Marketing Strategies - Push or Pull?

Your Marketing Strategies Plan. Part 2

Lets take a quick look at types of effective marketing strategies.

*The PUSH MARKETING STRATEGY in marketing strategies 'pushes' the advertised product into the market by using all available distribution.

*The PULL MARKETING STRATEGY works through direct interaction with the end user.

Pricing is a critical factor in marketing strategies. How will you will price the offering?

If your offering has adequate significant differentiation to justify a high price, and you prefer quick cash to substantial control and market penetration, then you set your prices very high.

If your goal is quick market penetration, and short term income is not a primary objective, then you can fix your prices at a lower end.

If your market influence is limited, the market leaders would have already created an 'anchor price' in the buyer's minds.

To state the obvious, you must effectively promote and advertise a product or service to 'sell' it, and there are many ways of doing this.

If your offering stacks up better when comparing features with a similar product, then a product comparison ad can be advantageous.

If you want to promote your offer without comparing with your competitors, or your product is one-of-a-kind, then the product advantages ad is the right approach.

The product family ad can be of benefit can be used if your offer is part of a group or family that can be of benefit to the customer as a group. 

Marketing a variety of offerings to a broad market will benefit from promoting your business brand or identity rather than a particular offering and selecting the distribution methods you will use. These could include:

* Direct Sales involves using an in-house sales organization that sells through the Internet, telephone or mail order contact.

* On-premise Sales involves visiting the customer's premises to make the sale.

* Wholesale Sales uses middle-men to distribute product or service to the retailers.

* Full-service Retail Sales involves a full service retail distribution channel.

* Self-service Retail Sales implies using self service retail methods of distribution.

In implementing your marketing strategies, making a decision about pricing, promotion and distribution is strongly influenced by:

1. Environmental factors 

2. Government regulations or actions

3. Demographic changes 

4. Emerging technology 

The potential for market penetration involves:

1. Whether you are targeting old customers or new prospects, how well the prospects know your offerings, extent of competition, demographics and industry growth rate.

2. If your offering provides a better solution to the problem.

The time needed for a prospect to make a 'buy' decision is affected by the prospects trust in your offering, the number and quality of competitive substitutes, the urgency of the prospect's need, the gamble involved in making the purchase and the number of decision-makers involved. 

Product value, as perceived by the buyers, is determined by their awareness of competitive pricing, credibility of the offering, their ability to pay and their need for the product's features such as quality, reliability, durability, and ease of use.

In considering your effective marketing strategies, it is important to be familiar with the components that help establish products/services as strong contenders in the marketplace; for example, is some or all of the technology for the offering trademarked by the enterprise, how the offering differs from the competition and the benefits to the prospect.

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Copyright Daniel Jeremiah, vmsbonline. Protected by Copysentry. Reprints of this article in any form must include the author's name and all links.