Market Planning Model

• assist analyzing your current home business position for expansion opportunities;
  
• develop tactics to strengthen and expand your market and secure tighter sales projections.

Step 1: establish your marketing objectives

Step 2: analyze your current marketing position

Step 3: complete market segmentation and research
Step 4: select your marketing strategy
Step 5: set your product, price, distribution and promotion

Illustrative models can be downloaded as reference guides.

• increase sales
• introduce a new product line
• develop a new marketing segment
• open a new territory
• other: ____________________

Target Objectives

1. Sales Volumes
   
• dollars
• units
• territories
• markets
  
2. Share of Market
3. Distribution Expansion
4. Other:
   
   • market-need satisfying objectives
   • community-need satisfying objectives
   • corporate-need satisfying objectives
     

Assess Your Marketing Experience
How would you define your current marketing experience? Are you a prospector, defender, analyzer or reactor?

This will determine how execute your marketing strategy. A prospector takes many risks, explores new marketing opportunities, and thinks out-of-the-box on new concepts and developments.

A reactor on the other hand assumes little risk. They will take action only when the market or competition forces their hand.

Your business experience may fall under any one of these modes. But if you are looking to grow your business, you may need to move up the marketing experience chain.

• change in demographics: i.e., baby-boom market near retiring
• change in technology: i.e., e-technology
• changes in political structure or business regulations
• changes in economics: i.e., interest rate drops
• change in socioculture: i.e., environmental products

• the competitor growth and size
• the competitor share of the market
• the competitor strength and weakness
• the competitor's possible behavior when you make market moves

Factors that can impact your competitive position include:

• barriers of market entry and exit:
  the stronger the barriers, the less likely that new entrants or existing competitors coming into or exiting the home business market.
  
  the weaker the barriers, the more likely you will face new players that can play havoc on your marketing position.
  
  a prime example are Internet plays. There are zero barriers to entry or exit. Internet leaders are constantly battling upstarts that challenge their online position.
  
  
• the strength of your suppliers / buyers:
  what prevents your suppliers or buyers from moving forward or backward in the chain to compete in your home business market
  
  could these players become a competitor?
  
  
• industry rivalry:
  for example, the threat of a "Wal-Mart" moving into your area may force a shift in your product strategy to stay competitive
  

1. in-bound logistics
2. operations
3. out-bound logistics
4. marketing and sales
5. service

The objective is to strengthen your core competency within the value chain and out-source other value chain activities to gain competitive advantage.

Auto manufactures are a prime example. Almost all of their in-bound logistics are outsource to auto part manufacturers using just-in-time operations and logistics.

• S=Strength: clearly define your home business strengths. It could be your product line, sales force, location, operation efficiency or other.
  
  
• W=Weakness: in comparison, you need to outline your home business weakness. This too may by your product line, sales force, location, operation efficiency or other.
  
  
• O=Opportunities: list the opportunities that may be available under a strategic play. This could include a product line expansion, opening a new market, streamlining an operation for better efficiency, etc.
  
  
• T=Threats: in comparison, you need to also list the potential threats. This may include price competition, new competition from a major player, etc.

1. Structure:
   • single management
   • multi-management
     
2. System:
   • reporting
   • budgeting, etc.
     
3. Style:
   • leadership
   • vision, etc.
     
4. Staff:
   • selection
   • training, etc.
     
5. Skills:
   • new capabilities vs. old capabilities
     
6. Shared Values:
   • attitudes
   • beliefs
     
7. Strategy:
   • business
   • marketing
   • operations

• Where do you hold the competitive position?
• Which segments are most profitable?
• Which segments should be strengthen?
• Which segments should be discontinued?
  
  Completing a segmentation profitability will pin-point areas that support a marketing decision and strategy.

• Cycle 1: Introduction or Emerging Markets
  This is when a business first comes into the market. The market is fairly new and needs to be developed.
  
  
• Cycle 2: Growth
  This is the period when the business begins experiencing rapid growth. The business will expand its operations, hire new people, and move into new markets and territories.
  
  
• Cycle 3: Maturity
  This is when the business begins to mature. Competitors have entered the market to challenge the market leader. To stay competitive, the business tightens its operations, increases productivity, and sheds unprofitable operations.
  
  
• Cycle 4: Decline
  This is when the business begins to decline due to competitive pressures or changes in the market.
  

An effective marketing plan will likely require a segmentation of your current markets. Each market segmentation may have its own "product-price-place-promotion" to maximize sales.

Segmentation comes in many forms. The most common include:

1. Physical Description Segmentation:
   
   • Industry Markets: SIC code, size, usage rate, location, etc
   • Consumer Markets: age, sex, income, family life cycle, etc.
     
2. General Behavioral Segmentation:
   
   • Industry: Industry buying situation
   • Consumer: life-style
     
3. Product-Related Segmentation:
   
   • product usage
   • loyalty
   • product influence
     
4. Customer-Needs Segmentation:
   
   • benefits sought
   • choice criteria
     

Most small and home businesses use physical descriptors for segmentation. Large corporations use a combination of segmentation strategies depending on brand and product.

The objective of segmentation is to develop a market within a market to maximize sales.

For example, we completed a segmentation strategy for a carpet-cleaning franchise. There were two distinct segments that we identified:

1. Residential Household
2. Hospitality Industry
   
   we further broke these segmentations down using physical descriptors and customer-needs segmentation.
   

What we have found was distinct marketing components that helped our client to target and grow their business.

• Consumer Market
  
  We targeted high-income households within a geographic area. Price was the segmentation strategy. Even though the target could afford multiple carpet cleanings, the business wanted to convey to the target that they were getting great value at a minimum price.
  
  We used selective coupons and seasonal incentives in print media and direct mail campaigns.
  
  
• Hospitality Industry
  
  Service was the segmentation strategy for hotels and restaurants. They needed carpet cleaning that can be performed in the off-hours with the least amount of interruption.
  
  Our client assigned a dedicated service professional to each respective account. That person was on the job almost daily building the reliability of their dedicated team.
  
  From this segmentation came a new product opportunity: concrete washing and cleaning. Our client was able to expand their service offering to the hospitality industry using customer-needs segmentation for reliable and dedicated service.

Segmentation marketing allows you to develop a product service that addressed different needs. Segmenting your market can open business expansion opportunities.

Segmentation strategies are often supported by marketing research and positioning analysis. This is very common with brand marketers such as Kelloggs, General Mills, and other brand-oriented companies.

They use segmentation research to determine whether a market exists. Often, new product concepts may be discovered and tested.

This component is beyond our brief discussion, but included in the download for review. We have within our network marketing research experts who can address any marketing research project.

We now reach the guts of your market strategy. Finding the right strategy will depend on your market, segmentation, and business analysis. We have for review the following:

Entry Marketing Strategies for New Markets

• Reviews market entry strategies for new products and services. Addresses marketing plans for market pioneers and fast-followers.

Market Strategies for Growth Markets

• Reviews market expansion opportunities for market leaders and market challengers.

Market Strategies for Markets in Mature/Decline

• Reviews market plans to maintain competitive advantage in a mature market. Reviews how to avoid shake-out and exit strategies when the market declines.

Market Strategies for International Markets

• If your plans have you moving into international markets, this outline raises issues that can formulate your plan.
  

1. Product
2. Price
3. Place (or distribution)
4. Promotion
   
   a 5th P will been added to the mix:
   
   
5. Pamper — meaning quality service

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	Market Planning Model: the 4-Ps of marketing

• new-to-world product development / services
• new product or service lines
• additions to existing product or service lines
• improvement in / revisions to existing product lines or services
• repositioning
• cost reduction

1. costs
2. customer perceived value
3. economics
4. competition

Building Your Distribution Outlets
Distribution channels are becoming an important play in many marketing strategies. With the advent of the Internet and online auction houses, businesses are expanding operations that reach around the world.

• Did you know that our Executive Director is a strong e-business marketing consultant? If you need an e-business review, drop him a line at guide@nbuy.com. You will be surprised how e-business can open new markets and reduce operation expenses.

1. Advertising: television, radio, direct mail, internet, etc.
2. Promotional Activities: coupons, samples, etc.
3. Public Relations
4. Personal Selling
   

Service Quality
Any successful marketing strategy requires quality management. The determinants of service quality include:

• reliability
• responsiveness
• competence
• access
• communication
• courtesy
• credibility
• security
• understanding / knowing the customer
• tangibles.