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8. Competitors Analysis in the Marketing Strategy of Gazprom

The detailed competitor analysis is highly important for the development of Gazprom Marketing Strategy. The competitive analysis is done to understand the relative positioning and market share of the company's direct and indirect competitors. Gazprom should first identify the competitors, evaluate their strategies and compare the strengths and weaknesses of their products with their product offerings. There are five steps Gazprom can follow to understand the strategic positioning of its key competitors:

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  Firstly, clearly define the target market.
  
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  Identify the director competitors and create a list of it.
  
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  Analyse the competitors’ product offerings, their market share, key strengths and weaknesses.
  
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  Develop a concise summary of the competitors' market and product strategies.
  
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  Conduct a comparative analysis against its products and/or services.
  
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  Continuously update the competitive analysis to make informed and strategically wise decisions.
  

The company can use different strategies to get the information about competitors, such as- doing Google research, going to trade shows, browsing public documents, asking customers, playing secret shopper technique and tapping the vendors

A detailed competitor analysis can be categorised into the following parts:

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  Identify market growth, share and financial objectives. Some examples are maximising short-term profitability or investing in R&D for long-term growth.
  
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  Evaluate the competitors’ strategies by collecting information from shareholder reports, white papers, press releases, promotional campaigns, hiring practices, acquisitions and mergers. This information will reveal the direction in which the competitors are moving.
  
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  Use the above information to analyse competitors’ strengths, weaknesses and core capabilities.
  

9. Market Analysis of Gazprom

Gazprom Marketing Strategy development requires a comprehensive market analysis. It can be done by quantitatively and qualitatively assessing the customer market. The information obtained from the market surveys will help Gazprom management in identifying the emerging opportunities, exposing the potential threats and understanding how they relate to the company’s major strengths and weaknesses.

Gazprom can follow the following steps to conduct the market analysis:

9.1 Market size analysis for developing Marketing Strategy of Gazprom

Gazprom should evaluate the market potential and volume to determine the size. The market potential includes potential customers and considers upper demand limit. The market volume includes certain indicators like realised sales and total turnover. Gazprom can take information from different sources to accurately determine the market size, such as- financial data of industry’s major players, government data, customer surveys, published industry reports and trade association data.

9.2 Market trends analysis for developing Marketing Strategy of Gazprom

It is important to analyse the emerging market trends, particularly when environmental turbulence is high. Gazprom can use different trend analysis techniques for this purpose, such as- marketing mix modelling, risk analysis, choice modelling and customer analysis. Gazprom should also monitor the political, legal, regulatory, social and economic changes as these environmental forces play an important role in shaping the market trends.

9.3 Market growth analysis for developing Marketing Strategy of Gazprom

Gazprom can extrapolate the historical data to determine the market growth rate. This information can help a company in determining the current lifecycle stage of the industry.

9.4 Market profitability analysis for developing Marketing Strategy of Gazprom

Gazprom can use Porter's five force framework to determine market profitability. The high buyer power will negatively affect market profitability, showing Gazprom’s customers have different options. Low supplier power positively influences profitability and indicates Gazprom has a strong position during the negotiation process with suppliers. High entry barriers show that there will be lesser new entrants in the market. High substitute product threat and high competitive rivalry will also decrease the market profitability and attractiveness for Gazprom.

9.5 Cost structure analysis for developing Marketing Strategy of Gazprom

Gazprom can use Porter’s value chain model (as given below) to determine the industry’s cost structure.

It will help Gazprom in isolating the costs and identifying critical success factors. Gazprom can also use the information obtained from cost structure analysis to develop cost advantage.