Richard Gee Presents....
Book Reviews:
BOOK REVIEW IN
NZ BUSINESS
OCTOBER 2005 ISSUE
Unraveling
the mysteries of marketing
If you’ve had a long question mark hanging over your marketing abilities and
knowledge, now there is a book that can answer all your questions and show
you how to successfully apply marketing practices, like a professional.
Richard P Gee’s Practical Marketing in New Zealand could well become the
marketing ‘how-to-bible’ for business owners and managers. It’s a big book
that will teach you what marketing is - the rules and the principles. It
will show you how to design, perform and analyse research; how to segment a
target market; how to set prices and promotions; how to advertise
successfully; how to write a strategic marketing plan; and how to market
internationally.
Practical Marketing in New Zealand also teaches how to integrate sales and
customer service, and gets you up to speed on legislation affecting
marketers.
It’s written by a man who has become an icon in the marketing industry – Gee
has been a marketing consultant since 1979, and is a great contributor to
the success of companies, organizations and individuals around the world.
RRP $90 – published by Richard P Gee –
www.geewiz.co.nz
NZBusiness has a copy to Practical Marketing in New Zealand to give away to
a deserving reader. Email
editor@nzbusiness.co.nz to go in the
draw!
Book Review
Prize Book on Marketing in New Zealand.
Practical Marketing in New Zealand
By: Richard P Gee
Publisher: Richard P Gee
ISBN 0-473-10096-7
RRP $90.
Review:
Mary MacKinven, editor, Business to Business
This is a heft tome, running at 647 pages plus a useful “Index.
Abbreviations and Glossary” section.
Daunting though it initially appears, this soft cover book is so
attractively laid out I wasn’t deterred.
The subject of marketing is divided into 15 logical and comprehensive
chapters starting with the Principles of Marketing and finishing with
International Marketing.
Furthermore, lots of sub headings and check lists break the text into
manageable and meaningful “read bites”.
This book feels good and true to promise, is informative and practical, with
a very Kiwi flavour: Gee acknowledges his allNew Zealand production team and
New Zealand marketing managers for their skilful ability to mulit-task and
handle many strategic demands.
His examples of success are Kiwi companies which have generated competitive
advantages from their marketing activities, even though he speaks in 22
countries and has feedback from throughout the world.
This book could become a tertiary students’ textbook or a guide and
inspiration tool to the practicing marketer, or for a person who just needs
to understand the issues.
This 2005 version updates the original 2000 book and is Gee’s fifth
published title.
Goodness knows how he finds the time – what with owning his own businesses
in consulting, training, and speaking, importing, packaging distribution,
manufacturing, services, logistics, leisure, property development and
exporting, and he is a director of a number of private companies. Plus he
has retained a family and hobbies.
Highly recommended.
We have one copy of Practical Marketing in New Zealand to give away. To
enter the draw to win the book, please send your name, position in company,
postal address and phone number to Business to Business P O Box 259 243,
Greenmount, Auckland 1730 or fax 271 8073 or email book@btb.co.nz by
September 23. The winner will be drawn and notified
Practical Marketing in New Zealand
Richard P Gee
Reviewed by JenniferCampion
Marketing
students, this is your book. For the rest of us, well, it is a big book. 900
pages in total. Yes, Harry Potter was big, and yes, you read it. But unlike
Harry Potter, this book is big without containing any adventure or
compelling characters. You will not complete this book in one sitting. You
will not want to. But you will learn a lot about marketing, and for anyone
interested in sales pitches, I highly recommend it. This book is about the
strategies underlying marketing through which you might make a success of
yourself as an advertiser of your product.
It's well-written and easy to read. Jargon is minimal and understanding
maximised. Yes, buzz words appear, but these are explained (and in so doing
the science of marketing becomes clear), and they do not seem anything other
than suitable in this context. There are 15 chapters each dealing with an
aspect of marketing, for example "strategic marketing" and "marketing and
the law". As a non-marketing student, I found the strategic thinking
underpinning every aspect of the process fascinating: anything that seems
spontaneous is you will discover, stage managed. It is acting of the best
kind: acting that does not seem so.
The author, Richard Gee, offers email consultation, making this a truly
interactive learning experience. He wants his book to help you be
successful. To his credit, just from reading his book you should learn how
to be.
The book is interesting. However, "interesting" needs to be pretty
spectacular to get you to part with your hard earned cash. Worth it? If you
have a future in marketing, be it as a small business or part of a large
firm, then you should definitely get yourself a copy. Reading this book is
investing in your future.
PUBLICATION: BMT NTH
WRITER: KAREN
WORD COUNT: 600
SLUG: PRACTICAL MARKETING
It’s
a big book. A real big book. Richard P Gee’s Practical Marketing in New
Zealand is for business people that take their marketing seriously enough to
sit down and read 647 pages. But if they do they probably won’t be
disappointed.
By the end of the book the author promises the reader will be able to
answer the questions every organisation wants to know: Where are we now?
Where do we want to be? How are we getting there?
Practical Marketing in New Zealand is great for beginners taking people
through the basics (even defining what marketing actually is) through to
practical applications. Even for those well versed in marketing already
there is bound to be something new to learn. Checklists at the end of each
chapter allow the reader to assess what has just been learned and apply the
strategies to their own business.
On the cover a photograph of Gee makes him look like some sort of
marketing evangelist. Gee touts himself as “New Zealand’s first interactive
author” and invites readers to email him with questions and feedback about
the book. The blurb says Gee has lectured at AIT/AUT in sales and marketing
for the past 22 years, has his own consulting and training business, acts as
director for several privately owned companies and is currently president of
the Sales and Marketing Institute of New Zealand. The main advantage of all
this is because the book has been written by a New Zealander it is very
applicable to our market. There are also many Kiwi marketing success stories
to glean tips from.
Everything is covered from how to undertake market research (complete
with sample questionnaires and how to analyse results) through to how to
generate ideas for new product development and strategies when sales are
declining. Want to know how to increase the appeal of your products?
Apparently colour has a lot to do with it – consumers identify red as ‘hot’
prices and associate blue with expensive goods.
Branding is another important sometimes overlooked area of marketing, which
can mean the difference between success and failure. Gee suggests brand
names should be short, snappy and easy to remember and spell. Some of this
is basic stuff maybe but sometimes it can be a case of Keep It Simple Stupid
when it comes to marketing.
There is also a section devoted to the difference between marketing
products and services. Gee points out that because services can’t be seen by
the consumer that this can make the marketing of them more challenging.
Building relationships and letting customers see what they can get (ie. by
offering free appraisals) is the key.
Because at the end of the day marketing is all about selling there are
also chapters on how to manage sales teams, customers service and
telemarketing. You’ll be bound to recognise at least on of the types of
salespeople classified by Gee with interesting names such as Farmer, Hunter
and Missionary.
Legal matters are covered with a chapter on New Zealand law and there are
sections on international marketing strategies useful for exporters. The
book also explores some of the newer marketing opportunities available such
as e -commerce and text message marketing.
And just in case you forgot how ruthless the world of marketing can be
there are also strategies for defending market share with names such as
Frontal Attack, Guerilla Attack and Pre-emptive Defence.
Practical Marketing in New Zealand by Richard P Gee. RRP $90.00,
available on Gee’s website
www.geewiz.co.nz
SEMINARS