Marketing strategy is a set of goals and objectives, policies and rules that give direction to marketing efforts from time to time at each level and location.
- Promotion
Promotion is an activity that generates information, persuades, or reminds consumers of the benefits of a product. The goals of carrying out promotional activities are:
a) Introducing new products to the public.
b) Extend the maturity of the product.
c) Maintaining the stability of the company from possible competition.
d) Encouraging product sales.
Thus Promotion is one of the determining factors for the success of a marketing program. Regardless of the quality of a product, if consumers have never known or heard of it and are not sure that the product will be useful for them, then they will never buy it.
In carrying out promotions, the nature of fathonah (smart) is needed to influence consumer attractiveness to the company’s products. Fathonah means understanding, comprehending, and living deeply all the things that are the duties and obligations. The nature of fathonah will also foster creativity and the ability to carry out various kinds of useful innovations. Business people must also be smart, shrewd, and wise in thinking.
- Market Segmentation
Market segmentation is the basis for knowing that each market consists of several different segments. Within each segment there are buyers who have different needs, different buying patterns, and different responses to various kinds of offers.
Market segmentation is the process of placing consumers in subgroups in a product market, so that buyers have nearly the same responses indicating the amount and frequency of purchases, loyalty to a particular brand, and other buyer response measures. Therefore, segmentation is an identification process that aims to find buyers in the entire market.
- Targeting (market determination)
Determining the target market is the process of evaluating and selecting each segment to be served by the company.
There are three alternative strategies that can be taken by companies to choose the target market (in the face of market heterogeneity), namely:
- Undifferentiated marketing
- Differentiated marketing, and
- Concentrated marketing.
- Undifferentiated Marketing
The use of this strategy is base on cost-saving reasons (standardization and mass production), because the product line is narrow, production, storage and transportation costs can reduce.
Actually this strategy is aimed at the largest segment in the market. when companies do that, there is massive competition in large market segments.
- Differentiated Marketing
In this strategy, the company tries to identify certain groups of buyers (market segments) by dividing the market into two or more groups. Besides that, the company makes different products and marketing programs for each segment.
In this strategy the company seeks to:
a. Selecting the sub-group/groups to serve.
b. Plan products that can provide satisfaction to these groups.
So, this differentiated marketing strategy can increase sales and increase costs.
- Concentrated Marketing
In concentrated marketing, the company only concentrates its marketing efforts on one or a few groups of buyers. This strategy is carries out by companies that fail to serve many groups of buyers, so that their marketing efforts are only focus on the most profitable buyer groups.
The objectives pursued by this strategy by the company include:
a. to gain a strong position in a segment it serves.
b. to obtain savings in its operations due to specialization in production, distribution, and promotion.
c. to get a high return on investment. this is possible if the market segment is chose correctly.