard to argue these products create value, yet marketers still put them into the market.

Simple definition: Marketing is to put into the market.

Walking is to walk. Marketing is to put into the market.³ It is as simple as that. Books and theories that shy from this simple explanation lead readers in the wrong direction. Projects’ promoters want to see their proposals accepted by investors (funders). Thus, they need to find a way to put products in the market of investors. Once completed, and thus having become an operation, managers must put the deliverable into the market. It has to reach its intended end users.

¹ We interpret marketing concepts within the realm of project feasibility. Some of our statements may differ from the standard marketing theory.

² See www.ama.org/the-definition-of-marketing/.

³ The word “market” has a Latin origin. Note that we endeavor to keep all definitions in a format as simple and as easily memorizable as possible.

On the other hand, marketers are usually keenly aware of latent, or unconscious needs, as well as those developing and emerging, and can provide project promoters and managers with exciting ideas. In the end, both marketing and project managers long to deliver value to the funders and future end users of the projects; they choose what value they wish to offer, work on building it, and provide and communicate it.

1.3 Who Are the Marketing Experts?

We divide marketing into two areas of expertise: the analytical side and the creative side. The analysts gage the market, trying to identify trends, hidden needs, and competitors’ weaknesses, and they constantly attempt to better capture buyers’ and consumers’ behaviors. These analysts thrive on statistics, love mathematics, and spend many hours scrutinizing databases such as those provided by, say, Euromonitor⁴ or AC Nielson.⁵ On the other hand, some marketing experts excel in creating ads, logos, and slogans (sometimes called mantras), or else in working hand in hand with salespeople to create innovative promotional programs. Jobs include Vice President (VP) of marketing (or, often, VP of sales and marketing), Director of marketing, etc. Pay varies widely, but a good career in marketing can be quite rewarding financially.

The skills required for the marketing field include a strong mathematical and analytical sense (to set prices and analyze data), sensitivity to market agents (especially the buyers⁶), imagination, and initiative.⁷

Marketing experts occupy an important role within organizations. Unfortunately, our experience has shown us that employers often blame them for market upheavals, even though they have no control over them! Sales are going down, so top managers must find a culprit.

Marketing experts work closely with research and development (R&D), especially when it comes to projects—the mechanisms used to conceive, test, and eventually create and “operationalize” new products to sell. Increasingly, sound knowledge in project management is becoming necessary for marketing experts, just as marketing knowledge enhances project managers’ ability to realize their ideas.

⁴ See www.euromonitor.com/.

⁵ See www.nielsen.com/fr/fr.html; for further examples, see also opinionresearch.com, google.com/intl/fr/analytics, stat.gouv.qc.ca, marketingpower.com, dialog.com, or lexisnexis.com.

⁶ This is important in international marketing.

⁷ Individuals interested in such a career should favor companies with solid reputations; those that have adequate personnel and stable financials provide sound management, offer something of value to the market, and are integrated within their communities. These conditions, when filled, make any marketing job that much easier and that much more promising.

1.4 Marketing for the Vast Majority

The vast majority of people have an ambiguous understanding of what marketing is; many have preconceived (and often negative) ideas, or else do not grasp its full scope. In fact, the main themes usual marketing academic journals cover provide a succinct list of those anyone can think of, including brand management, consumer behavior,⁸ culture, ethics, innovation and product development, international marketing, publicity, sales and customer relations, social networks including an Internet presence, strategy and decision-making, and viral marketing.

Marketers resort to market analyses, while sellers focus on the interaction between suppliers and buyers. Technically, marketing and selling go hand in han...