Business Marketing Strategies Essay

They are top-down marketing strategies and outside-in marketing strategies. Amazon will be used as the case study in discussing these two marketing strategies. DESCRIPTION Atop-down marketing strategy is one of the oldest business strategiescurrently around the world. Itis based on the belief that the intrinsic qualities and strengths of a business entity are the determinant factors of the subsequent success of an organization. There is very minimal regard given to the target population’s preferences and the final product is determined to be ideal for all. It is gaining popularity with corporations with time as they seek to invest more on the consumer based marketing. Factors influencing marketing strategy There are four major factors that will influence a company’s approach to market it product; i) Key performance indicators: key performance indicators are crucial as they help determine what a successful accomplishment of an objective looks like.

A well-defined business entity structure should have a clear and elaborate understanding of the outcomes and related key performance indicators (Brocke and Rosemann, 2015). ii) Marketing objectives: marketing objectives can eitherbelead-generation, branding or both. A study conducted in Saudi Arabia (Alabdulkader, Al Kahtani, Elhendy, and Al-Duwais, 2017) indicated that the objectives set played a major role in the determinant of success and efficiency of the eventual marketing effort. The consumers do not understand the mechanics of the business but understand that cyber-crime is a real threat and leave it up to the firms to design their own products and independently run their security products in their systems to protect them from cyber-attacks. The four major components of a top down marketing plan are; analysis, objective, strategy and tactics.

Objectives are set after the analysis of the current situation of the entity, assessment of trends and prediction of future outcomes and comprehension of the set corporation objectives. The greatest focus is on the executive as they control the financial aspect of the company and determine the resources allocated to each department. Advantages The major advantage is that this mode of business marketing strategy allows for the achievement of goals by the owners of a business. Disadvantages of top-down business approach The major disadvantage of the top-down marketing strategy is that the team feels left out of the decision making process. This bears a feeling of working towards someone else’s goals. According to Uma (2015), team participation in the decision making process enables employees to readily own the processes they undertake in the business and helps improve productivity.

This has a positive aspect in the final outcome of the business endeavor and will improve the outcomes of the independent processes. Thereby leaving them out of the decision making process eventually leads to a lack of morale by the employees. This would greatly help spare resources available and increase efficiency. Increased productivity will lead to a higher profit margin to help the entity achieve more. Outside-in marketing approach also helps in the increase of employee participation and ownership of the project’s objectives(Mu, Bao, Sekhon, Qi and Love, 2018). The employees of the company play a major role in the development of the strategies as they are part of the team that analyses consumer feedback. This interaction between the outside-in marketing strategy and the human resource has been related to a superior entity performance.

Cost cutting leads to a subsequent detrimental effect on the customer satisfaction(Malshe and Agarwal, 2018). The outside in marketing approach is a strategy majorly focused on improving the customer experience. This strategy puts more focus and aligns its objectives to ensure that the maximum benefactor is the consumer. Cost cutting measures are only implemented if there are no effects to the consumer. The right systems and strategies along with resources are well allocated because the business owners have listened to the needs of the consumers and are implemented in line with their positive impact on user experience. However, technological innovation, the business model and the marketing strategy employed by the founder and managers are the key cogs responsible for making Amazon the leading online retailer globally.

Amazon started out as an online bookstore but has since then branched out to other areas such as consumer technology, logistics and entertainment among others. Innovation is a key factor in its evolution and has enabled it to plot its path to being a trillion dollar entity. Amazon’s Business Strategy Amazon has been described to date as one of the most influential and successful business entities globally (Forbes, 2017). They were listed as 3rd in the list of the most innovative companies in the world. They seek to be the first company in the world to run fully automated business processes and the offer large amounts of money as incentives to university students in order for them to create next generation robots.

These robots would look to reduce human interaction with business or manufacture processes and increase efficiency of the output. ii) Drones – Amazon’s research on drones is to help improve product delivery to the end consumer. This would increase the efficiency of online shopping as they target to deliver the commodities to the doorstep of the clients and reduce time for delivery of said goods. iii) Artificial intelligence – Amazon’s Alexa program is one of the lading artificial intelligence applications programs in the world. Entertainment is a big market in the current business stream. Amazon prime members have free access to the shows available which is an added convenience to improve user experience. Amazon’s Improvement in Logistic Capabilities Logistics play a major role in Amazon’s business set up.

They promise delivery of the products purchased online within a specified period of time and if not delivered then that would have a hugely detrimental effect on the customer confidence. Amazon created an online application that would help track truck drivers. The aim was to help the small businesses to expand their operations and manage seasonal hikes. They did this in India especially to E-sellers. It further expanded to creating Amazon cash. Its major international market is India as it has been identified as one of the biggest emerging market. It has the fastest growing E-commerce and has been tipped to be a global giant in the near future. North America North America was the inception point of Amazon into the market.

The earnings result from retail purchase of products by consumers through their online store and subscription into their website services for both entertainment and business purposes. North America was responsible for a total combined sale of $2. 83 billion in 2017. Growth of sales was a subsequent of increased purchase of the number of goods resulting from discounts in various categories of products e. Amazon prime services effectively increased sales of consumer retail goods and electronics in the international market with reported sales of over $30 billion. AWS This was the most profitable component of Amazon in 2017 with a reported income of $4. 33 billion. The market was earning from sales of database, storage and compute especially from upcoming companies, government branches, schools, universities among others. Sales increased by 42% in 2017 compared to 2016.

report, 2018). The Amazon share price has fallen in 2017 but the management at Amazon does not seem fazed by that. This indicates that they are willing to incur losses in order to maintain the integrity of client satisfaction. The corporation is not willing to cut cost and sacrifice the goodwill of its clientele in order to turn a profit and make the shareholders happy. This is a primary example of the full whole hearted implementation of the outside in marketing strategy by Amazon. However their commitment to consumer satisfaction and their willingness to bear the brunt of the resource intensive process has a long term reward as the projected sales are over half a trillion dollars over the next decade. The leadership structure for Amazon led by their CEO Jeff Bezos also allows for innovativeness and creativity.

They penetrate a lot of emerging markets and invest heavily on a diverse range of business activities. Their employees are expected to show leadership and initiative which is a characteristic of the outside in approach. The lower level employees are best suited to give insight into the wants of the consumers as most of the time they are the ones who directly interact with the consumer. Hartmann, M. , Klink, J. and Simons, J. Cause related marketing in the German retail sector: Exploring the role of consumers’ trust. Food Policy, 52, pp. Outside-in marketing capability and firm performance. Industrial Marketing Management. Rakthin, S. , Calantone, R. J. G. , Michael, R. E. D. D. S. Patent 9,858,583. Uma, M. H. D. bluetext. com/topvsbottom/ https://www.