Defining marketing objectives and strategies

Abstract

The definition of marketing objectives and strategies is a key step in the marketing planning process and the keystone locking the value proposition together. If we imagine the value proposition as an arched bridge connecting supplier and customer, we can ask ourselves ‘Why would either party want to engage with the other, and what would entice them to act to do so?’ This deceptively simple question raises a multitude of issues that combine to shape the ‘give and take’ of commercial relationships. Staying with this analogy, the top of a smooth and symmetrical arch would describe a value proposition of mutual and equal benefit, where both parties derive an acceptable level of satisfaction for an acceptable level of investment. The summit of a lopsided arch would indicate that one party was getting a better deal than the other from the interface, and that the structural integrity of the value proposition (and thus of any future relationship) was probably tenuous. The central role of marketing objectives and strategies in creating the value proposition is depicted in Figure 7.1.