Product and Competitive Advantage in Product
Product
Being a leading retailer in the world, Wal-Mart has made significant efforts to invest in a wide range of products and services. The company achieves this by operating many departments, some of which include clothing, shoes, and accessories, books, cell phones, electronics, jewelry, beauty, home improvement, food grocery delivery, pharmacy, baby, auto and tires, household essentials, crafts, office, furniture, party and occasions, and music, among others(Walmart Stores, n.d). More significantly, Wal-Mart ensures to provide its customers with matchless products and services in terms of quality, thus ensuring to achieve a relatively high rate of customer satisfaction. By offering a wider range of high quality products and services, the company is able to attract and maintain many customers, which is critical in boosting sales and customer loyalty. Over time, customers have come to associate Wal-Mart with quality because the company strives to offer the best possible products in terms of quality. Besides, the company has ensured to invest in highly qualified and dedicated workers who provide top-rate services and in a consistent manner. Apart from offering many high quality products and services, the company also offers them to customers at affordable prices, which makes them more attractive to customers. This explains why Wal-Mart is been able to consistently maintain high revenue levels irrespective of any prevailing economic influences.
In the case of expensive products, Wal-Mart provides customers with warranties so that they may be able to get replacements in case they do not function as originally intended. In some cases, the company offers to install the products for their clients and generally provides service plans for most products, especially the electronic products(Lamb, Hair,& McDaniel, 2011). One other aspect that helps to boost sales for Wal-Mart is its unique packaging, which helps to set its products apart from competition because the packaging is quite attractive. I would consider Wal-Mart to be a business-to-consumer company because it mainly targets the final consumer.
Competitive Advantage
Wal-Mart operates in a highly competitive industry because there are numerous other players offering significant competition. To achieve competitiveness, the company has ensures to invest significantly in highly innovative leaders who are able to facilitate the change necessary to fight its rivals. The company has also invested in high quality production equipment that enables it to produce high quality products that are able to stand out in the market when compared to those offered by its competitors. Wal-Mart has also been able to achieve its competitiveness by adopting a policy that requires the use of high quality products in all stages of its business. This approach not only helps to ensure quality products, but also highly captivating packaging, which helps a lot in boosting its revenues (Lamb, Hair, & McDaniel, 2011)..By stocking a wide range of goods and services, customers are able to perceive Wal-Mart as a one-stop shop for all their needs. Thus, the idea of stocking virtually all essential products plays a critical role in increasing its revenues and in the process being able to fight its competitors successfully. Wal-Mart also gets a competitive advantage by investing in highly competent employees and ensuring to train them on a regular basis. This approach is quite significant because it helps to ensure that customers receive the best quality of services as such employees are more likely to be responsive to the needs of consumers.
Customers not only look for quality in a product, but also look for affordability and convenience. Wal-Mart recognizes the need for setting affordable prices for its products because such a move is helpful in retaining and increasing its market share in relation to its products. More significantly, Wal-Mart's popularity among customers has increased because most of its highly priced products come with warranties and the company is also always ready to offer service plans. These approaches are critical because they have enabled the company to stay ahead of its main rivals.