A marketing strategy for upcoming fertiliser businesses

Abstract

Agriculture in South Africa plays an important role in the success of the country and is one of the only sectors showing a positive contribution to the national GDP. At the centre of this industry are commercial farmers that need fertilisers on a daily basis to cultivate the needed crops for both human and animal consumption. The fertiliser market in South Africa is already saturated with no real growth in national sales figures in past years. Therefore fertiliser businesses need to constantly question, how to stay ahead and how to market and position their products. The primary purpose of this study was to develop a tailor-made marketing Strategy that can be implemented by any of the fertiliser blending companies in the agriculture industry in South Africa. A case study approach was taken where all the theory was applied to a successful company currently operating in this sector. The marketing strategy was developed by carefully evaluating well-known and trusted management tools combined with three academic areas, namely: strategic business management, competitive advantage and marketing strategy. Research using a questionnaire was conducted with a representative sample of 100 farmers to establish a customer profile that can contribute to the execution of the Marketing Strategy. The contribution of this study is a newly developed 7-step marketing strategy that can be implemented in the average fertiliser blending company in South Africa. The importance of this study is the fact that this newly developed process can be applied in reality and results can be drawn.