STRATEGIC MARKETING

Ansoff Matrix

October 4, 2011 By Hitesh Bhasin Leave a Comment

For any decision to be taken at corporate level, you need the right strategic tools. Ansoff matrix is one of them. Ansoff matrix helps a firm decide their market growth as well as product growth strategies. The 2 questions which the Ansoff Matrix can answer is “How can we grow in the existing markets” and “What amends can be made in the product portfolio to have better growth”.

From the above two questions, it is clear that Ansoff matrix deals with the companies external market scenario as well as the product portfolio which the firm has. The matrix is divided in two quadrants – The product quadrant and the market quadrant. The Product quadrant on the X axis is further divided into Existing products and New products. The market scenario on the Y axis is divided into existing markets and new markets. Thus the Ansoff matrix divides a firm on the basis of the products it has – existing products or new products, as well as the markets it is in – existing markets or new markets.

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7 steps of competitor analysis

September 19, 2011 By Hitesh Bhasin Leave a Comment

Competitor analysis is absolutely essential if you have to grow in a competitive market. It is becoming increasingly important because of rise in competition in each and every sector. Whether electronics, automobiles or FMCG, each sector today is facing immense competition affecting margins and sales. Thus there are some critical steps to be followed by these organizations to outperform their competition. However, they will be able to stand out only when they KNOW their competition. This is where the step by step competition analysis comes in the picture. Here are the 7 steps for competitor analysis

1) Identify current and future competitors in the market – The best way to identify current and future competitors is to target products. Supposing you are currently selling hair oil. You need to know how many branded and unbranded players are there in the market. You need to know if any new company is starting to sell Hair oil or if any current company might stop selling the same. Furthermore, you also need to know how many of your customers prefer some other product over Hair oil. Thus by doing this you know your direct and indirect competition. This is the first step in competition analysis.

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SWOT Analysis

February 13, 2011 By Hitesh Bhasin Leave a Comment

swotanalysis SWOT Analysis

SWOT analysis also known as internal analysis stands for Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats. The SWOT analysis involves analysis of both the internal as well as external environment. SWOT analysis is especially important during strategic planning wherein the organization needs to decide the strategy which it has to take. The strategic decisions can be made only when the organization knows everything about itself as well as where it stands in the market. Therefore it uses “Internal Analysis” or “SWOT Analysis”.

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10 steps in strategy formulation

December 24, 2010 By Hitesh Bhasin Leave a Comment

There are several ways a strategy can be designed for a company. However some methods are better than the others. Here are 10 steps which guide you in deciding the strategy of your company.

Steps 1 to 5 mainly involve internal or external research as well as very long term strategy making (Strategies made in the first 5 steps affect the whole life cycle of the company)

1) Write a Vision Statement – A vision statement (crisp and to the point) is a must for developing a strategy. Exploring and deciding on the vision of the company gives you clarity on the main objectives of the company.

2) Mission Statement - Decide a Mission statement for the company. This mission statement would actually determine the methodology of the company in reaching its vision, its purposes and its philosophy behind its goals.

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Need for Market Segmentation.

August 23, 2010 By Hitesh Bhasin 1 Comment

Why is there a need for market segmentation? Simply because according to the marketing concept by philip kotler, understanding customers and satisfying their needs better then the competition is the priority of an organisation. But different customers have different needs, and it is rarely possible to satisfy all customers by treating them alike. Thus there is a need for Market Segmentation.

Mass marketing refers to treatment of the market as a homogenous group and offering the same marketing mix to all customers. Mass marketing allows economies of scale to be realized through mass production and mass distribution. Thus is the principles of Market Segmentations are not applied, the firms ignore the differing customer needs and another firm would likely enter the market with a product that serves a specific group, and the incumbent firms would lose the customers.

Target marketing on the other hand recognizes the diversity of customers of customers and does not try to please all of them with same offering. The most basic step of in target marketing is to identify market segments and their needs. Thus depending on the type of marketing the firm wants to carry out, they need to carry out market segmentation.

Market Segmentation

August 22, 2010 By Hitesh Bhasin Leave a Comment

Market segmentation is the identification of the portions of the market that are different from one another. Market Segmentation allows the firm to better satisfy the needs of its potential customers.

Let us take a simple day to day life example and clearly understand what segmentation means. Each parent would like the teachers to give personal attention to their wards. This is practically not possible if all the children are asked to sit in the same class with various subjects. Thus to facilitate this the class is further segmented according to subjects. On the same philosophy, as the business or the organization cannot meet the needs of each and every individual in the market the market is segmented in to meaningful, relatively similar and identifiable groups, the purpose of which is to enable the marketer to tailor marketing mixes to meet the needs of one or more specific groups. These groups are known as segments and this process is known as market segmentation.

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Strategy

May 30, 2010 By Hitesh Bhasin 3 Comments

There is considerable confusion in management literature regarding the various terms used in strategic management. A recent survey by the American Management Association revealed that respondents found it difficult to define policy, and differentiate between strategy, policy and objectives, further compounding the difficulty. According to Andrews, strategy, policy and objectives embrace a range of statements from the “broad” and “important” to “narrow” and “unimportant”. Policies get merged into procedures and procedures into rules. Strategies get blended into tactics, resulting in an “end-means continuum”. This can be illustrated by the following example.

Suppose a company decides upon a sales growth of 35 per cent and desires to achieve this by acquiring other companies, instead of introducing new products. Acquisition in this case can be considered as a strategy chosen by the company. The company will then have to decide on the size of the firm to be acquired. If it decides on acquiring a small company, this becomes the objective.

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Strategic management process

February 26, 2010 By Hitesh Bhasin Leave a Comment

strategicmanagementprocess1 Strategic management process

The strategic management formulation and implementation methods vary with product profile, company profile, environment within and outside the organization, and various other factors. Large organizations which use sophisticated planning use detailed strategic management models whereas smaller organizations where formality is low use simpler models. Small businesses concentrate on planning steps compared to larger companies in the same industry. [Read more...]