Introduction
Samsung Group is a varied group that operates in many global locations. It operates in a variety of sectors including electronics, monetary services, substances and infrastructure. The headquarters are in Seoul, South Korea. It has manpower of more than 345,000 employees. The company is a leader in the electronic market. Samsung is among the most innovative electronic companies with cutting-edge technology. The products include televisions, Smartphones, domestic gadgets, notebooks, cameras and other gadgets.
Among the most innovative home products, include the Radianz Quartz (Sharma 4). It entails an ideal surface for kitchens. The surface combines exquisiteness, strength and adaptability. The company and its innovative products are often a subject in the media considering the disruption the products cause in the global market. The diversification into the mobile and electronic device industry has seen the rapid growth and profitability of the company beating competition from giants such as Apple, Sony and Microsoft.
Past Performance
Samsung has had a history of applying strategies that made the company one of the leaders in the phone industry and command a strong leading market position. The company was already a domestic brand with diverse lines of products including desktop computers, laptops, televisions, washing machines, and refrigerators in most world markets by the year 2000. However, Samsung missed the brand collection enjoyed by market competitors such as Apple.
Despite this fact, the company managed to increase its brand value over the years. In 2012, the management of the company took a decisive action. It increased the advertising and promotion budget drastically that the company outspend the ratio recorded by Apple, which was 2:1. Somehow, it negated Apple’s 3X advantage on product equity. Unlike the competitors, Samsung tested a wide array of expedient feature-sets.
While the competitors originally shied from introducing large screens on mobile phones and similar devices, Samsung prospered in exciting most customers with large display through Galaxy Note and consequently the Galaxy series of products (Sharma 5). This was a major breakthrough for the company.
Samsung was also quick and energetic in discharging handsets at diverse price points in the global market. The company also started utilizing its resource endowment to focus on constructing a market franchise in the Galaxy product line. This allowed the company to start amalgamating its marketing efforts and finances under a single roof. The Smartphone manufactured by the company was continuously improved. Each of the product released closed the gap with the Apples supreme iPhone (Trainer 1).
Considering that Samsung applies comparable control concerning the supply chain as well as the Android economic landscape, the company has previously released products that have disrupted the market at a quick pace. This enabled the company to maintain the margins with the leading competitors at a close check.
Current situation
The company is currently profitable. The company’s products often disrupt the mobile market. However, the increase in the number of competitors is threatening the company’s global market position. The offering of cheaper products with large screens is giving the marketing division of the company nightmares. Competitors such as Apple are finding it hard to keep pace with Samsung due to the company’s increased response to consumer demands.
In China, Samsung is the leader, as customers demand phones with bigger display unit at lower prices. For example, Samsung S4 is priced at $775 while Apple’s iPhone 5s is priced at $875.
The older model of Samsung Galaxy is priced at around $100. In addition to the larger display of Samsung products, the prices are relatively lower with cutting-edge technologies. Apple introduced the iPhone 5c to counter the competition offered by Samsung Galaxy products. However, Samsung remains ahead of Apple in the Chinese market with a market share averaged at 21 percent.
Apple has a considerable share in technological products. However, it is challenging any specific company to possess pricing power and market share simultaneously for an extended period. For example, Apple products are priced to attain market share infiltration and expansion at high prices (Trainer 1). The lower prices of Samsung products are currently disrupting many markets where the company operates. It is forcing competitors to reduce the prices in order to sustain market share.
In addition, Samsung is increasing the competition in the phone industry given the sophisticated technology the company uses in manufacturing phones as well as the increasing connectivity. The company is gradually catching up with market competitors including Sony, Microsoft and Apple in terms of the general user experience.
Outside-in strategies
In the increasingly competitive business arena, it is not just important to have competitive advantage. It is imperative for an organization to be essentially better than the rivals. Companies require addressing the issue of what the organization is perfect in producing or marketing. Upon the analysis of the strength of the organization, the company requires making the decision on manufacturing products that are highly marketable.
In order to supplement the effort, the company should devise intense marketing strategies to persuade end users to purchase them. The outside-in strategy involves the preparation of a strategic plan regarding the competitors (Civichino 15). Organizations that dominated the technology market are gradually becoming obsolete. In ensuring that the company remains competent with a promising future, Samsung management must be in a position to determine what competitors are doing to gain competitive advantage and enjoy considerable market share.
The mobile market is dynamic and has transformed radically over the last two decades. It is bound to change in the coming years considering the innovations by different stakeholders with multiplicity of emerging competitors. The events that take place outside an organization have a direct or indirect impact on how the organization responds from within. On the other hand, factors that determine the device market performance will probably remain consistent (Sharma 5).
In 2012, among the most captivating stories in Smartphone business was the steady rise of Samsung. Two years earlier, the company’s Smartphone volume was half Apple’s Smartphone in the United States. Apple had been the market leader for several years. Samsung invested heavily in research and development and encouraged the employees to be innovative. The management recognized individuals and groups that would develop ideas on product and marketing development.
The employees would receive monetary and non-monetary rewards for efforts made towards the profitability and innovativeness of the company. Consequently, the employees would borrow ideas implemented by competitors. They would make several adjustments to improve the manufacturing and marketing of the products. As a result, the company caught and surpassed the competitors in the overall phone industry not only in the US but also worldwide. Thus, it dislodged most substantive leaders such as Nokia.
In the future, Samsung require addressing the issue of how to reinvent itself in case of a substantive competitor entering the market in which the company operates. In view of this, it is paramount for the management to realize that what the competitors are doing in the industry has an impact on profitability, expansion and relevance of the organization.
Samsung remains at the top of the mobile telephony and other diversified products and services. However, the dominance in these sectors does not guarantee self-determination like Apple does. The company is significantly dependent on Android. In order to complicate the situation, Samsung has minute investment in Windows (Civichino, 14).
This is an opportunity for new entrants to exploit to gain competitive edge over Samsung. Thus, for Samsung to effectively deal with this aspect, it is imperative to monitor and pick up necessary trends in consumer consumption and buying habits. The social media is a novel way of observing consumer preferences. This requires the deployment of an internal staff to observe, analyze and interpret the information attained from social media accurately.
Samsung has stayed in the tablet game with clear application of financial endowment. It launched the tablet across all device sizes. It has availed tablets to its consumers in various global locations. The company should develop a portal where customers can engage with each other. The information gathered from the portal will be fundamental in responding to consumer concerns.
Results
Product is clearly the most important variable in the electronic industry. Companies require introducing better devices that have the potential to disrupt the market and keep competitors guessing. A company ought to have the financial endowment and innovativeness that allow the introduction of new and better products at competitive prices.
When a company offers an incompetent product or inadequate service, no amount of advertising or supply chain efficacy that will make up for the inadequacy. Among the main sub-variables of marketing, include the assortment, price and ecosystem. These variables are essential in addressing the benchmarks that Samsung will set to attain the coveted global leadership position.
Considering the huge changes in the computing industry, it is fundamental to comprehend what actually determines the electronic device market performance. Microsoft dominated the 1980s through 2000 in the computing industry. The arrival of iOS and Android saw the company’s share waned quickly.
Microsoft used to disrupt the market to the disadvantage of competitors. The innovative Samsung workforce supported by the management contributed towards innovativeness, which has significantly contributed to the growth of the company. When the management realized the value of the ideas brought by employees through borrowing from rivals, it encouraged them to contribute and assist the company in realizing its goals and objectives. The Samsung management competently employs the successes of most market competitors.
Evidently, the duration a smart phone model remains in the market is increasingly being reduced due to competition. New technologies are forcing companies to be competent in the market to avoid being regarded obsolete. Companies have to invest in research and development of any product that is aimed at enabling the company to gain competitive advantage in the market.
Marketing is vital to brand creation and development of any company product. The traditional ways of marketing are currently considered a waste of resources since they involve committed human and financial resources to the extent that they make no financial benefit for the organization sponsoring them.
The argument is substantiated by the fact that companies are investing in internet advertising and marketing. Samsung is among the leaders on this platform. It has a portal that customers can engage in to get updates on the latest products that the company offers.
Market performance is typically based on short- or long-term factors. Some market performance can be improved based on the product cycle. Others may take years to mature, generate credibility and present competitive advantage. The development of a brand is a long-term process that may take years to create a compact reputation regarding products and contributions to the industry.
At the same time, it consumes considerable amount of time to comprehend the supply chain. This can be achieved through building the company’s own mechanisms like Samsung or have huge financial endowment like Apple. The distribution channels also consumes considerable amount of time to develop.
Recommendations
There is a wide range of benchmark actions that Samsung can make to ensure it becomes and remains at a global leadership position in the technology field particularly the mobile connectivity arena. The management needs to realize that competition will intensify in future. The reduced entry hurdles will see the entry of more competitors into the market.
The ‘digital convergence’ will quicken the competition further. Companies seeking diversification will compete with Samsung. With the emergence of such a situation, Samsung will have to devise methods of creating a win-win situation in the uncertain digital convergence era. Inherently, it is imperative for the company to develop strategies that will enable it to attain this objective.
In the past, Samsung has developed brand building as a high-end plan. The strategies employed have enabled the company to be profitable based on low prices for highly sophisticated products. The company requires sustaining the strategies while considering price dynamics that are impacted by emerging technologies and competition.
The company requires spending more on research and development while ensuring that the R&D teams develop products that will see the company emerge as the leader in the increasingly competitive market. In order to achieve this goal, the company should ensure that it has a product in waiting to neutralize the impact of the introduction of new products by competitors. Whenever a competitor introduces a new product into the market, Samsung should have a better disruptive product for release into the market.
This way, the competitors will have to keep guessing about the company’s next strategic move. Additionally, the market is likely to be saturated with new connectivity devices. Consequently, future profits are likely to be realized from emerging markets. However, in the emerging markets, consumers favor affordable devices. This requires the company to put into consideration the coverage of low and middle income earns.
Conclusion
In the increasingly competitive global market facilitated by new and advanced technologies, it is essential to understand the consumers’ needs and preferences. This helps in determining whether there is something, an organization can do to address them or not. Samsung is among the global companies that require addressing marketing issues to stay ahead of competition despite the aggressive innovativeness the company is popular for over the years. The expansion of the computing landscape has changed how the company operates and significantly increased the products the company offers.
In addition, customers are progressively pursuing linked devices including mobile phones. The aggressive purchasing habits of the contemporary consumers have increased the sales with a particular tilt towards smart phones and tablets. This has enabled Samsung to realize profitability from the ventures that the company makes in diverse locations.
Previously, the company managed to convince the consumers that its products were among the best in the technology industry particularly in mobile technology. The strategies employed by the company over the years have offered the company the opportunity to gain competitive edge over competitors.
Works Cited
Civichino, Andrea. “Inside Out or Outside in?” CMA Magazine 1.1(2012): 14-15. Print.
Sharma, Chetan. What (Really) Drives Mobile Device Market Performance. 2013. Web.
Trainer, David. Apple Priced For Past Performance Not Market Reality. 2014. Web.