The business environment is highly dynamic. Sudden and unaticipated changes may take place in the business environment , such as the change in government policies, advent of new technology, socio-cultural changes, entry of new competitors, etc. It is crucial for a company to modify its business plans depending upon the enviornmental changes and harness the new oppurtunities thrown by the changes. This help the company to gain competative advantage.

The 'Marketing' function enables an organisation to understand the changes in the external and internal enviornment of the organisation, identify the gap between customer needs and current market offerings and take competative advantage of such oppurtunities for fulfilling customer needs in a better way. the process that the marketing function uses to do all of this can be explained with the help of the CAMMIS process model.

CAMMIS systematizes marketing activities to ensure that marketers can take advantage of the changing business enviornment and deliver value and benefits to the customer as well as to ensure profits for the organisation. It helps a company bring marketing activities in line with the corporate mission, vision and objectives. Corporate mission defines what the business of a company is. Corporate vision defines what a company plans to be in future. Corporate objectives are mesurable well-defined goals derived from the corporate mission. Based on the corporate objectives, marketers of a company formulate the marketing strategy and plans.

CAMMIS enables marketers to:

1. Identify and understand changing customer needs and wants.

2. Conceive ideas for new products or improve existing products to meet the changing needs and wants.

3. Analyse the feasibility of the concept or idea through research and analysis of current market oppurtunities.

4. For the most feasible and profitable concept, develop and implement marketing strategy. The strategy involves creating a blue print for developing, promoting, pricing and placing the product.

5. Develop and test the prototype of the product in actual market conditions as a measure to test the feasibility of the product.

6. Distribute the product after the successful completion of prototype testing in such a way that the goods reach the customer in time.

7. Create awareness about the products and sell them to the target customers.

8. Gather feedback, both qualitative and quantitative, to be able to analyse the reasons for success or failure of the product. This feedback helps to implement best practices and repeat success.

So, in this manner, CAMMIS helps an organisation to satisfy customer needs profitably and establish a long term and satisfying relationship with the customers.

Stages in CAMMIS

Stage 1: Concept Development for a New/Improved Product

The marketing activities are commonly uderstood as creating promotion material such as advertisements etc. However, in real life scenario, they begin much before creating long before the produced is produced by the company. The process starts with the organisation identifying the need for a new product concept or for the modification of the existing ones. The need is usually expressed in terms of a gap between the customer's needs and wants and the current product offerings in the market.

The most common indicators of such a need for a new product or change in the existing product are the sales figures in the case of existing products. Sometimes, organisations also get to know about such needs through surveys targeted at target customers and employees.

As soon as the need is identified, the organisation decides to come up with ideas/concept that will address the changing customer needs better than the competitors. New concept may come from the brand management team, research and design depertment, competitor's moves, sales people, corporate spies, etc. Various systematic methods are also used to arrive at new idea, such as brainstorming techniques, expert opinions, market surveys, customer surveys, etc.

All these enable a company to understand what people want. Now, among the various ideas generated, a firms narrows down to only those idea(s) that:

• Offer comprehensive benefit(s) to customers.
• Are feasible to be manufactured technically.
• When developed into a product and delivered to the customer at the target price, will reap profits for the company.

So, at the end of this stage, an organisation gets a few concept(s)/idea(s) than can be developed profitably.

Stage 2: Analysis of Market Oppurtunity

Once a concept/idea has been finalize, it is essential to analyse the environmental factor to assess if the concept/idea will succeed in the current business environment. The objective of the "Analysis of Market Oppurtunity" stage is to study the business enviornment and analyse what kind of oppurtunities exist for the new idea/concept.

Environmental analysis includes:

• analysis of the external environment (political, legal, social and cultural environment of a market) that broadly affects many firms.
• analysis of the internal environment of the firm (the company itself, its customers, the competitors and the collaborators).
• analysis of past, present and future aspects of company's market approach to understand how the situation has evolved to its present state and what kind of oppurtunities exist in the present as well as in the future for the concept

At the end of this stage, a firm is able to identify its strengths that can be utilised, the weaknesses that need to be taken care of, the oppurtunities existing in the market for the product and the threats existing in the market due to competition. This also helps the marketer decide major aspects related to marketing strategy, which will help the marketer in the next stage.

Stage 3: Marketing Strategy Design

Once the market oppurtunities have been identified, the next step is to design the strategy to be used to harness the identified oppurtunities by utilising the strengths of the company.

The objective of the "Marketing Strategy Design" stage is to develop a preliminary strategy plan for bringingthe product in to the market. It involves segmenting the entire market into logical segments, choosing the most profitable segment and positioning the new/improved product accordingly. When segmenting the market, the company divides heterogeneous groups into homogeneous smaller groups based on age, sex, likes and dislikes or economic conditions. from these homogeneous groups, it select the target groups of users who will be most receptive to the product and benefits the most from it. The firm, then, positions the product for the target customers in a waythat will attract their attention and meet their needs in a better way than the competitors.

Once the marketing strategy is defined,the next step is to decide the marketing mix elements for the chosen product concept. This includes deciding the product features, its price, how the product will reach the target customers (place) and how awareness will be created among the masses (promotion).

At the end of this stage, a detailed marketing plan for the new/improved product is prepared. a marketing plan consolidates everything done till now and lists all the activities that will help to achieve the marketing objectives of the company.

A marketing plan provides the following information:

• Brief product description

Product features

Benefits and value it will offer to the customers

Sales goals to be achieved through the product

Overall organistional goals to be achieved through the

product

• Company analysis report

Business goal of the company

Strengths and weaknesses of the company

Market share of the company

• Customer analysis report

Number and types of customers

Likes and preferences of customers

How do the target customers make purchase decisions

(What to buy, when to buy, where to buy from and how

to pay for the purchases)

• Competitor analysis report

The position of the competitors in the market

Strengths and weaknesses of the competitors

Share of the market held by the competitors

• Environmental analysis report

Oppurtunities existing in the market that can be

tapped

Threats existing in the market for which the company

needs to be prepared

• Market segmentation description
  
  Target customer to serve
  
  Their likes and preferences

Their values and beliefs

Their interest in the product

• Marketing strategy and the marketing mix to be used

Ways to offer maximun value to target customers

Methods of positioning the product in the minds of

target customers

The product features and benefits

Best price of the product

Best way to reach the product to target customer

Suitable promotional methods for maximum response

from target customers

• Short and long-term projections
  
  Forecast of revenues and expenses for coming years.

Stage4: Market Testing

Now, the product/service prototype is ready to be test launched in the market. The objective of the "Market Testing" stage is to assess the objective fulfillment and profitability of the new/improved product concept in the target market by doing a pilot test (on a small scale) of the product prototype in the target market.

The product is tested in typical usage situations. Target customers are interviewed to know their reactions and responses to the product prototype. Necessary adjustments are made to the marketing variables (product, place, price, promotion) and the overall marketing strategy(if required) based on customer responses and the product is prepared for a full scale implementation or commercialisation.

Many techniques can be used in market testing of a product like simulations, sales wave, controlled testing, and Alpha and Beta testing. A company modifies its marketing plan based on the feedback received from the market and decides to launch the product in the market accordingly.

Stage 5: Implementation

Successful market testing of a product leads to this stage where the product is launched in full scale in the target market.

In this stage, resources are estimated, how the product will be manufactured is planned, suppliers are selected, logistics is planned, and contingency plans are designed. Finally, the product is launched in the market, advertisements and promotions are placed and distribution channels are filled with the product.

After the large scale launch, the result of the marketing effort are monitored closely to assess whether the organisational objectives are being fulfilled or no. There may be a need to modify the marketing plan as per the changes in the market situation. For significant changes, a product redesign or an entirely new product may be required. Continual monitoring and adaptation is needed to fulfil customer needs consistently over the long term.

At the end of the "Implementation" stage, the product is available in the market and the target customers are aware of its presence.

Stage 6: Selling

Marketing sets the ground for selling the product to the target customers. With the launch of the product, the selling process starts.

The objectives of the " Selling" stage is to identify the prospects and sell the products to them.

The sales force interacts directly with the customers. So, they know and understand the market scenario and customer needs and responses well. The sales depertment of a firm provides input to the marketing depertment regarding the customer responses, their needs, changing market needs, competittion and so on.

At the end of this stage, through the product that is sold to the target customers, company captures value in terms of profits and sales.