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Product Life Cycle (What is the Product Life Cycle? (All products are born…
Product Life Cycle
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Limitations
- Difficult to identify what stage a product has reached in the cycle. Historical sales data doesn't help managers identify when an offering moves from one stage to another - therefore, it's difficult to forecast sales + determine the future shape of the PLC curve
- Worked well when the environment was quite stable, but nowadays customers have short-lived preferences: consumer fads, crazes etc. Some brands don't follow the classic curve - may rise steeply + then immediately fall away after sales reach a peak
- Unpredictability: no idea how long the process will take. Scale + timing vary considerably
- Ignores marketing effects: can stimulate needs, from awareness to fighting off competitors, to getting more use for the product + regenerating it at the end
- Not always applicable to brands/services: E.g Microsoft has many products that have come + gone but doesn't mean the brand itself is in the decline stage. Some of their products are growing whilst others are maturing
- Fluctuations in sales data: graph completely relies on sales data, so if there are fluctuations then it's not accurate. Can be due to production issues, seasonal sales of products etc