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Today, all signs point to the corporate facts of life that consumerism pressures will intensify, as will the pressures to increase government regulation with all its problems of inflexibility, high costs, and new inequities created by uneven administration. The seriousness of the problems created by these pressures will depend on the effectiveness of the responses of individual companies and trade associations, and their willingness to help the various agencies and legislative committees frame realistic and workable rules and regulations. In this article, the authors emphasize the opportunities inherent in management responses to consumerism and suggest how corporate managements can make future consumer-oriented programs more efficient and effective. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Understanding, attracting and keeping valuable customers, by transforming your organization into a market-driven one. (Part two of a two-part installment.) This month the author continues the discussion of how to [...]

Evaluation of marketing strategies is becoming more concerned with increasing shareholder value than with short-term return on investment or payback performance. Value-based planning methods can determine the strategy that will increase shareholder value to the greatest extent. Management judgements about the competitive and market responses to a strategy are converted into cash flow forecasts. The forecasts are adjusted for risk and timing and then compared with a baseline forecast. Value-based planning methods require the funding of strategies instead of projects with an emphasis on strategic fundamentals. The benefit of management strategy is expressed in the context of cash flow and risk consequences.

A carefully designed price discount program affords opportunities for strengthening a company's long-run competitive position. This article reviews types of discount programs and how they can be used to strengthen a firm's competitive position. It then develops a series of questions to aid in the evaluation of a strategic price discount program. (Reprinted by permission of the publisher.)

The article looks at the role of Chief Marketing Officer (CMO) in taking out the companies from complex and uncertain situations. It is suggested that CMO should act as the visionary for the future of the company, build adaptive marketing capabilities and win the war for marketing talent. It is also given that CMO's future role in the company will determined by the predictable trends in their marketplaces, the changing role of the C-suite, and uncertainty about the economic climate and organizational design in the future. INSET: Q/A.

In each issue of MARKETING MANAGEMENT we reprint an edited version of an article from one of our sister publications. This article, from the July 1970 issue of the Journal of Marketing, deals with consumerism. Day is currently at the University of Pennsylvania's Wharton School, and Aaker is at the University of California, Berkeley. "Consumer discontent is still simmering under the surface," they told MM, "but the expectations of the public about the value of government interventions have changed markedly. Many high profile issues have been subsumed by environmental concerns, so the consumerism movement is more diffused." [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A survey of senior marketing executives found 15 issues of broad importance to business that must be better understood. The use of market information, brand equity management, becoming market-driven, new product development, and service quality management rank among the top concerns for the 1990s. Addressing social issues, understanding distribution channels, building service relationships with customers, and more complete knowledge of pricing and promotion dynamics also rate high as major priorities. Complex, messy, and always changing, many of those imperatives transcend the traditional boundaries of marketing and require concurrent attention from other functions of a company, such as production, R&D, and finance. INSET: Selecting topics and setting priorities.. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this article the author examines the snares that are likely to prevent established companies from achieving Internet marketing success. Established firms may defer entering the Internet marketplace until it is too late, waiting for technology to reach a certain level of ease of use and reliability. By contrast, a company can move too quickly and impede itself by choosing the wrong kind of technology to drive their online marketing initiatives. Firms should avoid the natural reluctance to attempt things that might detract from their core business. Commercial concerns should set up new divisions to deal exclusively with new technology marketing ventures. A number of early set-backs in Internet marketing schemes might lead to a reduction in persistence on the part of businesses.

A response by the author is given to a letter to the editor referring to the November 2005 article "Scanning the Periphery."