Expert Answer
a. The situation that has been described in the article is the existence of a large number of potential consumers at the bottom of the pyramid (also known as the base of the pyramid). These potential consumers belong to low income groups. The problem at hand is how to make these large number of people in the base of the pyramid buy your products and services. The solution that has been described in the article is that companies should look at creating markets among the people belonging to the base of the pyramid. This can be easily done by building a lifestyle around the products and services that they are offering. When a lifestyle is build around the product the poor buyers will be induced to consume the goods and services being offered. Companies can build a lifestyle by addressing the basic needs of the consumers. The basic needs have been, till now, inherent and has not been expressed explicitly. The companies should work together with local communities while developing and marketing their goods and services to help the consumers at the base of the pyramid to adopt their behaviors in a way that will allow the goods and services being offered to fit into their lives.
b. As an entrepreneur, I would provide those goods and services that people at the base of the pyramid did not have access to. For instance new business models and strategies can be used to offer houses to people of low income groups in third world countries. Many people at the base of the pyramid in third world countries and developing countries do not own a house and live in shanties. I would implement a radical strategy and follow an approach that will see a paradigm shift by offering low cost houses that the people at the base can afford to buy. They can live in clean and hygienic conditions. I would enable them to adopt their behavior and budget to buy low cost houses to provide their families a better living condition. The marketing strategy would be based on premise that the housing option is offering them something that they never had access to – affordable housing. The focus would be on the 4P’s mainly the price and the product.