Market Management Chapter 9,11 Summary

SESSION 3, 4 READING SUMMARY

Group – 6

Section – A

Summary: - Crafting the Brand Positioning

All marketing strategy is built on STP. Other than, to identify which market segment to target it is also critical to convey how our brand is different or unique from its competitors, i.e. customer focused value proposition. How to decide on a positioning requires

1. Determining a competitive frame of reference in the most advantages way possible by identifying and analysing a list of actual and potential competitors  
2. Identifying the optimal points of parity (POP) and points of difference (POD) with respective of a frame of reference. PODs can be identified based on three criteria – desirability to the customer (relevance, distinctiveness and believability), deliverable by the company (feasibility, communicability and sustainability) and differentiating from competitors. Points of parity are classified in two basic forms category - necessary but not sufficient condition for brand choice (it may change over time) and competitive which are to overcome the perceived weakness of the brand. Perceptual maps are helpful in choosing specific benefits as POPs and PODs to position a brand.
3. Create a brand mantra to summarise the positioning and essence of the brand. A good brand mantra should the category of the business and set boundaries to it. It should be memorable, personally meaningful and relevant to as many employees as possible. They are typically designed to capture the brand PODs.

The typical approach for positioning a product is to inform consumers of a brand’s category membership before stating the point of difference. This is done so that consumer know what the product is and what function it serves before they compare it to its competitors. Initial advertisement creates brand awareness, and afterwards they create a brand image.

The main problem in creating strong brand positioning is that many attributes and benefits that makeup POP and POD are negatively correlated, and some of these attributes and benefits have positive and negative aspects.

Differentiation Strategies

Competitive advantage is the ability of a company to perform in one or more ways that competitors cannot and will not match. There is 2 type of competitive advantage leverage and customer advantage. Leverage advantage is one that a company can use as a springboard to new advantages, and customer advantage is one that a customer sees in the company offering.

The obvious means of differentiation and often the most compelling to customers relate to the aspects of different products and services and these are Employee differentiation, Channel differentiation, Image differentiation and Services differentiation

Summary: - Setting Product Strategy

    Contrary to popular belief that product is tangible, the truth is that the product is anything, which is offered to a market to satisfy a want or need. In planning market offering, the marketer needs to address five product levels in which each adds more customer value. These five levels are core benefit, basic product, expected product, augmented product and potential product. These five levels are also known as customer value strategy. Brand positioning and differentiation will happen on the augmented product stage, and its future life cycle will be in potential product level. Products will be classified based on the durability and tangibility into three categories Nondurable goods (FMCG) are tangible, Durable goods (Home appliances) are tangible and Services (haircut) are intangible. Further consumer goods are classified based on convenience (Impulse and Emergency goods), shopping (suitability, quality, price, and style), speciality (BMW) and unsought goods. Industrial goods are classified as materials and parts (raw materials (Farm products, natural products) and manufactured materials (component materials and parts) , capital items and supplies and business services.

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