The objective of the report is to highlight on the marketing plan for Unilever organizations for launching one of their product in new international market. It is one of the world’s biggest consumer goods organizations as accounted by total revenue and is headquartered in London. This company owns over 400 brands and this provides them the unique position in global market (Bahadir et al. 2015). The vision of Unilever is to enhance business growth while decreasing their environmental footprint and increase their social impact positively. The corporate structure of Unilever is responsible for innovating new products in the company’s global business. The organizational structure of this company adapts with variation in consumer product industry as well as in global market. In the present situation, Unilever uphold structure that addresses business needs as accounted by managing goods types globally. This company aims in attainment of customers satisfaction by producing high quality products.
Marketing Plan for Unilever
Marketing plan refers to systematic exercise for formulation of marketing strategies within the organizations. Marketing plan is vital for business as it facilitates in enhancing business growth. It helps in coordinating business activities, which can further facilitate in attaining business objectives within specified time (Wood 2014). In addition, it helps in appraising financial performance and capitalizes on the strength of the business. Implementation of marketing plan minimizes weakness as well as risk of failure in business. Moreover, it opens up new opportunities of business expansion in the global market. Economic condition of the country is also crucial for each business as it prompts them in undertaking strategic marketing plan for launching their existing good in new market.
Unilever is well known as FMCG (Fast Moving Consumers Goods) giant in this industry. Their portfolio in product mix integrates diverse selection of FMCG products that ranges from beverages, foods, home care as well as personal care products. The company achieves its goal and transcended in the international market successfully through their effective marketing plan. In fact, the marketing strategy also aids the company in gaining huge revenue as well as customer base. The marketing plan that Unilever should adopt must be complemented with their different pricing strategy across the nations. However, the diverse marketing strategy will further ease market expansion process and this will trigger growth in business through development in market of existing goods. This organization should mainly focus on the developing as well as emerging markets for increasing their prospect of sales growth. This study elucidates on the feasibility of Unilever launching one of its brand ‘Pure It’ water purifier in South Africa. As a marketing consultant, the marketing plan for Unilever is prepared for launch of this product in South Africa.
The economy chosen for launch of ‘Pure It’ water purifier is South Africa. South Africa has one of the huge emerging markets despite global economic slowdown. This economy is sophisticated as well as diverse in terms of wealth, financial services and investment (West et al. 2015). This nation has vast potential as investment destination and offers highly developed economic infrastructure for business organizations. There are few reasons behind selecting South Africa for launching this product. These are:
The consumers in South Africa are generally brand conscious. Middle class consumers in specific including black middle class has huge level of spending. In fact these consumers seeks mainly sophisticated product and hence prefer in spending on vital products or housing. In addition, the consumers in South Africa are well informed about the products in the market (Royle and Laing 2014).. Moreover, the dynamic economy of this nation has lead to rise in purchasing power of consumers. Hence, the middle class people in the country have higher disposable income levels. As E-commerce has made huge progress in this nation retail environment, traditional retailers sell their product through online mediums. Therefore, launching of water purifier in this economy will be benefit the company as the buyers in this nation will tend to purchase this crucial product.
The marketing plan or the objectives can be explained with the help of the SMART objectives. The basic purpose of using this SMART objective is to –
SMART refers to specific, measurable, achievable, realistic and time-related. This is explained as-
Specific- It means the company must focus on particular area for improving their position in the market
Measurable- It is an indicator that quantifies the business objectives of the company
Achievable- It reflects whether the goal of the project is achievable or not.
Realistic-It states whether the available resources used in the project can realistically achieve the objective of the project
Time-related-It specifies the time when the outcome of the project can be attained.
The following are the marketing objectives of Unilever that they generally follow before producing any product.
For launching this product in South African retail market, the marketing objectives that Unilever must follow-
The main aim of Unilever is to expand their business in the global market by innovating new products and penetrating it to new country or economic zone (Morgan 2012). They also aim to attain the loyalty of the customers of various segments in market by producing quality product. The marketing plan for Unilever in launching water purifier in South African market includes market targeting, segmentation, positioning and marketing mix.
Market Targeting- Unilever should focus on every single person needs living in South Africa. These should be from young age to elderly consumers before launching it so that each person can benefit from this product. However, these target customers will help the entity in improvising on their product and improves their sales growth.
Market segmentation- Unilever segments their product according to the population in the respective country. This strategy helps the organization in gaining competitive advantage over their rivals (Liu et al. 2012). Hence, the segmentation of water purifier will help the company in establishing good customer’s base in South Africa.
Market Positioning- Establishing wide customer base does not help the entity in always gaining higher profit. However, they should strategize to position their products according to the needs and preferences of the consumer. Before launching this water purifier in South African market, the marketing management team of Unilever must gather information about the behavior of the buyers.
Marketing mix- This is also termed as 4P marketing mix and reflects marketing tools that each firm applies to sue their objectives of marketing in the target. It refers to four marketing decision levels that includes- product, price, place and promotion. Based on these variables, Unilever should launch their product in new market.
Product- Unilever designs ‘Pure It’ water purifier with germ killing technology that kills harmful bacteria as well as removes pesticides impurities from water. The four variety of ‘Pure It’ water purifier that Unilever manufactures includes- Pure It (Compact, classic, Marvella, Auto Fill). This product gives guarantee of bacteria free water and protects the households from water carrying diseases. In addition, Unilever also focuses on packaging the product in two methods that includes- primary as well as secondary packaging. However, they must also focus on the needs of South African population before launching it in their retail market.
Price- Unilever sets the price of ‘pure it’ water purifier at reasonable prices so that all classes of consumers can purchase it. In addition, the organization also analyzes their rivals pricing strategy before launching it in the South African market. Unilever sets different price of these four water purifier products (Hutt and Speh 2012). The lowest price product is pure it compact while the highest priced one is pure it Marvella. They must offer discount on pure it Marvella in order to attract middle class customers of this nation. As there is no payment period and credit terms for this product, this will help the company in attracting more customers in South African market.
Place- South Africa is mainly chosen for launching this product as the customers purchasing behavior is quite good as compared to nations (Koku 2014). As the company has good transportation mode, delivering the products in this economy will not create any difficulty for the company.
Promotion- Unilever basically promotes their product by creating communication with the potential customers by giving them several information about it (Khan 2014). The promotional activities that they must select for launching this product in South African market are- advertising in traditional mediums such as television, social media etc. Personal selling method will also helps the entity in building up good relation with the customers. Hence, these two methods of promotion will facilitate them in establishing the business in this country’s retail market.
Moreover, the company must take into consideration sustainable marketing and must maintain ethics while working on the project. Unilever CSR ( Corporate social responsibility) has always strengthened the product brands. Their CSR strategy prioritizes on their stakeholders before producing any product. Therefore, as marketing consultant, it is suggested that they must utilize their CSR strategy in order to maintain sustainability in business.
The marketing budget of Unilever must planned in such a way that it helps them in maximizing profit from the sales of product. The total budget that Unilever must keep for launching this product is $6 billion. As the company penetrates into new market, they should keep the marketing budget lower (De Mooij 2013). This is because there is a possibility of achieving lower profit from this product as the market is not well known to them. In addition, the company must keep a quarter of the total budget for digital media, which will facilitate them in connecting with the customers in easier way. Furthermore, it will also aid this entity in receiving feedback from the customers regarding this product and hence this will help them in improvising on product quality (Gilligan and Hird 2012). The company’s strategy in taking a move towards ‘zero- based’ budgeting for marketing the product will also help the organization in cutting cost that is kept for spending on marketing. Hence, they must adopt this strategy in this case also in order to avoid risk of loss from the launch of water purifier.
Though the marketing strategy of Unilever that they adopts for launching their several product brands is quite good, but still they must focus on few things in order to attain highest rank in every market. In this case, as water purifier is to be launched in new market, few suggestions will benefit them in achieving success (Chaffey and Bosomworth 2012). These are:
Conclusions
From the above assignment, it can be concluded that marketing plan helps in promoting thriving marketing operations. It also facilitates in co-coordinating business activities and forces management in reflecting upon future goals in systematic manner (Chaffey et al. 2013). Furthermore, marketing plan aids in appraising financial performance and reduces threats as well as weakness in business (Chaffey et al. 2013). In fact, the resources can be balanced in better way in relation with market opportunities. While the launching the product, marketing plan is usually advocated for minimizing risk of project failure. Hence, marketing plan has huge significance in business as it aids in achieving success.
Critical appraisal of knowledge gained from undertaking team project
Team project refers to the team in which all the members belonging to various groups are assigned to business activities for a specific project. Project teams require involvement of several departments and hence can be segmented as cross-functional team. Project manager plays an important role in directing the members working in a team for a particular project. Proper combination of skills and abilities of members helps in becoming successful team (Baker 2014). Project teams benefits the company in getting creative ideas as well as innovative solutions for solving complex problems. It also helps in building good relationship among the employees as they interact with each other in innovating new products. Moreover, working in a team also provides opportunities in learning from each members and collecting new ideas for various approaches. On the contrary, team projects can adversely affect on the business. This means that unequal involvement of few members in project team results in inaccurate outcome of the project. Additionally, there might be clash of ideas regarding launching a product or due to different working styles. Thus, this might increases risk of failure in launching a product.
The project team uses record of all contacts in order to research on their contacts as well as overviews on their marketing personas based on the knowledge that they learns from the team. These record contacts also facilitates in identifying the personality of team members that fits well in the business (Bernhardt et al. 2014). The company records contacts between the members in team through emails, calls, new notes, log activity.
The performance of a team depends on the individual contribution of the members in a team. The behavior of the individual is usually measured by their skills, ability, creative ideas and degree of participation in that particular work. Individual contribution in a team facilitates the organization in achieving success in a project.
The overall success in a project is mainly evaluated with the help of 5 ways. These includes-
References
Bahadir, S.C., Bharadwaj, S.G. and Srivastava, R.K., 2015. Marketing mix and brand sales in global markets: Examining the contingent role of country-market characteristics. Journal of International Business Studies, 46(5), pp.596-619.
Baker, M.J., 2014. Marketing strategy and management. Palgrave Macmillan.
Bernhardt, J.M., Mays, D. and Hall, A.K., 2012. Social marketing at the right place and right time with new media. Journal of Social Marketing, 2(2), pp.130-137.
Chaffey, D., Smith, P.R. and Smith, P.R., 2013. eMarketing eXcellence: Planning and optimizing your digital marketing. Routledge.
Chaffey, D. and Bosomworth, D., 2012. Digital marketing strategy. Implementation and Practice.
De Mooij, M., 2013. Global marketing and advertising: Understanding cultural paradoxes. Sage Publications.
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Hollensen, S., 2015. Marketing management: A relationship approach. Pearson Education.
Hutt, M.D. and Speh, T.W., 2012. Business marketing management: B2B. Cengage Learning.
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Koku, P.S., 2014. Strategic Marketing Plan. In Decision Making in Marketing and Finance (p-45)
Liu, S., Kasturiratne, D. and Moizer, J., 2012. A hub-and-spoke model for multi-dimensional integration of green marketing and sustainable supply chain management. Industrial Marketing Management, 41(4), pp.581-588.
Morgan, N., 2012. Time for ‘mindful’destination management and marketing. Journal of Destination Marketing & Management, 1(1), pp.8-9.
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