1. PROJECT REPORT
ON
“MARKETING MYOPIA: A BIGGER DRAWBACK OF
MARKETING ”
Submitted in partial fulfillment of the requirement for the
Award of the degree of
OMKARANANDA INSTITUTE OF MANAGEMENT & TECHNOLOGY
(Affiliated to U.T. U; DEHRADUN)
Submitted to; Submitteby;
Mr. ApoorvaTrivedi RanaRatnakar
Associate Professor MBA 4th Semester

2. CANDIDATE’S DECLARATION
I hereby certify that work which is being presented in the dissertation report, entitled “Marketing
Myopia: A bigger drawback of marketing.” for partial fulfillment of the requirement for the
award of the degree of “Master Of Business Administration” in “Marketing” Submitted in
Omkarananda Institute Of Management And Technology (OIMT), of Uttrakhand Technical
University is record of my own work, under the guidance of Mrs. Parmoduniyal , Asst. Professor in
OIMT, RISHIKESH.
DATE: RanaRatnakar
MBA (Marketing)
This is to certify that the above statement made by the candidate is correct to
the best of our knowledge.
Dr. AdityaGautam Mrs. ApoorvaTrivedi
Director, Associate Professor
OIMT, Rishikesh OIMT, Rishikesh

3. PREFACE
As an integral part of the curriculum, I student of M.B.A needed to get exposed to the actual marketing
environment to get a better understanding of marketing management by way of undergoing practical
training.
I consider myself fortunate enough that I had an opportunity to get practical training at the marketing
(O.I.M.T.) for gaining substantial knowledge of performance management system. Where I get the
opportunity to do the real life project and enhance my knowledge as to deal with the real environment
(internal, external).
I would express my thanks to O.I.M.T. , RISHIKESH as I troubled them through my queries at every
stage of my work. I am really thankful for their patience with which they resolve my doubts amidst their
busy

4. Acknowledgement
The satisfaction and euphoria that accompany a successful completion of any task would be incomplete
without mentioning the people who made it possible whose consistent guidance and encouragement
crowned the efforts with success.
I would like to thanks my internal faculty guide ApoorvaTrivedi , OMKARANANDA INSTITUTE
OF MANAGEMENT & TECHNOLOGY , ( RISHIKESH) for their guidance and motivation, which
is pivotal in completion of my dissertation report.
I cannot forget the contribution of my project mentor and guide for their able guidance and support
throughout the tenure of the report.
Last but not least, I feel indebted to all those persons who have provided help directly or indirectly in
successful completion of this study.
RanaRatnakar

5. TABLE OF CONTENTS
1) Introduction of Marketing myopia
2) Marketing myopia analysis
3) Purpose of the study
4) Signification of the study
5) What is” marketing myopia”.?
Defining Marketing myopia
Occurrence
Fathful purpose
Impact of marketing myopia
Importance of marketing myopia
6) Literature review on marketing myopia
7) Research Methodology
8) Cases of marketing myopia
9) Avoiding marketing myopia
10) conclusion

6. Marketing Myopia
Introduction
A short-sighted and inward looking approach to marketing that focuses on the needs of
the company instead of defining the company and its products in terms of the customers' needs
and wants. It results in the failure to see and adjust to the rapid changes in their markets.
The concept of marketing myopia was discussed in an article (titled "Marketing Myopia," in
July-August 1960 issue of the Harvard Business Review) by Harvard Business School emeritus
professor of marketing, Theodore C. Levitt (1925-2006), who suggests that companies get
trapped in this situation because theyomit to ask the vital question, "What business are we in?"
Narrow-minded approach to a marketing situation where only short-range goals are considered
or where the marketing focuses on only one aspect out of many possible marketing attributes.
Because of its shortsightedness, marketing myopia is an inefficient marketing approach.
The Myopic culture, Levitt postulated, would pave the way for a business to fail, due to the
short-sighted mindset and illusion that a firm is in a so-called 'growth industry'. This belief leads
to complacency and a loss of sight of what your customers want.
There is a greater scope of opportunities as the industry changes. It trains managers to look
beyond their current business activities and think "outside the box.

7. Marketing Myopia Analysis
Most of the major industries today were once considered as growth industry‟s. However some of
the industries that are on the rise up the mountain or undergoing a boom in business may very
much be in the shadow of downfall. Other industries which are considered as veteran growth
industries have in reality ceased to grow. In every case the reason for this stint is not because the
market is impregnated, it is because of the failure of management as they have fallen prey to a
phenomenon called „Marketing Myopia‟.
Marketing myopia is an advertising strategy that does not focus on the needs and wants of
consumers, but the desires of a company to sell specific goods or services in the economic
market. Classic economic theory attempts to explain that consumers will tell companies the type
of goods and services desired through the economic behavior demonstrated by individual
consumers. Companies can benefit from this behavior by actively researching how consumers
are spending their money and what goods are services are currently popular in the economic
market. Marketing myopia can distort the company‟s view when managers focus more on what
the company can produce rather then what consumers are willing to buy.
A classic example is seen by Ford Motor Company‟s development of the Edsel. The Ford Edsel
was a late 1950s passenger car built under the marketing strategy that it was going to
revolutionize the automotive industry. The car was designed with the intent of being a large,
stylish vehicle that would meet the driving needs for thousands of U.S. consumers and families.
Although the Edsel was released with much fanfare and publicity from marketing agencies and
media outlets, it was an almost immediate failure in the consumer market. While reviews at the
time cited the vehicle‟s poor workmanship and styling, business experts have attributed the
failure to the company's inability to understand consumer desires. The name Edsel is now a
business term synonymous with business or marketing failure.

8. Marketing myopia may also occur when a business focuses on developing advertising strategies
for the wrong target markets or demographic groups. Individuals in the economic market usually
view advertising strategies or techniques in different ways; their perceptions are built upon
culture, race, age, or other personal opinions. Companies that fail to understand the perceptions
of consumers when advertising goods or services usually wind up struggling.
Companies in today‟s business environment often spend a lot of money conductingmarketing
research before releasing new products or services. This research or focus group activity may be
related to the utter failure of the Ford Edsel marketing campaign. Rather than spending huge
sums of money on national advertising or marketing campaigns, companies will use test markets
to determine the strength of consumer demand for goods or services prior to a national rollout of
new products. These test markets may also help companies build specific marketing strategies
based on the feedback they receive from individual consumers.
Error of analysis
The error of analysis refers to the defining the industry, or a product, or a cluster of know-how so
narrowly as to ensure its untimely ageing. What is lacking is not the opportunity but some of the
managerial imaginativeness and audacity to make them great.

9. Purpose of the Study
=>The purpose of this study on Marketing Myopia is to answer the basic question “How can a
company ensure its continued growth”? It also analyses the reasons for occurence of such a
phenomenon in organisations along with the impact it has on the future of the organisation and
finally the ways to avoid it from happening.
=>Narrow-minded approach to a marketing situation where only short-range goals are
considered or where the marketing focuses on only one aspect out of many possible marketing
attributes. Because of its shortsightedness, marketing myopia is an inefficient marketing
approach.

10. Significance of the Study
Marketing Myopia has been in existence for several decades now and is a result of narrow focus
of the top level management in its planning functions. It is of extreme relevance in todays world
as many entreprenuers while starting their business need to plan their activities for the future and
hence should ensure they dont enter the Marketing Myopic trap. Effectively speaking, an
organization should start to perceive itself not as producing goods or services but as doing the
things that will make people want to do business with them. Though being a collaborative effort
the onus in every case, lies with the chief executive who is responsible for creating a conducive
environment that reflects this mission. He has the burden of being aware of "marketing myopia"
and have the ability to understand the complexity of the consumer-needs by developing an
approach that justifies it.

11. WHAT IS “MARKETING MYOPIA”?
Defining Marketing Myopia
„Marketing myopia‟ is a term made up of two words: Marketing and Myopia which is used to
describe the short sighted (myopic) approach adopted by organizations which often leads to
their premature decay. The term was coined by „Theodore Levitt‟ in a paper which was
published in the Harvard Business Review in the year 1960. This paper has been regarded by
several industry experts as a revelation for the modern marketing era. It has set aside most of the
myths and has proposed a visual modality for the modern day CEO and is being successfully
implemented by most of the biggest corporate houses in existence today.
His theory suggests that “most of the industries are restricted in their thought process and
implementation of their future endeavours". He felt that the world was living in the „selling
concept‟, where the objective was to follow a push model instead of a pull model thereby forcing
the customer to buy whatever you produce. Profits earned in the short term were regarded as a
measure of success for the organisations. Organizations hence were hence living a lie and failed
to see the larger picture. This form of marketing could fetch them profits in the short run;
however, as time faded, this led to the customer being dissatisfied accompanied with brand
switching, tapering sales figures, and eventually, closedown. Levitt also advised CEOs „to extend
their horizons, delimitate their corporate objectives, and most importantly have a vision‟.

12. The basic ideology was to broaden the vision from a product level to an industry level or for that
matter to a more generic level. The idea was well assimilated among the organisations and
finally realised that what they were missing was a well defined vision which could serve them in
the future. Levitt illustrated about the of oil companies several times in his publication. His stand
was that, “at a generic level, the oil companies were in the business of providing energy, and not
petroleum, as was the norm then”. The ideology overturned the industry, which is now one of the
most productive industries of the modern era.
The moral to be ascertained is that thinking unconventionally and differently is what is the order
of the day to drive any business. He suggested that one has to get out of the „comfort zone‟ (of
doing what we do) and explore the undiscovered. For an example, if performance in a particular
niche is good, the concept needs to be extended further. Once this is done the next logical step
would be to climb up the ladder and to capture the segment, then a market, and finally the
industry. Things may not always go as planned, but built on the basis of logic; they definitely
provide the foundation to a thriving business in the long run.

13. Occurrence
The reasons for occurrence of such a phenomenon are as stated with cited examples from the
industry:
Fateful Purposes
The reason lies with the failure at the top management level where the decision making is done.
The executives who deal with the policy making and who document the objectives are the ones
responsible for this. It is their myopic view of the industry or the product which often leads to
reduction of scope of the product as a whole.
As cited by the management guru Theodore Levitt who coined the term „Marketing Myopia‟, the
railroads did not cease to grow because the need for passenger or freight transportation declined.
That was almost always increasing steadily; it was because the need was filled and capitalised by
others (trucks, cars, airplanes, or for that matter telephones) but because it was not filled by the
railroads themselves. He others literally snatched the customers away from them and did not
react appropriately because they were confined to only the boundaries of the railroad business
rather than the transportation business i.e. they were oriented towards the product rather than
being oriented towards the customer.

14. Another example involved the Hollywood industry. The Hollywood narrowly escaped the surge
by television. In reality, all the established companies went through drastic reorganisations. They
all get into trouble not because of TV‟s inroads but because of their own short-sighted vision of
the entertainment industry. They defined their business incorrectly. They were always under the
impression that they were a part of the movie business when actually they were just a small part
of the bigger fish „the entertainment industry‟. “Movies” implied a specific, limited product. Due
to this misconception the movie industry never saw the TV as a threat to its business. Hollywood
despised and rejected TV when it really should have greeted it as a chance to expand the
entertainment business. At last what saved Hollywood and accounted for its resurgence was the
flurry of young blood who had heaps of talent in the form of writers, directors and producers
whose previous achievements in the TV industry had decimated the old movie companies.
Still the bottom-line remains that the industries are now endangered not because of lack of
opportunity in the market but because of not defining their business in a broader perspective and
not having a customer oriented approach.

15. Impact of Marketing Myopia
As already stated in the preceding paragraphs, having a myopic vision not only reduces the scope
of the industry but also leads to stagnation of the product which may have tremendous potential.
It is analogous to saying that Marketing Myopia leads to falling into a trap called the „Self-
deceiving‟ cycle. The cycle consists of majorly 2 end states of existence; bountiful expansion
and undetected decay. The conditions which generally ensure this impact are as illustrated:
This is related to the population myth that growth of an industry is ensured by an expanding and
more affluent population. This was supported by the common ideology that a market which is on
the rise will keep the manufacturer from having to think out of the box.
The notion that there is no competitive substitute for the industry‟s major product.
Having excess amount of faith in mass production and being under the impression that output
rises as unit costs decrease.
Engrossment with a product that lends itself to carefully controlled scientific experimentation,
improvement, and manufacturing cost reduction.

16. Importance of Marketing Myopia
=>Through Theodore Levitt‟s work, it clearly states that it plays an important role in marketing
and gave a crucial knowledge to company owners, managers, etc. The organizations found that
they had been missing opportunities which were plain to see once they adopted the wider view.
The short sighted approach is one of the main reasons that people feel that they cannot accurately
predict the future. The major example of Levitt in his paper are oil companies. It redefined their
company as the supplier of energy, not just petroleum.
=>While according to Stephen Largo and Robert Lusch in their paper entitled “Evolving to a
New Dominant Logic for Marketing”, viewing the world at a highly abstract level will make a
difference also called as a “service-dominated view (Service Dominant -SD)” . It explained that
service is very important but they focus more on goods. They build-up the goods their selling for
it to be able to reach customer‟s expectations.
=>According to the 2 papers I read, both topics practically agreed about “thinking outside the
box”. It is is very interesting because it helps managers realize that there is a greater scope of
opportunities as the industry changes. It also stated that it is best if a company use a whole new
range to predict techniques for future circumstances.
=>From what I understand, logic is very important in marketing. What you see is not always
true, you should also look behind it, or if possible dig deeper for you to see and realize that
there‟s something more to it. Through logic, it will make you know more about your product, if
you know your product well, it will sure help you gain customer satisfaction that will help you in
the long-run.

17. LiteratureReviewonMarketingMyopia
Every major industry was once a growth industry. But some that are now riding a wave of
growth enthusiasm are very much in the shadow of decline. Others that are thought of as
seasoned growth industries have actually stopped growing. In every case, the reason growth is
threatened, slowed, or stopped is not because the market is saturated. It is because there has been
a failure of management.
1. An industry is a customer-satisfying process, not a goods-producing process. Businesses will
do better in the end if they concentrate on meeting customers‟ needs rather than on selling
products.
2. Companies stop growing because of a failure in management, not because the market is
saturated but because of MYOPIA.
Example: Railroads declined because they “were railroad oriented instead of transportation
oriented; they were product oriented instead of customer oriented.” They declined not because
of cars, trucks, airplanes, and even telephones, but because of their own myopia.
The article is as much about strategy as it is about marketing, but it also introduced the most
influential marketing idea of the past half century: that businesses will do better in the end if they
concentrate on meeting customers' needs rather than on selling products.'

18. Levitt presented quaternion main conditions which could lead to this failure:
(1) The belief that growth is informed by an expanding and more affluent population;
(2) The belief that there is no competitive substitute for the industrys study product;
(3) Too much faith in multitude production and in the advantages of rapidly declining unit
costs as output rises;
(4) Preoccupation with a product that lends itself to carefully controlled scientific
experimentation, improvement, and manufacturing cost reduction.
Levitt argued that firms strategies should evolve with the consumer, paying more attention to
truly listening to and marketing to consumers instead of blindly selling to them, and case the
foresight to see what new innovative services or products may be lurking on the horizon that
could be interpreted advantage of to benefit both the individual firm and the market as a whole.

19. RESEARCH METHODOLOGY:
An exploratory research has been carried out to study the behavior of businessmen, entrapreneur
and some case study. To meet the research objective a research formats, to collect information
from the respondents was made & the information was collected through individual interaction
with the researcher. The data was collected using scientific method as per the questionnaire
sample elements have been chosen by observation techniques.
Research Design
Research was conducted to know the scope of MarketingMyopia, so it was designed as
Analytical.
1. Sample Design: Data for this study has been collected from primary sources. For the
collection of data CONVENIENCE SAMPLING has been used.
2. Sample Size: Sample size for the study was 100 for the universe of the urban area.
Primary data: Primary data was collected with the help of:
1. Questionnaire
2. Personal Interviews

20. CASES OF MARKETING MYOPIA
The effect of the marketing myopia syndrome has been in existence for several decades now.
There are various cases pertaining to this phenomenon which is illustrated below:
The Indian Classic Vintage car: Ambassador
Ambassador entered the fray in 1958. The great Hindustan Motors (HM) launched the Indian
version of the classic „Morris Oxford‟ as the Ambassador in the year 1958. From then on for
about three decades the Ambassador was the king of the road. At that point in time there were
only two stalwarts in the Indian market - Ambassador and Premier Padmini. Issues like the
licensing, lack of capital and less conducive economic policies ensured that the above mentioned
enjoyed a healthy duopoly. All said and done the year 1983 saw the emergence of a new epoch
in the Indian car market. During this period MarutiUdyog Ltd surged into the market with their
epic Maruti 800 model. Eventually the Ambassador lost its numero-uno position to Maruti.
Ambassador‟s major target audience the „family segment‟ which was the largest segment in the
car market embraced Maruti. The Ambassador was soon reduced to a marginal player a short
period of time. One of the major market segments for Ambassador was the Indian Government.
More than 16 % of the brand sales was courtesy the Government. So much so to say the
Ambassador was used as the Prime Minister's car till 2002.
Soon the officials at Hindustan Motors also lost interest in the brand. With other automobile
makers entering the Indian scenario resulted in a substantial drop in the orders from the
Government. For four decades, the brand has not taken its customer seriously. Reasons are
plenty for brand's failure, the fundamental issues related to the product and price.
From the product‟s point of view, the Ambassador never changed with time. There were a lot of
minor changes to the appearance of the model from 1958-2000 in the form of three major
upgrades namely as Mark II, Mark III and Mark IV without any significant value addition

21. between these upgrades. It still looked like a rock with four wheels and the architecture never
changed. However one of the major transformations undergone by this brand was in their 1800
Isuzu engine. The new and improved Ambassador with the Isuzu engine managed to increase the
sales marginally. But the euphoria was short lived. HM‟s inability to offer product changes with
changing times and with the onset of new players in the market made the brand stale.
The other issue which that worked against them was the price of the vehicle. HM never bothered
to rationalize the price of the brand as they were of the ideology that decreases in price would
correspondingly mean decrease in quality. Even now Ambassador costs more than Rs 4,80,000 a
price at which one could afford a grander Indigo sedan.
Reports suggest that, the HM plant had achieved full depreciation by the year 2000. But it never
crossed the minds at the company to pass on this reduction in cost to their customers. If the
company had rationalized the price of Ambassador in 2000, the brand could have fought of
competition.
A final hammering came with the launch of Indica which took away the taxi car market from
Ambassador which was then the mainstay for the brand. Now even their Unique Selling
Proposition of producing diesel run cars was lost as individual consumers had a better affordable
modern car in Indica as compared to the ageing Ambassador.
In another attempt to boost their sagging sales, HM launched a radically designed Ambassador
variant named “Avigo” in the year 2004. Even with this radical styling, there was a cold response
from the customer.
The automobile industry today has so much to offer that the Indian consumer is now not
restricted to choices .Competition has increased manifolds with new and improved models
rolling out of showrooms by the day.
In today‟s scenario considering the value proposition domain, Ambassador never even figures in
the radar of the consumers. The reduced price gap between diesel and petrol has also eroded the
value in investing in an outdated Ambassador. To top it all of HM never thought of investing
surplus cash for this brand and hence closed all doors of escape for this product

22. .
Once KING of the Indian Roads is now a history !
The Rise and Fall of Ambassador
Ambassador the car with a British legacy was the first car to be made in India. Ambassador was
born in 1958. Its design was based on British car model – Morris Oxford; build by Morris
Motor Co at oxford United Kingdom. Ambassador borrowed not the design but technology as
well from Morris.
Hindustan Motors Limited (HM), India‟s pioneering automobile manufacturing company and
Flagship Company of the C.K. Birla Group, was established before Indian independence, in 1942
by B.M. Birla. When the Birla‟s wanted a new model to replace their already old Hindustan
models based on Morris Oxford Series II (aka Hindustan Landmaster), they scouted for the then-
new Morris Oxford Series III. Thus an Indianised version was launched by Hindustan Motors
launched in 1958.The car initially came with a side-valve engine but was later improved to an
overhead-valve engine. Also the car at that point was quite an innovation with a fully enclosed
monocoque chassis, which is why it is spacious inside.
1955 Morris Oxford Series III was launched in India in 1957 as Ambassador Mark I

23. The car was a runaway success. Ambassador ruled the Indian market till 1980‟s. The only other
car which was in market was Premier Padmini. The licence raj, lack of capital and the
unfriendly Indian economic policies ensured that no automobile manufacturers entered the
Indian market, and Ambassador was enjoying a good market share.
Premier Padmini

24. In 1983 MarutiUydog Ltd, launched its flagship product in collaboration with an unknown
company Suzuki Motors of Japan. Maruti 800 offered some never before seen features & a
radical design. Soon Ambassador lost its leadership position to Maruti. With brilliant marketing
strategies & a radical design Maruti 800 made inroads into the family segment in the car market
& the segment reciprocated by embracing Maruti. Ambassador starting losing its leadership
position to Maruti.
Maruti 800 DX of the first generation
Ambassador had some advantages over Maruti 800 which made it dearer to certain segments. It
was the only Indian car with Diesel option during that time. There was a significant difference in
the prices between Diesel and Petrol, and the other big advantage it offered was the space and
sturdiness. These two factors propelled the brand to become popular among big families and
among the Taxi & tour operators.

25. The brand was perceived to be less expensive to maintain & was ideal car for Indian roads.
These were only perceptions, as Ambassador lacked in quality & refinement. Rusting was a
common problem faced by its owners.
Ambassador was perceived to be a car ideal for Indian roads. The brand also had a positive
perception of being less expensive to maintain. In fact Ambassador was expensive to maintain
and even though the car looked sturdy it lacked the quality and refinement. Rusting was common
complaints. The only reason consumers bought the car was due to the economy of diesel cars
which made buyer to compromise on other parameters.
Another significant market for the brand was the Government. Over 16% of the brand sales came
from the Government. Ambassador was the first choice for most bureaucrats.However the
officials also lost interest in the brand. With the emergence of new and better models from other
auto-makers, there was a significant drop in the orders from the Government.
The fall of Ambassador from a leadership position to a marginal player is a classic case of
marketing myopia. For decades the brand had been taking its customers for granted.Out of
all the fundamentals & techniques in marketing, it’s failed in almost all which led to its
failure. Lets analysis them
Official Ambassador cars parked outside North Block, Secretariat Building, New Delhi

26. Product:
If we look at the product, Ambassador never changed with times. The brand made many
cosmetic changes from 1958-2000 and three upgrades was made which was named as Mark II,
Mark III and Mark IV. Beyond these so called cosmetic changes there was no significant value
addition between these upgrades. The look and the built quality remained the same. A major
change happened when the brand introduced an 1800 CC Isuzu engine. It did lift the sales of the
brand. But the euphoria was short lived. The apathy of Hindustan Motor to offer product
changes in tune with the times made the brand stale.
Rear view of facelifted 800, with a reshaped trunk lid and taillights, and license plate
moved down into the bumper

27. Price:
Hindustan Motor never bothered to rationalize the price of the brand. Ambassador was costing
around INR 4, 80,000. At the price a consumer could afford a more luxurious & comfortable
cars. According to reports, the Hindustan Motor plant had achieved full depreciation in 2000.
But the company did not even think about passing on the reduced cost to the consumer. Had the
company rationalised the price of Ambassador in 2000, the brand might have survived the
competition.
People:
The Company failed to understand the mood of the people. Indian consumer was spoilt with
choices. The competition was immense and the quality of cars has also gone up. Consumers now
have new set of purchase considerations like quality, brand, drivability, luxury, cost of
maintenance etc.
Promotion:
The Company did not promote the brand at all. With already declining market and no promotion
at all, made the matters worse. The brand has almost zero recall value.

28. Brand Management:
The Company also never invested in the brand. Without investing in either brand or product,
Hindustan Motors had sealed the fate of this brand. In the brand management perspective, it‟s
suicidal not to continuously invest in a brand. Often heritage brands wait till it becomes dated.
Once the brand becomes dated, it‟s virtually impossible to rejuvenate the brand.
The task is to prevent the brand to become dated. For that the brand has to go to the consumer for
ideas. Changes in product or promotions can sustain the brand even in the light of emerging
competition.
Present model of Ambassador launched in 2005 as Avigo
“Ambassador should have learned from Maruti 800. The brand survived because it made
changes along with the changing consumer values. The brand rationalised its price in the
light of emerging competition which makes Maruti 800 relevant even in the current market.”

29. Kodak Failed By Asking The Wrong Marketing Question
For 40 years, you couldn‟t walk through Grand Central Station in New York without admiring
the Kodak Coloramas. These 18×60 foot photographs showcased the Kodak brand to commuters,
highlighting the creativity of great photography in a series of “Kodak moments.” Kodak
marketing executives were adept at weaving the brand into the fabric of America for generations.
In fact, at its peak, Kodak captured 90% of the US film market and was one of the world‟s most
valuable brands.
Immensely successful companies can become myopic and product oriented instead of focusing
on consumers‟ needs. Kodak‟s story of failing has its roots in its success, which made it resistant
to change. Its insular corporate culture believed that its strength was in its brand and marketing,
and it underestimated the threat of digital.

30. Kodak did not fail because it missed the digital age. It actually invented the first digital camera in
1975. However, instead of marketing the new technology, the company held back for fear of
hurting its lucrative film business, even after digital products were reshaping the market.
Unfortunately, the company had the nearsighted view that it was in the film business instead of
the story telling business, and it believed that it could protect its massive share of market with its
marketing. Kodak thought that its new digital technology would cannibalize its film business.
Sony and Canon saw an opening and charged ahead with their digital cameras. When Kodak
decided to get in the game it was too late. The company saw its market share decline, as digital
imaging became dominant.
This blind faith in marketing‟s ability to overcome the threat from the new technology proved
fatal. Kodak failed to adapt to a new marketplace and new consumer attitudes.
The essence of marketing is asking first, “what business are we in?” and not “how do we sell
more products?” Had early 20th
Century railroad executives seen themselves asbeing in the
transportation business rather than the railroad business, or had Hollywood moguls in the 1940s
understood that they are in the entertainment business, not just the movie business, their
industries wouldn‟t have been decimated by air travel and TV shows, respectively.
Kodak made a classic mistake: it didn‟t ask the right question. It focused on selling more
product, instead of the business that it was in, story telling.

31. What’s the lesson to other companies on how to avoid Kodak’s fate?
Companies have to adapt to the requirements of the market, even if that means competing with
themselves. Technology has the potential to be disruptive of markets and companies, at the same
time that it is benefiting consumers. Survival is not a likely strategy in today‟s marketplace. In
this environment, marketers should strive for entrepreneurial greatness and innovation, not to just
determine preference among existing options.
Marketing is not the art of selling products, as Kodak thought. Smart marketing is about
providing a company‟s customer base value satisfaction. In short, marketing is tasked with
keeping the company relevant to their customers‟ needs. In an age in which the consumer is in
charge, approaching marketing from the perspective of products or services alone is not enough
to make consumers want to engage.

32. Dettol and Proctor & Gamble’s Safeguard soap
Dettol was market leader for a very long time because of its multi uses and category leadership
strategies. For years, it reaped profits without the need of innovating and giving its customers
that extra bit of value. This strategy worked fine for them until there weren‟t other strong players
in the market. In came Proctor and Gamble‟s Safeguard soap with a completely new approach
that not many would have thought of. They came out with a soap having better fragrance and
launched a campaign that targeted kids.
The campaign was based on a super hero cartoon character called Commander Safeguard that
created waves amongst children. Children, being strong influencers worked as wonders for
Safeguard and their sales saw remarkable rise. Eventually, because of the un-reactive approach
of Dettol and the extremely customer centric and creative approach of Safeguard, it gained
market share and market leadership from Dettol; a clear case of marketing myopia on Dettol‟s
behalf.
Hence, it is essential companies now keep innovating and designing all their strategies keeping
the customer‟s ever changing needs and value requirements in mind because if you don‟t,
someone else surely will.

33. The Business Smartphone: Blackberry
The brand was officially launched in the year 1999 and made its presence felt in India by 2004. It
didn‟t find the need for advertising because it was a product which clearly satisfied a need.
During the time of its launch, the definition of a smart phone or web enabled phones was
unknown, thereby offering a solution to stay connected while travel. Suiting the business
environment, the product was almost immediately absorbed by Corporate India.
The year 2007 witnessed a huge paradigm shift in its product with Blackberry repositioning
itself. It was no longer a brand that was targeting the CEO's and high rank officials in the
business world but had set their sight on the Gen Next. This move made Blackberry come into
direct contention with big players such as Nokia and Motorola. When Blackberry started
business their devices never looked like phones, they were in fact pagers. The shape was
different and the instrument had a QWERTY keypad with its iconic Track Wheel + Click
feature. Slowly they emerged into the cell phone market. By doing so they have grabbed the
opportunity to make it big. The numbers speak for themselves as the sales increased considerably
due to the paradigm shift.

34. AVOIDING MARKETING MYOPIA
Over the past half century, markerters have given their advice on how to avoid Marketing
Myopia. They primarily focus on the fact that the customer is the most important element in
marketing and hence the sole focus should on them. The problem with this approach is that the
advice has been taken too seriously thus resulting in a new type of myopia, which may cause
deformation in strategic vision and could possibly lead to business failure.
The result of doing so would however lead to other consequences as listed below:
A single-minded focus on the customer could lead to the exclusion of other important
people in the organisation like the stakeholders.
Narrowly defining the customer‟s needs.
A failure to recognize the changed societal context of business that necessitates
addressing multiple stakeholders.
Thus having an extremely customer scopic view is not the solution to this marketing
syndrome.

35. The following are the measures which could be adopted to avoid or mitigate the problem:
Mapping the company‟s stakeholders to show who influences or should influence the
company and what issues most concern them.
Determining stakeholder salience.
Researching the stakeholder issue, their expectations and the measure impact.
Engage with stakeholders as they are also an integral part of the decision making process
and in most cases fund the particular programme.
Embedding a stakeholder‟s involvement.

36. Findings
1- Most of the industries are restricted in their thought process and implementation of their
future endeavours
2- The moral to be ascertained is that thinking unconventionally and differently is what is
the order of the day to drive any business
3- Things may not always go as planned, but built on the basis of logic; they definitely
provide the foundation to a thriving business in the long run.
4- The reason lies with the failure at the top management level where the decision making is
done.
5- Too much faith in multitude production and in the advantages of rapidly declining unit
costs as output rises;

37. CONCLUSION
Conclusion
To build an effective customer-oriented company entails much more than good intentions or
marketing gimmicks; it demands unfathomed matters of human organisation and leadership. A
company has to do whatever it takes to survive in the market. In addition, it should have the
ability to conform to the requirements of the market, and it needs to be done quick before it is too
late. Just survival can also not last forever hence the catch is to survive chivalrously, to feel the
heaving impulse of commercial supremacy; not just to experience the sweet smell of success, but
to have the intuitive feel of entreprenuerial greatness. In business, the followers are in most cases
the customers and in order to produce such customers, the entire organisation must be deemed as
a „customer-centric‟ and „customer-needs-fulfilling‟ organism. Management must have the
ideology of not just producing products but as providing customer creating value satisfactions. In
short, the organisation must learn to think that it is not in business only for producing goods or
services but as buying the customers, as a result doing the things that compels people want to do
business with it.

38. BIBLIOGRAPHY
1) Kotler, Philip, Marketing Management, Delhi: Pearson Education, 2012
2) Marketing Research – Naresh Malhotra
3) M a r k e t i n g M a n a g e m e n t - K o t l e r
Newspaper and magazines
Business World
Business Times
Business Today
Websites:
 www.incrediblecharts.com
 www.script.com
 www.wikipedia.com
 www.slideshare.com
 www.businessdictionary.com
 www.studyzone.com
 www.marketingmanagement.com