“Our corporate mission is to deliver the ‘Best Value in Energy and Related Services,’” according to a large Midwestern electric and gas utility company. This is a mission statement, which after a minor modification (just change the industry), could be posted on any boardroom wall and inserted into any number of CEO speeches. But this company actually put its mission statement into practice and reaped the rewards by becoming a superior value provider. Six Sigma marketing was the tool the company used.

Six Sigma marketing is a fact-based, disciplined approach for growing market share and top line revenues in targeted product/markets by providing superior value. It uses a modified define, measure, analyze, improve, control (DMAIC) process, similar to the one employed by traditional Six Sigma, to focus on people, products, and processes to enhance or improve value.

Define

The company began by focusing on the key markets or segments that it was serving and the products that these segments use. The intersection of a product and market is the competitive arena in which organizations compete for revenues and market share.

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