Why is the Strategic Planning Process Important for Brand Development?
Sound business-decision making can be dramatically influenced by the strategic planning process. Entrepreneurs who wish to align their strategies with their overarching vision and mission, especially in this digital environment must undertake and monitor this process to develop sustainable brands.
The strategic planning process can significantly simplify the customer experience. Besides, it can bridge the gap between an online value proposition and conventional concepts. Moreover, it creates infinite opportunities for businesses to impact the marketing mix. For entrepreneurs who are oblivious to this process, gaining insights for their brand’s success can be challenging.
This article will enable you to understand the value of monitoring the strategic planning process and the implications of the Internet for the price factor in the marketing mix.
Let us review!
What is the Strategic Planning Process?
The strategic planning process consists of the various steps that will drive your brand’s vision and mission, assess your effort and processes, and develop your success strategies. It is a guide to your business decision-making that helps you gain transparency.
It is imperative for businesses to have a process. According to Robert Filek, “Strategy without process is little more than a wish list.”
Why is Monitoring the Strategic Planning Process Important?
In business decision-making, the strategic planning process acts as the ultimate roadmap. It provides a way to track and measure your brand’s performance, direct your strategies’ delivery, and monitor outcomes to refine your mechanisms.
The balanced scorecard, for example, is a strategic planning system. Let us examine this process. As cited by the Global Voice of Quality, “Ford’s balanced scorecard system provides reporting tools that offer monthly values versus target figures, year-to-date/year-end values against target, and a prioritization system using red/green/yellow evaluations to pinpoint where improvement is needed.”
With regular strategy analysis and evaluation, you can ensure that your goals are practical and accountable for implementation and execution. Also, you could assess the efficacy of the marketing mix and tactics. So, let us now explore one element in the Mix—Price, to learn about the implications in this digital climate.
What are the implications of the Internet for Price?
Analyzing the digital environment is vital in performing a situational analysis for the strategic planning process. It will help you identify how to position your brand in the marketing mix to gain a competitive advantage in the marketplace. Customers want a fair price, so be assured, they surf the Internet to compare prices! But how does the Internet affect price?
Studies illustrate that the Internet leads to price transparency. The implementation of dynamic pricing can enable you to test your price and provide differential pricing based on your targeted audience or segments and demands for goods or services. This also impacts the price elasticity of demand, which will help you in determining how the demand for your goods is influenced by a change in price. Accordingly, establishing price models is imperative.
Relative to your rivalry, the Internet can hinder your ability to set higher prices. Notwithstanding, it can also allow you to set higher margins for your products based on your distinct features. Price transparency can influence your brand’s consumer experience either negatively or positively. This behavior can further impact brand credibility and consumer satisfaction.
It is essential to gain confidence from your customers, so make sure your price is fair and transparent, as the Internet can be the boundary between your brand and customers or push you to higher margins and conquer your rivals.
Let us take a look at CarMax price transparency. “By making price one of the more flexible parts of the process, a known quantity, CarMax lifted that veil of secrecy and put its customers at ease,” revealed by Brand Quarterly.
Conclusion
Having a fair strategic planning process and updating it periodically for progress is of utmost importance for entrepreneurs. Besides, being able to justify your price and provide greater transparency can build brand loyalty. That can set the stage to realize your brand’s vision, purpose, and achieve set goals that can contribute substantially to the success of your brand.
Now that you have gained a clear understanding of the importance of monitoring the process and pricing, it is necessary to get acquainted with the digital environment. That was covered in the last article.
So, let us take a brief moment to revisit that post, “How Can Digital Marketing Environment Impact Businesses.”
Please share your thoughts!
Donnicka Robert
Founder of Brandzers, helping entrepreneurs build authentic and profitable brands
Brandzers.com