An activity that I have developed so that my university students acquire some basic concepts about marketing and that I have baptized as "The technique of the automobile factory", consists of the following:
At the beginning, I do not anticipate what the work session will be about. It seems to me that this is how I keep them expectant.
I ask them to form teams of between 4 and 6 people.
I provide each team about 10 or 15 sheets of paper, if I did not previously commission them to bring them to class. As an optional item, paper glue can be used.
Next I ask them to build paper cars improvising their own origami-like procedure. The important thing is that the members of each team agree on the final form that the car that will represent them will have.
That is, each team will devise a car model of which they will also have to build several paper units, between 3 and 5.
Likewise, I commissioned them to prepare a poster or promotional poster as a team where the car appears accompanied by a phrase or slogan, the price of the vehicle and the places of sale. Naturally, these last data are completely fictitious and it is not necessary that they follow any formal procedure for their development.
After approximately 30 or 40 minutes, when all the groups have concluded and cars and posters are visible, each representative in turn presents what their group has achieved. Thus, the task is concluded and a second stage of dialogue is passed on the activity carried out.
Then he asks if anyone has any idea what the class is about and what the previous activity was intended to show. The conversation is oriented around the requirements that any product or service must meet. In this sense, it must be specified that each of these must be accompanied by a price, a promotion and must also be distributed through channels that make it available to intermediaries and consumers.
Then it is formally exposed what the marketing activity consists of and what are its basic operations, that is, the 4Ps (product, price, promotion and place) also called marketing mix or marketing mix.
A separate mention should deserve market research as an inevitable step prior to the development of products and services. For this, it will be necessary to specify what is understood by market, by market segments and by market segmentation. These concepts and operations should be clear.
Likewise, it must be emphasized that marketing does not equal sales as some people believe. On the other hand, a distinction must be made between promotion and advertising, indicating that the former encompasses the latter and that it includes other activities such as exhibitions, offers, public relations, journalistic dissemination, sales, etc. Finally, a customer satisfaction measurement procedure should be recommended that will become a permanent driving force for our product and business.
I want to clarify, finally, that this activity is an auxiliary resource to introduce students or the public interested in some basic concepts of marketing. It is by no means an exhaustive or complete procedure for understanding such a vast field. It is simply intended to be an initial and motivating activity. If I can boast, if I may say so, that from this session my students come to class very enthusiastically and that since then they have avoided confusing marketing and promotion with other activities.
