Strategic Marketing Plan For Windows Phone 7 Smartphone - Case Study Example

Windows Phone 7 strategic marketing plan Introduction Microsoft corporation is a leading software and technology company in the United States. The company is headquartered in Redmond, USA. It is the pioneer in software products for computing gadgets. To expand its markets even further, Microsoft Corporation in October 2010 launched its new brand Windows Phone 7 to the smartphone market. This is the leading competitive industry, which is growing at a sharp and persistent rate. Windows 7 is an operating system, which functions on a number of handsets. Other Microsoft products vary from mobile phone software, browsers, and online services among others. At Microsoft, everyone is encouraged and stimulated daily by the way clients apply the software to determine creative solutions to corporate issues, create breakthrough concepts and remain linked to what is the most beneficial to them. more than three decades ago, Microsoft started with a vision of making computers accessible on every desk and in each home. Currently, for over 1.5 billion individuals, the company has attained life has been modified tremendously. Microsoft has assisted individuals and enterprises across the globe to unleash their entire potential through growing licensing, manufacturing, and helping an extensive variety of software goods for computing gadgets. Being an organization as well as an individual Microsoft Corporation values honesty, integrity, personal excellence, mutual respect, persistent self-improvement, openness, and positive self-criticism. The company is dedicated to their clients, associates, and has the desire for technology. They have to pride and work out through hardships to ensure its clients are get the best in the market. They are responsible for and accountable for their clients, partners, stakeholders, and workers through respecting their dedications, offering outcomes, and aiming at great quality provision. Evaluating marketing and its components Marketing is a fundamental operation for any ambitious enterprise. As per the 2007 report through the American marketing association, marketing is defined as he practice, collection of firms, and procedures for generating, communicating, passing, and exchanging provisions, which have value for clients, consumers, stakeholders, associates, and the community at large. The above components may be discussed individually as follows: Communicating: This implies conveying information and reports on one’s provisions and associated practices to the audience partners – clients prospects, consumers, employees, partners, advisors, leads, investors, and the press as well as all other individuals and companies, which have a role in their business and the community in general. One may likely apply any form of traditional and new media approaches to interact directly or indirectly with members of your audience. Indirect interaction occurs when you advertise or give some other kinds of promotional data by mass-media channels to exploit members of your group to interact, but leave it up to people to initiate direct deals. Direct interaction on the other hand, happens when one initiate interaction directly with people close to you just as when sending e-mail or calling a someone (Derek, 2010). Delivering: this implies the giving out of goods or services and exceptional client service to members of their group. Exchange: this implies swapping value. Usually, the exchange of products and services for monetary terms may establish for themselves what to accept in turn. Furthermore, in marketing the value concern is essential. Whereby this means a sense of worth. Individual value materials when they view that the material’s worth is more that the cost from which was expected to be achieved, consume or apply it (Derek, 2010). Windows Phone 7 should realize that the periods of mass marketing are diminishing. This is a technological age characterized by connectedness. A period of hyper-fragmentation of interaction or media channels as well as market splitting down to single members of the group. Instead, one may apply mass media and the mobile paths to involve persons in a one-on-one communication exchange. Year one strategic plan Some may claim that the changing point for Google Android smartphone OS is during the time when Verizon begun carrying out campaigns for Motorola DROID. Evaluation and marketing may appropriately develop or break Windows Phone 7 as it plans to enter into the saturated smartphone market. Previously, neither Microsoft nor its competitors had incurred any cost on advertisements and campaigns for Windows Mobile, and in essences, in the initial periods their handheld operating systems Microsoft depended on nearly thoroughly by word of mouth and fanatic web sites to extract the word out concerning their goods (Derek, 2010). For the next three years Microsoft will be launching Windows Phone 7 for its target market the tertiary students (university and TAFE students). With the concentration on advertisement and creating awareness on its new products, Microsoft will first have to study the market and understand what kind of adverts are being utilized by their partners or competitors apply for them to maintain a market share. Through advertisement, since other companies have already applied the strategy to penetrate the market, what Microsoft is aiming at is to obstruct the classification through stressing on how fast users may extract data from their phones. The main activity at this point is to create awareness on the different Windows Phone 7 software that is now accessible on five various handsets and users. This will enable the targeted market to give at least each one a choice to pick, which best suits their lifestyle and needs. These different handset categorize include HTC Mozart (Telstra), LG Optimus 7Q (Telstra), HTC 7 Trophy (Vodafone), LG Optimus 7 (Optus), and Samsung Omnia 7 (Optus) (Fried, 2011). The initial adverts are essential for creating awareness on existence of different that clients can choose from, but later as the company penetrate the market they have to include other features in their advertisements, for instance, features on what individuals may do with Windows Phone. For example, emulating what Apple did in their adverts is essential since they will demonstrate to individuals utilizing the phone how to find things they observe. Thus, Microsoft adverts will have to demonstrate to individuals how they may operate the same things faster, or perform things in Windows, which are missing in iPhone. The other things that Microsoft will be considering through the three years period is that actual power of Windows Phones are the office, gaming, and social factors. Therefore, these factors has to be strongly build and improved in order to attract a wide population since without emphasizing on these aspects, the Windows Phone 7 will just be like any other smartphone (Hayes, 2006). The continued persistence of Windows Phone 7 market will also assist in developing customer loyalty within this planned period. Some little modifications will be required, for instance, ensuring it is fast, has effective operating system containing a smart, fashionable user interface, which owes a little to the Zune HD media player. The exploitation of UL in the market will also keep then company moving because this technology was received well. Remote working initiative Remote working strategy may also be an approach for the Windows Phone 7 marketing. Several organization use this technology whether small or large scale enterprises because of its numerous gains that an organization may exploit to raise performance like increased efficiency, cost savings, loyalty, work-life balance, and finding ideas from a diversified society. This works in marketing because markets will not have to move across different regions trying to sell their products. Instead, satellite stations are set where marketers will concentrate their efforts in that region and ensure they cause an impact for the product to penetrate deep into that market. Moving around as in advertising, the promoters will not capture the attention of everyone like when they are just located in one place carrying out their promotions and looking for what is good in that given region (Hayes, 2006). Year two and three strategic plans During these years, at least the company has caused an in impact with its previous advertisements and remote marketing. What remains is now how to keep the products consistent in the market. Further studies on target’s group taste, preferences, and applications need to be carried out. This is because marketing is a continuous process where if you stop, the market also changes course. Modern approaches need to be utilized and exploited. Smartphone market is now saturated with different phones from different companies and, therefore, Microsoft will have to push hard without stopping in the first year of Windows Phone 7 introduction (Fried, 2011). Some of the various marketing plans that can be adapted in the second and that year include: Mobile marketing In the contemporary society, everyone is assumed having a phone or at least can easily get access to one. With this therefore, marketing can get an excellent tool through its applications. A number of people might be puzzled by the phrase mobile marketing but it is one of the modern tools exploited by marketers like direct mail, retail, email, TV, advertising, Internet, or Radio. This approach when applied well by Windows Phone 7 in their practice can ensure consisted development and value creation for the goods and services offered. Mobile marketing is essential because it will offer great interaction for the company and the customers. There are, however, two key forms of mobile marketing: direct and indirect (Derek, 2010). Direct mobile marketing: This involves the exercise of proactive moving out and participating individual’s people of once region through mobile channel on their handsets. because nowhere in the next three years people (students) will not be having other phones, this approach will ensure adverts reach them directly on the phones and persuade them to think of installing the Windows Phone 7 OS to their handsets. Microsoft can send direct messages to the targeted group and the students can respond directly to the company. This if well initiated can be a long term strategy that can help maintain the relationship, which will last for the coming three years the company expects to deal with the product. Direct mobile marketing can, nevertheless, occur only when the client have accepted openly to proactively interact with them i.e.by calling or text message (Hayes, 2006). Indirect mobile marketing: Since mobile marketing needs, that single clients offer you their permission to communicate with them on their mobile handsets proactively and directly, one needs to apply indirect mobile marketing to create awareness to individuals to know of one’s provisions and welcome them to offer you permission to interact with them directly. Hence, indirect mobile marketing implies the exercise of mobile-developing one’s customs and a current media programs (radio, Internet, TV, Voice, outdoor media, and e-mail). Welcoming single members to one’s audience to source out mobile or phone destination and reply to the mobile call to function. On radio, for instance, individual call function may request observers to text a keyword to a given code to place a vote. One can also request them to complete a form on the mobile Internet or Web, adding their mobile phone numbers, to engage in the program. This way the students being targeted can be given some prices at the end for example winning a free handset fully install with the Windows Phone 7 OS (Flynn, 2011). Nevertheless, it should not be mistaken that the statement on mobile marketing be mark to work solely. Three years is a long-term period and this approach may not work throughout. Microsoft, therefore, should not take mobile marketing to be different from the other identified or unidentified approaches of marketing practices, instead, they may and must incorporate it with those practices. They can apply mobile marketing mutually to improve all their marketing practices. To exploit this strategy to the fullest, Microsoft needs to embrace the advantages of the abilities of mobile conduit for their marketing. The company should have the willingness to modify, in real time, to the wideness of the mobile industry and its intricacies. In addition, Microsoft has to understand what other service providers usually do. Service providers in the industry ensure marketing on technical-and-exceptional service heights. These providers are individuals, organizations, marketers, and business practices, which assist firms to influence the mobile conduit to involve their clients with captivating mobile and mobile-improved marketing technologies (Fried, 2011). Social media marketing Because smartphone usage sector is not usually restricted by geography, this is mainly due to the fact that different smartphone applications are traded through online tool marketplaces. Now because of this Microsoft may successfully influence all clients with Internet accessibility. From this observation, it is significant that the company also decide on taking advantage of the fast growing social-network wave. Several companies dealing with other lines of production have seized the opportunity and invested on creating blogs that will sell the products by engaging customers whenever. Microsoft with its Windows Phone 7 product should exploit this approach because in current society is concern on culture adjustment and embracing this growing mechanism of marketing and communication if the way to experiencing improved profits. Marketing has changed to adapt and exploit the social-media service like Twitter, Facebook, YouTube as well as several other website, which have create extreme influence the way millions of Americans – mainly the students and those under the age of 40 years associate with others, view brands, and shop. For students it is a real-time-digital living, whereby if the OS is designed appropriately and marketed through the social media, most students will be attracted to it and will flock the market to get a piece of the technology (Flynn, 2011). Marketers especially for technological products have realized that Social-networking services rousingly are central business tools. Therefore, Microsoft should engineer its marketing strategies to adapt digital applications to more lithely new products such as the Windows Phone 7, assist clients, and cash in on the social-media surf. Through this, they will be developing online loyal communities and vigorous outreach schedules, and ensuring they are entirely honest in interacting directly to their clients, fans, followers, and friends. More than ever, social media will be among the fundamental trends pushing the Microsoft business within the preceding years if well implemented and all mechanism put in place. It will be more than just marketing this is because it improves of the bonds and links with clients; hence, creating a lasting relationship (Hayes, 2006). Conclusion Strategic marketing plan entails the control of any enterprise unit in a mutual view of expecting and reacting to changes that influence the marketplace for the goods. Expectation of change alongside its effects may be significantly enhanced when an organizing outline ;may be applied to mark directions and sources of change in a logical manner. Suitable reactions to change need an open understanding of the complimentary strategic options accessible to management as market transforms and change occurs. Microsoft has the resource and the skills of addressing possible issues but it needs to be very aggressive because of smartphone saturation and the highly competitive market. If changes expected for the Windows Phone 7 in the market are just incremental, Microsoft can effectively acclimatize themselves to the modern conditions through adjusting present marketing or some given operational programs. References: Derek, A. (2010). Strategic Windows. Journal of Marketing, 42(3), p. 21-26. Hayes, D. (2006). Strategic initiatives for e-branding. Retrieved on December 17, 2011, from Flynn, J. (2011). Microsoft's Windows Phone Marketing Strategy. Retrieved on December 17, 2011, from < http://socialtimes.com/microsofts-windows-phone-marketing- strategy_b48355> Fried, I. (2011). How Microsoft plans to sell Windows Phone 7. Retrieved on December 17, 2011, from < http://news.cnet.com/8301-13860_3-20019111-56.html> Read More