Part 1: Proposal
IMC is termed as integrated marketing communication. This is the concept that deals with integrating the marketing and communication strategies of the company with other activities of the firm (Camilleri, 2018). This is the report that focuses on the products called iPhone 8 plus that is launched by the very well-known brand called Apple Inc. this report discusses about the concept of brand audit with the reference of Apple Inc. in order to understand its positioning the market with regards to the competitors. The later part of the report provides the recommendations the company about the improved marketing communication strategies.
Company and brand description: Apple Inc.
Apple Inc. is the company that deals with mobile communication services, media devices, personal computers, etc. the company also conducted their business in various other products range such as associated software, networking solutions, applications etc. it is the company that majorly deals with the mobile phone products along with their own iOS software. It has been analysed that it is the company that is serving the market with success and believes in providing quality products and services to the customers at premium prices (Son, Lee & Kim, 2015). IPhone range of the company is very popular. Company has recently launched iPhone 8 plus which was a product that was really awaited by the customers. Following marketing mix clearly describes about the company and its products.
Marketing mix:
Products: Apple Inc. is the company that deals with many products in the electronic devices range. The first product that the company serves to the market is Mac. Macintosh is the name of the product that is famous as Mac. It is one of the most premium products of the brand and it involves laptops and personal computers (Bashir & Aqeel, 2015). Next product is iPhone. It is the range that is very much popular amongst the market and the latest version of this range is iPhone X and iPhone 8 plus. Other than these two products, the company also deals with iPods, watch and Apple TV.
Price: As far as the price is considered, it has been analysed that it is the premium price brand. This is the reason it serve the market with great quality products and target the small section of the society that can afford the price of the products.
Place: Apple is very aggressive in placing its products and reaching its target customers. The company use almost all the possible strategies to reach the market such as through its own stores that are called Apple stores, through trade partners, distributors etc. online medium is also used by the company to reach the market (Lo Dolce & Ryan, 2016).
Part 2: Introduction to brand audit
Promotion: it is the company that does let require much promotion because it is lardy very popular amongst its customer and they are loyal to the brand. The strategies that the company use are advertising through different mediums such as TV, print media etc. innovation is the competitive edge of the company and thus it tries to advertise its innovation to the customers.
Product category: luxurious mobile phone
Direct competitors:
Samsung S8: it is the latest product of Samsung that is competing with iPhone 8 plus range. This may be because of some of the similarities with the phone. As far as the processors of both the phones are considered Samsung is serving the customers with octa-core while Apple is serving with hexacore processors (Hughes, 2017). As far as the other features are considered, Samsung is winning the battle in terms of design and display but Apple has its own loyalty.
Google pixel 2XL: Google is a very well-known brand but for the search engine and applications rather than phones. It is difficult for the market to trust the brand in case of mobile phones (Piao & Kleiner, 2015). It has been analysed that iPhone is the preferred choice for the people who wants quality but the people who wants to try variations and different features that only android can provide then the customers prefer to buy Google pixel (Sims, 2017).
A brand audit can be defined as the process that helps in examining the market position of the company and its effectiveness in the market. This helps in determining the weakness and the strength of the company. It is required to conduct brand audit of every brand because encouraging the brand name in the market can only be done if the company knows about its position.
Core proposition of the brand:
Core proposition of the brand describes the perceived thinking of the customers towards the brand to buy its products over the competitor’s products (Armstrong, Kotler, Harker & Brennan, 2015). As far as the case of iPhone 8 plus id considered, it has been analysed that it is the product that is positioned as the great quality product with many features that Apple has not yet launched. People associate royalty and class with Apple products and find that buying Apple products help them to show their class over other competitors.
To analyse the involvement of stakeholders and the influence of the company’s actions on the same can be determined by conducting the stakeholder mapping of the products or the company. in case of Apple Inc. and iPhone 8 plus, it has been analysed that there are many stakeholders of the company and some of the most important are employees, trade partners that includes distributor, retailers, etc., investor that are also called as shareholders and customers (Minakhmetova & Savchenko, 2015). Following figure clearly describes the involvement and influence of the stakeholders in the company.
Stakeholders and brands
Above figure clearly suggests that two factors are considered under this framework of stakeholder’s mapping. First one is the degree of involvement of the stakeholders in the company and the degree of influence on the stakeholders by the actions of the company. The first column suggests that employees are the one who are highly involved and highly influenced by the actions of the company while customers are the one who are not directly involved and not directly influenced. This is because they can switch the brand and they have lot more options available. Suppliers are the one how have involvement in the company but they get rarely affected by the actions and activities of the company. Shareholders falls under the category where they have low involvement in company’s decision but the influence of the company’s decision is very high on shareholders and their capital is invested in the company’s shares.
Apple Inc. is believed to be the firm that does not use so much of promotional activities and strategies to promote their products. This is because of the brand image and the degree of loyalty of the customers has towards the brand (Kanagal, 2015). It has been analysed that at the time of launch of iPhone 8 Plus, Apple has tries making some efforts in the field of promotion and advertising and release the commercial for the promotion of this product. This is because the features that Apple was bringing in this particular product were very new and innovative. An ad campaign was also released and a new slogan was launched for promoting iPhone 8 plus that was “This charges everything”. This is to promote the new Qi charger with the phone. The company also released the commercial that was shot by Shannon wise known as portrait of her and this was to promote the new portrait mode of this product.
Samsung:
Product: the Samsung s8 is the latest attraction by Samsung I the market. It is the phone that is serving the customers with great features and out-cores processor in it.
Price: The price of the phone is $750.
Place: it is available in stores, franchisee stores, digital retail stores and online stores as well.
Promotion: promotion is usually done through mass media advertising and online advertising.
Product: the product is Google pixel 2XL mobile phone by the very well-known company called Google.
Price: the price of the product is around $649
Brand positioning and equity
Place: it is available online and with the distributors and retailers as it does not have any physical exclusive stores of the brand unlike Samsung and Apple.
Promotion: the promotion is done through advertising
Target market segment:
As far as targeting is considered, it has been analysed that Apple is very much clear about their target audience. They do not look for serving the masses but it is the brand of classes. It has been analysed that the customers of Apple are segmented on their basis of earning and the class of the people (Bowen & Chen McCain, 2015). As the company serves the market with premium quality products in premium prices, thus it is required for them to target the segment that is of high class and high purchasing power. Apple does not want to add new customers to their list of also does not want to target the new segment, they are just serving their segment customers and putting all the efforts to retain the and earning their loyalty by launching new and improved products with innovative features now and then.
Differentiation points:
In terms of differentiation, the company like Apple Inc. or the products like iPhone 8 plus attain their differentiation through product. The company use the approach of product differentiation in order to compete with the competitive brand and to stand uniquely in the market. The differentiation strategy of the company is used by the following ways:
Product design: in terms of design, iPhone 8 plus can be easily differentiated from the other products. It is a sleek phone that is designed for the people who wants to showcase their class. The glass back of the phone gives target feeling to the one who is holding the phone and the big display makes it very easy for watching videos and taking pictures with its awesome wide angel camera.
Pricing strategy:
The company believes in premium pricing strategy to be differentiated from the competitors. The pricing of the company shows the high quality of its products. IPhone 8 plus was launched at the price range between $699- $946 for different variations of the product (Arthur, 2014).
Positioning:
Positioning is the strategy that has been used to make an image in the minds of the customers. It has been analysed that iPhone 8 plus is the phone that has been positioned as the one which is for the premium range customers. It is positioned as the portrait camera phone in the minds of the customers.
IMC Mix Strategy
Relevance:
As far as relevancy is considered, it has been analysed that most of the people perceive Apple Inc. as the brand of innovation. This is because the features that are offered by this brand are very innovative in nature (Khan, Alam & Alam, 2015). The products that the company offers to the market have something unique in them in terms of their software and usage.
Identity:
Developing the identity of the brand is very important. It has been analysed that Apple Inc. has developed its brand identity as a premium brand. IPhone 8 plus is the phone that cannot be affordable for all and thus it targets only a particular segment of the market.
Relationships:
Relationships of the brand can be analysed by identifying the bond of the brand with its stakeholders (Grant, 2016). It has been analysed that Apple Inc. is the brand that has great relationship with its customers and it considers its customers as the most important stakeholders. The company has developed its great image in the market and made its customers so loyal that they do not have to make so much of efforts in retaining their customers. Not only customers but the company also make strong relationship with their suppliers and distributors. This is because they are one who plays very important role in expanding the business and reaching the market.
Part 4: Conclusion:
It has been concluded from the report that the brand is performing well with its business activities and serving the market with quality products at premium range. As per the overall analysis, it has been identified that Apple is the brand of classes and not masses and thus caters only the small segment of the market.
Strengthening brand equity:
It has been analysed that strengthening the brand equity is required by all the companies but Apple Inc. is the brand that is already very well known in terms of brad equity. It can put more efforts in advertising so that it can reach the different segment of the market which has not yet been touched. As far as iPhone 8 plus as the product is considered, it is for the loyal buyers. Samsung is also a brand with great brand equity but Goggle has to market more in order to make the people aware about its mobile phone sector.
Integrated marketing communication:
As far as marketing communications considered, it has been analysed that the company has weak advertising strategies and promotional activities. Thus, the company is recommended to make some expenses in this area as well (Petersen, Kushwaha & Kumar, 2015). As far as the iPhone range of the company is considered, it is bought by the loyal customers only and no new segment is entering their market thus it is also required to cater the new segment by making some of the offers and discounts to the people (Beck, 2014). It can improve its IMC strategies by approaching the customers through more efficient communication strategies such as TV advertising, campaigning and public relations.
References:
Armstrong, G., Kotler, P., Harker, M., & Brennan, R. (2015). Marketing: an introduction. Pearson Education.
Arthur, C. (2014). Digital wars: Apple, Google, Microsoft and the battle for the Internet. Kogan Page Publishers.
Bashir, A., & Aqeel, S. (2015). The Rapid Success of Apple’s IPhone 6 and the Challenges.
Beck, A. (2014). Integrated marketing communication and the developing marketing technologies for small business.
Bowen, J. T., & Chen McCain, S. L. (2015). Transitioning loyalty programs: A commentary on “the relationship between customer loyalty and customer satisfaction”. International Journal of Contemporary Hospitality Management, 27(3), 415-430.
Camilleri, M. A. (2018). Integrated Marketing Communications. In Travel Marketing, Tourism Economics and the Airline Product (pp. 85-103). Springer, Cham.
Grant, R. M. (2016). Contemporary strategy analysis: Text and cases edition. John Wiley & Sons.
Hughes, B. (2017). Samsung Galaxy S8 For Dummies. John Wiley & Sons.
Kanagal, N.B.(2015). Innovation and product innovation in marketing strategy. Journal of Management and marketing research, 18,1-25.
Khan, U. A., Alam, M. N., & Alam, S. (2015). A Critical Analysis of Internal and External Environment of Apple Inc. International Journal of Economics, Commerce and Management, 3(6), 955-961.
Lo Dolce, A., & Ryan, A. (2016). Discourse and Language in Marketing Communication, with Specific Regard to the Fear of Social Exclusion. A Single Case Study on Apple Inc.
Minakhmetova, D., & Savchenko, A. (2015). Mobile marketing strategy development in china, japan and south korea: An apple app store example.
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Petersen, J. A., Kushwaha, T., & Kumar, V. (2015). Marketing communication strategies and consumer financial decision making: The role of national culture. Journal of Marketing, 79(1), 44-63.
Piao, M., & Kleiner, B. (2015). Excellence in the Electronics Industry: The Comparison of the Organizational Culture among Apple Inc., Samsung Electronics and Google Inc. Conflict Resolution & Negotiation Journal, 2015(1).
Sims, S. (2017). Google Pixel 3 upcoming smartphone.
Son, I., Lee, H., & Kim, J. (2015). Preannouncement Effects on Apple’s Supply Chains: Using the Event Study Based on iPhone 6 and 6 Plus. Advanced Science and Technology Letters, 84, 73-78.
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