Question

Marketing Plan

From the real international market, select a company of your choice wishing to start its activities in Saudi Arabia. The Company hired you as Marketing Manager of Saudi Arabian Region.

You have to establish a marketing department starting from the Analysis of the market, formulate overall marketing goals, objectives, strategies, and tactics within the context of an organization's business, mission, and goals designing and planning the entire function.

Write a Marketing Plan considering the following points (2x5=10 Marks)

1. Introduction, Goals and Objectives

To introduce this section you should include the "mission statement" of the business; an idea of what its goals are for customers, clients, employees and the consumer.

a. Introduction about the business.

b. Business vision and mission

c. Business objective.

d. Products and services offered

2. Environmental Analysis

Conduct an environmental analysis that looks at and comments on your local area and your network of business contacts, competitors and customers.

3. Target Market Analysis

Identify the target market, describing how the company will meet the needs of the consumer better than the competition does.

4. SWOT Analysis

Conduct a SWOT analysis for your chosen company based on your research.

Strengths: List the strengths of the business approach;

Weaknesses: Describe the areas of weakness in the company's operations;

Opportunities: Examine factors that may improve the business's chances of success;

Threats: List the external threats to the business' success.

5. Marketing Mix (4 P’s ) Analysis

Describe each of the 4Ps of your chosen company.

Product or Service

Identify the product or service by what it is, who will buy it, how much they will pay for it and how much it will cost for the company to produce it, why a consumer demand exists for your product, and where the product sits in comparison to similar products/services now available.

Place

Identify the location of the business, why it is located there (strategic, competitive, economic objectives), the expected methods of distribution, and timing objectives.

Promotion

Describe the type of promotional methods that will be used. Identify techniques such as word of mouth, personal selling, direct marketing, sales promotion etc. television, radio, social media and newspaper ads.

Price

The prices of the products or services that reflects the overall company strategy. Should be competitive as well as a reflection of the quality, costs and profit margin.

Answer 1

MARKETING PLAN => To set up a marketing department in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia to process and sell date-enriched health drinks for children

LION DATES

The company of our choice is Lion Dates which is already an internationally renowned brand which exports and processes dates and other edible products across the globe. The company wishes to expand its operations and penetrate the Saudi Arabian market with dates health drink being the product of interest. Furthermore, procuring the raw materials such as dates from the local markets will be cheaper and reduce the production costs.

About the Company

Lion Dates Impex Pvt Ltd is India's largest date processing and trading company. The company was established in 1978. The company has factories located in the city of Tiruchirapalli and nearby villages in India. The company also markets dates as a product to improve health. The company also manufactures honey, dates syrup, jam, fruits squash and oats.It is the first company in India to sell deseeded dates and the first to provide vacuum packaging to keep Dates fresh.

Market Analysis

Since Saudi Arabia and other Middle Eastern countries are a natural reservoir of palm dates, the product will be of interest to the local residents who are fully aware of the nutrional benefits of dates especially for growing children. The local markets are flooded with a variety of dates and date-based confections but a date-based health drink is a novel concept. The unique amalgamation of powdered dates in the form of a health drink fortified with iron and other essential nutrients will generate interest in the consumers.

Clearly the target audience is children aged 5-12 years. Since children in this age group are going through physical and mental metamorphosis, it is very important to attract the children and their parents towards the product. This is where packaging and advertising comes into effect. Attractive packaging and advertising campaigns ought to be devised. Aggressive campaigns will be strategically held across various counters of supermarkets and shopping malls.

MISSION STATEMENT

The mission statement of our marketing plan is to dominate the health drink segment in Saudi Arabia with our novel date-enriched health drink for children.

Since the market is already flooded with health-drinks, it is important to cash in on the novelty factor ie the incorporation of dates which is not available in other health-drinks.

Target customers also include international schools, day care centers which provide packaged meals for students in the cafetaria.

VISION

• To emerge as a formidable player in the Saudi Arabian market
• To ensure customer satisfaction at all levels
• To effectively price the products to appeal across the economic bandwidth of customers
• To achieve economies of scale by hiring and purchasing locally

Environmental Analyis

Since we intend to procure the dates from the local markets, additional costs associated with shipping from other locations is drastically reduced. The processing plant will be set up away from settlement areas closer to the desert region so that environmental hazards can be reduced.

The 4Ps related to our marketing plan are listed below:

Product: Product's name is Lion Dates Health Drink for Children

Price: We intend to price our health drink competitively at AED 35

Place: The product needs to be available on the health drink shelves at the local supermarkets and shopping malls in Riyadh

Promotion: Promotional strategy includes attractive packaging, interesting adverstising campaigns such as sporting events for children. Additionally, conventional methods such as word of mouth, television, radio and print media, social media as well as personal selling and direct marketing will also be applicable as our promotional tactics.

SWOT ANALYSIS

STRENGTHS

The strength of our marketing campaign lies in the novely factor as well as procuring locally. The abundance of the raw material dates greatly reduces manufacturing and procurement costs. Familiarity of consumers with a brand such as Lion Dates also is an added advantage.  As the marketing manager, the nutrional benefits of dates should be reiterated while advertising and packaging the product. Some of the nutrional benefits include high proteins, vitamins and promotes bone health, iron-dense, stimulates nervous development and aids in digestion.

WEAKNESSES

Like any new venture, this marketing campaign is not fool-proof and immune to failures or other unforseen hurdles. The product may or may not received well initially. Initial investment is required to set up the markeing department in Saudi Arabia.

OPPORTUNITIES

Every new business venture provides several opportunities to all the stakeholders including employees, clients, customers as well as end-users. It could turn out to be a win-win situation for everybody. The biggest opportunity lies in the company expanding its presence in the Middle Eastern region, once the product has penetrated across the supermarket shelves.

THREATS

As listed with the weaknesses, unforseen factors such as the ongoing COVID-19 crisis, natural calamities are inevitably looming threats. Additional threats include some rival companies introducing simial products to gain a share of the profits, once the product is successful. Maintaing superior quality is the only way to ensure customer loyalty in such situations.

Therefore, with all these points extensively included in our marketing plan we can tap the unexpoited potential in the Saudi Arabian market.

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