Do Business Well

Imagine a plain white wall as a metaphor for a well-run, successful business. Now imagine that there is a small black mark somewhere on the wall. Where do you focus your attention? It travels to the blemish. The established thinking of ‘let’s fix what’s wrong’ has become so obsessive that we can spot a flaw in seconds, simply because that is what we are looking out for. Whenever someone makes a presentation, we are more attuned to its weaknesses than its strengths. Whenever we meet someone, we are more attuned to evaluating what we dislike about them, rather than what we may like. How many times are we missing the good by habitually searching for the bad? Continue Reading »

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The key role of research in effective marketing planning was introduced. The marketing audit comprises research and analysis of the internal and external environment as follows:

• The internal audit reviews existing marketing activities and assesses their effectiveness in terms of contribution to revenue, brand enhancement, customer service, customer retention, market share or sales leads.
• The external audit considers the micro-environmental influences (customers, suppliers, partners, distributors and competitors) and macro-environmental influences (political, economic, social, technological and legal) within which the company operates.

The circles representing different aspects of the business environment show that from a company’s perspective, the various components of the micro-environment are intimately connected with the operations of its business, but the macro-environment is one step removed. This means that a company has some degree of control over the micro-environmental influences, but cannot directly influence the ‘bigger picture’ of the macro-environment, which would include such issues as interest rate changes, new legislation, etc. By conducting a marketing audit, a company can at least monitor and be aware of the implications of likely changes in the macro-environment, even if it cannot directly control them.

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