6 C's of Situation Analysis for your Marketing / Branding Strategy

6 C's of Situation Analysis for your Marketing / Branding Strategy

Understanding both the current and future environment is critical because the customer's value will change over time, underlying trends will affect the size and value of markets, changing social, political, and regulatory environments will affect what's possible, and competitors will keep reshaping customer expectations.

Below I share the 6Cs of Situation Analysis marketing plan tool along with corresponding key questions that will help you capture the required insights and analyze the situation in order to come up with a marketing plan.

CONTEXT
1. What political, environmental, social, technological or regulatory trends may affect your business?
2. What technologies are likely to emerge or disappear from your category/business?
3. How will the trend towards globalization affect you in the future?

CATEGORY
1. What is the size and maturity of the target market? How will this evolve in the future?
2. What trends will affect the target market?
3. What will the future customer journey look like in this target market? How will this affect the overall experience?

COMPETITION
1. What will the future customer experience be for each of your key competitors?
2. Where will their growth come from?
3. What key trends will your competitors be taking advantage of?
4. How will they configure their value chains, e.g. outsource, insource, partner, acquire, merge, divest, cobrand, co-develop or cocreate?

CUSTOMER
1. Which key trends will influence customers in the future?
2. What will their future needs and motivations be?
3. How will their triggers and barriers to accessing your goods and services evolve?
4. Who/what will influence them?

CHANNEL
1. Where/how will customers be exposed to your value propositions in the future? (routes to market.)
2. How will this evolve to reflect future customer journey and experience?
3. In which channels will your competitors be strong?
4. What relevant online relationships will customers have in the future?

COMPANY
1. How will your brand need to evolve to reflect the future customer journey and experience?
2. Do you know what drives revenue and profits in this area? How will you make money in this area?
3. What will your future profitability look like? Will your margins be higher or lower than now? What will drive this?
4. What competencies will you need to compete in this category in the future?
5. What opportunities might exist in the future for collaboration with other brands/organizations?

APPLYING THE 6 C'S FOR SITUATION ANALYSIS
1. Gather the facts and answer the questions for each C - one by one.
2. List the consequences of each question for the future.
3. Integrate the gained understanding in your branding / marketing plan.

Source: Corporate training: 'Marketing Plan Development'.

		Vinay Mahindrakar Editor, India
	6Cs for Situation Analysis and Customer Journey Hello Shubhi, I want to thank you for sharing this concept with readers on this forum. You have effectively framed thes...

		Maurice Hogarth Consultant, United Kingdom
	Situation Analysis for Business Success It seems to me that the nature of this set of Situation Analysis questions is MUCH wider than just for Marketing / Brand...

		Anonymous
	Post Pandemic 6C Model of Branding Strategy Post-pandemic (post Covid19) branding work will be quite different from that in the preceding period. In the post-pande...

		Maurice Hogarth Consultant, United Kingdom
	Post Pandemic Mindset @Anonymous: I like these 'C's and I'm already seeing comments re No.1 as desires in the post pandemic world. I assume th...

		Prof. Arup Barman Professor, India
	Reaction to Confusion on Point No-6: Comfort @Maurice Hogarth: Any product you buy should always give a feeling of comfort (could be psychological, physical, social,...

		Shubhi Kotiya CxO / Board, Germany
	How McDonalds Reshaped Its Brand Offerings as Consumer's Evolved @Vinay Mahindrakar: There are examples of many timeless brands like Cadbury, Apple, Mc Donalds to name a few. Here is h...

		Shubhi Kotiya CxO / Board, Germany
	6C Situation Analysis for Both Brands and Organisation @Maurice Hogarth: I agree with your comment and we in our organization have used this model to answer the relevant quest...