Marketing is changing fundamentally, taking on a steering role in modern companies toward customer and market orientation. Successful companies have recognized that marketing belongs on the CEO agenda. The "Swiss Marketing Leadership Study 2015" by the ZHAW School of Management and Law (SML) shows the influence that the understanding of marketing has on the performance of companies.

Marketing is a management task

Owners, managing directors, marketing, CRM or product marketing managers from 525 Swiss companies of various industries and sizes took part in the study. The companies were divided into top, silver and underperformers based on their performance. 41 percent of the top performers give marketing a strategic weighting within the company - much more frequently than among silver and underperformers.

The significant differences show the impact that the importance of marketing has on the performance of companies. For example, customer satisfaction is the top corporate goal for almost two-thirds of those surveyed - even ahead of quality and profit targets. Although this claim can be seen in the specific goals and measures, it is often not consistently implemented. For example, only just under one-third of respondents go so far as to pay attention to customer orientation when selecting new employees.

Relationship management stands and falls with data quality

Customer relationship management (CRM) and product management are included in the study as important success factors for customer satisfaction. Almost half of the companies surveyed measure their success on the basis of customer satisfaction, while around a third of the companies surveyed do not measure CRM success at all. The respondents named data quality as the greatest strength, but also as the most frequent source of problems in the area of CRM. The success of a CRM project depends directly on this. Without support from top management, however, relationship management is doomed to failure from the outset.

Major weakness market research

In product management, too, the most important trends are the implementation of customer orientation and anchoring within the company. 34.8 percent of the companies surveyed have placed product management at management level. The clear differences between top and underperformers speak clearly for more marketing leadership in product management. Around three quarters of respondents identified market research as the greatest weakness of product management.

Background and details

The "Swiss Marketing Leadership Study" is a merger of the two proven study formats "Swiss CRM" and "Swiss Product Management" and will be published for the first time in 2015. For this purpose, the Institute for Marketing Management at SML randomly selected 2910 medium and large companies, of which 525 completed the questionnaire. The study is available for download free of charge (PDF link).
 

Sunrise announced on Monday that it will launch a UHD-capable TV reception box in the first quarter. The number of UHD TV channels has not yet been determined, Sunrise spokesman Roger Schaller told news agency SDA in response to an inquiry. As with the switch from standard definition to HD TV, there will be more and more channels with the new technology over time, he added. For comparison: Of Sunrise's 230 TV channels, more than 80 are now broadcast in HD.

Home theater

"Consumers want to bring the cinema home," Dirk Wierzbitzki, the head of Swisscom's fixed network business for residential customers, told the media in Zurich on Tuesday. For this, he said, UHD TV is needed. That's because flat screens have been getting bigger since their introduction, he said. "However, the picture quality has not kept pace with the increasingly larger screens," Wierzbitzki said. The same number of pixels, he said, is being stretched over an ever-larger area. As a result, the individual pixels become larger, and image sharpness suffers. This is where UHD comes in, which has four times as many pixels as an HD TV picture. In addition, the new HDR (High-Dynamic-Resolution) technology greatly expands the contrast between black and white and increases the color variety. TVs equipped with HDR can display eight times more colors and have five times the brightness. This makes the good old
"matte disc" finally becomes a glossy disc.

Data mountain

The downside to the brave, shiny new world of television is the amount of data that has to be transmitted. While an HD channel today requires a bandwidth of 9 megabits per second (Mbit/s), a UHD channel requires 25 to 30 Mbit/s. Initially, about two-thirds of households on the Swisscom network should be able to receive UHD TV, Wierzbitzki said. Swisscom plans to launch the new TV world next spring, he said, when the UHD-enabled reception box is launched. Initially, feature films, documentaries and series would be offered on demand in the high resolution. Starting with the next season 2016/17, one to two matches per round of the highest Swiss soccer league will also be broadcast in UHD. In addition, the intention is to broadcast selected matches from the Euro2016 European Championship where possible. Whether Swiss ice hockey games will also be shown in UHD is still being considered, said Wierzbitzki.

Overtake UPC Cablecom

At the beginning, he expects Swisscom to be able to offer about a dozen UHD TV channels. However, these tend to be niche channels and not the major broadcasters such as SRG or ARD. "In addition, we are discussing with Sky the acquisition of Bundesliga soccer matches in UHD," Wierzbitzki said. Swisscom's clear goal is to become the largest Swiss TV provider by the first quarter and overtake current market leader UPC Cablecom, said private customer boss Marc Werner. For its part, UPC Cablecom kept mum on UHD TV. "We can't say anything concrete at the moment," said spokesman Bernard Strapp.(SDA)

The large chamber thus remains in line with the Federal Council. The majority emphasized that the financial situation was uncomfortable and did not allow for any further additional expenditure - especially as Switzerland Tourism lacked a clear strategy. It was incomprehensible that the Council of States was now throwing millions around, criticized Thomas Maier (GLP/ZH). A minority argued that the tourism industry was particularly hard hit by the strong franc. Markus Ritter (CVP/SG) called for concrete measures and no more lip service. In the end, the minority motion failed by 103 votes to 78 with 8 abstentions. The Council of States had voted in favor of increasing the tourism promotion budget by CHF 9.5 million per year (Werbewoche.ch reported).

Administrative relief

The Councils also disagree on other credits for the promotion of business locations. The National Council wants to leave the amount for the promotion of e-government at CHF 5.3 million to CHF 12.4 million - against the wishes of the Federal Council and the Council of States. The decision was made by 94 votes to 92 with one abstention. Among other things, the money is intended to reduce the administrative burden on SMEs by enabling them to process administrative procedures at federal, cantonal and communal level via a portal.

More money for export promotion

In contrast, the National Council followed the line of the Council of States with regard to the payment framework for export promotion. It decided to increase the amount by CHF 4.4 million to CHF 94 million by a casting vote of the President of the Council. In the National Council's version, the package thus amounts to CHF 373 million. It also includes the promotion of innovation and cooperation in tourism, the extension of the additional loan for the Hotelkredit company and the promotion of information about Switzerland as a business location. The Federal Council had requested CHF 374 million for the promotion of Switzerland as a business location. This is 58 million more than in the previous period. Even then, Parliament increased the loans.

New regional policy

The bill also includes the second multi-year program of the New Regional Policy 2016 to 2023, for which the Federal Council has earmarked CHF 230 million. On Tuesday, the National Council maintained its commitment to promoting sustainable innovation in the implementation of the new regional policy. The federal government is using the program to support mountain regions, rural areas and border regions in coping with structural change. The matter will now return to the Council of States. (SDA/hae)

The video, in which eight Basel drummers - including active and former members of the famous Top Secret Drum Corps from Basel - transform an Ikea kitchen into a band room, was viewed over 200,000 times after just a few days and without being promoted in any way, shared 5,000 times and has already reached over one million users. "We were sure that people would like our kitchen concert; but that it would be so well received is something we didn't expect ourselves," says Annelies Bühler of Ikea Switzerland.

The 70-second film was composed and produced by sound designer and producer Roman Huber, himself a former member of the Top Secret Drum Corps. The clip was shot during ongoing operations at the Ikea furniture store in Pratteln. Dynamic Frame was responsible for the production. Since the end of August, the film can be seen on all social media channels of Ikea and Wirz.

Responsible at Ikea Switzerland: Mikael Pilblad (Marketing Manager Switzerland), Katrin Polzer (External Communication Manager), Annelies Bühler (Project Leader Campaign). Responsible at Wirz: Livio Dainese, Fernando Perez (ECD), Caspar Heuss, Michael Schmidt (CD), Petra Dreyfus, Yves Rückert, Livia Wanner, Johannes Schulmeister (consulting), Bettina Faessler (art buying), Roman Huber (composition), Dynamic Frame (film production).

Christoph Brand, Head of Digital at Tamedia, in a statement: "We want to specifically promote growth in the marketplace at Ricardo.ch with a focusing strategy. In recent years, the Ricardo Group has invested a lot in building up the new business segments Autoricardo.ch and OLX.ch. With the acquisition by Tamedia, we can now build on this and exploit synergies with Tutti.ch, Car4you.ch and the Tamedia media. Our offering thus gains even more reach and clout."

Tutti.ch's position in German-speaking Switzerland and Ticino is to be expanded through the merger with OLX.ch. OLX, as the international classifieds brand of the former owner Naspers, will disappear from the market in the course of 2016. The management of the merged classifieds business will be taken over by Francesco Vass, who has already managed Tutti.ch. Oliver Schibli, CEO responsible for building and expanding OLX.ch since 2012, will leave the company to pursue a new career.

Through the Integration of Car4you.ch into the Ricardo Group and the resulting close cooperation between Autoricardo.ch and Car4you.ch will create a second strong vehicle platform in Switzerland. The management of the vehicle market with the two brands Autoricardo.ch and Car4you.ch will be taken over by Marcel Stocker, responsible for the vehicle business of Ricardo.ch since 2008 and Managing Director of Autoricardo.ch since 2012. Myriam Reinle, who took over the management of Car4you.ch in 2011 and successfully expanded the platform, will leave the company at the end of October to pursue a new career.

Christian Kunz will hand over the operational management of the Ricardo Group at his own request in the course of the coming year, as soon as his successor has been settled. Christian Kunz joined the Ricardo Group in 2012 from Ebay International and has been instrumental in the successful development of the Group in recent years. Christian Kunz joins the Board of Directors of Ricardo.ch, where he will continue to contribute his broad experience to the further development of the leading Swiss online marketplace.

The new organization is expected to result in the elimination of a maximum of 15 jobs. The affected employees will be offered another job within the media group if possible. Tamedia had announced the takeover of the Ricardo Group from the South African media group Naspers in February 2015, and had subsequently Approval of the Competition Commission completed on September 8.

On the one hand, the current image campaign is being continued with a new motif. On the other hand, the club's website has been refreshed and the official SCB app has been completely revised and relaunched with the "SCB Super Fan" competition.

The current image campaign is being continued with a new motif - again reduced to the gesture of a bear's paw. After the campaign hashtag #bärnrockt was introduced in the first visual with a rock gesture, the public is now invited to wake up from their summer slumber with an index finger. The campaign will be used as an advertisement and in all SCB internal channels and will be supplemented by a further motif over the course of the season.

The SCB fan is now also holding the new, official SCB app in his paw. During the summer break, this was completely revised by the Bern-based creative agency in collaboration with the Swiss Ice Hockey Federation and swiss smart media gmbh. It is designed not only to provide real-time information, background information and networking as before, but now also entertainment. It does this with the in-app game "SCB Super Fan". In this game, Mutzen fans play for their own title and valuable prizes in several varied rounds throughout the season. The app topped the download charts in the sports category on the very first day. A refresh of the SCB website and the design of fan materials such as team posters, autograph cards and various measures in and around the stadium complete the agency's activities for SC Bern.

Responsible at SC Bern: Marc Weber (Chief Marketing Officer), Nicole Giroud (Head of Marketing Events & Services). Responsible at Republica: Chris Morgan (creative direction), Andreas Szentkuti/Lando Pföst (text), Gary Jude (composing artist), Nadia Jost/Franziska Binz/Aline Windler (graphic and web design), Tom Wyss/Simon Stalder/Fabio Zahnd (consulting), Gutknecht-informatik.com / Swiss Smart Media (programming), Groci & Du Fresne (photography), Bala Trachsel (overall responsibility).
 

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