E-marketing Communications Plan for IBB - Assignment Example

 E-marketing communications plan for IBB Executive Summary 1 Executive Summary Digital Media is gaining popularity and is also known as New Media. Many people think the new media will soon overtake the old one, but after billions of investments in the new media it has yet to reach the point of the old media. Both are equally important and none of them take each other’s position. To illustrate, the old media has its own significance where the new media has its popularity and importance. Therefore, if we ignore the new media in this fast-moving world, we will be left behind in the race and competitors will take the market. Hence, if we work through this new channel, it can make our work far faster and better than it used to be. Many Companies have moved away from big advertising expenditures that used to be a huge part of their marketing programs and have instead poured money into less expensive PR/Social Media programs. This digital media enabled long-term partnership with consumers and also provided cost-effective solutions. Companies switching to new media are within the latest trend and respond to the need of the market since most consumers prefer online channels these days. Indeed, online media are gaining popularity and consumers easily trust them. Today, content is created, consumed, commented on, collaborated over and circulated at an ever-accelerating pace through the social media, search engines and digital content. Companies have to move quickly to identify, learn from and engage in conversations that are related to their brands. They need to communicate using channels preferred by an increasingly selective audience. So, it has been decided to launch a full flash digital marketing campaign using different mediums. I will closely work with digital marketing agencies to ensure media relations campaigns dovetail with blogger relations and other social media PR strategies, as well as wider marketing and communications initiatives. We work “with our clients to identify and track the most influential and relevant industry analysts and work out strategies for engaging with them. “ (http://triercompany.com/services/analyst-relations/) For a new website launch, we will work for reputation management strategies, as well as communications services that meet our goals and objectives. We will take the time to understand our unique culture and challenges, which will help us come up with marketing strategies that will give us ultimate success. We will get the services of those agencies which specialize in helping clients build corporate visibility through high-profile media relations. We will also engage several crisis management experts, experienced in handling communications around a wide range of issues. During a campaign, nationwide network of highly experienced social media mavens will target both consumers and influences. The services that we will explore include research, brand category identification, message composition, ID maintenance, campaign development, execution and reporting. Methodology Since the world economy is influenced by globalization processes, the total business environment has dramatically changed of late. Competition is no more limited to a single market place, it has also expanded internationally. The technological advancement today creates competitive advantages in every industry and sector. Importantly, digital marketing is on boom and many businesses are shifting their budget to this new form of marketing. Before working on any report, it is vitally important to do a research. In particular, researchers have to ensure they understand the topic right, and then they need to gather data and craft it in a fine report, which should be understandable in the context of its target market. In other words, researchers carry out a research and transform the facts that they have obtained in a sequence, so that readers can easily understand the idea and the situation described in the report. In order to complete this study, a number of secondary sources was used to collect all data and extract the most relevant information. Secondary Sources: Secondary sources are used to support the study and make it more authentic. Specifically, the sources used to complete this study are: Books: To present the concept of digital marketing and its mediums, a number of books and manuals were written all around the globe. Therefore, we used many books as secondary sources to complete this study. Internet: There are many websites that can give basic information about the topic. For example, those that have been helpful in writing the report on the topic were www.google.com, www.ehow.com and some official websites of United Kingdom. We used the company’s website as well to understand the nature of the business and offerings available. It is worth mentioning that without these, the study could not be completed. So the website of the company that was used to produce the report is http://www.islamic-bank.com. Company Overview: Islamic banking is now gaining momentum in most Islamic countries. New banks are emerging offering solely banking services based on the Islamic code of conduct. Most of the Conventional Banks are already offering Banking windows in their portfolio of services. In the West, all banks have Islamic Banking services catering to the requirements of the Muslim community. Islamic Bank of Britain is United Kingdom's first Financial Services Authority (FSA) approved Islamic bank. It’s a first standalone bank of the western world. “The bank was launched on London Stock Exchange on 12 October 2004.” (HomeLoan Partnershi. http://www.homeloanpartnership.com/ancillary.asp) The core aims of the IBB are to offer friendly services, both inclusive and personal, to all customers. Not only has it been registered by the Financial Services Authority (FSA), but “It is also a member of Financial Ombudsman Service.” (the Financial Services Authority) The Bank offers appealing services to its customers, including personal banking, corporate banking and Sharia Finance. In personal services, it offers routine services, along with saving accounts, home purchase plans, money transfer services, debit cards, dormant accounts, etc. As far as business services are concerned, it offers business current accounts, business on demand saving accounts, business finance, commercial property finance, Masjid’s and charities. Moreover, Internet banking gives 24/7 online services; allows customers access their accounts and take advantage of a wide range of services. Market Characteristics: United Kingdom part was almost “equal to 3% of the total global market for Sharia compliant assets. What is more, it is the eighth largest market for Islamic finance worldwide with almost $18 billion Sharia compliant assets.” (BUILDING ISLAMIC BANKING PRODUCT DIVERSITY http://www.cpifinancial.net/v2/Magazine.aspx?v=1&aid=678&cat=IBF&in=17) The Bank targets “everyone and bank products can appeal to both, Muslim or non-Muslim customers.” (BUILDING ISLAMIC BANKING PRODUCT DIVERSITY) Our bank follows very strict Sharia guidelines and customers can enjoy exacting ethical standards of our banking. The Bank invests its customers’ money in ethically accepted businesses, for example, money is not invested in alcohol, tobacco or drugs companies or anything harmful for human beings. As this is a service industry, all customers look forward to receiving the best possible services from the supplier. Through our website, customers will be able to manage their accounts easier and regardless of location and time. This will help customers get better services within the products they are interested in. Also, from the corporate clients’ perspective, they will save both time and cost thanks to online services. To specify, interested clients may visit our new website and find the service pertaining to their need. It is free for them. Also, it will save time. The latter is very important for businesses, which get a chance to access their accounts and transfer money. The fact there is no need to visit the Bank again and again will help them increase their efficiencies. Porters Five Analysis: Competitive Rivalry: There are many banks in the UK with some of them offering Islamic Banking services on the market. The banks usually distinguish their services and products in order to attract consumers and corporate clientele. In addition, many banks have highly professional websites, almost all of them offering online services and most of them targeting consumers through digital marketing and making the business environment very competitive. Currently the UK has five fully Sharia compliant financial institutions, IBB being one of them. The major competitors of IBB are: European Islamic Investment Bank (EIIB): It was the first independent Islamic investment bank which was approved by FSA in year 2006. The Bank of London and the Middle East: It opened in 2007 and continues giving services to individuals and corporate worldwide. European Finance House: This was authorized by FSA in 2008 and it’s a subsidiary of the A-rated Qatar Islamic Bank, which is one of the biggest banks in Qatar, with almost 57% market share. Gatehouse Bank: It got authorization in 2008 from FSA. The bank is a subsidy of the Kuwait listed Sharia investment company named The Securities House KSCC. Bargaining Power of Customers This is a service industry which is characterized by customers that have always been looking for the best “service without paying any fees or paying very competitive prices. “ (Best Car Insurance Companies) If any of the suppliers is charging for the fees, better results are suggested. In this context one has to mention that customers have a chance to select between paying for the services or using the services free of charge. As for IBB, it offers free of charge online services and a highly advanced website which is easy to use in the most effective manner. Bargaining Power of Suppliers: In order to gain power and authority, Islamic banks have to produce the best results and give the best services to suppliers. Partners should have a chance to gain benefits from them based on mutual understanding. Importantly, the supplier power has always been low in this industry because hundreds of companies can give services. Barriers to Entry (Threat of New Entrant): Barriers to entry checklist Level Competition High Investment requirements High Quality of Services High Switching Cost Medium Brand Identity High Threat of Substitute: There are few substitutes available to consumers. If they invest, they have few substitutes. Yet, as for deposits, they have to come to banks. Smart Objectives: IBB is one of the market leaders in the Islamic banking market of the UK. It also plans to expand its business into other countries. Currently the company’s main focus is to launch a new website at the European Market, i.e. United Kingdom. Below are some of the key objectives of the company related to the introduction of its new website: To capture market shares in the most promising financial region of the world, which is United Kingdom, within the first two years after launching the website. To facilitate development of up-to-date technology and ease of services. Launch full flash digital marketing campaign to increase profitability To increase the sales in the region by 20% within two years and strengthen the company’s financial position. Improve the overall profitability of the company by at least 5% in the first year and 10% to 12% in the following two years. Introduce the most ethical products to keep the environment clean and unaffected. Customers: United Kingdom is a home to 2.4m Muslims, which is 3.9% of total population (compare with 3.1% in 2004). The Bank can currently serve more” than 50,000 customers. This result was achieved two-years time through the Bank’s expansion of its operations to seven branches from 2004 to 2006.” (] Annual Report 2007) Incidentally, all branches were in Muslim hotspots in and around London and the Midlands. Today IBB has networks of eight branches in “Edgware Road, Whitechapel, Southall & East Ham (London), Small Heath & Alum Rock (Birmingham), Leicester, Manchester and a Premier banking office in Mayfair.” (Islamic Bank of Britain 6.75p Opportunities from Possible Capital Raising ) The Bank primary targets the Muslim market of UK, but also aims at serving high net worth individuals from both UK and Overseas; either Muslim or Non-Muslims, who believe in ethical banking and prefer ethical products. Market Segmentation Strategy: Consumers Core Segments: 1. Employees from different sectors 1. Currently Employed people 2. People who want consumer banking 3. Overseas people who want to invest or transfer money Advantages Large market and increasing numbers High Profit Margins Disadvantages Short term relations. Many Competitors Segment Desirability High Businesses Core Segments: 1. Businesses from diversified industries 1. Individual business persons 2. Overseas businesses dealing in UK 3. Islamic Businesses 4. Online businesses 5. Muslim Entrepreneurs Advantages Long Term Projects New Companies emerging Good margins Disadvantages Many Competitors Segment Desirability High SWOT Analysis: Strengths: Competitive Advantage: We are offering utterly unique and ethical products. Quality of Services: The services on offer are of the highest standard. Competitive Prices: We offer free online services and our rates are very competitive compared to other services. Strong Marketing Strategy: From the start, we are going to promote our services through various channels. This will help us to get more and more job seekers. Strong Business Management Skills: We encourage strong business management skills within various industries. The team is exceptionally experienced and skilled to run the business efficiently and successfully. Website: We will launch an improved and more attractive website. Indeed, our current website (which is also attractive, by the way) will be re-launched within our digital marketing campaign. Weakness: New Entrants: Although we have vast experience in dealing with customers, but it is worth considering that our rivals in the market have already launched their digital marketing campaigns. Less Traffic: We do not have sufficient web traffic compared to our rivals. Opportunity: Economic Crisis: As more and more people are looking for how to save their money, they select free services. “Digital marketing boom: Internet marketing is booming and we will also get benefit from it.” (Internet Marketing Company. http://www.the-internet-marketeer.co.uk) Threats: Market Leader: There are many competitors who have already launched their digital marketing campaigns. Government Regulations/Policies: Any upcoming government regulations may restrict our business’s operations and target the customers. Explanation of digital marketing concepts Digital Marketing: Digital marketing is also termed as online marketing. It considers the concept of management and marketing activities through the lens of using electronic media, which includes e-mails, web, the Internet, TV, and other wireless media. It is easy to identify and respond to the customer’s uniqueness with the help of digital data and media (Wind, Mahajan and Wind, 2001). Additionally, digital marketing deals with many areas and the following media which are adapted to perform this task are given below: SEO or Search Engine Optimization Advanced Link Building Online Copywriting Social Media Marketing Word Press & Successful Blogging Google Ad Words Email Marketing Google Analytics & Strategy Google Website Optimizer Search engine optimization: “Search engine optimization is commonly known as SEO which is used to raise the website traffic.” (Website Optimization) For this, the website should be ranked in the first two pages of the search engine. Specifically, if the site is listed in top ranks of the search results, it leads to the fact that the chances of web traffic are greater (Grappone and Couzin, 2011). Advanced Link Building: Link building is also the way of increasing website ranking in search engine results. It is a process of adding links within other websites. This function is performed by submitting links in web directories, use links as signatures and vice versa. Paid and Reciprocal link are more effective compared to unpaid and free links (Leary, 2010). Online Copywriting: It is an internet option which is used to support services and products and allows the reader to take a positive act. The person can execute this action by means of clicking on images, subscribe newsletter or buy any product. The types of online copywriting are ads, catalogs, and pages of business websites (Bly, 2008). Social Media Marketing: Nowadays social media marketing is a popular way of electronic marketing through social media sites, such as Facebook, Twitter etc which help to increase web traffic. Social media marketing requires more personal interaction compared to other traditional marketing ways in order to build vast social networks and gain web traffic (Evans and McKee, 2010). Google Ad words: A Google ad word is a program of the Google search engine that helps you to market your product efficiently. It is a source to connect with the targeted customers who are seeking products and services. Ad word keyword tools give assistance in selecting best match words and expressions for your business and there are no initial charges for subscribing but setting up per click spending on your ad, which is shown in Google search results and Google content network. A Google ad word is considered to be the leading contributor of internet pay per click advertisement around globe (Harnett, 2010). Email Marketing: It is one of online marketing techniques which are used for advertisements of products, services and brands on behalf of groups or organizations. The focus on making new clients or convince existing clients to buy product again. It is also used to appreciate customer’s loyalty and maintain good relations. For this mode of marketing, the company pays to email brokers and subscription services for getting email addresses of future customers (Jenkins, 2009). Google Analytics & Strategy: Google analytics is the most valuable method of bringing web traffic and not only this. It is also used in making search engine optimization strategies function quiet efficiently. The most advanced option in Google analytics is that it not only indicates how much web traffic is on your website, but also lets you know the behavior of the customer while visiting your website (Cutroni, 2010). Google Website Optimizer: Google website optimizer helps you to change some things on your website whether it would be the option for newsletter signing up or something related to products and services buying option. With its help, you can find all latest methods which are attracting the customers and make them interested in your services (Jacobson, 2009). Conclusion: Our main strategy is to make sure our services will function in an appropriate manner responding to the demands of our clients and give them maximum benefits to achieve their goals. We will offer free consultancy, give them extra saving packages, discounted packages, partnering with other businesses to improve services and marketing, as well as make combined packages for mutual benefit. We will serve our customers on top priority and make their life easier and better. Sales Strategy: We will offer free online services to consumers and corporate clients; will add value to the clients’ life through improved online services and customer satisfaction through our customer care center, which will save money and time. We will offer competitive prices and low margins and give our customers freedom of selecting as many options as possible, and making choice depending on their affordability. We will launch a full flash digital marketing campaign to increase our customers’, portfolio which will increase our revenues. These core competitive advantages make us unique in promoting the business and its services. Service Objectives: We have innovative ideas for people living in United Kingdom and overseas, namely those who are looking for Islamic banking services at their door step. We will offer most trusted services and maximum benefits to our corporate and consumer market. We will provide a website with advanced technology, easy payment and money transfer moods. To add, we expect efficiency of the traditional online banking process to improve. Finally, “we want to assist our clients in having a business mindset while managing their businesses. It will save time and money for our clients.” (Competitive advantage. Competitive advantage) Recommendations: Promotion Strategy: Pull Strategy: In order to promote our services, we will use multiple channels. Our main advertising strategies will be based on product comparison advertising and product benefits advertising. We will create awareness about our new website, our improved services, its benefits and functions at the beginning of the campaign. Significantly, we will emphasize the following two objectives: Creating awareness amongst the target market, and Building a brand name in the market. This is the reason we will initially focus on joint ventures and social media marketing/networking. We will place emphasis on online channels of advertising. Some of the advertising media that we have selected are as follows: Website: We have a website that tells everything about us, our products and services. This helps a lot to our potential clients to gather all information about us and contact us through email and telephone number provided. Currently, our website has a well-developed and informative content including a blog and customer feedback/interaction sections. This site is the primary link listed on advertising booklets and flyers. Social media marketing: “Social Media have become a large part of online traffic, and it continues to grow. Now more than ever, it's imperative for us to take advantage of the marketing opportunities available through the social media.” (Social Media Marketing. http://apartx.com/social.html) We will utilize the existing social media to promote our business and create pages on social networks, such as Facebook, MySpace, Orkut, Twitter etc. In doing this we are guided by understanding that all social sites are used to generate awareness buzz about the product, and build the brand image. Search Engine Optimization: “SEO may target different kinds of search, including image search, local search, video search and industry-specific vertical search engines. This will help us to maintain a web site web presence.” (Search Engine Optimised Websites: what does it mean for the Small Business Owner. http://limeshot.com/2011/search-engine-optimised-websites-what-does-it-mean-for-the-small-business-owner) E-mail marketing: This will be used for our regular customers, including our high profile customers and business customers and used for providing information on new deals and promotions. E-mail Program – a monthly or quarterly newsletter to highlight new products, promotions, special events, and lure subscribers to the website for further info. We will use opt-in to build lists - No Spam. Below are some activities we can consider: Sending Automatic Welcome E-mails Develop Customer Databases and keep lists clean Build professionally looking templates Ask Readers to "forward" the newsletter to friends and family High Quality writing & content Short but sweet with a "call to action" Online Directory: We will also register our company details with many online business directories. In addition, we will promote our services on the Internet and related online directories. We will advertise through banner ads on websites as well. Finally, we will pick high traffic websites related to the sectors we are targeting for enterprises. Online Banner Ads: We will advertise through banner ads on websites. We will pick high traffic websites related to sectors we are targeting for enterprises. (Offline Marketing – What You Need To Know) Blog Marketing: We will host a blog where users can follow the progress of the business and discuss it with others, as well as offer tips for other users regarding issues they wish to discuss. IBB will also actively seek out other blogs within the interests mentioned and post comments to build product awareness. References: Wind, Y., Wind, J. and Mahajan, V. (2001), Digital marketing: global strategies from the world's leading experts, p. 130 Grappone, J. and Couzin, G. (2011), Search Engine Optimization: An Hour a Day, John Wiley and Sons Leary, S. (2010), Beginning WordPress 3, Apress, p. 101 Bly, R. W.(2008), Getting Started as a Freelance Writer, Sentient Publications, p. 162 Evans, D. and McKee, J. (2010), Social Media Marketing: The Next Generation of Business Engagement, John Wiley and Sons Harnett, M. (2010), A Quick Start Guide to Google AdWords: Get Your Product to the Top of Google and Reach Your Customers, Kogan Page Publishers Jenkins, S. (2009), The truth about email marketing, FT Press Cutroni, J. (2010), Google Analytics, O'Reilly Media, Inc., p. 1 Jacobson, H. (2009), Google AdWords for Dummies, For Dummies, p. 305 Read More