SME Times is powered by   
Search News
Just in:   • India’s GDP growth to remain steady at 6.5 pc, another RBI rate cut likely this fiscal  • GST reforms to increase demand for automobiles, ancillary industries to benefit  • Oracle’s Larry Ellison becomes world’s richest person, surpasses Elon Musk  • Extend ITR, audit deadlines due to portal glitches, compliance overload: Tax associations  • GST rate rejig shows promise of more access, growth in Indian pharma market 
Last updated: 26 Sep, 2014  

MArketing.9.Thmb.jpg Time to prepare your own marketing strategy

MArketing.9.jpg
   Top Stories
» India’s GDP growth to remain steady at 6.5 pc, another RBI rate cut likely this fiscal
» Extend ITR, audit deadlines due to portal glitches, compliance overload: Tax associations
» Centre to help automobile industry expand markets, strengthen supply chains
» Stock market opens higher, auto stocks lead rally over GST booster
» GST 2.0: What gets cheaper and costlier from Sep 22
Bikky Khosla | 27 Oct, 2009
It is usually seen that we try to do what others are profiting from. Particularly small and medium enterprises (SMEs) try to copy marketing strategies of their competitors instead of preparing strategies based on what their competitors are doing.

In a bid to gain a competitive edge over the competitor, one tries one's hand at too many things which are sometimes not one's forte or area of expertise. This is actually a dangerous approach. With no genuine fallback plan, one stands to lose if the competitor incurs losses due to a faulty marketing approach.

SMEs thus need to be very careful not to fall prey to such desires such as implementing their competitors' strategies solely in their marketing plans. It's a fact that one can't survive on somebody else's food. I sincerely feel that if you are copying someone, you will always remain in the second slot.

I have my reasons to believe that an SME or any other enterprise needs to create its own USP. We need to define our benefits keeping our customers in mind. We need to look into a couple of things about our product or service that can or should be important to our customers.

Secondly, we need to define our competitors' benefits or, in short, know how our competitors are positioned in the market. How are they different from us? What is their USP? Based on these findings, we need to separate ourselves from them and find our own product USP in order to be unique in our position in the market.

Thirdly, an organization needs to identify the market deficiencies. It needs to first find areas in the market where there is a void vis-a-vis the products it is selling or the services it is offering. Once it finds a suitable answer to this, there will be no dearth of customers/ buyers.

In addition, it is very important for an organization to identify and understand its customers' needs. The USP of one's products is not about the company producing it, rather, it is, or should be about its customers and how they (the products) will make them feel or help. We need to concentrate more on the benefits of our products or services and not on the features.

I feel the need of the hour is to differentiate ourselves from rest. Unless we know what we are good at, we will never able to give our customers a good reason to come to us.
 
Print the Page Add to Favorite
 
Share this on :
 

Please comment on this story:
 
Subject :
Message:
(Maximum 1500 characters)  Characters left 1500
Your name:
 

prepare own marketign strategy
Dr. P.A.Vora | Wed Oct 28 03:35:37 2009
Dear Sir, you have rightly mentioned here that coping competitiors does not pay. We have to understand what and how big companies not only prepare strategies but how they impelement and manage them to occur. If one SME follows another it is like rat race. Even if you win the race, you still remain rat only. Dr. P.A.Vora (Pharma consultant based at Ahmedabad)


 
  Customs Exchange Rates
Currency Import Export
US Dollar
₹84.00
₹82.25
UK Pound
₹104.65
₹108.10
Euro
₹92.50
₹89.35
Japanese Yen ₹56.10 ₹54.40
As on 25 Jul, 2025
  Daily Poll
Who do you think will benefit more from the India - UK FTA in the long run?
 Indian businesses & consumers.
 UK businesses & consumers.
 Both will gain equally.
 The impact will be negligible for both.
  Commented Stories
 
 
About Us  |   Advertise with Us  
  Useful Links  |   Terms and Conditions  |   Disclaimer  |   Contact Us  
Follow Us : Facebook Twitter