Concept Generation
Stylish Kicks Shoe Crafters Ltd is a company that designs and makes footwear. It has been in business for the last 12 years. We have been looking to expand our operations by diversifying our range of products further.
Our Research & Development department in the course of its intensive research work has identified existence of a market gap for maternity shoes. It has interviewed several expectant mothers who have given them valuable input regarding the challenges they face when oedema kicks in and what kinds of shoes they would want to wear in those circumstances.
The Ministry of Public Health has also been instrumental in providing useful information for Stylish Kicks ltd in consideration of executing the maternity footwear idea. The information includes statistics of pregnancy oedema in the country, consequences of wearing inappropriate shoes, and the importance of good posture in pregnancy. Stylish Kicks ltd is therefore gearing up for a new product line, maternity footwear, specifically designed for moms to be. We plan to call it for Mama.
Concept Screening
We will follow the following evaluation criteria:
Feasibility
Now, Stylish Kicks will be out to find out how practical launching for Mama is going to be. We will seek to know whether the market is large enough as to justify investment of capital in the project. The target market, needless to say, is the expectant women and their population is obviously substantial, backed by statistics collected by the R&D department from the Ministry of Public Health and other independent surveys.
Acceptability
Various departments will be looking at the viability of the product, their judgements being on different perspectives. Marketers will want to know how acceptable the market share is.
Preliminary Design
At this point the company will determine make a product using a preliminary design and launch in the market to evaluate its acceptability. The company will then take the views of the customers who will the guinea pigs. After that, the company embarks on the making of a final product.
Design Evaluation and Improvement
After making for Mama, we will take it to market for pre-testing. We will offer free samples to prenatal hospitals across the market (both high end and low end). We will evaluate critical areas of for Mama. This includes the impact of encouraging messages, comfort, durability (a little bit long term) and the overall brand perception.
Prototyping and Final Design
Putting into consideration the evaluation and improvement aforementioned, we will make a virtual prototype by use of Computer Aided Design and Drafting software. This will guide us in making a real prototype. Once we have a design that meets the above criteria, we will start making the real final product. This final design will undergo testing on a small scale. We will have confidence in its performance in the market since we will have done enough research and taken care of the initial sentiments (Kotler, Margaret and Turner, 2011).
Factors That Affect Location Decisions
The key decisions involve in managing a channel include:
Selecting members of a channel: Different companies attract customers differently within the different channels. In order to get the best intermediaries, the company should consider the following: the number of years the intermediary has been in the business, their profit and growth records, other services that they offer, their solvency, their degree of cooperativeness and their reputation.
Motivating channel members: For the intermediaries to perform well, the company must always motivate them. Some of the ways that a company can use to motivate them include the use of coercing power, rewarding power, legitimate power, expert power and referent power. Evaluating channel members: Occasionally the company should evaluate the performance of their members. This should always be in relation to their set standards (Hutt and Speh 2009).
Modifying channel arrangements: In order for a given channel to be effective, the producer should occasionally modify it to keep up with new conditions in the marketplace. Modification usually becomes essential if the current channel is not working as required, the market gets bigger, the buying patterns of consumers change, new competitors enters the market, better channels of distribution emerges and if the product enters a different production stage in its life cycle (Kotler, Shalowitz & Stevens, 2010).
References
Hutt, M. & Speh, T. (2009). Business Management Marketing. London: Cengage Publishers.
Kotler, P., Margaret, H. &Turner, E. (2011). Marketing Management. New York: Pearson Publishers.
Kotler, P., Shalowitz, J. & Stevens, J. (2010). Marketing for Health Care Organizations: Building a Customer-Driven Health System. London: John Wiley and Sons Publishers.