Marketing Plan

Marketing Plan

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Marketing Plan

Introduction

            ABC Company is an organization that specializes in fast-food restaurant operations, with a capacity of international expansion through its outlets. The company was founded in 1985, with its production line based from one outlet in United States. The growth and attributed expansion concerns facilitated its increased services, branding, and subsequent recognition. The company is seeking ways of improving its strategic placing in the industry, as well as increasing the market share as well as expanding to new targets. It faces stiff competition from the ever-growing number of rivals. Different targets and marketing plans have to be induced as means of achieving the target. The marketing strategies provide for a significant role in the development of any business. Without proper input into the mechanism, the hard work and progress of the organization is lost. The report analyses the current strategies in place, implementation criteria, monitoring methods and the integrated communication approach for ABC Company.            

Discussion

Branding, Pricing and Distribution

            ABC Company has a developed strategy for its branding, pricing and distribution needs in the industry. The branding concerns reflect the image portrayed by the company to the customers around the market regions. By embedding the initials of the company to its logo, the company generates a distinct image for the customers and easier recognition. In addition, the company has created unique blends of menus of the favorite dishes according to customer preferences. For example, a special sauce and lettuce salads according to the local availabilities of the market regions are served along other derivatives for the customers. The resounding effect is blended tastes of the customer requirements along with deliberate tastes. Another form of branding used by the company is the outlet designs with the logo in clarity at the entrance of each one of them. The customers can easily identify with the company.

            Pricing strategy is the most essential aspect of ABC Company, especially targeting the marketing mix. The company avails a special price list with the available discount facility on selected preferences by the customers. The company also used bundled pricing for the differential classes and levels of the customer base according to their income capabilities and range of menus served. In addition, several combinations are used to place value pricing in the range of the products within the outlets. Distribution strategies of the company are reflected by centralized transportation and differential meal generation at the various outlets. The transportation involves channeled secret recipes of the company’s famed menus. In addition, the acquisition of other preferential products is locally sourced for effective time allocation and presentation.

Competitors

            ABC Company faces competition from some of the leading organizations in the fast food business. They include McDonalds, Starbucks, Kentucky Fried Chicken, amongst others. They can be classified as inter-competitors due to the extent and domain of their reach within the markets. Their major strengths lie in the brand recognition aspects, especially on the worldwide stage. They are more established and have the capacity to reach out numerous consumers especially through advertisements and enabled promotional activities (Tracy, 2014). Another strength endeared with the competitors is the customer service with unique product pricing. The major weaknesses within the competitors are the slow allocation of expansion plans towards the non-established market regions. They are concentrated on the traditional market bases as opposed to decentralization and localization. Another weakness is the environmental record consequently from the choice of materials used as well as the health implications.

Differentiation

            In the fast food industry, differentiation is important for promotional messages aimed at distinguishing a company from its competitors, with the target customers in mind. ABC Company targets the consumers with the differentiation strategy based on nutrition. The growing culture within the industry is towards health-conscious feeding habits and attention to nutritive values in the foods and products. ABC Company is unique in delivering the healthier options as compared to its closes rival, McDonald’s. Through promotional activities on the media and outlet publication, the company advises customers on the safety of healthier diets within the menus, while offering strategic pricing for every healthy option desired. Direct comparison on the advertisements is carried out on the selected options within the product ranges, to the appeal of the consumers (Hooley, Saunders, and Piercy, 2008). The results are then translated back to the company for recording and planning.   

            The company’s intention within the industry is to achieve a leadership role among the competitors. In the vision and mission statement, the company has established set out objectives and goals within the long term and short-term basis. The company has set strategic plans on maintaining the market share with expansion and extended industry application mechanisms to increase on the potential market regions. The unification objectives and strategic plans are documented in being the leading fast food delivery organization within the world, serving healthy, unique, tasty, and affordable products to the customers. It also singles out the effective role in using the locally available materials, dishes, blends, and cooking styles to achieve the target in respective market regions for the distinct process.

Media Tools

            In order for ABC Company to achieve its target of market expansion and become the leader in fast foods industry, marketing plans have to account for social media use. Some of the media tools to use include sprout social and twitter. Sprout Social is a content-driven media tool capable of analyzing the number of mentions of the company’s products, streaming availabilities, and generated talk of the company’s services, brand, and products. According to Percy (2008), the company will induce the effect to different customers and help generate the interest across all media platforms for easier reach. Twitter on the other hand, will be responsible for the setting of standards in terms of mentions, trends, pictorial delivery, and informational tweets about the company and its products. The generated interest can then be transferred across different social media platforms, depending on the promotional outreach and relevance.

Integrated Marketing Communication

            Integrated marketing communications strategies in relevance to ABC Company affect the advertisement planning and promotional processes (Keillor, 2010). For example, advertising will have to integrate the soft copy and hard copy mechanisms in pored to increase the outreach numbers. Softcopy will utilize social media tools discussed through the Sprout Social and Twitter domains for increased communication channels. The hard copy will take form of the marketing and porinti0onal basis in magazines and newspapers. Additionally, inclusive flyers and brochures can also help in the advertisements. Customization will also be effective for integrating the marketing strategies of ABC Company through economies of scale. The company will be tasked with unique sensibilities of the different market regions in order to target the audience and cultural deliveries. In addition, using of the famous persons and celebrities through endorsement increases the target audiences in each of the different markets.

References

Hooley, G. J., Saunders, J. A., & Piercy, N. (2008). Marketing strategy and competitive positioning. Harlow, England: Prentice Hall Financial Times.

Keillor, B. D. (2010). Marketing in the 21^st Century: Integrated marketing communication strategies. SAGE Journals, 3(1): 1-17.           

Percy, L. (2008). Strategic integrated marketing communication: Theory and practice. Amsterdam: Butterworth-Heinemann.

Tracy, B. (2014). Marketing. New York, NY: American Management Association.