Marketing Plan
Outline your product, branding, and packaging strategy
This is a case of a consumer packaged goods that has to be sold under a proper brand name. Packaging and branding are important elements of marketing that should go together since they have a link that is inextricable (Brassington & Pettitt, 2013).It is through a good packaging that we will be able to build a great brand for our product.
Our brand strategy is to use a name and symbol that that identifies and defines our product to the customers. It is a brand name that must be able to create brand loyalty through repeated demand of the products that we make available in the market. The brand name for our product will be V-Fusion + Energy. This is a unique combination of the V-Fusion and Energy. It is more of wording together with the plus sign.
The role of packaging in this industry is currently very significant since it is one way that companies are getting the customers to notice the product (Brassington & Pettitt, 2013). The first important strategy in our case is to get the customers to notice our product. In our strategy, we consider the structural design, environmental and marketing responsibility of the brand.
The market is designed in a sense that products are only judged through the package that they come into the market with. This is the reason as to why our marketers have to put in a lot of time trying to put together one important design of our package. In our packaging, the strategy is to avoid problems that are related to labels, the safety of the environment and customers and the graphics. Our package should be environmentally friendly in the sense that it should be recyclable. The same package has to be well designed with few writings on the surface to ensure ease of reading. The colors must also be related to the theme of the company.
Discussed how you will differentiate yourself against the competition, and explained how the firm may expand upon its product line in the future
Differentiation refers to a strategy where businesses come up with means through which they make their products unique and different from what the competitors have (Varey, 2012). To gain an edge or advantage, our product will have to have a unique feature that stands out compared to what is being provided in the market. The first element of differentiation will be on the branding which will be based on the unique name that identifies our product. The second element of differentiation that we will use is the packaging; the unique and attractive package of the product will make our product different from what is being produced by our competitors.
A new product line will only be introduced at that point when V-Fusion + Energy will have reached its maturity where there are several other products in the market that are closer in appearance and quality to our product (Varey, 2012). At this point, it will mean that it is important that we try and diversify what we have and create a new product that will replace the matured V-Fusion + Energy.
Develop your distribution strategy for the product. What retail outlets will sell your new product? How will you manage your supply chain?
This product has to get to all the consumers that are existent out on the market, in the city and the remotest village in the country. To ensure this takes place, we have to rely upon three stages of outlets. Our product will go to the wholesalers before getting to the shop based retailers who will sell directly to the consumers at the recommended retail price. The decision for such nature of distribution has been reached considering the nature of the product that we are dealing in and the area that the goods have to cover before they reach the final consumers. This method is seen as cost effective since it will cut on our cost of transporting the goods to the customer as well as shift the risk burden to the distributors.
Our supply chain should be made up of the best practices which will enable us to expand our products into a global scale. The world has gotten flatter meaning that the supply chain has gotten longer and, therefore, our company has to apply the best practice in the supply chain. The best practice is to have a great and deep relationship with the customers who are spread across a vast area. This means that we can be able to expand our manufacturing to different parts of the market and be able to sell out to consumers in those different areas. Shifting the manufacturing to different parts that are occupied by our customers makes up part of our supply chain strategy.
Develop your pricing and promotional strategy. How will it focus on your target market?
Our pricing will be based on the target pricing technique. Under this technique, we will look at the cost that is anticipated when creating the product and getting it to the final consumer (Lubliner, 2012).Once the product has been manufactured and gotten to the final consumer, the cost plus mark up will be determined as the means through which the final price will be charged.
The target costing technique above will help our organization in terms of ensuring that the cost of V-Fusion + Energy is monitored to fit into the cost plus markup projection. This technique will ensure that we keep the costs low while ensuring that the consumers are getting fair price for the product
The main question that we ask at our company when it comes to developing a marketing strategy is; how will we contact our customers and what the message will be. The two questions are answered through a three stage process which is very relevant for all the elements that are created under the marketing mix (Lubliner, 2012).
The strategy will be to segment the market where it will be divided into two distinct groups; the urban and the rural consumers. The targeting will be based on deciding which group we will be communicating to. After this, it will be important to come up with a statement which will position our good among the different consumers. The positioning statement will be delivered as a message to the consumers through different mediums which are popular among the different segments. One example is that radio and television for the rural and social media for the urban population.
Define Integrated Marketing Communications. How will you provide clarity and consistency across multiple mediums to maximize the communicative impact?
This method can be defined simply as an expansion. The expansion is related to utilization of the modern as well as the traditional strategies in communication and marketing. It looks to optimize the communication by the organization of a message that is consistent and conveys the brand of the company to the most important stakeholders. In this case, the stakeholders do not only mean the final consumers (Westhuyzen & Horan, 2008). It means all the people that wish to care about the quality that is offered by the product and how it will change the nature with which the industry is managed.
Clarity in our case will be ensured through making sure that we have quality in the content of the message that is being delivered to the final consumer. The first area is the quality in terms of being intelligible and coherent, the second area of quality is that our content should be easy to see through the sharpness of the image and easy to hear through clear sound. The other element of quality is that we will have to be definite in terms of what we are communicating. The other element is purity and transparency in the message that we are passing across.
References
Brassington, F., & Pettitt, S. (2013). Principles of marketing. Harlow, England: FT/Prentice Hall.
Lubliner, M. J. (2012). Branding packaging: The ultimate marketing solution. New York: International Brand Packaging.
Varey, R. J. (2012). Marketing communication: Principles and practice. London: Routledge.
Westhuyzen, B. V., & Horan, L. (2008). Marketing strategies. Observatory: Future Managers.
