International Journal of Business and Social Science
Vol. 2 No. 13 [Special Issue - July 2011]
Defensive and Offensive Strategies for Market Success
Dr. Peter Yannopoulos Associate Professor Brock University, St. Catharines Ontario, Canada, L2S 3A1 E-mail: pyannopoulos@brocku.ca Tel: (905) 688-5550 ext. 3909 Abstract
In industries in which there is strategic interaction among competing firms, companies are continuously involved in defensive and offensive strategies. In this paper we discuss several defensive and offensive strategies that managers can you for market success. Defensive strategies are divided into pre-entry and post-entry stretegies. Marketing managers should attempt to discourage would be entrants before entry has
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Or they should initiate actions designed to make the entrant’s life difficult after entry has occurred. This may convince the entrant that its calculations were too optimistic and its early experience in the industry is so negative that it does not warrant continuing the entry effort. 1
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Over the years, marketing managers and business strategists have developed a number of defensive marketing strategies to defend their position and maintain their sales and profitability. There are two types of defensive marketing strategies. Pre-entry strategies are actions taken by incumbents before they are attacked by challengers. Defensive marketing strategies may also take the form of post-entry actions that are initiated after the challenger has entered the market (see Table 1). 2.1 Pre-Entry Defensive Strategies Pre-entry defensive strategies are actions taken by firms intended to persuade potential entrants to believe that market entry would be difficult or unprofitable. Such actions include signaling, fortify and defend, covering all bases, continuous improvement, and capacity expansion. Table 1: Defensive Strategies
Defensive Strategies Pre-entry strategies
Signaling
Both potential and existing competitors influence average industry profitability. The threat of new entrants is usually based on the market entry barriers. They can take diverse forms and are used to prevent an influx of firms into an industry whenever profits, adjusted for the cost of capital, rise above zero. In contrast, entry barriers exist whenever it is difficult or not economically feasible for an outsider to replicate the incumbents’ position (Porter, 1980b; Sanderson, 1998) The most common forms of entry barriers, except intrinsic physical or legal obstacles, are as follows:
The industry in which the company operates can be characterized as monopolistic competition. This is because, since there are no barriers to entry in this industry, threats of entry by potential entrants has made the industry some-what competitive. But the brand loyalty gained by the firms through massive advertising has rendered the firms within
Competition being one of the major issues that often must be addressed in the business world, it is important for a firm to learn on ways to reduce the impact of the competition. Competition is definitely an important factor in helping a business
The entrance of a new competitor into a market can cause a business to change its marketing strategy. For example, a small electronics store that was the only game in town might have to change its image in the marketplace when a large chain store opens nearby. While the smaller store might not be able to compete in price, it can use advertising to position itself as the friendly, service-oriented local alternative.
Thompson, Peteraf, Gamble, and Strickland (2012) found that competitive strategy depend on whether a company’s target market is narrow or broad, and whether a company is seeking competitive advantage through low-cost or product differentiation. These two factors reveal five generic competitive strategies. The five strategies are Overall Low-Cost Provider Strategy, Focused Low-Cost Strategy, Broad Differentiation Strategy, Focused Differentiation Strategy, and Best Cost
Business firms can use both competitive and collective strategies to manage their interdependencies. The literature distinguishes three major dimensions of competitive strategies: price, promotional, and product competition strategies (Khandwalla, 1981). Competitive strategies manage interdependence successfully if they result in advantageous competitive positions, thus forestalling interdependence and reducing decisionmaking uncertainty (Pennings, 1981). For
Threat of New Entrants – The threat of new competitors entering an industry is high when initial
Michael Porter, an authority on competitive strategy, mentions five forces that the stronger each of these forces is, the more companies are limited in their ability to raise prices and earn greater profit. In carefully scanning it industry, the corporation must assess the importance to its success of each of the five forces. Now, we will analyses these five forces in the inner-city paint corporation. The first one is threat of new entrants which means newcomers to an existing industry. The new entrants typically bring new capacity, if the company wanted to resist the threat of new entrants. They must build an entry barrier which is an obstruction that makes it difficult for a
Managers generally consider the rivalry among competitors as a major source for deriving strategy. As explained by the Michael Porter it is a narrow view of competition. A set of other parameters should be evaluated, mentioned in article as five competitive forces, along with industry
51]. The model suggests a successful businesses strategy to wart-off competition by careful application of an “environmental analysis”. The Porter model proposes five elemental strategic defenses against five potential forces: threat of new entrants, rivalry among competitive firms, bargaining power of suppliers, bargaining power of buyers, and the threat of substitution products.
The first journal I found was Business and Economics Journal which is an open access publisher. The main side gives an overview of useful links like most viewed article, indexing and archiving, eBook etc.
Porter (2008) argues that the threat of entry “puts a cap on the profit potential of an industry … [and] incumbents must hold down their prices or boost investment to deter new competitors” (p. 81).
A competitive strategy, or business-level strategy, is the way a business used to successfully enter and penetrate into a market (Eastwood et al, 2006), and also, to succeed in this chosen market against its competitors (Johnson et al, 2014). A company needs to develop and apply appropriate strategy to help the company to generate distinctive competences (David, 2007). Compared with the strategies implemented in other levels of operation, competitive strategy is more focused on the competition against other competitors and strategic choices to better attain market share (Harrison and St. John, 2009). According to
Another strategy is Being defensive ; Defensive strategies are relatively close to Differentiation & Cost leadership . This method helps in keeping all the advantages in one place once they are attained . This strategy is considered as an actual one as it limit competitors ability to offer a business opposition .
Competitive strategy is the moves and methods that the firm has taken and is taking to appeal buyers, improve its market position, and to endure competitive pressures. The strategy is about what a firm’s capability to try to knock off competitors and attain competitive advantage, which can be offensive or defensive. There are three approaches to competitive strategy, which are low-cost leadership strategy where struggling to be the overall low-cost manufacturer in the in industry. Moreover, pursuing to distinguish one’s product offering from competitors (differentiation strategy), and the last one is focus or niche strategy where aiming on thin portion of the market rather than the whole market (Porter, 1998).