Marketing Environment
Simon Isrif, 438344, DIM1VC
28-09-2016
Week 1.4 Business
Marketing
(King, 2012)
In which business markets is
your product sold?
Sennheiser
headphones and other Sennheiser products are besides being sold as a general
consumer product also sold on the business market, and to be more precise, the
Producer Market. Sennheiser produces their own products, mainly in their own manufacturing
factories located in Wedemark (Germany), Tulemore (Ireland) and Albuquerque (USA) (Sennheiser, n.d.). Sennheiser sells their
produced products to a wide range of companies and organisations which include
the following: government
institutions and non-profit organisations, schools and universities, religious
establishments, the hotel and catering trade and many audio and video rental
companies (Sennheiser,
n.d.).
Has your product been adapted
to the business markets?
Sennheiser
products are sometimes adapted to the business market if they are meant for
professional business use. Products have to function in busy and noisy areas
like offices and workplaces. A good example Sennheiser products that are
adapted for business use are shown in the video made by Sennheiser called “Sennheiser for Business I Sennheiser” (Sennheiser, 2016). The Tour Guide System shown in this video demonstrates how Sennheiser headphones
can isolate external sound on a very high level and give clear voice output so
that even presentations can be given in extremely noisy environments.
Which buying situation will
be most likely applicable to your product?
The
Straight re-buy purchase seems to be the most applicable buying situation for
Sennheiser business adapted products. Costumers in business with Sennheiser
know what to expect from the company and Sennheiser’s Global Application team
is always available to help the professional costumers with for example configuring, programing and commissioning
their systems after purchase. Sennheiser
focuses on costumers benefiting from associating with them (Sennheiser, n.d.). You can come to
the conclusion that Sennheiser is interested in long term relations with
companies, this can lead to routine re-purchases.
Describe
the buying centre and the buying process for your product in a selected
business market of your choice.
The buying centre of Sennheiser headphones in the
Producer market consist of multiple individuals: the users, influencers, buyers,
deciders and gatekeepers:
-
The users (the personnel in the Sennheiser manufacturing factories), they
need to be satisfied with the materials given by the buyers. If they are not
satisfied their performance may suffer.
-
The buyers, these people have to find out where to buy the best raw materials
and/or components for the users producing the final products.
-
The influencers, these are the more specialised, engineering
personnel, who assist the buyers in finding the best materials to produce with
if product are considered new and involve new, advanced technology to function.
-
The gatekeepers, control the flow of information to the others
in the buying centre to provide the best possible outcome and to make sure the
relations between the members of the buying centre remain balanced.
-
The deciders are the people in the buying centre who make the final decision on
what materials are best to produce with and provide the best products for other
companies in business with Sennheiser (Dibb,
Simkin, Pride, & Ferrell, 2016).
The buying process of the production starts
with a problem recognition (the need of new/more material to manufacture
Sennheiser products), information search (where is the best place to buy the
materials), evaluation of alternatives (is there a better way or place to buy
the new materials), purchase decision (final decision of choosing which place
to buy the needed materials for manufacturing) and finally the post-purchase
evaluation (am I satisfied with the newly acquired manufacturing materials and
did it live up to my expectations).
Describe
the concept of derived demand, and give an example how this impacts the demand
for your product in a business market.
The concept of derived demand is that if there
is demand for a good or factor of production resulting from demand for an
intermediate good or service (Pettinger, 2012). As an example: if demand office
personnel falls, so will the demand for business communication and audio
equipment from Sennheiser. Because of a decrease in people working in the
office there will be less need for headsets and other products from Sennheiser.
References
Dibb, S., Simkin, L., Pride, W. M., &
Ferrell, O. C. (2016). 6. In Marketing Concepts and Strategies
(7th ed.). Hampshire, United Kingdom: Cengage Learning EMEA.
King, I. (2012). Retrieved from http://www.atelier.net/en/trends/articles/ad-retargeting-becoming-b2b-business
Pettinger, T. (2012, November 28). Derived Demand. Retrieved from
http://www.economicshelp.org/blog/glossary/derived-demand/
Sennheiser. (2016, August 26). Sennheiser for Business I Sennheiser
[Video file]. Retrieved from https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DTAaThrQqmg
Sennheiser. (n.d.). Meet our services. Retrieved from
https://en-us.sennheiser.com/service-support-services
Sennheiser. (n.d.). Sennheiser at a glance. Retrieved from https://en-us.sennheiser.com/about-sennheiser-at-a-glance
