Market and Competitive Analysis is a latest technique of coming up to speed on the performance and forming result-oriented goals for the organization to achieve.
– A baseline of information is provided after the assessment of market and competitors. Differences also come out in the growth trends, economic distinctiveness and technological issues.
– It serves as a process to evaluate broad market trends and specific segment needs, determining attractiveness of the market, assessing factors driving the change in industry, evaluation of competitors, SWOT. All these data help in finding the target market out of the overall market and addressable market.
– Addressable Market data throws light on how much of similar offerings are purchased, availability of substitutes.
- Target market changes according to time and needs.
- Any market is influenced by changing certain demand factors on the limited resources; regulations and technology. Identification of market forces and emerging trends help predict market behavior in advance.
– A focused marketing scope is critical because of increasing heterogeneity of needs, increasing range of technology, product, process choices, economics of serving different product-market segments, fragmentation of channels in many industries resulting in the economics of serving different segments and which is challenging.
– Customer expectations are also important in market changes. Purchase decisions are influenced by a combination and not just from price, technology, quality, product range, features or speed alone.
– Marketing opportunity and sales strategy are also determined by the existing barriers to entry and potential competitive advantages.
- Competitive analysis helps in driving the key industrial pressures, framework for developing growth strategies, marketing plan for target markets, customer service and sales forecasting/ planning.
– An interesting area to gain is from studying the past and current selling strategy.
- Customer action is strengthened based on market needs and strategies.
- It also gives opportunity to identify niches or market gaps for the substitutes and equivalents.
– The competitive analysis can be used to identify the level of rivalry among competing sellers, reviewing competitive strategies to encourage customers to switch from a competitor, analyzing ease of entry for new competitors, determining supplier and buyer bargaining power, distribution channels for products/ services, analyzing macroeconomic factors.
– SWOT analysis provides insights on other marketing strategies, competitive positioning and customer experiences.
– Other industry standards of practice like pricing, market perception, purchasing cycles, seasonality, production etc also help in understanding market characteristics, positioning market strategies, assessing existing competitors, substitutes and alternatives.
