First of all I would like to give a hand to Audrey for the title, “Nike: They’re Doing It“, which I think is really clever. So this post will be based on Audrey’s post regarding Nike’s domination in the marketing world, regardless the market.

I would have to agree to Audrey where she said, “When thinking of companies who have dominated the marketing world, one obvious company comes to mind for me: Nike.”, and I think that would also come in the minds of a whole lot of other people. Nike is one of the strongest brand in the world (Forbes.com), and no one can doubt that. Agreeing with Audrey’s argument that one of the measures to prove that is the success of Nike+ being a tech products by Nike, which is to an extent a diversification strategy made by Nike in order to grow internally.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nike,_Inc.#/media/File:Logo_NIKE.svg

In my post regarding diversification, I had stated that the success of a diversification strategy would have to heavily depend on the company’s brand image to ensure credibility of the new product(s). Nike ensured credibility based on their brand but a part of why the Nike+ was so successful is I think because Nike integrated the technologies they created with the shoes their manufacturing. This made both the Nike+ products and Nike shoes’ sales sky-rocketed. Nike is definitely a great example and inspiration when it comes to bold and meaningful marketing stunts. To finish off my post, I would like to end just the way Audrey did, with a video of a Nike commercial. This is one of my favourites.

Source:

Audrey Popa’s Blog–https://blogs.ubc.ca/audreypopa/2015/10/04/nike-theyre-doing-it/

http://www.forbes.com/pictures/fjle45ldkk/no-9-tie-nike/

https://blogs.ubc.ca/garrysbedi/2015/10/04/diversification/

http://fortune.com/2012/02/13/nikes-new-marketing-mojo/

Guy Kawasaki wrote a blog post specially dedicated in showing how you should launch your startup business.

He reviewed the concept of scale, which refers to the concept that there are processes in place that are fast, cheap, and repeatable because there will soon be millions of customers who generate billions of dollars of revenue.

The concept basically outlines that a startup would test every single product that they’re trying to sell in order to ensure that the product would work and sell. However Guy argues that if that had been done, most giant businesses such as eBay, Salesforce.com, and Hot or Not may have not been very successful. It is interesting how he established three key points when you’re starting up a business which are:

You should

1. Get the word out
2. Make people to be willing to use your product
3. Make people to be willing to pay for your product

These three things would be the main goals of any businesses whose objectives is to get as much profit as possible. Getting the word out means you are enlarging your customer base. People would be willing to use your product for a number of different things, whether it would be because of its high-quality, or even because your product have established a new trend, which has been very common these days as well. Lastly, in order to make profit, you have to market your product in a way that appeals your customer in being willing to pay for your product at your given price.

Guy Kawasaki is a marketing executive, he popularized the word ‘evangelist’, he is the author of The Art of the Start 2.0, The Art of Social Media, Enchantment, and ten other books that are business-related.

Source: http://guykawasaki.com/guy-kawasaki/

Source: http://guykawasaki.com/how-to-launch-and-why-scaling-doesnt-matter/

Based on the discussion on Porter’s Generic Strategies, it is interesting how there are numbers of different strategies that could be followed by businesses in order to have market growth. Based on my own research, I stumbled upon the Ansoff Matrix, a business tool that could help develop a business strategy and it stood out because of its outline that is simple as well as vey comprehensible. However this post will only discuss its diversification strategy due to word limit as well as personal interest.

The Ansoff Matrix looks like the following.

Ansoff Matrix Source: http://dachpian2b.saschina.wikispaces.net/1.7.8+-+Ansoff+Matrix

Diversification refers to the high risk growth strategy that involves a business marketing new products in new markets. It is usually done in order to spread the risks of the business, in a way that if a product is not doing so well in the market, the other product could hopefully compensate the underperformance of the first product. It is also possible for business that have reached a plateau phase and would like to seek out new opportunities in new markets. However, as stated before, it is a high risk strategy because there’s always the possibility of that the business may not be familiar with the market they are entering. Diversification stood out for me due to the high risk it imposes. This strategy heavily depends on how the business could utilize its brand image in order to ensure the credibility of their new product.

Factors that count in when considering diversification are the company’s financial health, the cost of entering the market, the resource of work force from the company, and the access to distribution channels in the new market, and the regulatory issues regarding the decision (Reference for Business).

Brands such as *Starbucks have successfully diversify its products, however brands such as *Krispy Kreme may have not been so successful at it.

P.S. Apparently there is an article by the Harvard Business Review that has a more in-depth analysis on this matter, and it also has a similar title.

*=Links to articles regarding the brands I mentioned

Source:

http://www.referenceforbusiness.com/small/Di-Eq/Diversification.html