Table of Contents
Strategic Initiatives
When developing strategy, the two key questions are (Hooley et al, 2020, p161):
- how can we exploit our strong resources more fully;
- what new strong resources will we need to build to enable us to compete in the future?
Overview of Strategic Initiatives
| Affected Customers | Affected Markets | Goal | Resource exploitability strategy | Possible strategic initiatives |
| existing customers | -existing markets | serve them better now | ‘fill the gaps’ or ’defensive ’ strategy: exploit existing strong resources more fully | 1. Strengths-Opportunities 2. Strengths-Threats 3. Weaknesses-Opportunities 4. Weaknesses-Threats |
| existing customers | -existing markets | serve them better in future | ‘next generation’ strategy: build new strong resources | 1. Strengths-Opportunities 2. Strengths-Threats 3. Weaknesses-Opportunities 4. Weaknesses-Threats |
| new customers | -existing markets -new markets | get new deals better now | ‘exploit current skills’ strategy: exploit existing strong resources more fully | 1. Strengths-Opportunities 2. Strengths-Threats 3. Weaknesses-Opportunities 4. Weaknesses-Threats |
| new customers | -new markets | acquisition or merger | ‘diversified opportunities’ strategy: build new strong resources | 1. Weaknesses-Opportunities 2. Weaknesses-Threats |
Type of resource exploitability issues for marketing purposes
| Type | Strong resource exploitability status | Key Issue | Example |
| Strong | Are fully exploited in marketing now | No issues | We have a landing about a particular service for a particular customer segment, using this customer segment’s wordings describing their pains and required solutions. The landing contains successful case studies regarding exactly the same service, the same customer segment, the same pains, and the same solutions. We have a scalable and working system for generating leads from exactly the same customer segment with the same pains and solutions as described on the landing. |
| Strong | Are not fully exploited in marketing now | Start to exploit more fully | We have a landing about service for a particular customer segment and have successful case studies, but have not represented them on the landing or we offer services but don’t represent them online because we don’t know how to name the services in customer’s terms or we placed them online and aren’t happy with the results. We don’t have a scalable and working system for generating leads from exactly the same customer segment with the same pains and solutions as described on the landing. |
| Weak or absent | Are exploited in marketing now | Develop or acquire if is able to justify this strategy | We have a landing about service but without segmentation (ambiguous one-size-fits-all offering), without using customer wording (only marketing terms), not relevant case studies (we don’t have relevant ones), because we don’t have enough resources to work on it. We don’t have a scalable and working system for generating leads from exactly the same customer segment with the same pains and solutions as described on the landing. |
| Weak or Absent | Are not exploited in marketing now | Develop or acquire if is able to justify | We have little or absent experience and haven’t created a landing because we don’t know how to pack this experience into the offering. Moreover, competitors have more strong offers on landings and it doesn’t make sense even to start offering something less valuable for clients just for the sake of offering. We don’t have a scalable and working system for generating leads from exactly the same customer segment with the same pains and solutions as described on the landing. |
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