Week Three Summary

This week's information was interesting to me, and probably the two most interesting items we learned about were the positioning and the life cycle. Price strategy is important, but I think being aware of the product's life cycle has the greatest impact on the other two things.

Not understanding where the product is on the cycle makes it about impossible to find and use the right pricing strategy and appropriate positioning. If the product is new, the price can be a little higher, and the product needs to be positioned either in the community, or in the store so it gains the most attention. When the item moves to the growth stage, both the pricing and positioning need to change as the demand should be greater. When the item reaches maturity, both pricing and positioning aren't quite as important, but still need to be part of the whole marketing plan for that item. As the item begins to wane, then pricing and positioning again become important in order to glean as much revenue from that item as possible.

If the producer is lucky, then as the item falls into the end-stages there will continue to be a market for that item, just not as furious as at first. This is when positioning is relegated to the newer items, and pricing settles into a consistent level. You can always find Band-aids at any store, but they aren't the "newest, most exciting" way to cover that owie.

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