Measuring Marketing Productivity: Current Knowledge and Future Directions

Abstract

For too long, marketers have not been held accountable for showing how marketing expenditures add to shareholder value. As time has gone by, this lack of accountability has undermined marketers' credibility, threatened the standing of the marketing function within the firm, and even threatened marketing's existence as a distinct capability within the firm. This article proposes a broad framework for assessing marketing productivity, cataloging what is already known, and suggesting areas for further research. The authors conclude that it is possible to show how marketing expenditures add to shareholder value. The effective dissemination of new methods of assessing marketing productivity to the business community will be a major step toward raising marketing's vitality in the firm and, more important, toward raising the performance of the firm itself. The authors also suggest many areas in which further research is essential to making methods of evaluating marketing productivity increasingly valid, reliable, and practical.

Advertising vs. R&D: Relative effectiveness on brand equity

“…For example, stronger customer relationships could be created when a firm uses knowledge about buyer needs and preferences to build longterm relationship bonds with external entities such as customers and distributors (Srivastava, et al, 1998). The importance of these market-based assets has also been emphasized by other marketing researchers (Daidj, et al, 2004;Dahlhoff, 2002;Rust, et al, 2004a). Brand equity (Shocker, Srivastava & Ruekert, 1994;Pahud de Mortanges & Van Riel, 2003), customer satisfaction (Anderson, et al, 2004), and the management of strategic relationships (Morgan & Hunt, 1994) are the underlying concepts of market-based assets, whether it is relational market-based assets, intellectual market-based assets, or both.…”

“…One of the key roles advertising plays in the market is to increase brand awareness and promote favourable brand attitudes. Thus, advertising can contribute to development and maintaining of relational market-based assets through communication with customers and partners (Srivastava, et al, 1998;Chu & Keh, 2006;Rust, et al, 2004a;Srinivasan, 2006). R&D can influence and accelerate the development of new products and services by utilizing information and knowledge about the market environment, which are the typical examples of intellectual market-based assets.…”

Marketing Practices and Profitability of a Company: A Study by Machine Learning Method

“…При этом, как правило, речь идет лишь об отдельных элементах МП или объясняется общая взаимосвязь маркетинга и финансовых результатов компании [Doyle, 2000;Rust et al, 2004)], доказывается роль маркетинга в формировании выручки. В то же время остаются открытыми вопросы, связанные с принципиальным изменени ем набора используемых МП в финансо во успешных и финансово неуспешных компаниях.…”

“…Несмотря на то что попытки увязать мар кетинговую деятельность с результатами деятельности компании предпринимались достаточно часто [Rust et al, 2004;Sheth et al, 2002;Srivastava, Shervani, Fahey, 1999;Третьяк, 2007], исследователи, как правило, изучали взаимосвязи либо отдель ных видов маркетинговой деятельности, либо в целом маркетинга с финансовыми и нефинансовыми показателями компании. Комплексный анализ, посвященный вза имосвязи всего спектра МП или отдельных типов МП и прибыльности компании, не проводился.…”

Marketing metrics: A can of worms or the path to enlightenment?

“…But it would be wrong to decry or abandon marketing metrics out of frustration, merely seeing it as a difficult can of worms. Instead, we should try to tease out the beneficial what is known is provided by Rust et al 8 …”