Reference no: EM133343027

Question 1: Why is it important for managers to identify the marketing objective before beginning their analysis and before making decisions? Give a short example (real or hypothetical) to illustrate your point.

Question 2 The Positioning Strategy and the Tactics are two different levels of the marketing plan because they serve different purposes - that is, they have different functions. Briefly explain the purpose of both (1) Positioning Strategy, and (2) Tactics.

Question 3 (a) Why is it important to have alignment between the four elements of the Positioning Strategy? (b) How would a manager know if the four elements are aligned or misaligned? Give a short example (real or hypothetical) to illustrate your point.

Question 4 (a) Why is it important to have alignment between the four Tactics? (b) How would a manager know if the four Tactics are aligned or misaligned? Give a short example (real or hypothetical) to illustrate your point.

Question 5 (a) Why is it important to have alignment between the marketing decisions (the right-hand side of the framework) and the external environment (the left-hand side of the framework)? (b) How would a manager know if the marketing decisions and the circumstances in the external environment are aligned or misaligned? Give a short example (real or hypothetical) to illustrate your point.

B. POSITIONING STRATEGY
The Value Proposition and Competitive Differentiation are two elements of the Positioning Strategy. Together, they constitute a "unique selling proposition;" depending on the organization or industry you work in, you might use the term "unique selling proposition," or you might break it down into Value Proposition and Competitive Differentiation. It's useful to think about these two things differently because, while they are interconnected, they are fundamentally two distinct concepts. The Value Proposition is the 'bundle of benefits' that managers curate for their target market, and the Competitive Differentiation is the attribute(s) that set the product/service apart from the competition in a way that is meaningful to the target market. See Appendix C.

Question 6 Why is it important that managers carefully design the Value Proposition? In other words, why should a Value Proposition not be merely a list of specifications of the product?

Question 7 Why is it important for managers to establish Competitive Differentiation that is meaningful to the target market? In other words, why isn't a good Value Proposition sufficient?

Segmentation is the process of dividing the large population of possible customers into smaller groups, or segments. In Module 2, you read an article, "Segmentation and Targeting," that described the five segmentation criteria. See Figure 1 and see Appendix B.

Question 8 Why is it essential for managers to segment the market? In other words, what are the benefits to the organization if the manager segments the market effectively - rather than focusing solely on producing good products?

When managers undertake market segmentation, they should aim to have homogeneity within the segments. This means all the people within Segment #1 should all respond similarly to the organization's offering. Using the example in Figure 1, everyone in Segment #1 is very enthusiastic about the value proposition. Meanwhile, the people within Segment #2 all respond similarly; for example, they like the value proposition but they are extremely price-sensitive. The people within Segment #3 all respond similarly; for example, they like the value proposition but they are typically don't purchase this category of products. And all the people in Segment #4 have no interest in the value proposition. In sum, all the people within a given segment feel the same way about the value proposition.

And, managers should aim to have heterogeneity across the segments, meaning different segments should respond differently to the organization's offering. The people in Segment #1 should respond differently to the offering than the people in Segment #2. Segments #1 and #2 should also respond differently than the people in Segment #3, and so on. For example, people in Segment #2, who are price-sensitive, respond well to sales promotions (such as a 25% discount), but people in the other segments do not respond well to sales promotions.

Question #9 Re. heterogeneity across segments: Why is it important that the manager can identify some segment(s) that are completely uninterested in the organization's offering? In other words, using the example above, why is it useful for the manager to know that Segment #4 has no interest in the value proposition?

Usually, when creating or revising a marketing plan, it's easier to decide on the target market first, and then decide on the tactics.

Question 10 Why is this true; why are the tactical decisions easier (ie, less complicated) to make after the target market has been decided? Use an example (real or hypothetical) to illustrate your answer.