The McKinsey Quarterly

2010

• September 2010 

  Riding Asia’s digital tiger

  Asia is the world’s hottest area of Internet growth, but the dynamics on the ground vary widely by nation.

• July 2010 

  Capturing the world’s emerging middle class

  Multinational companies need new “scale at speed” approaches to penetrate the developing world’s increasingly prosperous consumer markets.

• June 2010 

  Unlocking the elusive potential of social networks

  To realize the marketing potential of virtual activities, you have to make them truly useful for consumers.

• May 2010 

  Three trends in business-to-business sales

  As attention shifts from how to survive to how to thrive, new trends are shaping the B2B universe.

• April 2010 

  A new way to measure word-of-mouth marketing

  Assessing its impact as well as its volume will help companies take better advantage of buzz.

  Includes:

• March 2010 

  Four ways to get more value from digital marketing

  Companies that make the deep strategic, organizational, and operational shifts required to become effective digital marketers can become more agile, more productive, and accelerate revenue growth.

• February 2010 

  A marketer’s guide to behavioral economics

  Marketers have been applying behavioral economics—often unknowingly—for years. A more systematic approach can unlock significant value.

2009

• October 2009 

  Building private-sector diplomacy

  Public-relations expert Richard Edelman explores the new landscape of corporate reputation and trust.

  Includes:

• June 2009 

  The consumer decision journey

  Consumers are moving outside the purchasing funnel—changing the way they research and buy your products. If your marketing hasn’t changed in response, it should.

  Includes:

• May 2009 

  Understanding online shoppers in Europe

  Shopping attitudes vary across Europe. Retailers must tailor their online offers to the needs of target segments.

• March 2009 

  Cutting sales costs, not revenues

  Courageous companies can use the downturn to make their sales operations not only less expensive but also more effective.

• March 2009 

  Measuring marketing: McKinsey Global Survey Results

  Marketing may be hard to measure, but many companies aren’t even using the tools available to them. However, some companies with a clearer understanding of their spending are planning to increase it, even in the current economic environment.

2008

• December 2008 

  The downturn’s new rules for marketers

  The old recession playbook won’t work this time around.

2007

• November 2007 

  Anticipating customer queries in call centers

  An effort to determine the value of specific kinds of customer inquiries shows how companies should decide which channels are best for dealing with each of them.

• November 2007 

  Serving aging baby boomers

  Baby boomers have rewritten the rules at every stage of their lives. They will rewrite the rules of retirement as well.

  Includes:

• August 2007 

  The evolving role of the CMO

  Many chief marketers still have narrowly defined roles that emphasize advertising, brand management, and market research. They will have to spread their wings.

• July 2007 

  Confronting proliferation ... in retail: An interview with Wal-Mart’s John Fleming

  The giant retailer’s chief merchandising officer explains why and how it is trying to reach a wider range of consumers than it has in the past.

• March 2007 

  Selling to 'mom-and-pop' stores in emerging markets

  Traditional shops and the companies that serve them are finding life harder and harder. For the suppliers, segmented execution is the answer.

2006

• November 2006 

  A call center's last line of defense

  All save desks are not created equal: the best help companies to cut their churn rates, become more profitable, and even develop new products.

• November 2006 

  A grassroots approach to emerging-market consumers

  By tapping into local networks, companies can serve low-income markets profitably, delivering significant value to shareholders while creating the essential market infrastructure for economic development in the neediest communities.

• November 2006 

  Escaping the middle-market trap: An interview with the CEO of Electrolux

  Hans Stråberg discusses the challenges of serving both the high and low ends of the market successfully.

• August 2006 

  Connecting CRM systems for better customer service

  Few companies gracefully pass sales leads and service information across the barriers of departments and business units. But those that do enjoy substantial rewards.

• August 2006 

  Managing your business as if customer segments matter

  As customers' needs fragment, marketers must develop common, actionable segmentations and integrate segment-level goals into planning and performance-management processes.

  Includes:

• June 2006 

  Lessons from a global retailer: An interview with the president of Carrefour China

  Jean-Luc Chéreau discusses the French company's experiences as its hypermarkets spread out from China’s biggest cities to the vast hinterland.

• June 2006 

  Profiting from Proliferation

  An explosion of new customer segments, sales and service channels, media, and brands is challenging marketers to reinvent themselves so they can simultaneously prioritize opportunities in a more sophisticated way and increase the consistency and coordination of their marketing execution.

  Includes:

• June 2006 

  Shaping China’s home-improvement market: An interview with B&Q’s CEO for Asia

  Steve Gilman says that because Chinese consumers are changing so quickly, retailers must change quickly to keep up with them.

• June 2006 

  The new Chinese consumer

  The emergence of an enormous middle class signals a seismic shift in the global market.

• May 2006 

  Using call centers to boost revenue

  Many companies can turn their inbound call centers into powerful engines for growth.

• March 2006 

  Using IT to boost call-center performance

  Call centers, making targeted improvements involving more cost-effective technologies, are finally saving money and improving revenues with IT.

2005

• September 2005 

  Winning the Indian consumer

  Multinationals that successfully adapt their products to India's largely untapped market will have the advantage.

• May 2005 

  Boosting returns on marketing investment

  Rules of thumb from the 1960s and '70s are losing their effectiveness. A more rigorous approach is required—one that treats marketing expenditures as investments.

  Includes:

• April 2005 

  Getting more from call centers

  Used properly, they can be strategic assets.

  Includes:

• February 2005 

  Profiting from spare parts

  Some aftermarket parts businesses lack the resources they need to raise their profitability and fend off low-priced competitors. Others have these resources without knowing it.

• January 2005 

  Dwindling readership: Are tabloids the answer?

  They can be, but only if newspapers first work out—and mitigate—the risks.

2004

• November 2004 

  A new model for marketing

  The proliferation of brands and channels is forcing companies to restructure their marketing efforts significantly.

• November 2004 

  Making brand portfolios work

  Brands are proliferating rapidly. Companies must now bring them under control.

• September 2004 

  Better rewards for hotel loyalty

  How to stop hotel customers from sleeping around.

• August 2004 

  Bringing science to sales

  By integrating systems in order to generate transaction-level costs and revenues, companies can determine where to focus their sales efforts.

• August 2004 

  Organizing for CRM

  Companies should treat a customer-relationship-management solution as a product or service and its users as internal customers—by making it valuable, pricing appropriately, advertising, and providing after-sales support.

• July 2004 

  Playing to win in the business of sports

  The pressure is on. Making money—not just popularity—is the name of the game.

• February 2004 

  When your competitor delivers more for less

  Value players will probably challenge your company. How will you respond?

2003

• November 2003 

  Better branding

  Marketers rely too much on intuition. The key to building brands more scientifically is to combine a forward-looking market segmentation with a better understanding of customers and a brand’s identity.

• November 2003 

  Going the distance with telecom customers

  Carriers can increase their profits—by getting more value from existing customers and being more selective about new ones.

• August 2003 

  Alliances in consumer goods

  Consumer-packaged-goods companies are turning to a range of alliance opportunities to achieve growth.

• August 2003 

  Solving the solutions problem

  Companies can earn higher margins or increased revenues by selling integrated offerings—if they don’t merely bundle their products.

• May 2003 

  Gambling on customers

  Gary Loveman, the man who brought the customer service revolution to gaming, explains how he helped double Harrah’s revenues and earnings.

• February 2003 

  Spotlight on the sales force

  A survey of consumer goods companies shows that top performers raised their prices and their market shares at the same time.

2002

• May 2002 

  Customer retention is not enough

  Defecting customers are far less of a problem than customers who change their buying patterns. New ways of understanding these changes can unlock the power of loyalty.

2000

• November 2000 

  The price of loyalty

  Do you know if your loyalty program is working?

• May 2000 

  Stop wasting promotional money

  Manufacturers pay little attention to trade spending—the payments they make to retailers to encourage promotion—but proper management of these expenditures can increase a company’s return on sales by two percentage points.

1999

• November 1999 

  Marketing in 3-D

  Functional, process, and relationship benefits are the hat trick of contemporary marketing. To score, follow three rules.

• August 1999 

  A segmentation you can act on

  Value-based segments usually don’t fit neatly into demographic ones. Some solutions step around the problem; others meet it head on.

1998

• August 1998 

  A new way to reach small businesses

  Continuous relationship marketing (CRM) is widely used in business-to-consumer marketing, but more large companies should apply the technique to small businesses, which often represent their most profitable customers.

• August 1998 

  Marketing to the Hispanic consumer

  Step one: find your language. Then recognize the "acculturated" segment. The best marketers create a bond through their products.

1997

• February 1997 

  European category management: Look before you leap

  In public, European consumer goods manufacturers have embraced joint category management, the theory that they can benefit consumers and themselves by cooperating with retailers to manage product categories as strategic business units. But in private, many are skeptical.

1996

• May 1996 

  Nestlé: The visions of local managers

  Peter Brabeck-Letmathe, then (1996) Nestlé’s CEO-elect, talks about his long-term views on globalization. And chocolate.

1995

• November 1995 

  Partners

  Teaming up with suppliers was just a first step. Customers and channels can be partners too, even competitors. Focus on creating revenue. Marketing’s fifth “P” is a direct link to strategy.

• August 1995 

  Can marketing regain the personal touch?

  “Continuous relationships” with customers can, in fact, be achieved. Classical marketing skills, not expensive IT and neural networks, are what’s needed. Pilots, skunkworks, and pragmatism. Avoiding electronic green stamps.

• May 1995 

  Increasing the value of product development

  Companies can improve the way they develop and commercialize new products and processes with the help of a new diagnostic tool that enables senior management to link value drivers with the creation of shareholder value.

1994

• August 1994 

  Does advertising work?

  Hands-on advice for getting an essential, value-added conversation back on track.

1993

• November 1993 

  Making profits after the sale

  In their search for new sources of growth, industrial firms often overlook attractive opportunities very near to home.