Cross-marketing

A marketing co-operation or marketing cooperation is a partnership of at least two companies on the value chain level of marketing with the objective to tap the full potential of a market by bundling specific competences or resources. Other terms for marketing co-operation are marketing alliance, marketing partnership, co-marketing, and cross-marketing. Sometimes, called as Consortium as well.

Marketing co-operations are sensible when the marketing goals of two companies can be combined with a concrete performance measure for the end consumer. Successful marketing co-operations generate “win-win-win” situations that offer value not only to both partnering companies but also to their customers.

Marketing co-operations extend the perspective of marketing. While marketing measures deal with the optimal organization of the relationship between a company and its existing and potential customers, marketing co-operations audit to what extent the integration of a partner can contribute to improving the relationship between companies and customers.

In recent years, marketing co-operations have been increasingly popular between brands and entertainment properties. This usually involves a minimum exchange of name and image rights on behalf of a film studio for a specified advertising commitment from the partnering brand.

Importance

The importance of marketing co-operations has significantly increased over the last few years: Companies recognize partnerships as an effective means for untapping growth potentials they cannot realize on their own. In the big merger and acquisition wave at the end of the nineties it became apparent, that co-operations (especially on the value chain level of marketing) often present a much more flexible approach with a more immediate growth impact than merging or acquiring entire business entities.

Studies show, that companies recognise the increasing relevance and potential of co-operations.

Objectives

There are five main objectives of marketing co-operations:
* Build-up and/or strengthening of brand/image/traffic by implementing joint or exchange communication measures
* Access to new markets/customers by directly addressing the co-operation partner’s customers or by using its distribution points
* Increase of customer loyalty by addressing own customers with value added offerings from the partner - often useful for community building
* Reduction of marketing costs by bundling or exchanging marketing measures
* Measure the potential value of an intangible asset through how much consumers are willing to pay the premium

3M'
corporate site describes the value they see in Joint Marketing

:Joint marketing refers to a situation where a product is manufactured by one company and distributed by another company. Both parties invest in commercialization efforts. Joint marketing differs from a joint venture in that it deals with commercialization and marketing dollars, rather than equity. The prominence of each logo generally is relative to its use as a primary or secondary contributor. Joint marketing differs from third-party relationships because both brands are present in the product itself. Normally, third-party relationships have both brands on literature and sales materials, but only the manufacturer is present on the product.

Forms

Marketing co-operations can take on many different forms, for instance:
* Joint product development or Co-branding
* Joint communication or “Co-advertising“
* Joint sales measures or Co-promotion
* Co-marketing">...