Mass marketing is a marketing situation free of market segmentation and whereby the whole market is dominated by one strategy or one offer with the sole intention of reaching the largest number of customers/consumers possible. This paper supports the position that mass marketing is still a viable way to build a profitable brand even in the wake of increasing adoption of more refined market segmentation schemes by marketers.
Marketers who value mass marketing approach traditionally utilize radio, television, and newspapers to reach a broad audience. Companies always strive to reach the largest audience possible in order to maximize exposure of their products which theoretically translates to making higher numbers of sales of their products. It is the objective of every business marketer to make high sales through the provision of products and services that appeal to the whole market at relatively low prices. Indeed, modern technology has further enhanced mass marketing in what is now referred to as digital marketing. Technology has enhanced and simplified online communication thereby providing the penetrating power to reach a broader circle of consumers in the market (Shyu et al., 2015). Further, digital marketing is a more efficient and cost-effective way of allowing marketers to reach a larger-scale audience, which is the main objective of mass marketing.
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The success of mass marketing campaigns is a function of the amount of audience persuasion done through peripheral route to persuasion or central route to persuasion. The strength of the persuasion route explored is usually attributed to the elaboration of a persuasive message, involvement, and/or issue-relevant thinking. To support this contention, examples of political campaigns mass marketing uses central persuasion approach and the toothpaste advertisement pursues mass marketing using the peripheral approach of persuasion (Lane et al., 2013). In this perspective, the content of the communication in political campaigns example achieves cognitive response through the use of a detailed level of thinking, whereas consumers in the toothpaste example depend on heuristics to change their purchasing behavior. With this explanation in mind, it is important to note that a product such as toothpaste is not specially designed for a particular consumer group but it makes huge quantity sales.
In the understanding that people are consumers with a variety of basic personal and societal wants that go beyond individualism, it is indeed sound to argue that there are some basic human needs such as food, shelter, and clothing that mass marketing can best address. Other products that are mass marketed even in the current world include residential communities, furniture, automobiles, fizzy drinks, artworks, and personal computers, among others. Moreover, there are some basic products and services that consumers would prefer acquiring at low prices and functionality (Lamb, Hair, & McDaniel, 2012). Therefore, firms will always pursue mass marketing to promote the lowest price through production, marketing, and distribution economies. Furthermore, mass marketing serves the desires of people who value some degree of simplicity in their daily lives. Customization of products and services to meet specific persons’ tastes and preferences is not without complications as it can both yield rewarding and stressful experiences. Mass production and mass marketing of products and services provide a lot of ease to consumers’ lives as well as create a sustainable marketing niche for firms. In general, I must allude here that mass marketing still remains among the best strategies for products and services perceived as necessary, basic, or essential to any consumer.
In the world today, small and micro-businesses such as startups prefer mass marketing because the resources required are cost-effective. Such businesses would prefer reaching out to huge audiences through the cheapest means possible and persuade them into purchasing their products and services. Some of the common products and services whose marketing pursues mass marketing approach include politicians and professional services such as chiropractic, law, medicine, etc.
Additionally, through planned obsolescence, companies through their marketing agencies use mass marketing to increase their profits and lower production costs. In addition to lowering production costs, this practice prevents saturation of high-quality, long-lasting goods in the market thereby facilitating future sales opportunities (Sarhan, 2017). Moreover, mass marketing of planned obsolescence is evident in disposability, collection culture, and technological innovations as well as free market forces. It is common logic that there are items that people have a habit of buying anew every time the old ones get used up or worn out. These items also referred to as staples are usually mass marketed even in modern markets. Marketers mass market as staples cheaper versions of long-lasting products in the understanding that the cost of regular replacement is easily affordable no matter how soon they wear out as compared to the more expensive ones.
Furthermore, the quantity of successful hits in mass marketing is usually high notwithstanding the low likelihood of a single consumer showing up given the broad target audience. Also, the eventual loss is less as opposed to one in a niche market in the event that all shots in a particular area fail. This position is true given the fact that for a single production operated for the homogeneous product has low production costs per unit. In equal measure, the costs incurred in marketing research and advertising are low thus minimizing losses, if any (Bennett & Strydom, 2001). In a much bigger market, these factors cumulatively lead to enhanced potentials of sales volume and efficiency of scale.
References
Bennett, J. A., & Strydom, J. W. (2001). Introduction to travel and tourism marketing . Kenwyn: Juta & Company Ltd.
Lamb, C. W., Hair, J. F., & McDaniel, C. D. (2012). Essentials of marketing . Mason, OH: South-Western Cengage Learning.
Lane, R., Miller, A. N., Brown, C., & Vilar, N. (2013). An examination of the narrative persuasion with epilogue through the lens of the elaboration likelihood model. Communication Quarterly , 61 (4), 431-445. doi:10.1080/01463373.2013.799510
Sarhan, A. (2017, December 22). Planned obsolescence: Apple is not the only culprit. Forbes [New York]. Retrieved from https://www.google.com/search?q=forbes&rlz=1C1CHBD_enKE805KE805&oq=forbes&aqs=chrome..69i57j69i60j69i65j69i60l2.2753j0j7&sourceid=chrome&ie=UTF-8
Shyu, M., Chiang, W., Chien, W., & Wang, S. (2015). Key success factors in digital marketing in service industry and the development strategies: A case study on Fleur De Chine at Sun Moon Lake. International Journal of Organizational Innovation , 8 (1), 172-185.
