Marketing ch 5

Health and Wellness Concerns

Accordingly, consumers' interest in improving their health has opened up several new markets and niches focused on healthy living.

Baby Boomers

After World War II, the birthrate in the United States rose sharply, resulting in a group known as the Baby Boomers, the 78 million Americans born between 1946 and 1964. Now that the oldest Boomers are collecting Social Security, it is clear that this cohort will be the largest population of 50-plus consumers the United States has ever seen

ETHNICITY

Approximately 80 percent of all population growth in the next 20 years is expected to come from African American, Hispanic, and Asian communities. Minorities now represent approximately one-quarter of the population; by 2050 they will represent about 50 percent, and nearly 30 percent of the population will be Hispanic

The Immediate environment: Competitors

Competition also significantly affects consumers in the immediate environment. It is therefore critical that marketers understand their firm's competitors, including their strengths, weaknesses, and likely reactions to the marketing activities that their own firm undertakes

Microenvironmental Factors: Generational cohort

Consumers in a generational cohort—a group of people of the same generation—have similar purchase behaviors because they have shared experiences and are in the same stage of life.

The Immediate environment: Corporate Partners

Few firms operate in isolation. For example, automobile manufacturers collaborate with suppliers of sheet metal, tire manufacturers, component part makers, unions, transport companies, and dealerships to produce and market their automobiles successfully. Parties that work with the focal firm are its corporate partners.

Microenvironmental Factors: Technological Advances

Has contributed to the improvement of the value of both goods and services in the past decade. Has enabled the firm to track an item from the moment it was manufactured, through the distribution system, to the retail store, and into the hands of the final consumer. Mobile devices enhance the customer's experience by making it easier to interact with the manufacturer or retailer or other customers, and they add a new channel of access, which makes customers more loyal and more likely to spend more with a particular retaile

GENDER

In particular, women today outperform men scholastically, earn higher grades on average, and graduate from both high school and college at greater rates. Perhaps unsurprisingly, recent studies also show that approximately 15 percent of married women in Western economies earn more than their husbands do in the workplace.24 These shifts in status, attitudes, and behaviors affect the way many firms need to design and promote their products and services. More firms are careful about gender neutrality in positioning their products and attempt to transcend gender boundaries, especially through increased interactions with their customers.

Generation Z (Gen Z)

Known as Digital Natives because people in this group were born into a world that already was full of electronic gadgets and digital technologies such as the Internet and social networks.

Privacy Concerns

More and more consumers worldwide sense a loss of privacy. At the same time that the Internet has created an explosion of accessibility to consumer information, improvements in computer storage facilities and the manipulation of information havePage 161 led to more and better security and credit check services

Microenvironmental Factors

Operate in the external environment. These factors are culture, demographics, social trends, technological advances, economic situation, and political/regulatory environment, or CDSTEP,

Microenvironmental Factors: Culture

Shared meanings, beliefs, morals, values, and customs of a group of people. The challenge for marketers is to have products or services identifiable by and relevant to a particular group of people.

The Immediate environment: Company Capabilities

Successful marketing firms focus on satisfying customer needs that match their core competencies. Marketers can use analyses of their external environment, like the SWOT analysis to categorize any opportunity as attractive or unattractive. If it appears attractive, they also need to assess it in terms of their existing competencies.

INCOME

The increase in wealthy families may be due to the maturing of the general population, the increase in dual-income households, and the higher overall level of education. It also may prompt some ethical concerns about the distribution of wealth. However, the broad range in incomes creates marketing opportunities at both the high and low ends of the market.

Regional Culture

The region in which people live in a particular country has its own regional culture that affects many aspects of people's lives, including their dietary tastes and preferences. EX. McDonald's keeps the staple elements of its menu consistent throughout the United States, but it offers slightly different variations to appeal to specific regions. In the south and southwestern regions of the United States, McDonald's offers a Hot 'n Spicy variant of the McChicken sandwich that is not available other areas

The Immediate environment

This illustrates the factors that affect consumers' immediate environment: the company's capabilities, competitors, and corporate partners

Microenvironmental Factors: Social Trends

Various social trends appear to be shaping consumer values in the United States and around the world, including a greater emphasis on health and wellness concerns, greener consumers, and privacy concerns.

EDUCATION

Young adults who did not graduate from high school have an average annual salary of about $23,900, high school grads earn $30,000, and those with bachelor's degrees earn around $48,500

Generation Y

also called Millennials, include the more than 60 million people born in the United States between 1977 and 2000. As the children of the Baby Boomers, this group is the biggest cohort since the original postwar World War II boom. It also varies the most in age, ranging from teenagers to adults who have their own families.

Greenwashing

disingenuously marketing products or services as environmentally friendly, with the goal of gaining public approval and sales rather than actually improving the environment

Generation X

includes people born between 1965 and 1976 and represents some 41 million Americans. Vastly unlike their Baby Boomer parents, Xers are the first generation of latchkey children (those who grew up in homes in which both parents worked), and 50 percent of them have divorced parents

Microenvironmental Factors: Demographics

indicate the characteristics of human populations and segments, especially those used to identify consumer markets. Typical demographics such as age (which includes generational cohorts), gender, race, and income are readily available from market research firms such as IRI.

Greener Consumers

involves a strategic effort by firms to supply customers with environmentally friendly, sustainable merchandise and services