Tag: Marketing

1. Introduction to Marketing Dissertations

This guide gives you some ideas for dissertation titles. Marketing is a broad area, with many different ideas to explore, so there should be plenty to whet your appetite here.Marketing dissertations typically take one of two forms, focusing either upon collecting and analyzing primary data or upon appraising secondary data only. Either type can be appropriate to your area of study. You will also find an overview of how to structure your dissertation in section three below.

2. Categories and List of Dissertation Titles

2.1 Theories of Marketing

2.1.1To what extent does Borden’s ‘Marketing Mix’ provide an adequate tool for marketing in the 21st centuryA review of the literature from the UK and USA.

2.1.2The management of marketing: is empowerment a useful concept to inform the contemporary marketing departmentA case study in a UK advertising agency.

2.1.3 Can the Jetstar marketing science model, developed to assess profitability in the low-cost airline market, be used successfully for other budget marketsA case study of a new dental practice chain.

2.1.4 Is there one best marketing decision model, or should models be selected on a contingency basisA review of recent literature.

2.1.5 The relationship between theory and practice. Do the most successful marketers have an in-depth theoretical knowledge of their fieldA qualitative study amongst marketing professionals.

2.1.6 Is the PEST analysis sufficient to interrogate environmental factors pertinent to marketing, or are subsequent developments (SLEPT, PESTEL, PESTLE) also necessaryA literature review.

2.1.7 Which approach to market segmentation is able to offer the best characterization of, and way to market to, the over 80’s A quantitative study of residents in a sheltered accommodation facility.

2.1.8 Can marketing principles developed for commercial interests be appropriate for promoting ethical issues A case study of the use of marketing techniques by the Stop the War Coalition.

2.2 Global Marketing

2.2.1How do consumer expectations of continuity in relationship with a brand differ from country to countryA qualitative study amongst experts around the world, using models of cultural differences.

2.2.2Aspirational purchases: the added value of luxury brands. How do consumers in developing countries view traditional British brands A quantitative study amongst affluent Chinese consumers aged 18-35.

2.2.3 Is political activity associated with rejection of global brandsA quantitative study of young European consumers’ attitudes to products from the USA.

2.2.4 The speed of convergence and globalization: to what extent are consumer behaviours becoming more alike around the worldA review of the literature.

2.2.5 What are the best theoretical tools for coping with rapid change in consumer preferences in the global marketplaceA review of recent literature.

2.2.6 How can global marketing campaigns best address culturally-specific ethical differences between nations A qualitative study amongst marketing managers involved in promoting alcohol and cigarette products.

2.2.7The impact of body language and gestures on global communication: to what extent can misunderstandings arise, and how does this impact on salesA quantitative study amongst sales people entering new global territories.

2.2.8 Can a managerial cognition perspective offer a good approach to global marketingA review of the literature.

2.3 Market Research, Advertising, Branding

2.3.1 The irritation factor: can ‘annoying’ television advertisements be more successful in securing consumer recall of products than ‘pleasing’ ones A review of the literature.

2.3.2 The resistant consumer: what is the best way to advertise and promote products to people who hold anti-capitalist viewsAn action research study amongst radical activists.

2.3.3 Can game theory contribute to successful brandingA critical analysis of three branding strategies using game dynamics.

2.3.4 Can successful branding approaches be used within politicsA review of the most recent UK election campaigns in terms of models of branding and advertising

2.3.5 Can ethics be used to develop effective brands A case study and historical analysis of branding by the Co-Operative Bank in the UK.

2.3.6 Is there a solid academic case for using hip hop, and its emphasis upon shared ownership and questioning of authenticity, as marketing tool A literature review.

2.3.7 Can brand association and cause-related marketing be used to build awareness of less-familiar brandsA quantitative study amongst European consumers of ‘green’ products.

2.3.8 Is it possible to enhance brand-building by training customer-facing staffAn intervention-based quantitative study amongst staff in an independent hotel in London.

2.4 Market Trends and Consumer Behaviour

2.4.1 To what extent does education level influence reading of food product labels for nutritional informationA quantitative study amongst Tesco customers.

2.4.2 Is commitment to buying ‘green’ and sustainable supermarket products mediated by level of household incomeA quantitative study amongst consumers across Europe.

2.4.3 A signifier of sophistication and desirable life-styleHow do UK women consumers view wine brands readily available in the UK high streetA qualitative study amongst women shoppers aged 18-65.

2.4.4 Can theories of semiotics be used to explore the meanings that products have for consumersA literature review examining the use of theories by de Saussure, Pierce and others.

2.4.5 Is there any evidence that car use will decrease over the next 10 years as a result of changing awareness of green issues, rising fuel costs or changing consumer attitudesA literature review.

2.4.6Compulsive shopping: are neurological models more adequate to explain the phenomena of compulsive buying than social or psychological models A review of recent literature.

2.4.7 The functional food phenomenon: good for body, soul or imageA qualitative investigation into the motivating factors influencing purchasers of functional foods.

2.4.8Is there a relationship between rural living and type of foods purchasedA quantitative study of shopping habits amongst residents in rural Wales.

2.5 New Media and New Trends in Marketing

2.5.1Pop-up Paradise: to what extent can the ‘pop-up’ shop be an effective marking toolA qualitative study of young consumers in London.

2.5.2 Caring and sharing: to what extent does the advent of new media technologies allow a newly collaborative approach to marketingA review of recent literature.

2.5.3 Can social media offer new approaches to marketing for theatre managementA case study of an independent theatre in Manchester.

2.5.4 ‘A nice idea, but …’ For small businesses, does the reality of using social and new media in marketing live up to the promiseA qualitative study amongst business owners in the UK.

2.5.5 Are new media channels for marketing as effective as old methods A quantitative study amongst consumers and marketing professionals looking at a range of attributes related to effectiveness.

2.5.6 New media: effective only when targeting young consumersA literature review looking at the use of new media and marketing effectiveness for the over 55s.

2.5.7 To what extent has control over the internet impacted upon the use of new media for marketing activities in ChinaA literature review.

2.5.8The need for a social media strategy: emerging best practice in marketing. A comparative and analytic case study looking at 5 UK brands using social media.

3. How to Structure a Marketing Dissertation, Tips

For details on how to structure a marketing dissertation, kindly check out the following post:

How to Structure a dissertation (chapters)
How to structure a dissertation (chapters and subchapters)
How to structure a dissertation research proposal

What is Marketing?

The supply of products and services of high quality is the relationship between the company and its customers to use management as a marketing tool. Consumer products and services of the Organization of force and focus on quality and a different style depending on product type and product promotion and marketing of products / services for visitors and a strategic plan based on planning.

Segmentation of Market:

Retail marketing strategy for each of the areas, and create an organization based on the quality it provides. This requires an understanding of customer needs in each region, so the product quality improvement and service sector development needs to be able to deal with the organization. Strategies of marketing of various techniques and strategies to overcome the competitors planning.

Balance Scorecard:

Balance scorecard has a huge used of management to assess the overall performance and to check the three key areas; the first one is customer retention rate, on the other hand, satisfaction of user and finally profitability share.

Marketing Mix:

The marketing mix indicates that most of the focus on the promotion of education and distribution of products, promotion, however. Thus, can the relative influence of these studies do not provide insight into mouth marketing and risk of suffering a variableThe variable bias firm cannot be linked to strategy matter. At the level of relevant personal interview with Iran Research on various consumer packaged goods managers Companies focus on the coverage of similar relax in the field of research and advertising industry. The director on whether the interest in trust, this means that the product is the original error distribution performance played a big brand. Accordingly to the question, “How can impact of brand marketing mix fairly for long timeIt was a high priority to research Marketing Science 1988 (for example, marketing in the company after Science Institute, 2008). One reason of this question was around for a long time. There is a need to respond to this combination extensive data and method that can be measuring the effects on long-term deal with the ordinary experimental modelling challenges.

Marketing Strategies:

Marketing strategies work as the mainstay of the market to fill the needs of the market and marketing plans designed to reach the goals. Plans and objectives are usually measured by test results Overall, the plan multi-year marketing strategy as a strategy based on specific steps to complete the current year plan with the details. Time horizon, according to a marketing plan vary from one company, by industry, and the United Nations, however, the time horizon over climate change and the speed is small Marketing strategies and a dynamic and modern. Bush plans to partially random and partially.

Marketing strategy of internal and external environment shows the summary of SWOT analysis survey. Internal environmental factors are use in the marketing mix, as well as performance analysis and include reduction strategy. Environmental externalities and analysis of customers, competition, and target market analysis with the analysis of technological, economic, cultural or political / legal environment impact is likely to succeed, including a set of elements. An important part of marketing strategy in many cases is the company’s mission statement to keep in line with the mass marketing.

Once you have an integrated environment, and develop a strategic action plan to identify options, the aim of the challenge, the maximum of the marketing mix to achieve these goals, and are evaluated in detail the construction process can scan. To develop a strategy for marketing and development, the final step in a series of contingency plans in case of problems that arise in this process to monitor the project.

Marketing can develop a strategy unique work and one disagrees about. However, a common strategy aimed at a number of ways. Schemes listed below and a brief description of the most common classification.

Strategy always based on market position – in the chart, and classified companies in market share, or the basis of the dominance of the industry. There are usually four types of strategy to dominate the market.

?Leader

?Challenger

?Follower

Porter, a simple strategy:

It is use as the strategic capabilities and strategic dimension of strategic power. Scope of the strategy refers to the market penetration while strategic strength refers to a strong competitive advantage sustainable. Common strategic framework (Porter 1984) with two ranges of alternative includes two alternatives. This is the difference between the low-cost leadership focus and dimension and wide or narrow is with all of them.

?Product differentiation:

?Cost leadership:

?Market segmentation:

Innovation strategy:

New product development and innovation business model that deals with the rate of the company. Ask that whether of the company was on the cutting edge of technology and business innovation.

Strategic Models:

Most of the participant’s arkytng models marketing strategy and the tools necessary to analyze the employee’s decision. Begins with strategic analysis, strategic environment can be used to achieve a comprehensive understanding. As off Matrix and the one often mix the marketing strategy used to identify sites of expression. It can be used to explain the marketing strategy 4ps for planning ahead.

Many companies, particularly in the area of consumer goods package (CPG) market that the buyer business customers and retailer focused on the need to adopt principles of operation. The marketing departments of these download time consumer spending in the targeted categories, buyers and retail partners and relevant ideas (both thinking and behaviour) identified by the search for growth opportunities. The development of opportunities and changes in market trends, and emerging the changing, dynamics of the region challenges. The 4ps can be used to check the defined strategy of the company. Internal team is also marketing the brand or operational business development opportunities and strategies so that the potential for new products or by request can include services and the beneficiaries to start preparing for the same priority can be changed 7Ps.

The managers always use the method of perception and experience to handle and exclusive situations in their day to day business. A consumer who uses the osmosis knowledge can easily judge the marketing employed. The main purpose of the marketing budget is to focus to enhance the value of the firm, but on the other side of this concept is the stock price usually fluctuates. This stock price fluctuation is the result of increase in financial revenue. Due to the above measurements marketing expenditure can affect the marketing investment in a long term. The market base asset depends upon the market action to market place outcomes, which can attain from the exploring relationships.

To explore and define these issues, a small group introduce a five key elements areas.

1-Market Drivers:

It defines that to get information regarding stock price of main customers, brand and marketing assessmentHow can you define the relationship of short-range versus long-run group performance?

The market based elements should be on the both sides.

2. Awareness of brand valuation:

There is different methodologies use for the valuation of brand but still it’s questionable that wither the brand has ability to capture the market share or it faces the negative response. The brand directly affects the level of each activity such as cash flows, risk elements, growth and cost of risk capital.

3. Dare the efficient market hypothesis:

It is being observe that the market base on the assumptions and strategies which focus mainly on the segmentation and differentiation which all cause the market imperfect. The results of all the above activities can be judge through the positive results inform of retention of customers and positive stock returns etc.

4. The investor sector treats as customer:

While communicate the investor community it’s important to evaluate that the right community is being address. The major focus should be on the activities that the companies present themselves in a way so that they can get the major share of the investor’s market.

5. Analyzing the analysts:

The recommendation of an analyst will be suitable for the business organisation in order to brand equity and the most important that the analyst closely observe the market events or not because it directly effects the prices of a products. A firm worth can be measured by analysis of its cash flows as well as growth and risk link with the future cash flows.

The market performance could be examined through the following relationship:

Market based assets:

It consists of brand, customers, innovations and channels.

It seems that they have not value but they have a sound impact over the market.

Marketing capabilities:

Market orientation and expertise places a major role in perfect utilised use of resources.

Marketing actions:

Market action based on strategy development and extension of business models that leverage marketing assets and capabilities.

MODES OF ENGAGEMENT FOR CRITICAL MARKETING AND THE MAINSTREAM:

There are three possible types of engagement the oppositional mode, the revivalist mode and the therapeutic mode.

1- Oppositional:

This situation against key marketing and acting dialectically with the mainstream a separate alternative and present themselves – discipline approach and marketing. This Reference is to submit their methods distinct from the development of critical infrastructure, awareness base, vocabulary, etc., and the various major networks, conferences, Magazines, in opposition to the dominant people, and so on. The goal is to establish Alternative agenda, marketing, and the prevailing philosophy is based on strength and attacks her Institutions and more than willing to take. The network marketing will separate the principal and other educational institutions as a focal, Development of the theory and methods, research and education centre for programs, Anti attract scientists and ideas that have proven effective are ready to attack and change Prevailing.

2- Revivalist:

This important project is busy with the mainstream and to encourage his methods of investigating the original and important educational values and the return of a doubt. Evidence of the time on the basis of marketing power lost the original harmonies and creativity, this was counterbalanced by a healthy suspicion and criticism fixed ideas. Instead of, in these days, through the knowledge of the Supreme transmission, the recipient is limited to receive texts become ossified in Philosophy of Kotler is to managerial skills to take, as set out below as status the direction of the search method.

3- Therapeutic:

This approach as a sign of mainstream marketing ideas, the philosophy of group and marketing power of knowledge in education, social and economic relations (System (1999 Wilmot). Demystify and democratize the importance of the role of marketing. Marketing knowledge and wean direction away from the mainstream to help fetishism marketing techniques and texts.

Conclusion:

According to our global environment business it is not tough to makes a very popular to your business and to enhance it according to your desire over the world. Today a firm cannot get success without develop a progressive business strategy that can provide a strategic fit between its resources and to change the business strategy. In this case study, you can get the ideas regarding to Literature review by using a long range of strategies based on the market mix and market drivers to achieve organizational goals. The strategies should be build as customer friendly and to help the customer through continuing the services to Independent business owners, members and Clients.

Introduction

Marketing is an expansive topic that covers a range of aspects, including advertising, public relations, sales, and promotions. The former involves getting a product or service into the market, promoting it, prompting behavior, and encouraging sales. Communicating to consumers is very important and Communication is easily unnoticed, but capability to communicate effectively is compulsory to carry out the opinions and visions of an association to the people. In today’s world everywhere we see is a digital world now. Without communication, there is no mode to express thoughts, ideas and feelings and to advertise products to the consumers. The marketing communications should be digital centric because it is much faster and easier to communicate, attract consumers and the messages can be stored in the device for longer period of time, without being damaged, unlike paper files that easily get damaged. As well as, digital can be targeted over a larger markets and distances. Digital communication is pouring social transformation and this has effects for the future of advertising. It is very importance in the field of advertising when promoting products to consumers through digital devices like television, electronic billboards, internet etc. which makes it very eye-catching towards the consumers. This form of advertising and communications has become very profitable over the past few years and many consumers are adapting to it and also prefer it. With the help of technology, digital advertising has grown a lot. Digital Advertising via plasma display panels, liquid crystal displays, computer monitors, and televisions are used to enhance advertising. Using computer-generated images for print advertising and large format graphics can be a unique way of showcasing your products, with all this Digital advertising and communications has made the market a better place.

Digital advertising has been widely accepted because of its countless advantages such as dynamic creative elements and interactivity, guaranteed delivery and organized display, multiple advertisers with no clutter, co-op revenue opportunities, instant digital changes for season, price, or promotion, rapid ability to update content, timely insertion of trailer loops with advertising content, instant digital programming with informative and entertaining content, and the ability to deliver specific messages to specific audiences in specific locations. It also helps to combine the industries of advertising networks and point of purchase display merchandising.

(Source: http://www.webpronews.com/digital-advertising-2004-12) The impact of digital advertising is sensational; whether the presentation is on a single separate floor display or a giant multi-screen format the messages can be conveyed with energy, focus and entertainment and special images to fascinate the consumers. With the help of digital products and devices the marketer is provided with many options and facilitates to promote and convey the message to the consumers which more than one images and option to choose the large format displays of their choice for the ultimate impact in their venue. Technology drives media, media drives social growth, and marketers track societal growth in an attempt to take benefit of the advertising openings that new media presents.

Digital marketing through television is one the most vital and effective means of promoting a brand. The visuals gives the image of the brand and the vocals gives the product/services a voice to speak for itself. Beverage organization like Pepsi, coca cola will surely operate for television or internet as they require the customer to see the soft drink and what it can offer by quenching the thirst. Digital marketing for beverage companies, airline industries, sportswear and technology-based companies result more effective in quality results as they use star-studded personalities to make their marketing strategy more effective and applicable as humans are bound to have idol personalities and easily get attracted if they promote such brands. How-ever on the other hand, the same organization might fail if the market radio lacks visual ability. Vocal marketing is useful for delivering any message, promoting institutional brand, academics, technical brands and many others.

Digital marketing through mobile phones are very popular and effective these days. Mobile phones are now a need of every individual and can be found in the hands of every individual. Devices like i-phone and blackberry have stormed the digital market and the mobile technologies has advice to a new level.Organisations,since around 4-5 years, are considering reaching their employees on mobiles through phone calls, video calls, short message services, multimedia messages etc. This digital marketing allows the organization to make the use of technology and reach to its main final consumer directly avoiding the in between agents or channels and deliver the message or promote the brand. For e.g.; retails brands prefer to send an SMS directly to the mobiles instead of advertising in the newspaper or magazines. Not only it the message is clearly delivered, but it helps the organization to save thousands of pounds in terms of finance and the most important, gives them the right number in identifying and analyzing their true market potentials or true buyers.

With digital marketing communications it helps companies increase their exposure towards consumers who are actively seeking products and devices. Communications involves online advertising, digital advertising and social media. Beginning with online advertising is a form of advertising which uses internet and World Wide Web for the communicated purpose of delivering marketing messages to interest customers. Online advertising is an effective form of advertising and communication, because it offers various kinds of animations, banner advertisement, email advertisement, and also on platforms like Facebook, Twitter etc. Web related advertising has a selection of sites to publicize and reach a niche audience to focus its devotion to a specific group. Research has proven that online advertising has given results and is growing business revenue. Online advertising also provides one major benefit of privacy towards the companies when advertising unlike other forms of advertising. Social media is the use of web-based and itinerant technologies to turn communication into collaborative dialogue. Social media also leads to many advantages such as relationships and discussion, creativity and re-mix culture; embrace your passion and identity, community, sharing, and connecting and increase clearness in government and organizations. By using social is increases reliability and builds an effective image, but also successfully increase revenues and the number of consumers. With the help of digital media marketing, companies and organizations can use data or their message in digital format which can be released to the targeted audiences anywhere in a short period of time.

The message can be conveyed very effectively by the use of graphics, figures, audio, video, text data according to one’s own marketing convenience, and can direct them to the looked-for area, even globally through the internet. The digital media marketing has enormously benefited from the internet. While sitting at the ease of your own office, one can now market the product to the other corner of the world. This is the unlimited benefit of digital marketing through internet. Digital marketing communications has become a part of the world and is an essential part of every business today and a fast means of transferring and reaching consumers. The creation of internet-based news communication is directly impacting upon traditional forms of media, and the method in which this is consumed. “In the UK, the availability of internet-based media has led to a reduction of radio, newspapers and TV engagement. More than 25% of 15-24 year olds read fewer newspapers since using the Internet.”

(Source: http://shura.shu.ac.uk/518/1/fulltext.pdf )

Moreover, digital advertising and communications can be found private and public environments. Most of the message are conveyed through LEDs and LCDs and projected images too. Thus, the message is conveyed is targeted and focused. Another advantage of using the digital signage is the probability of updating information from anyplace. When working on a digital media, the requirement is to update data in a flash card. Digital system has the facility to connect with the mobile also. This technology allows updating the signage data through Bluetooth or SMS. The ad can be displayed all day long like 24 hours a day and can be repeated frequent number of times, so that your customers can observed it at their convenience rather than any specific time

DIGITAL TRENDS AND ITS DEVELOPING:-

There is a wide range of categories on which these type of web sites offer a wide range of information which include different types of accessible like games,pcs,mobiles,laptops,mp3,cameras etc. These electronics also cover home connections like TV in digital entertainment and other service areas. With these technologies at a round and round rate, there are some companies that fear that they are lacking behind in these latest types of centuries and in developments in digital marketing. On the other hand digital trend is no longer said to be confined to a computer monitor or mobile phones in the world of 2011.

RFID TAGS (radio frequency identification technology):-.RFID has been there for a long period of time towards the opportunities in many sectors. Towards these the marketers are now starting to begin a technology in such a way which automatically captures the real time data automatically. The most usable way of these digital trends RFID is using are the leveraging technology to create more efficient oppurtunities.The RFID has mostly increased in parks and other outdoor places that integrate quickly are on Facebook and twitter and they immediately update their status. While all these products include different types of enhancements like locations and social networking the RFID has integrally created a user’s history and getting valuable data to advantages on both sides.

TECHNOLOGIES AND ITS ORGANIZATIONS:-

Marketing and technology are now considered as the main vital weapons for organizations in terms of success. They have to be upgraded according to the time and as per the requirements of the market conditions. Any organizations with consisting of outdated marketing strategies and outdated technologies will often find it.it will often find it hard to co-op up with the success market has both the technologies and the marketing strategy has to be upgraded and customized with time and the requirements of the organization.

There is no doubt that the organizations are more digitalized and have already adopted more digital based strategies in approaching there target market. Media has been playing a vital improvement role promoting organizations and its product and services to a local market. Catering to over billions of people around the globe, no one denies the role of televisions when it comes to promoting brands as every individual and every organization understand its importance for e.g. :- a one minute of advertisement of Pepsi on the television is viewed by millions of people around the globe and they recall the brand as a source of satisfying the thirst and entertainment.

WHY TO ADOPT A MARKETING-CENTRIC APPROACH?

These are the companies that make good consumers, and as a result they have their own style of focusing in our mindset around launches from where all these systems are made at the starting of the products life cycle. Towards this our job is just to make more people educate about there needs of goals and assets through the whole cycle of a product. On the other side there is not much of budget for more giving tv ads as there are many new ideas that come out every minute so there should be an easy way of knowledge and knowing which way can be engaged. It is said that there should be a customer’s marketing centric approach in the digital marketing ways as it gives a wide range of opportunities of segmentations and integrations. Towards a better customers experience and marketing department the demand of their prices and budget increases.it is worthy while they acknowledge the different ways in the organizations that can improve towards their customer’s centric marketing?

BY STARTING IN A SMALL WAY ON THERE PROGRESS:-By looking and beginning towards the customers demand and starting with a small programmed, channels etc. and by continuing the track and to communicate overall.

THE DIGITAL MARKETING MIX:–

It is always said that a digital marketing always focuses on a 2 core principles. Developing websites and how is the marketing in it.During this situation people on the other hand will think that social media is not present in the digital marketing. However in other ways social media does form an integral part of digital marketing mix. In terms of this social media lies towards the digital marketing mix, it is only necessary when the following have become as the elements considered:

A very highly brand name.

The b2c communication and combination of the management.

The succeed in their websites.

GRAPH OF USAGE OR EXPENDITURE OF DIGITAL MEDIA ADVERTISING:-

Most of the companies have adopted towards this kind of advertising strategy which is digital. This is much less expensive and more reliable and only digitized information can be conveyed through a strident channel without degradation. One of the widely available and successful marketing strategies is also viral marketing. The advantages of viral marketing service are high reliability, low costs, large audiences, high efficiency and the chance to unremitting promotion adjustments. Viral marketing is one of the cost-free techniques for promoting a business operation. Time and resources are simply available in this type of marketing and also inexpensive to setup. Viral marketing is built to link to the website. For instance over the medium or over the email, one recommends the product. Using viral marketing thrill about good products is created. Hence, people get hold of the right product. Viral marketing campaigns are popular for both online and offline media. Therefore it is another cost effective way of reaching out to several customers. Viral marketing contains the use of all the media formats available on the internet such as video clips, interactive flash games, e-books, text messages, etc. Widespread channels that drive circulation include social bookmarking sites, forums, blogs, newsletters, emails, etc. Viral marketing is generally word-of-mouth and that makes it all the more convincing since it is carried out by people that readers can connect to. Article marketing and video are some of the viral marketing techniques. Article marketing provides a good stage to present a product or service in a unbiased tone. This technique of article marketing comprises, writing several articles unfolding about the product or service and submitting them in article directories or in the website’s article section. http://www.teqtonic.com/blog/2010/01/effects-of-online-advertising-beyond-the-click/

VIRAL MARKETING:-

In the recent years and times, a new marketing process known as viral marketing has come into the effect. Arguably, many consider it similar to the word-of-mouth promotion, but viral marketing process has proved itself to be more efficient especially to technology based and medical organizations. Viral marketing is more like a networking process where people promote brands or products to their colleagues or friends who are in need of such a product convincing them to purchase the product and asking them to carry on the process by selling the similar product to their peers or contact(potential customers),thus creating a network of real customers.

This viral marketing helps the brand or the product to get more popularity and awareness in short span of time and reaching its true buyers. Not only the sales of the product increases by double but this helps the organization to study its true market of its customers by segmenting them according to their needs and wants. Medical organizations have benefited a lot from such marketing process where their products such as massagers, vitamin tablets, fitness machines are sold as it attract many people who are health conscious and their lives are affected by health issues on regular basis. Viral marketing may vary from text messages to images, magazines to eBook, from software to guides, and from video clips to phone calls.

THE BENEFITS OF VIRAL MARKETING CAN BE LISTED AS BELOW:-

The awareness of the product increases by double as the people promoting the brand grows.

Helps people to create a proper PR amongst their colleagues.

Helps in identifying and reaching the right consumer who is surely a true potential buyer of the product.

The sale is the product increases as the network of people grows.

Helps individuals to carve their own skills and polishing their selling techniques in selling a product

Customer segmentation gets easier for the organization.

ON THE OTHER SIDE VIRAL MARKETING DO HAVE DRAWBACKS SUCH AS :-

Often the products sold in viral marketing are expensive which makes it harder to sell the product.

The network gets affected if people do not have strong PR or contacts.

People fail to convince other to join the network due to lack of complete information of the product or poor communication skills.

One bad customer can easily kill the efficiency of the network by quitting it or selling the product to another bad customer as one bad customer can influence at least other 15 people for a negative action.

INTEGRATED MARKETING COMMUNICATION:-

The marketing world and process is incomplete without the integrated marketing communication and the marketing mix process which involves the products, the cost of the product, the placement from where it can be available for its customer, how can the product be promoted and advertised to reach its targeted audience, who are the people who matter the most to the product, the overall process involved to make the process executed properly and the partnership and policy to keep the process effective.

Integrated marketing communication can be defined as an injection communication package of coordination and integration of all marketing communication features, tools, functions and sources into a process to aim the maximum productive output with the least financial minimal cost. The process involves in creating, managing and improving customer relationship that helps in promoting the brand and creating awareness and identifying the brand value through effective communication process. The integrated marketing communication (IMC) affects all kinds of communication such as:-

Business to consumer communication.

Business to business communication.

Customer-focused communication.

Brand-centric communication.

Marketing strategies and procedures.

Both externally and internally directed communication within the organization.

The overall process of integrated marketing communications involves how an organization can brain storm ideas, plan and implement digital marketing and make it the main focus of attention while making strategies and procedures how to deliver the product and make the right product reach its targeted market at the right time, in the right place. With time and experience, marketing organizations and experts have been forced to revise the theory of integrated marketing communications and implement it with better logical aspect.

Introducing multiple forms of communication process to communicate with the targeted customers knowing the audiences in better terms of what are their demographic information and what are their needs and wants. By having such information, organizations find it easy in delivering the brand or product information through the right and appropriate means of making way. For e.g.-if Toyota has information of the main family head knowing his demographic information and his buying power ability, they will reach to him on a more personal and customized level by inviting him to the new sales offer through an SMS.If busy they can MMS him the visuals of the car or email the features which will make the car making it easier for him during the decision making process.

DIGITAL ADVERTISING:-

A large number of people connected to the internet rise every day because of its convenience. There are a large number of investment done by the telephone companies has showed up with a big result in a large range of broadband width which is available towards any interested subscriber. Internet has gone so forward in such a way that the need not to be connected anymore through wires as they have invented new systems like Wi-Fi or wireless and it has also made it affordable.

Digital advertising has made such technologies in an improved way with web services. On the other hand in previous days many web services were in different limit speeds and receiving or sending data and whereas now a large number of data can be received or sent and in different varieties e.g.:- music or videos. This has changed the trend in the World Wide Web. Digital advertising on the internet has till now not made any issues in slowing down as compared to other medias such as televisions, magazines, newspapers advertising etc.

BREIF ADVANTAGES:-

Tracking.

International audience.

Upscale audience.

Low cost.

Blog.

Interactivity.

OTHER HAND THE DISADVANTAGES:-

Clutter.

Potential for deception.

Measurement problems.

Web snarl.

Poor reach.

ISSUES TO BE DISCUSSED ON:-

How will the distribution channels and consumers affect the publishing industry
Which ones are the most powered for monetizing digital content
How should the companies of media and advertising deal with online private issues
The key values and platforms affecting media
Will the mobile affect media
How are the large and small varieties of business contributed to go inside the online spending
Will there be any location based advertising
Will the digital be death of advertising at some point
The recession is demonstrating that sports and arts sponsorships was always more about corporate ego than about driving sales
Is cinema fighting a losing battle for share of advertising when the future for its audience is digital media

A DIGITAL CENTRIC MARKETING MODEL:-

The digital market involves the marketing model in different ways it includes the customer centric marketing excellent in which it build the customer centric marketing strategy to enhance the customer experience and identified your customer base and engages with them to understand their sophisticated needs.it also connect with your customer through their most relevant marketing channel’s.

THE DIGITAL MARKETING INVOLVES MANY OF THE SEGMENTS SUCH AS:-

Banner Ad – An advertisement on a Web page may appear at the any of four arms (top, bottom, left and right) of the page. Designed to have the user click on it for more information or opening of a new web page / URL

Blog – Shortened from “web log” a blog is a user-generated Web site where entries are made in journal style and displayed in a reverse chronological order.

Bookmarking – Bookmarking is a way to store, classify, share and search links that are combined into a single site (or folder) for easy access.

Search engine marketing – Is mode of Internet marketing & contextual advertising through the use of search engine, generally paid placement or paid inclusion, by increasing their visibility in search engine result pages.

Cost Per Click – The amount of money payable to search engines and other Internet publishers for a single click on its advertisement that brings one visitor to its website.

Digital Brand Engagement – Brand and consumer interaction through Internet. It includes all aspects of social web and the brands own website.

Instant Messaging – Instant messaging (IM) is a type of communications service that creates a virtual private chat room with another individual to facilitate the communication in real time over the Internet.

Open Rate – The number of times the email is opened/viewed compared to the total number of times the email sent. Generally this number will be low for large campaigns and higher for more focused campaigns.

Opt-In List – or Solicited emails. Email marketers have databases of subscribers (email account holders containing names & their email addresses) to their newsletters or websites. Such a list is known as an opt-in list (a potential candidate for SPAM).

RSS – Real Simple Syndication allow users to subscribe to a specific content feed and get alerted automatically when new updates are available.

RSS Reader – Application used to subscribe & read selected RSS content feeds.

Social Media Optimization – A practice or strategy of social media activity with the purpose of attracting unique visitors to website and its content.

Spam – Unsolicited emails, an email message unwanted by the recipient.

Streaming Technologies – Communication channel such as video and audio that is accessed online. It can be a pre-recorded clip or a live feed.

Subscriber – A person who signs up and agrees to receive messages from a particular company or entity.

Targeting – Sending message to people who agreed to receive message or based on specific criteria from your subscriber database.

Voice Broadcast – Sending pre-recorded voice messages to a large set of phone numbers at the time same. Can either be a voice call (answering the call for the message to play) or voice mail (message will play at its own if not answered or receiver choose to play).

Widget – A small graphical device or application, highly focused and often for single/specific task. Web widgets can be embedded in web pages or run on a PC or mobiles/PDA’s.

Web Video – Short video clip, designed to be displayed on a website or released openly to be displayed on many websites such as youtube.

CONTENT:-Text, image and interactive assets are dealing with social context integration.

LICENSES AND TRANSACTIONS:-There should be the positions to optimize the feeds amongst the double sources and distribution channels.

APPLICATIONS:-There should be a straight strong cement floor for the entertainment in their lifestyles and news.

Above all the advantages, the major drawbacks in digital advertising and communications are they are unreliable as the messages cannot be recognized by initials. Though software can be established for this, yet the soft wares can be certainly hacked and is very time consuming. Usually it is very confusing for the consumer when too much information is given on the ad as it is difficult to focus on one concept during the ad. It is text-based which means mostly relies on entering text which can be challenging for those who don’t prefer to write or have poor keyboard skills, but with the advance of broadband connectivity and voice and video conference technology. Reduced social skills and false impression are likely to happen.

TO THE ARGUMENT, it is much accepted statement that the digital world should really be practiced now at a more professional and practical level in order to have more larger productive results. Organizations should be more digital-marketing oriented to cater and reaching to its mass consumer market with the right approach and right message to make sure that the consumers are clear enough to understand what exact message is delivered to them. Digital market varies from radio to television, from internet to mobiles from smart phone to gadgets. Moreover, one can argue that the cost of digital marketing is high and the budget setting can vary from thousands to millions. For brands like Pepsi, coca cola or emirates airlines, the budget may also result in billions. Despite catering to the trillion customers market, they have the customized strategies reaching them through digital marketing in forms of television,radio,internet,mobiles,word of mouth,billboards,screening,which makes sure the brand name and the product is remembered by the customers for a longer period of time.

However, internet marketing is arguably more effective as compared to television, radio and mobiles. Organization needs to be customized there strategies for internet marketing while reaching their audiences. They need to target or create websites to promote their brand either by advertising on the website, creating inter-links to their personal websites, pop-ups, banners and etc. Also organizations can attract its customers by streaming media (including both audios and videos)to promote the brand. A true example of digital marketing is a concept from emirates airlines promoting the airlines inner services, the atmosphere of travelling, the environment and the high quality staff service through a streaming video online. This not only gives a clear message to the targeted audience about emirates airline services but also gives a pure picture of a real-life travelling experience one can have.
Carrying on with this internet marketing, and the search engines have promoted the organizations marketing team on to the next level by making them visible on just a matter of a click. Organizations are now more closer to its targeted consumers as well as and other potential markets through yahoo, Google and other search engines by listing their names over the world wide web. Search engines have not yet only promoted brands but also products to the extreme detail level. For example; nokia mobile phone lovers can view their favorite cell and its features through search engines over the internet making the customers a more potential buyer for the product. Also a future potential market is also created by such organizations by publishing and listing future mobile phones over the internet. This helps in marketing the product and creates a valid potential market for the product. Search engines keeps the digital marketing world in the continuous process by keep on adding products and the brands through which products are not only advertised to the main final consumer but also it helps the organizations to grow on the success scale and create better products and services for its present and future customers.

CONCLUSION:-

Advertising online is now one of the necessary aspects of media and marketing policy. Digital advertising is very versatile, capable both of building brand awareness and engagement and driving response and purchase behavior. Today advertising online and digital media is one of the greatest strategies ever invented. With the help of digital advertising consumers can be targeted at any point during the purchase.

Builds new levels of brand meeting and activism. Digital has quickly changed the way consumers re-count to brands. The digital media can create many benefits like east editing , easy sharing and streaming , easy copy and backup and free up spaces and playable across multiple media. Another benefit to selling Digital Media products is that you are dealing with bodily materials that will help avoid fraudulent performance on the customer’s part. The main benefits to using integrated marketing communications or IMC is that it is critical and cost effective to an organization. Most of the advertising companies are now adopting this strategy and it is becoming very common and useful. And it is stored in an electronic way, so there is a lot of digital content on the internet which includes text content, images, audio content, as well as video content. The ability to confidently procedure, participate in and comprehend digital media and services is becoming a significant prerequisite to effective and the participation in the digital economy.

References:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Online_advertising

http://marketingdeviant.com/the-importance-of-communication/

http://ezinearticles.com/?The-Importance-of-Digital-Media-MarketingHYPERLINK “http://ezinearticles.com/?The-Importance-of-Digital-Media-Marketing&id=4744412?&HYPERLINK “http://ezinearticles.com/?The-Importance-of-Digital-Media-Marketing&id=4744412?id=4744412

http://www.articlealley.com/article_1493426_64.html

http://in.answers.yahoo.com/question/index?qid=20071224070526AAztBBc

Advantages and Disadvantages of Viral Marketing

http://www.webdesign.org/site-maintenance/web-promotion/measuring-the-pros-and-cons-of-online-advertising.15332.html

http://ezinearticles.com/?Importance-of-Viral-MarketingHYPERLINK “http://ezinearticles.com/?Importance-of-Viral-Marketing&id=1858181?&HYPERLINK “http://ezinearticles.com/?Importance-of-Viral-Marketing&id=1858181?id=1858181

http://advertising.microsoft.com/canada/en/why-digital-advertising

www.mama.com/digitaladvert.co.uk

Introduction

Triumph motorcycles is a privately- owned British company. Triumph has always had its own distinctive character and a history of creating motorcycles. The company plans to enter Chinese market, they prepared a detailed marketing plan, which is including 7 main parts: marketing objectives, product adaptation, promotion mix, distribution, price determination, term of sale, and methods of payment.

Marketing objectives

a). Establish retail stores in Shanghai, Beijing and Hongkong b). plan to add 5 to 15 dealers through 2013 c). Increase retail unit sales to more than 28 percent d). Triumph for the planning years above 3,000,000, take 0.9% market share e). target markets- buy for leisure, buy for competition, and buy for collection.

Market segment:

a) geographic segmentation- population growth rate around 5.28‰, male to female ratio was 119:100, target population is around 50 000, East Sea and South Sea biggest part of Chinese GDP, China GNP in 2009 was $437 billion, in 2008 was $422 billion, growth rate 9.65% b). Demographic segmentation- between 25 and 45 occupied 70%. Buy for competition aged between 25-30, for collection aged over 38, buy it for leisure aged 30-40, aged 25 years above, 80% of target audience Bachelor degree or above. c). psychographic segmentation-(SRIC-BI) and (VALS)

2. Product adaptation

a). core product benefits- features, image, technology, and perceived value b). product attributes-brand name, quality, packaging, design, size and color variants, country of origin, price c).support service-livery, installation, guarantees, after-sales service and spare parts

3. Promotion mix

a), 1.advertising objective- increase among 200,000 people who personal annual income above $100,000, from 22 percent to 31percent in one year. 2. Media mix- television, magazines, outdoor, brochures and internet 3. Massage- Is not only a motorcycle, but also a lifestyle; go your own way

b). 1.Sales promotions objective- carry new items, encouraging stocking, building brand loyalty, encouraging support of a new product or model, and searching more potential customers. 2. coupons-10% discount 3. Specialty advertising- low-cost items bearing the company’s name and address

c). Personal selling- hired 10-15 sellers, AIDA method, FABV method

d). Other promotional methods- Catalog marketing, Telemarketing

5. Distribution: from origin to destination

a). Port selection-Tianjin port, Hongkong port,Shanghai port

b). Mode selection

C). Packing- wooden case, label attached on the container

d). Document required- transportation documents, banking documents, commercial documents and government documents.

e). Insurance- cover loss and damage to the product

f). Freight forwarder- 1.advantages concentrated core business, reduce investment fee, decrease the risk, reduce the cost, save the expenditure, and decrease inventory; improve level of transportation service, improved; finally 2. reduce control in the supply chain, bring risk of relationship management, cause leakage of business secrets

g). Channels of distribution- two-level channel: a wholesaler and a retailer. Type: department store and franchise organization.

h). Wholesale middlemen- full-service wholesaler, mark-up the cost of 20 percent

i). Import and export agent- negotiates exchange transaction, commission of 2 to 6 percent of the selling price

j). Warehousing- distribution and automated warehouses, locate suburb of Shanghai

6. Price determination- Total retail price in China of $24,763, is a 206 percent of the British price

7. Term of sale-Ex-work,FOB, FAS,CIF

8. Methods of payment- cash in advance (unfair), letter of credit, open account (later)

Conclusion

The Chinese market is potential market for the company to entry. Triumph will find huge power of purchasing in China. Moreover, it has increasing demand of Chinese consumers for luxury products. Triumph motorcycle before enter Chinese market, they prepared a detailed marketing plan. Triumph already entry Chinese market.

Introduction

Triumph motorcycles is a privately- owned British company and that their motorcycle are designed, developed. Triumph has always had its own distinctive character and a history of creating motorcycles. Triumph’s aim is to craft motorcycles that deliver a great riding experience through the fusion of well- balanced, easy to handle chassis and strong, flexible engines. The company currently has market in many major counties like the UK, America, and Japan (Triumphmotorcycles.co.uk, 2011). As the development of emerging marketing, the company plans to enter Chinese market. In the face of globalization many firms attempt to expand their sales into Chinese market. However, internationalization is unlikely to be successful unless the firm prepares in advance. Just like Triumph motorcycle before enter Chinese market, they prepared a detailed marketing plan, which is including 7 main parts: marketing objectives, product adaptation, promotion mix, distribution, price determination, term of sale, and methods of payment.

Marketing objectives

In Chinese market Triumph continue developing truly existing motorcycles product that are distinctive in looks, design and performance to this new market. Triumph’s aim is to craft motorcycles that deliver a great riding experience through the fusion of well- balanced, easy to handle chassis and strong, flexible engines. The result is an inspiring range of motorcycles delivering intelligent, usable performance (Triumphmotorcycles.co.uk, 2011). In addition, in Chinese market Triumph group will pay more attention on after-sale service, such as, provide assembling and fitting service for customer convenience, also provide accessory. The long-term development projects and the solid business base Triumph have to start their new business relationship. Triumph already have retail store in Taiwan, according to this situation before enter Chinese main market they will sell product in internet first. This model we called “DELL direct selling model”. This model not only can bring more profit for the company, but also make the user close to the company. Then supply of goods and service available to meet market demand. Next step will to establish retail stores in Shanghai, Beijing and Hongkong. Triumph strategy is multi-generational and multi-cultural. It calls to grow sales to their core customers, while growing sales to outreach customers at a faster rate. In Chinese markets Triumph plan to add 5 to 15 dealers through 2013, and in the same period increase retail unit sales to more than 28 percent (figure 2). From (figure 1) we can see that the whole industry sales for the 2009 about 25,427,700, industry sales for the 2010/1-7 mouths around 16,839,900, estimate industry sales for the planning year around 40,000,000, estimate sales for Triumph for the planning years above 3,000,000, take 0.9% market share of whole market (stats.gov.cn, 2009).

Triumph has a great number of Chinese market information. These are information will help company good to know who is the potential customer, what they need, and how to communicate with customer. The target markets are followed: buy for leisure, buy for competition, and buy for collection.

Triumph will use E-commerce which is the selling or buying of goods and information over the internet, and through transport. So they will spare no effort to serve their customer with high quality products and best service, no territory restriction. From geographic segmentation, China has a vast territory and a large population, despite the implementation of birth control, still sees a yearly net increase of 17 million peoples, a number equal to the population of a medium-sized country. The population growth rate is keep around 5.28‰, male to female ratio was 119:100(baidu.com, 2009). So Triumph total amount of target population is around 50 000. According to geographical region China is divided into three ladders. The most population focus mainly on ladder 1 and ladder 2.China from south to north is Bo Hai Sea, Yellow Sea, East Sea and South Sea. These four main areas boast a developed economy, well- grounded infrastructure and abundant human resources. Especially, areas of East Sea and South Sea, these two areas contribute a biggest part of Chinese GDP. China GNP in 2009 was $437 billion, and in 2008 was $422 billion, growth rate about 9.65% (baidu.com, 2009). So Triumph’s new market will focus on Shanghai, Beijing and Hongkong. From demographic segmentation, the sex ratio of male customer is higher than the female customer. The age of the patients was mainly between 25 and 45 which occupied 70%. Customer buy product for competition aged between 25-30, for collection aged over 38, buy it for leisure will be a biggest part of sales, usually, aged 30-40. Aged 25 years above, 80% of target audience have Bachelor degree or above. Personal annual income above $100,000 will be target group. In China, around 200,000 people personal annual income above $100,000(stats.gov.cn, 2011). In psychographic segmentation, customer divided into different groups on the basis of lifestyle or personality and values (Kotler P, 2000). According to the consulting business intelligence’s (SRIC-BI) value and lifestyles (VALS), the target audience trend to followed kinds of people: innovators who successful, sophisticated, with high self-esteem, also are very active consumers, purchases tastes for upscale product and service; Achievers who have goal-oriented lifestyles and a deep commitment career and family, image is important to achievers, they favor established, prestige product and services that demonstrate success to their peers; Strivers who are trendy and fun loving, favor stylish product, they are active consumers because shopping is both a social activity and an opportunity to demonstrate to peers their ability to buy(strategicbusinessinsights.com, 2011). In behavioral segmentation, the target group will be who trend to spending too much money on luxuries; who enjoys going to competition, like something exciting; who favor collection, a way to demonstrate success.

Product adaptation

“In creating an acceptable product offer for international market it is necessary to examine first what contributes to the ‘total’ product offer (Hollensen S, 2004).” In order to the product can be adapted for the Chinese market, it is necessary to examine what the product offer, which is called to the three levels of a product. First level, core product benefits which is include functional features, image, technology, and perceived value (Hollensen S, 2004). A product can also be adapted to function under Chinese political conditions. Development new technology and it’s for reducing motorcycle emissions in whole motorcycle industry. In Chinese market, Triumph still will keep have a distinctive three-cylinder layout, which makes them more powerful than the two-cylinder bikes, and more relaxing than the high revving four-cylinder bikes. In product image area, try to make customer feel comfortable, classical, fashion and luxurious. Motorcycles were also classified by types of use, generally separated into four groups: standard, which emphasized simplicity and cost; performance, which focused on racing and speed; touring, which focused on comfort and amenities for long-distance travel; and custom, which featured styling and individual owner customization (source: Case?.4 Triumph Motorcycles Ltd). Second level, generally we called product attributes, include brand name, quality, packaging, design, size and color variants, country of origin, price and staff behavior (Hollensen S, 2004). In Chinese market, the brand name better to change, because of different language system. For instance, in Taiwan market they change the brand name to Kaixuan which mean victory in Chinese. Chinese name will be better and easy for customer to pronounce, recognize and remember, so the company better to continue use Kaixuan in Chinese new market, also Triumph available too. In order to reduce the cost, product assembly in China, but supplier from around the world, keep product quality in the first level. The packaging, design, and color, which featured individual owner customization, depend on customer different demand, if customers willing to pay more for the convenience, appearance, dependability, and prestige of better packages, design, and color, the price of a product also will be difference and charge extra money; in a other hand, if customer do not want individual owner customization, the packaging, design, and color will be fixed and free, which already included in a product; in generally speaking, pricing strategy will follow Taiwan’s market. The size of Triumph’s motorcycles are in the middleweight and heavyweight category only, these two categories satisfy Chinese market demand. Third level, which include delivery, installation, guarantees, after-sales service and spare parts (Hollensen,S, 2004). Triumph will set up after-sales service in Chinese market, offer prompt and reliable after sale service, promise timely delivery, and guaranteed quality. Customer do not need to worried about repair, maintenance, and spare parts, all the service will be offered by Chinese after-sales service department.

Promotion Mix

a. Adverting objective

“The advertising objective must flow from prior decisions on target market, market positioning, marketing mix (Kotler P, 2000).” Triumph’s advertising objective: to increase among 200,000 people who personal annual income above $100,000 the number who identify brand Triumph as a good quality, performance and worth to buy – from 22 percent to 31percent in one year. Persuasive advertising will be the best choice for Triumph. Triumph attempts to persuade consumers that delivers special taste and status than other brands of motorcycle. Try to make an explicit comparison of the attributes of another brand, such as, compare with Harley-Davidson. In media mix area, Triumph attempts to use television, magazines, outdoor, brochures and internet. Television advertising combines sight, sound and motion, also appealing to the sense, and with high attention and reach (Kotler P, 2000). For a new band in Chinese market, the first step should let costumer recognize the brand, so need keep exposal. Triumph attempts to advertise at peak viewing time at the CCTV (is a biggest TV station in China), especially during economic news time. Magazines might be a good choice. It is with high geographic and demographic selectivity, credibility and prestige, high- quality reproduction, long life and good pass-along readership (Kotler P, 2000). There are several magazines on the list, such as, For Him Magazine, which is best choice for man to read; Hurui Magnate Magazine, it is popular in rich people; or Auto Magazine. There are several reasons for choice outdoor advertising, because of high repeat exposure, flexibility, low cost and low competition (Kotler P, 2000). The poster announces in extra- large print in the commercial center and shopping center of a city. Brochures is a convenient media, it is more flexibility, full control and can dramatize messages. Triumph attempt to production a brochures, which include company history, product information, big event, contact information so on, then send to different kind of place, such as, golf club, polo club, yacht club, luxurious hotel, owner retail store and auction house. The most popular approach is the internet advertising, which include high selectivity, interactive possibilities, and relatively low cost. For example, Triumph can use facebook build close relationship with customers, also advertising on facebook. “Is not only a motorcycle, but also a lifestyle; go your own way”, it is a main advertising massage and product value Triumph deliver to customer.

b. Sales promotions

For Triumph, sales promotion objectives include persuading retailers to carry new items, encouraging stocking of related item, building brand loyalty, encouraging support of a new product or model, and encouraging searching more potential customers (Kotler P, 2000). In order to achieve the objectives, there are many sales promotion tools can be use. For instance, free trials, which inviting purchasers to try the product without cost, after that they may will buy the product. Triumph encourage free test-drives to stimulate purchase interest. Moreover, use coupons, which saving on the purchase of a specific product. Such as, buy Triumph’s coat with its T-shirt by a 10% discount coupon. Specialty advertising, which consists of useful, low-cost items bearing the company’s name and address, give to prospects and customers. Such as, pens, calendars. Join trade shows and conventions, which display to demonstrate Triumph’s product. Usually, trade show attracted thousand and thousand people attendance.

c. Personal selling

Personal selling is person-to person communication between a company and a buyer. The seller’s communication effort is focused on persuading, marking a sale and building a relationship with buyer (Keegan W. & Green M. 2008). Every Triumph seller must be well trained, providing training in a specific trade with aim of gaining employment. Every Triumph retail store hired 10-15 sellers. Triumph’s seller will use two main methods to desire customer purchase behavior. First one is AIDA method- get attention?interest?desire?action (Kotler P, 2000), seller mouth to mouth introduce brand or product story to customers. Second one is FABV method-features?advantages?benefits and value (Kotler P, 2000), seller focus on describe product’s physical characteristics, and what the advantage. In order to better satisfy the clients, in Triumph, one seller completely follow one order, include guide after-sales service.

d. Other promotional methods

Catalog marketing: Triumph send full-line merchandise catalogs, specialty consumer catalogs, and business catalogs, usually in print form but also sometimes as CDs, videos, or on-line to customer (Kotler P, 2000). Make customer good to know Triumph and their product and service.

Telemarketing: Triumph use telephone to attract new customer, to take order. Telemarketing will increase company’s income, reduce cost, improve customer satisfaction, and offer customer service and technical support.

Distribution: from origin to destination

a. Port selection

In order to reduce the cost, Triumph plan to joint venture one Chinese motorcycle company, so most product assembly in China, some new and special case assembly in UK, and supplier from around the world. For example, a batch of products from British port deliver to Shanghai port by ocean carry, then distribute to Shanghai’s retail store. Beijing close with Tianjin port, Hongkong close with Hongkong port, so transportation is very convenient of all three markets.

b. Mode selection

Transportation usually constitutes 10-15 percent of the retail costs of imported goods (Hollensen S, 2004). There are four main modes of transport: rail, air, ocean and road.

According to above comparison, Triumph will choice ocean carrier to be main vehicle; special use for international business to business mode; for national B to B, or B to C mode use motor carrier will be economical. If customer have extra requirement, air carriers also will be available, but need pay extra deliver fee.

c. Packing

A packing that catches the eye will help us push the sales. Triumph attempt to use wooden case to package motorcycle, use existing label make it to be an elaborately designed graphic that is part of the package. This label might describe the product: who produce this product, where it was made, and what kind of product it is (Kotler P, 2000). Finally, the label might promote the Triumph through its attractive graphics. Triumph will use container to deliver product, the label may be attached on the container, the label will identifies the product or brand, also will increase ratio of brand exposure.

d. Document required

Triumph require following four most common export documents: transportation documents, banking documents, commercial documents and government documents. Transportation document include bill of lading, dock receipt and insurance certificate (Hollensen S, 2004). More specific, now Triumph had a batch of product should transport from UK to Shanghai by ocean carrier. Ocean carrier will issue of dock receipt to Triumph to prove carrier received the product and start take responsibility of these products. Then will received bill of lading, may be used as an instrument of ownership. “Banking documents letter of credit is a financial document issued by a bank at the request of the Chinese Triumph, guaranteeing payment to the UK Triumph if certain term and a transaction are met” (Hollensen S, 2004). Commercial invoice is the bill for the products from the exporter to buyer, also as a basis of taxation to British government. Government documents included export declaration, consular invoice and certificate of origin (Hollensen S, 2004). If British Triumph want to export their product to China, they have to complete fill the export declaration, include transportation information; also need consular invoice from Chinese consul that is used to control goods shipped there; certificate of origin is a document that is make Chinese buyer to know the origin of motorcycle.

e. Insurance

On the other hand, Triumph need to buy insurance certificate, that is provided to cover loss and damage to the product during the transport process.

f. Freight forwarder

Hiring a freight forwarder for Triumph Motorcycles transportation, will have distinct advantages and disadvantages. Analysis of pros and cons of hiring a freight forwarder, there are several advantages to hiring a freight forwarder with the goal to concentrated on all effort to developing core business; also can reduce investment fee, and decrease the risk; Triumph will reduce the cost, save the expenditure, and decrease inventory; improve level of transportation service, be more professional, the enterprise image is greatly improved; finally, take advantage of an in-place network complete with resources and experience. Unfortunately, freight forwarder might cause Triumph reduce the firm’s control in the supply chain; may bring risk of consumer relationship management; and might cause leakage of business secrets (etest8.com, 2011).

g. Channels of distribution

Triumph attempt to select a two-level channel to enter Chinese market. A two-level channel contains two selling intermediaries, such as a wholesaler and a retailer. There are two types of retailers satisfy Triumph motorcycle: department store and franchise organization. Department store operation several product lines, each line operated as a separate department, such as Shanghai Isetan which is located commercial center, only sell luxury goods. Business format franchising is mutually beneficial to both franchiser and franchisee. The franchisees familiarity with Chinese current surrounding, and they will bring the huge purchasing power of the franchisor (Kotler P, 2000). Chinese Triumph attempt to develop a brick-and-click model we called E-business. Customer available to make order through on-line, but need choice a specific retailer before you buy, then you order will send to this retailer. In first year, Triumph plans to open 6 shops in China, one department store and one franchised in Shanghai, and the same strategy in Beijing and Hongkong. Retail will markup for product of in each type of retail. For instance, suppose a Triumph motorcycle has the following costs and sales expectation: variable cost per unit is $1,000; fixed cost is $1, 000, 000; expected unit sales about 200. The manufacture’s unit cost is given by $6,000; the manufacturer’s markup price {markup price= unit cost / (1-desired return on sales 25%)} is given by $8,000. Triumph would charge Chinese retail $8,000 per motorcycle and make a profit of $2,000 per unit (Kotler P, 2000).

h. Wholesale middlemen

There are major wholesaler types: merchant wholesalers, full-service wholesalers, limited-service wholesalers, brokers and agents, manufacturers’ and retailers’ branches and offices, and miscellaneous wholesalers (Kotler P, 2000). According to Triumph’s situation, better to choice full-service wholesaler who only carry one merchandise line; also carry stock, maintain a sales force, offer credit, make deliveries, and provide management assistance to Triumph’s retail (Kotler P, 2000). Wholesalers usually mark-up the cost of the goods by conventional percentage, say 20 percent, to cover their expenses. Expenses may take 17 percent of the gross margin, leaving a profit margin of 3 percent (Kotler P, 2000).

i. Import and export agent

“Main function is to facilitate buying and selling, for which they earn a commission of 2 to 6 percent of the selling price (Kotler P, 2000).” Triumph hire a Chinese import agent who negotiates exchange transaction between British Triumph to Chinese wholesalers, but does not take power to the goods being purchased or sold. In China, current most import agent will charge 10 to 20 percent guarantee deposit, then import agent open a letter of credit to export part, that kind of work was import and export agent do.

j. Warehousing

Triumph in order to reduce warehousing costs, build a distribution and automated warehouses. This warehouses not only with advanced materials-handling system under the control of central computer, but also will as soon as possible to move out receiving goods (Kotler P, 2000). These warehouses will reduce worker injuries, labor costs, pilferage, and breakage and improved inventory control; benefit for consumer too, such as deliver on time. The warehouse will locate suburb of Shanghai, Because Shanghai between Beijing and Hongkong, also near the port.

Price determination

Triumph motorcycles shipped from Britain to China

In this example, Triumph motorcycles shipped from Britain to China. A shipment of product that costs ex-works $12,000 in Britain, and total retail price approximately $25,000 in China. First, there is the total shipping charge of $5,485, which is 46% of the ex-works price. A currency adjustment factor is to protect the seller from disadvantageous shifts in the Dollar to RMB exchange rate. Finally, a dealer markup of 25 percent adds up to $4,952 of the British price. Total retail price in China of $24,763, is a 206 percent of the British price (Keegan W. & Green M. 2008).

Term of sale

Ex-work means that the price quoted by the British Triumph applies at a certain point, and the buyer bears all risks and expenses from that point on. This term affords Chinese buyer maximum control over the cost of transporting the goods (Keegan W. & Green M. 2008). With free on board (FOB) named port, the British Triumph will take the responsibility until the goods have cleared the ship’s rail, then the Chinese buyer take all responsibility of the goods the moment they pass over the ship’s rail. The price quote includes all charge up to the point when goods have been loaded (Hollensen S, 2004). Free alongside ship (FAS) named port is for a transaction in which seller places the shipment alongside, the goods will be transported out of the Britain by ocean vessel. The seller pays all charges up to the point; the buyer has to pay for loading the goods on the shipment. When goods are shipped cost, insurance, freight (CIF) named port, the risk of loss or damage to goods is transferred to the buyer once the goods have passed the ship’s rail. However, the British Triumph has to pay the expense of transportation, must also provide the necessary insurance (Keegan W. & Green M. 2008).

Methods of payment

The most common payment methods are including: cash in advance, letter of credit, documents against payment and acceptance, open account, and consignment. The favorable term to the exporter is cash advance because it with low risk and financial risk, also allows for immediate use of the money. However, this method of payment unfair for importer, if they pay the money and the goods may not received. So such methods are not available for Triumph. Worldwide letters of credit are very popularly and very important. “Banking documents letter of credit is a financial document issued by a bank at the request of the Chinese Triumph, guaranteeing payment to the UK Triumph if certain term and a transaction are met” (Hollensen S, 2004). Open account is quite simplicity to Chinese buyer, they does not have to pay credit charge to banks. The Chinese buyer can pick up the goods without payment first. A disadvantage of the method is that there are no safeguards for payment. Consequently, for the first cooperation using letter of credit benefit for both side. However, if later British Triumph feel Chinese buyers are very trustworthy and excellent credit rating, there is another option for payment which is consignment (Hollensen S, 2004).

Conclusion

The Chinese market is potential market for the company to entry. Triumph will find huge power of purchasing in China. Moreover, it has increasing demand of Chinese consumers for luxury products. Chinese attempt to improvement of life quality and the change of consumption view. On the other side, the brand is new and young for Chinese market, it means low brand awareness; also strong competition its threats. Fortunately, Triumph motorcycle before enter Chinese market, they prepared a detailed marketing plan. Triumph already entry Chinese market.

Reference:

Triumphmotorcycles.co.uk, (2011) http://www.triumphmotorcycles.co.uk/the-triumph-company [Viewed 25 Feb. 2011]

www.baidu.com (2009) the rate of gender proportion, http://tieba.baidu.com/f?kz=563315305 [Viewed 25 Feb. 2011]

www.baidu.com (2009) the rank of GNP all over the world, http://zhidao.baidu.com/question/117304651 [Viewed 25 Feb. 2011]

stats.gov.cn, (2011)http://www.stats.gov.cn/tjsj/qtsj/ [Viewed 26 Feb.2011]

Kotler P. (2000), Marketing management, New Jersey:Prentice Hall.

strategicbusinessinsights.com http://www.strategicbusinessinsights.com/vals/ustypes.shtml [Viewed 26 Feb. 2011]

Hollensen S. (2004) Global Marketing: a decision- oriented approach. Essex: Prentice Hall.

Triumphmotorcycles.co.uk, (2011) http://www.triumphmotorcycles.co.uk/triumph-world [Viewed 28 Feb. 2011]

Etest8.com (2011) http://www.etest8.com/html/180110.htm [Viewed 28 Feb. 2011]

Keegan W. & Green M. (2008) Global Marketing, United States of America: Pearson Prentice Hall.

Harley-davidson.com, (2011) http://investor.harley-davidson.com/annual.cfm [Viewed 1 Mar. 2011]

Triumphtaiwan.com, (2011) http://www.triumphtaiwan.com/2010-moto/price.html [Viewed 1 Mar. 2011]

Zeji Z, (2008) Motorcycle industry urged to upgrade.http://en.ce.cn/Insight/200801/02/t20080102_14090054.shtml [Viewed 3 Mar. 2011]

CHAPTER 1: – INTRODUCTION

1.1 Introduction

Today, every enterprise looks forward to grow and expand in terms of size, profits, infrastructure, products, market share and customers. Co-ordination and integration among different units such as production, operational activities, finances and marketing are the main requisite in order to achieve overall corporate aim and objectives. It is very necessary for the organisation to be recognized for its products and services in the business and consumer market. Hence, marketing can be regarded as one of the important aspect in every organisation. Marketing can be defined as a process which involves identification, anticipation and satisfaction of customer needs in best possible and profitable way by the management (Smith and Taylor, 2004). However, it can be stated that it is very essential to communicate with the customer in order to acknowledge about company’s products and services. This can be achieved through integration of different channels such as advertisement, internet, exhibitions and direct marketing. These channels are termed as marketing communication tools. These different tools of marketing communication comprise different features, benefits and limitations. This research study will help in assessing the implication of integrated marketing communication tools in the Indian retail sector. Hence, it will help in evaluating different marketing communication tools available for the enterprise in order to influence the customer for the products and services available in the retail industry of India. This research study will provide a detailed explanation about the marketing communication process, models such as single, two step or linear; and tools such as internet, direct marketing and so on. It will help the reader to understand different characteristics, advantages and disadvantages of various communication tools available for the enterprise in order to correspond with changing consumer behaviour and market. This study will also describe about research methodology process and approach adopted by the researcher such as qualitative, quantitative or mixed for collection of data. Findings and analysis would be done by collecting data and information in retail sector, business and consumer market of India in order to draw a conclusion regarding implication of such concept and the most effective marketing communication model or set of different tools. This analysis will help the reader, retailer and researcher in understanding the best possible way of integrating different communication tools in the Indian consumer market.

1.2 Research Aim and Objectives: –

Research aim can be defined as a general statement which describes the reason for selecting a particular subject matter of the research (Collins, 2010). The main aim of this research study is to evaluate the implication of integrated marketing communication by the practitioners. According to Collins (2010), research objective can be defined as a definite statement related to the defined aim of the research. Hence, in order to achieve the above stated aim, certain objectives are formulated by the researcher which can be described as follow: –

To identify different marketing communication models and tools available to the enterprises.
To describe various features, benefits and limitations associated with every marketing communication tool.
To analyse the theoretical aspect on effective implication of integrated marketing communication.
To examine the retail sector, business and consumer market of India for the evaluation of implication of integrated marketing communication by the practitioners and to evaluate the most effective marketing communication model or set of different tools.
To recommend a justification about the different aspects that assist in choosing an appropriate set of marketing communication tools.

1.3 Significance of the Research

This research study would be beneficial for the reader in understanding the subject on marketing communication more rationally. It will describe the concept of implication of marketing communications in the real business environment, particularly in Indian retail sector. Use of required research methodology approaches and tools will help in collecting information and data for better analysis and study. Hence, this research study would be of valuable assistance to marketing department and overall management in the business to understand the significance and purpose of implying marketing communication tools in order to persuade a customer. It will help the reader, corporate management, marketing executives, and retailers in making a decision about the implication of marketing communication tools in the most effective way in the enterprise. This study will also recommend about the explanation about different aspects affecting in choosing the appropriate set of tools.

1.4 Structure of the Research

It is easier for the reader to understand a well designed and structured report study. A concise picture about the various contents of the research study is very necessary. For the above reason, the researcher has presented the following short outlook of each chapter in this research study. The above figure describes all the chapters categorized by the researcher in this research study to facilitate the conduct of this study in an improved manner.

CHAPTER 2: – LITERATURE REVIEW

2.1 Introduction

2.2 Marketing Communication

In the present business scenario, it is very essential for every enterprise to communicate with the customers, consumers or as a whole to the target market for the products and services provided by the company. Target market can be referred to the group of individuals to which an enterprise is intended to attract for its products and services. A set of four principles of marketing mix generally referred as four P’s – product, price, place and promotion is used to persuade the target market. Among these four elements, promotion includes set of various modes such as advertisement, direct marketing, internet and merchandising and so on. These modes of promotion assist the management in communicating to the customers regarding the products and services of the enterprise. The process of communicating with the customers in order to deliver message and receive feedback is termed as marketing communication (Koekemoer and Bird, 2004). It has become a very vital concept in the marketing field due to changes, growth and development in the business and consumer market.

2.3 Integrated Marketing Communication

Today, changes and development in political, social, economical and technological environment has lead to the emergence of new concept integrated marketing communication. According to Masterman and Wood (2006, p.14) “An integrated marketing communication can be defined as a programme which includes written, spoken and electronic interactions with stakeholder audiences.” This type of systematic planning through integrated communication facilitates the management in generating responsiveness, interest and participation in the enterprise, its activities, plans, personnel, products and services. It is very essential to integrate different marketing communication tools as it can be stated that today consumer is becoming more rational towards the products offered. Consumer market can be classified on the basis of different aspects such as class, religion, gender or locality. Communication through single database may create problems in delivering the accurate message to the customer (Smith and Zook, 2011). Hence, it can be stated that integration of different marketing communication tools has become very essential as every tool comprises its own benefits and limitations. Moreover, changes in consumer market and technological advancement has made it necessary for the enterprise to adopt integrated marketing communication tools in order to survive in such competitive business market.

2.4 Marketing Communication Process

Market communication process comprises marketer – who sends the message to the customer regarding products and services being offered by the company with the help of different tools such as advertisement, internet, promotions, direct marketing and so on. However, it can be stated that feedback is most important element for accurate and complete communication process as every individual has its own values, beliefs and perceptions. This communicating process can be illustrated with the help of the following figure: – Source: – Smith et. al. (1999, p. 27) From the above figure, it can be stated that appropriate analysis in terms of increase in sales and customer interest activities will help the marketer in analysing the effect of communication tool adopted by the company. 2.4 Marketing Communication Mix With the changes in the corporate sector, there is a tremendous growth and development in the marketing field in terms of communicating tools and techniques. Earlier, advertisement and promotions were considered as the only effective tools for communicating with the target market. Over the recent years, technological advancement and changes in consumer behaviour has led to the increased usage of other tools such as internet, e-marketing, exhibitions and so on. These tools are termed as marketing communication mix which can be well represented in the following figure: –

Source: – Smith and Taylor (2004)

Every element of above stated marketing communication mix comprises its own features, benefits and limitations. Decision regarding adoption of a tool or integration of communicating tools is affected by different aspects present within and outside of the enterprise.

2.5 Factors Affecting the Decision regarding Adoption of Marketing Communication Tool

There are different factors which affect the decision regarding adoption of marketing communication tools such as organisational structure, management policies, financial restraints, market research, competitors, technology requirements, changes and trends in the consumer behaviour and market. These aspects must be considered while deciding about the adoption of communication strategies by the enterprise.

2.6 Theoretical Aspect on Integrated Marketing Communications

There is a remarkable growth in the marketing communication sector due to the development of information technological and other communication sectors. There is a massive development and innovation in communication tools in the form of event marketing, text messaging and so on (Kitchen et. al., 2006). There are different theories regarding use of integrated marketing communication in practice by the companies. According to Eagle et. al. (2007) practical implication of integrated marketing communication concept is undertaken during specific needs and conditions. Companies generally rely on old rigid rules of advertisement and promotions in order to communicate with the customers. On the contrary, Schultz (1995) states that this particular useful concept of integrated marketing communication is being widely used by the companies on regular basis along with the concept of advertisement. According to McArthur and Griffin (1997), advertisement and public relations are two most important communicating tools in the corporate sectors. Yarbrough (1996) states that integrated marketing communication tools are regarded as an option for improving the sales of an enterprise. It is not considered as advancement in the promotional activities of the marketing mix. Use of combination of communicating tools increases the overall cost of the marketing operations. Therefore, companies generally do not prefer such concepts (McLaughlin, 1997). On the other hand, research by Schneider (1998) shows that agencies are developing themselves in integrated marketing communication practitioners and also trying to minimize the overall budgeted expenditure in using a set of communication tools. Hence, it can be stated that there are different theories by the researchers regarding implication of integrated marketing communication concept in the business world. This research study will help to examine the implication of such concept in Indian retail market.

2.7 Indian Retail Sector and Consumer Behaviour

Indian retail sector comprises both national and international retail giants such as Reliance fresh, Big Bazaar, Pantaloons, Shopper’s Stop, Subhiksha, Allen Solly, Bharti-Walmart and so on. With the increase in competition in the retail sector, it has become very necessary for the retailers to influence more and more customers and also to retain old consumers with them. In the present modern world, consumers are becoming more demanding in terms of quality of commodities. This attentiveness has made the Indian customers to search for more reliable sources for buying such as well structured retail chains that possess an appropriate commercial settings and where the responsibility is well-defined. Indian consumer varies in terms of psychological, economical, social and certain traditional factors. There is a momentous growth and development in the country due to increased rate of literacy and other changes in the economic, political and social environment. Today, people prefer those marketing communication tools which provide them complete knowledge and understanding about the products offered and their feedback is valued. Previously, only advertisement and promotions were considered as prominent communication tools. But now in the present modern scenario, with the overall development in technology and education rate, other communication tools such as internet, exhibitions, merchandising, and direct marketing, e-marketing possess more and more significance among the consumers. Hence, this research study will help the retailers and readers in taking decisions regarding adoption of appropriate marketing communication mix according to the changing consumer behaviour, technological development, competition and overall economic and social changes in the Indian retail market.

References

Collins, H. (2010). Creative research: The theory and practice of research for the creative industries. Switzerland: AVA Publishing. Collis, J. and Hussey, R. (2003). Business research: A practical guide for undergraduate and postgraduate students. 2nd Ed. Palgrave Macmillian. Cooper, D. R. and Schindler, P. S. (2006). Business research methods. 9th Ed. McGraw-Hill. Eagle, L., Kitchen, P. J. and Bulmer, S. (2007). ‘Insights into interpreting integrated marketing communications: A two-nation qualitative comparison’, European Journal of marketing. 41(7/8): 956-970. Koekemoer, L. and Bird, S. (2004). Marketing communications. South Africa: Juta and Company Limited. Kitchen, P. J., Pelsmacker, P. D., Eagle, L. and Schultz, D. E. (2006). A reader in marketing communications. Oxon: Routledge. Masterman, G. and Wood, E. H. (2006). Innovative marketing communications: Strategies for the events industry. Oxford: Butterworth-Heinemann. McArthur, D. N. and Griffin, T. (1997). ‘A market management view of integrated marketing communication’, Journal of advertisement research. 37(5): 19-26. McLaughlin, J. P. (1997). ‘Why is IMC taking so longBlame it on the clients’. Marketing news. 31(19): 27-30. Saunders, M., Lewis, P. and Thornhill, A. (2003). Research methods for business students. 4th Ed. England: Pearson. Schneider, L. (1998). ‘Agencies show that IMC can be good for bottom line’, Marketing news. 27(6): 12. Schultz, D. E. (1995). ‘Traditional advertising has role to play in IMC’, Marketing news. 29(18): 18. Smith P. R., Berry, C. and Pulford, A. (1999). Strategic marketing communications: New ways to build and integrated communications. 2nd Ed. London: Kogan. Smith, P. R. and Taylor, J. (2004). Marketing communications: An integrated approach. 4th Ed. London: Kogan. Smith, P. R. and Zook, Z. (2011). Marketing communications: An integrated approach. 5th Ed. London: Kogan. Yarbrough, J. F. (1996). ‘Putting the pieces together’. Sales and marketing management. 148(9): 68. Dissertation on

Background

We will be discussing on the various techniques involved in the marketing plan for an organization in order to make reach the product to the customers. The report given here summarizes the various activities involved in marketing the end product named “CE 13” of Citroen which is an eco-friendly as well as helps in maintaining our greener environment.

1. Executive Summary

Citroen was founded in 1919 by Andre-Gustave, which was the first car company to mass produce outside the United States of America. Almost within eight years after it had started, it became one of the largest car manufacturers in Europe.

Citroen is all set to launch its hybrid plug-in car named “CE 13” in the UK market. As hybrid cars are already available in the UK market the competition is also the toughest. The strengths in the proposal of CE 13 is its small, economic and fuel-efficiency. CE 13 will be a challenge to the current version of both gasoline and the electric one now available in the market. Their target is specifically based on a specific proportion of consumers who needs a vehicle for commuting in their daily life. As it is compact in size it is very easy to commute between the congested traffics so helps in evading the congestion charge in the UK.

The marketing objective of CE 13 is limited to 10 to 15 percent in the UK with the unit sales of about 10000-12000 units in the next two years. Financial objective of CE 13 at the time of introduction is to achieve the sales of GBP 20 to 30 million.

2. Situation Analysis

Citroen which was established in 1919 is all set to manufacture the plug in hybrid car for the UK market which is a developed nation has a good economical growth rate. Though during recession it had seen number of problems the country has still maintained their economy stable compared to other nations. Citroen has considered the fact of the increase in fuel prices and has come up with the solution to meet this with their plan of CE 13 which will help its consumers overcome their problem of fuel prices.

As soon as CE 13 hits the market, the consumers will be overwhelmed to buy the plug in hybrid as it has an enhanced product portfolio and covers the overall worries of the car customers in terms of money as well as the performance.

GDP of UK was 0.5 percent in the latest quarter which was revised from a fall of 0.6 percent published earlier. GDP estimated during 2010 fourth quarter is now 1.5 percent higher than the fourth quarter of 2009 (National Statistics, 2011).

Also the output in the latest quarter was up 0.8 percent for the manufacturing industries. Manufacturing output has increases 1.1 percent and 4.3 percent of increase was seen in utilities output and the mining and quarrying output has fell by 4.1 percent.

2.1 Market Summary

CE 13 market comprises of customers who prefer to use sustainable energy to compensate the spending on petrol or diesel. The major segment being targeted during the initial period includes the professionals and senior citizens, who have annual personal disposable income above GBP 7000. Table 1 shows how CE 13 addresses the needs of targeted customers.

TARGETED SEGMENTCUSTOMER NEED RESPECTIVE FEATURE
ProfessionalsTo acquire modern technology at reasonable price; reasonable mileage.A smooth drive for 45 miles per charge and an automatic change to fuel after 45.
Senior citizenHave a safe mode of transport in traffic; savings in fuel expenditure.Compact structure providing ease in traffic with dual air bags

Table 1: Segmented customers (Jeroldin, 2011)

CE 13 will be available in one basic model with carbon dioxide emission below 40 g/km. The CE 13 operates entirely as an electric car for its first 25 miles, drawing energy from a 450-pound lithium ion battery and then uses the gasoline for the 1.6 liter engine that provides another 360 added miles. Thus the design of the car along with its price and technology will strengthen its presence in the UK PHEV market.

2.2 SWOT Analysis

Strengths

Advanced technology from C- zero, C3 picasso, Berlingo multispace are used in building this plug in hybrid electric vehicle.
CE 13 has better fuel effiency of about of 45 miles for a single charge and covers and average range of 15 miles per liter of petrol. So this adds the strength to the CE 13 as usual vehicles have a mileage of below 13 per liter of petrol.
Towards the initiative to a greener environment the CE 13 holds the key as it emits less than 40g/km which is helps our environment for its sustainability.

Weakness

Consumers are not much aware of the Plug in hybrid technology as because there are less fuel station for charging the electrically and people has less idea of these high end technological factors in mind.
As newer technology is used in the development of CE 13 the price band is as well on the higher and only the customer who have wages above GBP 2000 are able to buy the vehicle and also to be on the safer side we are providing finance option for the vehicle by having tie with the HSBC bank which will lower the tensions between the customers who are less affordable to buy which again acts as a strength for us.
Considering maintenance of CE 13, as it is a hybrid plug-in the maintenance is slightly higher than the usual ones.

Opportunities

As towards the step to sustainable and greener environment, UK government supports in the development of CE 13 as it is eco friendly as well as fuel efficient in compared to other vehicles on road. Due to step to greener environment, government had decided to lessen the tax and import duties of batteries being waived.

Threats

One of the major threat being faced by CE 13 is the extending of the product life cycle. As this is a newer step in the technology and offers only one single model in the market extending the life cycle of CE13 is currently not possible as it is in the growth stage of the. Later after the maturity of the product the extension will be made within next two years on a average estimation.

2.3 Competition

There are considerable amounts of rivals seen in the plug-in hybrid industries and one of the major rivals is the Volvo and another major rival is the Toyota who plays a major role in the technological development in the UK market.

Toyota prius is currently the market leader in the UK market for the plug-in hybrid version of the vehicle. So the competition is tougher and our new technology used in the development of the same is higher than usual which will support in the battle of survival in the UK market with Toyota prius.

Another rival is the BMW which is planning to introduce their plug-in hybrid car in the UK market with by launching their “i-series”. Another major rival is the Honda with their newer version of plug-in hybrid technology as they have introduced in the Japan. Though there are different rivals in the market with higher competition, we believe to withstand all the rivals in the market with our leading edge technology we have used in the development of our CE 13.

2.4 Product Offer

CE 13 is going to be introduced in a single variant as it is a newer version, currently only single variant is available and has the following features included in it:

Rechargeable lithium ion battery that can be charged connecting to an ordinary 240V socket. The battery comes along with a one year replacement warranty.
Extended cable alongside the electric inverter.
1.6 liter petrol engine
Air condition
Heater
DVD player
Central locking
Power steering
Anti theft alarm
Dual air-bags.

These are the basic features included in CE 13 and with the gradual maturity of the product we have decided to enhance the features further based on the development of CE 13 later after two years based on the customer requirements.

2.5 Distribution

Citroen cars are normally made available to the customers through the following retail channels such as:

Citroen motors showrooms.
Dealership with private showrooms.
Events such as Auto expo conducted in the various parts UK.
Through online booking.

3. Marketing Strategy

3.1 Objectives:

Citroen has currently set a realistic and achievable objective for the first and second years of the market entry.

First-year objectives: Citroen is aiming for 10-15 percent share in UK market through the establishment of CE 13 with a unit sales volume of Indian PHEV market through a unit sales volume of 10,000 to 12,000 by summer 2012.

Second-year objectives: Second year objective is set to introduce new variants with added features during the fiscal year of 2013 with a diesel variant plug-in.

Contingency Planning: In unforeseen situation of the product not satisfying the objectives, Citroen will postpone the launch of the succeeding model till the break-even is attained. The target market share will remain the same and new marketing process may be acquired (Jeroldin, 2011).

3.2 Target markets

Citroen’s targeted customers are segmented demographically and geographically. Our primary customer target for the CE 13 is upper working professionals who need to commute on daily basis, who opt to charge than fill fuel, and be entertained on the go. Our secondary customer target is senior citizens who want a simple car with savings in fuel spending. The segmented audience is between the age of 25-65 and having a personal disposable income more than GBP 7000 (Jeroldin, 2011).

3.3 Positioning

Using product differentiation and comparing with other brands of the PHEV segment, we position Electra as a high quality car with comparatively low price in the Indian market. Our marketing will highlight on the affordable price, trusted brand, and environmental friendly with the quantity of carbon dioxide emission differentiating the Citroen CE 13.

3.4 Strategies:

Product

The CE 13 comprises of all the normal features available in the normal market earlier during the introduction of the vehicle. Later it will include custom developed features based on the customer requirements which include spare parts warranty of one year and also offer the onsite road assistance support made available 24/7 to the customers. CE 13 will inherit the normal logo with an added eco-friendly logo to its normal logo.

Pricing

Citroen has planned to price the vehicle at GBP 33,000 for the single variant which will be made available to the customers including all the necessary taxation. The price of the product is developed using the market-penetration pricing concept to acquire higher long-run profits for the company (Kohtler, 2009). We expect to lower the price of this model when we upgrade the product by launching our new model later during 2012, to be priced around GBP 42, 000.The low-priced high quality cultural requirement of the customers is fulfilled to gain shares of the plug-in hybrid electric vehicle market in the UK.

Distribution

Around 70 per cent of the manufactured cars will reach its destined owners through various Citroen motor showrooms in various parts of UK, and the remaining production via private agents and showrooms. Detailed specification handouts will be provided to support our distribution partners. The company also plans to consider special payment terms for agents that place consistent orders.

Marketing Communication

Though the plug-in hybrid electric vehicle technology is relevantly is old in the UK market, creating awareness in the public will be the initial step in the promotion of the product. The primary action is to successfully launch the CE 13 in the upcoming Auto Expo to be conducted in UK later this year. A combination of “Above the line” (ATL) and “Below the line” (BTL) activities will be used in Electra’s marketing process. ATL will include the print media, mostly magazines like the Overdrive, television adverts and the internet. The latter will use automobile fairs organized in various parts of the country to pull customers and also movie theaters, which is often visited by professionals (Jeroldin, 2011).

3.5 Marketing Time Line

The CE 13 will be introduced in during June as the testing of the car is current being taking place. Here are the summarized lists of action programmes we will implement to achieve our stated objectives.

May: We will launch a GBP 0.3 million trade sales marketing campaign and take part in various Auto Expo or Fairs to support and educate dealers. This will also function as foundation by developing support for product launch in June. Key production staff with the help of marketing team will work with retail sales personnel to explain the features of the CE 13.

June: Citroen will be starting the detailed print campaign via auto magazines and also adverts in the Internet and television. The sales team will play a critical role in explaining the car to the interested customers.

July: As the multimedia promotions continue, we will organize contest in which users will post to the organization’s blog as ‘which is the best methodology to spend least on gasoline‘(an average of 40 miles/day covered)’. This private user sales promotion will act as direct feedback from the customers.

August: Citroen will organize a ‘Green home’ rally to spread awareness about the main feature of Hybrid technology and its effect on the environment.

3.6 Market Research

‘Using the research, we will identify specific features and benefits of our target market segments value’ (Kohtler, 2009). The feedback obtained from the customers through blogs, vehicle rating and review by ‘Autocar’ will set up the perfect CE 13. We are also tracking and analyzing customer’s thinking over competing brands in the PHEV market (Jeroldin, 2011).

4. Financial matters

Total first-year sales revenue for the Citroen CE 13 is projected at GBP $20 million, with an average whole sale price of GBP 32000 per unit and variable cost of GBP 21000 per unit for unit sales volume of 4000 in the first year. A first year loss of GBP 12 million is anticipated. The break-even calculations indicate that CE 13 will attain profit after the sales of 4773 units, mid way in the product’s second year. The analysis also estimates first-year fixed costs of GBP 52.5 million. Based on the assumptions, break-even calculation is

GBP $52,500,000/ ($32000-$21000) = 4773 units

5. Controls

The control of the marketing procedure of CE 13 will help the management to measure performance and provide an opportunity to improve in the required segments. ‘Controls are being established to cover implementation and the organization of our marketing activities’ (Kohtler et al 2009).

5.1 Implementation

We have implemented the Annual-plan control in our marketing activities (Kotler et al 2009). The senior management will set quarterly goals to monitor the performance of CE 13 in the UK market and later in the European market. The management will then trace the deviation, if any, and take required action to make the performance co-inside with the goals (Jeroldin, 2011).

5.2 Marketing Organization

The marketing director of Citroen takes the overall responsibility to get all the marketing activities done in the respective allocated time. The new product manager/marketing manager is utilized to identify the opportunities of CE 13 UK market and anticipate the customer needs. They should have strong knowledge of advertising and merchandizing agencies to promote via campaigns and programs. It’s the honored responsibility of Citroen to satisfy the needs of the customer through CE 13.

Conclusion

Thus, the marketing plan for CE 13 of Citroen is achieved based on the various techniques given in order make reach the final product to the customers. The marketing planning helps in increasing the sales, growth and monitors these reports in order to successfully maintain the development of the Citroen in the Hybrid plug-in market. Following a structured marketing plan helps in the development of the organization and positions the market perfectly according to the needs of the customers.

References

Kohtler, P., Keller, K.L., Bradley, M., Goodman, M., Hansen, T. (2009) Marketing Management. England: Pearson Education Limited.

Alphone Seon Jeroldin (2011) ‘Marketing Planning’. Marketing in a Global Age 1 1-9

Citroen (2011) the list of reference illustrated [online] available from [17 April 2011].

National stastistics (2011) the list of reference illustrated [online] available from [17 April 2011].

business-standard (2011) the list of reference illustrated [online] available from [17 April 2011].

hybridcars (2011) the list of reference illustrated [online] available from [17 April 2011].

emic-bg (2011) the list of reference illustrated [online] available from [17 April 2011].

Introduction

All marketing is built on STP – Segmentation, Targeting and Positioning (Kotler &
Keller, p.310). In the chapter of fundamental marketing concepts, trends, and tasks it
says: “A marketer can rarely satisfy everyone in a market. Not everyone likes the same
cereal, hotel room, restaurant, automobile, collage or movie. Therefore, marketers start
by dividing up the market into segments” (Kotler & Keller, 2005, p.24).

Segmentation is often the key to developing a sustainable competitive advantage based
on differentiation, low cost, or a focus strategy (Aaker, 1995, p.49). It is difficult to
identify segments, but typically you consider five, ten or more segmentation variables.
These variables needs to be evaluated on the basis of their ability to identify segments
for which different strategies are (or should be) pursued (Aaker, 1995, p.51).
Once the segments are defined, it is possible for the marketers to evaluate what segments
presents the greatest opportunity for business and make an offer to target this specific
segment. The useful segment variables for this are :

(1) Parameters unrelated to the product (demographic, gender etc)

(2) Parameters related to the product

(3) Competitor segmentation

(4) Benefit segmentation

(5) Price Sensitivity

(6) Loyalty

(7)Application segmentation (Aker, 1995, p.52-54).

No company can win if its products and offerings resemble every other product and
offering. Companies must pursue relevant positioning and differentiation. In the line of
making these strategies, each company must represent a distinctive big idea in the mind
of the target market. Positioning is the act of designing the company’s offering and
image to occupy a distinctive place in the mind of the target market (Kotler & Keller,
2005, p.310).

This way of positioning works for static businesses like the shampoo and the washing
powder businesses for example. Products in a more dynamic environment like PC’s and
semiconductors, where things change often, fast and dramatically, need another way of
thinking which is described below:

”Standard approaches to positioning do not necessarily work. A company that is #1
today has no guarantee that it will be #1 tomorrow. New technologies can turn a
seemingly solid position into a fragile one almost overnight. No amount of
advertising can prevent that from happening. Even with the best of slogans, a
company can lose its position in the market.” McKenna (1985, p.15)

Positioning is not something that you do with the product, positioning is what you do to
the mind of the prospect. That is, you position the product in the mind of the prospects.
This is described in the book Positioning (Ries & Trout, 2006), who claims that the
market place today is an overcommunicated society where there is too much of
information communicating its offer (Ries & Trout, 2006, p.6). This is the reason of why
we need positioning. We need positioning to be successful in communicating our
message on the market place in the overcommunicated society.

Positioning is a concept that has changed the nature of advertising, a concept so simple,
people have difficulty understanding how powerful it is (Ries & Trout, 2006, p.2).
According to Trout the history within the advertisement on the market place, which now
is overcommunicated, have been in three different eras (Ries & Trout, 2006, p.22-24):

• Product era; where Unique Selling Points were communicated, but was destroyed

by Me-too companies.

• Image era; where successful companies found image more important than

product features. This era was also destroyed by the Me-too companies.

• Positioning era; to succeed in our overcommunicated society, a company mustcreate a position in the prospect’s mind. In this era, strategy is king and there isnot necessary to invent and be first with the product, but you need to be first in the mind of your customer.
In our overcommunicated society, the paradox is that nothing is more important than
communication. With communication going for you, anything is possible. Without it,
nothing is possible. No matter how talented and ambitious you may be (Ries & Trout,
2006, p.19). Positioning is about communication. Positioning is to say the right things to
the right person at the right time, NASA call this a window in space. In other words,
positioning is an organized system for finding windows in the mind. It is based on the
concept that communication can only take place at the right time under the right
circumstances. With this in mind, it is also important to keep the position statement
oversimplified, to be able to reach the mind of the prospects (Ries & Trout, 2006, p.7)

According to Ries & Trout, there are two possible ways to get into the mind of a person,

the easy one and the hard one. The easy one is to be first, the hard one is to be second or

ater. Most of the people know the name of the first man on the moon, a lot fewer know
the name of the second. But even if you are second, there are strategies for this kind of
situation. These situations are described as repositioning by Ries & Trout (2006, p.63).
Once you are in the mind of the person, the positioning requires consistency. It should be kept year after year. It is very common that companies forget what made them
successful, and change the positioning communication. This is normally wrong strategy
according to Trout, and refers to when Avis changed their successful slogan: “Avis is
only No. 2 in rent-a-cars, so why go with usWe try harder.” to the less successful;
“Avis is going to be No. 1”.

The explanation behind this logic is that to be successful you need to touch base with
reality. And the only reality that counts is what’s already in the prospect’s mind (Ries &
Trout, 2006, p.5). In this case, Avis was not destined to be No.1, unless it could find a
weakness in Hertz to explore.

To develop an offer, you need to know your strategies of what you are going to sell to
whom. If you are working according to the suggestions in Michael Porter’s book
Competitive Strategies (Porter, 1998, p.35), where he claims that you need to choose
between (1) Product differentiation, (2) Low price or (3) Niches to be successful, then
you need to form a clear offer for that specific segment. You can only have success by
being the best in one segment, if you try to combine you will most likely have trouble
with resources and risk that another company wins this area. When you know the
segment, you need to decide about your specific positioning. Kotler recommend the
company to evaluate between 7 specific sources of positioning (Kotler, 1999, p.78):
(1) Attribute positioning

(2) Advantage positioning

(3) Application positioning

(4)User positioning

(5) Competitive positioning

(6) Category positioning

(7)Quality/price positioning. Further on Kotler (1999) writes that companies must not do the following mistakes:

Under positioning: Fail to offer a strong benefit or reason to buy the product
Over positioning: To create a position that is too tight, which results in that you miss customers.
Confusing positioning: To offer two or more benefits that interfere with each
Other irrelevant positioning: To offer benefits to customers that doesn’t matter forthem.

Doubtful positioning: To claim a benefit that customers will doubt the company to achieve.
In the book “Crossing the chasm” by Geoffrey Moore, he claims that the positioning is
the single largest influence on the buying decision. Not only for the final decision, but
also for how to evaluate alternatives leading up to the final choice (Moore, 2001, p.144).

Geoffrey Moore describes the positioning process in four components (Moore, 2001,

p.147):

The claim: The fundamental position statement
The evidence: Develop sufficient evidence for the statement
Communications: Address the right audience in the right sequence with the right message
Feedback and adjustments: Competitors can be expected to respond to the

statement trying to poke holes in the effort, this might require a patch up.

There are different tools to use when evaluating the status of the position. Some of them
can be found in the handbook of Andberg & Eliasson (2005, p.47-54) where they are
mentioned: 1) Marketing positioning diagram 2) Marketing roles 3) Marketing stairs 4)
Profile diagram. Sjostrom, R. (1996, p26) have made a deep analysis of positioning and found out that there are four different groups of how to see positioning:Product-, Competition-,
Relation-, and Phase oriented Positioning.

Marketing Mix, Four P’s

The Marketing Mix model also commonly known as the 4P’s Kotler (2005, p.19),
describes the marketing tools and variables used by a company to pursue its marketing
objectives.

In other words, the Marketing Mix approach to marketing is a model used to assist in
implementing marketing strategies. The Marketing Mix principles are based on ontrollable variables which can be used by companies to meet the changing needs of the
target group. Typical controllable variables are product variety, quality, list price
advertising and channels. The function on the model is useful helping companies to
develop an optimal package (mix) of variables that will not only satisfy the needs of
their customers within the target markets, but also simultaneously maximize the
performance and profit of the company. Pricing is an important but difficult issue in this
model, important because it is the only mix that generate a turnover for the company, all
other P’s in the model are connected to costs, and “Pricing is difficult because the
various products have demand and cost interrelationship and are subject to different
degrees of competition” Kotler (2005, p.387).

Figure – The 4P’s Components of the Marketing Mix (Kotler 2005, p.19)

The Marketing Mix model is described in figure 3, describing the mix of Product, Price,Promotion and Place. Working with the model, also means working with sub-mixes ofeach different P. For example, the Promotion variable can be further decomposed into apromotional mix consisting of variables like; sales promotion, advertising, sales force,public relations and direct marketing. Within the promotional mix, advertising can befurther broken down into an advertising media mix that specifies how much emphasis isplaced on television ads, radio ads, newspaper ads, internet ads, magazine ads, etc.

I would like to reflect on some variables within each group of the model that I find

interesting when analyzing a Marketing Mix of a company.

1 Product

The mix of products in each company is defined in one or more product lines, and each
line has its own length depending on the companies strategy and competition. The
lengths (amount of products) can be stretched to cover wider area of products or it can be
filled (features of product within the range), both activities strive to find new customers
and increase the sales and market share. The product line is also an interesting object for
analyzing, to find out which product line to grow, maintain, harvest or divest. The
quality is a variable to benefit from when communicating the message of the
product/brand, but also when dealing with warranties, services and returns, while
services and returns cost money.

2 Price

Pricing is as mentioned above, a complex issue. There are both internal and external
parameters to consider, with internal I mean manufacturing and marketing costs that
need to be covered and with external I mean that you should consider the need of the
market, the competition etc. I have read about 6 different situations only involving
different product-mix pricing Kotler (2005, p.387). Pricing is also about credits,
discounts, interests and leasing. It is all about to find out the most beneficial method for
the company and in the same time give the customer maximum satisfaction according to
his expectations.

3 Promotion

Promotion is a group that handles variables likeadvert i si ng and sales promotion. These
two variables I mentioned affect each other in a positive way. According to a study
described (Kotler, 2005, p.387), a price promotion resulted in a 15% increase in sales
volume, combined with feature promotion the product sales increased 19 %. Most affect
was when also POP (Point-of-Purchase) was added to the campaign, like
demonstrations. The tools to use are many and some will work better than others
depending on the product and market. The main different areas when talking about

omotion tools are; Consumer-, Trade- and Business and Sales Force Promotion Tools

(Kotler, 2005, p.588-599).

4 Place

I find the variableschannel andlocation in the group “Place” to be important variables
to have control of. The channels are about moving goods from producer to consumer.
Location is about where to find and get the product, not only physical but also places like
web pages on the Internet. When discussing channels, functions and flow (Kotler, 2005,
p.473) are easy to understand for me. Functions like physical or promotion creates a
forward flow, from company to customer, and functions like ordering and payment
create a backward flow. I find it more complex to understand, control and implement the
Vertical marketing System Kotler (2005, p.486), Horizontal Marketing System (Kotler,
2005, p.488) or the most common of them, the Multi channel Marketing System (Kotler,
2005, p.488) into the strategies of a company. But this is the strength of this model I
think, because if you can control all the independent variables in this model, you will
most likely have good success in the sales volume.

Reference

Aaker, D. (1995), Strategic Marketing Management, John Wiley, New York, NY

Adndberg, L. & Eliasson, B. (2005),Marknadspl anen, Liber, Malmo.

Holme, I.M., & Solvang B.K (1997), Forskningsmetodik: om kvalitativa och kvantitativa

studier. Lund: Studentlitteratur. Oversattning: Bjorn Nilsson.

Kotler, P. (1999), Kotlers marknadsforing, Liber, Malmo.

Kotler, P. & Keller K. L. (2005), Marketing Management, 12th edition, Pearson Prentice

Hall.

McKenna, R. (1985), The Regis Touch, new market strategies for uncertain times,

Addison-Wesley Publ. Company Inc., California.

Moore, Geoffrey A. (2001), Crossing the Chasm, 3rd edition, Capstone, Oxford.

Ries, A. & Trout, J. (2006), Positioning: The battle for your mind, McGraw-Hill,

London

Sjostrom, R. (1996), Positionering under strategisk osakerhet, Diss. Ekonomiska

institutionen, LiTH, Linkoping

INTRODUCTION

Far – reaching changes have been taking place in the Indian economy during the recent past, consequents to the opening up of our economy through globalization and liberalization policies. The flood gates have been through thrown open to allow international competition for manufactured goods and as well as services, making it a question of survival of the fittest in any industry. In the present highly competitive economy, which can be called as Buyer’s market, it is the customer who wields full power. He can make or wreck a company. No wonder that the collective battle cry from sales and marketing people, retailers, wholesalers and advertising wizards alike is now ‘Serve the customer’, or ‘Delight the customer’.

The customer who was considered the ’King’ is now treated almost like ‘God’, emulating the highly successful marketing people of Japan. When consumer expectations become higher and higher, superior market driven strategies or customer driven strategies and their execution in the market are important. Companies have to be fully customer oriented to succeed in the present competitive scenario, and should “Think Customer”, “Live for Customer”, “Smell Customer”, and “Build Customer Relations”.

MARKETING

“Marketing is defined as a social and managerial process by which individuals and groups obtain what they need and want through creating and exchanging products and values with others”. – (PHILIP KOTLER 2007)

THE AMERICAN MARKETING ASSOCIATION defines marketing as “Marketing is a performance of Business activities that directs the flow of goods and services from producer to customer or user”. These traditional definitions have undergone some changes and the new version is given as “Marketing is a societal process by which individuals and groups obtain what they need and want through creating, offering, and freely exchanging products and services of values with others”. Thus marketing is a communication channel through which the industry and consumers are communicated.

MARKETING PLAN

A marketing plan is a formal statement of a set of business goals, the reason why they are believed attainable, and the plan for reaching goals and the way of reaching to the customer about to their product. Business plans may target changes in perception and branding by the customer, client, tax- payer, or larger community. When managing a business, a business plan, or B-plan, is often confused with the term Marketing Plan. Marketing plans are decision-making tools. There is no fixed content for a marketing plan. Rather the content and format of the marketing plan is determined by the goals and audience. (Deboreh 2010)

A marketing plan represents all aspects of business planning process; declaring vision and strategy alongside sub-plans to cover marketing, finance, operations, human resources as well as a legal plan, when required.

For example, a business plan for a non-profit might discuss the fit between the business plan and the organization’s mission. Banks are quite concerned about defaults, so a business plan for a bank loan will build a convincing case for the organization’s ability to repay the loan. Venture capitalists are primarily concerned about initial investment, feasibility, and exit valuation. A business plan for a project required equity financing will need to explain why current resources, upcoming growth opportunities, and sustainable competitive advantage will lead to a high exit valuation.

Preparing a Marketing plan draws on a wide range of knowledge from many different business disciplines: finance, human resource management, intellectual property management, supply chain management, operations management, and marketing among others. “A good Marketing plan can help to make a good business credible, understandable, and attractive to someone who is unfamiliar with the business. Writing a good Marketing plan can’t guarantee success, but it can go long way toward reducing the odds of failure”.

THE MARKETING ORIENTATIONS OR CONCEPTS

The marketing function or activities are conducted by various companies based on six alternative or orientations. They are:

The Production Concept
The Product Concept
The Selling Concept
The Marketing Concept
The Customer Concept
The Societal Marketing Concept

The Production Concept

The production Concept believes that consumers will favor products that are readily available at reasonable prices. Improvement in production and distribution efficiency will be the focus for managements under this concept. When the demand for a product exceeds the supply, manufacturers have too increase production. When the product’s cost is too high, the management has to bring it down to affordable levels. Production concept, though useful in some situations, could result in ‘Marketing Myopia’, according to Theodore Levitt. Companies following this concept focus too narrowly on their own activities and lose sight of the real objective of customer’s need satisfaction.

The Product Concept

The product concept believes that the consumers will favor products that offer the most in quality, performance & innovative features. Continuous improvements in product and quality are essential for companies that follow the product concept. So, this concept may also lead to Marketing Myopia.

The Selling Concept

This concept believes that the consumers will not buy enough of the company’s products unless it undertakes pressure selling tactics and heavy promotion efforts. Buyers are believed to have a buying inertia. This concept is especially used for unsought goods which buyers do not think of buying, like cemetery plots, life insurance, etc.

The Marketing Concept

This concept believes that achieving the company’s objectives depends on understanding the needs & wants of target markets and delivering the desired satisfaction in a better way than what the competitors are doing.

The Customer Concept

Many companies are today moving beyond the marketing concept to the customer concept. These companies shape separate offers, services and messages to individual customers, based on their individual preferences. They hope to achieve profitable growth through capturing a larger share of each customer’s expenditures by building high customer’s loyalty and focusing on customer’s life time value.

EXAMPLE: Barbie Dolls, Levi Strauss jeans, Dell Computers.

The Societal Marketing Concept

This concept believes that organizations should determine the needs, wants and interests of target markets. It should then deliver superior value to the customers in a way that maintains or improves the consumer’s and the society’s well being.

Society (Human welfare, environment)

Consumers (Needs, wants and Company (Sales volume, profits

Satisfaction) and growth)

MARKETING PLANNING PROCESS

The marketing Planning process consists of the following activities:

Analysing market opportunities
Selecting target markets
Developing the marketing mix
Managing the marketing efforts.

At the center of the process stand the consumers. The objective is to build a strong and profitable customer relationship.

The first step is market segmentation, targeting and positioning, to customers the company should serve and how. This process identifies the total market, and then divides it into smaller segments.
The next step is to design a marketing mix consisting of factors under its control like :

I. Product

II. Place

III. Price

IV. Promotion

For identifying best marketing mix combination and to put into action, the company engages in the activities like:

I. Marketing analysis
II. Planning
III. Implementation
IV. Control activities

With the help of these, the company watches & adopt to the actors and forces in the marketing environment around it.

Fig. The Marketing Planning Process

1, 2, 3,4 DENOTES:

1Marketing Intermediaries 3 Market planning

2 Marketing Control 4 Competitors

DEVELOPMENT OF MARKETING MIX

The marketing manager is a mixer of ingredients, according to JAMES CULLITON, a noted Marketing expert, who coined the expression,” Marketing Mix”

“The marketing mix is the set of controllable, tactical, marketing tools that the firm blends to produce the response it wants in the target market”

– (PHILIP KOTLER 2007)

The marketing mix consists of the variables such as:

Product
Price
Place
Promotion

These are well known as the Four P’s of Marketing as classified by McCarthy and this figure below gives clear description about the variables of marketing mix and its various tools.

Place stands for the goods and services offered by a company to the target market, to satisfy needs and wants.
Price refers to money value that the consumers have to pay to buy for the product or services.
Promotion refers to the activities of Advertising, personal selling, sales promotion, public relations and communicating products benefits and attributes to target customers to persuade them to purchase.
Place stands for physical distribution activities through which the products moves from the industry to the customers.

To be successful, the marketing programmes have to blend the 4 variables into an ideal integrated action plan aimed at achieving the corporate objective. While the 4 P’s concepts relates to the sellers perspective of the market.

The other P’s which are included as 7 P’s of marketing are:

Packaging
Positioning
People

Packaging is the fifth element of the marketing mix, which refers to the outer physical coverage of the product or the way in which your product is appearing outside.

Positioning refers to the present position of our product among the consumers. “How they think about our companyWhat position does the concern have in the marketWhat is the customer’s perception towards our product in the market?” these questions should be answered in the case of positioning of a product in the market.

People refers to both inside and outside people, the former refers to the employees of the industry and the later refers to the customers of our products and services, where they are considered as the important resources of marketing our goods and services.

The 7 P’s are a useful framework for deciding how the company’s resources will be manipulated (strategically) to achieve the objectives. However, they are not the only framework, and may divert attention from the real issues. The focus of the strategies must be the objectives to be achieved – not process of planning itself. Only if it fits the needs of these objectives should you choose, as we have done, to use the framework of the 7 P’s. (Jackie 2010)

The strategy statement can take the form of a purely verbal description of the strategic options which have been chosen.

Thus these are the various tools and variables described under the marketing mix.

THE MARKETING AND SALES PLANNING PROCESS

Marketing process can be realized by the marketing mix in step 4. The last step in the process is the marketing controlling. In most organizations, “strategic planning” is an annual process, typically covering just the year ahead. Occasionally, a few organizations may look at a practical plan which stretches three or more years ahead. To be most effective, the plan has to be formalized, usually in written form, as a formal “marketing plan”.

The essence of the process is that it moves from the general to the specific, from the vision to the mission to the goals to the corporate objectives of the organization, then down to the individual action plans for each part of the marketing program. It is also an interactive process, so that the draft output of each stage is cheeked to see what impact it has on the earlier stages, and is amended.

TARGET MARKETING

To define a target market for your business plan, you should research the potential buying audience for your product. This could range from millions of people if you are starting an online business, to a few thousand individuals if you are opening a retail store in a small town. If you are catering to the consumer market, narrow your potential customer base to a defined demographic group. By doing so, your business will not only be more attractive to investors, but you will have a much easier time compiling sales and marketing plan.

Study your product or service and determine the most likely consumer. Define the age range, gender, marital status, and income level of the individual most likely to be your customer. Explain the motivations for purchasing your product or service. Is it a necessity or luxuryWhat value does this product bringIt’s best not to assume or guess. Use surveys, questionnaires, or secondary research to gather your demographic data.

Once you have defined the target market:
Explain the purchase habits of this demographic group.
Show how your company will impact those purchase habits.
Explain the motivation behind this demographic group and how you will help them meet their needs.
Project future changes in this market.
Indicate how you will meet their changing needs.

Base your future projections on research and details from your findings. Make projection based on past buying habits, the average purchase amount, and other factors, such as your ability to make the products or services available. The more you know about this target market, the more confidence you will have in your sales projections.

The same need to identify your target audience (business-to-consumer market) will also hold true if you are serving a business market (business-to-business market). You need to determine which companies will benefit from your products or services. Will you meet the needs of a specific industry or several industriesLarge or small businessesPublic or privately owned businessesDefine exactly the types of businesses that will buy our product or services and target them through your marketing efforts. Determine how you will reach your target market, i.e. online, by referral, by cold-calling. For more about learning about the customer you intend to pursue, read Use Demographics to Understand Your Target Market.

Another way to look at target market is to consider how you are positioning your company and your products. Read “What’s Your Position in the Market?” to get the basics of this important but tricky concept.

MARKETING PLANNING AIMS AND OBJECTIVES

Behind the corporate objective, which in themselves offer the main context for the marketing plan, will lay the “corporate mission”, which in turn provides the context for these corporate objectives. In a sales-oriented organization, the marketing planning function designs incentive pay plans to not only motivate and reward frontline staff fairly but also to align marketing activities with corporate mission.

This “corporate mission” can be thought of as a definition of what the organization is, of what it does: “our business is …” This definition should not be too narrow, or it will constrict the development of the organization; a too rigorous concentration on the view that “we are in the business of making meat-scales,” as IBM was during the early 1900s, might have limited its subsequent development into other areas. On the other hand, it should not be too wide or it will become meaningless: “we want to make a profit” is not too helpful in developing specific plans.

Abell suggested that the definition should cover three dimensions: “customer groups” to be served, “customer needs” to be served, and “technologies” to be utilized. Thus, the definition of IBM’s “corporate mission” in the 1940s might well have been: “We are in the business of handling accounting information [customer need] for the larger US organizations [customer group] by means of punched cards [technology]”. (Karunakaran 2010)

Perhaps the most important factor in successful marketing is the “corporate vision.” Surprisingly, it is largely neglected by marketing textbooks, although not by the popular exponents of corporate strategy-indeed, it was perhaps the main theme of the book by peters and waterman, in the form of their “Super ordinate Goals”. “in search of Excellence” said: “Nothing drives progress like the imagination. The idea precedes the deed.” if the organization in general, and its chief executive in particular, has a strong vision of where its future lies, then there is an good chance that the organization will achieve a strong position in its markets (and attain that future). This will be not least because its strategies will be consistent and will be supported by its staff at all levels.

In this context, all of IBM’s marketing activities were underpinned by its philosophy of “customer service,” a vision originally promoted by the charismatic Watson dynasty. The emphasis at this stage is on obtaining a complete and accurate picture.

A “traditional” – albeit product-based-format for a “brand reference book” (or, indeed, a “marketing facts book”) was suggested by Godley more than three decades ago:
Financial data-facts for this section will come from management accounting, costing and finance sections.
Product data-form production, research and development.
Sales and distribution data-sales, packaging, distribution sections.
Advertising, sales promotion, merchandising data-information from these departments.

Market data and miscellany-form market research, who would in most cases act as a source for this information. His sources of data, however, assume the resources of a very large organization. In most organizations they would be obtained from a much smaller set of people (and not a few of them would be generated by the marketing manager alone).

It is apparent that a marketing audit can be a complex process, but the aim is simple: “it is only to identify those existing (external and internal) factors which will have a significant impact on the future plans of the company.” It is clear that the basic material to be input to the marketing audit should be comprehensive.

Accordingly, the best approach is to accumulate this material continuously, as and when it becomes available; since this avoids the otherwise heavy workload involved in collecting it as part of the regular, typically annual, planning process itself-when time is usually at a premium. Even so, the first task of this annual process should be to check that the material held in the current facts book or facts files actually is comprehensive and accurate, and can form a sound basis for the marketing audit itself.

MARKETING PROGRAMS

Marketing programs are the most important, practical outcome of the whole planning process. These plans must therefore be:

Clear – They should be an unambiguous statement of ‘exactly’ what is to be done.
Quantified – The predicted outcome of each activity should be, as far as possible, quantified, so that its performance can be monitored.
Focused – The temptation to proliferate activities beyond the numbers which can be realistically controlled should be avoided. The 80:20 Rule applies in this context too.
Realistic – They should be achievable.
Agreed – Those who are to implement them should be committed to them, and agree that they are achievable. The resulting plans should become a working document which will guide the campaigns taking place throughout the organization over the period of the plan. If the marketing plan is to work, every exception to it (throughout the year) must be questioned; and the lessons learnt, to be incorporated in the next year’s planning.

A marketing plan for a small business typically includes Small Business Administration Description of competitors, including the level of demand for the product or service and the strengths and weaknesses of competitors.

Description of the product or service, including special features.
Marketing budget, including the advertising and promotional plan
Description of the business location, including advantages and disadvantages for marketing
Pricing strategy
Market segmentation
Operational plan

Operational plans are an important element of writing a business plan and they notify business assessors for how business owners are going to release product/services into the market. That’s why operational plans are also a very important part of writing a marketing plan. In simple words, operational plans help to understand ways for business reviewers, by which products are set to pass the production phase heading toward the targeted customers and these plans must be in the business plan outline. Operational plans are a usual phenomenon in a how to write a business plan, but they outline crucial answers basic questions as such:

What are the daily activities of a business
What is the raw material sources used
How will the company or business use vendors and suppliers
What are the labours requirements
Who is the product supplier

Operational plans need to ascertain the activities and finances for almost every section of the firm or business for the next 1 or 3 years. Operational plans also connect with intended plans and the activities that the business may deliver to its customer base.

Good operational plans ought to include:

Apparent target areas
Preferred results
A procedure to supervise growth execution schedules
Employment and resource requirements
Quality levels
Finally, activities which a firm or business may deliver to its targeted customers.

REFERENCES:

Deboreh (2010) International journal of Market research, “ Agenda Development for marketing research” vol 52, pp 339 – 362.

Luan (june 2010) journal of marketing research, “Forecasting marketing mix responsiveness for new product” vol 47, pp 444 – 457.

Karunakaran (2010) “Marketing Management” The Himalaya publishing house 1st edition pp256

philip kotler (2007) “Marketing Management” Analysis, planning, implementation and control 9th edition prentice hall, New jersey

Baker, M., J.,Hart, S. (2007) the Marketing Book, (5TH edn.), Butterworth- Heinemann,UK.

Introduction

The tourism business around the world which is one of the most susceptible and vulnerable sectors, must always manage and survive from the global crises. In recent decades, the tourism industry in many countries all over the world has experienced major crises from natural disasters such as hurricanes, storm, and tsunami to terrorist attacks, political instability, and economic recession. Generally, disasters are large non-controllable problems that evaluate the capability of nations and communities to effectively protect the population and its ability to recover after the disasters. No tourist destination is immune to such crisis. Hence, the global tourism industry requires strategies and set of directions which help tourism businesses prepare a way to manage a crisis event from its onset and rapidly implement a recovery strategy. The purpose of this essay is to examine the post-disaster destination marketing viewpoint, its effects on the city of New Orleans, and the attempt to reposition as a premier destination for domestic and international of New Orleans after the devastating effects of Hurricane Katrina, the most destructive natural disaster in American history in August 2005. Besides, this essay will critically examine the effectiveness of recovery marketing strategies undertaken by the city’s tourism marketing organizations and the lessons learned for post disaster market repositioning are also discussed.

The first section will define the tourist destination, destination crisis, tourism disaster, and a narrative of vital tourism statistics for the city of New Orleans before the hurricane. The second section will mention the effects of the hurricane on the New Orleans tourism. Finally, the third phase will critically examine the effectiveness of recovery marketing strategies undertaken by the city’s tourism marketing organizations.

According to Beirman (2003), a destination is defined as a country, state, region, city or town which is marketed or markets itself as a place for tourist to visit. Many countries’ main income is collected from tourism activities; they have invested heavily in tourism and required a high level of economic dependence on inbound tourism. The economic disruption to the country, state or region is considered as a result in the viability of a destination and it could be a result in loss of income, unemployment and poverty. However, these implications do not determine the choice of destination in tourists and their prime concern is to travel to destinations that satisfy their own desires with minimum threats to their safety and well-being. Therefore, the marketing of destination crisis is no longer being treated as a problem of a specific destination; it is now an issue of global tourism industry and become a critical political, economic and social priority for many nations which tourism is a significant industry.

Faulkner and Russell (2000, cited in Beirman 2003) defined a disaster as ‘a tourism destination is confronted with sudden, unpredictable, catastrophic changes over which it has little control’. In order to modify the definition of Faulkner and Russell, Beirman defines a destination crisis as ‘a situation requiring radical management action in response to events beyond the internal control of the organisation, necessitating urgent adaptation of marketing and operational practices to restore the confidence of employees, associated enterprises and consumers in the viability of the destination’.

For many years, New Orleans was an ideal vacation destination and it is the world famous tourist destination due to its rich cultural heritage, copiousness of unique food and many opportunities to enjoy local art, music and festivals. Throughout the past 30 years, New Orleans focuses on its efforts to attract tourists by constantly redefine its image through all taglines such as ‘The Crescent City’, ‘The Gateway to the Mississippi Valley’, ‘America’s Most Interesting City’, ‘The City that Care Forgot’, and the ‘The Big Easy’ (Clement 2008). Moreover, it often cited as “European” charm and the unique French Quarter historic district, thus, there is a large number of tourists visit the city for many years to take part in the distinct experience that New Orleans has offered as a vacation venue. In January 2005, just seven months before Hurricane Katrina, New Orleans was ranked sixth among the top United States vacation destinations which were conducted by the University of New Orleans (UNO) Hospitality Research Centre (Chacko and Marcell 2008). Statistically, in 2004, tourism of New Orleans was one of the main economic engines of the city and the employment in hospitality and leisure accounted around 80,827 jobs generating $30 million in state income taxes. Besides, the number of visitors came to city reach to peak 10.1 million and spent $4.9 billion in 2004. Before the Hurricane Katrina occurred, the tourism industry accounted for 3.8% of Gross State Product, provided 175,000 direct jobs, and generated under 8% of total tax revenues of the states (Louisiana Research Team 2004).

New Orleans is a unique circumstance of Hurricane Katrina. Faulkner (2001) addressed the difference between the definition of crises and disaster that crisis was defined as ‘induced by the actions or inactions of the organization’ while a disaster was considered to be an ‘induced natural phenomena or external human action’. The terrorist attack September 11, 2001 in the U.S and Chernobyl nuclear accident would be classified as crises while the Turkey earthquake and the plane crash in Lockerbie were disasters. According to Faulkner’s definition, Hurricane Katrina would have been classified as a disaster with over 1,300 died; 228,000 housing units were flooded in the New Orleans metropolitan area and over 70% of 188,000 housing units were damaged by the storm and subsequent flood (Olshansky et al. 2008). However, the poorly man-made concrete levee walls which were designed by the U.S. Corps of Engineers, a federal agency aimed to protect the city breached, did the flood waters deluge 80% of the city and created a crisis of gigantic proportions. In addition, federal, state, and local government authorities lacked of capacity in preparing and re-acting in a timely manner to the city citizen’s needs. Therefore, the Hurricane Katrina can be described as an induced natural phenomenon or a disaster followed by the inactions of organizations or a crisis.

Two major organisations responsible for the overall tourism and hospitality marketing of the New Orleans are the New Orleans Metropolitan Convention and Visitors Bureau (NOMCVB) and the New Orleans Tourism Marketing Corporation (NOTMC). The primary mission of NOMCVB is bring meetings, conventions, and tour groups to the city, supply many hotels, restaurants, attractions and provide tourism goods and services for customers. This organisation uses personal selling as the primary sales strategy and solicits business from several tourism intermediaries such as meeting planners and tour operators. The second organisation’s goal is to spur the city visitation and uses two million dollar in its budget for advertising and positioning the leisure market of New Orleans. Besides, tourism marketers capitalise New Orleans’s strength as an exotic, unique, and ‘foreign’ locale (Stanonis 2006). In addition, just two months before Katrina, marketers produced a television commercial which is part of the summer campaign 2005, featuring New Orleans’s well-known and talented local musicians with titled ‘Do They Play Jazz in Heaven?’ According to Kotler et al. (2005), the appeal of the message was more emotional than rational and included the lines ‘do they play jazz in heaven, in New Orleans we know they do’ (Chacko and Marcell 2008). These messages reinforced the well-established position of the city as an exciting and popular destination with great food and music. However, the arrival of Katrina made a major shift in positioning strategy in producing hundreds of hours of negative publicity in the mass media.

Unfortunately, New Orleans’s city was truly in a state of disaster after Hurricane Katrina. The storm and flooding are not only washed away physical infrastructure of the city, but also eroded the perception of the city’s tourism destination. According to Northington (cited in Chacko and Marcell 2008), the city loss $15.3 million and this was potentially devastating to New Orleans’s tourism industry, especially the loss of economic impact from many festivals and events that it hosts. However, the biggest obstacle that New Orleans’ tourism industry has to face is the tarnished perception as a tourist destination of the city. Faulkner (2001) claimed that the power of media and tendency in lingering negative images, the destination usually takes longer to recover than the period requires services restore to normal.

The tourism industry of New Orleans has met a lot of challenges after Hurricane Katrina. Prior the disaster, the research focused on measuring the industry and profiling the visitors to New Orleans, but now the focus has sharply shifted to measuring the perceptions of visitors about New Orleans. Mayor C. Ray Nagin said in an interview with the New Orleans Times-Picayune that ‘We have an image challenge throughout the country. You ask what New Orleans is like today, and any people only have images of a city in crisis. And that’s a concern, that they don’t see the rebuilding that is going on’ (Thevenot 2005). Moreover, due to the national and international media continued to display images of a ravaged city every detail, the tourism industry was getting worse and worse. According to journalist Eric Morgan (2008), ‘because of the media, people believe we have infrastructure issues, hotels aren’t open, restaurants aren’t operational, and there are no supporting service industry workers’. In March 2006, the New Orleans Tourism Marketing Corporation conducted a perceptions study of a panel of 5,000 online travellers, 22% indicated they believed that some neighbourhoods of New Orleans still had standing flood water from Hurricane Katrina, 14% of them believed New Orleans is not a safe place to visit because of contaminated air or drinking water, and 12% indicated that the historic districts in New Orleans are still destroyed or devastated. However, the optimism seems to have increased over time with 77% of meeting planners over the three quarter between October 2005 and January 2006 indicated that they were “very optimistic” about the sufficient recovery of New Orleans in regaining its status as a major destination city. Although meeting planners fully expect city’s recovery, they believe it will be a slow process (Chacko and Marcell 2008).

In reality, New Orleans is different from the potential leisure travellers’ perception. The city’s tap water was safe to drink according to city health officials and there is no standing water on the streets. Transportation and airline are suitable to handle travellers and 80% of hotel room inventory has rebounded as pre-Katrina levels. Nevertheless, many flooded neighbourhoods’ recovery is still slow and the city is continued framing news coverage in these environments and undermining positive messages by the media. Therefore, the challenge is to find the appropriate marketing strategies to mitigate the impacts of disaster for New Orleans.

As the result of the Katrina disaster, the NOMCVB, NOTMC, and other tourism organizations have elaborated on their past branding campaigns and created new campaigns to change perceptions of potential travellers and using brand elements such as new slogans and logos to alter the images of New Orleans. The slogans and themes try to counteract negative images which were played out in the national media and reconstruct and increase brand identity of New Orleans. According to Braun-LaTour, LaTour, and Loftus (2006), ‘reminding consumers of their past connection with a brand may be a particularly effective way to repair the brand’s image after a crisis situation’. Slogans were launched through branding campaigns of organisations such as ‘fall in love with Louisiana all over again’, ‘New Orleans: Happenin’ everyday’, ‘do you know what it means to Miss New OrleansWe know you do’ and etc. to rebrand New Orleans as a multicultural destination and created a sentimental image of New Orleans, divert attention of travellers from the human suffering’s reality, physical destruction and stimulate consumer desires to travel to the city by constructing a narrative of past grandeur. According to Greenberg (2000), the urban branding campaigns function not only as ‘texts-on-cities’ but also power-laden ‘texts-as-cities’ that position of organisations and tourism professionals as important voices in the articulation of the collective identity of the city and thus ultimately the urban brand.

In January 2007, with support from Lieutenant Governor Mitch Landrieu, the NOMCVB launched ‘an aggressive, strategic, marketing, public relations and direct sales campaign designed to celebrate its authentic culture, lure domestic and international visitors back, preserve the city’s leading industry (hospitality) and overcome misperceptions about New Orleans among consumers’ (NOMCVB Press Release 2007). The ‘Forever New Orleans’ campaign is an international branding campaign which was designed to re-brand the city internationally by showcasing the confidence of hospitality industry in New Orleans and developing a deeper understanding of the city culture as unique and authentic. It uses headlines in outdoor advertisements and print campaigns such as ‘New Orleans is Open. To Just About Anything’, ‘Soul is Waterproof’, ‘Old World, New Promise’ and other phrases to celebrate a spirit of swagger, appeal the meetings industry, travel trade professionals and the traveling public. According to Morgan (2008), the largest out-of-home advertising company in the United States – CBS Outdoor donated 44 billboards worth a valued of $3 million to New Orleans. Besides, the 30 minutes television show ‘A Whole New Orleans’ attempts to attract visitors with displays of the city’s most authentic, historic destination and unique culture.

The NOMCVB and other tourism professionals try to increase the development of New Orleans’s tourism post Katrina and mention the perspective of ‘internalising the brand’ as a major ingredient in branding New Orleans as an entertainment destination (Gotham 2007). New urban rebranding campaigns are being implemented in order to present ‘authentic’ image of New Orleans as clearly demarcated, disconnected, and segregated from flooded neighbourhoods by tourism professionals. Besides, a new industry of ‘disaster tourism’, for example ‘Hurricane Katrina: America’s Worst Catastrophe!’ tour through devastated neighbourhoods of Gray Line New Orleans Bus Tours focused on ordinary places that have historical and cultural significance thereby mobilizing travellers to visit them. Moreover, in order to attract corporate brands to invest in New Orleans, political and economic elites have pushed for the development of lucrative tax subsidies and help finance the rebuilding effort. Therefore, the above points demonstrate that tourism organisations are trying to marketing the imaginary of New Orleans base on entertainment version to attract investment and rebuild the city. The branding strategy is a new method to promote urban place to align local political interests with transnational corporate entertainment to organise urban rebuilding. Rebranding New Orleans post-Katrina is not just attracting consumers and visitors to spend money in the city, but also ‘about socializing residents to view the city as a brand and imagining an urban future that conforms to a semiotic script’ (Gotham 2007).

Due to tourism professionals mention the perspective of ‘internalising the brand’ as a major ingredient in branding New Orleans as an entertainment destination, there are some conflicts intrinsic in the understanding of urban brands. Firstly, there is the lack of clear and understandable object capable of being branded. Cities and places are multifaceted and complicated systems of organization and they contain a range of different groups, diverse identities and conflicted social relations. Branding destinations is more complex and challenging than other goods and services because of the existence and interdependence of multiple stakeholders, multiple components and multiple suppliers involved in the tourism service delivery (Buhalis 2000) and especially when it involves national characteristics and loyalties and popular permission of whole population. The second is the lack of control between urban branding organisations and branding campaigns when they deal with uncertain and unstable environment of many stakeholders who have diverse interests, contending perceptions and urban visions (Park and Petrick 2005). The branding work of New Orleans’s tourism professionals are informed by market research and tourist trends, however, they do not know whether the campaigns are successful or not. Besides, the branding process is full of instability and uncertainty. Moreover, the urban branding’s unpredictability derives from gained knowledge about visitors through surveys is partial and incomplete because consumer’s desires and preferences always change. Thirdly, there is exist the risk that visitors and residents may reject the images of brand and view them as irrelevant, inauthentic or affronts to local culture. Additionally, there is the lack of consensus about the positive or negative effects of tourism in the city and a clear differentiation between residents who favour tourism and those who against it. In the construction of urban reality and produce meanings, residents are actively involved in and sometimes they are challenge the dominant imaginary of urban and brand. Due to the views of residents about New Orleans are not singular or fixed, thus, ‘internalising the brand’ is no means ensured or guaranteed. There is unclear and questionable about the partial internalisation whether it is realised as a vehicle for enhancing brand value or not when some residents may incorporate some affective links with the New Orleans brand into their lives.

Conclusion

In summary, hurricane Katrina has weakened the New Orleans’s tourism industry, displaced thousands of people, problematized meanings of community identity, and can cause wholesale changes to all aspects of tourism destination management. Numerous prescriptive strategies have provided examples, templates and checklists for tourism agencies to formulate marketing strategies which are the very important in the recovery process. Restoring the urban brand strategy of New Orleans is a differentiation and diversification process whereby local tourism organizations harness and construct destination images in order to control consumer impressions and understandings of a particular locale. Although urban brand has network of power operate and clear profiteering motives, it is also important to recognise branding as a contradictory process with unpredictable outcome, unforeseen consequences and facing a long road to recover destination image. However, tourism marketers of the city are using repositioning strategy or (re)brand strategy to make New Orleans regain its status as an outstanding tourism destination.

Introduction

The purpose of this report is to present a marketing plan and marketing strategy for the re-launch of a selected product which is currently being sold by DIY retailers in UK. The product selected for the re-launch is Passion Radiators that is being sold by Wickes Plc. The marketing plan and strategy is applicable from 1st June 2012 to 1st January 2013. Passion radiators are designer and eco-friendly radiators that are currently being sold in three colours and designs. For presenting the marketing plan, many areas have been discussed such as the company analysis, competition, current market trends, Pestel analysis, swot analysis etc. The key reasons for the re-launch of the product have been discussed. In the current economic downturn, the purchases of new homes have decreased. So people are renovating their current homes where they prefer trendier, designer and efficient products for their households. People are also looking for more ways to bring down their expenses. During the re-launch period, two special events are there: Olympic Games and the Christmas. The marketing plan and strategy is proposed in such a way that it can take full advantage of these events. A plan has been given for all the marketing activities to be carried out during the re-launch period. Academic journals, articles, newspapers and books have been referred to present the marketing plan and strategy for Passion Radiators from Wickes.

Background / Current Situation

Wickes Plc launched Passion radiators in 2005-06. Passion radiators are designer itself from the rest, as it is eco and user friendly. A Passion radiator consumes 80% less water and produces 15% higher output though the same consumption of electricity. This feature can save electricity and the environment at the same time as it consumes less and generates more. The sales of Passion radiators are very limited. Little information is available about the product on the broachers and the company website. Passion radiators have only three products in their range. Other key issue is the price; at present, the company is charging around ?713 GBP for a radiator, which is expensive, compared to the competition. Based on this, the main reasons to be considered for the failure and re launch of the product are:

Low Awareness
Comparatively High Price
Market Trend
Economic situation in UK
Installation Charges and after sale services were higher.

These points are discussed in the later sections of the report.

Company Analysis

Define company analysis (reference)

To meet the financial and marketing objectives and recover the loss due to failure. (see objectives)
Specific R & D of passion radiator and analysis of competitors.(see product)

Wickes Plc is one of the largest DIY companies in UK. It was established in 1972 and is currently owned by Travis Perkins Plc. It has over 200 stores and around 8500 DIY products in UK. The company has a large range of home improvement products. One of the important commitments of the company is to provide more eco friendly products that help improve the environment.

Analysing the financial data for the company of 2010-2011, it is evident that the sales grew by 3.1%. But, the significant growth was seen in market share which at present makes the group the largest DIY retailer in UK. Considering the current economical conditions, the company is making good progress by acquiring more market share and increase in sales figures. Following success, company has planned to launch more DIY products that are environment friendly and open more stores in UK.

Customer Analysis

Define customer analysis.(reference)

Labour are expensive and we make this product user-friendly to reduce expenses.
Customer satisfaction is our first-priority because the customers are the only element to make the product success or fail
How we retain the customers

Currently economic condition of UK is not very good. Following cuts in benefits, customer confidence is decreasing. The real estate market is also struggling. Customers at the moment want to buy cheaper products and want to save money in any way they can. The trend of buying new homes is decreasing these days in UK, and more people prefer to renovate the old ones. This seems a good opportunity for home improvement products. For Wickes Plc, the other important point is that many small retailers are closing due to tough economic times. This was the reason that the company gained market share in 2010-2011 following closures of many small retailers and shops.

According to research conducted by AMA, it is evident that the designer radiator market is showing good growth potential. The two important products are the designer radiators and towel warmers. People tend to make their home more design oriented by installing designer radiators to make their house look more beautiful. Consumers prefer innovative designs, odd shapes and more colour options. On the product development side, consumers prefer better thermal performance, efficiency and lower running costs. Adding on, customers look to bring down their utility expenses and purchase more environment preserving products in homes.

Market / Competitor Analysis

Define and reference

CompanyCompetitor

High quality-low price
Different package with passion
Customer can pay its easy instalment without pay any interest.
High efficiency that there is no need to jump from single to double glaze windows, which saves the customer extra budget.

There are currently many companies in the designer radiator market. The other DIY companies such as B&Q, the radiator company and other designer radiator range from Wickes group itself such as Havel, dynasty and others. When comparing the prices, the designer radiators range from around ?250 to ?1500, depending upon the size and style. Price competition has become very fierce as more companies are entering the designer radiator market, which are importing products manufactured in low cost foreign markets.

The market of designer radiators has shown an inspiring increase of around 10% to 20% in the recent years. In 2008, the market for designer radiators was nearly ? 75 million. However, due to economic downturn a decrease of 9% was seen in 2009 reducing the market size to nearly ? 69 million. But, according to a research conducted by AMA, it was forecasted that the market would grow nearly 16% by 2012 compared to 2009 and the market size would be around ?80 million. The market for designer radiators can be segmented into three main sectors: domestic renovation, domestic new build and commercial installations. The key sector is the domestic renovation as due to current economic downturn it is more likely that people will make improvements in their current homes rather than buying new houses.

PESTEL Analysis

Political: The current coalition government has many plans to support eco friendly improvements in houses and encourage environment friendly products. The government has launched a benefit scheme under which the householders need to prove that they are using products that saves money on utility bills and thus save environment.

Economical: The current economic downturn and government cuts in benefits have decreased customer confidence. The real estate market is struggling and so people are improving their current homes and installations. The opportunity here for Wickes is to gain market share as it did in 2010 following closures of many shops and other retailers.

Social: People are looking ways for decreasing money on their expenses. The product Passion Radiators is ideal as it will help save money for its customers on utility bills. During the re-launch period, Christmas and Boxing Day are there. Customer spending during this time is the highest. The company should offer lucrative offers to attract more sales and customers.

Technological: In the radiator market, the trend is for installing more decorative and innovative radiators that are energy efficient. The company should increase the range of Passion radiators by introducing more shapes, colours and making them more energy efficient.

Environmental: People surely prefer more environmental friendly products for their homes. Passion radiators can satisfy this need of the customers. Passion radiators consume less water and produces more thermal output saving electricity.

Legislative: The government is providing exemption from VAT on purchase of eco-friendly radiators where the people can save money. However, the rules are very complicated to claim for exemption.

SWOT Analysis

Strengths:
Passion radiators are eco friendly and thus energy saving.
The Wickes group has a large distribution network of around 200 outlets in UK from where the products can be sold to customers.
The product has a warranty of 5 years with two years of after sale service.
Low electricity/gas consumption.
Customer can install by themselves.
Passion radiators are a product of Wickes Plc, which is currently the leading DIY Company in UK. This shall increase reliability and provide a good marketing platform for the product.
Weakness:
Passion radiators have a very low awareness in the market.
The price for the product is relatively higher compared to its competition.
Fierce competition among the companies for selling designer radiators.
Opportunities:
The opportunity of this company is market share regarding the re-launch of radiator successfully, result in gaining more market share by grasping more customers.
The product can address the current market trend where people prefer more innovative and designer products that are energy efficient.
The markets for the designer radiators have good potential to grow of around 16% in 2012.
Government benefits and tax exemptions for eco friendly products in homes.
In the current economic situation, people are more likely to improve their existing homes. Further, they want to cut their expenses. This product can address people’s need in current situation.
Threats:
Wickes Plc has other products in the designer range. Re-launching Passion radiators and giving more emphasis to it might reduce sales of its other products and can hamper the company in overall sales.
Competition is introducing cheaper products made in low cost foreign markets.
Other products are available in market with same features.
The leakage of the latest technology used in these radiators.
New entrants can be entered after the leakage.

Objectives

Marketing Objectives:
The company should maintain a strong growth during the entire re-launch period of Passion radiators.
Wickes should achieve stable market penetration in the designer radiator market.
Company must take full advantage of the Christmas and Boxing Day.
More market share leads to optimize profit.
Customer loyalty and satisfaction.
The re-launch period also has the 2012 Olympics (27th June – 12 Aug). It is very likely that the commercial installations of radiators could possibly increase during this period. The company should establish Business-to-Business relations to take advantage of the Olympics.
Financial Objectives:
Company should manufacture the radiators in low cost foreign regions in order to decrease price of the product.
Company should maintain research and development costs in order to improve efficiency, introduce more designs and innovations in the radiator.
Wickes should concentrate on acquiring more market share of the designer radiator market.

Marketing Strategy

Target Market Segments
Repeat again

At present, the designer radiator market is nearly ?75 million GBP and has good potential to grow in 2012. With current market trend of people more likely to purchase designer and energy efficient radiators, Passion radiators have a good potential. As mentioned earlier in the report, the designer radiator market can be segmented into mainly three categories: domestic renovation (65%), domestic new homes (20%) and commercial installations (15%). After analysis, the company must consider two main categories here i.e. domestic renovation and commercial installations. In the tight economic situation, people will improve their current homes. The Olympic events are in the re-launch period. The commercial installations of radiators will surely increase in hotels and other places. Wickes should surely target the commercial market with Passion radiators.

The company should associate the Passion radiators with environmental activities for marketing the product. They should also give a punch line to the product that suites its functionality and features. In the outlets, the product should kept in such a way that it attracts more people visiting the stores. On the website, the product should be highlighted. One of the commitments of Wickes is to introduce more environmental friendly products. By promoting and giving emphasis to Passion radiators, the company can come closer in achieving its commitments given to its customers.

Competitive Advantage:

There are surely many designer radiators available in the market. But, very few are eco-friendly. Being designer and eco friendly are the most distinctive features of Passion radiators that separate it from the competition. The other important point is that it is a product of the Wickes Plc. People will prefer a product from a more reliable and trusted company such as Wickes. Wickes also has a good loyal customer base. The company is also strong financially so they will be able to invest more in the re-launch of the Passion radiators.

Marketing Mix

The marketing mix of Passion radiators should be like this in terms of product, price, place and promotion.

Product:
Increase range of the product. Introduce more shapes, colours and designs.
Maintain research and development to improve efficiency of product.
The product is user friendly for which customers can install and fit the radiators by themselves easily.
Innovative product with meaningful features.
Price:
Pricing of the different radiator should be finalised after considering the competition.
Special discounts on Christmas and Boxing Day.
During Olympics, provide more discounts to businesses as they mostly purchase in bulk.
Maintaining Low Prices with High Quality is the main target.
Promotion:
The company must promote the product through TV ads, hoardings, banner Ads and social networks, newspapers and advertising on internet.
If the company will able to make the product associated with the Olympic Games, it would be a huge benefit.
Passion radiators should be associated to many eco friendly events and charities.
Place:
Wickes should display the product in all its outlets in the UK.
Customers can be able to order the product online and through phone calls.
Increase the number of distribution centres for ease access to customers.
Free delivery services.

Implementation and Control

The company should select proper milestones during the re-launch period for it success. The company must also monitor that activities are finished on time and budget. A Gantt chart has been prepared for implementing the marketing activities which is given at the end of report.

The company should monitor the actions of the Re-launch plan of the Passion radiators. The following areas should be observed:

Revenue: The sales of the product should be checked during the entire period especially during Olympic Games and Christmas time.
Expenses: during the entire re launch period i.e. 1st June 2012 to 1st January 2013.
The company should strictly monitor that the customers of the product are satisfied as it will be the key to successful re-launch of the product.
Constant development and expansion of the product.
Conclusions

Passion radiators at present are very limited to only three types and colours. Being energy efficient and eco friendly will surely help the company to re launch the product. In the present market t rend, people prefer designer and energy efficient radiators. In tough economic conditions, people look ways to cut down expenses. Passion radiators can meet all these requirements of the market trend in UK. The Olympic games and Christmas both fall in the re-launch period. During Olympic games, the commercial renovations of radiators is surely to increase. During Christmas and Boxing Day customer spending is the highest in the year. The company Wickes, should not miss the opportunity and grab the maximum advantage they can from both these events. There is immense competition in the designer radiator market but very few have eco friendly radiators. This gives Passion radiators the extra edge over the competition. Being a product of Wickes DIY will certainly add more to it. The government is also providing benefits to environment friendly households and giving VAT exemptions. The market trend, government support, edge over competition, Olympic games and Christmas; all these aspects will surely make the re-launch of the Passion radiators successful.

Recommendations

The weak points of Passion radiators are high price compared to competition and less varieties in the product range. Wickes should consider manufacturing in the product in low cost foreign regions so they can bring down the price of the radiators. Company should continue research and development throughout the re-launch period in order to bring more innovations in the product and add more products in the range. The company should also improve the efficiency and make the product more environmental friendly. Wickes should establish good relations with businesses as they will go for renovations during the Olympic games. The company should provide flexible and discount prices as businesses generally purchase in bulk. Sales target should be set and met during the Olympics and Christmas period. Wickes should associate Passion radiators with other environment preserving events and programs for promoting the product. By attaching the company name and the product to environmental programs will increase goodwill among the consumers and the company can also satisfy its commitment of preserving environment. The product should be highlighted in all its outlets and website. Customers should be able to purchase the radiators online and via phone calls. The company should also assist through proper instructions and help line if customers face any problems in installing the radiators. Good customer service is always important for the success of any product. It is important for the success of re launch that the marketing activities and milestones occur on time and on budget. Wickes should steadily follow the marketing plan and strategy for the accomplishment of the re-launch of Passion radiators.

INTRODUCTION

Over the last decade, product marketing and ways through which communication takes place between manufacturers and consumers has changed tremendously (Belch & Belch 2004). Due to the technological revolutions and the rise of innovations such as the mobile phones and the internet, control over information has shifted apparently from the manufacturer’s hands to the hands of consumers (Belch & Belch 2004). The market environment has also changed due to globalization of marketing strategies, loss of confidence in mass media advertising, increased reliance on targeted communication methods, and media fragmentation and so on (Belch & Belch 2004).

Given the changing market environment, the need for more efficient and cost effective marketing strategies has induced changes to the way marketers conduct their marketing activities and led to the adoption of more integrated approaches (Dewhirst & Davis, 2005). The consequence has been the adoption of a more holistic customer oriented approach to conducting marketing communication activities, a process often known as Integrated Marketing Communications (IMC) (Dewhirst & Davis, 2005).

IMC CONCEPT
A vast number of studies have made attempts to define the term Integrated Marketing Communications. One of the most succinct and widely accepted definitions of the IMC concept is that defined by the American Association of Advertising agencies (AAAA). That is, “a concept of marketing communications planning that recognizes the added value of a comprehensive plan that evaluates the strategic roles of variety of communications disciplines (for example, general advertising, direct response, sales promotion, and public relations) and combines these disciplines to provide clarity, consistency and maximum communications impact” (Arnott & Fitzgerald 1999: p.4).

RATIONALE OF THE STUDY

IMC has moved beyond simple communication to the use of promotional elements in a unified way in order to create a synergistic communication effect (Cornelissen 2001). It has become a powerful tool for developing and implementing marketing communications consistently and more effectively; and is certainly one of the most innovative marketing functions endorsed by advertising and marketing practitioners (Cornelissen 2001). Despite its continuing appeal, this concept has become a subject of great controversy with regard to its merits and validity.
In the recent years, a controversy has emerged between the proponents and opponents of the IMC concept. While the proponents suggest that the concept represents a revolutionary way to organizing marketing efforts and enhancing the brand awareness, critics argue that the concept is simply a “pop management theory” without a solid theoretical base (Duncan, 2002). Others contend that the IMC concept suffers from ambiguity in its definition and practice (Eagle & Kitchen 2000). It is thus the sole purpose of this analysis to critically explore on the IMC concept and its synergetic communication effects in relation to advertising strategy and planning in the UK.

HISTORY OF THE IMC CONCEPT

The origin of the IMC concept can be traced back to the 1990s when Prof. Don Schultz first introduced it at Northwestern University (Kitchen & Schultz 1998). Back in the 1960s and 1970s, marketers relied primarily on the advertising agency for the development of all marketing communication activities (Kitchen & Schultz 1998). In the recent years, two strands of change have however occurred. That is, the wider appreciation of techniques and the creation of specialist companies that deal with specific marketing communication areas (Dewhirst & Davis 2005).
As a result, there has been a progressive fragmentation of provisions in this field. Initially, there was an emergence of specialists in the various fields of marketing communications such as direct marketing, public relations, and sales promotion among others (Duncan & Moriarty 1997). Today, there are various companies with the ability and expertise to advertise their brands using a wide range of communication medium (Dewhirst & Davis 2005).
As a result of the IMC concept, marketers are increasingly employing several devices which were once the domain of dedicated and specialist companies (Dewhirst & Davis 2005). This concept has been embraced in practice by many companies not only due to the acquisitions and mergers which have resulted in consolidation of the advertising industry but also due to the synergies that have emerged from the integration of the various communication activities within the IMC framework (Dewhirst & Davis 2005).

LITERATURE REVIEW

The IMC concept has also received greater attention in the academic sphere. Several academic journals have devoted space to explore on the deeper implications of IMC in advertising and planning (Low & George 2000). These include: journal of marketing communications, journal of Advertising research and journal of Business research among others. Scholarly work on IMC, however, seems to be evolving from the limited view of effective coordination to a strategic process (Low & George 2000). The depth and breadth of research in the field of IMC has also evolved since its initial inception in the late 1980s.
A review of the various publications and scholarly work on IMC shows recurring themes, in particular, themes related to the definitional issues of the IMC concept and its theoretical development (Low & George 2000). Several scholars have undertaken and sufficiently discussed on the IMC concept by providing more in-depth literature reviews, which will not be repeated here. Of particular interest is the work undertaken by Shultz et al., (1993).

CRITICAL ANALYSIS OF THE IMC CONCEPT IN RELATION TO ADVERTISING AND PLANNING IN THE UK

According to Shultz et al (1993), the IMC concept is based on a holistic view of marketing communications whereby brands capitalize synergies among advertising, public relations, direct response and sales promotion; and combines these communication disciplines to provide consistency, clarity and maximum communication impact.
Each of these promotional elements plays a major role in marketing communications.
Advertising: – due to its amplified expressiveness, persuasiveness and public presentation, advertising campaigns have become extremely important in creating awareness about the product, company or brand (Peltier, et al 1992).
Sales promotion: – campaigns for sales promotions offers some kind of stimulus (free sample, discount etc.) and are more preferable in cases where new products are being launched (Hutton 1997).
Public relations: – since public relations are characterized by high credibility, PR campaigns enjoy a high level of trust among the potential customers (Riley & James 1991).
Direct marketing: – this approach is based on databases that contain information of potential customers. Therefore, direct marketing offers greater opportunities to reaching the target audience (Peltier, et al 1992).
As Shultz et al (1993) asserts; the coordination of these promotional activities is necessary to deliver a clear, consistent and competitive message about the brand. It is important to recognize that consumers often combine information from various media. In order to prevent them from integrating this information inconsistently, marketers must take charge of this process so as to deliver clear and consistent information about the brand (Schultz, 1996). The overriding purpose of the IMC framework is managing all marketing activities that impact profits, sales and brand equity (Schultz, 1996).
A good example in the UK can be seen with Wrigley Company which developed an integrated marketing communications program in January 1998 that brought with it tremendous effects in terms of the cost and time devoted to the campaign (Anon 2000: p.89). The program cost the company approximately 500,000 pounds in the first 18 months. The aim of the program was to persuade the dental profession to recommend the use of sugar free chewing gum by raising awareness of the role of saliva in dental health (Anon 2000: p.89).
Among the promotional elements included in the program were advertising in the trade press, a quarterly magazine, a patient education action pack, posters and leaflets (Anon 2000: p.89). The results were amazing with about 73% of the dentists recommending sugar free gum to patients, up from 44% before the campaign (Anon 2000: p.89). This provides a good illustrative example of the synergetic effect of combining several communication instruments (advertising, personal selling, sales promotion, and public relations) in a solid integrated campaign.

COMPARISON OF THE IMC MODEL TO THE STANDARD MODELS

The main advantage with the IMC model over other models is that it provides for the joint effects or synergies which are generated by the orchestration of the multiple marketing activities discussed above (Duncan & Everett 1993). The major difference between the IMC model and the standard models is that, unlike traditional marketing, the effectiveness of each activity depends entirely upon the other communication activities (Eagle & Kitchen 2000). Also, while traditional marketing employs a “push” strategy whereby communications are designed to promote the firms products, the IMC model on the other hand employs both the “push” and “pull” strategies by incorporating feedback from the customers so that the firm’s products and communications can be adjusted to meet the needs of the end user (Eagle & Kitchen 2000).

CONCLUSION

Clearly, we have established that the major benefits of the IMC framework is its ability to create synergies among the various marketing communications disciplines and to combine these disciplines to provide clarity and consistency of the set of messages conveyed to target audiences.
It therefore follows that, in order for firms in the UK to remain successful in the competitive environment, they must adapt to this new approach to marketing. All marketing communications must be designed from the view point of the customer and interwoven together in a manner that forms a coherent whole. Undoubtedly, the integrated planning and implementation of the various communications mediums is far more effective in achieving maximum communications impact than their separate usage.
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REFERENCES

Anon, 2000. Some aspect of measuring integrated marketing communications. In: Economics and organization, p. 89
Arnott, D., and M. Fitzgerald, 1999. Marketing communications classics: An international collection of classic and contemporary papers, Thomson Learning
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Dewhirst, T., & B. Davis, 2005. Brand strategy and integrated marketing communication (IMC). Journal of Advertising, Vol. 34(4), pp.81-92.
Duncan, T., 2002. IMC : Using advertising and promotion to build brands. New York: McGraw-Hill.
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Duncan, T., & S. Moriarty, 1997. Driving brand value: Using integrated marketing communications to manage profitable stakeholder relationships. New York: McGraw- Hill.
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Hutton, J. G., 1997. A study of brand equity in an organizational-buying context. Journal of Product & Brand Management, Vol. 6(6), pp. 428-437.
Kitchen, P. J., & D.E. Schultz, 1998. IMC – a UK ad’ agency perspective. Journal of Marketing Management, Vol. 14, pp. 465-485.
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Advertising Research, Vol. 40, pp. 27-39.
Peltier, et al., 1992. Direct Response Versus Image Advertising. Journal of Direct Marketing, Vol. 6 (1), pp.49-66.
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Schultz, D. E., 1996. The inevitability of integrated communications. Journal of Business Research, Vol. 37, pp. 139-146.
Schultz, D.E., et al., 1994. The new marketing paradigm: integrated marketing communications. NTC Business Books, pp. 105-156.

INTRODUCTION

Global marketing is the act of marketing products or services across national, political or cultural boundaries in a bid to maximize sales, diversify, achieve economies of scale, and explore new territories (Keller, 2003). Marketing on a global scale has been born primarily due to globalization and international expansion. Multinational companies need to expand beyond their home markets, and this involves investing in new territories, often with differing cultures and socio-cultural norms. Hofstede (2011) notes that the most significant hurdle in global marketing has been over the past decade with an increasing number of multinational corporations seeking to gain substantial market share in China, and other developing countries (such as Brazil, India and Russia), as these countries have relatively low market penetration, high demand, but very different cultures to western countries.

According to Schneider and Barsoux (1997), cultures around the world are increasingly converging, and these have resulted in the ability of multinationals to leverage their international reputation and successfully sell one product across multiple regions. Murphy and Lacziniak (2006) have also stated that the influence of technology, economic, socio-cultural and political forces makes it easier to create a marketing strategy with a mix suitable for a variety of regions and catering for different cultures. However, in as much as converging cultures may have unified demand, this does not necessarily translate to similar consumer perception or expectations across all markets. Culture affects consumer behavior by influencing consumption decisions, hence creating desires and driving the consumer to select products or brands that fulfill specific needs. As a result, organizations need to understand how cultural norms may affect their marketing strategies within respective regions in order to create a marketing strategy that can successfully penetrate new market environments (Usunier et al, 2005). This paper focuses on the global marketing efforts of Toyota Motors, and how various cultural dimensions may have an affect on its marketing activities in international markets.

Cultural Analysis

Toyota is the third largest automobile manufacturing company in the world, employs over 300,000 staff, and operates globally (Whoriskey, 2012). Its extensive global operations make the company an ideal case study for cultural analysis.

Scholars have conducted extensive research on cultural dimensions across different regions, and the most notable of these are of Hofstede (2011), who developed a model hierarchy of the world based on an analysis of IBM managers in several countries. His model identified four main components that define cultural dimensions and these are: power distance, uncertainty avoidance, masculinity / femininity, and individualism / collectivism. According to Hofstede (2011), several regions differ in their cultural dimensions, and these could have a significant impact on the marketing activities of international firms such as Toyota operating extensively within different cultural regions.

Power Distance

High power distance cultures are usually characterized by authoritarian societies and work environments, in which subordinates are highly dependent on their bosses in decision-making and welfare. Such societies are highly authoritative and are usually characterized by high amounts of income and gender inequality (Mooji and Hofstede, 2010). Hofstede (2011) found power distance to be high in Latin American and Arab countries, and much lower in Europe and the US. According to Hocklin (1998), high power distance cultures are usually characterized by chauffeur driven cars, while Dash et al (2009) found that countries with low power distance usually expect highly responsive and quality service; while those high on power distance attach a greater importance to tangible service attributes.

These attributes relevant to the automobile industry could be prestige, reliability, exclusivity, luxury, type and cost. Therefore an emphasis of branding, in such a way that it communicates to the buyer that it would improve their prestige, reputation, and it is exclusive, would be effective in high power distance cultures. However, in low power distance cultures, an emphasis on service delivery such as roadside assistance, extended warranties, reliability and servicing could be equally effective.

Power distance is also prevalent in youth consumption. In the US, a low power distance economy, about 49% of 17-year olds had driver’s licenses in 2008 (Neff, 2010). This translates to the fact that more young people are able to buy cars. However, when compared to a high power distance country like China, much less numbers of youth are able to afford automobiles, due to the high-income disparity between the rich youths and the rest of the population (Lee, 2010).

Individualism / Collectivism

As the title suggest, collectivism suggests a collectivist society in which a greater emphasis is placed on family values, community and team in the work place (Mooij and Hofstede, 2010), as opposed to individualism whereby it is mostly about an individual’s accomplishment and self-actualization. Dash et al (2009) found that consumers high on individualism expect lower empathy and assurance, while Murphy and Lacziniak (2006) noted that consumers high on individualism are more focused on personal preferences than family or team preferences. Regarding Toyota’s products, cultures with high individualism may see higher sales in two door sports cars and luxury vehicles, as opposed to collectivist cultures where sedans and family cars could sell higher. Furthermore, with respect to advertising and marketing, Mooij and Hofstede (2010 advocate denoting a brand in a more collective light within collectivist cultures. So for a car manufacturer like Toyota, branding efforts could center on family road trips or team based activities; or a happy couple driving their brand new jeep with a baby in the back. However, for an individualistic culture, it may focus more on a sense of self-achievement or fulfillment.

Uncertainty Avoidance

This refers to the extent to which people feel threatened by unknown situations (Hoecklin 1998). Cultures that are strong in uncertainty avoidance are aggressive, active, compulsive and intolerant while those weak in uncertainty avoidance are less aggressive; more relaxed, contemplative and relatively tolerant (Hoecklin 1998). Markets with high uncertainty avoidance are also characterized by much lower consumer credit (Mooij and Hofstede, 2010), as consumers usually desist from financial items such as consumer loans, credit cards, mortgages or car loans. This may likely lead to a lower amount of cars being sold.

Mooij and Hofstede (2010) also notes that innovativeness and a wish for change are low in high uncertainty regions, so the emphasis would center on more of the same. The same trusted brands, driving standards, and an emphasis on Toyota’s core values could be marketed. While marketing to cultures with high uncertainty avoidance, Toyota could also emphasize on the safety of its motor vehicles, the value of its brand, and its reputation; as these would most likely promote the sense of a predictability and safety.

Masculinity / Feminity

According to Mooij and Hofstede (2010, “an important value of masculine cultures is achievement, and when combined with individualism, success can be shown”. Hofstede (2011) labeled those cultures that strive to differentiate the roles of men and women as masculine cultures while those that permitted more overlapping social roles for the sexes as feminine cultures. Japan ranks high among the more masculine countries while Netherlands ranks lows The UK and US, on the other hand, rank in the middle of this dimension though slightly more towards masculine cultures (Assael 1998).

Toyota promotes its luxury brands (Lexus) as a status symbol, while some of its other brands are off-road, strong, high capacity vehicles. With these, they have gained substantial market share in the US. Societies placing high value on feminism are less assertive, and focus more on quality of life, interpersonal relationships and a concern for the weak (Aaker & Alexander 1993). These societies tend to be less extravagant in consumption and their purchase decisions, are more modest, and seek low-end products.

Toyota Cultural Marketing

Based on the cultural dimensions analyzed, Power Distance seems to have the most significant impact on marketing, especially in high power distance cultures. This chapter would give recommendations on how Toyota could adjust its marketing mix to account for a culture with high power distance[1].

Firstly, Toyota should focus on differentiating the market into the upper 20% and the masses. The upper 20% would be targeted for their affinity for luxury goods, and their spending power. They would be capable of purchasing luxury cars and jeeps, which would appeal to their status within the society.
An emphasis should be placed on marketing service attributes such as prestige in owning the vehicle, it’s luxury, reliability and it’s status-enhancing power. Individuals should want to own new Toyota’s because it makes them feel better than their peers, and like they have achieved something.
In such a high power distance culture, it is likely that the youth population and the lesser earning individuals may not be able to afford luxury vehicles. However, the vehicles sold to them, no matter how cheap or small, should be packaged in such a way that it enhances their social standing, and offers a sense of achievement even in the smallest sense.

Conclusion

The analysis within this report has shown that cultural attributes within a region do have an impact on global marketing. Dimensions such as power distance, uncertainty avoidance and individualism affect consumer behavior due to its impact on culture. As a result, different marketing messages and tactics are likely to appeal to different audiences based on their cultural values. It is therefore in the best interest of multinational companies to ensure they understand their target markets, and develop appropriate methods of marketing their products in the most appealing way.

REFERENCES

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Aaker, A. D. (1991) Managing Brand Equity, Capitalizing on the Value of a Brand Name, The Free Press, New York.

Assael, H., (1998) Consumer Behaviour and Marketing Action. 6th edition, International Thomson Publishing.

Dash, S., Bruning, E., and Acharya, M. (2009) The effect of power distance and individualism on service quality expectations in banking: A two-country individual- and national-cultural comparison”, International Journal of Bank Marketing, Vol. 27 (5), pp.336 – 358

Harner, S. (2011) Japan’s Automakers Face New Challenges (1): Toyota in China, www.forbes.com, [accessed: 12/03/2012]

Hoecklin, L., 1998. Managing Cultural Differences, Addison Wesley, ISBN 0-201-42770-2

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Keller, K.L., 2003. Strategic Brand Management: Building, Measuring and Managing Brand Equity, 2nd Ed, Prentice hall, New Jersey.

Lee, K. (2010) Debunking Myths About China’s Youth Culture, www.forbes.com, [accessed: 12/03/2012]

Mooij, M, and Hofstede, G. (2010) The Hofstede model – Applications to global branding and advertising strategy and research, International Journal of Advertising, Vol. 29(1), pp85 – 110

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Neff, J. (2010) Is digital revolution driving decline in US car culture, www.adage.com, accessed: 12/03/2012

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Usunier, Jean-Claude & J. Lee, 2005. Marketing Across Cultures, 5th Edn, FT Prentice Hall, ISBN: 0273685295

Whoriskey, P, (2012) GM once again leads the world in auto sales, www.washingtonpost.com, accessed: 12/03/2012

Zhang, Y., Winterich, K. P., and Mittal, V. (2010) Power Distance Belief and Impulsive Buying, Journal of Marketing Research, Vol. 47 (5)

References

Aaker, A. D., 1991. Managing Brand Equity, Capitalizing on the Value of a Brand Name, The Free Press, New York.

Aaker D & L.B. Alexander, 1993. Brand Equity & Advertising’ Advertising’s role in building strong brands. Lawrence Erlbaum Associates, London.

Assael, H., 1998. Consumer Behaviour and Marketing Action. 6th edition, International Thomson Publishing.

Hoecklin, L., 1998. Managing Cultural Differences, Addison Wesley, ISBN 0-201-42770-2

Howard, J.A., & J.N. Sheth, 1969. “The theory of buyer behavior”.

Hofstede, G., 2011. “Geert Hofstede Cultural Dimensions”, {Viewed on 15th March 2012} from http://www.geerthofstede.com/

Keller, K.L., 2003. Strategic Brand Management: Building, Measuring and Managing Brand Equity, 2nd Ed, Prentice hall, New Jersey.

Murphy,P.E. & G. R. Lacziniak, 2006. Marketing Ethics, Pearson Prentice Hall

Schneider, S. C, & J.L Barsoux, 1997. Managing across cultures, 2nd Edn, Prentice Hall

Usunier, Jean-Claude & J. Lee, 2005. Marketing Across Cultures, 5th Edn, FT Prentice Hall, ISBN: 0273685295

[1] Toyota is in virtually all developed, developing and under developed market so it was near impossible to find a new market where they could take an existing product. The best thing was to come up with a hypothetical new market and give recommendations.