Market Orientation - Customer, Competitor And Collaborator

Market Orientation - Customer, Competitor And Collaborator

In the following essay, I will address the concept of Market Orientation and in doing so, expand upon the three underpinning components; Customer, Competitor and Collaborator Orientation. Market-orientated businesses are committed to identifying and meeting ‘the expressed and latent needs of their customers’ (Slater and Narver, 1998, p. 1003); they aim to understand the capabilities and strategies of their competitors, as well as the requirements of their collaborators; this intelligence is consequently shaped through the gathering and valuing of   market information in a proactive, orderly way. The Apple experience of the iPad 2.0 and its success in recent weeks demonstrates how a company can take full advantage of this business philosophy. Through adhering to this model, the firm’s profitability and sales revenue continues to grow. This example will be used in the paragraphs below, before a discussion of what impact an application of this concept has had on the business.

Market–orientated businesses are able to produce greater customer value by spreading this ‘market intelligence’ (regarding customers, competitors and collaborators) throughout their organizations. They are involving marketing skills in the entire process of the product’s production and selling; these organisations are utilising marketing skills to their full potential. Thus, many of these firms tend to do better than those who simply incorporate a marketing orientation. As Slater and Narver assert, companies that adopt a market-orientation, are given the opportunity to ‘escape the tyranny of the served market by searching for unserved markets. The unserved market represents potential – those who might be customers’.   Apple has done so; particularly looking at the hidden needs of the customers and this is seen with the iPad 2 As suggested in the article ‘iPad 2: The best just got better, app-solutley’, taken from Britain’s Independent, Apple has harnessed Market Orientation to realise that is a...