London Ships of Historic Interest Partnership - Essay Example

London Ships of Historic Interest Partnership Executive Summary Britain is well known as a maritime nation that heavily depends upon sea activities for trade. The historic ships which are based in London serve as sources of valuable information and inspiration. The historic ships provide facilities that aim at educating and informing visitors about the country’s maritime heritage. It is the objective of the maritime ships to increase awareness of museum and historic ships work based in London. The member vessels of the London’s ships of historic interest partnership are fire boat Massey Shaw, HQS Wellington, HMS Belfast, clipper ship Cutty shark, golden Hinde and SS Robin (londonships, 2010). From the fact that Britain is a maritime country, the income of most of the citizens is derived from maritime activity. The London’s ships partnership has a major obligation of increasing the maritime activity and the number of visitors coming to the country. This has to be done through enacting various strategies and ways. The partnership should make the whole world aware of the existence of the historic ships and the uniqueness in them. This paper will explore how the partnership can increase the global awareness of the uniqueness and existence of the historic ships in London, means and ways to tap into the market and PEST analysis in relation to the same. The paper is to explore the best marketing mix in international and global marketing especially during overseas expansion. Objectives The main objective is to identify the most appropriate international market place to target to ensure tourists are aware of the brand and will view the member vessels as must see attractions when they visit London. The subsidiary objectives are as stipulated below: To compete effectively with the major market players. To increase the amount of cash getting into the partnership account. To ensure marine tourism have been fully recognized as a major player in Britain’s economy To make London a major tourist destination in the United Kingdom. To identify means of improving the services offered in attempts to satisfy the marine tourists Assessment of the market environment Tourism is a major player in the economy of Britain with tourist coming from both local and international markets. This has boosted the economy of the country and efforts to increase the tourist volume are being put in place each and every day. The London ships of historic interest partnership being a major player has also implemented actions to increase awareness among the residents and foreigners of the tourism facilities available. This has boosted the tourism industry in a major way. International tourists are well informed of existence of the maritime tourism and are well aware of the kind of tourism facilities they are to view and interact with when they pay a visit to the city of London. There are various factors both internal and external that have contributed to the success of the organization in response to marine tourism. The coming together of the various organization and parties to form this partnership has ensured that the organization gets good leadership and management. The management is bound to follow a certain guideline in implementing the management and marketing strategies. Also the involvement of the various groups will help to check on the management in performance of the managerial obligations. Also in recruiting the management, the organization picks the candidates on merit and thus propelling the organization to higher levels in the tourism industry. Most of the tourists visiting Britain have their origins in the European countries and the local tourists. The region has a very good transport network thus making it easy for the local and tourists from the other section of the world to travel from one place to the other. The presence of rail transport with the backbone been the electric system and international airports has made it cheap and easy for the tourists to travel from one place to the other. From the fact that most of the tourists visiting Britain have their origins either locally or from the European countries and the region is well interconnected with a good road transport network and fast speed electric train, the area enjoys dozens of tourists (Bhatia, 2007). The organizations possesses unique tourists attractions with the major been the historic ships. These can never be found anywhere else apart from London. If the organization lay their marketing strategies on this fact, tourist volumes is bound to increase. The organization has also partnered with several other organizations like the museums organization in marketing tourism. This has given the organization the required publicity and dominance in the local and international market. The organization has also partnered with other organizations to make various events a success like photography competition 2010 (nationalhistoricships.org.uk, 2010). The tourism market in the United Kingdom has faced several challenges emanating from poor weather conditions. Severe gales have led to thousands of flight cancellations and disruption of the ferry transport system, road network and rail transport. There has been high rainfall and temperature above average. Economically, the market is facing great challenges due to the weakening of the euro against the sterling pound and the increase in interest rates. This has increased the living costs of the citizens thus spending less in visiting tourists’ attractions and the international tourists have considered the tourism in London expensive. Market Identification After identifying the tourist attractions to be targeted by London ships of historic interest partnership, it is necessary that the management of the organization identifies the specific markets in terms of regions and the market segments in terms of age. The best market region for the organization to carry out extensive marketing is the European market, American market and Arabian market. The living standards in the United Kingdom are high thus requires people who are very wealthy. Undertaking tourism activities or visiting tourists’ attractions sites should not leave the tourist broke as this will fundamentally affect the market. It is therefore necessary for the managerial organ to target the wealthy who will in effect spread the word of how good the visit rather than how broke they became after the visit (Woodside & Martin, 2008). In regard to the market segment, the target group should be the elderly and young couple. The elderly have no much expense to meet and the young couples are eager to explore as they build their love memories. Also these are the groups who are ready to spend without paying much attention to the amount they are spending. The advertisement should lay emphasis on the product mix of the historical aspects of the ships and the wonderful environment they create for young couples. The marketing team should also focus on attractions with bias to ladies for they have been known to be more outgoing and flexible than the males (Mazanec & Wober, 2009). Among the market segment to target is Day visitors Discretionary business tourism Domestic leisure tourism Visiting friends and relatives Marketing Objectives The national maritime museum and London’s ship of historic interest partnership must work closely in formulating objectives and implementing the strategies in marketing of marine museums tourism. The organization must state precisely what it wants to achieve and the duration to achieve this before carrying out any marketing (nmm.ac.uk, 2010). This will necessitate for setting of marketing objectives initially and subsequent continued review and monitoring of the progress. This has to be stated in a stipulated duration business plan. The marketing objectives to be implemented by the London’s ship of historic interest partnership will help to steer the organization to higher levels. Some of these are as stipulated below: Satisfying and predicting customer needs Monitoring competition Analsying the market trends Increasing positive perception among the clients or the tourists Ability to anticipate change and counter the effects Increasing visits by tourists throughout the year Increasing the visitor’s spending on average However, apart from the objectives set in-house, there are also objectives set by the government which includes increasing participation to all as well as access and social inclusion which is a program targeting the disadvantaged and underrepresented groups. To achieve these there has to be a breakdown of the objectives that are to be achieved in stages. With so doing, the organization will be able to fully achieve the objectives with ease (Cooper, 2008). The objectives for the coming financial year are: Identify compelling, competitive and distinctive positioning in promoting the historic ships To engage other local attractions in promoting London as a tourist destination from tourists all over the world. Increase awareness of the historic ships through advertising on the internet as well as through the international media houses To achieve a 75% increase in the number of visitors Families and individuals by 80% School groups by 33% Tour groups and societies by 17% As directed by the government, the London’s ship of historic interest partnership should meet the target as set by the government in relation to social inclusion. The London’s ship of historic interest partnership has to attract more of the disabled, lower income and minority ethnic groups (Mawa, 2004). However in implementation of these objectives, the management should be flexible enough to ensure that their achievement have been consistent with the budget and other business activities. When the budget surpasses the recommended one the management should apply sound management practices to ensure that the amount spent is reasonable. The above key objectives are measurable, achievable and can be distributed well over well spell out time duration. For instance the increase in the number of visitors is measurable through counting of the visitors on arrival. Marketing Strategies Firms have highly benefited and achieved success in competitive and high growth markets through the marketing concept of building a firm on the basis of profitable satisfaction of of the customer needs. It should be noted however that, for a firm to be successful in a field with leveled economic growth and many competitors following a marketing concept, the marketing strategy has to be well developed. Any satisfactory marketing strategy requires a portfolio of products and anticipated moves in response to competitors moves (Ferrell & Hartline, 2008). The London’s ship of historic interest partnership is to use the 4p’s marketing mix in the best possible way to achieve its objectives. To be able to attract more people from the minority group, the London’s ship of historic interest partnership will slash the entry fees for those groups. It will also incorporate special facilities for those with physical disabilities. The pricing strategy will ensure that the organization competes effectively with its competitors by adjusting the price in response to the market needs. Also to encourage more families to visit, there will be tourist package such that when the visitors come in a group, then they are able to gain more economically. This will encourage the families to come as their needs are better catered for by the organization. Such skimming practice will enable the organization to sacrifice short term profits and increase the market share over time as the organization turns to be the most preferred of the tourism destinations. To compete effectively in such a competitive field requires the organization to do a SWOT and PEST analysis of its competitors. This will help London’s ship of historic interest partnership to build itself to the benefits of the competitor’s weaknesses and opportunities available and develop unique abilities to counter the competitors’ strengths. The organization should device defensive strategies before arrival of potential threats. Also the organization should enact promotional activities for creating awareness among the existing and potential clients. The use of the internet in marketing has proved to be an effective way of advertisement as does not face geographical boundaries challenge. The organisation should collaborate with Google so that their advertisements may be given priority over its competitors. In relation to local tourists, the organization should contact the media for a good coverage especially in the visual and written media, newspapers and television precisely. Also the management should book appointments for interview by the media houses as this will give the organization more publicity. The organization can further contact CNN and BBC media houses as these enjoy international coverage. The children visiting the marine museums should be given fliers as this will effect the advertisement more (McGrath, 2001). The Action Plan The management should set up an implementation committee to ensure the strategy is implemented to full fledge. In case there is a scheduled interview on the media, then the top management should avail themselves to the media houses as this may attract more viewers and listeners compared to sending the junior staff. The children visiting the monuments should be given fliers on arrival and at departure if they have destroyed them. The taskforce should engage everyone in the organization so that all the objectives are achieved. The use of media should be among the first of the strategies to implement followed by lowering of rates. This will auger well with the tourists as first they will get the information followed by the good news of lowering entry fees. The marketing plan is subdivided into the following subcategories: overseas marketing; business tourism; e-marketing and website marketing; group, educational and travel trade marketing; and main marketing in the United Kingdom which includes special interests campaigns. The Marketing Provisional Budget There are various expenses to be incurred when achieving the organizational advertisement objectives. These are stipulated below with the corresponding amount to be spent on each. Item Amount Media : Audio 4200 Visual 8000 Fliers 900 Internet advertising 6000 Sales team: Sales persons (8) 5800 Sales taskforce (4) 4800 Total 29700 Monitoring and Evaluation In a very competitive multi-channel business environment, advertisement and promotional activities are core to the survival of the business. However, it is always advisable for the management to ensure that the investment gives fruits that are true competitive advantage. The management should also ensure that the marketing strategy yield the best marketing ROI. To ensure that the advertisement objectives are achieved, the management should ensure that the right data of the visitors’ arrival is collected and analysed. Any improvements or decline in the visitors’ volumes should be clearly documented to ensure that the right steps are taken to counter the decline and improve performance. Any business performance can best be analysed by an independent party not privy to the business activities. It is in this regard that the organization’s management should engage an independent audit firm to review the business activities with regard to the marketing strategy and evaluate the extent to which the objectives have been achieved. The audit firm should give an independent recommendation to improve performance. As an internal control or audit, the organization should apply econometric modelling, experimental design and metrics in measuring the performance of the strategies (Bevolo, 2010). Today’s business activities have become very competitive and therefore the management has to ensure that the advertising activities are fruitful to a satisfactory level. The management has to be confident with the marketing activities and that they breaking through, effectively achieving the predetermined return on investment and reaching the target group. For example, the young couples are mostly on the internet. The management in collaboration with the necessary authorities should place advertisements in social sites and carry out email advertisements. This will expose the young people of the existence of the facilities. Critical Issues When implementing marketing strategies and plan, most of the organizations face challenges and London’s ship of historic interest partnership is no exception. Such are the critical issues that the organization should aim to eradicate and take care of at all costs. London’s ship of historic interest partnership should be capable of foreseeing and predicting and implement actions to minimize their effects to desirable levels. Examples of the critical issues are implementation gap, individual marketing competencies, communication barrier between the various levels of management, amount of money to spend, and lack of cooperation between the various organs of leadership of the organization. To counter this, the top management should educate the employees on the need to cooperate and the benefits of teamwork. If there are employees who are uncooperative in actions aimed at achieving organizational objectives then the management should take a strict action against them as a warning to the rest of the organizations employees. The management should let the employees understand the need for teamwork and cooperation amongst themselves. Also it is the obligation of the management to ensure those at the leadership positions practice ethical leadership that works towards promoting unity among the employees and motivates them towards better output. References Bevolo C. (2010), A Marketers Guide to Measuring Results: Prove The Impact of New Media and Traditional Healthcare Marketing Efforts, Marblehead, Hcpro Inc. Bhatia A. K. (2007), The Business of Tourism: Concepts and Strategies, Berkshire, Sterling Publishers Pvt. Ltd. Cooper C. (2008), Tourism: Principles and practice (edition 4, illustrated), New Jersey, Prentice Hall. Ferrell O. C. & Hartline M. D. (2008), Marketing Strategy (edition 4, illustrated), Florence, Cengage Learning. Londonships.org.uk (2010), London’s ships of historic interest partnership ships, retrieved on 19th August 2010, http://londonships.org.uk. Mawa S. (2004), Pilgrimage tourism, marketing strategy: with special reference to Shri Mata Vaishno Devi Shrine (illustrated), New Delhi, Kaveri Books. Mazanec J. & Wober K. W. (2009), Analysing International City Tourism, Springer, Springer. McGrath M. E (2001), Product Strategy for High Technology Companies: accelerating your business to web speed (2nd edition, illustrated), New York, McGraw-Hill Professional. Nationalhistoricships.org.uk (2010), Photography Competition 2010, retrieved on 19th August 2010, http://www.nationalhistoricships.org.uk/pages/photography-competition-2010.html. Nmm.ac.uk (2010), Marketing objectives, retrieved on 19th August 2010, http://www.nmm.ac.uk/leisure-travel-tourism/units/marketing/objectives/. Woodside A. G. & Martin D. (2008), Tourism management: analysis, behaviour and strategy (illustrated), Surrey, CABI. Read More