Exchange Relationships

The Exchange Relationship with Travel Agencies and Consumers

Tasha Hicks

Managerial Marketing

BUS 620

Dr. Thomas Steinhagen

July 9, 2012

The Exchange Relationship with Travel Agencies and Consumers

Abstract

There are very few products and services that sell themselves and do not require advertisement or promotion. In many cases, marketing is paramount to generating revenue and obtaining marginal profits that make a company successful. The nature of the product determines the marketing strategy and how difficult it would be to achieve results from the marketing effort. The state of the exchange relationship between businesses and consumers is based on whether the product is easy or hard to sell.

Introduction

In today’s economy it has become increasingly harder to sell and market items or services that are not a necessity or have already been established as a desired product or service in a consumer’s household. Therefore, marketing is becoming more crucial to entice consumers into purchasing goods or services. According to Mullins & Walker (2010), marketing can be defined as the social process involving activities necessary to enable individuals and organizations to obtain what they need and want by exchanging with others while developing ongoing exchange relationships. There are some companies that do not engage in creating an effective market orientation which would improve the sale of items that are not desirable by consumers. Those products or services are deemed “hard to sell”. The nature of the exchange relationship can be impacted negatively by “hard to sell” products and services because businesses may be at a loss at how to market hard to sell items. This paper intends to describe how undesirable products affect the nature of the exchange relationship between businesses and consumers. This paper will also examine methods to market “hard to sell” products and services.

The “Hard to Sell” Service

Marketing simply stated is the promotion or...