Commerce 1MA3: Guidelines for Report 2
The second group report is focused on applying course concepts to create a viable and effective marketing strategy for your company. Business strategy is often conceptualized at the level of the business division so for report 2 you will first start by picking among one of the business divisions in your company (note: some companies may only have a single business division).
At the level of the business division, what can the company do, to ensure future success in a competitive marketplace?
1. Introduction – State what business division of your company you are focusing on. Make sure that it is B2C (the business division has at least one product/service which consumers can purchase). Refer to the lecture where we went over how to find your business division.
2. STP –The first thing you will need to do is to identify who will be your customers. As part of the STP process we first start with the entire population of potential consumers and then we identify market segments, choose a target market and develop a positioning strategy for that target market. For this report, you will follow the 5 steps in STP as laid out in Chapter 6 of the textbook and the Chapter 6 lectures. Segmentation: Step 1-Objective/business strategy Step 2-Segmentation bases – Clear state your overall strategy/objectives. Identify relevant segmentation bases with justification.
Using a good mix of segmentation bases, identify several viable market segments for the business division. Stronger groups will provide secondary research as support/justification for market segments identified. Targeting: Step 3-Evaluate market segments on Segment attractiveness on the basis of: Identifiable, Reachable, Substantial and Profitable and Responsiveness. Step 4-Select a single target market for the report with clear reasoning and justification. If you would have recommended a different targeting strategy, you can mention it here.
However, for the purposes of this report, coming out of stage 4 you should have picked a single market segment to focus on as your target market. Positioning: Step 5-Identify and develop a positioning strategy for your business division that you believe will best resonate with your target market. Be sure to provide a clear explanation for why the specific positioning strategy was chosen, as well as why this positioning will be competitive in the market. As part of this section, be sure to provide rationale, justification and/or support for the positioning strategy (this could include a positioning statement, value proposition, a perceptual map and/or external research to support positioning).
3. Marketing Mix – Now that you have a target market and positioning, it is time to build your marketing mix. The marketing mix will describe the 4Ps. Refer to the specific chapters for each of the 4Ps for more information. Page 67 of your textbook provides an example of the marketing mix; however, you may find that you will need to include additional information to meet the requirements for this assignment. Each component of the marketing mix will be evaluated on the strategic elements proposed as well as their justification and rationale. It is not enough to simply state the strategy without providing justification.
As you are creating your marketing mix, be sure to keep in mind the important work you did in the previous section relating to your target market and positioning. Every element of the marketing mix should be consistent with your target market and positioning strategy.
Product: Discuss the overall product strategy for the business division. As part of this section, you can discuss the complexity/type of product(s), the product mix breadth and depth, as well as branding. A business division will oftentimes have multiple products/brands in its portfolio. Which do you think the business division should prioritize? You might also want to consider if there are any gaps in the product assortment that you believe could be filled with a new product/service.
Place: It is important to realize that place is not just about locations, but also about distribution channels. Retail companies can also discuss retail strategy. As part of this section, you can discuss the channel structure, channel strategy and distribution intensity.
Price: Discuss your overall pricing strategy. As part of this section, you can discuss the pricing method, the pricing strategies and any pricing tactics that you will be using.
Promotion: Discuss your overall promotions strategy. Will you be making use of an integrated marketing communications campaign? What types of promotion will you be using? This section should answer the question of how you will communicate and appeal to your target market.
4. Conclusion – Very short conclusion to end the report.
