Using metaphors as a tool for creative strategic sense-making

Abstract

This paper investigates the use of metaphor as a valuable tool in encountering contemporary challenges in marketing strategy development. A review of the literature indicates how traditional approaches pay insufficient attention to the fact that marketing strategy development rests largely on the processes of intuitive and symbolic thinking. The first part of the paper establishes creative strategic thinking, which includes these processes as a key imperative in marketing strategy development. To show how metaphors can serve as a tool in encountering some of the challenges identified the second part examines the functions of metaphors. The final part of the paper presents a practical example of use of the military metaphor in the process of marketing sense-making and strategy development, followed by proposal of an extended and universal framework for metaphorical transfer and a discussion of the principles of such use.