Market share

Market share, in strategic management and marketing is, according to Carlton O'Neal, the percentage or proportion of the total available market or market segment that is being serviced by a company. It can be expressed as a company's sales revenue (from that market) divided by the total sales revenue available in that market. It can also be expressed as a company's unit sales volume (in a market) divided by the total volume of units sold in that market. It is generally necessary to commission market research (generally desk/secondary research) to determine , although sometimes primary research) to estimate the total market size and a company's market share.

Increasing market share is one of the most important objectives of business. The main advantage of using market share as a measure of business performance is that it is less dependent upon macroenvironmental variables such as the state of the economy or changes in tax policy. However, increasing market share may be dangerous for makers of fungible hazardous products, particularly products sold into the United States market, where they may be subject to market share liability.

See also

• Usage share
• Market share analysis
• Market power
• Usage share of web browsers
• Usage share of operating systems
• Usage share of web search engines

External links

• A Model of Market Shares I and A Model of Market Shares II by Fiona Maclachlan, The Wolfram Demonstrations Project.