In a high competitive world market and with the increasing rational buyers a company can only win by creating and delivering the best customer value than the others competitors do. To succeed, a company needs to use the concepts of value chain. 1985, Michael Porter indentified that – a value chain is a chain of value-creating activities in order to offer the customer the level of value that exceeds the cost of the activities, than competition, thereby resulting in a profit margin. Competitive advantage comes from carrying out these activities in a more cost-effective way than competitors. The concepts and benefits of Value Chain Analysis The value chain analysis can be examined as to whether they provide opportunities for differentiation or cost reduction. According to Porter, the value chain model is a useful analysis tool for defining a firm's core competencies and the activities in which it can pursue a competitive advantage by following one of the two strategies: • Cost advantage: by better understanding costs and constricting them out of the value-creating activities. Main focus of this strategy also known as cost leadership is to offer goods and services at lower cost than the competitors. To follow this strategy a company also consider these approaches- tight cost control, economics of scale in production and also cost minimisation. • Differentiation: by focusing on those activities associated with core competencies and capabilities in order to perform them better than do competitors. The key point of this strategy is to create something that customers feel as being unique. It depends on the company, which strategy they would fellow- comparing their competitors’ strategy. It does not matter whether the follow cost leadership or differentiation strategy, they must manage their own value chain.
The series of activities that are enacted by a firm that add value to a product beyond the cost of the production are referred to as the value chain. Harley Davidson offers a combination of superior performance and unique attributes within its value chain that promotes their core competencies and provides them with a competitive advantage.
means by which the marketing value chain operates, we first need to orient ourselves to its
Narrow focus on limited value chain activities, competitor’s pricing war and lack of differentiation parity can erode the competitive advantage associated with cost leadership strategy. Similarly, imitation of differentiating features by competition and lack of perceived value of the differentiating features can erode the competitive advantage associated with differentiation strategy.
Value Chain Analysis is used to describe the activities that take place within the organization and relates them to an analysis of the competitive strength of the organization. Michael E. Porter (1991) stated that the activities of an organization could be divided into two groups: Primary Activities- Those that are directly concerned with creating and delivering a product and Support Activities- this group consist of those not directly involved in production, this group also add values to the organization because they help to increase effectiveness or efficiency (e.g. human resource management). Porter also stated that is not common for an organization to undertake all primary and support activities (Porter, 1991).
The tool essentially shows the chain of activities required to develop and deliver the products. The effectiveness of the organization vastly improves when all the key activities such as customer, vendor, suppliers and partner within the value chain working smoothly. The value chain used to reduce operational and production cost using low-cost producer strategy. If two service or products are delivery by two separate divisions for two different markets, there are functionality and process that can be integrated to save cost.
Value chains are essential elements of successful businesses, and how to gain a competitive advantage by analyzing them is the most important aspect. In Porter’s value-chain model, he points out that there are two types of business activities: primary activities, which include inbound logistics, operations, outbound logistics, marketing, sales and service; and support activities, which include procurement, technology development, human resources management, and firm infrastructure. In order to gain an edge, companies should focus on these activities to improve or create products that will satisfy their customers.
The success of differentiation relies on a company internal strengths: highly developed R&D, efficient marketing, branding and advertising, highly skilled product or service development teams, superior quality and innovation, finally fast delivery and effective distribution channels. Example: Apple's iPod was a breakthrough innovation because of its stylish design, its unique straightforward features. It allowed users to store a gigantic amount of music in one place, and further permitted users to play any genre in any order unlike the obsolete mp3 CD player which allowed limited possibilities. Also the original white colour of the device made it a revolution and a statement in the its industry. Let's also note that differentiation can become accentuated through competitive positioning which is about defining how a company will “differentiate” its offering while creating value to the market. The use of a positioning statement mark the very beginning of the differentiation process. Example: Apple Inc “ Think
In the modern world of conducting business, any company that wishes to succeed must differentiate its products or services from others in the industry. Differentiation makes it possible for consumers to point out notable differences between one company’s products as compared to those of competitors. Differentiation helps companies build brand loyalty as the uniqueness keeps customers fixed on a particular product. BMW is one of the most popular automakers in the world today. It definitely uses differentiation as a strategy to beat off competition by building products that are innovative, detailed and incomparable to those of competitors.
Value-based marketing requires organizations to provide greater value to consumers than competitors, achieved through assessing all business processes from a consumers’ viewpoint. This requires attentiveness and continuous monitoring as consumers’ needs and wants are affected by numerous dynamic factors.
The value chain analysis allows the firm to understand the parts of its operation that create value and those that do not. This is important for firms to understand because the firm earns above-average returns only when the value it creates is greater than the costs incurred to create that value. The value chain analysis has two parts which include the value chain activities and support functions. The value chain activities are “activities or tasks the firm completes in order to produce products and then sell, distribute, and service those products in ways that create value for customers” (Hitt, Ireland, & Hoskisson). The support functions are the “activities or tasks the firm completes in order to support the work being done to produce, sell, distribute, and service the products the firm is producing” (Hitt, Ireland, & Hoskisson)
The aim of the value chain structure is to maximize the value creation while minimizing costs. Value Chain Analysis is a useful tool for working out how you can create the greatest possible value for your customers. Value chain analysis relies on the rudimentary economic principle of competitive advantage -companies are best served by operating in divisions where they have a relative prolific benefit compared to their competitors. Concomitantly, companies should ask themselves where they can deliver the paramount value to their customer. To conduct a value chain analysis, the company begins by identifying each part of its production process and recognizing where steps can be purged or enhancements can be made. These improvements can result
The value chain is a systematic approach to examining the development of competitive advantage. The Google's chain consists of a series of activities that create and build value, the mission is to organize the world's information and make it universally accessible and useful. Innovations in web search and advertising have made the web site a top internet destination and Google brand is one of the most recognized in the world.
Value is used in a central thought in economic theory (Haksever et al., 2004). The key for the value is an ‘exchange’ between two units such as “benefits and sacrifices” (Möller, 2006), “consumer surplus," value for money or optimize used value, but minimize exchange value (sacrifices in terms of price) (Bowman & Ambrosini, 2010). Normann & Ramirez (1993) use the terms co-produce to define the participation of customers in value co-creation that realized value is not created at supplier level, but between customer interactions. Several authors describe value in terms monetary business value whereas others include non-monetary benefits such as market competitiveness, competencies, and social rewards (Walter, Ritter, & Gemünden, 2001) or could be the combination of both business value. Haksever et al. (2004) describe tangible or intangible value may derive from business activities, policies, and regular action of the firm as the power of the product, service, or activity to fulfill a requirement or deliver a profit to a person or legal entity. Those values may positively influence the “quality of life, knowledge, prestige, safety, physical and financial security, as well as providing nutrition, shelter, transportation, income, etc.” (Haksever et al., 2004, pg. 292). These values are meant for stakeholders of the firms such as its customers, suppliers, owners and other firm’s alliances (Bowman & Ambrosini, 2010). Therefore, the role of firm and customers are different, it is a sequence of activities performed by the firm (Vargo et al., 2008).
By adopting the value chain into a manufacturing company, it will gain efficiency, effectiveness, reduce the product cost and improve continuously. For example, Toyota has implemented Toyota Product System (TPS) integrated information system with the business process which allowed the company to be more efficiency, effectiveness and reduce inventory cost. (Toyota
Olav Jull Sorensen (2009): “Formation, Organisation and Management of the (Global) Value Chain I a Theoretical Perspective”