MIT Sloan Management Review

Why a company can lose touch with its market and how to reorient it through a successful change program.

In almost every business-to-business industry, companies are facing increasingly powerful intermediaries in their distribution channel. Industry consolidation is replacing a multitude of small “mom and pop” distributors with a handful of national, professionally managed, publicly traded corporations.

Delivering quality to customers in a competitive marketplace dictates the need to continually enhance a customer’s experience and satisfaction. However, evidence indicates that satisfying customers is not enough to retain them because even satisfied customers defect at a high rate in many industries.

How could a team of decent, hardworking, normally law-abiding managers find themselves facing fines, jail time, the loss of their jobs, and ultimately the loss of the company they managed? In making executive decisions, these managers were not deliberately trying to evade the intent of the law, defraud anyone, harm

Trade promotions permit manufacturers to influence retail price, retail sales, and total channel profit by rewarding resellers for lower prices and subsidizing their selling effort.

How a paper mill used price-based concepts as part of a strategy to reduce cost and regain profitability.

Managers should consider three economies — consumer, emerging, and survival —when evaluating new business opportunities.