Strategic Marketing Plan - Assignment Example

Strategic Marketing Plan: Insert the of your Company Here Insert American Intercontinental Marketing is continuousprocess which requires that all the stages of it are thoroughly explored before making any decision. Product development being one of the most critical aspects of marketing also require that there is an integrated approach to be adopted in order to make a successful entry into any market. Strategic Marketing Plan: Insert the Name of CREATED Company Here Introduction We are a company intending to launch seafood products in UAE markets. UAE is fast becoming one of the most sought after destination for the tourists as well as the local people because of its recent economic growth and substantial increase in the standards of life. Hospitality sector is one such great opportunity existing within UAE markets which can offer a great opportunity to serve our ready to cook seafood products. Our strategy will be based on the value addition proposition which our products will offer besides offering other health benefits. Objectives & Mission Statement Short Term Objectives 1) Establish strategic alliance with at least one local player to ensure local availability of the sea food raw material. 2) Establish at least two outlets where we can sell our products at places where foreign visitors frequently visit in UAE. 3) To start advertisement campaign targeting the visitors especially of European Origins. Through this, we aim to achieve an influx of customers to our outlets. 4) To achieve moderate profitability level. Mission Statement To be the leading seafood products providers in the International market taking care of the nutritional value of our customers beside providing a less expensive, high quality and fresh sea food products to our customers through value addition. Customer Targets Tourism is considered as the main attraction of the UAE with annual shopping festivals of international stature besides offering a very cheap and more westernize environment to the visitors from Western countries. Our target market will be divided into two groups: First group of consumers will be foreign touring UAE. We aim to serve them with traditional fish products of UAE besides offering customized cooked seafood products which are more in demand in Western Countries thus providing them an experience of second home market as for as serving their taste buds are concerned. Hospitality sector. Both in Dubai and across the country, it is the hospitality sector that is the largest single consumer group of seafood products, with nearly every 5-star hotel hosting a seafood restaurant. Competition in the foodservice segment continues to heat-up, keeping pace with both population and tourism growth (in 2006, Dubais 371 hotels hosted a record 6.5 million guests). Competitor Targets Gulf Seafood LLC is considered as one of the oldest and largest players in the UAE seafood industry. There is a growing trend within the whole Gulf market that the trends are shifting towards the more health conscious seafood products with many local as well international players are coming into the market to define their own niches. A closer analysis of the competition suggests that there is a need for the company having more experience in serving Western customers. Since we are already having experience of serving Western Markets, therefore we believe that our products clearly fit into the competition with clearly defined niche market. Product/Service Features The product which we are going to launch is the process sea food. This product will be basically based on the processing of sea food items like fish, crabs etc to the UAE market. We will be selling our product based on our quality and freshness. This will be achieved while keeping in view the element of value addition in mind since sea food being a generic commodity; we believe our unique selling proposition will be value addition. Since the main market for our product is UAE which has very strict requirements for quality, therefore, our most important feature of the product will be the value addition. Our solo motto is producing quality seafood stuff which not only taking into account all the health related issues. We understand that for our customers it is very necessary that they receive nutrition which is on one hand is healthy and harmless to consume but it must also contain an element of taste and quality in it. Since Product quality, as a variable relating marketer’s action to consumer’s response largely depends upon the competitive positioning (Yoon & Kijewski, 1997) of the company therefore our product through its USP of freshness, quality and health consciousness will provide us the competitive positioning in the market. What makes our product and innovative is the fact that we are planning to create differentiation on three counts; Process the seafood, preserve its quality and sell it uncooked. Add value to the processed seafood by making various seafood dishes and prepare them as ready to cook products. Based on above two processes, our product line includes Fresh and Preserved Fish, Frozen seafood, Processed and Canned Seafood, Preserved and Frozen oven ready fish dishes for modern food service. Core Strategy As discussed in our earlier discussion, the unique selling proposition of our product will be the healthy nutrient added to our seafood products so that not only we provide tasty sea food but also the healthy and fresh food which can be taken as an alternative to the mainstream food supplies. Based on this, our core strategies include value proposition as well as the product positioning. As discussed our main focus will be on creating value added seafood products therefore based on this proposition, we intend to add value to the processed seafood by making various seafood dishes and prepare them as ready to cook products. It is because of this fact that we are planning to sell fresh and preserved Fish, Frozen seafood, Processed and Canned Seafood, Preserved and Frozen oven ready fish dishes for modern food service. The value proposition in this whole product will be the perceived health benefits which a customer can enjoy by eating white meat. Backed by latest research, we will market our product based on the idea that eating seafood is not only healthy but it can also provide great taste when cooked and processed in our way. Regarding the product positioning, as discussed earlier that we are intending to target the hospitality sector of UAE therefore, there will be two channels involved in carrying out our strategy. Firstly, we will target the hotels which will be selling our product and secondly, we intend to open our own stores cum restaurants which will be used to sell our product range. Since this will be an international venture and product positioning in international market require that products can be evoked and distributed as bundles of attribute capable of generating benefits for the customer (Johansson, 1985) therefore we believe that our product will include an intangible perceived benefits to the customer in terms of taste and healthy food. Marketing Mix: Communications & Promotion Since out main strategy involve value addition to the raw seafood by processing it in ready to cook food with special emphasis on the healthy nutrition involved in it therefore our message to our target customers will be to directly inform them about the potential benefits involved in consuming our seafood. Since out target market is based on two segments, one which is the hospitality sector of UAE and other the general public therefore we believe we need to customize our message in a way that it can be effective to both the segments of our market. Based on this analysis, we believe that we will be employing two methods to communicate our message. One will be through advertising to general public which will be well directed and focused on women specially because most of the shopping for home consumption is done by them and secondly we will be engaging into personal selling through our sales force which will directly market out product to the hotels of all range and stars to procure our product to serve them to the foreign customers. Marketing Mix: Price Price setting is on of the delicate arts which organizations has to perform in order to get back what is put into the product by incurring costs and investments into producing goods and services. From the marketing perspectives, setting prices or rather executing the pricing strategy is more of a control variable rather than an industrial organizational experiment. (Oren, 1984). As discussed earlier, we are targeting two consumer niches. One is the hospitality sector of UAE and other is the common end users who make purchases for the home. I.e. Women. In this way, we are facing two different sets of demand dynamics. One is derived demand and other is direct demand. We believe that while serving the hospitality sector of UAE, we may not be in a strong bargaining position and may be charging prices which are marginally covering our costs whereas in open market for general public, since our product is based on the premise of health, we may be able to charge premium prices on our products in open market sell. Based on these two different dynamics of demand, our pricing objectives will be different for both the segments of the market. While setting the prices for our products, we will be taking care of the following strategic objectives: (eyeswideopen.com, 2008) 1) Have a focus on the value delivered and its outcome. 2) Building competitive differentiation through price and quality 3) Executing our own business strategy So our key objectives for setting the pricing for our products will be to achieve above three broad strategic objectives specially our focus will be on building competitive differentiation through our pricing and quality. However, on the more operational side, we will be focusing our pricing strategy to achieve healthy cash flows to achieve strong cash leverage so that our reliance on the external debt to execute our business is minimal. Based on that, we believe that there are different methods for setting up prices and each method has its own strong points and weaknesses and it’s more of a trial and error method before we can set up optimum prices to achieve our objectives. Based on our core strategy of value addition through healthy contents, we are planning to set our pricing strategy based on the value added based pricing strategy. (eyeswideopen.com, 2008). However before setting up the strategy, we will be checking the price elasticity of our pricing method as in order to sustain our future strategic presence in the region and meet the contingencies. Marketing Mix: Product Policy (Leave this Blank for the Group DRAFT--To be added in Week 5) – see TIPS email for a reference list on the topic Marketing Mix: Channels of Distribution (Leave this Blank for the Group DRAFT--To be added in Week 5) Marketing Mix: Customer Relationship Management (Leave this Blank for the Group DRAFT--To be added in Week 5) Conclusion We believe that we have a very clear idea of what our products will be and what we are going to serve them. Though we are new in the market however it is expected that we will be capturing good market through our sheer product quality and service. References eyeswideopen.com. (2008). Price Setting : How to Set your Prices Effectively. Retrieved March 1, 2008, from Eyeswideopen.com: http://www.eyeswideopen.com.au/articles/93/1/Price-Setting--How-to-Set-your-Prices-Effectively/Page1.html Oren, S. S. (1984). Comments on "Pricing Research in Marketing: The State of the Art. The Journal of Business , 57 (1), S61-S64. Orange Fairs & Events, Dubai Int’l Seafood Expo 2007, [online]. Available: http://tradeshow.alibaba.com/trade_shows/1104/Dubai_Int_l_Seafood_Expo_2007.html Retrieved 12 Feb, 2008. Yoon, E., & Kijewski, V. (1997). Dynamics of the relationship between product features, quality evaluation, and pricing. Pricing Strategy & Practice , 5 (2), 45-60. Brown, A. (2008). Consumer Buying Behavior. Retrieved Feb 19, 2008, from http://www.udel.edu/alex/chapt6.html Johansson, J. K. (1985). International Product Positioning. Journal of International Business Studies , 16 (3), 57-75. Error: Reference source not found References Please see the proper format for the reference list (should be in alphabetical order): Print Resource: http://owl.english.purdue.edu/owl/resource/560/06/ Electronic Resources: http://www.apastyle.org/elecsource.html General Form for Electronic References  From the 5th Edition of the Publication Manual (© 2001) NOTE: A reference list is presented alphabetically by authors last name   Note: Some elements of the 5th editions style guidelines for electronic resources differ from previously published guidelines. Electronic sources include aggregated databases, online journals, Web sites or Web pages, newsgroups, Web- or e-mail-based discussion groups, and Web- or e-mail-based newsletters. Online periodical: Author, A. A., Author, B. B., & Author, C. C. (2000). Title of article. Title of Periodical, xx, xxxxx.         Retrieved month day, year, from source.   EXAMPLE: Reinartz, Werner, Thomas, Jacquelyn S., Kumar, V. (2005). Balancing acquisition and retention         resources to maximize customer profitability. Journal of Marketing, v69, Issue 1. Retrieved 6/13/2005, from Business Source Premier. Add any other references that you used Winer, R.S. (2007). Marketing management, 3rd edition. Upper Saddle River, N.J.: Pearson Education, Inc. Read More