Bali Padda is the operations maverick behind LEGO's remarkable turnaround from a business basket-case, struggling to deliver on its orders, to the biggest and most profitable toy brand in the world.

As Chief Operations Officer at LEGO, Bali overhauled the toy company by shaking up its operations and instilling essential business fundamentals. He resolved issues across the supply chain and forged close partnerships between functions. He cut unpopular product lines and diverted the company's attention on hero items. He developed a relentless focus on customer service - of delivering what was promised - and he instituted weekly performance briefings known as the Visual Factory, which ultimately spread throughout the whole organization and transformed culture and performance. LEGO became the largest toy manufacturer in the world, and Bali was honoured with becoming the company's first non-Danish CEO in 2017.

In Deliver What You Promise, Bali distils his methodology at LEGO into ten essential, fundamental lessons. From how to reduce complexity to prizing reliability over agility. Why a business should be treated like a living organism and how to bring everyone together under a shared sense of purpose. On when to use soft and hard managerial skills and the hidden risks of success.

Illustrated by insider stories from LEGO, these are enduring principles that both young starters and established leaders alike need to know and can implement straight away, to deliver on what is promised.

In our interconnected world, mastering global branding is essential for success. International Brand Management is your comprehensive guide, covering key aspects of international branding to help you navigate the complex global marketplace.

Beginning with brand identity and positioning, the book emphasizes the importance of cultural sensitivity, market research, and strategic alignment in crafting a compelling brand narrative that resonates across diverse cultures. From there, it explores brand architecture, demonstrating how to manage complex brand portfolios while maintaining coherence and synergy.

Brand equity and its value chain are examined, providing insights into measuring brand equity and evaluating the impact of branding investments on financial performance and consumer perceptions. The text also covers brand communication strategies, showcasing how effective communication can amplify brand resonance and foster meaningful engagement with global audiences

Business-to-Business Marketing provides valuable insight into B2B marketing management, analysing B2B buying practises, supply chain management, selecting business customers and developing a B2B marketing strategy. It helps students and marketing practitioners to understand the unique demands of marketing to organisational customers.

This third edition of Business-to-Business Marketing provides South African universities offering modules in B2B marketing, a locally written and contextualised text which students will easily relate to. This book is about businesses marketing products and services to other businesses and covers concepts related to this environment. It provides readers with an understanding of what B2B marketing is, how it differs from B2C marketing and provides theoretical and practical discussions on various B2B concepts.

This 3rd edition of Business-to-Business Marketing provides students with a strong theoretical basis, but also utilise many applicable cases from a South African perspective.

The edition explores B2B issues such as:

• The business-to-business marketing environments
• Business-to-business buying
• Business strategy and strategic marketing planning
• Market research and competitor analysis
• Segmenting business markets, choosing target markets and positioning products
• Developing the product, service and value proposition
• Innovation and competitiveness
• Pricing in business-to-business marketing
• Business development and planning
• Business-to-business selling and managing customer relationships
• Business-to-business branding – creating and fostering brand loyalty
• Managing supply chains and channel relationships
• Communicating with the business-to-business market

Business-to-Business Marketing is intended for undergraduate and post-graduate marketing diploma and degree students. Entrepreneurs, business and marketing executives, and business consultants may also find Business-to-Business Marketing beneficial, especially because of its South African focus.

Sales management is a management function that plays an important role in any marketing and sales organisation. The profitability of the organisation depends on how successfully sales managers lead their salespeople. The sales manager is responsible for the strategic planning of the sales force that includes the management of the selling process and organising the sales activities within the sales department.

Also included in this book are two other functions that are becoming important for sales managers in performing their management tasks, namely sales promotions and sales metrics. Each chapter includes specific outcomes, case studies and discussion questions.

This textbook will be a valuable resource for sales managers who want to improve their knowledge, sales people who want to advance their careers and students studying marketing and sales.

Relationship Marketing and Customer Relationship Management (CRM) have become important tools in securing the survival of businesses in the new millennium by considering both external customers and employees (internal customers). CRM enables businesses to provide excellent realtime customer service through the eff ective use of digital technologies. CRM will evolve to become more aligned to customer management practices both internal and external to the business as well as to embrace Industry 5.0.

Both internal and external customers are increasingly using smart phone devices to engage with organisations, highlighting the importance of digital relationships and technologies. Relationship marketing acknowledges the importance of other stakeholders and the building of relationships with these groups. Relationship Marketing and CRM will therefore have to secure state-of-the-art customer and relationships management strategies delivered to all its customers through the development and implementation of these CRM strategies.

Key topics covered in this book:

• The nature of Relationship Marketing and Customer Relationship Management
• Building relationships, including online relationships
• Service issues in Relationship Marketing and Customer Relationship Management
• Internal marketing
• Business-to-business marketing relationships
• Stakeholders in Relationship Marketing
• Planning and organising a CRM strategy
• Implementing Customer Relationship Management (CRM) in an organisation

  This newly updated South African book was written to compliment students at both undergraduate and postgraduate level and is therefore both highly informative and practical in its approach. It will also further inform practising marketers about the complex world of RM and CRM and new developments in the field.

Marketing (5th Edition) covers issues like pricing, product labelling and sponsorship and includes a wealth of examples to guide students through current topics such green marketing and marketing communication.

This new edition is written in a more accessible way to assist students to grasp new concepts.

Features:

• Case studies with questions from a real-world context that bring the theory to life.
• Examples and insights on current issues
• End-of-chapter questions to test the content covered in each chapter
• Website links where students can gather more information on a specific topic or example discussed
• Strategy features to indicate to students how certain company's make certain marketing decisions and what the consequences of those decisions are Broad coverage of topics.

Marketing is not a function by itself or a task for just one person – its success depends on several activities in the marketing value chain.

Understanding this value chain is important for companies to stay relevant, and crucial for seeing a return on their investment in marketing. Companies employ and interact with many members of the marketing value chain, and therefore need to be familiar with the relationships between each link in this chain.

Marketing Value Chain is about understanding this value chain, where marketing fits into the chain, and what role marketers play within it.

Teaching you how to use online tools to reach your customers. In today's increasingly digital world, marketing is going online. From companies to individuals, people are seeking new and creative ways to promote their products and themselves in the virtual realm. Websites, email and social media are reaching out to customers at home, in the office or on the move, and finding ways to engage with them. The virtual world has many benefits, but not everyone is familiar enough with digital channels to use them to maximum potential. This is where e-Marketing in the South African context comes into play. This comprehensive book focuses on the critical issues associated with e-marketing in the South African context. It is written in an easy-to-read and practical fashion that will help readers grasp the relevant technologies and concepts presented in the book. And it provides a strategic perspective as well as metrics to help achieve the goal of successful e-marketing.

It is widely recognised that sales and marketing are the two business functions that contribute directly to the bottom line of any organisation.

Marketing is more than a sequence of steps or a strategic process; it is also a mindset that leads to good business philosophy. The marketing mindset focuses wholeheartedly on customers and the satisfaction of customers’ needs while aiming to influence the entire organisation to strive towards customer satisfaction. Sales, on the other hand, is that business function that ultimately closes the deal and brings the customer and the business together. Without sales, the customer would never achieve need satisfaction and the organisation would never meet its objectives. The ultimate goal of meeting the customer’s needs brings these two seemingly different fields together.

Fundamentals of Sales and Marketing serves to provide a fundamental understanding of both sales and marketing by equipping the reader with theoretical knowledge and practical examples that are applicable to a South African context.

The electronic age has brought many changes to the world of marketing and sales. More people are communicating in cyberspace to access more information about products, services and brands. New methods of selling and communicating with customers are invented virtually on a daily basis. And the extended use of social media is placing new demands on marketers, sales managers and sales practitioners around the world.

Despite this upheaval, retailers and marketers believe that personal selling — the age-old art of person-to-person communication between a salesperson and a prospective customer, is here to stay — although it should be adapted to incorporate technological developments.

In this fourth edition of Personal Selling, the authors outline the key steps in the selling process that lead to a successful sale, from prospecting for a sale to the follow-up once the sale has been completed. In addition, it explains the role and place of personal selling, the impact it has on the economy, and how it ties in with and supports marketing. The importance of communication in the act of selling, as well as different approaches and sales presentation methods, are explained and clarified, and a comprehensive discussion on how sales people should manage themselves and their time is included.

In today’s competitive retail environment, where new products are being introduced daily, how do you attract customer attention to your new product, and how do you manage its success? But equally important is the price. Just what is the science of pricing?

Product and Price Management recognises that a product manager needs to maximise the value of a product, oversee all aspects of a product line in order to deliver superior customer satisfaction, and coordinate production with an understanding of the market’s and customers’ needs, while simultaneously providing a long-term competitive advantage for the company. It also focuses on the basics of pricing and conveys the choices and strategies surrounding price in a concise and practical manner. South African examples help illustrate the discussions, and the topics have been updated to reflect the current realities of the markets.

The first book by a Coca-Cola CEO tells the remarkable story of the company's revival.

Neville Isdell was a key player at Coca-Cola for more than thirty years, retiring in 2009 as Chairman after rebuilding the tarnished brand image of the world's leading soft-drink company. Inside Coca-Cola tells an extraordinary personal and professional worldwide story, ranging from Northern Ireland to South Africa to Australia, the Philippines, Russia, Germany, India and Turkey. Isdell helped put out huge public-relations fires (India and Turkey), opened markets (Russia, Eastern Europe, the Philippines, and Africa), championed Muhtar Kent, the current Turkish-American CEO, all while living the ideal of corporate responsibility.

Isdell's—and Coke's—story is newsy without being gossipy; principled without being preachy, and filled with stories and lessons appealing to anyone who has ever taken "the pause that refreshes." It's also a readable and important look at how companies can market and govern themselves more—ethically and to great success.

Handbook of Public Relations is a South African text that offers academic and practical perspectives on public relations (PR) in the business and management environment.

The new edition provides current, relevant and topical PR developments in the industry using case studies on issues such as digital communication. It also aligns current international practice with local contexts to ensure a decolonised approach and relevant theories.

The pandemic that hit the world in 2020 has brought about many changes around the world. This has led to numerous changes in the world of business and new trends have emerged in the world of sales. Artificial intelligence became more prominent, the impact of videos increased and automation of sales processes became the order of the day.

One of the more noticeable sales trends that emerged in the past years is creativity. The business world changed and salespeople had to work harder to meet targets. This also led to more intense competition, which in turn, resulted in more innovative ways of doing business. Salespeople were forced to work smarter and not harder during these trying times. One of the cyber-age strategies focused on was the use of the Internet to drive sales. This, however, quickly became annoying to customers. To prevent this type of strategy from becoming an also-ran, it needs to be adjusted and adapted to be one step ahead. Creativity is called for in sales – not silliness!

It is clear that customer expectations of personal selling are constantly changing and that businesses must adapt to these changes. The days are gone where a business can tell customers what they want to hear; or will close a deal fast; or talk a lot to influence customers. Customers expect businesses to change the way they approach them.

In this edition of Personal Selling, the authors outline the key steps in the selling process that lead to a successful sale, from prospecting for a sale to the follow-up once the sale has been completed. In addition, it explains the role and place of personal selling, the impact it has on the economy and how it ties in with and supports marketing. The importance of communication in the act of selling, as well as different approaches and sales presentation methods, are explained and clarified, and a comprehensive discussion on how salespeople should manage themselves and their time is included.

Unravelling the complex worlds of public relations practitioners and journalism in a single publication is a challenge, but when the dynamic synergy of these two occupations are established their interaction is easily apparent.

Dynamics of Public Relations and Journalism unravels and explores these worlds to enhance the journalistic skills of Media Studies students and give journalists invaluable insights into the complex, multidisciplinary world of public relations. It also highlights the interdependency of the two professions and explains the need for their smooth interaction.

Key Features and Benefits

• Integrates Public Relations and Journalism and explains the relationship between the two fields in language ideal for first year students
• Use South African examples and case studies
• Locally relevant content
• Extensive support material for students and lecturers

The marketing world is continuously changing and Introduction to marketing addresses these changes by discussing core concepts like understanding the environment that the organisation operates in, analysing their competition, understanding how consumers make decisions, conducting marketing research, applying segmentation, targeting and positioning, the process of developing and making decisions around products, managing services, marketing channels, retailing, pricing, promotions, branding, integrating communication efforts, business-to-business marketing, marketing metrics, international marketing and ethical considerations.

These topics are fundamental to any marketing professional or academic.

The second edition of this textbook provides updated discussions, examples and scenarios that marketers are currently facing.

In the developed world, which is a mature market, many businesses are finding that opportunities for growth have declined. As a result, they are seeking growth opportunities in developing economies. Africa is an emerging market, with some countries outpacing developed nations in economic growth. It has the fastest–growing population and an exploding middle class with more disposable income. The continent is open for business and has become an investment destination of choice.

Marketing in Africa covers the key aspects of marketing in non–traditional markets and explains important marketing concepts. The book is about understanding the lucrative African markets, including informal markets, and how to market to them.

Marketing in Africa is intended for undergraduate and postgraduate Marketing students, and students in other programmes such as Business Management, Supply Chain Management and Human Resources.

Services, whether online or offline, are important in modern economics in which the understanding is that ‘we are all in services’.

Service Marketing, a subset of the field of marketing, has evolved and developed a range of theories and models all focused on providing superior services offerings to today’s market and it’s growing expectations of service delivery. New research provides additional contemporary insights into this dynamic and developing area. This text seeks to address the current research and its managerial implications, specifically by including new case studies and integrating new research results and new perspectives on the various aspects of services.

Information and Communication Technology (ICT) is indispensable in the spheres of business, government, education and entertainment. It makes internet marketing, e-government, e-learning and online chat services possible, as well as e-commerce. Today, no business training is complete without covering at least the basics of e-commerce. But although e-commerce opens up new opportunities, it also presents threats and risks. The success of e-commerce hinges on security and trust. Every business manager should therefore have a fundamental awareness of the meaning of e-commerce and ICT security and risk management. The success of e-commerce also hinges on building relationships. Managing e-commerce in business (third edition) explores the ways in which entrepreneurs and managers can make use of e-commerce related aspects to improve their contact with their customers and enhance their business and marketing strategies.

Fully updated and revised, the eighth edition of this popular text reflects the changing focus of international marketing and ensures students are fully up-to-date with the challenges posed by new patterns of development in global markets. It provides students with accessible content from around the world including newly emerging economies as well as explaining the increasingly global risks such as natural disasters and the role of digital developments. An exciting range of features including Management Challenges, Directed Study Activities and contemporary case studies guide students through the complexities of international marketing as it responds to a rapidly changing environment.

This revised and updated second edition of Channel Management (previously titled Distribution Management) focuses on the basics of product distribution as part of the marketing mix and explains the choices and strategies involved in choosing distribution channels.

Channel Management 2e clearly describes how distribution strategies need to coordinate the activities and aims of the producer or manufacturer and various intermediaries in order to bring products and services to buyers at the right time, at the right place and in the right quantity.

As an introduction to branding, Fundamentals of branding provides students with an overview of the building blocks of branding, which include: the influence of branding on marketing decisions; the role and place of branding in the organisation; the various elements of branding; packaging the brand; positioning the brand; planning, leveraging and extending the brand; evaluating the brand. The book contains a chapter with real-life branding case studies which illustrates the practical application of the topics discussed in this book. This is a very useful resource for students who struggle to apply theory learned to real-life situations.

In today's globalised and digital world, consumers can move from one retailer to the next across the world at the click of a button. Online access and social media mean that consumers are more market savvy, more informed and more discerning than ever before. What brings them back is an enhanced shopping experience, and key to this is good customer service. More and more marketers are focusing on retaining their customer base or trying to erode their competitor's customer base through better customer service. After all, happy customers are repeat customers and become advocates for the business.

Advances in technology and the change in customer profiles have changed advertising and sales as they have traditionally been conceived, forever. Marketers need to adapt their advertising and sales approaches in order to reach their rapidly changing market and keep up with their clients and customers. Advertising and sales promotion focuses on the main advertising media and sales approaches and the impact these have on the demands and pace of effective, persuasive communication in the current digital age.