Marketing Strategies for Mature Products in a Rapidly Developing Country: A Contingency Approach

Reports the findings of a study that examined the relative impact of various marketing strategies on the performance of mature products in a rapidly developing country, South Korea, from a contingency theory perspective. The results indicate that the competitive environment of the maturity stage in the product life cycle in Korea can be classified into four distinctive types and that different strategies have different effects on product performance for each type of environment. The results also suggest that generally, vertical integration and product/service improvement strategies have the most significant influence on the performance of the mature products in Korea. Discusses implications of the results for domestic and international marketers in the country.