Corporate Vs. Marketing Strategy

Discussion Post

Corporate Strategy

“Corporate strategy focuses primarily on profitability” (Edmunds-Ashe, n.d.).    In order for a company to be successful, it must make a profit.  Corporate strategies include ways make their product(s) appealing to as many people as possible in order to drum up business and increase sales.  You can think of corporate strategy as basically not putting all of your eggs in one basket.  For example, if you owned a restaurant and only served French fries and nothing else, your corporate strategy could be to offer more items on the menu (diversify) to attract more customers.

Marketing Strategy

Marketing strategies are ways to sell your service or product, to make people interested and want to purchase.  Creating a product with a unique selling benefit and targeting a particular consumer demographic are two examples of marketing strategies (Edmunds-Ashe, n.d.).    It is not just enough to have a product out there; you have to use marketing to make your product stick out and to appeal to more people.  Product, price, place and promotion (known as the Four P’s) are the center of a marketing strategy.   The marketing team has to be well versed in the Four P’s in order to know exactly what they are marketing and who they are marketing it to.

Corporate and Marketing Strategies with Holiday Inn Express

Corporate and marketing strategies will combine to help Holiday Inn Express with its new venture.  Holiday Inn Express has teamed up with the American Youth Soccer Organization and will create “active rooms” at its locations that give the teams a place to practice and hold meetings before and after their soccer games.  The corporate strategy in this is that Holiday Inn Express is diversifying its services by offering the active rooms and by partnering up with American Youth Soccer Organization.  The marketing strategy in this is having a target market and consumer demographic to focus now focus on:  youth soccer and the families that participate in youth soccer.  Together, the corporate and marketing strategies will create the increased sales and business to a larger segment of consumers, including the youth soccer demographic.

Reference:

Edmunds-Ashe, S. (n.d.).  Corporate Strategy Vs. Marketing Strategy. Retrieved from

http://smallbusiness.chron.com/corporate-strategy-vs-marketing-strategy-63753.html

Discussion Post Response

The combination of the corporate and marketing strategies is the best approach that the company can use to streamline its products and services in the competitive market. I agree with this combination, as attractiveness and profitability are two major factors, which are to be carted by the company to enable the long-term business sustainability. I also agree with you that the company shapes its corporate strategy to enhance the visibility of profitability. The company derives its values and mission through these strategies, which helped to meet the goals and objectives.  It seems right if we have a restaurant and include the attractiveness as a major factor in the corporate strategy. Also, I support different arguments regarding the marketing process or strategies in the discussion. For Instance, when it comes to the marketing process of the company, the most important thing for the management is to increase or streamline the competitive positioning (Schlegelmilch, 2016). Through the attractive depiction of products or services along with the appropriate content, the company can definitely position better in the minds of customers. Making separate strategies for four different elements such as product, price, place, and promotion is necessary for holiday Inn to attract customers and gain the advantage in the competitive industry. I also agree with several points or initiatives the company has considered regarding the marketing process. Partnering up with American Youth Soccer Organization and active room is two different elements, which can be visualized in the different advertisement campaign.  Interestingly, the marketing process of the company is good to target youth soccer demographic. Thus, it seems good to make the effective marketing strategy and align with the corporate strategy. The success of the company is also aligned with the combination of marketing and corporate strategy. Holiday Inn is looking to make some outputs predictable by implementing these strategies (Hiriyappa, 2013).

References

Hiriyappa, B. (2013). Corporate Strategy: Managing the Business. AuthorHouse.

Schlegelmilch, B. B. (2016). Global Marketing Strategy: An Executive Digest. Springer.