Social Marketing

 Social Marketing

MBA / BBA MARKETING MANAGEMENT 

QUESTION PAPER 2018 OCTOBER

PUNE UNIVERSITY

 Definition of Social Marketing it's defined as,

 

 "the application of commercial marketing techniques to social problems." It means to take the same principles used in selling goods--such as shoes, television shows, or pizza--to convince people to change their behavior

 

Social Marketing was first explicitly defined in 1971 by Kotler & Zaltman (1971, p.5) as: “The application of principles and tools of marketing to achieve socially desirable goals, with benefits for society as a whole rather than for profit or other organizational goals and includes the design, implementation and control of programs calculated to influence the acceptability of social ideas and involves considerations of product planning, pricing, communications and market research.”

 

 

 

Imp observation-

 

  The original idea of social marketing is accredited to Wiebe who in 1952 in an article entitled, “Merchandising Commodities and Citizenship on Television,” he demonstrated how mass media campaigns can motivate people to take action, and challenged the marketing community by asking, “Why can’t you sell brotherhood and rational thinking like you sell soap?” (Weibe, 1952).

 

 The term ‘Social Marketing’ gained popularity when the Journal of Marketing brought out an issue on the topic in July 1971 (Kolter 1971). (It cannot create the behaviour, it can only help to gain acceptance and a willingness to adopt the behaviour).

 

1. Behavioural change is voluntary i.e. not by coercion or enforcement.

2. It operates on the principle of exchange i.e. there has to be a clear benefit for the customer (target group or individual) if change is to occur.

3. Uses marketing techniques such as consumer oriented market research, segmentation and targeting and marketing mix.

4. The ultimate goal is to improve individual and societal welfare not make profit for the organization carrying out the intervention as is the case with commercial marketing.

 

Goals Social marketing

Goals Social marketing seeks to impact personal behavior by persuading target audiences to:

 Avoid risky practices (e.g., smoking)  Discontinue antisocial actions (e.g., littering)

 Take preventive measures (e.g., safety belts)

 Join, give or organize for a specific cause

Difference between social marketing and commercial marketing?

 

commercial marketing tries to change people's behavior for the benefit of the marketer;

 social marketing tries to change people's behavior for the benefit of the consumer, or of society as a whole.

 

Why Social Marketing?

 ‘It would be easy to give the public information and hope they change behavior but we know that doesn’t work very satisfactorily.

 Otherwise none of us would be obese, none of us would smoke and none of us would drive like lunatics’

 

 

BASIC PRINCIPLES OF MARKETING: THE "4 PS"

 Product -- the "product" is a certain behavior you are trying to change.

 Example: ending child abuse and neglect, or stopping people from committing suicide, or convincing people to not throw trash on the ground--or any other behavior that members of your community want to modify.

 Price -- "Price" refers to what the consumer must do in order to obtain the social marketing product. This cost may be monetary, or it may be the consumer to give up intangibles, such as time or effort.

8.  Place -- Social marketing efforts make it easier to change behavior by making sure the necessary supports are not only available, but also easily accessible to the most people possible. The less people need to go out of their way to make a change, the more likely they are to make it.

 

 

 

 

 

 Additional Social Marketing "P's"

 Publics--External and Internal groups involved in the social marketing intervention

 Partnership--Collaboration with other community organizations in order to increase accessibility and demand

 Policy--Using media advocacy to encourage policy change

 Purse Strings--Where you will get the money for your program and who the involved stakeholders are

 

 

Social Marketing Key Principles

 Know your CUSTOMER – put them at the center of every program decision you make. Social marketing begins and ends with your customer / target audience. Talk to them to understand their needs, knowledge, beliefs, and attitudes along with the social context in which they live.

 Understand BEHAVIOUR - understand your target audience’s current behavior and key influences on it.

 It’s about ACTION - increasing awareness, shifting attitudes, and strengthening knowledge is valuable only if it leads to action. Be clear in what you want your target audience to do.

 

Social Marketing Key Principles

 There is a mix of INTERVENTIONS - use a range of interventions or methods to achieve your behavioral goal.

 Who are your key SEGMENTS? – target your programs to key audiences.

 There must be an EXCHANGE. If you want someone to give up, or modify, an old behavior or accept a new one, you must offer that person something very appealing in return. What benefits can you offer to help them to change their behavior? How can you make it easier for them

 

Social Marketing Key Principles

 COMPETITION always exists. Your target audience can always choose to do something else. Many factors impact on them and compete for their attention and time.

 

 

 

 

Social marketing vs. Commercial marketing

 Aims to change attitudes & behaviour to a healthier behaviour.

 Serves interests of target market without personal profit.

 Mostly marketing of ideas and concepts rather than tangible products.  Meets identified needs & wants of target market segment.  Aims to make a profit by serving the interests of target market.

 Marketing of products/ services mostly through ideas.

 

Marketing mix of Social Marketing

 

Social Marketing consists of four marketing elements (marketing mix) of (4Ps) Product, Price, Place and Promotion.

 

The Product (What we’re offering people?)

• Tangible material (for example, contraceptives, Chlamydia test kit or medication).

• Intangible/non-standardised service (for example, health education or counselling service).

• Product/service branding, packaging, positioning, form, life cycle and product development.

Example:- if the packaging and quality of a condom is poor, there is bound to be poor response and low acceptability of such condoms.

 

The Place

The Place (where users are most likely to find them) Places in which consumers can obtain certain products such as contraceptives or services such as screening or counselling. Place includes settings such as working places, homes, schools, colleges, and health institutions

Examples

• Marketing of STD clinics as a separate entity has largely been a failure because of stigma attached to such clinics, hence poor utilization of such services.

• Some countries have very successfully increased utilization of condoms by making them available in areas where the potential users can find them easily, such as in ‘red light’ areas, on bus stands, on highways etc.

 

Promotion •

Refers to the means and messages by which the benefits of a particular product or behaviour change are communicated.

• Most common means include advertisement (radio, televisions, billboards), leaflets, posters, dedicated websites and community outreach activities.

 (Visibility & Timing)

• High visibility constantly reminds the user of the existence of a product/service.

• Timing, on the other hand, pertains to presenting the reminder when the user is most likely to accept the idea, product or the service.

For example,

• social marketing of (ORS) is best undertaken by doctors in a paediatric OPD or by Village Health Guides during home visits, especially when a child is suffering from diarrhoea.

• Educating a woman about ORS when she is about to go into labour would be of no consequence since the felt-need is not present at that time and the woman is thus not receptive to the idea.

• Promotion could be done through public service announcements, billboards, mass mailings, media events and community outreach.

 

 

 The Price (The cost of adopting the product)

 what consumers must give up if they are to adopt a certain health behaviour often emotional and psychological. e.g. taking a Chlamydia test which is often stigmatised or practical efforts such as seeking for a screening kit at a sexual health clinic or attending a health talk.

 Cost to the target audience of changing behaviour (Barriers to behaviour change) Can be financial, or more often related to other “costs”

 Time (Takes more time)

 Pleasure

 Loss of self esteem

 Embarrassment

 Life style

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

A Step-Wise Approach to Social Marketing

1. Identification of health problem & establishing methods for social marketing

2. Identification of priorities and implementation of affordable efforts

3. Analysis of marketing activities, including social message

4. Identification of target audience for each marketing component

5. Analysing each marketing strategy to determine attitudes and potential resistance among target groups

6. Identification of objectives for each target group

7. Designing and testing the social message

8. Selection of marketing/distribution system

9. Evaluate the impact of social messages

 

 

A Step-Wise Approach to Social Marketing

Identification of health problem & establishing methods for social marketing:

 identification of traditional health measures, demographic & population studies including mortality/ morbidity patterns and economic impact etc. The causes of the problem have to be established clearly.

 the required & available resources like mass media, marketing & design expertise should also be identified. −

 Why are we doing this? − What impact and benefits it would generate?

 

 Identification of priorities and implementation of affordable efforts:

 For saving time, energy and money for a social marketer.

 The health problem and desired objectives should be assessed.

 Cost estimates for media, material & delivery, personnel and other resources should be assessed in advance.

 It is essential to project realistic and achievable goals & objectives and prepare realistic budgets.

 

 Situation analysis

–factors and forces in external and internal environment anticipated to have impact

− Review the composition of the strategy team SWOT

 

 

 

 Analysis of marketing activities, including social message:

 The strategy of social marketing needs to be evaluated regularly.

 adopt different messages and message styles for effectively communicating the message for a particular target group.

For example, messages and their style of delivery for HIV prevention would be different for college students, commercial sex workers, truck drivers and housewives.

 

. Identification of target audience for each marketing component:

 ‘Market segmentation’: involves accurate identification of the group or individual who is not doing what they should be doing, in terms of health related behaviour.

 Audience segmentation is usually based on sociodemographic, cultural, and behavioural characteristics

For example, the National Cancer Institute's “five a day for better health” campaign developed specific messages aimed at Hispanic people,

 because national data indicate that they eat fewer fruits and vegetables and may have cultural reasons that discourage them from eating locally available produce (NCI, 2002)

 

Analysing each marketing strategy to determine attitudes and potential resistance among target groups:

 Identify all possible cultural, social and religious resistance points.

 Isolate beliefs and values which offer resistance to healthy behaviour.

 Build consensus and strategy to overcome the resistance. 6. Identification of objectives for each target group:

− Behavioural objective − Knowledge objectives − Belief objectives

For example, we may define our objective as “increasing household use of iodised salt in a given district from 60% to 95% in next 2 years”

 

Designing and testing the social message:

 pretested on samples of target audience for:

  acceptability,  comprehension,  believability  conviction.  Revising and retesting of the messages as necessary.

 

Selection of marketing/distribution system

 The message should be in a manner which ensures maximum coverage among target audience.

 

Example: Introduction of statutory warnings on tobacco products is one such way to ensure that the anti-smoking message reaches all target audience.

Evaluate the impact of social messages:

 These should be assessed periodically to evaluate the impact of social marketing and mid-term corrections should be made wherever required.

For example, incidence of sexually transmitted diseases as ascertained from a busy STD clinic or hospital in a district is a good indicator of the impact of social marketing for condoms in that district

 

LIMITATIONS OF SOCIAL MARKETING

 

 1. Scale of intervention

2. Focus on isolated behaviour or products

3. Major structural barriers

4. Decision-making

5. Funding

6. Lack of support for social marketing programmes

7. Lack of opportunity for educational use of the mass media

8. Poor management and implementation of a social marketing effort

 

1. Scale of intervention: social marketing is aimed at individual & at the city, state, national and even international level.

2. Focus on isolated behaviour or products: may lead people with limited resources to perceive a need to choose between the idea which is marketed and other health-promoting behaviour.

3. Major structural barriers: unsuitable where major structural barriers exist against change in individuals.

These include poverty, lack of health facilities, political pressure, discrimination.

4. Decision-making: Remain an educational tool rather than a coercive mechanism, social marketing must involve the consumer in decision-making.

5. Funding: Social marketing is often labour- and time-intensive. A cost. effective strategy must be drawn up for each case.

6. Lack of support for social marketing programmes:

Marketed health programmes are frequently of very low priority within official channels and they therefore lack resources and opportunities.

 7. Lack of opportunity for educational use of the mass media:

• The channel or times given for transmission may be poor in quality or ineffective due to inappropriate timing.

• The mass media are aimed at those with economic means and are less feasible in developing countries due to financial difficulties.

1. Accurate market analysis: is most often not possible.

2. Market segmentation: may be detrimental to efforts because of discrimination & stigma attached to such segmented.

3. Product strategy: Difficulty of developing complex behaviour which is acceptable to target audience and which meets their felt.

4. Pricing strategy: Social marketing often has no control over (and cannot address) issues of intangible consumer costs such as cost of personal embarrassment:

Examples: − examination by a male doctor for cervical cancer. − fear (as in voluntary testing for HIV).

5. Strategy for selecting channels for dissemination of social messages. indirect dissemination of social message is often associated with misinformation.

6. Limitation of communication options: large amount of information needs to be conveyed to target audience before behaviour can be changed.

7. Limitation of health planner knowledge's regarding principles of marketing. Leads to programs failure. Such programs also often face opposition from competing groups (such as baby food manufactures in breast feeding campaigns).

8. Difficulty of impact evaluation: Change in social & individual behaviour & attitude is complex and intangible with very few objective variables.

• Social marketing is widely used to influence health behaviour.

• Social marketers use a wide range of health communication strategies based on:

− Mass media; − Use mediated (for example, through a healthcare provider), − Interpersonal, − other modes of communication; and marketing methods such as message placement (for example, in clinics), − promotion, − dissemination, − and community level outreach.

 

 

 

 

1. Developing plans and strategies using behavioural theory;

2. Selecting communication channels and materials based on the required behavioural change and knowledge of the target audience;

3. Developing and pretesting materials, typically using qualitative methods;

4. Implementing the communication programme or “campaign”;

5. Assessing effectiveness in terms of: − Exposure and awareness of the audience, − Reactions to messages, − Behavioural outcomes (such as improved diet or not smoking);

6. The last stage feeds back into the first to create a continuous loop of planning, implementation, and improvement.

 

 

Source: National Social Marketing Centre.