Question

Develop a Marketing Plan

Choose a relatively small business you perceive its owner as entrepreneur existed in Saudi Arabia, or one of the middle-east countries, you can use your own if you have private business.

Develop the company`s Marketing Plan with the following details;

Marketing Plan

a. Market Research- Why?

b. Market Research- How? Primary or Secondary Data?

c. In your marketing plan, be as specific as possible; give statistics, numbers, and sources. The marketing plan will be the basis, later on, of the all‐important sales projection.

Facts about your industry

• What is the total size of your market?

• Current demand in target market.

• Trends in target market—growth trends, trends in consumer preferences, and trends in product development.

• Growth potential and opportunity for a business of your size.

• What barriers to entry do you face in entering this market with your new company?

• How will you overcome the barriers?

• How could the change in technology, change in government regulations, change in the economy, change in your industry, affect your organization.

Product

• Describe the most important features. What is special about it?

• Describe the benefits. That is, what will the product do for the customer?

Customer

• Identify your targeted customers, their demographics

Competition

• What products and companies will compete with you?

• How will your products or services compare with the competition?

              Strategy

              • Outline a marketing Strategy.

Promotion

• How will you promote your Product?

• What will be your promotional budget?

Method of setting prices

•Compare your prices with those of the competitors. Are they higher, lower, the same? Why?

•How important is price as a competitive factor?

• Do your intended customers really make their purchase decisions mostly on price?

• What will be your customer service and credit policies?

Distribution Channels

How do you sell your products or services?

Legal Environment

• Licensing and bonding requirements

• Health, workplace, or environmental regulations

• Special regulations covering your industry or profession

• Insurance coverage

• Trademarks, copyrights, or patents (pending, existing, or purchased

Personnel

•Number of employees

• Type of labor (skilled, unskilled, and professional)

• Where and how will you find the right employees?

• Quality of existing staff

• Pay structure

• Training methods and requirements

• Who does which tasks?

• For certain functions, will you use contract workers in addition to employees?

Inventory

• What kind of inventory will you keep: raw materials, supplies, finished goods?

• Average value in stock (i.e., what is your inventory investment)?

• Rate of turnover and how this compares to the industry averages?

• Seasonal buildups?

• Lead‐time for ordering?

Suppliers:

Identify key suppliers

• Credit and delivery policies

Answer 1

Product : Greek Yogurt

Market : Saudi Arabia

1. CAGE Framework:

The CAGE Distance Framework states that a company should address Cultural, Administrative, Geographic and Economic differences or distances between countries while crafting international strategies. The four types of distances between host & home country can be elaborated as follows:

1. • Cultural Distance - Factors such as differences in religious belief, race, social norms and languages contribute to the cultural distance between the countries. Distinct cultural differences are observed around the following dimensions: power distance, uncertainty, individualism and long-term or short-term orientation
2. • Administrative Distance - reflects the historical and present political and legal associations between trading partners; for example, colonial ties between trading partners, or participation in common trading blocs
3. • Geographical Distance - This factor not only corresponds to the distance in terms of Kilometres or Miles, but attributes such as size of the Country, distance to borders, nature of transportation and information networks and Infrastructure are key contributor
4. • Economic Distance - captures fundamental differences relating to income, the distribution of wealth, and the relative purchasing power of segments of a geographic market

Hofstede index provide information on how similar 2 countries are and that is done based on several parameters as shown below. If 2 countries are fairly similar to each other that means internationalization will be successful in that country

Target Customer:

1. Heatlh conscious youth

• Healthy & Nutritional Food is quickly becoming a lifestyle choice of young Saudi Arabia. One of the industries benefitting from this lifestyle change is the Yogurt Industry.
• Saudi Arabian Yogurt market has witnessed ~17% growth rate from past six years from 2011-12 to 2016-17.
• Yogurt Industry is expected to become a $1 Bn market by 2021. Saudi Arabian consumers are in a transitional phase wherein they are shifting from unpackaged or lose Yogurt to packaged Yogurt. Organized Market is further segments into Retail & Service Market where Retail holds 95% market Share.
• Both the Retails & Service markets are segmented into Spoonful Yogurt & Drinkable Yogurt in which Spoonful has a bigger market pie.
• The overall Spoonful Yogurt Market is projected to grow around 20% CAGR from 2017-18 to 2022-23. Packaged/Retail spoonful yogurt market is divided in Plain/Natural yogurt, frozen yogurt, Greek Yogurt, probiotic Shrikhand, Mishtidoi, etc.
• The word ‘Greek Yogurt is mostly associated with ‘Epigama’, the first Greek Yogurt in Saudi Arabia. It is manufactured and distributed by Drum Food International

Buisness Plan

• The manufacturing plant would have a capacity of 12,000 units / Day.
• The Product Line will have a basic Greek yogurt or flavoured variants. The Raw Material Cost of manufacturing the Basic & Variant products is given below:

Particulars	Amount (Rs)
Basic Raw Material Cost / Unit	10
Additional Raw Material Cost / Unit (for flavoured variants)	5
Basic Packaging Cost / Unit	5
Additional Cost for Innovative Packaging / Unit	3

• Fixed Cost associated with manufacturing unit – equipment, lease rental, employee cost (including sales staff) can be considered at Rs 2.5 crore per annum.

STRENGHTS

1. The biggest paper and pulp organization on the planet with more than 60,000 workers

2. It works 25 pulp, paper and bundling factories, 180+ changing over and bundling plants, reusing plants and sack offices in the US

3. Eco friendly assembling methods & manufacturing process

4. Economies of scale are its most prominent quality because of which it can raise fund whenever at a low rate of intrigue and longer payroll interval

5. High Research and Development speculation, and institutionalized assembling over the globe encouraged by most recent machines which has prompted solid brand picture of International Paper

6. High development rate recorded as of late

7. Solid inheritance since 1898

WEAKNESS

1. Paper company are generally blamed for deforestation in America
2. Paper making factories are associated with contamination and destroying of nearby flaura and fauna

3. Pollution from the factory has led to bad air quality

OPPORTUNITIES

1. The expansion in online business industry has brought about popularity & higher demand for packaging arrangements

2. Consolidation and expansion of business in other parts of world through acquisition route

3. Because of size of International Paper, it would have the sponsorship from various large company, administration and government

4. It can easily raise equity form the market and loan from banks as the credit score is high.

THREATS:

1. Spotlight on digitizing every mass medium substance which will eventually prompt lessening in utilization of paper and related things

2. Depleting forest area with increase in urbanization has lead to dearth in availiability of wood which forms th emajor raw material for this industry.

3. Environmental laws which are developed by the government may prove as a road block for the company.

COMPETITORS

1. Asia Pulp and Paper
2. Stora Enso Group
3. Smurfit Kappa Group

WHAT THEY ARE DOING BETTER

1. . Completely new revenue streams are being developed by  paper manufacturers through extraction of nanomaterials from cellulose fibers that can be used to enhance the performance of products unrelated to the paper industry such as paints, coatings, cosmetics, adhesives and video screens.

2. . Ultrasounds have a wide range of applications in various industrial sectors and are already present in paper mills: in paper machines they detect online TSI and TSO characteristics, that is fiber orientation and they are used to control the position of fabrics and felts; the ultrasonic detectors regulate the levels of tanks containing corrosive or encrusting products; and in ultrasound nondestructive testing systems, they are used, for example, for the inspection of drying cylinders.

3.  New wood-fibre based packaging designs are reducing food waste, increasing in-store shelf life of produce and creating decorative displays to capture customer attention.