Applying PR Smith's SOSTAC Marketing Model to an Online Confectionery Start-Up

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Going deeper in the Marketing theory, we analyzed the SOSTAC Marketing Model a systematic design and implementation of a digital marketing plan on the online Start-Up company 'Jellies & Jaffas'.

SOSTAC is an acronym for the six core components to be considered when generating a marketing plan: situation (S), objectives (O), strategy (S), tactics (T), action (A) and control (C).  Each component represents a stage in the cycle of planning, and each stage is of  equal  importance  to successful marketing planning, implementation, and review (Chaffey & Smith, 2013).*(2.)


What came to my attention is the curious fact, that SOSTAC is an extension of the traditional SWOT analysis, that I knew before and from my job training, that is a situational analysis of the strengths (S), weaknesses (W), opportunities (O), and threats (T) facing a business at the outset, when introducing a new product line, or when engaging in an organizational change process. (*3)

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Each stage of the SOSTAC model has been theoretically applied to the start-up online business and it has been checked if it is necessary to the model. It all depends on the necessities of the development. All in all, the perfect SOSTAC model has been officially applied, which has been summarized in the report.

I found the SOSTAC report of Jaffas & Jellies as a very interesting example of the strategy. I will share here the details, that I found most appealing:

The Situation was that sweets are always popular and are one of the products hat customers will always pursue and in the times of Digital marketing, the photos of these sweets in retro style were the very best approach.

The main Objective of the business is to satisfy market demand, to generate profit and market share.  Moreover, building brand awareness and reputation for service and products, while discovering where the most valuable consumers are. It this example the most valuable Customers were Wedding organizers.

The Strategy was to be in alignment with what competitors share and employ. To build strong and recognizable and competitive on the market brand.

The Tactic characteristic for this project was to build strong social media brand, especially Google Ads, You Tube baking channel and regular posts on Pinterest. Apart of that using Facebook and Twitter and deep analysis of all the mentioned channels appeared to me as very structural and well-organized tactics.

Having said that, the regular Action & Control has been presented as the most important parts of the whole SOSTAC plan. Schedules and responsibility plans are essential in here.

Tu sum up, this model of Digital Marketing may be costly and take time, but for sure it will bring structured results and outcome, same as on the "Jaffas & Jellies" example.
All in all it looks like time-consuming, so not sure if I would use it personally for my Photography business.

Bibliography & Social Media Image Credit Appendix:

1.https://slidemodel.com/templates/sostac-marketing-diagram-for-powerpoint/

2.https://www.researchgate.net/publication/315488492_'Jellies_Jaffas'_Applying_PR_Smith's_SOSTAC_Marketing_Model_to_an_Online_Confectionery_Start-Up

3.https://www.researchgate.net/publication/315488492_'Jellies_Jaffas'_Applying_PR_Smith's_SOSTAC_Marketing_Model_to_an_Online_Confectionery_Start-Up

4.https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SWOT_analysi