Addition of Innovative Technologies to Car Models by Holden Australia - Case Study Example

Case study - Holden Australia - Marketing and Survey Research Introduction Holden, an Australian based vehicle manufacturing company was facing a tough time in the local market. The highly competent flagship product of the company Commodore was not being able to capture significant market share whereas the other small traditional cars were hitting on high sales. Since the company was not being able to achieve profit margins in the local market though the vehicle market was a booming sector at that time, the management decided to leave the Australian market. Answer 1 MDP: Should Holden improve on their product lines by addition of innovative technologies to their car models or introduce a completely different product range so as to attract more of the Australian consumers towards their brand? Rationale: The major managerial problem was rapid failures in the new product development. Holden should have tried to determine the reason behind the failures of its new product developments. The company did not aim to understand the changing needs of the consumer market but focused only on profit growth which led to such an erroneous managerial decision. The new product development is a strategy that is adopted by a company when it intends to enter into new market with existing products. Customers nowadays focus on more on quality and new technology based products. The problem that resulted from the management’s decision was quitting the Australian market which somewhere was coincided with Holden’s failure in the local market. The flagship product of Holden was Commodore whose sales fell down by 9%. The vehicle manufacturing company was producing those cars that were not demanded by the consumers anymore. Commodore which had hit high sales three years ago was declining on the sales growth. Though the vehicle market was booming the locally made cars by Holden was failing miserable. The traditional small cars had hit high sales in the financial year but the locally made cars by Holden had seen a slump down in sales. The company was manufacturing different kind of products without being concerned of what was actually the demand of the Australian market. Then because of the problem faced by Holden the management decided to leave the Australian market. Holden’s key goals were to be the market leader of the vehicle manufacturing industry through the range of products it offered. Its aim was to acquire more of market share than to really understand what kind of modifications its product line required so as to support the changing consumer demand. The new product development strategy is adopted to sustain in the existing market with product differentiation based on the consume demand. The goal of the company to be market leader has enforced on the management to take the decision of moving away from the local market as they were not being able to achieve the desirable profits. The company’s goal to be the leader made it adopt the new product development strategy which eventually led to downfall of sales rather the growth that Holden had expected (Zimmerman and Blythe 45). The marketing strategy should be based on the demand of the consumer market, but Holden lacked the market research techniques. Answer 2 MRP: Holden needs to determine the changing preferences of the Australian consumers towards vehicles and also to identify and analyze where their business operations is lacking according to these consumers. Rationale: The MRP or market research problem is defined “as a broader statement that results into specific components to be focused on for the research process (Kotler 121).” The major decision making problem of the company Holden was its failures in the local market. The flagship products of the company which had seen a rise in the sales growth was not being able to sustain in the booming vehicle market in the current financial year (Birn 102). The market research problem was to identify the changing perceptions of the Australian market so as to launch a new product line and revive its sales growth. The company needs to carry out the research through various primary and secondary data in order to derive at a conclusion as to what exactly the local market consumers demand from the company instead of deciding to leave the Australian market because of its product failures.. The entire research process would enable the company to analyze the changing perceptions of the consumers and at the same time incorporate the changing requirements into their product line (Roberts 92). Answer 3 The research objective is a description related to what is going to be achieved through the research study. The importance of research objective in the market research is to narrow the issues and focus on the problem; it facilitates the development of research methodology, and even provides guidance on the information to be collected to carry on the research study. There are two types of research objective one is the broad objective and the other is specific objective. The broad objective comprise of what is achieved from the study in general terms, whereas the specific objective focus on describing the variables that can be measured through the study. According to the MRP as stated earlier there can be three kinds of research objectives (Kothari 131). RO1 (first research objective): to determine the changing needs of the customers towards vehicles. RO2: to identify the different marketing strategies that can be adopted by Holden so as to increase the sales growth in the next two years. RO3: to determine the areas where the Australian local market feels that Holden is lacking in its business operations. These research objectives are aligned with the marketing research problem as the objectives are based on the expected outcome that would enhance the revenue growth of the company (Creswell 113). Answer 4 Repertory grid technique was invented by George A. Kelly. It is a research technique for elicitation of personal constructs. This instrument was designed to capture the structure and dimensions of personal meaning. It is a method in which people in their own terms gives meanings to their explanations. The repertory grid methodology is more of structured interview design rather than a test. This technique is a structured approach to explore the content of those implicit personal meetings through which we act and perceive in our day to day existence (Jankowicz 49). The appropriateness of this technique is in terms of the four basic steps of element selection, construct identification, element comparisons using grid, and finally analysis of the data generated by the grid. The first is the design phase through which the parameters of the grid are designed in respect to the area of application. The second phase is the administration phase which defines the structured interview and the resulting numerical matrix (Fromm 125). The third phase is the mathematical analysis phase which is based on the reported grid data. The last phase is cognitive measures which focus on the inclusion of the grid data on the basis of the same subject or different subjects. This technique through its structured and mathematical analysis makes it an effective tool for personal interview. The first research objective (RO1) to determine the changing needs of the customers towards vehicles can be based on this technique. The Repertory grid technique has various attributes on basis of which a comparison can be drawn between Holden Australia and the other vehicle market players. This would help to analyze in which respect the customers preferred the other brands more than Holden which led to a decline in the sales of the company. This would in turn help the company to improve on the areas where they were lacking to satisfy the demand of the consumers. Different parameters can be incorporated in terms of quality, speed, innovative technology, customer service, model structure, delivery speed, convenience, price, etc in order to record the numerical data on the views of individuals. This technique would give effective results to determine where Holden should improve (Maxwell 114). The following diagram is a proposed repertory grid that can be implemented by Holden in order to analyze the changing consumer perception towards the vehicle market in relation to RO1, and also help to determine the competitive advantages of its competitors in the industry. Repertory Grid: Preferred attribute (O) Ideal Product Brand 1 : Toyota Brand 2: Hyundai Brand 3 : Mazda Brand 4 : Nissan Non - Preferred attribute (X) Small size cars           Large size cars Advanced technology           Old technology New designs           Outdated designs High speed           Inefficiency in speed Convenience while driving           Lesser convenience Wider choices           Limited choices Customized products           Standard product range Competitive prices           High end pricing High quality           Poor quality Better customer service           Poor customer service Answer 5 Exploratory research helps in identifying the possible reasons for a problem that has not been clearly identified. It helps in providing a base for the research design. A different kind of research technique that can be used for the research objective RO3: to determine the areas where the Australian local market feels that Holden is lacking in its business operations is through a focus group study (Corbin and Strauss 67). There would be 5-6 groups each comprising of 6 members to clearly identify the changing needs of the consumers. There would be no interference by the interviewer as he would be responsible for clearly noting down the opinions of the individual (Salkind 290). The focus group study helps to determine the hidden perception of consumers towards a particular problem statement. This study would reveal the main reasons behind the failure of the brand. The focus group study can incorporate the consumer’s of Holden cars or can even involve people from the local market who are not amongst their consumer base, so as to analyze the default areas of Holden. Works Cited Birn. The International Handbook of Market Research Techniques. UK: Kogan Page Publishers. 2002. Print. Corbin, Strauss. Basics of Qualitative Research. USA: SAGE.2008. Print. Creswell. Research Design: Qualitative, Quantitative, and Mixed Methods Approaches. USA: SAGE Publications. 2009. Print. Fromm. Introduction to the Repertory Grid Interview. Germany: Waxmann Verlag. 2004. Print. Jankowicz. The Easy Guide to Repertory Grids. Great Britain: John Wiley & Sons. 2004. Print. Kothari. Research Methodology: Methods and Techniques. New Delhi : New Age International.2004. Print. Kotler. Marketing Management. New Delhi : Pearson Education India. 2009. Print. Maxwell. Qualitative Research Design. USA: SAGE. 2012. Print. Roberts. Direct Marketing Management. USA : Prentice Hall. 1999. Print. Salkind. Encyclopaedia of Research Design. USA: SAGE. 2010. Print. Zimmerman, Blythe. Business to Business Marketing Management. New York : Routledge. 2013. Print. Read More