Marketing Strategy
It’s all about the P’s. Mixed together to serve your Target Market–Price, Product, Place and Promotion. And Planning.
It’s about watertight data coupled with boundless creativity to work out where you are, where you want to be and how to get there.
Fill in the blanks to this basic Marketing Strategy outline, whether you are just starting up or launching a new product, service or brand.
Target Market
- Which market segment are we pitching to?
- Who is my Ideal Customer?
- What key benefit will clients get from buying in?
- What makes our product/service/brand/organization different from the competition?
- What will trigger our ideal client to chose us?
- What’s our Positioning Statement?
Product
- What are we selling that people really, truly, actually want and need?
- Why do they need this product?
- For how long will they need it?
- What warranties or post purchase servicing do we offer?
- How is our product packaged and branded?
- How will this product really make people’s lives better?
Price
- What’s the cheapest way to produce our product at the highest quality?
- What price can we sell for to cover operating costs and make the profit we want?
- How does our pricing compare to competition for the same product or alternatives?
- Do we discount or value add?
- What payment terms or financing do we offer?
Place
- Where do our customers buy from? Should we distribute through retail, on-line, mobile phone applications, directly or third party suppliers?
- Which locations are best and how many should we have? Consider transportation, warehousing, processing orders.
Promotion
- Packages, special promotions, loyalty programs, gift cards etc to generate new and reward existing clients.
- Marketing Communications Strategy – where to spread the word, in which channel? Includes Advertising, PR, Social Media etc.
The Marketing Mix is critical to success. Every step of the way needs to be budgeted and evaluated so you learn and adapt from mistakes and wins. You must always keep your eye on the future. Blockbuster didn’t. Neither did Kodak. And R.I.M? Let’s hope they don’t R.I.P.