Strategic Marketing Management
Topic 1 – Introduction
Multiple definitions of marketing strategy:
“A thoughtful plan by a company to produce desired outcomes in the marketplace
vis-a-vis customers, channel members and competitors” (Kotler 2012 Handbook of
Marketing strategy)
“ […] an organization’s integrated pattern of decision that specify its crucial choices
concerning products, markets, marketing activities and marketing resources in the
creation, communication, and/or delivery of products that offer value to customers
in exchanges with the organization and thereby enables the organization to achieve
specific objectives.” (Varadarajan 2010 JAMS; Morgan et al 2019 JAMS)
Strategic Marketing Decisions
Long-term holistic decisions concerning the future directions for the organizations
Features (Varadarajan 2010 JAMS):
Entail major resources commitments spread over long periods
Impact over longer time periods
Result in a distinguishable competitive advantage
Irreversible or difficult to reverse
Entails tradeoffs (e.g., if strategy A -> strategy B & C foregone…)
Made in the context of other strategic decisions (interdependencies)
Made at a higher level of the organization
Other examples of strategic marketing decisions:
Tactical Marketing Decisions
Short term (annual or quarterly) decisions to execute the strategic directions within
the firm; filling in the marketing mix of the individual product or brand to realize the
company strategic goals
e.g., brand price level, advertising by brand, sales force allocation
,Topic 2 – Strategic Decision Making
Marketing Strategy = an organization’s integrated pattern of decision that specify its
crucial choices concerning products, markets, marketing activities and marketing
resources in the creation, communication, and/or delivery of products that offer
value to customers in exchanges with the organization and thereby enables the
organization to achieve specific objectives.”
Agenda – Topic: Strategic Decision Making
How to make good strategic decisions
1. Accumulate organizational knowledge
Organizational learning
Enhancing culture and climate
2. Get help
Compiling opinions: The wisdom of the crowd
Obtaining and using data
Marketing Management Support Systems
3. Be responsive
Business cycles
To competition (see also game theory knowledge clip / weblecture)
Implementation intentions
4. Think and decide rationally
Rational decision making (expected value knowledge clip /
weblecture)
Cognitive biases in decision making
1. Organizational Learning & Knowledge Management
Nature of organizational learning
Have a combination of culture and climate to make sure knowledge is stored.
Acquire and share knowledge in an organization.
Example: hospital surgery team learning to use a new technology to increase
operation efficiency and effectiveness
The ability to learn faster than your competitors may be the only sustainable
competitive advantage" (DeGeus 1988)
,Organizational learning = “process of improving organizational actions through
better knowledge and understanding or as the outcome of such a process”
(Chadwick & Raver 2015 JMgmt, p. 959)
Key concepts:
A. Individual learning vs organizational learning
B. Explicit vs tacit knowledge
C. Single-loop learning vs double-loop learning
A. Individual vs. organizational learning
Organizational knowledge = “accumulation of the knowledge bases of all the
individuals within an organization and the social knowledge embedded in the
relationships between those individuals” (Trott 2005, p.139);
Organizational learning assumes individual learning, but individual learning is
an insufficient condition for organizational learning – without sharing or
transferring the knowledge, the organization will not learn;
More than the sum of the parts;
Is also about exchanging and sharing individual assumptions, models,
knowledge across the organization at various levels:
individual > group > organization > inter organizational
B. Explicit vs. tacit knowledge
Firms formalize their explicit or ‘tangible’ knowledge through representations
like manuals, minutes, operating procedures, administrative forms, work
routines…
Tacit knowledge
o Low codifiability (= to what extent is it possible for the organization to
structure knowledge into a set of identifiable rules and relationships that
can easily be communicated).
‘know-
o Often high complexity (science-based)
Transfer of tacit knowledge requires frequent social interaction, education,
training.
Difficult to transfer, but therefore also difficult to imitate!
Which type of knowledge is more common?
Which type of knowledge is more important to share?
Tacit knowledge the most important knowledge for an organization.
, C. Single vs. double-loop learning
Single-loop learning (adaptive learning) occurs within a set of recognized and
unrecognized constraints (i.e., the learning boundary) that reflect the
organization’s assumptions about its environment and itself. This type of
learning solves problems, but ignores the question of why the problem arose in
the first place.
Double-loop learning (generative learning) occurs when the organization is
willing to question long-held assumptions about its mission, customers,
capabilities, or strategy. It uses feedback from past actions to question
assumptions underlying current views.
Examples:
o Students exam failure
o V&D
Single-loop learning = most basic, do what we normally do but improve a little bit.
Double-loop learning = not just getting little bit better this is thinking out-of-the-box.
Example student exam failure
Situation = a good student fails exam but have attended classes, taken notes and
started the day before the exam with preparing for the test.
Single-loop = the student will take better nots and start earlier with preparing the test.
Double-loop = the student will nog only read notes but will also read mandatory
readings again, or read slower and will make a story of the notes.
Organizational learning: the process
1. Acquisition: from experience, from others, formal market research,
competitive intelligence, informal collection of information, experiments,
satisfaction surveys, etc. Exploitation = learning from internal experience,
Exploration = learning from external.
2. Dissemination: formal (cross-functional teams, trainings, presentations, etc.)
or informal (social interaction). Informal best for uncertain
problems/opportunities.
3. Shared interpretation: Need agreement on meaning. Conflict resolution &
information exchange by organizing formal meetings, discussing
alternative options
4. Utilization: behavioral change
Action oriented: direct application of knowledge to solve problems
Knowledge-enhancing: influences managerial perspectives on
problems
Affective use: increases satisfaction with a change.
Dissemination = share information and knowledge. Informal is the best way to share
information.
Shared interpretation = there is always a gap between data and knowledge and it is
essential that everybody have the same interpretation of the data.
Organizational Learning: Culture & Climate
Culture = Deeply rooted values and beliefs that provide norms. Necessary
foundation for organizational learning
Climate = Structure and processes that facilitate achievement of desired behaviors.
Need to be complementary
Topic 1 – Introduction
Multiple definitions of marketing strategy:
“A thoughtful plan by a company to produce desired outcomes in the marketplace
vis-a-vis customers, channel members and competitors” (Kotler 2012 Handbook of
Marketing strategy)
“ […] an organization’s integrated pattern of decision that specify its crucial choices
concerning products, markets, marketing activities and marketing resources in the
creation, communication, and/or delivery of products that offer value to customers
in exchanges with the organization and thereby enables the organization to achieve
specific objectives.” (Varadarajan 2010 JAMS; Morgan et al 2019 JAMS)
Strategic Marketing Decisions
Long-term holistic decisions concerning the future directions for the organizations
Features (Varadarajan 2010 JAMS):
Entail major resources commitments spread over long periods
Impact over longer time periods
Result in a distinguishable competitive advantage
Irreversible or difficult to reverse
Entails tradeoffs (e.g., if strategy A -> strategy B & C foregone…)
Made in the context of other strategic decisions (interdependencies)
Made at a higher level of the organization
Other examples of strategic marketing decisions:
Tactical Marketing Decisions
Short term (annual or quarterly) decisions to execute the strategic directions within
the firm; filling in the marketing mix of the individual product or brand to realize the
company strategic goals
e.g., brand price level, advertising by brand, sales force allocation
,Topic 2 – Strategic Decision Making
Marketing Strategy = an organization’s integrated pattern of decision that specify its
crucial choices concerning products, markets, marketing activities and marketing
resources in the creation, communication, and/or delivery of products that offer
value to customers in exchanges with the organization and thereby enables the
organization to achieve specific objectives.”
Agenda – Topic: Strategic Decision Making
How to make good strategic decisions
1. Accumulate organizational knowledge
Organizational learning
Enhancing culture and climate
2. Get help
Compiling opinions: The wisdom of the crowd
Obtaining and using data
Marketing Management Support Systems
3. Be responsive
Business cycles
To competition (see also game theory knowledge clip / weblecture)
Implementation intentions
4. Think and decide rationally
Rational decision making (expected value knowledge clip /
weblecture)
Cognitive biases in decision making
1. Organizational Learning & Knowledge Management
Nature of organizational learning
Have a combination of culture and climate to make sure knowledge is stored.
Acquire and share knowledge in an organization.
Example: hospital surgery team learning to use a new technology to increase
operation efficiency and effectiveness
The ability to learn faster than your competitors may be the only sustainable
competitive advantage" (DeGeus 1988)
,Organizational learning = “process of improving organizational actions through
better knowledge and understanding or as the outcome of such a process”
(Chadwick & Raver 2015 JMgmt, p. 959)
Key concepts:
A. Individual learning vs organizational learning
B. Explicit vs tacit knowledge
C. Single-loop learning vs double-loop learning
A. Individual vs. organizational learning
Organizational knowledge = “accumulation of the knowledge bases of all the
individuals within an organization and the social knowledge embedded in the
relationships between those individuals” (Trott 2005, p.139);
Organizational learning assumes individual learning, but individual learning is
an insufficient condition for organizational learning – without sharing or
transferring the knowledge, the organization will not learn;
More than the sum of the parts;
Is also about exchanging and sharing individual assumptions, models,
knowledge across the organization at various levels:
individual > group > organization > inter organizational
B. Explicit vs. tacit knowledge
Firms formalize their explicit or ‘tangible’ knowledge through representations
like manuals, minutes, operating procedures, administrative forms, work
routines…
Tacit knowledge
o Low codifiability (= to what extent is it possible for the organization to
structure knowledge into a set of identifiable rules and relationships that
can easily be communicated).
‘know-
o Often high complexity (science-based)
Transfer of tacit knowledge requires frequent social interaction, education,
training.
Difficult to transfer, but therefore also difficult to imitate!
Which type of knowledge is more common?
Which type of knowledge is more important to share?
Tacit knowledge the most important knowledge for an organization.
, C. Single vs. double-loop learning
Single-loop learning (adaptive learning) occurs within a set of recognized and
unrecognized constraints (i.e., the learning boundary) that reflect the
organization’s assumptions about its environment and itself. This type of
learning solves problems, but ignores the question of why the problem arose in
the first place.
Double-loop learning (generative learning) occurs when the organization is
willing to question long-held assumptions about its mission, customers,
capabilities, or strategy. It uses feedback from past actions to question
assumptions underlying current views.
Examples:
o Students exam failure
o V&D
Single-loop learning = most basic, do what we normally do but improve a little bit.
Double-loop learning = not just getting little bit better this is thinking out-of-the-box.
Example student exam failure
Situation = a good student fails exam but have attended classes, taken notes and
started the day before the exam with preparing for the test.
Single-loop = the student will take better nots and start earlier with preparing the test.
Double-loop = the student will nog only read notes but will also read mandatory
readings again, or read slower and will make a story of the notes.
Organizational learning: the process
1. Acquisition: from experience, from others, formal market research,
competitive intelligence, informal collection of information, experiments,
satisfaction surveys, etc. Exploitation = learning from internal experience,
Exploration = learning from external.
2. Dissemination: formal (cross-functional teams, trainings, presentations, etc.)
or informal (social interaction). Informal best for uncertain
problems/opportunities.
3. Shared interpretation: Need agreement on meaning. Conflict resolution &
information exchange by organizing formal meetings, discussing
alternative options
4. Utilization: behavioral change
Action oriented: direct application of knowledge to solve problems
Knowledge-enhancing: influences managerial perspectives on
problems
Affective use: increases satisfaction with a change.
Dissemination = share information and knowledge. Informal is the best way to share
information.
Shared interpretation = there is always a gap between data and knowledge and it is
essential that everybody have the same interpretation of the data.
Organizational Learning: Culture & Climate
Culture = Deeply rooted values and beliefs that provide norms. Necessary
foundation for organizational learning
Climate = Structure and processes that facilitate achievement of desired behaviors.
Need to be complementary
