Competitive Strategy
Competitive advantage is basically the long-term strategy of a company to create a market niche that can survive the impact of competition. In application, a competitive advantage strategy is tailored to set up a defensive position in an industry and ensure realization of higher return on investment.
Cost Leadership
AV Packaging Company Limited has been proactive in guarding its cost leadership strategy by managing the cost of production and diversification. For instance, AV Direct has been an effective cost management tool in the diverse productivity matrix. At present, the company has more than 20 product lines that are managed from a central location. Through mass production, the AV Packaging Company Limited has gained from economies of scale (Kajalo & Lindblom 2015).
Differentiation Leadership
Differential leadership refers to development of products with unique attributed that are desired by customers (Kotler et al. 2013). For instance, AV Packaging Company Limited offers a huge range of chemicals cleaning supplies and janitorial equipment to serve the desires of different private and public institutions. Moreover, the glass-wares, cutleries, disposable and industrial packaging products are tailored to meet the needs of different market and customer segments. In addition, the company’s distribution network is well spread to reach all markets.
Cost Focus
The cost focus strategy is concentrated on narrowing different customer segments to realize optimal cost advantage through market differentiation. AV Packaging Company Limited’s products are tailored to serve customer and business segments in equal measure. The markets are differentiated by size, location, and demands. The business segments are classified into small, medium, and large institutions. The customer segment is divided into low-income, middle-income, and high-income classes. This strategy has created an environment of own competition to reduce the overall impact of competitors (Clow & Baack 2014).
Differentiation Focus
AV Packaging Company Limited has been able to serve the needs of different customer segments through product diversification, market differentiation, and focus marketing (Chaffey & Smith 2013). For instance, the company has a show room where different products are displayed to appeal to all customer and business segments.
Smart Objectives
Based on the results of the Five Forces, SWOT, and environmental analysis for the AV Packaging Company Limited, the SMART are increasing sales, creation of strong online presence, and establishment of a loyal customer base as discussed in the next section.
Increasing Sales
The AV Packaging Company Limited’s proposed marketing plan has the objective of increasing the sales by 10% over the next year.
Specific
As captured in the sales focus, the AV Packaging Company Limited has been able to improve on their sales over the years and the company has expanded from a simple venture to a regional giant. This means that it is possible to increase the sales though proactive expansion of the market networks and current distribution channel (Cole 2015).
Measurable
The projection of sales increase by 10% is informed by previous market performance and consistency over the years to record positive growth in each financial year. The matrix for measuring the 10% growth will be gauged by the sales at the end of the 2019 financial year, which is actually projected to be a positive value.
Attainable
The projection of sales increase by 10% is achievable through improvement in the offline and online selling strategies. For instance, the AV Packaging Company Limited would directly gain from increased sales if the distribution network is injected with extra vans for delivery. The company could also contract distribution agencies on a sale-commission basis (Fill 2013).
Realistic
A conservative value of 10% is a realistic increase in the business sector where AV Packaging Company Limited operates. Over the years, without strategic changes in the sales strategies, the company has been able to record a positive growth in annual sales. The company can afford to institute the proposed changes in the sales efforts.
Time Bound
The objective is given adequate time, which is up to the end of the year 2019. This means that the marketing strategies could be adjusted on a need basis if the projections are not realized on a monthly basis.
Increasing Online Presence
The second objective is a creation of a direct online presence for the AV Packaging Company Limited on a series of social media platforms and improved visibility of its website (Belch & Belch, 2012).
Specific
The AV Packaging Company Limited already has a website, Facebook, Twitter, and Linkedin pages. These pages could also be modified through Facebook, Twitter, and Linkedin verification. The pages could be promoted through engaging the service of an online agency for a small fee (Holt 2015).
Measurable
The achievement of this objective will be measured by the number of new funs who have liked these social media pages. The success of promoting the Facebook page will be measured by 15,000 new likes. Twitter will be 5,000 while Linkedin will be 10,000 new followers. The trends in new likes and followers will be tracked after every three months.
Attainable
Recruiting a reputable online promotion agency and a search engine optimizer would ensure that this objective is met without much struggle. This agency has several online tools for promoting the pages on different platforms (Elder & Krishna 2013). The AV Packaging Company Limited’s website could be installed with pluggins that are capable of making the website more visible.
Realistic
The objective of increasing online presence by 30,000 new followers is achievable over a period of 12 months. It would not take a social media promotion agency a lot of effort to recruit just about 2,500 followers per month.
Time
The period for achieving this objective is a year, that is, by March 2019. This is adequate time to make adjustments and proactively track any progress.
Creation of Loyal Customer Base
Instead of narrowing the focus to an individual customer, the AV Packaging Company Limited should aim to build a strong customer base consisting of different customer segments by the end of 2019.
Specific
The objective is specific in ensuring that a loyal customer base is established for different customer and business segments. The objective is reaching all the categories of potential customers.
Measurable
The success of the customer care center could be measured by the number of positive feedbacks (Ang 2014). In this case, the target with be 400 ratings in every six months. Another measure will be the number of repeat customers, which is projected to be 1,000 at the end of the 2019 financial year. The target is 5% increment in the customer traffic following every successful promotion campaign.
Attainable
Establishing a 24/7 customer care center is very achievable within three months. The promotional strategies are actually running every year in the company. This means that increased efforts would not impact on the operational costs (Holt 2015). Increasing the customer traffic by only 5% is equivalent to extending the promotional activities from current three months to at least five months.
Time bound
Duration of one year would be ideal to establish a customer care center, roll out different promotional activities, and track the changing customer traffic.
Reference List
Ang, L 2014, Integrated marketing communications: A focus on new technologies and advanced theories, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge.
Belch, G.E & Belch, M.A 2012, Advertising and promotion, an integrated marketing communications perspective, 9th edn, McGraw-Hill Higher Education, New York, NY.
Chaffey, D & Smith, P 2013, Digital marketing excellence, planning, optimizing and integrating online marketing, 5th edn, Routledge, London.
Clow, K.E & Baack D 2014, Integrated advertising, promotion, and marketing communications, 6th edn, Pearson Higher Education, New York, NY.
Cole A 2015, The implications of consumer behaviour for marketing, Anchor academic publishing, London.
Elder, R & Krishna, A 2013, ‘The visual depiction effect in advertising: Facilitating embodied mental simulation through product orientation’, Journal of Consumer Research, vol. 38, no. 6, pp. 988-1003.
Fill, C 2013, Marketing communications: brands, experiences and participation, 6th edn, Pearson Higher Education, New York, NY.
Holt, D 2015, Brands and branding: Cultural strategy group, Web.
Kajalo, S & Lindblom, A 2015,’Market orientation, entrepreneurial orientation and business performance among small retailers’, International Journal of Retail & Distribution Management, vol. 43, no. 7, pp. 580-596.
Kotler, P, Keller, L, Koshy, A & Jha, M 2013, Marketing management: a South Asian perspective, 14th edn, Imprint Pearson Education, New York, NY.