Scribd
Upload
73 views

Topic 3. Positioning Services in Competitive Markets

This document discusses positioning strategies for competitive service markets. It outlines three focused strategies - fully focused, market focused, and service focused. It also discusses the importance of understanding important versus determinant attributes for consumer choice when positioning a service. Effective positioning requires linking market and competitor analysis to internal analysis to develop a position statement articulating the desired market position. Positioning maps are also discussed as a tool to help visualize customer perceptions on determinant attributes.

Uploaded by

Umi Kholifah
Copyright
© © All Rights Reserved
We take content rights seriously. If you suspect this is your content, claim it here.
Available Formats
Download as PPTX, PDF, TXT or read online on Scribd
73 views

Topic 3. Positioning Services in Competitive Markets

This document discusses positioning strategies for competitive service markets. It outlines three focused strategies - fully focused, market focused, and service focused. It also discusses the importance of understanding important versus determinant attributes for consumer choice when positioning a service. Effective positioning requires linking market and competitor analysis to internal analysis to develop a position statement articulating the desired market position. Positioning maps are also discussed as a tool to help visualize customer perceptions on determinant attributes.

Uploaded by

Umi Kholifah
Copyright
© © All Rights Reserved
We take content rights seriously. If you suspect this is your content, claim it here.
Available Formats
Download as PPTX, PDF, TXT or read online on Scribd
You are on page 1/ 8

Positioning Services in

Competitive Markets
Sutono, SE, MM, PhD
Positioning strategy is concerned with creating, communicating, and maintaining
distinctive differences valued by those customers with whom the firm aims to
develop long-term relationships. Positioning services often is associated with:
• Price and product attributes (e.g., terms and conditions of a mortgage
product).
• Customer service processes (e.g., their conven- ience and ease of use).
• Service distribution and delivery systems, service schedules, and locations
(e.g., coverage and density of branch and ATM networks).
• Service environment (e.g., its functionality and level of luxury).
• Service personnel (e.g., their competence and customer service orientation)
In competitive service industries, most firms need to focus to achieve competitive
advantage. There are three focused strategies firms can follow to be able to achieve a
competitive advantage. They are:
• Fully focused: a firm provides a limited range of services (perhaps only one) to a
narrow target segment (e.g., Shouldice Hospital).
• Market focused: a firm concentrates on a narrow market segment, but offers a wide
range of serv- ices to address the many diverse needs to that segment (e.g., Rentokil).
• Service focused: a firm offers a narrow range of services to a fairly broad market (e.g.,
Lasik eye surgery clinics or Starbucks coffee shops).
• The unfocused strategy. However, it generally is not advisable for firms to choose an
unfocused strategy as this will mean that they spread themselves too thin to remain
competitive (e.g., some departmental stores).
• Market segmentation forms the basis for the three focused
strategies. In market segmentation, a firm needs to identify and
select target segments it can serve best.
It is crucial for positioning a service in its target seg- ment to understand the
difference between impor- tant and determinant attributes for consumer choice.
•Important attributes. They are important to the consumer, but that may not be
important for thebuying decisions (e.g., safety is important, but all airlines a
traveler considers are seen as safe). If that is the case, such an attribute should
not be used as a basis for segmentation.
•Determinant attributes. They often are way down on the list of service
characteristics im- portant to customers, but they are attributes on which
customers see significant differences between competing alternatives (e.g., fre-
quency of flights to a destination and resultant convenience of departure times,
or quality of in-flight service).
• Once the important and determinant attributes are understood,
management needs to decide which service level the firm should
offer on each of the attributes.
• Service levels often are used to segment customers according to
their willingness to trade off price and service level across a broad
variety of attributes
• Effective positioning required firms to link market and competitor
analysis to internal corporate analysis.
• The outcome of these analyses is the position state- ment that
articulates the desired position of the firm’s offering in the
marketplace.
• Positioning maps are an important tool to help firms develop their
positioning strategy.
• They provide a visual way of summarizing customer perceptions of
how different services are performing on determinant attributes.

You might also like