KFC\'s Marketing Strategies China. What Successfully Cater

¶ … KFC's marketing strategies China. What successfully cater Chinese market? This include limited: Introduction (history KFC china they're upto today) Market Segmentation strategy ( target market ) Price strategies ( pricing strategy china) Promotion strategies Place strategy ( decide locate strategic reasons) Product strategies ( specific tailored products Chinese market) Conclusion (summary works ).

Some voice concerns, in the present, about the potential saturation of the fast-food market, driven both by the expansion of Western chains and local competitors, as well as by a decreasing purchasing power of local consumers. This paper will aim to address some of these concerns, including by examining the price, place, product and promotion strategies implemented by KFC in China and by looking at how these were customized to match the company's market segmentation strategy. Based on this analysis, the paper aims to draw conclusions and put forward recommendations towards future KFC actions in China.

Market segmentation strategy

Although age is an important part of KFC's market segmentation strategy, it is not prohibitive. The way that KFC structured its menu tends to argue in favor of the fact that older people are also encouraged to eat at KFC restaurants across China. Older people are traditionally more conservative, but KFC also contains traditional Chinese dishes. The diversified menu/portfolio of products allows the company to expand its market.

Promotion Strategy

The first thing that KFC needed to consider when defining its promotion strategy (as was the case with strategies in other areas) was the fact that there are huge cultural differences between the U.S. And the Western world and China. In this particular case, since the promotion strategy included advertising, the immediate impact on the potential client could be disastrous if a translation was not properly done in Chinese or if one did not consider things such as different significance of colors.

The most obvious blunder that KFC made was translating its slogan, possibly the element that has the most immediate impact on the potential client, into Chinese characters. KFC's slogan was "Finger Lickin' Good," its slogan since the 1950s. Its translation, however, into Chinese, was "Eat Your Fingers Off!"

. It corrected its mistake soon enough and the impact was minimal, since the time was the late 1980s and the company was still at the beginning of its expansion into China.

One of the promotional instruments often used on the Western markets by companies are coupons or other forms of discounts. Because of cultural differences (and, in this case, because of a lack of regulations when it came to the online environment and to the distribution process), this also turned to a fiasco when it was used by KFC as a promotion strategy in China

. The company distributed coupons for 50% discounts on its online store. However, these coupons circulated and were reproduced on other websites as well, with the immediate result that a lot more people than expected claimed the discount. The turbulences clearly affected the company's image.

One of the promotion strategy that KFC has planned to launch by October 2013 addresses one of the issues that will be discussed when talking about the product strategy. One of the factors that affected the company's image in China was the campaign that showed KFC used chicken with high amounts of antibiotics in its products. As a way to combat this, the company has proposed an advertising campaign that focuses on its quality assurance process. Part of the message is also targeting the concerns that Chinese had with eating poultry, after the cases of avian flu

The way the ad campaign has been created is interesting, because it includes both store employees and suppliers, who, as seen, have been part of the problems that KFC faced in China. At the same time, it focuses on the benefits of protein, so, from a larger perspective, it also promotes some of its other products, such as shrimp.

Another part of KFC's promotion strategy speculates the new Western habits and traditions that the Chinese have adopted. Although there is a Chinese day of love, many young Chinese (and clients from the segment of consumers that has been previously identified) have migrated towards celebrating St. Valentine's. As such, KFC had promotions during this period of the year, including by customizing its menu to include dishes such as egg tarts. While this strategy seems to have had a positive impact on the company's revenues, there is also a potential backlash: some associate this with extreme commercialism.