MCAD Market Segmentation and Positioning Strategies
Defining and Selecting the Target Audience in MCAD
Once the company has identified opportunities for segmentation of the Mechanical Computer-Aided Design (MCAD) market, it must decide which and how many segments to target.
Rating MCAD Segments
In the assessment of different segments of MCAD, a company must look primarily at two factors:
- Attractive structural segment: Size, growth, profitability, economies of scale, and low risk.
- Resources and business objectives: The segment must align with the company’s resources and long-term objectives.
Selecting MCAD Segments
Focus on a Single Segment
Through this technique, the company first achieves an important understanding of the needs of the segment and acquires a strong presence in the MCAD market. It can further reduce costs through specialization of production, distribution, and promotion.
Selective Specialization
The company selects multiple segments, with the advantage that it diversifies risk.
Product Specialization
The company specializes in selling a specific product to several segments. The company develops a high reputation in the product within the MCAD market but runs the risk that it is displaced by a superior technology.
Market Specialization
The company focuses on serving a number of requirements for a particular client group.
Total MCAD Coverage
The company seeks to address all segments with all the products they might need. Only large companies can do this, in two possible ways:
- Undifferentiated Marketing Mix: The company ignores the differences between the various segments and serves the total MCAD market with a single offer. It focuses on common consumer needs and requires distribution and mass advertising.
- Differentiated Marketing Mix: The company operates in various segments of the MCAD market but designs different programs for each of them. It generates more sales than undifferentiated marketing but also incurs more costs.
Positioning and Differentiation Strategy
Marketing Strategy: Target Segmentation, Audience Positioning
Positioning: The action to design and supply a company’s image so that it occupies a distinctive place in the minds of consumers.
Differentiation: The company designs a number of significant differences in order to distinguish its offering from the competition.
Differentiation Strategies
By Product
We can distinguish two dimensions:
- Product Features: Products vary widely in their degree of differentiation. On the one hand, we have very standardized products (aspirin, chicken), and on the other, easily distinguishable products (cars, computers).
By Service
Service Dimensions: When the physical appearance of the product cannot be differentiated easily, the key is to increase the number of valuable services or improve them.
By Personnel
Companies with personnel better equipped than the competition. Well-qualified staff has credibility, ease of response, courtesy, and competence.
Through Channel
Companies can gain a competitive advantage by designing the environment in which the coverage of their distribution channels is presented.
Through Image
Consumers respond differently to different company and brand images. One must distinguish between:
- Identity: How the company is positioned to identify itself or its products.
- Image: How the public perceives the company or its products, and is affected by many factors that the company does not control.