In this month's Marketing 101, we are going to be talking about how to decide what products and services to focus on.
This is the Boston Consulting Group classification matrix that helps marketers understand where a product or service falls within a company. Using the table below, think about the services you offer.
Stars - High growth, high share services. They often need heavy investments to finance their rapid growth. Eventually, they will slow down and turn into Cash Cows. A good example within pharmacy is compounding.
Cash Cows - Low growth, high share services. These are established and successful products/services that produce a lot of cash. Like most immunizations or educational services.
Question Marks - High growth, low share services. They require a lot of cash to keep active and it is important to think about if these services are able to turn into stars or if they need to be phased out. For example, diabetic supplies and bubble packs.
Dog - Dogs are low growth and low share services. They may generate enough cash to maintain themselves but do not promise large sources of cash. Unfortunately, this is usually where prescriptions and medication flavoring fall.
If your marketing rep knows what classification applies, we can turn our attention to focus on how best to market each one.