What Is the Role of Strategic Marketing in an Organization? Discuss the Role of Strategic Marketing at Coke After 2000.

Strategic marketing planning is the process that the operational and managerial staff of a company goes through to create and implement effective marketing strategies. Strategic marketing planning takes several aspects of company marketing and promotion into consideration.

Another important weakness is that the company’s products are seen as a major cause of obesity. (Melser, 2013) The beverage sales are affected by various factors including change in trends and preferences. Recently, beverage sales have fallen because of people’s increased preference for the health drinks. Around the world, obesity is a major problem and the Coca Cola products are seen as a major cause of obesity. As people are getting health conscious they are moving towards low calorie healthy drinks. This affects coca cola’s profitability and popularity. However, the brand can overcome this situation by increasing the number of low calorie products in its brand portfolio. It will need to add more healthy choices for its customers in its product portfolio.

These two-company’s economic characteristic include their market size and growth rate from the early 2000’s to 2010. Coke and Pepsi have struggled for years in the carbonated and non-alcoholic sector. According to Barbara Murray (2006c) "But as the pop fight has topped out, the industry 's giants have begun relying on new product flavors and looking to noncarbonated beverages for growth.” (Murry, 2006). For instance, Coke boasts in the advertisement as the king of the soft drink; as a consumer of both products, I agree. About 15 years ago, I was selected to participate in a critiquing of Coke and Pepsi products. Additionally, my travel to Africa in 2007 and 2010 provided the same raving review for the Coke Cola products. Apparently, Coke and Pepsi have been rivals for ages locally, regionally, nationally, multinational, and globally, therefore, one expects them to have an on-going rivalry when marketing the high-energy beverages.

Marketing strategy is a method of focusing an organization's energies and resources on a course of action which can lead to increased sales and dominance of a targeted market niche. A marketing strategy combines product development, promotion, distribution, pricing, relationship management and other elements; identifies the firm's marketing goals, and explains how they will be achieved, ideally within a stated timeframe. Marketing strategy determines the choice of target market segments, positioning, marketing mix, and allocation of resources. It is most effective when it is an integral component of overall firm strategy, defining how the organization will successfully engage customers, prospects, and competitors in

Although most authors speak about some parts of Strategic Marketing, here is included a list of definitions of the term. Some authors appear in different years ( for example, Jain), It is understand that they have added new comments or redefined the term after the years. The table and the definitions have been ordered by year of publication.

Every organization needs to have a marketing strategy so that they know who are their competitors, which market they need to target, do they have resources to compete in that market and what strategies they need to adopt to gain competitive position in the industry. The most important thing is with the help of marketing, company is able to make people aware of its product.

Marketing strategy is a process that can allow an organization to concentrate its resources on the optimal opportunities with the goals of increasing sales and achieving a sustainable competitive advantage.

- Marketing strategy: A marketing strategy is a process that can allow an organization to concentrate its limited resources on the greatest opportunities to increase sales and achieve a sustainable competitive advantage.[10]

Marketing strategy is a process that can allow an organization to concentrate its limited resources on the greatest opportunities to increase sales and achieve a sustainable competitive advantage.

Product Diversification is low – Where Pepsi has made a smart move and diversified into the snacks segment with products like Lays and Kurkure, Coca cola is missing from that segment. The segment is also a good revenue driver for Pepsi and had Coca cola been present in this segment, these products would have been an additional revenue driver for the company.

In today 's marketplace you need a strategy that insures a consistent approach to offering your product or service in a way that stands out from the competition. Branding, pricing, and distribution are all important parts of a strategic marketing plan.

Marketing strategy is the goal of the increasing sales and achieving the sustainable competitive advantages. Marketing strategy includes all the basic and long-term activities in the field of the marketing that deal with the analysis of the strategic initial situation of the company and the formulation, evaluation and selection of the market-oriented strategies and therefore it contributes to the goals of the company and its marketing objectives.

Moving to the Coke Company, they are not any behind in the competition against their rival, Pepsi Company. Perhaps, they are even ahead of Pepsi companies in both statistically and efficiently. Talking about statistics, they are certainly the number one brand leaving Pepsi in number two. And just like their rival Pepsi and every other beverage companies, they also have plans for marketing strategies and their marketing strategies are effective and creative as well. According to Chad and Gabriel (2003), “Coke is trying boost its vending-machine business by tapping into the Japanese obsession with cellphones. Coke partnered with Japan 's leading cellular operator, NTT DoCoMo, to develop a service called Cmode that lets customers buy a drink by using their phones instead of cash” (p.38). It was a very creative, innovative, and of course, one of the most effective marketing strategy Pepsi made to increase their sales and eventually to promote their brand. It was effective because it was a strategy especially for the people in Japan. In Japan, not many people had access to the vending machines or they didn’t have cash money to buy the drink, so they could easily buy it by using cell phone, which didn’t require cash money. The result of this strategy was extremely positive, as Chad and Gabriel informs, “On a recent summer day, Coke beamed an electronic coupon to all of its Cmode customers. Sales jumped 50% that day” (2003, p.38).

The strategic marketing management is the analytical way of learning that how to different type of strategies related to the customers and solutions of packages to fulfill the needs of customers. It is seeming very easier to reach the target customer of the company but most of the people related with marketing management field have less ability to create such compatible products which give meaningful results to the targeted customer in near future also. The recent competitive business environment requires to develop a more profitable marketing plan and this plan must hit the ground reality as well. Many researchers stated that it is the core principle of the successful marketing. In marketing management plan the marketer must see

‘Strategy’ means a plan of action that is mainly design to achieve the future goal or objective. And in the other hand ‘marketing’ means a business of promoting good or services and selling that with market research and advertisement. So strategic marketing is an explanation of the objective that we need to achieve in future with the help of marketing.