Marketing Aptitude

MARKETING APTITUDE || MARKETING CAPSULE

Important Marketing Terms for SBI Clerk|| SBI PO|| SBI Associate Banks Exam etc.

• Above the line: “Above the Line” is the term commonly used for advertising for which a payment is made and for which commission is paid to the advertising agency. Methods of above the line advertising include television and radio, magazines, newspapers and Internet.
• Accountability: Libraries like private sector businesses are increasingly called upon to make all units accountable for results. Growing funds are needed for technology as opposed to only books. Libraries are developing better performance measures within the present day control systems to offer better accountability.
• Acquisitions value: The users’ perception of the relative worth of a product or service to them. Formally defined as the subjectively weighted difference between the most a buyer would be willing to pay for the product or service, less the actual price of the item. Time user must spend to ‘acquire’ is often used as a surrogate for ‘relative worth or price paid,’ in library research. For example, a user might be willing to expend drive time and a brief time in the library to check out a best seller, but not wait two weeks for a copy to be returned.
• Activities, interests, and opinions (AIO): A measurable series of psychographic (as opposed to demographic) variables involving the interests and beliefs of users. Note, because psychographics are usually expensive to gather, yet offer a more precise profile of users, demographic variables are usually relied upon.
• Ad hoc market research: Ad-hoc research focuses on specific marketing problems. It involves the collection of data at one point in time from one sample of respondents.
• Added value: Added value refers to the increase in worth of a product or service as a result of a particular activity.  In the context of marketing, the added value is provided by features and benefits over and above those representing the “core product”.
• Ad-Valorem Duties: These are the duties determined as a certain percentage of prices of the product.
• Advertising: Advertising is a form of communication that typically attempts to persuade potential customers to purchase or to consume more of a particular brand of product or service. Many advertisements are designed  to  generate  increased  consumption  of  those  products  and   services  through  the  creation and  reinforcement  of  “brand  image”  and  “brand  loyalty”.  For these purposes, advertisements sometimes embed their persuasive message with factual information.
• Aggregation: A concept of market segmentation that assumes that most consumers are alike.
• AIDA: Attention Interest Desire Action
• AIFI: All India Financial Institution
• ALCO: Asset-Liability Management Committee
• ALM: Asset/ liability management involves a set of techniques to create value and manage risks in a bank.
• Ambush marketing: A deliberate attempt by a business or brand to associate itself with an event (often a sporting event) in order to gain some of the benefits associated with being an official sponsor without incurring the costs of sponsorship.
• AMC: Asset Management Committee
• Analysis: In marketing and other social science disciplines, a variety of statistical and non-statistical methods are used to analyze data, instead of sheer intuition, or simple descriptive statistics, which have been the norm in the library filed.
• Annual Financial Statement: It is a statement of receipts and expenditure of states for the financial year, presented to Parliament by the government. It is divided into three parts: Consolidated Fund, Contingency Fund and Public Account.
• Anti-competitive practice: A practice is considered anti-competitive if it prevents, distorts or restricts competition in a market for goods and services in Barbados.
• Anti-dumping: Anti dumping is a measure to rectify the situation arising out of the dumping of goods and its trade distortive effect.  Thus,  the  purpose  of  anti  dumping  duty is  to  rectify  the trade  distortive effect  of dumping  and  re-establish  fair  trade.  The  use  of  anti  dumping  measure  as  an  instrument  of  fair competition  is  permitted  by  the  WTO.
• Appropriation Bill: This Bill is like a green signal enabling the withdrawal of money from the Consolidated Fund to pay off expenses. These are instruments that Parliament clears after the demand for grants has been voted by the Lok Sabha.
• Audience: The number and/or characteristics of the persons or households who are exposed to a particular type of advertising media or media vehicle. In a library this could be a certain number of people that attend a library program.
• Audit: The process of reviewing the library’s strengths and weaknesses (internally), and opportunities and threats (externally) to shed light on the agency’s performance.
• Augmented brand: The additional customer services and benefits (“added value”) that are built around the core product or service offering.
• Balance Of Payments: The difference between demand and supply of a country’s currency in the foreign exchange market.
• Balance Of Trade: The difference between monetary value of exports and imports of output in an economy over a certain period of time. It is the relationship between a nation’s imports and exports.
• Balanced stock The composition of merchandise inventory in the colors, sizes, styles and other assortment characteristics that will satisfy user wants. For the library this would mean, services and materials based upon users wants and needs.
• Banking Cash Transaction Tax (BCTT): BCTT is a small tax on cash withdrawal from bank exceeding a particular amount in a single day. The basic idea is to curb the black economy and generate a record of big cash transactions.
• Barcode: An information technology application that uniquely identifies various aspects of product characteristics, increasing speed, accuracy, and productivity of distribution process. Most library materials are barcoded for security.
• Barter: A Trade Exchange or  Barter is a  type of trade in which  goods or  services  are directly exchanged for other  goods  and/or  services,  without  the  use  of  money.  It  can  be  bilateral  or  multilateral,  and usually  exists  parallel  to  monetary systems  in  most  developed  countries,  though  to  a  very limited extent. Barter usually replaces money as the method of exchange in times of monetary crisis, when the currency is unstable and devalued by hyperinflation.
• Behavioural Segmentation: Behavioural segmentation divides customers into groups based on the way they respond to, use or know of a product.
• Bond: A negotiable instrument evidencing debt, under which the issuer promises to pay the holder its face value plus interest as agreed.
• Brand: A name, term, design, symbol, or any other feature that identifies one seller’s good or service as distinct from those of other sellers. The legal term for brand is trademark. A brand may identify one item, a family of items, or all items of that seller.
• Branding: It is a promise, a pledge of quality. It is the essence of a product, including why it is great, and how it is better than all competition products. It is an image.  It is a combination of words and letters, symbols, and colors.
• Brand building: Developing a brand’s image and standing with a view to creating long term benefits for brand awareness and brand value
• Brand equity: Brand equity refers to the value of a brand. Brand equity is based on the extent to which the brand has high brand loyalty, name awareness, perceived quality and strong product associations. Brand equity also includes other “intangible” assets such as patents, trademarks and channel relationships.
• Brand extension: Brand extension refers to the use of a successful brand name to launch a new or modified product in a new market.
• Brand image: Brand image refers to the set of beliefs that customers hold about a particular brand. These are important to develop well since a negative brand image can be very difficult to shake off.
• Brand loyalty: A strongly motivated and long standing decision to purchase a particular product or service.
• Budget estimates: It is an estimate of Fiscal Deficit and Revenue Deficit for the year. The term is associated with estimates of the Center’s spending during the financial year and income received as proceeds of tax revenues
• Budgetary Deficit: Such a situation arises when expenses exceed revenues. Here the entire budgetary exercise falls short of allocating enough funds to a certain area.
• Business to business: Marketing activity directed from one business to another (as opposed to a consumer). This term is often shortened to “B2B” businesses communicating with customers.
• Capital Budget: Capital Budget keeps track of the government’s capital receipts and payments. This accounts for market loans, borrowings from the Reserve Bank and other institutions through sale of Treasury Bills, loans acquired from foreign governments and recoveries of loans granted by the Central government to State governments and Union Territories. It consists of capital receipts and payments. It also incorporates transactions in the Public Account. It has two components: Capital Receipt and Capital Expenditure.
• Capital Expenditure: Long-term in nature they are used for acquiring fixed assets such as land, building, machinery and equipment. Other items that also fall under this category include loans and advances sanctioned by the Center to the State governments, union territories and public sector undertakings.
• Capital Goods: Goods used in the manufacturing of finished products
• Capital investments: Money used to purchase permanent fixed assets for a business, such as machinery, land or buildings as opposed to day-to-day operating expenses.
• Capital Market: Market in which financial instruments are bought and sold.
• Capital Payments: Expenses incurred on acquisition of capital assets
• Capital Receipt: Capital Receipts consist of loans raised by the Center from the market, government borrowings from the RBI & other parties, sale of Treasury Bills and loans received from foreign governments. Other items that also fall under this category include recovery of loans granted by the Center to State governments & Union Territories and proceeds from the dilution of the government’s stake in Public Sector Undertakings.
• Capital Structure: The composition of a firm’s long-term financing consisting of equity, preference shares, and long-term debt.
• Capital: Funds invested in a firm by the owners for use in conducting the business.
• CCI: Competition Commission of India
• Central Plan Outlay: It refers to the government’s budgetary support to the Plan. It is the division of monetary resources among different sectors in the economy and ministries of the government.
• CENVAT: This is a replacement for the earlier MODVAT scheme and is meant for reducing the cascade effect of indirect taxes on finished products. This is more extensive scheme with most goods brought under its preview
• CESS: This is an additional levy on the basic tax liability. Governments resort to cess for meeting specific expenditure. For instance, both corporate and individual income is at present subject to an education cess of 2%. In the last Budget, the government had imposed another 1% cess as secondary and higher education cess on income tax to finance secondary and higher education.
• Channel of distribution An organized network of agencies and institutions which in combination perform all the functions required to link producers with end customers to accomplish the marketing task. For a library this would include vendors, publishers as well as library facilities.
• Circulation: The number of copies of a print advertising medium that are distributed. For the library field, this is numbers of items checked out by users. For example newspaper or magazine.
• Classifieds: An advertisement in a newspaper that is placed along with advertisements for similar events under a classified heading, e.g. ‘Entertainment’ or ‘Cinema’.
• Cognitive dissonance: Cognitive dissonance is an customer effect commonly observed after a major purchase whereby the customer feels uncertainty about whether the purchase should have been made. Post-purchase promotion (particularly advertising) has a role to play to reduce the incidence and effect of cognitive dissonance
• Combination brand: A combination brand name brings together a family brand name and an individual brand name. The idea here is to provide some association for the product with a strong family brand name but maintaining some distinctiveness so that customers know what they are getting
• Competitive advantage: A competitive advantage is a clear performance differential over the competition on factors that are important to customers
• Competitor benchmarking: Competitor benchmarking compares customer satisfaction with the products, services and relationships of the business with those of key competitors
• Concept: A design in which all aspects of the product are linked to a central idea, function or theory, etc.
• Conglomerate: A conglomerate is the term used to describe a large company that consists of seemingly unrelated business sections. This term may also be referred to as a multi-industry company.
• Consolidated Fund: This is one big reservoir where the government pools all its funds together. The fund includes all government revenues, loans raised and recoveries of loans granted.
• Consumer: The ultimate user of goods, ideas or services. Also the buyer or decision maker, for example, the parent selecting children’s books is the consumer.
• Consumer buyers: Consumer buyers are those who purchase items for their personal consumption
• Consumer durables: Consumer durables have low volume but high unit value. Consumer durables are often further divided into White goods (e.g. fridge freezers; cookers; dishwashers; microwaves) and Brown goods (e.g. DVD players; games consoles; personal computers)
• Consumer markets: Consumer markets are the markets for products and services bought by individuals for their own or family use
• Consumer Price Index: It is a price index that features the rates of consumer goods
• Contingency Fund: It is more or less similar to that extra little bit of savings that all mothers set aside in case of an emergency. Likewise, the government has created this fund to help it tide over difficult situations. The fund is at the disposal of the President to meet unforeseen and urgent expenditure, pending approval from Parliament. The amount that is withdrawn from the fund is recouped.
• Continuous market research: Continuous research involves interviewing the same sample of people, repeatedly
• Copy: Written or typed matter intended to be reproduced in print.
• Copyright: The  exclusive  right,  granted  by  law  for  a  certain  term  of  years,  to  make  and  dispose  of  copies  of, and otherwise to control, a literary, musical, dramatic, or artistic work.
• Core product: The set of problem-solving or need-meeting benefits that customers are buying when they purchase a product. Customers are rarely prepared to pay a premium for these elements of a product.
• Countervailing Duties (CVD): This is levied on imports that may lead to price rise in the domestic market. It is imposed with the intention of discouraging unfair trading practices by other countries.
• Critical Path: Plots the events that need to occur to complete a project on a timeline.
• CRM: Customer Relationship Marketing. Building loyalty through your relationship with a customer.
• CRR (Cash Reserve Ratio): Banks in India are required to hold a certain proportion of their deposits in the form of cash. However, actually Banks don’t hold these as cash with themselves, but deposit such case with Reserve Bank of India/ currency chests, which is considered as equivalent to holding cash with RBI. This minimum ratio (that is the part of the total deposits to be held as cash) is stipulated by the RBI and is known as the CRR or Cash Reserve Ratio. Thus, when a bank’s deposits increase by Rs 100, and if the cash reserve ratio is 6%, the banks will have to hold additional Rs 6 with RBI and Bank will be able to use only Rs 94 for investments and lending/ credit purpose.

Therefore, higher the ratio (i.e. CRR), the lower is the amount that banks will be able to use for                        lending and   investment. This power of RBI to reduce the lendable amount by increasing the CRR, makes it              an instrument in the hands of a central bank through which it can control the amount that banks lend.                    Thus, it is a tool used by RBI to control liquidity in the banking system.

• Current Account Deficit: This deficit shows the difference between the nation’s exports and imports.
• Current Account Surplus: Excess of receipts over expenditure on current account in a country’s balance of payments.
• Customer: The actual or prospective purchaser of products or services. The library user is the library’s customer.
• Custom Duties: These duties are levied on goods whenever they are either brought into the country or exported from the country. The importer or the exporter pays custom duties.
• Customer demand: Consumer demand is a want for a specific product supported by an ability and willingness to pay for it.
• Customer loyalty: Feelings or attitudes that incline a customer either to return to a company, shop or outlet to purchase there again, or else to re-purchase a particular product, service or brand.
• Database: A  large  volume  of  information  stored  in  a  computer  and  organised  in  categories  to  facilitate retrieval.
• DE marketing: The process of reducing the demand for a product–or decreasing consumption. For example, the library discontinues offering income tax assistance and forms.
• Decision support system (DSS): A decision support system (marketing definition) is a systematic collection of data, techniques and supporting software and hardware by which an organization gathers and interprets relevant information from business and the environment and turns it into a basis for making management decisions. A DSS differs from a management information system in that it is designed to answer precise questions and what/if questions. An example would be, ‘What affect on system library use will there be if Branch X is closed?’
• Demand For Grants: It is a statement of estimate of expenditure from the Consolidated Fund. This requires approval of the Lok Sabha.
• Digital Marketing: Digital Marketing is the practice of promoting products and services using all forms of digital advertising. It includes Television, Radio, Internet, mobile and any other form of digital media.
• Direct Mail: Mailing brochures, letters, questionnaires etc. directly to the target market.
• Direct marketing: Marketing efforts, in total directed toward a specific targeted group–direct selling, direct mail, catalog or cable–for soliciting a response from customer. A library may mail a library registration card to every new mother in the hospital.
• Direct Marketing: Marketing to the customer without the use of an intermediary.

Types of Direct marketing:

There are many types of direct marketing, only some important types are listed below and these are the                  most form of direct marketing.

         i) Direct Mail Marketing: Advertising material sent directly to home and business addresses. This is the                most common form of direct marketing.

         ii) Telemarketing: It is the second most common form of direct marketing, in which marketers contact                  consumers by phone.

         iii) Email Marketing: This type of marketing targets customers through their email accounts

 

• Direct Response: In advertising. Advertising  designed  to  trigger  a  behavioural  response  in  target  audiences,  e.g. placing mail back coupons in the ad, asking people to bring in or mention an ad, setting up a phone number and asking individuals to call for further information etc.
• Direct Taxes: Taxes paid directly by the person or organisation on whom they are levied. Income Tax and Corporate Tax fall under this tax category
• Disinvestment: It is the dilution of government’s stake in Public Sector Undertakings.
• Display Ad: An advertisement which is usually designed by the advertiser and displayed in a box.
• Distress Rates: Cheaper rates for advertising at short notice, i.e. When newspapers have spaces to fill shortly before their deadlines.
• Distribution: To place promotional material, e.g. fliers or posters, throughout areas where they will be picked up.
• Drip Marketing: Method of sending promotional items to clients is called Drip marketing.
• Dumping: If a company exports a product at a price (export price) lower than the price it normally charges on its own home market (normal value), it is said to be ‘dumping’ the product. Dumping can harm the domestic  industry  by  reducing its  sales volume  and  market shares,  as  well  as  its sales  prices. This in  turn  can  result  in  decline  in  profitability,  job  losses  and,  in  the  worst  case,  in  the  domestic industry going  out  of  business.  Often,  dumping  is  mistaken  and  simplified  to  mean  cheap  or  low priced  imports.
• Dwell time: The amount of time a customer/user spends in time waiting in line. For a library user this is a price expended.
• Early adopters: People who choose new products carefully and are often consulted by people from the remaining adopter categories
• ECB: External Commercial Borrowing
• E-commerce: The use of technologies such as the Internet, electronic data exchange and industry extranets to streamline business transactions
• Eighty-twenty principle: The situation in which a disproportionately small number (e.g., 20%) of staff, products or users generate a disproportionately large amount (e.g., 80%) of a firm’s use/profits. A use analysis should be conducted to determine what the cause is.
• Endorsement: The promotion of some kind of product recommendation or affirmation, usually from a celebrity, implying to the potential customer that a product is good
• ESPO: Employee Stock Option Loan
• Exchange: All activities associated with receiving something from someone by giving something voluntarily in return. This is the heart of the marketing process. A library user gives time instead of money to borrow materials, but it is still an exchange
• Excise duties: These duties refer to duties imposed on goods manufactured within the country.
• Finance Bill: It is the government’s proposals for imposition of new taxes, modification of the existing tax structure or continuance of the existing tax structure beyond the period approved by Parliament.
• Fiscal Deficit: It is the difference between the Revenue Receipts and Total Expenditure.
• Fiscal Policy: Fiscal policy is a change in government expenditure and/or taxation designed to influence economic activity. These changes are designed to control the level of aggregate demand in the economy. Governments usually bring about changes in taxation, volume of spending, and size of the budget deficit or surplus to affect public expenditure.
• FRBM Act: Enacted in 2003, the Fiscal Responsibility and Budget Management Act required the elimination of revenue deficit by 2008-09. This means that from 2008-09, the government was to meet all its revenue expenditure from its revenue receipts. Any borrowing was to be done to meet capital expenditure i.e. repayment of loans, lending and fresh investment. The Act also mandates a 3% limit on the fiscal deficit after 2008-09; one that allows the government to build capacities in the economy without compromising on fiscal stability.
• Freepost: Used to encourage a response by mail. The sender does not pay to return an item by post e.g. a questionnaire.
• Fringe Benefit Tax (FBT): It is the tax levied on the ‘fringe benefit’ / perks given by a company to its employees. Companies could no longer get away with marking such expenses as ‘ordinary business expenses’ and escape tax when they actually gave out club memberships to their employees. Employers had to now pay a tax (FBT) on a percentage of the expense incurred on such perquisites.
• Gender segmentation: The segmentation of markets based on the sex of the customer. The cosmetic industry is a good example of widespread use of gender segmentation.
• Geographic segmentation: Geographic segmentation divides markets into different geographical units.
• Goods A product that has tangible form in contrast to services that are intangible. A book versus a story read.
• Gross Domestic Product: Total market value of the goods and services manufactured within the country in a financial year. GROSS NATIONAL PRODUCT Total market value of the finished goods and services manufactured within the country in a given financial year, plus income earned by the local residents from investments made abroad, minus the income earned by foreigners in the domestic market.
• Growth stage: The stage at which a product’s sales rise rapidly and profits reach a
• GST: A GST (Goods and Services Tax) contains the entire element of tax borne by a good / service including a Central and a state-level tax.
• Guerilla Marketing: Unconventional marketing intended to get maximum results from minimal resources is nothing but Guerilla Marketing.
• Incentive: Something  of  financial  or  symbolic  value  added  to  an  offer  to  encourage  some  overt  behavioural response.
• Income Tax: This is the tax levied on individual income from various sources like salaries, investments, interest, etc.
• Indirect Marketing: Indirect Marketing is the distribution of a particular product through a channel that includes one or more resellers.
• Difference b/w Direct and Indirect Marketing:                                                                                                                  i) Direct marketing is basically advertising your own products or services.                                                                  ii) In the same way you might advertise for someone else is called Indirect marketing, is an increasingly          popular way of doing business

 

• Indirect Taxes: Taxes imposed on goods manufactured, imported or exported such as Excise Duties and Custom Duties.
• Inflation: A progressive increase in prices of goods and services. It is the percentage rate of change in the price level. In inflation, everything tends to appear more valuable except money.
• Internal marketing: The process of eliciting support for a company and its activities among its own employees, in order to encourage them to promote its goals. This process can happen at a number of levels, from increasing awareness of individual products or marketing campaigns, to explaining overall business strategy.
• Internet Marketing: Internet marketing is the marketing of products or services over the Internet. Internet Marketing is also known as i-marketing, web-marketing, online-marketing, Search Engine Marketing (SEM) or e-Marketing.
• JIT: Just-in-time (JIT) is an inventory strategy implemented to improve the return on investment of a business by reducing in-process inventory and its associated carrying costs. In order to achieve JIT the process must have signals of what is going on elsewhere within the process.
• Key Selling Points: The components of a program or event that will appeal to the greatest number of people.
• Laggards: The group of consumers who are typically last to buy a new product
• Loyalty Programs: A component of relationship marketing. Programs designed to increase the strength of a consumer’s preference for a particular entity. The most common form of loyalty program in the arts is subscription or membership programs.
• Marginal Standing Facility Rate:  Under this scheme, Banks will be able to borrow upto 1% of their respective Net Demand and Time Liabilities”.  The rate of interest on the amount accessed from this facility will be 100 basis points (i.e. 1%)  above the repo rate. This scheme is likely to reduce volatility in the overnight rates and improve monetary transmission.
• Market: The set of actual or potential users/customers.
• Market area: A geographical area containing the customers/users of a particular firm/library for specific goods or services. This would be determined by geocoding library users’ addresses and determining the boundaries of the primary geographic market.
• Market demand: The total volume of a product or service bought/used by a specific group of customers/users in a specified market area during a specified period. For example, the demand for best sellers during the fall.
• Market development: Expanding the total market served by 1) entering new segments, 2) converting nonusers, 3) increasing use by present users.
• Market positioning: Positioning refers to the user’s perceptions of the place a product or brand occupies in a market segment. Or how the company/library’s offering is differentiated from the competition’s. For a library a competitor may be another public agency competing for public funds. What unique niche does the library serve when competing against police for same $$
• Market profile: A breakdown of a facility’s market area according to income, demography, and life style (often.)
• Market Research: The  process  of  planning,  collecting,  and  analyzing  data  relevant  to  marketing  decision-making. Using a combination of primary and secondary research tools to better understand a situation.
• Market segmentation: Segmentation involves subdividing markets, channels or customers into groups with different needs, to deliver tailored propositions which meet these needs as precisely as possible.
• Market share: A proportion of the total sales/use in a market obtained by a given facility or chain. Branch A has 35% of the system’s circulation.
• Market targeting: Market targeting is the process of evaluating each market segment and selecting the most attractive segments to enter with a particular product or product line.
• Marketing channel: A set of institutions necessary to transfer the title to goods and to move goods from the point of consumption. (Vendors, publishers, library facilities.)
• Marketing mix: The mix of controllable variables that the firm/library uses to reach desired use/sales level in target market, including price, product, place and promotion- 4 P’s. For a library this would be embodied in price of user’s time to access goods, a product would be a book or story time, place is a branch or bookmobile, and promotion is publicity, displays etc.
• Marketing opportunity: An attractive arena of relevant marketing action in which a particular organization is likely to enjoy a superior and competitive advantage. The library is selected to host the community heritage festival which is funded by the city.
• Marketing plan: A document composed of an analysis of the current marketing situation, opportunities and threats, analysis, marketing objectives, marketing strategy, action programs, and projected income statement. This could be very similar to a library’s long range plan.
• Marketing Strategy: The first stage is setting  marketing objectives (where the organisation wants to be at the end of the strategic  planning  period)  and  goals  (the  objectives  with  specific  numerical  benchmarks  and deadlines attached to allow  management  to  measure achievement). The  second stage  is specifying the core  marketing  strategy,  i.e. specific target markets,  competitive  positioning and  key  elements of the marketing mix. The third is the implementation of tactics to achieve the core strategy.
• Marketing: The all-embracing function that links the business with customer needs and wants in order to get the right product to the right place at the right time”
• Maturity: stage of product life cycle Initial rapid growth is over and use/sales level off.
• Media Hooks: Aspects of an event or program that are most likely to appeal to a journalist or the media generally.
• Media Monitoring: Systematic monitoring of the media in order to ascertain what has been said.  Specialised agencies provide this service.
• Mergers and Acquisitions: The phrase  mergers and acquisitions (abbreviated  M&A) refers to the aspect of corporate strategy, corporate  finance  and  management  dealing  with  the  buying,  selling  and  combining  of  different companies  that  can  aid,  finance,  or  help  a  growing  company  in  a  given  industry  grow  rapidly without  having  to  create  another  business  entity.  A  merger  is  a  tool  used  by  companies  for  the purpose  of  expanding  their  operations  often  aiming at an  increase of their long  term  profitability. An acquisition, also known as a takeover, is the buying of one company (the ‘target’) by another.
• Minimum Alternate Tax (MAT): It’s known that a company pays tax on profits as per the Income-Tax Act. If a company’s tax liability is less than 10% of its profits, it has to pay a minimum alternate tax of 10% of the book profits.
• MODVAT: It stands for Modified Value Added Tax and is a way of giving some relief to the final manufacturers of goods on Excise Duties borne by their suppliers.
• Monetized Deficit: Measures the level of support the RBI provides to the Centre’s borrowing program.
• National Debt: Total outstanding borrowings of the central government exchequer.
• Non-Plan Expenditure: Expenses that don’t form a part of the government’s five year plan. These expenses consist of Revenue and Capital Expenditure on interest payments, Defense Expenditure, subsidies, postal deficit, police, pensions, economic services, loans to public sector enterprises and loans as well as grants to State governments, Union territories and foreign governments.
• Non-profit marketing: The marketing of a product or service in which the offer itself is not intended to make a monetary profit for the marketer.
• Non-Tax Revenue: Any loan given to state governments, public institutions, PSUs come with a price (interests) and forms the most important receipts under this head apart from dividends and profits received from PSUs. The government also earns from the various services including public services it provides.
• Offer: A  proposal  by  a  marketer  to  make  available  to  a  target  customer  a  desirable  set  of  positive consequences if the customer undertakes the required action.
• Peak Rate: it is the highest rate of Custom Duty applicable on an item.
• Penetrated market: Actual set of users actually consuming the product/service.
• Per capita income: The national income of a country, or region, divided by its population.
• Performance Budget: it is a compilation of programs and activities of different ministries and departments.
• Personal Selling: Persuasive communication between a representative of the company and one or more prospective customers, designed to influence the person’s or group’s purchase decision.
• Pitch: A proposal – either verbal or written – to enlist the engagement or support of a third party.
• Plan Expenditure: Consists of both Revenue Expenditure and Capital Expenditure of the Center on the Central Plan, Central Assistance to States and Union Territories.
• Plan Outlay: Plan Outlay is the amount for expenditure on projects, schemes and programmes announced in the Plan. The money for the Plan Outlay is raised through budgetary support and internal and extra-budgetary resources. The budgetary support is also shown as plan expenditure in government accounts.
• Point-of-purchase Promotional materials placed at the contact sales point designed to attract user interest or call attention to a special offer, e.g., ‘Sign up for Summer Reading Program.’
• Point-of-sale (POS) A data collection system that electronically receives and stores bar code information derived from a sales transaction. This could the zip codes for library users, facilitating the library in determining geographic market are that users reside in.
• Potential market – Set of users who profess some level of interest in a designed market offer.
• Price: The formal ratio that indicates the quantities of money goods or services needed to acquire a given quantity of goods or services. For a library user price may come in the form of time the library users must expend to obtain library materials or services.
• Primary Deficit: Fiscal Deficit minus Interest payments
• Private sector: Activities outside the public sector that are independent of government control, usually, but not always carried on for a profit.
• Product life cycle: The four stages products go through from birth to death: introductory, growth, maturity, and decline.
• Product mix: The full set of products offered by an organization e.g., books, videos, storyhours, etc.
• Product positioning: The way users/consumers view competitive brands or types of products. This can be manipulated by the organization/library. The library’s video collection, available for free, is competitive with local video stores that charge, if video collections are comparable. If the collections are not, the library is differentiating the video collection from the video store.
• Product: A bundle of attributes or features, functions, benefits and uses capable of exchange, usually in tangible or intangible forms. The library’s products include materials to use, questions answered, storyhours, online searching, etc.
• Progressive Tax Structure: A tax structure in which the marginal tax rate increases as the level of income increases.
• Promotion: One of the four “P’s” of the marketing mix. Promotion is all about
• Proportional Tax: a tax taking the same percentage of income regardless of the level of income.
• Psychographics: Life-style measures which   combine psychological and demographic measurements based on consumers’ activities, aspirations, values, interests or opinions.
• Public Account: it is an account where money received through transactions not relating to consolidated fund is kept.
• Public Debt: The difference between borrowings and repayments during the year is the net accretion to the public debt. Public debt can be split into two heads, internal debt (money borrowed within the country) and external debt (funds borrowed from non-Indian sources).
• Publicity: Definitions vary but in Sauce the term is used to describe obtaining media coverage.
• Qualitative Research: Research  that  seeks  out  people’s  attitudes  and  preferences,  usually  conducted  through unstructured interviews or focus groups.
• Quality control: An ongoing analysis of operations, to verify goods or service meet specified standards, or to better answer customer/user complaints. Libraries have been criticized for not employing more quality control standards on library services.
• Quality of life: Sometimes measured by income, wealth, safety, recreation and education facilities, education health, aesthetics, leisure time and the like.
• Quantitative Research: Research  that  measures  (quantifies)  responses  to  a  structured  questionnaire,  conducted  either through  telephone,  face-to-face  structured  interviews,  on  the  Internet  or  through  self  completion surveys.
• Quantity discount: A reduction in price for volume purchases.
• Quickcuts: The brand name of technology which enables design companies or advertising agencies to transmit advertisements directly to the publication over a telephone line.
• Reach: The total number of people your organisation or campaign reaches.
• Regressive Tax: a tax in which the poor pay a larger percentage of income than the rich. It is the opposite of Progressive Tax.
• Relationship marketing: Marketing  with  a  focus  on  building  long-term  relationships  where  the  target  customer  is encouraged to continue his or her involvement with the marketer.
• Repo (Repurchase) rate: It is the rate at which the RBI lends shot-term money to the banks against securities. When the repo rate increases borrowing from RBI becomes more expensive.  Therefore, we can say that in case, RBI wants to make it more expensive for the banks to borrow money, it increases the repo rate; similarly, if it wants to make it cheaper for banks to borrow money, it reduces the repo rate.
• Revenue budget: Consists of Revenue Receipts and Revenue Expenditure of the government.
• Revenue Deficit: It is the difference between Revenue Expenditure and Revenue Receipts.
• Revenue Surplus: Opposite of Revenue Deficit, it is the excess of Revenue Receipts over Revenue Expenditure.
• RRR: Reverse Repo rate is the rate at which banks park their short-term excess liquidity with the RBI.  The banks use this tool when they feel that they are stuck with excess funds and are not able to invest anywhere for reasonable returns. An increase in the reverse repo rate means that the RBI is ready to borrow money from the banks at a higher rate of interest. As a result, banks would prefer to keep more and more surplus funds with RBI.
• Revised Estimates: usually given in the following budget, it is the difference between the Budget Estimates and the actual figures.
• SEBI: Securities and Exchange Board of India
• Securities Transaction Tax (STT): STT is a small tax you need to pay on the total amount you pay or receive in a share deal.
• Shopping good: Goods and products can be classified as convenience, shopping or specialty. A shopping good is one that more time is spent selecting (browsing) than a quick convenience good.
• Situational Analysis:  An analysis of the internal and external environment of a company or event.
• Slogan: The verbal or written portion of an advertising message that summarizes the main idea in a few memorable words–a tag line.
• SLR (Statutory Liquidity Ratio): Every bank is required to maintain at the close of business every day, a minimum proportion of their Net Demand and Time Liabilities as liquid assets in the form of cash, gold and un-encumbered approved securities. The ratio of liquid assets to demand and time liabilities is known as Statutory Liquidity Ratio (SLR).
• Social advertising: The advertising designed to education or motivates target audiences to undertake socially desirable actions.
• Social class: A status hierarchy by which groups and individuals are classified on the basis of esteem and prestige.
• Social indicator: The data and information that facilitate the evaluation of how well a society or institution is doing.
• Social Media Marketing: Social media marketing is marketing using online communities, social networks, blog marketing and more
• Special Economic Zone Scheme: A new export promotion scheme entitled ‘Special Economic Zone’ (SEZ) was introduced in the Export and Import (EXIM) Policy which came into effect from 01-4-2000. The Scheme envisages a simple and transparent policy and procedure for promotion of exports with minimum paper work. The most important feature of the Scheme is that the SEZ area is considered essentially as a foreign territory for the purposes of trade operations, duties & tariffs. Therefore, goods supplied to SEZ from the Domestic Tariff Area (DTA) are treated as deemed exports and goods brought from SEZ to DTA are treated as imported goods.
• Specialty advertising: The placement of advertising messages on a wide variety of items of interest to the target markets such as calendars, coffee cups, pens, hats, note paper, t-shirts, etc. These are widely given out to librarians at professional conferences from vendors. Libraries may use these items as well, but are usually sold in library gift shops.
• Strategic Marketing Planning: The  process  of  managerial  and  operational  activities  required  to  create  and  sustain  effective  and efficient  marketing  strategies,  including  identifying  and  evaluating  opportunities,  analyzing markets  and  selecting  target  markets,  developing  a  positioning  strategy,  preparing  and  executing the market plan, and controlling and evaluating results.
• Subsidies: Financial aid provided by the Center to individuals or a group of individuals to be competitive. The grant of subsidies is also aimed at improving their skills of those who benefit from the subsidies.
• Subvention: This is how a government bears the loss that financial institutions incur when asked to give farmer loans below the market rates.
• Surcharge: This is an extra bit of 10% on the tax liability that individuals pay for earning more than Rs. 10 lakh. Companies with revenue of up to Rs. 1 crore are spared.
• SWOT Analysis: Identifying the strengths and weaknesses, which are internal to the organisation or project and the opportunities and threats, which come from outside the organisation.
• Talent: The  person  or  people  you  put  forward  to  the  media  as  possible  subjects  for  an  interview,  a  game show, a picture or footage, etc.
• Target Audience: The  section  of  the population  that  is  identified  as  likely  to  be  most  interested  in  buying  or  being associated with a product.
• Target market: The particular segment of a total population on which the retailer focuses its merchandising expertise to satisfy that sub market in order to accomplish its profit objectives. Or for the library, a target market might be within the market area served, children 5-8 years old, for summer reading programs, to increase juvenile use and registration
• Target media: The media you decide to target for coverage because they reach your target audience.
• Targeting: The act of directing promotions to the target audience.
• TARPS (Target  audience  rating points) : That  is,  the  number  of people  or  percentage  of  people  reached  in your target audience
• TRAI: Telecom Regulatory Authority of India
• Treasury Bill (T-BILLS): These are bonds (debt securities) with maturity of less than a year. These are issued to meet short-term mismatches in receipts and expenditure.
• Unique Selling Proposition (USP): The one thing that  makes  a  product different  than any  other.  It’s  the  one  reason  marketers  think consumers will buy the product even though it may seem no different from many others just like it.
• Value: The power of any good to command other goods in peaceful and voluntary exchange.
• Values: The beliefs about the important life goals that consumers are trying to achieve. The important enduring ideals or beliefs that guide behavior within a culture or for a specific person.
• VAT: This tax is based on the difference between the value of output and the value of inputs used to produce it. The aim here is to tax a firm only for the value it adds to the manufacturing inputs, and not the entire input cost. Thus, VAT helps avoid a cascading of taxes as a product passes through different stages of production/value addition.
• Viral Marketing: Marketing by the word of the mouth, having a high pass-rate from person to person is called Viral marketing.  Creating a ‘buzz’ in the industry is an example of viral marketing
• Vote On Account: It is a sort of interim budget where the government presents accounts required to keep the process on until the next government takes over.
• Ways And Means Advance (WMA): RBI is the banker for both Central and State governments. Hence, it provides a breather to manage mismatches in their receipts and payments in the form of ways and means advances.
• Union Budget: The Union Budget is the annual report of India as a country. It contains the government of India’s revenue and expenditure for the end of a particular fiscal year, which runs from April 1 to March 31. The Union Budget is the most extensive account of the government’s finances, in which revenues from all sources and expenses of all activities undertaken are aggregated. It comprises the revenue budget and the capital budget. It also contains estimates for the next fiscal year.
• Wholesale Price Index: Prices of goods that are dealt with wholesale
• Word of mouth communication (WOM): This occurs when people share information about products or promotions with friends–research indicate WOM is more likely to be negative.