In this Assignment, you will create an audiovisual presentation to verbally market a product to another business rather than to consumers.

According to Lamb et al. (2014), business marketing differs from marketing to consumers only in terms of the use of the products or services – leaving out the consumer. Business marketing entails marketing to person and businesses who will then offer it to consumers. These products can include parts of goods or those that are used to manufacture other products, or services used by organizations to operate more efficiently or that are later resold. To demonstrate your comprehension of Business Marketing, read the following scenario and follow the directions to complete this Assignment.

Scenario:

You have just been hired as a new Business-to- Business (B2B) marketing associate with ZMX Global, inc, a national distributor of food, beverage, and supplies to hospitality oriented businesses. As part of your marketing training, you have been tasked with finding new marketing opportunities (Retailers, wholesalers, Internet, Internet, institutions, etc) for the distribution of a new product called “Bon Vivant Organic Gourmet,” a high quality organic frozen food product. Read the Bon Vivant Business and Product Profile. Click here..

http://extmedia.kaplan.edu/business/AB219/1501B/U5/Unit5_BonVivant_Organic.pdf

Your job as a B2B marketing associate is to build relationships with reputable organizations that will successfully represent ZMX Global, Inc. and the Bon Vivant Organic Gourmet brand and product with integrity.

Directions:

Using what you learn from reading Chapter 7 to inform your work on this Assignment, build a 5-slide audio visual presentation using Microsoft PowerPoint with audio covering the characteristics that mae Bon Vivant Organic Gourmet a business product.

(This is where your microphone either build into your computer in most cases or alternatively your microphone headset you purchased, will be used)

Slide 1: Title Slide Include your name, date, title of the presentation.

*Oral narration: Introduce yourself and the topic of your presentation.

* Notes: Narration Script

Slide 2: Describe what type of business product ZMX Global, Inc. Offers in the Bon Vivant Organic Gourmet frozen meal product line. Discuss why it can be considered a business product.

*Oral narration: Explain your decision.

* Notes: Narrations Script

Slide 3: Identify a business customer category (producer, reseller, government, or institutions) to focus relationship marketing and strategic alliance efforts in the sale of Bon Vivant Organic Gourmet frozen meals.

Oral Narration: Explain why you chose the business customer category.

Notes: Narration Script

Slide 4: Outline how the Internet can assist in B2B marketing efforts of the Bon Vivant Organic Gourmet product line.

Oral Narration: Describe your ideas on this topic.

Notes: Narration Script

Slide 5 Discuss the business market characteristics (see starting on page 117 in your chapter Reading) of the Bon Vivant Organic Gourmet product line. Identify a minimum of three (3) business market characteristics on the slide.

*Oral Narration: Briefly discuss the three (3) business market characteristics.

* Notes: Narration Script

Slide 6: References slide Provide an APA style formatted References for your textbook.

Oral Narration: Concluding remarks and state the References for your textbook.

Notes: Narration Script

Chapter 7 reading

The key characteristic distinguishing business products from consumer products is intended use, not physical form.

How do you distinguish between a consumer product and a business product? A product that is purchased for personal or family consumption or as a gift is a consumer good. If that same product, such as a PC or a cell phone, is bought for use in a business, it is a business product. Some common items that are sold as both consumer goods and business products are office supplies (e.g., pens, paper, staple removers). Some items, such as forklifts, are more commonly sold as business products than as consumer goods. A survey by HubSpot revealed that the two primary marketing goals of U.S. business marketers’ Web sites are making sales and attracting customers, clients, and other new business.¹

The size of the business market in the United States and most other countries substantially exceeds that of the consumer market. In the business market, a single customer can account for a huge volume of purchases. For example, IBM’s purchasing department spends more than $40 billion annually on business products. Procter & Gamble, Apple, Merck, Dell, and Kimberly-Clark each spend more than half of their annual revenue on business products.²

Some large firms that produce goods such as steel, computer memory chips, or production equipment market exclusively to business customers. Other firms market to both businesses and to consumers. Hewlett-Packard marketed exclusively to business customers in the past but now markets laser printers and personal computers to consumers. Sony, traditionally a consumer marketer, now sells office automation products to businesses. Both companies have had to make organizational and marketing changes to expand into the new market categories.

108 109 109 110

7-2: BUSINESS MARKETING ON THE INTERNET

The use of the Internet to facilitate activities between organizations is called business-to-business electronic commerce (B-to-B or B2B e-commerce). This method of conducting business has evolved and grown rapidly throughout its short history. In 1995, the commercial Web sites that did exist were static. Only a few had data-retrieval capabilities. Frames, tables, and styles were not available. Security of any sort was rare, and streaming video did not exist. Today, B-to-B sites look more like consumer sites with social media, valuable content, and community building applications. Before the Internet, customers had to call Dow Chemical and request a specification sheet for the products they were considering. The information would arrive a few days later by mail. After choosing a product, the customer could then place an order by calling Dow (during business hours, of course). Now, such information is available through MyAccount@Dow, which provides information tailored to the customer’s requirements, such as secure internal monitoring of a customer’s chemical tank levels. When tanks reach a predetermined level, reordering can be automatically triggered.

business-to-business electronic commerce (B-to-B or B2B e-commerce)

the use of the Internet to facilitate the exchange of goods, services, and information between organizations

Companies selling to business buyers face the same challenges as all marketers, including determining who, exactly, the market is and how best to reach it. This is particularly difficult in business marketing because business has rapidly moved online. A recent report from Forrester Research, “B2B US Interactive Marketing Forecast 2009–2014,” predicted that interactive spending by B-to-B marketers will reach $4.8 billion by 2014. Some of the expected increase can be attributed to companies looking to bypass more expensive offline tactics and use more measurable online tactics.4 Content marketing is becoming more and more important to B-to-B marketing. Content marketing is based on the idea of developing valuable content for interested audience members—namely through videos, white papers, e-mail newsletters, webinars, and blog posts—and subsequently using e-mail marketing, search engine optimization, paid search, and display advertising to “pull” customers to the site. For example, Kelly Outsourcing & Consulting Group spends about 60 percent of its B-to-B marketing budget on the creation and dissemination of content designed to provide useful information to executives about staffing and outsourcing. Indeed, one recent study found that 82 percent of B-to-B marketers used content marketing—the key is making it valuable to users.

The reviews on social media are mixed. Some B-to-B marketers feel that social media are not as useful to them as to business-to-consumer (B-to-C) marketers.⁶ But other experts see growth in social media use as B-to-B marketers use opportunities to generate quality leads. Overall, one study shows that 93 percent of B-to-B marketers use social media, primarily LinkedIn. Most of the spending is allocated to create and manage online customer communities (32 percent), podcasts (20 percent) and blogs (18 percent) to convey thought leadership, Facebook (71 percent), and Twitter (67 percent).⁷ It is clear from some companies’ Web sites that they are embracing new tools and applications. The primary tools used by B-to-B marketers are blogs, social networking sites, Twitter, video streaming sites, and mobile marketing. B-to-B marketers are experimenting with how to successfully use these media to build relationships with business customers. For example, YouTube offers a guide for B-to-B marketers to effectively use 110111online videos to promote their brands. LinkedIn, a social networking site for professionals, is seen as a repository for finding new talent for companies.⁸ Other companies are using social media listening tools to determine strategic topics to include in newsletters and videos. The key to making social media use effective is to combine it with other digital assets such as e-mail marketing and content marketing. For example, a marketer can drive e-mail subscriptions through Facebook or use Twitter to promote an upcoming e-mail newsletter that features an interview with an industry expert. likely to purchase again in the near future than are customers who haven’t purchased for a while. Frequency data help marketers identify frequent purchasers who are most likely to repeat their purchasing behavior in the future. The monetary value of sales is important because big spenders can be the most profitable customers for a business. As such, there are literally thousands of metrics that can then be utilized depending on the conversion task. The conversion task is the behavior that the marketer wants the visitor to

STICKINESS = FREQUENCY × DURATION × SITE REACH

Each year, BtoBonline.com identifies ten business marketing Web sites that are particularly good examples of how companies can use the Web to communicate with customers. Exhibit 7.1 identifies the ten great Web sites for 2011. The key is to design Web sites with the end user in mind. Many sites are designed with logic behind them, but people don’t necessarily search in a logical manner. Personalization is an important element in the winning sites. Marketers are also focusing on zero-click Web sites, sites that bring visitors right to where they want and need to be (e.g., optimized landing pages). Many of these companies have also been recognized in past years for effectively communicating with their target markets.