Market Research Strategies Used by Netflix
Discuss About The Mcdonalds Uses Interior Designs Customers.
Marketing management is a critical aspect for the success of any business. There are various strategic management tools that allow organizations to pave their way effectively and ensure long term sustainability in the market. This report highlights 7 different organizations and how they provide evidence of ‘marketing in action’.
Market research includes any activity that helps the business in gathering information regarding customer’s needs and preferences. Market research is pivotal to the success of the business in order to make sure that the products or services introduced in the market are in line with the changing consumer needs. There are various tools that can be used by businesses to gather this information. Most leading businesses hire market research agencies to conduct business research for them.
Streaming giant Netflix seeks user preferences by asking the users to select the genres that the viewer is interested in watching. After the user has made the choice, Netflix creatively targets the user with different web series and movies from that particular genre. This leads to increased Netflix usage hours. Viewers get hooked on to the content they are watching as the brand continues to suggest them videos of their likeability. This information is gathered by carefully identifying the user preferences by analysing their ‘watched history’ as well as the information provided by them. Netflix also keeps track of the internet content viewed by the user and tends to target them with other content within the same genre (The Conversation, 2017). Currently Netflix has over 125 million users worldwide. A strong brand image and brand affinity is a result of extensive market research techniques.
Competition for any business ideally refers to other players in the same industry who are targeting the same customers. Understanding the existing market competition is important for businesses in order to identify how they can differentiate their services from each other and earn a competitive advantage. A healthy competition also ensures the overall growth of the industry. It is imperative to carefully and consistently keep track of the information in order to ensure sustainability in the market.
A leading consumer electronics brand Apple Inc. has been effective in beating the competition and mustering a loyal customer base across the globe. Apple Inc.’s leading competitor is Samsung. Samsung has been leading in terms of market share since a long time. Therefore it was important for Apple to gain a competitive advantage in order to sustain in the industry. This is when Apple started to differentiate itself and created a significant mark for itself in the Smartphone industry (The Economist, 2017). Samsung has a wide target market across the globe as Samsung introduces different mobile handset models that cater to different income groups. Apple on the other hand, has adopted a price skimming strategy. This strategy involves pricing a product really high to begin with and then slowly bringing the price down. The initial high price sets a premium positioning in the minds of customers. Lowering the price enables Samsung to target lower income groups. Apple’ IOS and Samsung’s android also differentiates them from each other. Both the organizations target the same customers and it is the competition that compels both the brands to innovate and deliver excellence in terms of quality and design.
Competition Strategies of Apple Inc.
PESTLE analysis is an important strategic tool that helps businesses in understanding the environment of the industry before introducing a new product or venturing into a new geographic area. This tool is important for businesses to gauge the acceptability and profitability in the new area or of the new product.
An Uber taxi service is a disruptive innovation that has changed the shape of public transport in various countries. Since it was first launched in San Francisco, Uber has introduced the service in over 80 countries across the globe (Uber, 2018). PESTLE analysis has played a significant role in helping the brand to analyze the impact of its presence in various countries. Based upon this analysis, Uber carefully curates its marketing strategies in order to reach out to different consumers.
Every country is guided by a different set of laws and has a different political scenario. All these factors widely impact the brand it is imperative that the brand gathers significant information about a country before entering the new location. At present Uber is banned in various countries or specific cities of certain countries like Alaska, Oregon, and Vancouver in Canada, New Delhi in India, Bulgaria, Denmark, Greece, Hungary, Italy, Germany, Japan and Taiwan. This is due to various legal restrictions of the country (Telegraph, 2017).
PESTLE analysis also helps Uber in conducting a thorough economic and social analysis of the country and hence helps the brand in adopting the most appropriate pricing strategy for that particular country in order to beat the existing competition.
SWOT is short for Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats. This is a widely used strategic tool that is used by leading organizations in order to understand the internal and external abilities and flaws of the brand. SWOT analysis helps brands in analysing the internal as well as the external business environment and assists them in making the most appropriate marketing decisions. SWOT analysis must be conducted during different stages of the business in order to consistently be aware of the external environment and be prepared for the threats that may be posed to the business.
Amazon Inc. is an Ecommerce giant that has a presence in every country of the world but five. Amazon is well known for its service quality and the wide range of products offered by the brand. Amazon Inc. understands this attribute well and clear that its biggest strength is the large range of services offered by the brand as well as its customer relationship management. This is why the brand continues to connect with many sellers across the globe and enlists them with Amazon so that the ‘out of stock product’ number goes down and the brand can effectively cater to its customer needs.
Importance of PESTLE Analysis for Uber
Amazon took advantage of every opportunity that was presented to the brand and continued to use extensive marketing strategies in order to garner a strong and loyal customer base across the globe. The increasing advent of the use of branded wear has also motivated Amazon to enter into private labels (Inc, 2017). Indian government announced a sudden demonetisation in November 2016. Within a few hours, Amazon targeted its customers in India by starting its ‘Go cashless’ advertisement.
In India itself, Amazon was in consistent competition with Flipkart that ruled the Indian market for a long time. Therefore, upon entering India, Amazon adopted a price penetration strategy and gave a tough competition to Flipkart. Owing to this strategic approach of the brand, Amazon in currently in talks with Alphabet about together buying a majority stake in Flipkart and the deal would be finalized in a few weeks.
Segmentation strategy by a business refers to the process of dividing the consumers on the basis of various segments. These segments could be geographic, demographic, psychological or Behavioural. Once these segments have been defined, businesses then decide upon which customers to target from the given segments. A target market of any business is the group of customers whose needs the business aims to fulfil. Identifying the target market for the business in the initial days is imperative for the long term sustainability of the business.
McDonalds is a renowned fast food chain that has a massive presence in different parts of the world. While defining the business, the founders were clear about how the brand would be positioned and what target market will the brand serve. McDonalds target children who like tasty snacks, school and college going students who are looking for an inexpensive snacking place where they can also spend some time with their friends, families who are looking for a dining place with a separate play zone for their children and office goers looking for a quick go to snack and a coffee. McDonald’s target market is well in line with the brand’s offerings. Even the brand’s outlet structure and interiors are designed effectively to attract customers to eat more (Market Watch, 2018).
Positioning of a business refers to the image that the brand holds in the minds of its consumers. McDonalds has positioned itself as a quick, inexpensive fast food brand that is present in different parts of the world. The global food image of the brand is also owing to the same infrastructure and similar offering by the brand in different parts of the world.
SWOT Analysis of Amazon Inc.
There are various factors that directly or indirectly impact the launch of a new product or service in the market. There are various examples of disruptive innovations which became an overnight success owing to different external and internal factors that turned in their favour and assisted the business in gaining customer base.
Airbnb is one such disruptive innovation. The service aims to bridge the gap between people who wish to rent their properties on a short term basis and guests who are looking for properties to rent. The service has changed the shape of hospitality industry by its unique offering and a highly effective business model (Fast Company, 2017). There are various factors that led to the success of the brand. These factors include, the brand’s unique idea and hence lack of competition, the massive extent to which this new model was accepted in the market, the large number of guests as well as hosts listed with the brand and the extensively creative branding and marketing strategies adopted by the brand. The sudden evolution and the continued growth of the brand makes it a truly successful launch.
A launch of a new product by an existing brand provides the product with a certain amount of backing and acceptance in the market owing to the strong brand name of the parent company. However, even then, it is the product’s design, features, price and various other factors that eventually decide the fate of the brand.
One highly anticipated but a major fail product was Samsung’s Galaxy note 7. The phone was one of the most anticipated models of the year and was expected to give a tough competition to Apple Iphone 7. However, after over 30 cases of Samsung Note 7 exploding out of the blue, the brand had recall the product which was the biggest product recall in the history of consumer electronics (Business Insider, 2017). This was owing to the various technological faults that the product had and hence not only did the product fail miserably in the market, but also adversely impacted Samsung’s positioning in the minds of consumers.
Conclusion
There are numerous strategic marketing tools that help businesses in analyzing the environment, anticipate the profitability, enhance acceptance and improve expansion in the market. This marketing portfolio includes Apple Inc. McDonalds, Amazon, Uber, Samsung, Airbnb and Netflix. These business have created a significant mark in their respective industries owing to the extensively effective strategic marketing tools used by them.
References
Business Insider, 2017, ‘How Samsung overcame the Note 7 fiasco’, Available at https://www.fastcompany.com/3067471/why-airbnb-is-one-of-the-most-innovative-companies-of-2017, retrieved on 6 May, 2018.
Economist, 2017, ‘Rivalry between Apple and Samsung in smartphones will grow fiercer’, Available at https://www.economist.com/news/business/21728978-south-korean-firms-galaxy-note-8-takes-iphone-x-rivalry-between-apple-and-samsung, retrieved on 6 May, 2018.
Fast Company, 2017, ‘Why is Airbnb on of the innovative companies of 2017’, Available at https://www.fastcompany.com/3067471/why-airbnb-is-one-of-the-most-innovative-companies-of-2017, retrieved on 6 May, 2018.
Inc, 2017, ‘Amazon’s new multi-billion business’, Available at https://www.inc.com/business-insider/amazon-profitable-private-label-brands-multi-billion-dollar-business.html, retrieved on 6 May, 2018.
Market Watch, 2018, ‘How McDonalds uses interior designs to trick customers’, Available at https://www.marketwatch.com/story/how-mcdonalds-uses-interior-design-tricks-to-keep-customers-wanting-more-2018-03-23, retrieved on 6 May, 2018.
Telegraph, 2017, ‘Where has Uber run into trouble in the world’, Available at https://www.telegraph.co.uk/technology/2017/09/22/has-uber-run-trouble-around-world/, retrieved on 6 May, 2018.
The conversation, 2017, ‘the unique strategy Netflix deployed to reach 90 million worldwide subscribers’, Available at https://theconversation.com/the-unique-strategy-netflix-deployed-to-reach-90-million-worldwide-subscribers-74885, retrieved on 6 May, 2018.
Uber, 2018, ‘Uber countries’, Available at https://www.uber.com/en-IN/country-list/, retrieved on 6 May, 2018.
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