As a seasoned marketing professional and a member of pulp, paper and cardboard community, I know how hard you work every day to serve customers in your market with exceptional products in the form of fine printing paper, coated paper, newspaper, office paper, packaging paper, cardboards, corrugated paper, stationary paper, special paper, pulp and so on. Paper is an important part of everyday life and so is marketing for our industry. Peter Drucker is a father of marketing other than being the father of management. Peter F. Drucker once said “The two functions that counts in a business are marketing and innovation. All the other functions are costs” and he also said “the purpose of a company is to create a customer not a product”. According to Drucker, the aim of marketing is making selling unnecessary. In this perspective, my goal for this writing is to help you gain more practical marketing knowledge you need in the increasingly competitive marketplace. I designed this in question and answer style since I have been receiving so many marketing related questions over the years from different parts of the world. I kept my answers simple.

1. H. Kursad Devecioglu,M.Sc.
http://tr.linkedin.com/in/kursadd
Version 1.0

2.  Success is not final, failure is not fatal: it is the
courage to continue that counts.
-Winston Churchill

3.  An American educated marketing professional with published marketing and
direct marketing books. A public speaker and presenter in the field of marketing
as well.
* You may watch his presentations on Youtube Channel;
http://www.youtube.com/user/hasankursad
Linkedin : http://tr.linkedin.com/in/kursadd/
Website : www.hasankursad.com
Slide Share : http://www.slideshare.net/HASANKURSADDMSc
Facebook : www.facebook.com/hdevecioglu
Skype : kursad.devecioglu
Email : kursadd@yahoo.com

4.  As a seasoned marketing professional and a member of pulp, paper and cardboard
community, I know how hard you work every day to serve customers in your market with
exceptional products in the form of fine printing paper, coated paper, newspaper, office
paper, packaging paper, cardboards, corrugated paper, stationary paper, special paper,
pulp and so on. Paper is an important part of everyday life and so is marketing for our
industry. Peter Drucker is a father of marketing other than being the father of management.
Peter F. Drucker once said “The two functions that counts in a business are marketing and
innovation. All the other functions are costs” and he also said “the purpose of a company is
to create a customer not a product”. According to Drucker, the aim of marketing is making
selling unnecessary.
 In this perspective, my goal for this writing is to help you gain more practical marketing
knowledge you need in the increasingly competitive marketplace. I designed this in
question and answer style since I have been receiving so many marketing related
questions over the years from different parts of the world. I kept my answers simple.
 I hope you enjoy reading this as I enjoyed writing it. If you have any questions, please feel
free to contact me directly.
H.Kursad Devecioglu, M.Sc. – April 2014
kursadd@yahoo.com

5. I. Marketing Management
II. Marketing Planning & Strategy
III. Direct Marketing Management
IV. Brand Management

6. MARKETING MANAGEMENT

7.  American Marketing Association offers the following formal definition:
“Marketing is the activity, set of institutions, and processes for creating,
communicating, delivering, and exchanging offerings that have value
for customers, clients, partners, and society at large. ”
 Marketing is a war of ideas, not products. The more focused your
marketing approach, the greater your chance to dominate in the
marketplace. There are many definitions of marketing. Basically,
marketing can be described as “finding out what your target customer
wants/needs and just give it to them.”
 For the Pulp, Paper and Cardboard Industry (PPCI), I would like to
share my favorite definition as the one from Prof. Philip Kotler;
“Marketing is creating, communicating and delivering value to target
market at a profit.” From this definition, marketing clearly involves
product management, brand management and customer management.

8. This concept of giving versions to marketing is an idea of
father of modern marketing Philip Kotler and here it is the
definition:
 Marketing 1.0 is appealing to the customers‘ mind
wherever customers are,
 Marketing 2.0 is appealing to the customers‘ heart by
knowing a lot about customers and trying to get close to
serve to the customers,
 Marketing 3.0 is knowing that customers have other
concerns and Company says "we care too to make a better
world". it is about caring about the earth.
After reading the definition, take a moment to think about
your company and see in what version you are operating
with.

9. Marketing is a part of our lives for sure. Here is a list
of some marketing types:
 Commercial Marketing,
 Place Marketing,
 Person Marketing,
 Political Marketing,
 Social Marketing,
 Fundraising.

10.  The marketing mix consists of product, price, place and promotion.
 Product is the pulp we deliver to paper mills for paper production or office paper we
produce for people to communicate or environmentally friendly cardboards we use for
packaging. Although we do supply tangible products in PPCI, the service always comes
with the product.
 Price is an important element of the marketing mix. A pricing policy needs to be based on
the current situation in the marketplace. If you are offering a type of special paper, and you
have little or no competition for that product, you might have the luxury to set a high price.
If you are selling a common product such as office paper, you might need to keep an eye
on your competitors and price your product close to the going rate for those products.
 Place stands for your distribution channel. The typical distribution channel for a
manufacturer is Wholesaler > Retailer > Consumer. The distribution channel includes all
parties who facilitate the flow of goods and services from producers to final consumers.
Other channel partners could include distributors, agents and brokers.
 Promotion is communication between your company and your customers. Promotion
includes personal selling (face-to-face selling), direct marketing (direct mail, e-mail,
catalogs, etc.), general advertising (radio, TV, newspaper, etc.), social media marketing
and sales promotions (free shipping for a certain amount ordered, free samples, etc.) The
primary objectives of promotion are informing, persuading and reminding. Informing is
necessary for potential customers to become aware of your products. Persuading is used
to create or reinforce a positive set of attributes associated with the brand and to stimulate
interest in and to try the product. Reminding includes communicating with customers to
create and/or sustain brand loyalty by reinforcing positive brand association.

11.  Within the marketing mix (product, price, place
and promotion) only price brings revenue to
company. Being the only element within the
marketing mix to bring revenue, price is the most
important element to focus on. That is true that we
as business professionals do not want to reach
target customer with price alone so it is marketer’s
job to work on other marketing activities such as
market research, word-of-mouth-marketing,
branding and advertising in order to support the
price position.

12.  The price ceiling is the highest price that a
consumer is willing to pay for your product.

13.  The price floor is the lowest price at which you can
sell your product without losing money.

14.  It is the first price you establish in order to
introduce a new product into the market.
Customers take this price as a mental reference.

15.  Pricing a product based on a previously released
similar product.

16.  If you do not set the price high enough for the
company’s profitability for the long term, it is
difficult to sell the product later at its true (higher)
price because the customer will still be thinking of
the low “reference price.” it is important to start
with a fair market price so that you make a profit
and your customer can still buy from you. You can
test your pricing tactics in designated pilot areas
before applying in entire marketplace

17.  Price skimming: Setting the price high initially,
then lowering it.
 Penetration Pricing: Offering the product with a
low price to capture market share.

18.  The actual product: Physical product, design,
features, quality, brand and packaging.
 Augmented product: Extra features and benefits
that improve the actual product. For instance,
selling 80 gram/m2 offset printing paper to a
printing house with a satisfaction guarantee.
 Core benefit: This stands for what you are really
selling, for example when you receive corrugated
paper with high stiffness from your supplier for box
making, your boxes will have high stiffness as
well.

19.  Just like everything else in the world, each product
has a life cycle defined by the following stages:
market introduction, market growth, market
maturity, market decline and market decline. Do
you have any paper products in your product line
that used to sell well but is now selling slowly due
to low demand? Think about this as product life
cycle.

21.  Marketing process starts with market research.
In any market you are entering whether local or
International, you need to make sure that you have
Enough, meaning market knowledge for
Segmentation, targeting and positioning purposes.

22.  There are two types of market research available for PPCI professionals:
 Primary Research
 Secondary Research
 Primary research is research that you conduct such as: surveys, questionnaires, and focus
groups. You gather the information, sort it and analyze it yourself. You do not use any other
source to get information.
 Secondary research is using research information that was gathered and analyzed by
other researchers. In this case you are using someone else’s research results for your
company.
 If you talk to your customers to get feedback regarding your A4 office paper product then
sort and analyze their comments, that is an example of primary research.
 Primary research can give you more in-depth information about the marketplace, but you
should be careful when you are implementing it in terms of quantity and quality of the
research details. On the other hand, secondary research can help you save time while you
are using previously made research information but you need to understand the conditions
of that research before using it.

23. Segmentation is dividing the market into groups
based on similar needs relevant to your product.
The primary objective of segmentation is to identify
unique sub-Markets of customers with like
attributes, and to find segments that are attractive
from a profit perspective. You can segment your
market based on your criteria.

24. Targeting means identifying attractive
market segments and tailoring the marketing mix to
match the needs of target customers. In this sense,
segmenting your market helps natural stone
companies identify their target markets.

25.  You need market research results (primary or
secondary market research results )first to analyze the
market situation. While analyzing, you need to be as
realistic as possible. There are some tools to use such
as SWOT analysis, and Porter’s 5 Forces. While
doing a SWOT analysis, you need to asses your
company’s strength and weaknesses. Also
opportunities and threats in the marketplace. Strength
and weakness part is usually the most difficult part as
it is about the company itself and this requires an
utmost objectivity.

26.  Micro environment and macro environment.
 Micro environment consists of company, suppliers,
competitors, publics, marketing intermediaries.
 Macro environment consists of demographic
forces, economic forces, natural forces,
technological forces, political forces, and cultural
forces.
 As a member of pulp, paper and cardboard
industry, you can affect microenvironment. You
can affect macro environment but you can be
proactive.

27.  Competition brings higher quality products, lower
price products and innovation to marketplace.

28.  Millions of people are moving. It is important to
know where they are moving in order to modify
marketing plans based on changing geographic
and demographic conditions. It is also especially
important for paper industry to follow trends in
terms of industrial parks and industrializing
regions. The rule of thumb is wherever there is
production, there is a need for paper and
cardboard.

29.  Demographics are the population or consumer
statistics regarding socioeconomic factors such as
age, gender, income, occupation, education,
family size and so on. Demographics are
important to use as a basis for creating target
markets (market segmentation). It also helps
natural stone companies match advertising media
with target market groups

30.  Buying power and spending habits. It is essential
to know about the buying power of customers in
your target market. Based on their buying power,
you can modify your offers.
 Spending habits show us how your customers
spend their income.

31.  Recognize the need
 Research information
 Evaluate
 Purchase
 Post purchase

32.  Problem recognition
 Produce specification
 Supplier search
 Proposals (RFQ, RFP)
 Select supplier
 Specify order routine
 Review

33.  1- Monetary Risk,
 2- Functional Risk,
 3- Physical Risk,
 4- Social Risk,
 5- Psychological Risk

34.  Price
 Quality
 Delivery
 Support
 Financing
 Quality of suppliers

35.  There are fewer business buyers than consumers
 Business buyers are often concentrated in certain
geographic areas
 Business buyers make larger purchases in volume
 Business buyers buy what they need not what
they want
 Business buyers buy exactly what they need
 Business buying decisions are group decisions

36.  Quality
 Features
 Style and design
 Branding
 Packaging
 Support services

37.  They are both important, however, focusing on the
benefits is usually more helpful for any paper
company to close the sale.
 For instance, an A4 office paper might have high
bulk. This is a feature. If high bulks lowers the risk
of paper jam then paper user can save on time.
Saving time is a benefit.

38. All marketing strategy is built on STP – Segmentation, Targeting and Positioning.
Kotler defines Positioning as “the act of designing the company’s offering and
image to occupy a distinctive place in mind of the target market.
Let’s say you work for a paper distribution company and due to market conditions,
you may position yourself as cut to size cardboard distributor so that you can cater
your target market’s needs in a specialized manner, which is a service.
Another example for corrugated paper manufacturers. Let’s say you position your
company to provide the highest quality low gram-high density corrugated paper
with highest know-how possible. In this sense, you provide the product and
educate box makers to have the highest productivity while working on the paper
you provided, which is providing a service along with the product of yours.
The idea is to be as different as possible from competition. Leadership, heritage,
market specialty, production process, being the best in a category or the latest in a
category can be great differentiation ideas.

41.  The answer is “ it depends”. It depends on what
kind of paper product we are talking about. Let’s
divide paper products into two groups as cultural
paper products (A4, offset printing paper, design
paper and so on) and industrial paper products
(packaging paper, cardboard and so on).
 In general wants are more profitable than needs.

42. Marketing myopia is being short-sighted in the
Marketplace. While operating, you do not pay
attention to changing environment, you can not
keep up with changing customer preferences and
fierce competition. Marketing myopia causes
Company to fall behind in dynamic environment. For
Instance; Kodak fell behind in digital camera market
place while it was dominant in regular film camera
Industry. Marketing myopia is not being able to see
further ahead and no adapting to change.

43. Customer lifetime value is how much a customer
worth over the years doing business with our
Company. While some products can be purchased
again and again by customers, some products can
be purchased for certain number of years. The idea
is to acquire customers and retain them as long as
possible to have more revenues from them and
increase their lifetime value. A customer’s life time
value can be high for A4 office paper product since
A4 office paper consumption is continuous.

44.  Buying habits and purchasing behavior

45.  As saying goes, you can not manage what you can not measure.
 First and foremost, each marketing activity has to have a goal
such as generating leads, creating awareness, increasing market
share and so on. After testing and making sure, the marketing
activity is ready to launch, marketing metrics needs to be shaped
as well to monitor and control the developments.
 Marketing metrics are supposed to find out how much of the goal
has been reached or exceeded. The most popular metric is
return on marketing investment (ROMI).
 Let’s say a cardboard company launches a marketing campaign
towards cardboard packaging companies and goal is to generate
leads for sales team to finalize the order. In this case marketing
department needs to measure how many leads they generate,
and then how many of them ended up with orders.

46.  A product line is group of products that are
connected to the same brand.

47.  Cannibalization is a negative consequence
resulting from the line extension of a product. The
potential negative impacts of line extension are as
follows:
 If the line extension does not fit with the current
branding (image, function, appeal to target market,
etc.) a mental disconnect can occur for the
customers,
 Customers might be confused about product and
the brand.

48.  When a company offers another variety or version
of a product, which is already part of an
established brand line of products. For example,
adding a diet or sugar free version of a line of
soda products.

49. MARKETING PLANNING & STRATEGY

50.  As long as it takes

51.  Intensive Growth
( Market Penetration, Market Development,
Alternative Channel Development, Product
development, New product for new customers),
 Integrative strategies(Forward, Backward,
Horizontal Growth),
 Diversification

52.  Marketing is about differentiation. If you do not
have any differentiation point, you better have a
better price,
 Quality, Creativity, Price and customer orientation
are rarely differentiation ideas. Being first,
leadership, heritage, market specialty, preference,
being the latest, hotness can be differentiation
ideas.

53.  Competition (know your competitor. stay away
from competitors' strength and exploit the
weakness), differentiation idea, credentials to
support the point of difference, communicate the
difference
 Every aspect of your communication should reflect
your difference.
 Advertising can dramatize the difference. you do
need the drama to present differentiation

54.  In general 10 % is recommended.

55.  Customers
 Brands
 Distributors
 Patents
 People

56.  According to strategy guru Michael Porter, there are two
ways for a company to have competitive advantage:
 Cost leadership,
 Differentiation.
 If you have cardboard products, that are different from the
competition, that is a competitive advantage. If you have no
differentiation point, you better have low cost. In some
paper and cardboard markets, we have seen companies
that are creating differentiated service instead of product
itself such as custom order service, fast delivery, free
delivery, customer satisfaction guarantee and so on.

57.  Products lacks a meaningful value proposition,
 Price is too high
 Market did not understand the product

58.  Represent the voice of the customer,
 Monitor the evolving business landscape and
gather customer insights,
 Be the steward of the corporate brand,
 Upgrade marketing technology and skills in the
company,
 Bring insight into the corporate strategies,
 Measure and account for marketing financial
performance.

59. DIRECT MARKETING MANAGEMENT

60.  Direct marketing is the interactive use of
advertising media, to stimulate an immediate
behavior modification in such a way that this
behavior can be tracked, recorded, analyzed, and
stored on a database for future retrieval and use.*
 * Bob Stone, Ron Jacobs, “Successful Direct
Marketing Methods”, 7th edition, McGraw-Hill
2001, Page:5

61.  Direct marketing can help pulp, paper and
cardboard companies get new customers and
retain current customers.

62. Elements of Direct Marketing
Media and
customer list
Offer
Copy
Graphic

63.  A direct marketing campaign has the following elements:
 Media and customer list – 40%
 Offer – 30%
 Copy – 15%
 Graphic – 15%
 * Bob Stone, Ron Jacobs, “Successful Direct Marketing Methods”, 7th edition, McGraw-Hill 2001, Page: 8
 Based on these percentages, we can say that when organizing your direct marketing campaign, the most important element
to consider is your customer list and your media. You need to identify your customers and choose ideal media channels
(internet, newspaper, industrial magazine, catalog, etc.) to reach them.
 The next element is what you will offer to your customers to respond to your direct marketing campaign. You need to give
them a reason to respond. That reason might be discount, premium, free-shipping and so on.
 Copy is the text of your direct marketing piece. It stands for the language and tone that you will use in your campaign.
 The last element is the visual part of your campaign. It stand for the pictures, graphic and photos you will use in your
campaign.

64.  Direct marketing’s starting point is the
customer
 The chosen media must have a consistent
message
 Since direct marketing operations are on-
going, communications must be well-planned
 Listen to your sales team in order to improve
your direct marketing efforts

65.  Customer retention is less costly than customer
acquisition,

66.  The offer (proposition) is the terms under which a
specific product, service, or brand is promoted. It
includes a mix of factors that motivate individuals
within the target group to respond.
 * Bob Stone, Ron Jacobs, “Successful Direct
Marketing Methods”, 7th edition, McGraw-Hill
2001, Page:9


67.  Hard offer: Asking for the payment up front when
the customer places the order
 Soft offer: Asking for the payment after the order
is delivered
 Negative offer: Keep sending the products until
customer asks you to stop shipping.

68.  It is essential to give customers reasons to call
you. It might be a discount, free gift, introductory
price or free shipping to move the customer to
take action and accept the offer.

69.  Direct email, direct mail, telephone, catalog, radio,
TV, newspapers, magazine, social media and
alternative media.

70.  RFM stands for: Recency (the last time the
customer made a purchase from your company),
Frequency (how often the customer buys from
your company) and Monetary (the customer’s
average dollar amount spent per purchase).
Based on this information, each customer’s
activities with your company can be analyzed.

71.  Before launching the full scale direct marketing
campaign, the marketing materials should be
tested on a small portion of your customers in
order to understand how effective your campaign
will be. Based on the test results, the campaign
materials or approach can be modified and tested
again or, if successful, the campaign can be
launched after the test.

72. BRAND MANAGEMENT

73.  Brand is an identifying mark, symbol, word or
combination of the same that separates one
company’s product or services from another firm’s.
Brand is a powerful asset to your paper company.
Brand creates a connection with your customers.
 Brand is what you are all about. It is a character
that needs to be built.

74.  Branding is how a product is identified via name,
logo, symbol, tagline, etc. The goals of branding
are: to help differentiate your product among
competing products and to help people remember
your product when they consider their choices.
Some brands go beyond loyalty and become icons
like Harvey Davidson, Disney, Nike, etc.

75.  Gets customer preference,
 Gets customer loyalty,
 Provides Leverage,
 Provides Awareness.

76. The brand should:
 Suggest a benefit or quality of the product
 Be easy to pronounce and remember
 Be distinctive, especially among competing brands
 Be easy to translate into other languages and
cultures

78.  Manufacturer brands,
 Private label brands. Usually retailers create their
own private labels.

79.  Brand loyalty is the degree to which a consumer
repeatedly purchases a brand. There are many
factors that influence brand loyalty such as:
consumer attitudes, family pressure and friendship
with the sales person.

81.  Brand Pyramid is the foundation to establish a brand
with a discipline. In each part of the pyramid, you can
define what the product is all about, especially in an
emotional point of view. Brands make an emotional
connection with the customer and it is essential to
pinpoint those emotions. From bottom to top; brand
pyramid consists of product/service features,
functional benefits, emotional rewards, user values
and brand personality. After viewing the example for
brand pyramid on next page, try to build your pyramid
for your paper/cardboard or pulp brands.

84.  References
 Previous works
 Ideas for the business

85.  CRM stands for customer relationship
management. Its main objective is to establish a
long-term, reliable relationship with customers.
That is an important point for paper companies. A
customer centric approach can help you organize
your operations where your customer and your
company can win at the same time.