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Marketing

Key concepts

Product / Price / Promotion Placement / Service / Retail Market research Marketing strategy Marketing management

Promotional content

Advertising / Branding Direct marketing / Personal Sales Product placement / Public relations Publicity / Sales promotion Underwriting

Promotional media

Printing / Publication / Broadcasting Out-of-home / Internet marketing Point of sale / Novelty items Digital marketing / In-game Word of mouth

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A marketing strategy^{[1] [2]} is a process that can allow an organization to concentrate its limited resources on the greatest opportunities to increase sales and achieve a sustainable competitive advantage.

Contents 1 Key part of the general corporate strategy 2 Sectorial tactics and actions 3 Types of strategies 4 Strategic Models 5 Marketing Practice 5.1 Coarse Marketing 6 See also 7 References

A marketing strategy is most effective when it is an integral component of corporate strategy, defining how the organization will successfully engage customers, prospects, and competitors in the market arena. It is partially derived from broader corporate strategies, corporate missions, and corporate goals. As the customer constitutes the source of a company's revenue, marketing strategy is closely linked with sales. A key component of marketing strategy is often to keep marketing in line with a company's overarching mission statement.

A publishing strategy can serve as the foundation of a marketing plan. A marketing plan contains a set of specific actions required to successfully implement a marketing strategy. For example: "Use a low cost product to attract consumers. Once our organization, via our low cost product, has established a relationship with consumers, our organization will sell additional, higher-margin products and services that enhance the consumer's interaction with the low-cost product or service."

A strategy consists of a well thought out series of tactics to make a marketing plan more effective. Marketing strategies serve as the fundamental underpinning of marketing plans designed to fill market needs and reach marketing objectives^[3]. Plans and objectives are generally tested for measurable results.

A marketing strategy often integrates an organization's marketing goals, policies, and action sequences (tactics) into a cohesive whole. Similarly, the various strands of the strategy , which might include advertising, channel marketing, internet marketing, promotion and public relations can be orchestrated. Many companies cascade a strategy throughout an organization, by creating strategy tactics that then become strategy goals for the next level or group. Each group is expected to take that strategy goal and develop a set of tactics to achieve that goal. This is why it is important to make each strategy goal measurable.

Marketing strategies are dynamic and interactive. They are partially planned and partially unplanned. See strategy dynamics.

Every marketing strategy is unique, but can be reduced into a generic marketing strategy. There are a number of ways of categorizing these generic strategies. A brief description of the most common categorizing schemes is presented below:

• Strategies based on market dominance - In this scheme, firms are classified based on their market share or dominance of an industry. Typically there are three types of market dominance strategies:
  • Leader
  • Challenger
  • Follower
• Porter generic strategies - strategy on the dimensions of strategic scope and strategic strength. Strategic scope refers to the market penetration while strategic strength refers to the firm’s sustainable competitive advantage.
  • Cost leadership
  • Product differentiation
  • Market segmentation
• Innovation strategies - This deals with the firm's rate of the new product development and business model innovation. It asks whether the company is on the cutting edge of technology and business innovation. There are three types:
  • Pioneers
  • Close followers
  • Late followers
• Growth strategies - In this scheme we ask the question, “How should the firm grow?”. There are a number of different ways of answering that question, but the most common gives four answers:
  • Horizontal integration
  • Vertical integration
  • Diversification
  • Intensification

A more detailed scheme uses the categories:

• Prospector
• Analyzer
• Defender
• Reactor

• Marketing warfare strategies - This scheme draws parallels between marketing strategies and military strategies.

Marketing participants often employ strategic models and tools to analyze marketing decisions. When beginning a strategic analysis, the 3Cs can be employed to get a broad understanding of the strategic environment. An Ansoff Matrix is also often used to convey an organization's strategic positioning of their marketing mix. The 4Ps can then be utilized to form a marketing plan to pursue a defined strategy.

In practice, as opposed to theory, research has indicated that the outstanding problems facing marketers lie in the use of specific functions.^{[citation needed]} Most senior managements have committed to the philosophy, even though their junior managers may be cynical about the degree of that commitment. Unfortunately, there is little evidence to show that this new-found belief has led to positive action. Indeed, there is little evidence that marketing practice (as opposed to the theory) has been widely embraced. In particular, pricing is largely on a cost-plus or competitive basis, promotional budgets are small (and spent more on sales promotion than advertising or PR), 'place' is - in any case - not relevant, and marketing research is almost all second-hand.

The marketer, in real life, does not face each decision with a copy of a text-book in his or her hand - ready to work through the various lessons. The marketer starts with a quite specific environment, which will immediately limit the range of relevant factors. To the perceptive marketer the range of options to be explored is usually obvious. Beyond this, the position is further constrained by the available resources. For instance, theory always says that the first step is marketing research, but if a competitor has just made a major change in strategy, a company may have just days to react - where research may take months.

Real-life marketing primarily revolves around the application of a great deal of common-sense; dealing with a limited number of factors, in an environment of imperfect information and limited resources complicated by uncertainty and tight timescales. Use of classical marketing techniques, in these circumstances, is inevitably partial and uneven.

Thus, for example, new products will emerge from irrational processes and the rational development process may be used (if at all) to screen out the worst non-runners. The design of the advertising, and the packaging, will be the output of the creative minds employed; which management will then screen, often by 'gut-reaction', to ensure that it is reasonable.

For most of their time, marketing managers use intuition and experience to analyze and handle the complex, and unique, situations being faced; without easy reference to theory. This will often be 'flying by the seat of the pants', or 'gut-reaction'; where the overall strategy, coupled with the knowledge of the customer which has been absorbed almost by a process of osmosis, will determine the quality of the marketing employed. This, almost instinctive management, is what is sometimes called 'coarse marketing'; to distinguish it from the refined, aesthetically pleasing, form favored by the theorists.

• Business model
• Customer engagement

1. ^ UK govt businesslink marketing strategy guide.
2. ^ Marketing strategy Australian administration small business guide.
3. ^ Marketing basics Marketing strategy based on market needs, targets and goals.