International Marketing Objective
Minhlong has a good reputation in manufacturing high standard of table wares product in which are currently sold into several foreign countries, except Australia. Since there is a growth rate and the current positive trends of the Australian house wares industry (Ahern 2007), this will be a good expanding market opportunity of porcelain table ware from Minh Long, Vietnam to Melbourne, Australia. To compete in the international marketplace in Australia, Minhlong needs to formulate the international marketing strategy in response to differences in cultural values, consumer tastes and needs, economic conditions, political and legal risks, government trade barriers and restrictions, market structures and so on.
The activities set out in this marketing plan will be for the Minhlong table wares porcelain and will establish a new marketing strategy and target market for Minhlong business operating in Australia. The plan will cover 5 years period from 1 January 2010 to 30 December 2014 and will concentrate on Australia-wide. Responsibility for implementing the plan will be in the hands of the intermediaries and distributors with the assistance of headquarter. As Minhlong is new to Australian house ware industry, the company’s marketing plan will have to set out the following objectives: building brand image and increase brand awareness and create affective feeling: liking, preference, conviction. The last objective is about sale-oriented objective and creates the motives which stimulate or direct desires which to obtain sales of at least 1% market share among imported Australian tableware product or at least $3.61 million sale at the end of December 2014 or in the next 5 years. Our main international marketing objective is to create quality, design, and convenience porcelain table wares for daily use and to give pleasure to many people at reasonable prices in comparison to products with the same quality in the market.
Marketing Mix � 4 P
4. Promotion
Minhlong will adopt two promotion approaches which firstly the entire process may be left to the local intermediary or distributor as Minhlong needs the intermediary or wholesaler in the early stage of expanding in Australia. As a result, Minhlong will not have much control in promotion strategies or with only a minimum of guidance from headquarters. The next approach, after familiar with Australian market, Minhlong or regional headquarters makes most of the decisions, including all the details surrounding the development of advertising campaigns. For example, with platform advertising, headquarters spells out guidelines on the positioning theme (platform) and the brand identity to be used in the advertisements but in which the actual execution of specific creative concepts differs, giving local firms and agencies more creative flexibility (Kotabe et al. 2005). Instructions on proper positioning themes and concepts are shared with the local agencies and affiliates through manuals, videotapes, CD-ROMs, DVDs or other communication tools (Kotabe et al. 2005).
Minhlong should develop integrated marketing communication (IMC) plan which is designed to manage and coordinate the different communication tools- mass advertising, sales promotion, direct marketing, public relations and so forth, to convey one and the same idea to prospective customers (Kotabe et al. 2005). The primary role of IMC plan is to communicate the features and benefits of our product to our target customers and that planning should be based on communications objectives that is specific and measurable (Belch & Belch 2007). The DAGMAR model propose that the communications task be based on a hierarchical model of the communications process with four stages; awareness, comprehension, conviction and action (Belch & Belch 2007), which our promotional plan for Mihnlong porcelain table wares will follow this DAGMAR approach.
Copy platform: What is the basic issue to be addressed?
This is a brand in a new market, so there is a desire to increase brand awareness and a positive brand attitude towards Minhlong porcelain table wares in the small sized families market, including restaurants.
Major selling idea
Minhlong porcelain product is a quality, design, convenience table ware for small sized households and restaurants at a reasonable price.
First, to establish and increase brand awareness of Minhlong table wares as a quality, design, convenience table ware, the cognitive stage, which is awareness and knowledge provides information and fact about the product of Minhlong to the target market. Brand awareness is important because it means the consumers recognize and remember a particular brand or company name when they consider purchasing options (Terence 2008). Creative strategy for this objective is to use repetitive advertising in TV, radio and newspapers. In Australia, advertisements spending by TV, newspapers, magazines, radio are 33.6%, 43.2%, 10.8% and 7.7% respectively (Kotabe 2005, p. 362). Minhlong must also consider media costs because media costs differ enormously between countries and also consider the set of advertising regulations we need to cope with in foreign markets, in this case, the Australian Association of National Advertisers (AANA) has adopted their respective advertising codes.
Since television is expensive production, but to reach the most of target market and because Minhlong tableware is a new product in Australia, TV commercial would be needed to get the target audience attention and awareness of the brand (Clow & Baack 2004). For example, TV commercial will be scheduled to advertise on cooking programs and will use an emotional appeal with a touch of humor to communicate to potential buyers as Australians have always loved their good sense of humour. Moreover, radio is the cheaper option that can be planned as the housewives who is the decision maker in our target market like to listen easy and old music, the advertisement on radio, such as 101.1 FM radio in Melbourne along with competition game with ending word or sms the word ‘Minhlong tableware’ would be considered as skillful radio advertisers help the listener remember the message by creating a powerful image to visualize or by repetition of the Minhlong tableware name or design quickly to give knowledge to customers of our variety of collection (Terence 2008).
Second is to create affective feeling: Liking, Preference, and Conviction. Create interest in the brand among 70 percent of target audience by supporting ads in newspaper and magazine, such as Woman Weekly. Create positive feelings about the brand among 40 percent by communicate information about the features and benefits of the brand that it contains variety of quality design and collection of porcelain table wares for customers to choose from. Research of what people like, don’t like, what to improve will be advantage for advertiser to know more about target market. Also, create preference among 25 percent of the target audience, by using more copy in ads to convey features and benefits, such as poster on the supermarket where our target often go shopping, banners, brochure or flyers with more designs and details to houses or restaurants. Moreover, famous artist’s recommendation in those particular cities will create liking and preference. Create favorable attitudes by conveying information, promotions by referring consumer to website for more information, such as variety of size, designs and collections. The website is now located at www.minhlong.com. Affective strategies elicit emotions that, in turn, affect the consumer’s reasoning process and finally lead to action (Clow & Baack 2004).
Supportive information
At all times and with all activities, the distributors and retailers of Minhlong product will be informed and encouraged to provide extra information regarding Minhlong porcelain table wares to the customers. Moreover, if we would have our own outlets and stores which are located in Melbourne, it would help to create credibility in the mind of customer that they would have trust our business.
Lastly, to fulfill the sale-oriented objective and creates the motives that stimulate desires which to obtain sales of at least 1% market share among imported Australian tableware product or at least $3.61 million sale at the end of December 2014 or in the next 5 years. Obtain trial among 20 percent of the target audience by use cents-off coupons, Internet ‘hits’ and orders from Minhlong website and in store offers along with advertising and promotions. Also, develop and maintain regular buy of Minhlong table wares among 5 percent of the target audience by using continued-reinforcement advertising (Clow & Baack 2004). These conative message strategies are designed to lead more directly to some type of consumer behavior (Belch & Belch 2007). The goal of a conative advertisement is to elicit behavior and they further encourage the action by stating that this type of design or promotion is available for only a limited time. Besides coupons and offers promotions, our company may advertise a sweepstakes that a consumer enters by filling out the form on the advertisement or by going to a particular retailer. A point-of-purchase display is also useful as it designed to cause people to make impulse buys (Clow & Baack 2004).
Nevertheless, promotion campaign evaluation is needed such as pre-test and post-test evaluation to measure the effectiveness of the promotion plan. For example, the designs for the advertisements, posters and flyers have been pre-tested with a group of sales representatives and housewives and customers will be asked what they think about Minhlong table wares product, the design, the image, the quality and if they have any suggestion for improvement (Waller 2004).
References
Kotabe M, Peloso A, Gregory G,Noble G, Macarthur W, Neal C, Riege A and Helsen K 2005, International marketing an Asia pacific focus, John Wiley & Sons Australia Ltd, Milton.