Companies do different activities to reach the target customers. They promote their product or service in different kind of promotional activities. End of the day it is all about reaching the audience. In these activities companies perform two different kinds of activities such as push pull strategy. These strategies work in different functionalities.

To explain it more clearly, Push is the strategy to push the products from the companies the customer by different modes such as email, tele- marketing, cold calling etc. In layman terms "carrying the Product at customer end". And pull strategy is the requirement from the customer initiation. In lay man terms, "catching the customers to buy the product". Hence these are the strategies used by the companies at different stages.

In the push strategy the focus is more on the target audience. The companies look at different strategies to develop the promotional activities. The manufacturer sets up distributors, middle men, marketing agency and retailers to stock the product and make the product available to the customer. Here the face to face selling, Retailers involvement, direct selling , cold calling and direct marketing matters a lot. New companies adopt these strategies. They do different form of activities such as Trade shows, packaging and designing of the product, huge promotions, and point of sale displays. This requires an effective supply chain. As this has to come from Suppliers to the customers end. Here the distribution for the companies is for long term, it is the important position in the supply chain. For the push strategies the SCM should be good. The inventory maintenance, Effective flow of products is the main criteria in this. Hence in push strategy the company needs to do a lot of homework.

In pull strategy the consumer tries to gain the information from the consumer. They try to get the product from retailer. Here the demand comes from consumer. It gets out or the customer pulls the product from the delivery channels. Even in this strategy also there should be an effective SCM. Here the product is being demanded by the customer. The company needs to maintain a perfect inventory in case of huge demands. The delivery channels should also maintain good amount of inventory so as to move it to the retailers. This may come when the product or the company has good brand name in the market. Here the company maintains customer relationship management. Here the word of mouth works a lot, Discounts, sales promotions, Advertising, Mass media etc.
helps the company to perform better. Here the creation of demand plays a vital role. Once it is done the middle players looks into that. Hence in pull strategy it is important to maintain inventory at store and promotional activities to aware the consumer.


These two strategies are important in marketing and supply chain management. These strategies create demand and sales. Hence these are the strategies used for branding and sales activities. If the marketing mix is good enough then these strategies will help you out in achieving the success rate.

SCM=Supply Chain Management

About Author / Additional Info:
An MBA From GITAM University, India

Reference: Marketing made simple .com