What are the weaknesses of target marketing?

Answer 1

1. Junk Mail - By using direct mail, a company risks alienating the customers it seeks to gain. The use of direct mail is often associated with a company of lower status and quality.

2. Environmental Impact - Direct marketing typically involves the heavy use of physical components in order to give consumers an object they can hold in their hands. This physical side of direct marketing means that a greater amount of Natural Resources are consumed in their production as well as a greater amount of pollution.

3. Metrics - It is hard when using direct marketing to get any reliable metrics on its impact. Direct marketing involves a much longer-term strategy where the results are uncertain and the best that can be said is that it may be working. It is often very unclear whether direct marketing is alienating more customers than it is creating.

4. Time - It is hard to get as immediate of an impact when using direct marketing, as the advertising product, by its nature, takes time to reach consumers. Time is often equated with money in business, and the time ratio in direct marketing is a disadvantage.

5. Laws - The distribution of fliers and street advertising is often prohibited by law in certain areas. This is a major disadvantage of this form of direct marketing as certain customer bases will be unreachable. If a marketer wishes to reach customers, for instance, in a high-traffic and wealthy area, this may be impossible using direct marketing of this kind.

6. Limited Reach - There is an inherently limited geographic reach to direct marketing involving fliers and street advertising. By using this form of direct marketing, you will be limited to consumers in a very specific distribution area and will have to depend on word of mouth for others.

Answer 2

Direct marketing is the process of any marketing or promotional method that depends on direct communication or distribution to individual consumers without the use of an advertising middleman or a third party.

There are many advantages and disadvantages of direct marketing. Things you need to consider before starting a campaign are-

• Demand from consumers to end unsolicited contact from companies.
• Direct marketing can target many people who have no interest.
• General perception that telemarketing is rather intrusive
• Direct marketing is often uninvited.
• Direct marketing can often look very cluttered.
• Direct marketing often has very low response rates.
• Public cynicism and apathy towards junk mail
• Direct marketing takes up a lot of time.
• Higher initial costs than other traditional advertising methods
• Direct marketing can make negativity spread quickly.
• Direct marketing requires a lot of patience and consistency.
• Direct marketing always requires a warm market to begin

Answer 3

Direct marketing may sometimes lead to a quick spike in sales, but it has several disadvantages:

• Intrusiveness: Pinging users directly with texts, emails or social media messages can be seen as intrusive and, if continually pursued, can damage a company’s reputation.

• Lack of Effectiveness: The response rate is usually very low, which means it may not be worth the investment required to initiate the campaign in the first place.

• limited reach: Since direct marketing directly targets individuals or groups, it doesn’t have the all-encompassing reach of a radio, television, search engine or social media ad.

• Expensive: Direct marketing via email and SMS is very cost-effective, however, telemarketing and direct mail marketing incurs costs that can add up quickly, especially if the response rate is typically low.

• Boring: With the exception of direct mail, direct marketing mediums don’t leave much room for creativity, making for a plain vanilla presentation of the offer that’s unlikely to wow consumers beyond the discount itself.

Answer 4

Since marketing isn't an exact science, marketing representatives can get it wrong. If they get it wrong with target marketing, they can make isolate this group of people.