Reading Hawkins, we once again are assured that having a strong foundation = identifying your business model clearly and following it during your business is crucial for your business’ success.
I am currently reading a book on product innovation, where the writer emphasizes the very first stage of inventing/innovating a product – asking the right questions on what task a product has to perform. The correct implementation of this stage will lead to a right understanding of customer needs, then eventually the product parameters. However, if carried out wrongly, you get what is called mutations (imitation of existing products) rather than innovations, or even a failure of your design. I found the book really interesting and useful, however it’s whole another topic.
The reason I thought of it is that, just like the problem definition in product design, a business model in marketing is an extremely essential part of the whole process. You screw it up – you screw up the whole business.
As much as Hawkins emphasizes the importance of moving online, as much I am convinced that only online retailing would not be the potential to take up the whole market. I think still a lot of people will be preferring shopping offline, where you can actually see the product/test it rather than just relying on reviews or other sources. Perhaps, here the best option is what Hawkins calls multi-channel retailing, i.e. having both online and offline integrating with each other. Thus, in addition to “moving-online” and “integration” factors Hawkins is encouraging, the keypoint, I think, is to keep track of everything. Online/offline stores/catalogs should all cooperate in what service they provide, and in cases replace one each other’s disadvantage by others’ advantages.
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5 comments:
I totally agree that there will allways be a market for "offline shopping". As you say, there are advantages and dissadvantages with offline and online stores. I think that the key is that you have to find what these are and then specialace on your advantages.
"Offline stores" have the advantage of human to human interaction. So you should emphasize on haveing good customer service in the store and staff with good knowledge about the products you sell. Another advantage with the "offline store" is the factthat the customer can really see the product and even try it out. This is a big advantage over online stores, so it
s something to work on improveing. maby try to encourage your costumers more to try the products.
I completely agree and don't really have that much to add actually. Online shopping is a complement to offline shopping (in the same way that offline shopping is a complement to online shopping). The fact that online is new doesn't mean it's better, it's just different.
Though I somewhat agree that having a business model is important, I think it's worth to note that following the original plan may in fact not be as important. A good business, and a good business plan, should evolve and thus change over time. I don't believe it's the actual plan that is important, but rather the overview and overall understanding of the business that conceiving the plan gives you.
I totally agree with that online retailing doesn't have the potential of taking over completely. I honestly don't even see it ever reaching that potential. I could maybe see it happen for certain types of products, by in the big whole I also think that people will always prefer to shop offline. This simply because they can get touchy with the product, try it out and basically just see it for real.
I think online shopping only really works for targeted shopping, that is when the shopper already (kinda) knows what to get. But I think most of the time people shop by browsing, they don't really know what they want until they see it or touch it, and that's where physical stores will always have an advantage.
Though I actually agree with you that the way to go is probably multi channel retailing. Both online and offline retailing have their advantages and disadvantages, so why not combine the best of both and cancel out the downsides?
As for following your business model, I agree with that the first stages are the most crucial. I can totally imagine how if rushed you end up with something you think is innovative and unique, but's actually just a mutation of something already around. You shouldn't rush it and do the preplanning properly, but after that I don't agree with having to follow your plan. I actually don't even think it's possible to follow it, since you always have to adapt to the environment. I however believe that if preplanned properly, your business model will evolve without problem.
I agree with what Jacob, patrik,filip,and Eleonora said. Even online markets become active, many people will shop on offline. Because shopping to offline has much merit than online. You can feel products and compare them. Also some people like shopping with friend or other people. Online has another advantage for convenience. A firm should consider on and offline customer to sell the product.
As you and commentators pointed out, there will always be offline shopping. Certain service might have more portion online, and vice versa. One of the reasons is this: you can buy more books (even something rare) through online like amazon.com, but, still, people, like myself, wants have offline experience like going to bookstore, buy them, and sit and read in the cafeteria... this kind of experience cannot be bought through online.
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