Market Orientation

In today’s scenario, marketing is the main element that ensures the success of the organization. The concept of marketing focuses on process of generating, communicating and supplying value to the customers to manage the relationship with the customers and maximising the benefits provided to the organization and its stakeholders. It focuses on analysing the needs and expectations of the target customers and providing the satisfaction in an efficient and effective manner. Through the process of marketing, the organization identifies its target market and combines the goals of the organization with the expectations of the customer to provide the overall satisfaction to the target customers and thus ensuring the success of the organization. It examines the needs and expectations of the customer and delivers the products and services according to the expectations of the target market.

Market orientation is a business philosophy, which focuses on identifying the needs of the customer and accordingly designs the products and services to meet the expectations of the customers (Dibb and Stern, 2000).

It involves two or more departments fetching in the activities geared towards emerging and understanding the customer’s current and future needs and the factors affecting them. It shares the information across the other departments and then collectively focuses to meet the selected customer needs.  Market orientation is different from the philosophy of product orientation because in case of production orientation approach the focus of the organization is to sell the products and services offered by them while in case of market orientation the organization focuses on the needs, wants of customers, and then deliver accordingly. It helps the organization in earning higher profits and thus increasing its market share. Market orientation helps the organization in making the customers aware about the product and services and providing them with the benefits of the same. It is consider as synchronised marketing campaign between the supplier and consumer. Competitive analysis is considered as a significant constituent of market orientation. It collects the information through market research, consumer survey and focussing on the group of prospective customers to identify their needs and preferences as well as gaining insight of competitor’s strength and weakness (Kiessling, Isaksson and Yasar, 2016).

The organization that follows market orientation considers customer as their main ingredient for success of the organization. It focuses on delivering quality service and product to the customer to provide overall satisfaction to the customers and achieving higher level of profits. After the introduction of e-commerce services the customers gathers and are aware about the detailed information of the products to compare and select the best product or the service.  Companies with marketing orientation are known as customer centric as they work according to the demands of the customer and are highly approachable towards customer (Raju, Lonial, and Crum, 2011).

The supremacy of market orientation in organization success because it is observing that market orientation leaves a positive impact on the success of the organization. By using the market intelligence, the organization progresses continuous improvement in the products and services and delivers the quality products to the customers. It helps the organization in sssproducing innovative products according to the changing demands of customers and ensuring the survival of the organization. Marketing orientation helps the organization in generation of intelligence, which delivers the suitable information about trends, and participants in the market i.e. the current needs of customers, abilities and strategies of competitors and the trends in the market (Drummond and Ensor, 2005).

Importance of Market Orientation

Marketing orientation helps the business in earning long term profits by considering the customer needs as primary focus it will provide overall satisfaction to the customers and thus ensures repurchase of the product by the customers  which provides  long term profits to the organization and ensures that the customer is loyal towards the brand . By adopting market orientation, the organization has a strategic vision of the needs of the customers and thus providing the clarity in the roles of employees. Implementation of market orientation provides the deep insight of the market to the employees and thus helps them in effectively market its product. Market orientation helps the organization in achieving long-term profitability by consistently understanding the marketplace and delivering the quality products creates loyal customers for the organization, which in turn increases the profitability of the organization (Hooley, Piercy, and Nicoulaud 2012).

By adopting market orientation the strategic mistakes can be avoided, as the organization will be know well in advance when to launch its new product and when to use innovative technology this ensures that the company do not waste its resources. When a company is market oriented, it keeps the customer in mind during all the phases of product development So that they are able to bring the innovation which is required the customer. Through a proper market orientation, the organization can spot the emerging trends and can adopt the changes in trends before the competitor does that to expand its market share and thus ensure long-term survival of the organization. It helps the organization to build a strong market base by having loyal customers and thus enhancing the reputation of the company as an early innovator (Anis, Belaid and Kamel, 2011).

The cross- functional strategy applies in organizations helps the organization in building long- term shareholder value as all the departments work together towards a common goal in an efficient manner and thus providing the higher benefits to its shareholders. It helps in protecting the interest of the shareholders by providing additional benefits to them and giving a better experience. This helps in building the trust of the shareholders (Laukkanen, Tuominen, Reijonen, and Hirvonen, 2016).  

After the detailed description of market orientation now in the further paragraphs there will be description of components of marketing orientation and their effect on the organization. It will include the components of the Market orientation .i.e. Customer orientation, Competitor orientation, Inter-functional coordination and the organization culture.  

 Customer orientation promotes an incessant, active disposition towards meeting the customers’ requirements. This approach focuses providing the customers with total satisfaction and nurtures continuous innovation in the organization performance. In this organization places the highest authority on providing superior customer value. It is consider as the most fundamental part of corporate culture. In this, the information about the needs of the customers and requirements is regularly collected and the policies of the organization directly aim towards creating satisfied customers. The organizations that are customer oriented aims to build long-term relationship with the customers and make continuous efforts to improve the level of satisfaction of the customers. In relation to above context Tesla motors are highly customer oriented as they focuses on the customers who were high end affluent, demands the luxurious sports car and after scanning the needs of the customer Tesla   launches its model 3 to cater to the needs of the customer it provides the customers with high mile warranty and the only company that directly sells its products and provide services to its customer. Tesla promotes highly customer centric approach and thus focusing on the needs of the customer and making the products accordingly (Liao, Chang, Wu, and Katrichis, 2011).

Components of Market Orientation

Competitor orientation focuses on the analysing the strength and weakness of its potential and existing competitors to generate new ideas, which helps the organization in maintaining its competitive edge. When an organization is competitive oriented it constantly compares its strategies to its competitors and evaluates its performance which includes efficiency in production, pricing of the product, delivery time, its market share, innovation in the product and mainly the customer satisfaction. In this approach, every organization attempts to maximise its advantages on the cost of its competitors. Analysing the strategies of its competitors helps in upgrading one’s own organization strategies and thus leads to responding to the environment in a better way. In relation to above context Apple has always remained on the ball in terms of keeping ahead of its competitors. Apple is well known as an only luxury brand in the technology industry and able to charge premium price for its product. Its competitive strategy helps it to position its product in the market place and helps in maintaining the competitive edge over the others (Dwyer and Gilmore, 2017).

Inter-functional coordination defined as cooperation of various internal business functions to achieve the overall objectives of the company and assure its receptiveness towards the fluctuating environment. It helps in improvising the performance of the company by sharing the resources and the information among various departments. It is consider as the important function of market orientation.  Inter-functional coordination leads to generation of new ideas as there is coordination among the departments and the management positively response towards the ideas given by the employees at all the levels. It enhances the performance of the organization as thus collaborating the efforts of all the departments at all the level.  Inter-functional coordination helps to solve the issues hampering the success of the organization through the contribution of all the departments in an organization.  In relation to the above context, Earlier Samsung focuses on autocratic leadership styles and does not focuses on the suggestions given by the other employees which does not lead to coordination among the departments and the generation of the new ideas then Samsung shifts towards inter-functional coordination involving interaction and collaboration among all the departments and thus generating the ideas which ensures further improvement  in the process of the company and thus ensuring coordination among all the departments at all the levels. Adopting such approach helps the organization to guide all the employees to work in united direction and thus promoting efficiency in expanding market share (Mujahid, 2018).

Organization culture emphasize on adopting the culture that collectively focuses on providing the satisfaction to its customers. The employees at all the levels are collectively responsible for carrying out the activities that ensures success of the organization. In such culture the senior manager, considers customer satisfaction as its highest priority and the reward system is set according to the performance of the employees towards satisfying the customers. It consists of the values, belief, and behaviour of the companies its structure and the control of the organization. In relation to the above context, Walmart adopts the culture in which leaders believe that all the associates of the organization have an important voice and play a crucial role in driving the business. It is believe that the associates are the best idea generators for the organization. Walmart associates make the corporate strategy a reality and consistent efforts are applied to make the customer experience special. The Walmart defines its culture as “our values in action” and every associate expected to behave consistently in accordance with the core values of the organization (Glassdoor for employers, 2016).

Long-term perspectives component of market orientation states that the organization must focus on earning long- term gains rather than focussing on the short -term profit. It emphasise to improve the market performance rather than focusing on internal efficiencies. The decisions must consider by long- term deliberations rather than short- term suitability. This approach states that organization should take steps that help the organization in attaining long-term profits and ensure the survival of the organization. In relation to above context, Deloitte focuses on achieving long term profits for the company and thus protecting the interest of stakeholders and all the other people associated with the company . It ensures to enhance the experience of its customers as well as stakeholders leading to long- term survival of the organization (Grinstein, 2008).

Thus from the above discussion it is concluded that market orientation helps the organization in enhancing the experience of the customer and thus ensuring the long-term survival of the organization and protecting the shareholders.   

References

Anis,B.B., Belaid,R., and Kamel,M.(2011)Market orientation, corporate social responsibility and business performance. Journal of business ethics, 99(3), pp.307-324.

Dibb,S., and Stern,P.(2000) Further thoughts on the marketing trifid: The case of marketing orientation. Journal of marketing education,22(3),pp.214-224.

Drummond,G., and Ensor,J.(2005) Introduction to marketing concepts.1^st ed. Butterworth-Heinemann: Oxford.

Dwyer,O.M., and Gilmore,A.(2017) Competitor orientation in successful SMEs: an exploration of the impact on innovation. Journal of strategic marketing,DOI: 10.1080/0965254X.2017.1384040.

Glassdoor for employers. (2016) Learn from the best: How Walmart builds its corporate culture[ online]. Available from: https://www.glassdoor.com/employers/blog/learn-best-walmart-builds-corporate-culture/ [Accessed 29/10/18]

Grinstein,A. (2008) The relationship between market orientation and alternative strategic orientations. European journal of marketing, 42(1/2), pp.115-134.

Hirvonen,S., and Laukkanen,T.(2016) The moderating effect of the market orientation components on the brand orientation-Brand performance relationship. Springer link, pp.185-186.

Hooley, G.,Piercy,N., and Nicoulaud,B.(2012) Marketing strategy and competitive positioning . 5^th ed.FT prentice hall p.8.

Kiessling,T., Isaksson,L., and Yasar,B.(2016) Market orientation and CSR: Performance implications. Journal of business ethics, 137(2), pp.269-284.

Lancaster,G., and Massingham,L.(2011) Essentials of marketing management.1^st ed.Oxon:Routledge.

Laukkanen,T., Tuominen,S., Reijonen,H., and Hirvonen,S.(2016) Does market orientation pay off without brand orientation? A study of small business entrepreneurs. Journal of marketing management, 32(7-8), pp-673-694.

Liao,S.H., Chang,W.J.,Wu C.C.,and Katrichis, J.M.(2011) A survey of market orientation research(1995-2008). Industrial market management, 40, pp.301-310.

Martin,H., Custance,P., and Lindgreen,A.(2016) Market orientation.London:Routledge.

Mujahid,B.M.(2018) Impact of firms customer orientation on performance: The moderating role of interfunctional coordination and employee commitment. Journal of strategic marketing, 26(8), pp.702-722.

Raju,P.S., Lonial,S.C., and Crum,M.D.(2011) Market orientation in the context of SMEs: A conceptual framework. Journal of business research, 64, pp.1320-1326.

Uk Essays. (2013) Competitor orientation the customer orientation marketing essay. [online]. Available from: https://www.ukessays.com/essays/marketing/competitor-orientation-the-customer-orientation-marketing-essay.php [Accessed 29/10/2018]