Analysis of marketing institutions and infrastructure

¶ … Marketing Institutions and Infrastructure

Brazil has been in the last decades an ever growing market for almost any product. The development of the internal markets, increased consumption and an increase in the population's purchasing power meant that more and more new products penetrated the market and diversified the existing supply. However, penetrating such a market, as well as consolidating one's position on the market is usually a difficult endeavor. Brazil is an immense market, both in terms of the size of the population (which implies diverse consumer preferences and the formation of a large number of niches) and geographically. From this perspective, the marketing and sales activity is difficult.

This explains the apparition and consolidation of a number of marketing institutions whose purpose is to facilitate the interaction between the marketers, as well as to provide guidance and support for them in their activity across the country. As facilitators, these marketing institutions' activities range from gathering information to disseminating with its members.

One of the most important one is the Brazilian Association of Direct Marketing - ABEMD. Founded in 1976 as a not-for-profit civil entity, the association grouped together entities that specialized in direct marketing, but also those who were interested in finding out more about how direct marketing functions in Brazil and about the ways direct marketing can be best applied to obtain the best results. The mission of the association, according to the website, includes "the purpose to incentive, value, develop and promote the Direct Marketing in Brazil."

As previously mentioned, the association proposes for itself a number of eleven purposes, group around informing its members, promoting technical and informational exchanges and helping the members' images with regulating institutions, as well as with the public opinion, in what direct marketing is concerned. Further more, through instruments such as newsletters and monthly publications, the association is better able to distribute existing information in its field to the association's members. The industrial segments represented in ABEMD include Agency Houses, Customer Relationship Management (CRM)/Database Marketing, E-Commerce/Internet, Mailing Lists, Logistics and Telemarketing/Contact Centers.

The organizational infrastructure of ABEMD is representative for other similar marketing institutions in Brazil as well. The Board of Directors (referred to here as an administrative council) is led and coordinated by a president (in this case, Paolo Vasconcelos) and a vicepresident (Fernando Cirne), as well as a number of members and a smaller financial/fiscal council. At the same time, for operational purposes, the association is led by a CEO and several executives in charge with particular segments of the association's activities: database and customers relations management, financial, logistics etc.

In a similar manner and with common purpose is the Brazilian Association for Teleservices (Associacao Brasileira de Telesservicios), except that this is concentrated most notably on this particular type of marketing services (teleservices and telemarketing). The area of activity is in fact vast and covers any telemedia, including thus call centers etc. The association was created 19 years ago, in 1989, and has grown tremendously in number of members in these years. In a similar manner to the ABEMD, the company aims to both disseminate information and provide guidance and help for its members, as well as a framework where information and experience can be shared between the members. In terms of instrument, an important one is the magazine that the association publishes, the Chamada Geral.

An important and original direction for the ABT is its association with NGOs, which can be instrumental in carrying the message across to both the associated partners and the other entities with which the members interact.