Dessert Dreams Marketing Plan - Case Study Example

DESSERT DREAMS MARKETING MIX Student’s name Course &Code Professor’s name University City Date Introduction Marketing is an essential part of business that needs to be effectively undertaken with the aims of improving business performance. Effective marketing strategies are tantamount to achieving most, if not all, business objectives. As such, it is important to always have clear and effective marketing strategies based on research and situation analysis of a business and the industry it operates in. Using Dessert Dreams situation analysis, this retrospect paper provides a market mix analysis and strategies for the venture that would ensure it optimizes its profits through increasing profitability. Objectives It is important to have SMART objectives in order to clearly have clear evaluation strategies upon which the marketing strategies implemented can be evaluated. As such, for Dessert Dreams, the following marketing mix objectives are essential in achieving its overall business goals. i. Segmenting the market and identifying the target market using demographic and psychographic details in order to provide a guide for the marketing mix strategies ii. To develop effective product positioning strategies for the desserts. iii. To develop effective distribution strategies that would enhance easy access and market availability of the products. iv. To develop competitive prices based on reliable and effective pricing policies. v. To develop effective promotional strategies with strategic messages that would contribute to attracting consumer traffic towards purchasing the products. Target Market According to the situation analysis, it was pointed out that the Australian Government has increased efforts of creating health awareness and consciousness amongst the youths (Australian Institute of Health, 2012). As a result, there is a changing trend in the food industry, whereby the more health conscious youths are inclining towards healthier dietary food options (Australian Taxation Office). Additionally, ABS statistics reveal that 240,000 people of the total 382,000 people in Canberra are young people aged between 16-35 years (Australian Bureau of Statistics). These youths have a tendency of having complicated lifestyles that is characterized by desire for fun as well as busy educational or professional schedules. As such, most of these youths are more likely to prefer quicker food service by passing through the nearest food stores to purchase available foods. As such, the target market for the business would be these youths based on the information in Table 1 below. Table 1: Identifying the target market Segmenting Factors Considerations Demographic details Age (16-35) Population size (240,000 people) Busy life due to education or employment (Australian Taxation Office) Psychographic details More preference for healthier foods Preference for fast foods Marketing Mix Strategies Marketing mix strategies control the marketing processes based on four main essential marketing elements, commonly dubbed as the 4Ps (Feng, Morgan & Rego, 2015). These are product, price, promotion and place. This section discusses each of these individual aspects based on Dessert Dreams marketing objectives. Product Dessert Dreams intends to make healthier dessert alternatives as compared to the traditional style of using more sweeteners to improve dessert tastes. The products, therefore, will not only be tasty but also healthier, hence offering more benefit to the consumers by preventing diseases and disorders such as obesity, cardio-vascular diseases, diabetes among others. As such, Dessert Dreams will be establishing a unique competitive brand by offering tasty and healthy dessert alternatives. Offering the same product category with its potential competitors such as Cold Rock, Stripey Sundae and Max Brenner, the brand will directly compete with these competitors, only that it will thrive on the competitive advantage of offering healthier dessert alternatives. Using healthier ingredients which are mostly organic samples and organic additives would be the main product differentiation strategy. Mainly, the business to business transactions will be in acquisition of the ingredients and products to be used in making the desserts, while the desserts will be business to consumer products. Due to high competition in the industry, it is important to have well strategized product adoption process that will mainly focus on the health value in order to move most customers from the awareness to adoption stage. Price Most of Dessert Dreams main competitors use competitive pricing policies, setting their prices at levels where they can effectively compete with the prices of their potential competitors. To effectively compete, Dessert Dreams can use a combination of three main pricing policies with the aims of increasing its sales as compared to its competitors. Penetration pricing would be important especially at the trial stage of the consumers’ adoption process. Setting the initial prices lowers would be essential in attracting the customers to try the product which provides room to increase brand awareness and product evaluation. Additionally, cost based pricing will be used to ensure that the sales earn enough profits to counter the production costs. Finally, value based pricing will be used in pricing the products based on the consumer value with an expectation that health concerns will not hinder sales. However, it is important to keep a good price, discount and incentives management strategies for sustainable competitive advantage (Cuneo, Lopez & Jesus Yague, 2012). In this case, Dessert Dreams would consider employing random discounting strategy with the aims of having unpredictable discount patterns targeting to frequently attract the bargain hunting customers. Budget Table 2: Estimated Costs Main Costs Cost Estimates (p.a) Fixed Costs Rent $24,800 Wages $27,500 Advertising $ 9,100 Total Fixed Costs $61,400 Variable Costs Equipment $35,000 Foodstuffs and Ingredients $43, 200 Total Variable Costs $78, 200 Total Costs $139,600 Dessert Dreams intends to sell its products at $13 each. As such, to break even the company will need to make 10,739 sales in a year. Compared to the main competitors Max Brenner, Stripey Sundae and Cold Rock who sell their products between $9-$10, Dessert Dreams prices are expected to be slightly higher as a result of more consumer benefits and anticipated higher costs of organic content to be used in preparing the deserts. This price is considered to be within the affordability range of the businesses target market, hence expecting to make sales despite the relatively higher price. Promotion Push promotional strategies aim at creating customer demand for company’s products or services through promotion (Hair Jr & Lukas, 2014). This would be the most reliable promotion strategy for Dessert Dreams. For effective and successful promotion, the businesses main promotion message could aim at creating brand awareness by emphasizing the health value of the products in order to encourage consumers to purchase. In order to effectively reach the target market with the brand information, it is important to use promotion communication channels that are commonly used and popular among the youths and teenagers. These are mainly television advertisements, teenagers and youths magazines such as Xpress Magazine, Who and Dolly and social network marketing through Facebook, Twitter and Pinterest. Table 3 below provides estimates of anticipated promotion frequency and costs through these promotion channels. Table 3: Promotion frequency and costs Promotion Channel Frequency Costs Television 6 times a day, strategically times at meal times. $35 per advert Magazines: Xpress Magazine, Dolly and Who Depending with the magazines publication frequency, hence once a month for a monthly magazine and weekly for a weekly magazine. $14 per advert Social Network: Facebook, Twitter and Pinterest Daily social network updates using images, customer experiences and marketing messages. To be assigned to a staff who will take care of frequently updating the social media pages. This would require training, hence incurring $30 training costs. Place An effective distribution strategy is important in ensuring that consumers access the product wherever they are, whenever they need it (Gordon, 2012). Dessert Dreams competitors strategically use selective distribution strategies by ensuring that their products are easily accessible at their shop outlets. To intensify the distribution, however, the companies such as Max Brenner and Cold Rock have several outlets strategically located at high traffic regions, mainly along driveways. As such, Dessert Dreams would have to use a similar strategy in order to effectively compete by providing consumers with convenience in accessing their products whenever and wherever they need it. The company could develop delivery channels to allow customers make orders and receive deliveries at their places of work, homes or learning institutions in order to improve customers experience and offer them convenience. Implementation In order to effectively use the marketing mix strategies, there is need to have effective implementation strategies (Baker, 2014). These strategies need to be systematic in order to ensure that the business achieves the marketing objectives identified in this plan. Table 4 below indicates the steps and milestones that would be taken in the marketing process and appropriate control mechanism. Table 4: Marketing steps, milestones and control mechanisms Steps Schedule Control Mechanism Hiring a marketing manager 15 days To ensure the marketing manager has adequate training and previous successful marketing experience Identifying strategic stores locations (Place strategy) 20 days Ensuring the locations are strategic to ensure easy access by the target market. Conducting further market mix research (Examine all the 4Ps) 30 days To be objective and precise for reliability of data and information. Designing promotion messages (Promotion strategy) 2 days To emphasize on the health value of the product. Training the staff to control social network marketing page 7 days Effective training on the use of messages and images in social network marketing Implementing the promotion advertisement strategies on television, magazines and social network 120 days The advertisements should have strategic timing on television, use clear visual images and address the specific target market. Evaluating the marketing mix strategies 5 days Should be done against the marketing objectives. Conclusion Conclusively, based on situation analysis, this research provides market mix details and suggests different marketing and promotion strategies that would ensure Dessert Dreams competes effectively in a highly competitive sector. As such, it is recommended that the businesses management uses this marketing mix information to implement its strategies in order to exploit the market growth opportunities. References Australian Bureau of Statistics. (2015). http://www.abs.gov.au/websitedbs/censushome.nsf/home/quickstats Australian Taxation Office. (2015). https://www.ato.gov.au/Business/Small-business- benchmarks/In-detail/Benchmarks-A-Z/ Australian Institute of Health. (2012). Australia's Health 2012: In Brief. AIHW. Baker, M. J. (2014). Marketing strategy and management. Palgrave Macmillan. Cuneo, A., Lopez, P., & Jesus Yagüe, M. (2012). Measuring private labels brand equity: a consumer perspective. European Journal of Marketing, 46(7/8), 952-964. Feng, H., Morgan, N. A., & Rego, L. L. (2015). Marketing Department Power and Firm Performance. Journal of Marketing, 79(5), 1-20. Gordon, R. (2012). Re-thinking and re-tooling the social marketing mix. Australasian Marketing Journal (AMJ), 20(2), 122-126. Hair Jr, J. F., & Lukas, B. (2014). Marketing research. McGraw-Hill Education Australia. Read More