Marketing
strategies serve as the fundamental underpinning of marketing plans designed to
fill market needs and reach marketing objectives. Plans and objectives are
generally tested for measurable results. Commonly, marketing strategies are
developed as multi-year plans, with a tactical plan detailing specific actions
to be accomplished in the current year. Time horizons covered by the marketing
plan vary by company, by industry, and by nation, however, time horizons are
becoming shorter as the speed of change in the environment increases. Marketing
strategies are dynamic and interactive. They are partially planned and
partially unplanned. See strategy dynamics.
Marketing
strategy involves careful scanning of the internal and external environments. Internal environmental factors
include the marketing mix, plus performance analysis and strategic constraints.External
environmental factors include customer analysis, competitor analysis, target
market analysis, as well as evaluation of any elements of the technological,
economic, cultural or political/legal environment likely to impact success. A
key component of marketing strategy is often to keep marketing in line with a
company's overarching mission statement. Besides SWOT analysis, portfolio analyses such as the
GE/McKinsey matrix or COPE analysis can
be performed to determine the strategic focus.
Once
a thorough environmental scan is complete, a strategic plan can be constructed
to identify business alternatives, establish challenging goals, determine the
optimal marketing mix to attain these goals, and detail implementation.
A final step in
developing a marketing strategy is to create a plan to monitor progress and a
set of contingencies if problems arise in the implementation of the plan.