Marketing strategies and implementation

¶ … acquaints the reader with a proposed set of marketing strategies of a fresh breakfast cereal brand of Australian Fruit Pty Ltd.; named as Crispy Fruit. Australian Fruit Pty Ltd. is one of the top competitive organizations in the health and nutritional foods industry in Australia. It has always served the Australian consumers with a large variety of nutritional foods manufactured by meeting the highest standards of quality and business operations.

Based on the external environmental analysis, the new brand Crispy Fruit has attractive opportunities to emerge the market and make its brand lovers in a short span of time. The highly favorable consumption behavior of Australians, fast pace nutritional food industry, and the company's strong rand image will have a positive impact on the growth of Crispy Fruit.

Target market

To strengthen a newly established brand in the industry, an organization must effectively define the target market for that brand (Dickson & Ginter, 1987). An effectively defined target market not only boosts up the marketing and promotional efforts of the organization, but also contributes to an increased volume of sales and sales returns. Identifying a target market also helps the marketing section in their marketing research process (Kotler & Armstrong, 2008).

Crispy Fruit is a highly nutritional breakfast brand intending to serve the old Australians with an age group of 50-70 years. This target market is chosen for Crispy Fruit based on some segmentation variables. The first variable is the consumer preferences in life. In this case, the old age Australians believe that nutritional and healthy food is an essential part of their lives. They are highly keen towards including these foods in their daily diet plans.

The second variable is the income level of these old age Australians. Although every old age Australian believes that the nutritional foods are essential in their life, but they vary with respect to their income level. Therefore the target market is further limited to the income level of these old age Australians. Based on these two variables, Crispy Fruit will mainly target the low income group of Australians who are in the age group of 50 to 70 years.

Another important segmentation variable is the location of Australian Fruit Pty outlets. To make the Crispy Fruit a successful brand, Australian Fruit Pty will make it available in every outlet for the initial stage of its product cycle. The rationale behind it is to explore the most potential target location for Crispy Fruit. This variable depends upon the former variable, income level up to much extent. Reason being, it has to target the low income level Australians. So the areas in which Crispy Fruit will be available will mostly fall in the low income areas of Australia.

Finally, the target market will be characterized on the basis of flavors and tastes of nutritional foods. The Crispy Fruit will be offered in more than one flavor which will increase its chances of liking by the target consumers who have diverse taste and liking habits. Moreover, Crispy Fruit will meet all the quality and health standards. This is such a characteristic which is demanded by every type of consumer (Kotler & Armstrong, 2008).

These all variables clearly define the target market for Crispy Fruit. Defining this target market does not mean that Australian Fruit Pty will not try to attract the other categories of Australian consumers. Rather, it will keep its main focus on the old age Australians but market the brand in a broader meaning to attract every type of consumers.

Section 3: Setting marketing objectives for the organization

The purpose of setting marketing objectives is to keep all the organizational members directed towards one goal, ensuring an efficient use of organizational resources, and achieving the set goals in the specified time period (Dickson & Ginter, 1987).

The most important marketing objective of Crispy Fruit is to create its awareness among the target consumers. This is very essential to develop this brand in the target market (Kotler & Armstrong, 2008). The second objective is to gain a high market share and get back the initial capital outlay which was invested to launch this brand. Crispy Fruit will try to attract new consumers as well as snatch the loyal customers from the existing competitors in the industry.

Another marketing objective is to run a strong marketing campaign for Crispy Fruit. To meet this objective, Australian Fruit Ply will use all the promotional mediums and a large chain of distribution channels. These all promotional campaigns and distribution cannels will help the organization in attracting and persuading the consumers to use this brand (Dickson & Ginter, 1987). The ultimate marketing objective is to make the target consumers aware of a quality brand in the nutritional food industry which they have never used before.

Section 4: The marketing mix

The Marketing Mix, also known as the four P's of Marketing is an essential component of a marketing plan (Kotler & Armstrong, 2008). It is composed of four different components; Product, Price, Place, and Promotion. Every organization must devise a full fledge marketing mix which could effectively describe its strategies and plans related to all the 4 P's of marketing. These strategies and plan are described in the light of previously defined target market, analysis of the external environment, and the set marketing objectives. This section describes each of the 4 P's of Australian Fruit Pty for its new brand Crispy Fruit.

1. Product Strategies:

The first P. Of marketing is Product. It constitutes all the product related strategies which the organization must develop and implement for its brand (Dickson & Ginter, 1987). The very first and the most important product strategy is its quality (Kotler & Armstrong, 2008). It all depends upon the consumers' perception and consumption behavior towards different brands in a particular industry. Some consumers are quality conscious while others are price conscious.

Crispy Fruit is claimed to be a brand which meets the highest standards of nutrition and quality. Although it will target the old age Australians who prefer to choose breakfast cereals that are less expensive, but they will like this brand which takes both qualities in it; a reasonable price and high quality.

Quality of a brand is also judged by its organization (Dickson & Ginter, 1987). An organization which has a well-established public image, strong business model, sound financial strength, and high level of acceptability of its existing brands does not face any type of difficulty in making its new brands penetrate in the market (Kotler & Armstrong, 2008). Crispy Fruit is the new brand of Australian Fruit Pty which is a well-recognized organization in the nutritional food products. If it introduces this brand any where in Australian region or even in nearby countries, they will highly appreciate its new brand.

Another product strategy is the ingredients used in the product. It is very important for health conscious consumers and most of the people do not compromise on the ingredients used in manufacturing a product. Crispy Fruit is a quality product which will guarantee that it does not contain any type of artificial flavors or preservatives. It will also help to attract the target consumers (Waterschoot & Bulte, 1992).

Product strategies also include the product design and packaging. An innovative product design and packaging make consumers feel that it is a quality product. Keeping in view this general perception of consumers, Crispy Fruit will be available in an attractive packaging and design.

2. Pricing Strategies:

The second P. Of marketing is Price. Pricing is often the most dominating factor in the purchase decisions. Every consumer wants that he has to pay the minimum possible price for whatever he purchases for his use. An organization needs to set a price which not only covers its cost of manufacturing and administration but also gives it an attractive return or profit.

Crispy Fruit intends to serve the low income group of the Australian market. The consumers will mainly belong to the last age group who have very limited or no means of earning. As a top quality breakfast cereal, the price of Crispy Fruit will be a little higher than those of low quality and un-known brands already present in the industry. But setting a low price for this brand will not be possible for Australian Fruit Pty as the costs of research and development and manufacturing are increasing day by day. However it can be suggested that it should charge a very reasonable price to attract a large number of consumers; especially from the low income level group.

Australian Fruit Pty should not charge the competition-based pricing for its Crispy Fruit brand because it will throw it out of the market in the initial stage of its product life cycle (Waterschoot & Bulte, 1992). Reason being, the top and well-recognized brands are charging a high price for their similar products. If Crispy Fruit competes on the basis of price, it will not be able to survive. It is recommended that it should compete with the strength of its quality and brand image of Australian Fruit Pty.

As far as the decision to use penetration pricing or skimming pricing is concerned, Crispy Fruit should be emerged with the penetration pricing (Waterschoot & Bulte, 1992). That is; set a low price in the introductory stage then gradually increase it with the passage of time. It will help it to strengthen the customer base and increase the level of acceptability in the market (Waterschoot & Bulte, 1992). Price skimming should not be used in any case. This is because all the top competitors of Crispy Fruit are charging high price because they have a surety of a developed customer base. If Crispy Fruit charges a higher price than these competitors, no consumer will like to pick a new brand with a higher price in the presence of their favorite brand or brands (Waterschoot & Bulte, 1992). Converse to this situation, if Crispy Fruit charges a very less price than the other top competitors, there may begin a price war in the near future when the introductory stage of Crispy Fruit will transform into the growth stage (Kotler, Armstrong, Harker, & Brennan, 2009).

Another reason for keeping the price of Crispy Fruit reasonable and affordable for the old Australians is that the existing product line of Australian Fruit Pty is not premium-priced. If it decides to follow the same pricing strategy, Crispy Fruit will get the same high level of acceptability among the members of the target market. Further, the legal requirements will also restrict Australian Fruit Pty of not charging a very high price for its product in the initial stage.

In a nutshell, it can be said that Australian Fruit Pty has to analyze the competitors as well as the legal requirements and constraints to set the price of Crispy Fruit at an optimum level that would be easily acceptable by the target market (Waterschoot & Bulte, 1992).

3. Place Strategies:

All the distribution decisions fall in the Place strategies (Waterschoot & Bulte, 1992). Place constitutes the organization's decisions about which distribution channel it should use for its brand. There are two commonly used distribution channels in the manufacturing sector. The first distribution channel is selling the product direct to the consumers. For instance; opening own outlets at different locations in the target location. Australian Fruit Pty has always focused on using this channel for its product line. This cannel enables it to save the cost of using distribution channels.

The second distribution channel is through the supply chain members. These constitute business development agencies, wholesalers, and retailers (Kotler & Armstrong, 2008). If Australian Fruit Pty uses this channel, it will cost it a little higher than the former channel. This is because these supply chain members will charge their own commission which will directly hit the cost of Crispy Fruit (Waterschoot & Bulte, 1992).

Keeping in view the benefits and limitations of both the distribution channels, it would be best for Australian Fruit Pty to use the direct distribution channel for Crispy Fruit. That is; expand its outlet chain throughout the country instead of using private outlets for this purpose.

As far as the distribution strategies are concerned, the focus of Australian Fruit Pty should be to make the new brand Crispy Fruit as a selective product in the shortest possible time. Selective distribution means the Crispy Fruit should be a preference of consumers rather than an alternative choice in case of their favorite brand is not available. It requires a lot of promotional efforts as well as continuous improvement in the product design (the outlook, external features, and design) and the process design (taste, quality, purity, perfection, and customer satisfaction) (Bamford & Forrester, 2010).

In the introductory stage, Australian Fruit Pty should make Crispy Fruit available only in the major outlets at different location. But with the passage of time, it should offer it at all the small and big outlets throughout the country.

The placement of Crispy Fruit should be one the high shelf at each of its outlets. It will make the consumers believe it as a high quality and one of the top brands of Australian Fruit Pty (McDaniel & Gates, 1998). It will also increase the chances of being chosen by the target consumers (Kotler & Armstrong, 2008).

4. Promotion Strategies:

Promotion strategies are also known as communication strategies (Kotler & Armstrong, 2008). Promotion is simply the way an organization communicates important information about its brand to the target market (Waterschoot & Bulte, 1992). There are various promotional mediums each of them has its own role in the development of an organization's business. The most important and widely used promotional medium is advertising. Advertising is done on electronic media, print media, and online sources (Kotler & Armstrong, 2008).

Crispy Fruit will compete in the nutritional food industry which essentially requires its participants to make the consumers aware of their brands in order to achieve a sustainable and secure future in the market (Hill & Jones, 2007).

Australian Fruit Pty should use all the advertising mediums for Crispy Fruit, including electronic media (television, radio) and print media (daily newspapers, health magazines, Australian Fruit Pty's own publications, broachers, bill boards, etc.). Another most commonly used advertising medium is social media networking sites. Social media has proved to be the most cost efficient and effective advertising mediums of the present times (Male, 2010). Australian Fruit Pty can use Facebook, twitter, Linkedin, Google+, etc. For the promotion of its Crispy Fruit brand.

When using the print media, Australian Fruit Pty should use billboards and banners in the localities nearby its outlets. But it should avoid using the small size in-store displays. These are not an effective medium of advertising because consumers rarely stop to see the small text and pictures on these small size displays. Converse to this medium, it should use the large billboards in the big cities and major town which contain large text and pictures visible to every one even from a large distance (Kotler & Armstrong, 2008).

In addition to advertising, Australian Fruit Pty should use the personal and direct selling techniques through its sales executives. These sales executives will personally meet the target consumers and introduce the company's brand and its specifications in a clear and informative manner. They can also be given free samples of the Crispy Fruit so that they can check the taste and flavor. It will help them to make purchase decision in favor of the Crispy Fruit (Waterschoot & Bulte, 1992).