LEARNING OBJECTIVES

Developing a Marketing Plan

On completion of this chapter, readers should understand:

· the eight key steps in the marketing planning process;

· the importance of the corporate connection;

· analysis and forecasting;

· setting goals and objectives;

· targeting and positioning;

· tactics and action plans; and

· How marketing planning is conducted in various sectors of the tourism industry.

KEY TERMS

Portfolio analysis: An approach to evaluating a diverse group of goods and services, based on long-term planning and economic forecasts.

Boston Consulting Group (BCG) model: A technique designed to show the performance of an individual product in relation to its major competitors and the rate of growth in its market.

Branding: A method of establishing a distinctive identifies for a product or service based on competitive differentiation from other products.

Cash cow: A service or product that generates a high volume of income in relation to cost of maintaining its market share.

Dog: A service or product that provides neither cash flow nor long term opportunities and holds little promise for improved performance.

Competitor analysis: A review of competitors that allows the organization to identify market trends and the level of customer loyalty.

Budget competitors: Organization that compete for the same consumer dollars.

Direct competitors: Organizations that offer similar goods and services to the same consumer at a similar price.

General competitors: Organizations that provide the same service or product.

Product category competitors: Organization that produce the same product or class of products or the same services.

Executive summary: A few pages, usually positioned at the beginning of the marketing plan that sum up the plan’s main sections.

Forecasting: A process that uses market research to predict sales volume and revenue trends, consumer profiles, product profiles, price trends, and trends.

Low-cost leadership: The simplest and most effective strategy for dealing with competition, requiring large resources and strong management to sustain.

Differentiation: A strategy that involves an innovative technological breakthrough, which can take competitors a long time to imitate, to gain a competitive advantage.

Focus: A strategy that concentrates on designing a good or service to meet the needs of one segment of the market better than the competition.

Segmentation analysis: The practice of dividing total markets up into groups on the basis of similar characteristics.

Marketing plan: A written, short-term plan that details how an organization will use its marketing mix to achieve its marketing objectives.

Strategic marketing plan: A written plan for an organization covering a period of three or more years into the future.

Market share: An organization’s sales expressed as a percentage of the sales for the total industry.

Niche marketing: Focusing on the needs and wants of narrowly defined geographic, demographic, or psychographic segments.

Vision statement: A brief simple phrase or sentence that describes where the organization wants to be in some future time and usually answers the question, what do we want to do.

Mission statement: A brief simple phrase or sentence that summarizes the organization’s direction and communicates its ethos to internal and external audiences, and also answers the question, what business are we in.

Goals: The primary aims of the organization.

Objectives: The specific aims that managers accomplish to attain organizational goals.

Positioning: A communications strategy to establish an image for a product or service in relation to others in the minds of consumers.

Product differentiation: A technique that enables organization to seek competitive advantage by offering a product (or service) that has features not available from its competitors.

Question marks: Speculative, potentially, high-risk products or services that may be profitable and, because of their small market share, may be vulnerable to competition.

Stars: Products or services that have a dominant share of a fast-growing market.

SWOT analysis: A methodology for assessing strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, and threats for strategic purposes.

Target market: A clearly defined group of customers whose needs the organization plans to satisfy.

Unique selling proposition (USP): A unique feature of a product or service that distinguished it from all other products and services.

CHAPTER OVERVIEW

Marketing planning is the subject of Chapter 3, and in its principles, marketing planning is no more than a logical thought process in which all businesses should engage. It is an application of common sense, as relevant to a small bed and breakfast as it is to an international airline. The chapter proposes that there are eight key steps in the marketing planning process. Each of these steps is discussed in turn, and practical examples are given from various sectors of the tourism industry.

Date: 2015-01-12; view: 827