Response: Freshman Marketing
Introduction
There were three responses to Carol Motley's request for Principles of Marketing materials that could be used with freshmen
: : : Posting
Carol Motley had sought Principles of Marketing materials that could be used with freshmen having only modest college experience. Here are the responses she received:
Have you looked at cengage’s MKTG5? It’s part of their Four Letter Press series. The books are affordable ($65) so students are more likely to buy the book. And the text is written in a breezy, magazine style. There are also fairly good teaching aids, such as videos to use in class and a few mini case studies.
Cordially,
Ann Mirabito, PhD
Assistant Professor of Marketing | Hankamer School of Business | Baylor University | One Bear Place 98007 | Waco, TX 76798
I might suggest you look at some of the materials at .
Cheers,
Theresa B. Clarke
Professor of Marketing
James Madison University
A colleague sent me your Elmar posting because she thought you might be interested in Marketing in a Nutshell, the 100-page “textbook” I wrote that’s used in all undergraduate sections of Principles of Marketing at Wake Forest. Below is the book’s Preface, which explains how and why it’s different from other introductory texts. If it sounds like something in which you might be interested, please don’t hesitate to contact me!
This textbook replaces those previously used in Principles of Marketing classes at Wake Forest University. Over the last decade, faculty teaching the introductory marketing course have adopted numerous texts by a variety of authors in the hope of finding one that appropriately addressed the topics to which we believe all business students, regardless of their specific major, should be exposed. In most cases, the books provided too much coverage of non-critical material. In some cases, the books provided too little coverage of subjects that are at the very heart of the discipline.
Marketing in a nutshell is designed to give you the bare essentials of a marketing education. “Bare” because the manual excludes incidental information not necessary to a basic course; “essentials” because it covers concepts that are fundamental to marketing theory and practice.
Traditional introductory textbooks typically begin with an overview of marketing, including the comprehensive (if turgid and long-winded!) definition developed by the ÂÜÀòÉç¹ÙÍø (“. . . the activity, set of institutions, and processes for creating, communicating, delivering, and exchanging offerings that have value for customers, clients, partners, and society at large” ); a description of the components of marketing (the four Ps: product/service, price, place and promotion); a history of the discipline (production focus, sales era, market orientation and, finally, the focus on value creation); and a delineation of the requirements for marketing to occur (two or more parties with unsatisfied needs, a desire and ability to satisfy those needs, a way for the parties to communicate, and something to exchange).
Marketing in a nutshell omits much of that material (beyond what’s above, of course!), instead opening with a specification of the basic objective of most businesses and a description of how marketing helps achieve that objective. This “beginning at the very beginning” approach reveals marketing’s true position in an organization – as an indispensible, primal ingredient of a firm’s day-to-day operations and long-term success, not optional “icing” on its competitive strategy.
Given that this is probably your first encounter with marketing as a student, as opposed to as a consumer, the best way to think about the book’s concepts is to relate them to companies, brands, ads, retailers, trends or situations with which you’re familiar. For example, the next chapter introduces the four Ps. What strategy does your favorite brand employ for each of the variables and why? The what question requires you to know something about the brand; the why question requires you to think about the reason behind the what. Knowing is important, but thinking is crucial.
Because the manual is abridged, reading assignments won’t take you as long to complete as they would with a conventional textbook. Consequently, you’ll have more opportunity to think about the material and how it applies to the businesses and brands you know.
Class time will be used to deepen your understanding of critical concepts and enhance your ability to identify, analyze and solve marketing-related problems. The more you think about the material before you arrive, the more meaningful – and enjoyable – each session will be for you.
Here’s a question to help get your brain in gear:
CNBC recently interviewed Indra Nooyi, CEO of PepsiCo, which owns Frito-Lay, and Warren Buffett, CEO of Berkshire Hathaway, a diversified holding company whose subsidiaries include GEICO, Dairy Queen, Fruit of the Loom, and Benjamin Moore, among many others. Buffett, who is Coca-Cola’s largest shareholder, was asked why he doesn’t also hold stock in PepsiCo.
“It – Pepsi – it’s a wonderful company. And particularly, I mean, Frito-Lay is a fabulous business. I’d love to own it. I eat Fritos, I eat Cheetos, I eat their potato chips; I even eat Munchos, which are kind of hard to find. But I always drink Coca-Cola with them,” he replied.
In 2004, researchers associated with the Human Neuroimaging Lab at Baylor College of Medicine conducted blind taste tests with subjects who sampled Coke and Pepsi while their brain activity was monitored. When asked which unnamed, unlabeled soda they preferred, about half said Coke and the other half Pepsi. However, blood flow to the brain’s reward center was five times stronger when participants drank Pepsi than when they drank Coke.
After subjects were told which of the two samples was Coke, the number of people who said they favored that brand’s taste increased to 75 percent. Moreover, once the Coke had been identified, blood flow to areas of the brain associated with drinkers’ thinking and judging activities increased . Given that blind taste tests consistently show balance between liking for the two cola brands, why do you think more people claim to prefer Coke?
What does Coke have that Pepsi doesn’t?
Sheri Bridges
Associate Professor of Marketing
Wake Forest University
336.758.4589