Talk:Segmenting-targeting-positioning

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Wikipedia has an article dedicated to Market segmentation and an article dedicated to positioning. Do we really need an article dedicated to segmentation and positioning combined????????????

Much of the content on this page repeats material that is covered elsewhere on Wikipedia, notably on the 'Market Segmentation' Page, but also on the 'Target Market' page and the 'Positioning' article and also on other pages.

How many articles do we need to cover the same concepts? Could this be merged with 'Market Segmentation'?

A great deal of the content on this page is unsourced, confused and conceptually unsound.

There does not seem to be much merit in fixing this article, when all of its themes are adequately covered in other articles on WP!

BronHiggs (talk) 08:06, 30 October 2016 (UTC)[reply]

Market segmentation

Target market

Positioning (marketing)

Perceptual mapping

Total addressable market

Serviceable available market

In addition to that there are a number of pages that cover narrow aspects of this subject matter:

Microsegment

Targeted advertising

Product differentiation

Is this level of repetition really necessary? Could some of these pages be merged with existing content? BronHiggs (talk) 06:05, 23 November 2016 (UTC)[reply]

Process Data Model

• The diagram is neat and congrats for obtaining permission for use. It would be nice if it was actually discussed.

Segmenting

• Reference to physiographic segmentation? Could this be psychographic?
• Seems to suggest that there is a scholarly debate over which variables to use. Instead it comes down to the analysts choice and there are good reasons why some approaches are preferred in certain situations
• Section seems to gloss over the segmentation process and all the attendant decisions and suddenly, bang we arrive at a new heading

Market segmentation: Creating segments

• Very confused step by step process - defining the target market is a step that is recommended before the segments are identified; perceptual mapping is recommended before the segments are known. Segments are selected based on their attractiveness but we are not told what evaluation criteria might be used to evaluate 'attractiveness'. In short, there is no logical progression in the steps. This section needs a lot of attention - but there's no need - it's covered elsewhere on Wikipedia.

Confusion/ conflation In marketing, there are two different approaches to positioning. One is competitive positioning - which refers to how a company positions itself in an industry in order to gain a competitive advantage and the other is product or brand positioning which refers to how a brand occupies a distinct space in the customer's mind. The current article appears to conflate these two concepts.

References

Much of the content is unsourced.

There is very little new material in this article and the content that is there is poorly handled. BronHiggs (talk) 06:41, 23 November 2016 (UTC)[reply]

Last year I posted a list of articles devoted to segmenting and positioning in support of adding an article duplication tag to the current article. Since then, little has happened, except that one editor deleted the tag with the note that segmenting and positioning is a distinct topic quite separate from segmenting and Positioning (marketing). I am sorry to say that I cannnot agree. In marketing texts, the combination of segmentation and positioning is never treated as a separate topic. Instead, market segmentation is treated as part of the overall marketing framework (part of the marketing planning process) while positioning is treated as one of the product-related decisions (part of the marketer's tools). ^[1] The subject of market segmentation is seriously overexposed on Wikipedia. Although the subject of positioning receives less coverage, it is also well canvassed on WP.

Since I added the intial list, I have prepared a more comprehensive account of the articles that canvass themes around market segmentation and positioning for the Outline of marketing. By my estimate, there are 40+ articles or susbstantive sections that cover market segmentation and/or targeting and at least three that cover positioning. How many more articles do we really need to cover these topics? Here follows a comprehensive listing of pages devoted to segmenting and positioning :

• Market analysis
• Market segment
  (article)
• Segmenting and positioning
  (article)
• Market segmentation (section)
• Market segmentation (section) and a bit more further down the page Market segmentation (another section)
• Market segmentation
  (section)
• Mass customization
• Mass marketing
• Market segment
• Microsegmenting
• Microsegment
• Niche market
• Hypersegmentation or one-to-one marketing
• Precision marketing
• Sub-niche market

Strategic approaches to market segmentation (i.e. undifferentiated (mass marketing), differentiated marketing, Concentrated (i.e. niche or focus strategy) and hypersegmentation (or one-to-one marketiung))

• Hypersegmentation or one-to-one marketing
• Mass marketing
• Focus strategy or niche marketing
• Differentiation strategy and Focus strategies
• Strategies for reaching target audiences
• Strategies for reaching target markets

(a) Segmenting consumer markets

• Demographics
• Geo-targeting or Geodemography
  )
• Intermarket segmentation (for segmenting international markets)
• Psychographics
  (lifstyle and values segmentation) (article)
• Psychographic segmentation (article)
• Sagacity segmentation

• List of abbreviations for frequently used consumer segments

(b) Segmenting business or industrial markets

• Industrial market segmentation
  • Firmographics
  • Industry classification

Measuring market segment size

• Bass diffusion model
• Serviceable available market
• Total addressable market
• Market analysis#Market size (section)

Targeting

Targeting

• Targeting (section)
• Attitudinal targeting
• Behavioral targeting
• Demographic profile
• Demographic targeting
• Geo-targeting
• Microtargeting
• Niche market
• Targeted advertising
• Target audience
• Target market
• Persona (user experience)
• Serviceable available market
• Total addressable market

And there are also industry specific applications of targeting such as social media targeting; Target market#Online target marketing

Positioning

• Gap analysis
• Perceptual mapping
• Positioning (marketing)
• Product differentiation
• Point of difference

BronHiggs (talk) 05:30, 21 February 2018 (UTC)[reply]

This article just goes from bad to worse. A recent addition, mostly unsourced, informs us that there are five steps in segmenting the market, namely:

• Step 1: Define your target market, trends and scope of segmentation.
• Step 2: Perceptual Mapping and Market Mapping
• Step 3: Construct a Model of the market.
• Step 4: Identifying Segments
• Step 5: Segmenting

Putting aside the fact that it is written like an instructional manual or "how-to" guide, the steps are just not logical. The sequence of the steps is confusing and the terminology used is vague. The aim of market segmentation is to divide a total potential market into segments with shared characteristics, with a view to identifying a segment or segments that can be targeted profitably, known as the target market(s). In other words, the definition of a target market is the end game, the outcome of the segmentation process.

Let's have a closer look at the steps and their inherent problems:

• Step 1 has the marketer defining the target market before they even know what the segments are. The definition of a TM is the final step in the process, not the first.
• Step 2 deals with perceptual maps, more commonly used to position products and rarely used in market segmentation. This section lacks focus, is out of place, appears to confuse product segments with market segments, and has the potential to confuse readers.
• Step 3 has the marketer construct a model of the market. This is so very vague. What sort of a model? we might well ask. Reading the content in this section does little to illuminate, but it is quite possible that the "model" refers to a diagram of the segments. If so, then how can the marketer draw a model of the segments that will not be known until the following step is completed?
• Step 4 has the marketer identify the segments - but apparently these were already identified in step 3 when the marketer drew a model of the segments, so it is unclear why this requires another distinct step. And, given that the target market was already identified in step 1, this entire step appears to be redundant
• Step 5 has the market segment the market. According to the preamble to this section, the entire process (steps 1-5) are the steps necessary to segment the market, so why would anyone want to segment the market at the conclusion of a segmentation exercise? This is just double-handling and very inefficient.

Moreover, these 5 steps are entirely at odds with the "process data model' which appears in the same article. Not only has this material clearly been written by someone who has no understanding of market segmentation, it appears that the person who added this content did not take the time to read what was in the article before the addition. Given that there has been little attempt to use reliable sources, or work within the existing framework, the weak understanding of the segmentation process, its aims and methods remains totally misguided.

In any case, there is no real need to reinvent the wheel, since as I have previously pointed out, there are many other articles on Wikipedia that canvass the same ideas, and some of them do a much better job than is evident here.

Currently Wikipedia has far too many devoted to market segmentation (excluding the current article);

• Market segmentation = 3 articles, 6 sections plus a further 22 articles dedicated to specific approaches to segmentation and/or segmentation bases (no less than 31 different treatments)

• Targeting = 1 article, 1 section plus 14 articles dedicated to specific types of targeting (a total of 16 articles in total)

• Positioning = 1 main article plus 4 articles that deal with specific aspects of positioning (a total of 5 articles)

With each article inventing its own unique process for segmenting markets, the potential for internal contradictions is very high. Any reader, consulting with more than one or two of the WP articles on this overexposed topic, is likely to get contradictory information and be left more confused than when they started out. So, with some 50+ articles that discuss segmentation, targeting and positioning, it defies comprehension that yet another article which combines these three concepts is warranted at all!

BronHiggs (talk) 23:06, 25 April 2018 (UTC)[reply]