The advantages of using marketing information system

Marketing information system has the following benefits:
*It helps marketing planning by gathering reliable information. It handles both internal and external data.

*The problems and opportunities are automatically spotted out. It helps effective tapping of marketing opportunities and effective defense against marketing threats.

*It helps in spotting trends and facilities on formulation of basis of assumption economic and business conditions. It tends to be future oriented.

*It helps the firm adjust its products and services to the needs and tastes of consumers. It acts as a control mechanism as customer reactions are also fed into it from market intelligence, the first sales force or marketing research.

*It provides market intelligence to the firm.

*The system can provide information on seasonal and cyclical demand patterns for planning, monitoring and control purpose.

*It helps controlling marketing activities. The report can be used to monitor and control marketing operations.

*Sharing selected operational information in order to gain advantage from superior expertise across organizational boundaries and further improve efficiency.
The advantages of using marketing information system

Barcodes systems in marketing

The Westinghouse Corporation introduced the origin concept of the barcode as early as 1929. A barcode is a machine readable code consisting of a series of bars and spaces printed in defined ratios.  It is formed by combinations of high and low reflectance regions of the surface of an object, which are converted to ‘I’s and ‘0’s.

Most automated systems are designed to utilize either barcodes or optical character recognition imprints (OCR). The majority used barcodes but a number of systems can also accept OCRs and other identifiers as well. With digital convergence of technology barcodes can now be placed virtually anywhere. Barcode readers are increasingly incorporated into pens and mobile phones.

Using barcodes information about an item can be captured using optical barcode scanners.

The barcode technology has been developed with the creation of 2D barcodes to increase the data capacity of ID barcodes. With the integration of cameras, mobile phones act as scanners, barcode readers and portable data storages and maintaining network connectivity.

2D barcodes have been traditionally more popular in mobile marketing due to the amount of information they can pack compared to a 1D code.

However, 1D codes are becoming more popular in certain instances, such as mobile coupon delivery, because 1D scanning systems are still dominant at the point of sale.
Barcodes systems in marketing

Marketing information system

Marketing information is useful only of it can help a marketing manager to make a decision. In order to be useful, information should be of high quality, relevant timely and complete.

What is a marketing information system? A marketing information system can be  defined as a set of procedures and methods for the regular planning, collection, analyses and presentation of information for use in making marketing decision. It is a structure of people, equipment, and procedures used to gather, analyze, and distribute information needed by an organization.

The information is part of on-going data-gathering process involving initial data collection as well as routine and systematic data collection procedures. This requirement distinguishes marketing information system database activities from ad-hoc, one time project-oriented data gathering characteristic of traditional forms or market research.

Philip Kotler has identified three types of marketing information:
*Marketing intelligence: information comes from the environment
*Internal marketing information: information flows within the firm
*Marketing communications: information flows from the firm outward to the environment
Marketing information system

History of Business Intelligence

History of Business Intelligence
In the 1970s and 1980s analytical software packages started showing up in the market place. However, lack of computing power, poor user friendliness and cumbersome and manual integration with the transaction system providing the data kept business intelligence tools from widespread usage. The release of spreadsheet software like Lotus 1-2-3 and Excel in the 1980s opened up for end users creating their own data models for business analysis. Spreadsheets are still widely used in this area today, and probably will be for many years to come.

For a period in the 1980s and early 1990s so called executive information systems (EIS) grew in popularity with the promise that they would put key information on the desktops of executive. The idea was that colorful software screens with big buttons and sometimes touch screen, so that the user did not ever have to use a mouse. Should put data directly in the hands of top management to reduce the need for secretaries and assistants to write and print reports for them. However, one of the biggest problems with executive information system (EIS) systems was that it took a lot of manual work to convert and lead data from the data sources, as well as to maintain customized versions of the user screens. Major effect in maintaining the EIS made implementations short-lived. In the 1990s and the new millennium, with the widespread usage of SQL (standard query language) databases; datawarehouse technologies; extraction, transformation, and loading tools; as well as new and powerful end-user analytical software, the stage is set for fast growth in usage of business intelligence tools in the next decade.

Furthermore, most of the business intelligence software vendors have released web-based versions of their solutions. Companies can easily and at a low cost give users access to large amount of corporate data and sophisticated analytical tools. By providing access to the internet or an intranet connection, a person can investigate and analyze data from home, when traveling, or from any other location at which they may happen to be.
History of Business Intelligence

Gateway Pages : To market Your Website

Marketing Strategy
A gateway page is another door into your web site. For example, if your business is a speakers' bureau, what you can do is set up individual pages for your speakers, and submit each one to search engines and directories with their own description, title and keywords.

When an Internet user is looking for a specific person, your page comes up close to the top because it is entirely relevant to the name entered in the search engine or directory. One of the easiest gateway pages to set up is a links page. By becoming a major source in a specific area of the Internet you will get numerous repeated visits.

Another easy way to use a gateway page is to have some of the information from your web site located on other web sites, with a link to your web site for further information on the information you have provided.

In my opinion, this is one of the easiest ways to draw traffic to your web site. And also if you have more than one web site under different addresses (URLS) you can have them promote each other.

Tripod, Geocities are just a few pages that provide space for web sites for free. Every page on your web site is a doorway into your web site. Promote each and every page.
Gateway Pages : To market Your Website

Directed Advertising Gets Results

Marketing Strategy
If you're the only product/service provider in a consumer's time of need, you may get a sale based on that even if you haven't established firm trust.

How can you set this up this kind of advertising? It depends on your business. But I'll give some examples of advertising based on benefits.

An appliance dealer can give/send magnetic advertising specialties for people to put on their appliances. To supplement this, the dealer can establish a program of getting information about the specifications people will want/need in a replacement appliance, such as measurements, capacity, gas/electric, color, etc. Then when an appliance breaks down, the customer can call for a price quote without having to supply the necessary information. (During a stressful time, people aren't apt to want to hassle with this information; they just want a solution NOW!)

I still have a business card for a lock-out service in my wallet.

I got it at a gas station. I never met the owner of the service but if my keys are locked in my car on a cold winter day, it doesn't matter that I haven't met him, I'll call him.

We know that people tend to hate advertising.

The whole truth is that people hate advertising that intrudes on them without giving them a benefit.

Entertainment is a benefit; it may not induce anybody to buy the advertised product but it may get them to pay attention to the ad. Since people are more cure oriented than prevention oriented, it's necessary to fully describe the undesirable effect.

This is something an appliance dealer can use but can be adapted for other businesses. "Did this ever happen to you or to somebody you know? The freezer breaks down and all of the food in it (possibly $200 worth) is going to spoil if it isn't put into a new freezer SOON! Now besides all of the other things you have to do, you have to buy a freezer NOW! Pre-shopping for a freezer will limit the hassle you go through at a stressful time like this. We can deliver the new freezer right away and take away the old one."

Then it's just a matter of introducing what I wrote above. Just think, "Why or when would a consumer want my marketing message?" Then base the marketing message on the answer.
Marketing Strategy