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The argument for making Category Visioning the top dog in marketing strategy
When done well, a category vision has the power to guide and influence the full spectrum of upstream marketing activities from growth, innovation, brand and portfolio strategy. And as a result, can be one of the most – if not the most – important strategic assets in a marketeer’s toolbox.
But while it should arguably be the first thing any Marketing Director or CMO considers in the pursuit of future-proofed, sustainable growth, this is often not the case.
The challenge, and the reason category visions can fail to live up to their full potential, is that they can be viewed solely as the preserve of shopper marketing or category management teams – at best divorced from or at worst in direct competition with brand or business growth strategies led by the marketing or commercial functions.
In our experience, a few myths cement this view:
Myth 1: Category Visions are just there to fuel our trade sell-in stories
A strong trade narrative is absolutely a key output for your category vision but it should also have a significant role in shaping the future direction of your business.
The intent behind sharing your vision should go beyond short-term objectives of getting your retail partners to give your product more shelf-space or stock it in a particular channel.
The vision you build should set out a future state that works to everyone’s advantage: the consumer, your customer and your company’s.
It should tell a story of growth that your customers buy into, are motivated by and want to work together with you to turn into a reality.
And this growth narrative should have a similar impact on your internal stakeholders: creating opportunity platforms that fuel innovation, brand, M&A and marketing initiatives in an intentional way that focuses resources, capability building and investment.
Myth 2: Category Visioning is just a fancy name for Category Strategy
While a Category Vision and Category Strategy both centre around driving growth, the key difference is the type of growth they are built for driving. A category strategy is focussed more on the short-term: identifying unmet need in the category as it exists today to keep engagement healthy and drive value and volume share for your brand.
The purpose of a new category vision meanwhile, is to drive incremental growth and penetration for your category. It builds a picture of a future that is yet to come, often exploring the outer reaches of what is happening today, to identify where growth can be generated over the next 3-5 years but crucially also beyond this.
Myth 3: Category Visioning is solely focussed on shopper and category insights
While shopper and category insights are an important ingredient to understanding how the landscape today will evolve over time, to build a future strategy only around these would limit the relevance and potential impact of your vision.
At STRAT7 we believe that you must fully understand the total playing field to anticipate how it will evolve in the future and what factors might impact that evolution.
We advocate capturing a balanced view of current dynamics across 5 key areas to ensure you have a solid basis to build from and pinpoint signals that point to potential category evolutions…
Consumer: What motivates consumers to engage with your category and the factors that drive their decisions – including but not limited to shopper behaviours
Culture: How the category is perceived and ‘shows up’ in consumers worlds
Category: How the category is defined and accessed and performance over time
Competition: Dominant and emerging competitors relative health, positioning including claims
Company: Your brand(s)’s current position and performance in the market and past heritage
By exploring the landscape through each of these lenses, you can capture the full range of signals today that can be translated into concrete, commercially sizeable opportunities for tomorrow.
For those whose interest was piqued by our 80s film reference, we hope you agree that category visioning deserves a place in the spotlight and is key to businesses expressing the best version of themselves!
If you would like to see your category vision claim its rightful place, centre-stage, in the strategy hierarchy and set the agenda for future growth initiatives in your business that inspire customer, delight consumers and reap rewards for your brands, get in touch to discuss how we can help.
