7 Rules of Marketing Strategy

“Strategy without tactics is the slowest route to victory. Tactics without strategy is the noise before defeat.”

– Sun Tzu, Chinese general B.C 500

Following are the 7 rules of success in formulating marketing strategy.

Rule 1: Don’t flirt beyond adolescence; get serious if you want to be taken seriously!

Every market is home to various segments, and in the initial stages there are few brands and thus they cater to multiple segments and latitude of needs. In this stage it is advisable to position brands at multiple segments as products haven’t reached the sophistication levels to cater to different needs exclusively and neither are the consumers mature enough to know what they want. But as markets develop, products developments becomes more comprehensive and consumers more sophisticated, we start seeing single segments brands providing superior and relevant value to the targeted segment. At this stage, if a brand still continues to flirt with segments it is bound to fail, as it differs from desired value of either segment it caters too, and competition is catering to the evolved needs of segments in a focused manner.

Rule 2: Always celebrate success by asking the question “What Next”?

This rule has been highlighted by many management books including the prescribed book of Jadish Seth. When a company strikes gold, it should need just sit and uncork the champagne but should be staring at the results and asking “What Next”. In other words, the competitive advantage build in one period can be copied in the next one and thus one should always keep building on newer competitive positions rather than resting on laurels of one already achieved. Also, situations change and once dominant strategy might become a redundant one in the new situation and therefore the critical question “What Next?”

Rule 3: Produce value for consumer, but also shout it aloud and make it available in plenty.

Just matching consumers ideal point isn’t enough, you have to communicate this to as many people in your target segment and do it loudly than your competitors to be heard by these targeted people. We learnt this the hard way, as we thought producing superior value is enough to drive sales, but what we figured out is that it just isn’t about producing but providing. And providing includes communicating and making it available.

Rule 4: Don’t fall in love with your brands, leave that to your consumers.

When analyzing your brand portfolio, look at your brands with a dispassionate view. Look at their net contribution, future growth opportunities etc. and decide if they should be divested or continued. Ask questions like “Is it giving me a high enough RoI?” or “Can this money be better utilized for any other brand?” etc. Too often we have brand managers or marketing executives fall in love with their brands and keep continuing them even after realizing that they are performing unsatisfactorily.

Rule 5: Imitating is an art competition will master, innovation is an art you should master.

This is one of the most unfortunate facts of life, that our competition copies your successful strategy very fast and very well. If we reduce price for a certain segment, next period everyone does so. If you lunch a new brand and your SPI goes up, people follow suit fast. This applies to almost every strategy that you adopt, sooner or later it will be copied. Thus, innovation i.e. new ideas of executing same strategy, coming up with superior products etc. have to happening on a continuous basis to maintain competitive advantage.

Rule 6: Competition is your best teacher, and the same holds true for consumer.

Monitoring your competition’s activities as is tracking the consumer. They are your best teacher in terms of showing you what works in the market and what doesn’t. Don’t do all mistakes yourself, learn from the ones competition did and build on successful strategies adopted by them. This is a must as it makes no sense for anyone to repeat those mistakes and one has to be a fool to not learn from something working successfully for someone. Also, competition plays the most crucial role in shaping consumer expectations and this also makes it imperative to learn from you competition, as your customers are.

Rule No. 7: Remember all of above.

Remember all of the above, as it is not one learning alone which can guide as but the coherence force we develop when we adopt the learning’s mentioned above.