Beyond Traditional Marketing

This book is like a stream of fresh air compared with the many stale business books I have read lately. Reading it felt like attending one of IMD's management seminars: instead of giving you the latest cooking recipe that nobody can use, the authors help you to broaden their perspective, reflect on the marketing isssues we all face in REAL life, and find ways of devising your own solutions adapted to your company and reality. That is different from reading theories that only the authors know how to apply. In my current position I found a number of chapters of particular relevance including: the Value Chain Marketing, Countering Commoditization, The Missing P in the Marketing Mix and Beyond the Matrix. I'm not a fan of business books but I found myself taking some 20 notes while reading this volume that I can apply to our company today. -Jose Maria Gonzalez Tejera, Vice President Global Marketing, Tetra Pak International What every marketing manager needs to know to succeed in today's competitive markets. This book has been written for thoughtful marketing managers looking for new ways to improve marketing practice in their organizations. Markets change constantly, but the discipline often fails to keep pace and takes time to catch up. As change accelerates, so the problem worsens. And the classics of the field, whilst offering an important foundation, are simply not designed to address emergent issues. There is thus a clear need for a focused and practical book to chart the breaking ground, and to harness the latest developments for frontline marketing managers. Beyond Traditional Marketing is that book. Studded with case studies of real companies who have dealt effectively with emerging issues and others who have not, it offers an overview of the innovations that have transformed industries and driven major shifts in the field over the last decade, as well as those areas where the reverse is true and new thinking has led to breakthroughs in practice. In total it explores more than 20 techniques absent from the traditional literature, delivering examples, managers' checklists and practical action summaries for each. Even the biggest names have acknowledged that traditional marketing is no longer achieving the success rates enjoyed in the past. If concepts such as value chain marketing, customer collaboration marketing and two-way brand building are unfamiliar to you, consider one question: Are they as unfamiliar to your competitors?