There is a useful tool that marketing teams can use to determine what areas they should concentrate on. It even has a useful anagram to remember it, SWOT. SWOT stands for strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threats. While strengths and weaknesses are internal factors, opportunities and threats are external factors.
Strengths are things such as: marketing expertise and experience, the products innovation, the location of your business, and anything else that may add value to your business.
Weaknesses are things such as: a lack of marketing expertise and experiences, poor quality in your product, a damaged reputation, and other factors that may hinder your business.
Opportunities are things such as: mergers with other companies, new markets (international markets for example), or a new medium (the internet for example), or even new markets created by ineffective competitors.
Threats are things such as: new and better competitors, price wars, new or better products, new taxes aimed at your product, or any other factor that may harm your business.
Using these criteria as your basis, you should be able to come up with an effective marketing strategy to use your strengths, downplay your weaknesses, and take advantage of opportunities while avoiding any threats.
A manual such as this one will surly help as well.
http://ac.rnm.ca/ac_marketingmag_ca/fjord/fjordad.html
