MRKT20052 Marketing Management And Digital Communications – A Case Study On Ingogo

Situational Analysis Recap

The modern business market is getting significantly competitive with each and every passing day where a significant number of market leaders are making the market incredibly congested (Markarian & Santaló, 2014). The intense market competition is a major concern for a large number of organizations trading in various industries. One of such industries having intense rivalry among the market players is the private transportation (Bataille & Steinmetz, 2013). A significant number of competitors like Uber, Ola or 13 Cab are not letting a single opportunity of increasing their business go away. The organizations are concentrating significantly in planning different strategies which can give the much-needed breathing space in the intense market competition and in doing so the organizations are implementing notable discount offers which will be effective for the organizations in attracting their targeted customers. Apart from this, the organizations are trying their level best to align their business in accordance with the need of the customers. The paper evaluates one such interesting service in the form of Gogo card facility for the chosen organization, Ingogo. The paper is able to form a market plan for the mentioned service.

The organization Ingogo is one of the notable company in Australia which concentrates on online taxi booking and payments. In the month of August 2011, the organization was founded by Hamish Petrie who is also the Chief Executive Officer of the organization (ingogo.com.au, 2018). The organization is currently having it’s headquarter in Sydney, Australia and is serving a considerable amount of people of Adelaide, Perth, Brisbane, Sydney and Melbourne. It is one of favoured organization by the people of Australia for the travelling because it was the first organization in the transportation industry of Australia that employed the concept of fixed fares for the riders including all the tolls and charges and the organization was instrumental in eradicating the concept of surge pricing or additional fees for the traffic jams and the service during the adverse natural conditions. The organization expressively triggered the technological competence of the people of Australia with the introduction of the mobile application on Android smartphones for the bookings and transaction of the fares. The organization operates through its own GPS-enable booking system and provides the opportunity to the nearby taxi services to pick up fares irrespective of the agency they work for. One of the most advantageous features of Ingogo’s service is that their system enables the users to book a taxi even two days earlier from the date of departure. The organization set some records in crowd funding which crosses even 4 million US dollars and was acknowledged by the Australian equity-crowd funding platform, VentureCrowd as one of the significant amount gathered by any organization from crowd funding (venturecrowd.com.au, 2018). One of the notable investors for the organization was Brad Shofer, co-founder of MYOB and along with that the Australian Federal Government also provided a grant to the organization as well (myob.com/au, 2018). The organization had a delay in the inclusion of it into the Australian Securities Exchange which took place in the latter part of 2017 (asx.com.au, 2018).

Market Segmentation, Targeting and Positioning

The organization was facing intense rivalry from its competitors and was considering a plan which will enable them to attract the customers in a more effective manner. The recommended plan of having the Gogo cards was capable of serving them the perfect strategy in order to increase their business with proper alignment to the concern of the probable customers. The plan was to install Gogo cards for the travelling expenses of the customers. Along with this the plan also included the introduction of a system which will be present in the vehicles in order to top up the Gogo cards without sharing the credit card details with the company. The recharge can be done at each and every vehicle at any time by cash or credit card. The proposed model was significant in securing the bank details of the customers and along with that it provided regular driver facility with a comparatively stress-free application for the top up. Apart from the scope of increasing the presence of technology in providing effective and improved service to the customers, the plan was significant in creating probable new customers. The plan included significant discounts for the old age and the young students. This was instrumental in improving the relationship with the society and that also highlighted their service in a significant manner which other companies were not able to conduct in the desired manner (Sukthankar et al., 2014). The plan was significant in the formation of the trust and belief of their customers with their portrayal of ethical business practice.

The impact of the technology in the modern is significant and along with advantageous factors of technology, the presence of the negative impact will also be there. Australia is significantly observing a considerable number of fraud cases where technology is used in order to transfer the money unethically (afp.gov.au, 2018). This is making the people of Australia significantly concerned regarding the exchange of their bank details or the credit card details to any sort of agencies for their service or products. This was a major concern for the mentioned organization as well as their online form of business significantly required the transactions to be conducted via the credit cards or digital mode of payments. The Gogo cards were hitting the absolute requirement of an alternative plan for the organization where the people of Australia were kept relaxed from their concern of exchange of their bank or credit card details. The card has the facility to get recharged from any of the vehicles and the customer can conduct the process on their own without any sort of exchange of the details.

Market Segment and Positioning

The potential choice of the market for the mentioned service will generally depend on two factors which are the average taxi fares and the number of probable passengers that the organization will look for. The statistics from the report of Australian Taxi Industry Association (ATIA) of December 2014 makes it pretty clear that the organization will not feel the absence of customers in the areas they operate as the statistics state that the operation of the organization in Sydney will be having more than 174600000 numbers of passengers (atia.com.au/taxi-statistics, 2018). The statistics in Melbourne state that the organization will be having customers over 42000000, the operation in Brisbane will observe customers more than 107222000 (atia.com.au/taxi-statistics, 2018). Along with this the organization will have customers more than 15247000 in Adelaide (atia.com.au/taxi-statistics, 2018). The statistics specify that the organization will have a notable opportunity of rapid growth with the introduction of the Gogo cards as significant amount people in Australia travel by taxi (atia.com.au, 2018). Along with this the average taxi fares in the areas of operation for the concerned organization has also increased significantly which is visible from the statistics of average fares (statista.com, 2018).

The concept will be significantly good for the upper class as they are observed to avail online cabs in a significant manner (Rahman &Anand, 2014). Along with the focus on the upper class, the plan will provide a discount up to 20% to the students. The young generation specifically the students are also one of the section of the society that uses the technology and the online taxi in an increasing manner (Maciejewski, 2014). The concept of the online taxi is a bit complex for the old age people due to their inexperience in handling technologically advanced applications and that is evident with the low rate of participation of them in availing the online taxi (Singh, Teng & Netessine, 2017). The concept of the online taxi is one of the easiest plans for the transportation of the old age people as the other modes of general transportation are significantly overcrowded by the people of every age group. The plan was significantly accurate in attempting the section of the old people with the possible concession rate of 25% which will attract the attention of the old age people and motivate them in availing the online taxi.

• To conduct several promotional campaigns in order to increase the brand awareness.
• To effectively promote the discounts on the students and the old age people along with the concept of a transaction without any sort of exchange of the bank or credit card details of the customers.
• The scope of going cashless with the facility of online taxi booking and paying by means of the Gogo card will be effective for the organization in expanding their business to the growing nations.

The organization is expected to undertake several campaigns for increasing the brand awareness among the people with an effective description of the Gogo cards which will be helpful for the customers to understand the new plans of the organization. The campaigning is also advised to follow the digital mediums as the tech-savvy Australian people are significantly dependent on the technology and social media.

The discounts on the part of the organization need to be marketed with effective marketing policies as that would be significant for the organization in enhancing the customer relationships (Pearson, 2016). The description of the fact that the plan does not require any sort of bank or credit card details of the customer, needs to be expressed publicly in an excessive manner so that it reaches to the people concerned about the financial fraud cases. It will be instrumental for the customers in the assessment of the fact that the organization is aligning their services in accordance with the needs of them. This will be significant for the organization in gaining the faith of their targeted customers which will eventually increase the number of customers availing their service.

The plan is incredibly benefitting for the organization even in case of business expansions. The entire world is significantly trying to go cashless and with the option to book the taxi online, the people of other nations like USA or developed countries of Europe which accepted the technology in their style of living in an incredible manner, will take the opportunity with both hands (Thomas, Jain & Angus, 2013). However the market will be bit competitive as the industry of online taxi is significantly growing in the modern generation, but the organization will be able to conduct business in such a manner that it will be able to achieve sufficient revenue in order to survive in the new market and grow significantly.

The plan will try to attain three important financial objectives for the concerned organizations which are:

• To increase the amount of generated revenue.
• To increase in the profit margins.
• To enhance the growth of return on investment.

The service charges for each top-up will form a considerable amount for the organization.

The successful implementation of the plan is desired to reach a revenue that will have a growth rate of 7% after the financial year. The promotional activities from the part of the organization will be crucial for the desired growth of the revenue. The first financial year will observe a comparatively slow growth rate as the business concept will be in need to be recognized by the customers. This is why the desired growth rate for the organization after the implementation of the plan is kept at 7%.

The implementation of the plan is expected to increase the margin which is the difference between revenue and the costs by at least 5% after the first financial year as the installation of the devices in the vehicles is subjected to a significant amount of investment from the part of the organization.

The return on investment will also be expected to increase by a percentage of 4 as the gains will be comparatively low at the first year than the other years and the cost of investment will also be high as the installation cost of the devices will be subjected to a significant amount of investment.

The operations of the Gogo cards and the procedure for the top-up will be expressively user friendly and the user interface of the device that is to be connected with each and every vehicle needs to be simple as one of the targeted section for the plan is the old age people who generally lack the knowledge of operating the digital applications. The prescribed discounts will need to be there for a longer period in order to motivate both the young and the old generation. The after sales service from the part of the organization needs to of top quality as well because the faults in the effective operation of the Gogo cards will create significant panic among the people of Australia. This will also have a notable impact on the old age persons as it is observed that the old people are panic-stricken faster than the younger generation in terms of any sort of misunderstanding generated due to technology.

As mentioned earlier, the service of Gogo cards will provide discounts to the students and the old age people up to 20% and 25%. This will be crucial for the organization in attracting new customers and increase the market penetration.

The marketing activities will be cover different states of Australia with a specific focus on the states in which the operation of the mentioned organization is absent. This will be done with a precise focus on the expansion of the business in those states. Apart from this, the marketing activities in the states in which the organization is operating currently will be also in full swing as that will aware the customers of that region about the new idea, Gogo cards.

The sufficient amount of launching events for the Gogo cards at different cities of Australia will highlight the product in front of the Australian people. Apart from this, the promotional activities by the Australian Superstars like Tim Cahill or Brett Lee will be significant for the service in getting sufficient limelight. The organization is advised to think of innovative taglines which will advertise their new concept and at the same time will be significantly catchy as well.

Conclusion:

On a concluding note, it can be said that the Gogo cards will be instrumental for the organization, Ingogo in achieving the desired growth in the competitive market of the taxi industry in Australia if the operation of the cards is properly managed. Along with this, the new concept needs to be effectively promoted by the concerned organization so that the people of Australia know the benefits of the new concept. The successful implementation of the plan along with proper promotional activities will definitely guarantee an increment in the generated revenue for the concerned organization.

References:

ATIA. (2018). Retrieved from https://www.atia.com.au/

Australian Federal Police. (2018). Retrieved from https://www.afp.gov.au/

Average taxi fares in Sydney, B. (2018). Australia – average taxi fares 2015 | Statistic. Retrieved from https://www.statista.com/statistics/706661/australia-average-taxi-fares/

Bataille, M., & Steinmetz, A. (2013). Intermodal competition on some routes in transportation networks: The case of inter urban buses and railways (No. 84). DICE Discussion Paper.

Business Software & Solutions | MYOB Australia. (2018). Retrieved from https://www.myob.com/au

Crowdfunding equity investment platform in Australia – VentureCrowd. (2018). Retrieved from https://www.venturecrowd.com.au/

Home – Australian Securities Exchange – ASX. (2018). Retrieved from https://www.asx.com.au/

Ltd, i. (2018). ingogo | Taxis done better. For Passengers, Drivers and Businesses. Retrieved from https://www.ingogo.com.au/

Maciejewski, M. (2014). Online taxi dispatching via exact offline optimization. Logistyka, 3, 2133-2142.

Markarian, G., & Santaló, J. (2014). Product market competition, information and earnings management. Journal of Business Finance & Accounting, 41(5-6), 572-599.

Pearson, S. (2016). Building brands directly: creating business value from customer relationships. Springer.

Rahman, T., & Anand, N. (2014). Organized sector taxi operators in India–Opportunities and Challenges. International Journal of Research in Management and Social Sciences, 23.

Singh, J., Teng, N., & Netessine, S. (2017). Philanthropic campaigns and customer behavior: Field experiments on an online taxi booking platform. Management Science.

Sukthankar, G., Geib, C., Bui, H. H., Pynadath, D., & Goldman, R. P. (Eds.). (2014). Plan, activity, and intent recognition: Theory and practice. Newnes.

Taxi Statistics | ATIA. (2018). Retrieved from https://www.atia.com.au/taxi-statistics/

Thomas, H., Jain, A., & Angus, M. (2013). Measuring progress toward a cashless society. MasterCard Advisors.

Order an Essay Now & Get These Features For Free:

Turnitin Report

Formatting

Title Page

Citation

Outline

Place an Order