The 4Cs (Clarity, Credibility, Consistency, Competitiveness) is most often used in marketing communications and was created by David Jobber and John Fahy in their book ‘Foundations of Marketing’ (2009). Once a business has segmented its marketing and identified the target audience, the next stage is to position the business. To successfully achieve this, the 4Cs is a useful tool to create a positioning statement or to build an online value proposition.
The 4Cs are designed to help you think about your value proposition.
To understand how this works in practice, I’ve looked at four well-known companies and what’s interesting is that their slogans all meet the rules of Clarity, Credibility and Consistency. The Competitiveness element is less clear. And I am not sure how you would convey competitiveness with luxury brands.
Some UK supermarkets do address the Competitiveness element, for example: Morrisons’ slogan is ‘Love it cheaper’ and Sainsbury’s slogan is ‘Live well for less'. It seems when the competitiveness element is included, it’s about price, although it could also be about performance in B2B firms such as technology. Competitiveness is also about levels of customer service, such as Avis’s slogan (until 2012) ‘We try harder’.
For more discussion of how digital marketing models can inform marketing, download our free guide from Annmarie Hanlon. You can also read this case study showing three integrated marketing campaign examples.
Download free, Basic member resource – Digital Marketing Models Guide
This guide lists 10 models including the 5Is that can be used by marketing professionals and students for digital audits, planning and strategy.
Access the Digital marketing models guide
By Annmarie Hanlon
Annmarie Hanlon PhD is an academic and practitioner in strategic digital marketing and the application of social media for business. Dr Hanlon has expertise in the strategic application of social media for business and the move from digitization, to digitalization and digital transformation for business. Her expertise spans consumer touch points, online customer service, the use of reviews, the role of influencers, online engagement and digital content. You can follow her update on Twitter https://twitter.com/annmariehanlon
This blog post has been tagged with:
Digital Marketing ModelsTurbocharge your results with this toolkit containing 7 resources
The Marketing Campaign Planning toolkit contains:
Start your Digital Marketing Plan today with our Free membership.
Recommended Blog Posts
Use our simple, 15 section download to quickly create a marketing plan for your business Many marketing plan templates you will find online were created long ago for larger businesses and aren’t so relevant to small and startup business competing …..
A Marketing Plan is a bit like a job description for your company. Everyone should have one, but they’re often not fit for purpose, out of date and reviewed infrequently… Research has shown that businesses with plans succeed…
Using the RACE OSA process to structure a marketing plan A marketing plan is an essential tool to compete and grow your business since it gives focus to your marketing activities by setting realistic, achievable priorities within your budget. It …..
