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Archive for the ‘Marketing Strategy’ Category« Previous EntriesMarketing Strategies or Business Ethics?Wednesday, January 18th, 2012  In this week’s Business Surgery, Stephanie Teow comments on the recent struggles of supermarket giant Tesco over the Christmas period According to an article sourced from the Daily Mail:
Being a shopaholic, articles about retailers always catch my attention. Not only because I am curious to know what sales and promotions are currently being offered, but also, in a way, I think that retailers have a significant impact on our daily lives. In the past few years, repeated reports have been discussing and criticising the disappointing marketing strategies and poor customer service performances within the retail sector. So, when I was browsing through the news recently, it wasn’t a big surprise at all for me to read another negative report on a giant UK retailer:
This is actually nothing new to me, because for the past few years I have seldom taken an interest in these names anymore, not just because of what I felt to be their unattractive prices and products, but also, from my point of view, the advertising and the promotions that they are offering are just not customer focused; in a way, not convincing.
It is self-explanatory that the total sales increment from Sainsbury’s and Morrisons of 2.8 per cent have resulted from that lost by Tesco. It must be shocking for a business to realise that its losses are feeding its rivals. But what shocked me the most are the decisions that have been made at such a critical period of the year by the pioneer of the sector. It’s easy to be smart after the event, trying to lay the blame either to some person or some decision which has been made, but understanding the root cause will always be the most effective solution. Most promotional tools and marketing strategies that a business (in this case the retailer) implements are done to create a positive impact to the business operation and growth. For example, ones most commonly seen in the stores are: “Buy 3 for the price of 2” and “Buy the second one half price”. This is an excellent idea to increase the customer buying potential and to ensure the products are all sold before the next manufacturing and delivery deadlines are up, to avoid over-stocking. From the customer point of view, we only see this happening when the product expiry date is approaching. But do we really need more than 1 item in such a short period, even if the second item is slightly cheaper? Hence the questions: does this strategy really work? How many items are sold in the end? Will the customer fall into the same ‘trap’ again? Or would it be more effective to simply reduce the price of the product by 1/3 from the start? Another example which has been discussed in the article:
Example: Tesco Value Unsalted Butter – August 23: £1.10; August 30: £1.19; September 26: £1.10” As a marketing tool, the retailer will show a price tag with a reduction from the latter 2 dates. In a way, this is a brilliant marketing idea. However, if we are regular shoppers familiar with prices, what will we make of this? A penny saved is a penny earned, but in business this is not always applicable. Not only is focusing on the customer’s needs essential, but at all times we need to stand in the customer’s shoes to understand what kind of service, products and treatment they need. While many customers are happy – and indeed prefer – to be regulars, they expect to be treated well. Businesses should therefore be wary: few businesses are completely unique (i.e. irreplaceable) and once a customer has switched away, they have switched away. £5million is a big price to pay for a few poor decisions made in the festive season which are not customer-focused enough. Is there a role that market research can play to minimise the lost revenue or even to turn around the situation? I think the answer absolutely is yes! Marketing Training Courses In ShanghaiFriday, August 19th, 2011  B2B International is pleased to announce the dates of its upcoming training courses in Shanghai: On Thursday, 22 September 2011, we will be running a Market With Intelligence course, and on Friday, 23 September 2011, we will host a course on Value-Based Marketing. As with all our courses, these full-day, hands-on training workshops will enable attendees to not only learn the theory of marketing, but – crucially – to apply the learnings to their own businesses. A brief summary of the course schedules is shown below, but more information can be found here “Shanghai Marketing Training Courses”. To book your place online, please click here.. If you have any questions, please call your nearest B2B International office or email shanghai@b2binternational.com Market with Intelligence – Thursday, September 22, 2011 This course introduces you to the key principles of market research and how research tools can be used to grow your business. Topics covered include: • Introduction to market research Value-Based Marketing – Friday, September 23, 2011 Our value-based marketing workshop explores the key marketing principles and how you can make them work for you, including: • Market intelligence and value-based marketing Positive Outlook for Industrial CompaniesWednesday, July 21st, 2010  Good news this month for many of our clients! According to a new report, Trends in Industrial Marketing 2010: How Manufacturers are Marketing Today – incidentally published by one of our clients, GlobalSpec – 70% of sales and marketing professionals in the industrial sector expect their companies to increase sales this year, compared with a mere 16% in 2009. However, the online survey of 464 respondents found that only 31% had an increased marketing budget. For 42% of sales and marketing professionals questioned, customer acquisition is their primary goal this year. One-third is focusing on lead generation and 13% specified branding as their main aim. More than two-thirds (68%) plan to increase spending on social media. The same percentage intends to increase their spend on online video this year. Conversely, a quarter plans to decrease spend on trade magazine advertising and 24% will decrease use of printed directories. What, No More Football?Friday, July 16th, 2010  Reflecting on a month of non-stop football coverage, Alex Clements this week mulls over the effectiveness of high profile advertising and sponsorship. The World Cup is now over and things are, once again, returning to normal. Wives get their husbands back, kids get the right to watch TV back and the men are in recovery for another four years until the next World Cup. I will confess, I’m not a huge fan of grown men kicking a ball around a pitch (I’d rather watch grown men beat the life out of each other in a cage!). I did, however, watch a few games of the World Cup, including the England vs. Germany game, which was an interesting one to watch with Vanessa, my fiancée who, just to make things more interesting, comes from Wuppertal in Germany! Despite not really caring who won the World Cup, I found myself subconsciously supporting Spain in the final. The only reason I can think of for this is that I quite like visiting Spain on my holidays. The least I can do is support their football team in return for their hospitality. I’m quite easily distracted at times and my mind can wander to a vast array of weird and wonderful things. The example I’m going to share with you on this occasion came to me during this football (or “soccer” for those of you in the US) match between Spain and the Netherlands. As I watched the ball go back and forth between opposing players – and on occasion directly from one goalie to the other – my mind wandered as I noticed the multitude of banners advertising different companies around the pitch. There were banners for Adidas, Sony, Coca-Cola, McDonald’s and Budweiser to name a few. I sat there and wondered to myself, “How effective are these adverts?” I decided that some of these adverts must be more effective than others when using this platform to reach their target market. I praise the strategic placement by Adidas because it is a company that manufactures sports clothing, which is likely to be of interest to a considerable percentage of football fans who will be watching. Similarly, people watching the game on TV at home or in a public bar could see the banners for Budweiser or Coca-Cola and as a result think “I could really do with a Budweiser!” – just as I did! Unfortunately, however, I was sitting at home with no access to any Budweiser… Of course, this is the aim of the banner and I’m sure it works quite effectively. In my mind, I compared the effectiveness of the ‘drinks’ banners to that of ‘electrical goods’ banners which have used the exact same method to reach their target market. Let’s first think about the platform for advertising here: The World Cup final. A quick search on the internet suggests there were over 18 million viewers in the UK watching the game on British television. Before the game took place, FIFA expected an audience of 700 million worldwide to watch the final. Even if viewers turned out to be significantly fewer than this prediction, it would undoubtedly still reach a considerable number of potential customers. As a means of embedding your brand in the minds of your target market, I say this is a very effective way to reach millions globally. Maybe the decision to advertise in this way would be more straight-forward for companies such as Coca-Cola as they are presumably targeting anyone who drinks liquid – which I shouldn’t need tell you is a pretty high percentage of the world’s population! However, for companies that specialise in electrical goods – which are not necessities of life (don’t tell my fiancée I said that) – as high value and infrequent purchases, from a consumer point of view there is more at stake and a bigger purchase decision to be made. Such companies must assess who they are targeting and who they would reach by each method of advertising before deciding on a platform. At first, I questioned whether electrical goods companies would see as much return on investment as drinks companies would. Will people see these banners and think, “I could really do with a new TV”? My guess would be that the need for a beer would come before the need for a new TV, but then again, I was watching the game in high-definition on a 40-inch screen! Despite this, this approach still does the job of raising awareness and embeds the brand in the minds of millions. Not bad for something as simple as a banner with your logo on, is it? Not that a pitch-side banner at the final of the World Cup will be within every company’s budget, mind! I’ll leave you now with one final example, which truly shows how effective advertising and sponsorship can be. Domino’s Pizza sponsored television coverage of the World Cup and Britain’s Got Talent, and it has been reported that the company has seen sales rise to 237.1 million – an increase of 21% in the last half year leading up to June 27, making a £17.5m pre-tax profit. Even more impressive, sales were said to have been up 65% on the day of England’s only World Cup win, increasing by a whopping 333% during the hours the match was shown! To find out more about Domino’s recent successes, click here to read Domino’s Pizza Plc Half Yearly Report.
Marketing Laid BareWednesday, June 23rd, 2010  Apparently Diego Maradona, coach of the Argentina football team, has claimed that if Argentina wins the World Cup he’ll celebrate by running around naked in Buenos Aires. Pepsi has pounced on this statement and jumped on the World Cup band wagon by announcing that, if Argentina is victorious, their soft drinks bottles will be sold in Argentina for a week without labels. The following print advert, demonstrating Pepsi’s promise, is currently running in the country:  Would a week without branding be compensated for by the hype surrounding such a bold, high-profile move? One would certainly imagine so. Still, the staff of our English office are not expecting Argentina to win the World Cup anyway…! « Previous Entries |
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