Product Marketing Strategies for an Entrepreneur during 21st Century By Prof. C.Ramalingam M.Com, MBA, M.Phil, (Ph.

D) Department of Management Studies Rajalakshmi Engineering College Thandalam 602 105, Sriperumbudur Taluk, Kancheepuram District, Tamil Nadu Small businesses have taken a wait and see approach to the challenging economic environment, and many postpone the exploration of any new opportunities. And many firms try to revaluate their business model. The cost of production started rising and the pinch of inflation is also threatening the consumers to buy the products. Many firms try to outsource some of the processes and tasks by sub contracting to other firms in the similar business houses. Attracting and retain the labour force is also a great challenge as the workers get trained and switch to newer jobs and try to earn more salary to cope up with the inflation and growing economy . The cost of training is also increasing and the qualities of workers are to be improved to a great extent by their constant involvement in corporate decision making process. At every stage; the suggestions are to be got from employees to fight the global competition. This is being done by good corporate Governance and frequent meeting through quality circles and team leader meetings. Marketing Activities become more competitive and the best marketed goods only would be sold in the market. Customers would be more knowledgeable and see the details of various products and its costs effectiveness. So the products features in

detail have to be made known to people with all the special features. E very product must have unique Sales Proposition when it comes to market. Then only the people would buy and the marketer has to segment his targeted population and try market the goods in the required time to make suitable sales revenue. Complaints from customers to handled carefully and try to maintain good and cordial relationship with the customers. If possible the complaints must be attuned immediately and rectify the same at the least time. Sometimes people do not even complain the problem as they feel it is not worth the time and effort. But through word of mouth and other social media the quality of products will be communicated to mass people within a shortest time; as a result of which there are lots of possibilities for the reduction of sales. So service within 10 minutes concept 24X 7 servicing facilities would catch up. Even if the goods had any small defects; either the marketer has to sell it at a lesser price or else guarantee for rectification of product during the warranty period. Maruti and Hyundai also took back few models due to mistakes in some components and replaced them and made as one of the best models in the car business. Consumers are choosing better value for their products for their hard earned money, hence providing better value for customer is the main challenge for companies in the present economic scenario. Many products could be sold by internet. Network marketing is also picking up and it is successfully practiced by the Amway Company in India also. This method of organized personal selling need to be used by the entrepreneur in the coming years for marketing his product in the remote areas. To penetrate into the market, the entrepreneur must have people to study the pre-

purchase behavioral pattern of consumers and their expectations. After few months, the post purchase behavior of the consumers need to be studied and analyzed and get their feed back to improve the marketing strategies. Global competition in business will continue to increase and affect the business. Technical innovation would also take place to a large extent and amuse us. Continued de-regulation by government will happen to improve the growth of economy. So, the entrepreneur has to promote his products quickly through time based events, exhibitions, trade shows, sports events, sponsoring to various cultural programmes in the country and participating various societal development activities will bring confidence to consumers. Many Factory outlets and more corporate retain chains would come and they would be buying in bulk quantity for the entire nation and they will use different marketing strategies to sell the products. So entrepreneurs have to find the corporate retain chain stores who buy in bulk and take confirmed orders from them to manufacture the goods. Market segmentation and special offerings to different segments will continue. Companies need to measure how many people or firms want the product and estimate how long they would be willing to buy and how many of them, have the capacity and affordability to buy the product before the starting a production activity. Entrepreneurs need to formulate offers that motivate the buyers to buy the product with attractive offers and discounts and leave a choice to consumers to select the quantity discount or cash discount. Consumers should also have a scope for bargaining the price and to that extent the Maximum retail price should give a cushion for the retailers.

Organization needs to accept the credit and debit cards as well as various coupons issued by different marketing organizations like Sodaksou Meal coupon pass; so that it is easy for the consumers to go to market without cash in their hand. These coupons also give opportunity to track the details of goods purchased when, where by whom etc. More aggressive selling tactics are to be used in the coming days by a shrewd entrepreneur to market any of his products in any market. Entrepreneurs also need to have battery of selling and promotion tools to stimulate the demand for the product. The frequent enquiry of the product performance and pre-sales demonstration would lead to more customer loyalty for a brand. Customers may not be in a position to tell exactly what they need and they would expect the marketers to give solutions for their problems and to those extent products need to be manufactured and made available all over the places in a country. Customers may forget the brand name; but it is the retail marketing man to ask the features and give the required product to satisfy the needs of the customers. Hence the retail and chain stores marketing people have to be trained more effectively. Business to Business purchase would be more and they would be growing and the ultimate consumer would go to the large retail shops, Departmental stores or to a specific centralized stores. All the marketing functions like sales force, advertising, customer service, customer care, billing, displaying and operational activities are to be integrated to get a concrete solution for withstanding the competitions.

Customers need has to be understood from the longer point of view and continue to supply the needs continuously and try to retain them as much as possible; since the cost of getting a new customer is very high than retaining an existing customer for a long time. Consumers want widely available and affordable products and aim to get maximum satisfaction from every rupee spent; accordingly the entrepreneurs must try to market their products, spare parts widely and make the products more affordable that pricing at a very high level. Patience in Marketing is very essential for an entrepreneur and when the goods has proven its performance; marketing would catch up and then production can be done on a large scale ; until then he has to do slow pedaling. Entrepreneurs also need to prove the product and its performance under simulated conditions to make the customers believe the various features of the product. Use of Internet facility and reaching rural market is also important and one should not concentrate only on big cities. The tier 2 cities and remote villages also have vast market potential; which should not be neglected. Conclusion: Marketing is going to be a Challenging Task during the next generation. The person wants and need s have to be closely observed and they have to be met with in time at a good price and quality. References: 1. Product Selection by Prof. H.N. Pathak, Pub. By (NIESBUD), NSIC-PATC Campus, Okhla. 2. Entrepreneurial Development Dr. S. Moharana and Dr. C.R.Dash, Pub. by RBSA Publishers, Jaipur.

3. Entreprenurial Development by S.S.Khanna, Published by S.Chand & Company Ltd., Ram Nagar, N.D 4. Entrepreneurial Development by C.B. Gupta and N.P.Srinivasan, Sultan Chand & Sons, 1992. 5. Entrepreneurship Development Principles, Policies and Programmes by P. Saravanavel, Publishers Ess Pee Kay Publishing House, Madras