Marketing Strategy and Competitive Positioning pdf ebook

Unique and valued products and services
In potential markets where the company has superior products and services that are different 
in a way that is valued by the customers, there is potential for creating a stronger competitive 
position. Similarly, a competitive advantage based on low price relative to the competition 
is likely to be attractive to price-sensitive segments, but may actually deter segments more 
motivated by quality.
9.4.2 Economic and technological position
The evaluation should also address the company’s relative economic and technological char-
acteristics and resources.
Relative cost position
The company’s cost structure relative to competitors was listed as a potential marketing 
asset in Chapter 6. Low relative production and marketing costs – through technological 
leadership, exploitation of linkages or experience and scale effects – give a financial edge to 
the company in the particular market.
Capacity utilisation
For most companies, the level of capacity utilisation is a critical factor in its cost structure. 
Indeed, the PIMS study has shown that capacity utilisation is most crucial to small and 
medium-sized companies. Few companies can hope to achieve 100 per cent utilisation (there 
will inevitably be downtime in manufacturing, and slack periods for service companies), 
and indeed running at ‘full’ capacity may produce strains on both systems and structures. 
But what is clearly important in any operation is to identify the optimum level of utilisation 
and seek to achieve and maintain that.
Technological position
Having an exploitable edge in technology again creates a greater strength for the company 
in serving a market. That may or may not be leading-edge technology. In some markets a 
lower technology solution to customer requirements may be more suitable than state-of-
the-art applications. Again, the key is matching the technology to the customers’ problems 
or requirements.
9.4.3 Capability profile
The third set of factors affecting competitive strength centres on the resources that can be 
brought to bear in the market.

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