Advertising Plan for Shazam - Research Paper Example

Insert Insert Grade Insert 23 October Advertising Plan for Shazam Executive Summary This is an advertising plan for Shazam entertainment limited intended to revitalize the service through effective brand positioning, widened reach to capture other segments and increasing use among the main target – Smartphone users. This plan recognizes the company’s strength that comes with its association with top television program producers and other players in the entertainment sectors and even recommends that this helps when formulating a good strategy for this campaign. The industry is ever-growing with content from artists, program managers and the viewership appetite. The various platforms in the mobile phone operating systems have also been changing at a first pace and hence the company’s need for an advertising strategy geared to keep up with this dynamism. The main objective is to expand the target market for about 200% within the first half of the period of advertising and even grow it further in the long run. This is to be achieved at a very lean but objective budget estimate of about 2% of the total revenue derived from additional sales or profit. The plan further outlines an evaluation criterion for the proposed advertisement campaign to ensure that all set objectives and targets are met in accordance with the schedule and in line with the rapid changes being experienced in the industry. Situational Analysis Shazam entertainment limited is a privately owned company connecting over 250 million individuals to their preferred brand, TV shows and music (Shazam Entertainment Ltd 2). This advertisement plan aims to leverage on this potential and exploit other avenues to ensure that the brand derives further gains in the competitive industry. The multimedia content industry is at the peak of competition today owing to vibrant watching and sharing population that mostly consist of the youth. This has been further enhanced by an ever growing number of social sites that people are able to communicate using tools like voice, text and video chats. In the process of these communications in the internet, the users end up commenting on various things and sharing information that sometimes can be in the form of referrals to some form of -multimedia content. Shazam has a presence in the world’s major cities laden with social media enthusiasts. It is positive to note that it has been positioned to take advantage of the opportunities that come with the ever growing mobile phone platforms that have come to be the single most effective and preferred communication and entertainment tool in the world today. The product was launched back in the year 2002. The application has achieved a lot in terms of acceptance in the market as evidenced by the number of downloads it has gained so far by Smartphone users. However, there are several competitors offering a similar service in the industry, some of which have an upper hand because they are involved in manufacturing Smartphones. Shazam has, however, gone out of its way to collaborate with labels, program producers and broadcasters and, therefore, positioning itself as an all round entertainment content application. The purchase process is as simple as downloading the application and viewing content that can then be viewed and shared at a relatively lower cost. The application also comes with other content such as news and trivia on the current entertainment industry happenings. The main market segment for this application is that of mobile phone users especially the Smartphone users. Other segments include tablet users and other personal computer users. This makes the mobile phone users the primary market because of the larger number of people having one, and the frequency of internet use among this group due to its portability and flexibility. In terms of demography, the youthful populations are the primary targets of this content even though the presence of television programs brings on board the other category like the elder individuals who might want to view or share their favorite programs with others. The long term sales objective of this plan is to be able to double the users of this product worldwide and make it a brand name in the industry. In the short term, the content platform should be widened to bring in other segments of the population that are not yet used to this product functionality through massive product campaigns. Advertising Objectives The main objective of this plan is to widen the scope of the company’s product to an average of 40% besides making it the most preferred brand when it comes to multimedia content access and viewership among the ever changing Smartphone platforms in the world. This will be attained through a close consideration of the advertising pyramid components that include awareness creation, cultivating user interest, attaining credibility, creating a desire among potential users and lastly, taking action to ensure the targeted users purchase the product. In quantified terms, the growth in user numbers should be about 200% percentage points six months from the time the plan comes into effect. The market growth in terms of geography should be at least 40% to ensure that more users from different cultural backgrounds are also brought on board through differentiated service. Advertising Strategy This will be catered for in terms of the product concept, the target audience and the advertising message that will appeal to the potential users. To begin with, there is a plan to differentiate the product by developing the application in different languages and giving it themes according to different cultural backgrounds the targeted users may be coming from. For instance, this plan proposes the use of thematic colors that depict the different flags of the world’s nations. Secondly, the target audience includes the Smartphone users due to its ever growing number of users in the world despite the rising number of Smartphone models. The main aim here is to keep at par with the changes in the different platforms so that users have frequent updates of the application to cope with the dynamism of the industry. The proposed communication media include the different social media platforms, use of interactive texts and television advertising to create more attention towards the product. Consequently, the main advertising message should be bringing your Smartphone to the current tunes and content. Users are assured of keeping up with the happenings in the entertainment industry besides the availability of new releases at the go. This is very important since sharing the content requires that you have managed to access the content first. The company’s record with the various program producers should be cited as the main strength in ensuring that the content will be availed in good time and in the required quality and download or viewing speeds. Budget This section handles two components on budgeting, that is, the effects of the method of allocation and the specific allocation method itself. This plan adopts a lean budgeting approach to ensure that sunken costs associated with this advertising are not a burden to the company. However, it is important to spend a realistic amount to be able to position this brand to an international platform and taking into account the intense rivalry in the industry. This advertising is based on the criteria that sales will be increased by an average of forty percent; thus, driving the profit margin upwards. The method of allocating funds, therefore, is that of a derived sales or profit percentage. This plan proposes that the company begins by allocating 2% of the previous year profit or the equivalent of that and thereafter review it to 2.5% if there is a significant growth in sales. Since units are a definite criteria here, this can also be approached in terms of the marginal increase in say the additional downloads as a result of this advertising campaign. Testing and Evaluation This section addresses the issues of performance that may arise as a result of investing on this plan. There are different areas that can be pre-evaluated and post- evaluated to ensure that targeted results are being achieved at required levels and timeframes. The elements would include the markets, the message and brand positioning whereas methodologies would include conducting surveys, attitude tests and aided recall tests. The budget would also be reviewed to ensure that the costs of evaluation are catered for. For instance, users of Shazam will be frequently asked to fill a short survey on how they rate the application. Work Cited Shazam Entertainment Ltd. “Shazam: About the Company.” Shazam Entertainment Ltd, 2012.Web. 22nd Oct. 2012. Read More