Customer or Competitor?

Success in marketing leads to success in business. An appropriate strategy can facilitate further growth and development of a company whilst an inadequate strategy will guide the company into a swift decline. With so much on the line it is of obvious importance to pick the right marketing strategy, but what is right? Theodore Levitt published the much-acclaimed article “Marketing Myopia” in 1960 that outlays a strategy revolving around the consumer. Al Ries and Jack Trout’s “Marketing Warfare” spells out a very different method being that marketing is like war, your opponents should be your focus. Each perspective presents interesting facts and opinions of marketing strategies, which will be explored in comparison to the other as well as dissected for their relevancy to today’s market environments.

The two outlooks on marketing strategy are very dissimilar as a whole. Levitt proposes that one must focus on the consumer’s needs and wants in order to succeed in business. This focus on the consumer leads to defining your business in a broad sense, as to not detract from your growth opportunities. An example of this idea can be illustrated in the sno-cone industry. Instead of defining your business as being in the sno-cone industry, Levitt would advise you to define it as in the “treat” business. This more broad definition allows for expansion into cupcakes, various dessert coffees, smoothies, and numerous other treats to expand your company. Dissimilarly, Ries/Trout’s focus lies on the competition. In war a group is faced by many opponents and much thought should go into figuring out the plans of the rivals. To succeed in business, Ries/Trout argue that it is necessary in marketing, as in war, to spend a large amount of time out-ma...

... middle of paper ...

... the marketing strategies outlined in Levitt’s “Marketing Myopia” and Ries/Trout’s “Marketing Warfare” can help anyone develop their own perspective on marketing. Both consumer-oriented and competitor-oriented methods have their attributes and drawbacks but in the end, for me at least, focusing on the consumer seems most logical for a manager to adopt. By proactively responding to the consumers instead of reacting to your competitors you can likely achieve success in your marketing endeavors. However, just because you employ one strategy over the other does not mean that there is not a time or situation in which the other strategy can be utilized. As previously suggested, the marketplace environment is a constantly fluctuating unit. A consumer-oriented strategy may yield the desired results as of now, but a year from now may tell a completely different story.