The Marketing Playbook

Citation

Bello, S. (2006), "The Marketing Playbook", Journal of Consumer Marketing, Vol. 23 No. 1, pp. 49-49. https://doi.org/10.1108/07363760610641163

Your song sheet cannot be a lullaby. It must be a drum line (p. 258).

This is the essence of the book as conveyed by its authors. The message is clear and concise – a well‐executed plan can turn an ailing company into a prospering one. The plays are simple, yet thoughtful, and they are backed with industry experience and realistic advice.

The plays in a nutshell are:

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  The drag race play. This entails singling out the right competitor, challenging the competitor on a comparable point, and winning the race victoriously.

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  The platform play. This play means vertically and horizontally aligning your company with partners who can grow your business, as well as theirs, and the industry as a whole. You put the direct competition out of mind and become a strong, encompassing leader over the long term.

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  The stealth play. A strategy played more out of necessity than want, it is used when the direct competitor is too robust to be taken on directly. By taking advantage of a niche market, an unforeseen opportunity, or a weakness in the leader, this play can help your company stabilize before moving onto a more aggressive play.

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  The best of both play. One of the riskier plays, it involves charging through the middle of the pack. Collapse two opposite‐end‐of‐the‐spectrum industry ideas or products and create a fresh, end result that solves existing problems or reads into future needs.

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  The high‐low play. The opposite of the best of both, this play focuses on consumer choice. Instead of compromising as the previous play does, this suggests offering an exclusive, innovative product for early‐adopters (resulting in high margins) and an inexpensive, entry‐level submission (preventing new entrants from moving into that category).

Once a play is chosen, an industry analysis or picture of the “playing field” must be drawn up. It is imperative to assess the industry, customers, competition, and internal strengths and weaknesses before leading the troops on a determined mission.

Finally, the campaign brief, which is the culmination of the chosen strategy, comes into play. All details are culled down into one document that serves as the intra‐company bible of attack. All departments from operations to sales to marketing can stay focused and cohesive when they understand that they are fighting the same fight. Useful direction is given for writing a concise brief. This section is also filled with insightful anecdotes and helpful team‐building tips for pulling the ranks together to tackle the play you have chosen.

While the material covered may not be new to the marketing industry, its approach via a sports vehicle that remained consistent throughout the book proved to be interesting and relatable. While the examples provided were clear and always relevant, they were, at times, too abundant. Breaking through the dense material was this steady theme of the game – the game of struggle, of breaking through, and of achievement.

I appreciated the writing style and the chapter and sub‐chapter layouts. Reading this book seemed more like a conversation than typical business‐oriented rhetoric. Additionally, the summaries helped to recap and draw conclusions after an information‐filled chapter. The chapters were broken up by subheads that helped to transition thoughts.

In my opinion, The Marketing Playbook was written for two audiences: top‐level and mid‐level management. While it serves as a practical tool for senior planners and visionaries who have enough foresight and industry knowledge to choose the correct play, in a large enough corporation it does not seem likely that they would be writing and/or executing the brief. With that said, the book does bring up a critical point – a strong team is necessary for such a large undertaking as choosing a new industry position for your company.

Overall, I would recommend the book as a resource for business professionals. I would stay away from business students reading this book since a lot of the material, while is very conceptual, would not be fully grasped without some real experience in a business setting.

The Marketing Playbook offers any company sound advice for strategic direction and implementation in an ever‐evolving business world.