Marketing Plan of Lifestyle Production Free-Samples for Students

Question: Demonstrate an Understanding of Marketing and how it is Managed within the Australian business Environment. Answer: Marketing Plan of Lifestyle Production Introduction A marketing plan is a document in business that is used to formulate strategic marketing position and action for a specified period of time (Maritz, 2008). The marketing plan shows marketing objectives, costs, environment, target market and competitors. Marketing plan help business achieve marking goals and objectives effectively and use resource efficiently. This following report is preparation of a marketing plan for life style Video business. The report analyses the current situation of the business in terms of capabilities and weakness in the industry. The report also outlines the macro environment that the business is operating in. This will enable the business achieve it marketing objectives in the Australian market. Company information Lifestyle Production business is a Rowville Melbourne based events video recording business. The business is involved in production of videos. The business is owned by John and Anne Morton. The firm has been in business for the past 20 years (Lifestylevideos.com.au, 2017). John is the business cameraman. Ann Morton acts as the administrator of the business and offers other assistance to second camera, designing, editing and writing. John has won several awards and got recognized of his exceptional work in video making. These awards include Australian video producers Association national Award 2008 stage Production and AVPA National Award 2006 Documentary 2 for shooting Tasmania the Devils Playground. The business is a member of Australian Video Producers Association and has accreditation from Australian Video producers Association Special event and Australian Video Producers Association Corporate. Purpose of the marketing plan The marketing plan will have the following purposes; The marketing plan will set objectives of the business involvement in marketing. It will set a budget for the marketing activities It will enable accountability of the marketing activities The marketing plan will compliment the strategic plan of the business. Lifestyle Production Marketing Mix Lifestyle Production product is videos. The business makes videos for its customers that involve their life style. These include; birthday videos, wedding video, concert videos, business promotion videos, special events, travel DVDs and family history videos. The business provides it products to customers in Melbourne. The business also serves people around Victoria State. Lifestyle production uses internet and personal sales persons to promote the business product. The owners approach customers who have event and persuade them creating demand for the product. The business also uses it website https://www.lifestylevideos.com.au to promote it products. The business product prices depend on the length of the video, size of he event and location of the event. The Lifestyle production business marketing mix is significant to understanding the product, place, and promotion and pricing. The marketing mix enables understanding of the value that the business offers to its customers. It also help in understanding the area coverage, current promotional activities and determinants of the prices charged. Situational Analysis The situational analysis of Lifestyle Production Company will involve external environmental analysis, industry overview, target market and internal analysis. External environmental analysis Political trends: The business has to abide with the get copyright for making video and copyright clearance. The business also needs to abide to the moral rights for the work that they are involved in. The business has to observe privacy laws in Australia. Lastly, the business has to observe the competition law and engage in fair trade (Austrade.gov.au, 2017). Economical Trends: People in Melbourne have an index purchasing power of 122.30. The Australian economy is forecasted to decrease in terms of GDP growth rate and increasing inflation rate for the second and third quarters of 2017 (Tradingeconomics.com, 2017). Social, cultural and demographic Trends: The population in Melbourne is expected to increase with 5.8 in this year. This shows that there is an increase in populations and therefore more services demand. The people in Melbourne are changing their lifestyle. There is an increasing use of internet, long working hours and increased need for entertainment. Technological Trends: There are new development in technologies and usage. People are using their phones to record due to phone advancements. There is a new advanced camera that has been launched by Samsung Company (DeMers, 2017). There is also changing trend on video posting. Videos are posted online for hosting and transfer. Environmental trend: The business has to observe the environmental legislation that protects the environment and cultural concerns. This ensures that the activities of the business do not cause any cultural concerns to the society. Legal Trends: The business has to subscribe for business license in order to carry business in Melbourne and have an office. The business also require permit from the Media Association in order to be permitted to shoot videos. Industry Overview The video production industry in Melbourne is dominated by large companies concentrating with large events and targeting large corporations promotion video productions. The industry has many customers spanning from personal needs to corporate needs for producing their events. Analysis of the market There has been an increase in media consumption in Melbourne and Australia at large. It estimated that one out of seven Australian watch non commercial TVs. According to a survey done by ABC News in 2017 kids used an average of 12hours a week watching online materials. The critical industry success factors of the video industry is having the highest number of views and getting recognition by Awarding organizations. The video industry has no discrimination to new entrants and the producer power is held on how best products of high standards (Blankson, Motwani and Levenburg, 2006). Videos in distributed either via CDs, DVDs, flash disks or through the internet. Target Markets Lifestyle targets personal events, school events, wedding events and small-medium businesses promotional events. The business target small to medium events in Melbourne. The target audiences are individuals with great sense of keeping memories for the events in their life. Review of the Situation The business is operated by two individuals who perform the camera works and administration. The business has more than 20 years experience in video producing. The business involved making of videos for personal events and small to medium business promotion videos. Capabilities The business has the following capabilities; Skills for making videos Professional photo taking Documentary making Creating promotional messages Story telling (narration) The business owners have good experience and the business is well established for it has been in existence for the past 20years. The business can use it core competence to attain a competitive advantage over it competitor. SWOT Analysis The SWOT analysis shows the businesss strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threats. The tool shows the strength that the business has and can use them to take the existing opportunities in business. The tool also shows the internal weaknesses that the business is facing and the threats that exist in the business. Therefore, the business is able to use it strength an minimize it weaknesses in order to take opportunities and avoid threats that can lead to business failure. Branding of lifestyle Production Lifestyle production has established it brand in making quality videos by taking best professional shots and telling clients story. The business has experience in telling stories and uses this position to distinguish itself from its competitors. The business has positioned itself with ability to position businesses through video marketing and putting clients business in the forefront. The business has also branded itself as customer centered by offering flexible terms. Marketing Objectives The marketing plan of Lifestyle Production will include the following; Increase number of clients per week to 100 Increase businesss return by 15% within one year Increase coverage to Darwin and Sydney cities. Marketing strategies The marketing strategy will be used execute the marketing plan to achieve set objectives. The marketing strategy will be formulated in terms of price, product, place, physical evidence and promotion. They include the following; Product offering Product is core value that the business is offering to its customers. Giving more products to customers will build a business relationship. This business will create packages that will be sold out. These packages include; video + photo, video+ narration and writing +video shooting+ narration. This increase product package will give customers offers to choose from (Senapati, 2014). This strategy of increasing product package to video photos and narrations will persuade customers to select Lifestyle production business for their events. This will be aimed at increasing sales of the business. Price Strategy The business will lower the prices of it products. The lowering of prices will make the business provide it product at slightly cheaper price compared to it competitors. These prices will be competitive and thereby attracting customers to select Lifestyle Production based on favorable prices. Lower the minimum price fromAU$450 to AU$350 to attract more customers Place The business will increase it coverage by opening new offices in Darwin and Sydney. These offices will open to enable customers to access the business services. Potential customers will visit offices to inquire and book services with the business. Promotion strategy This strategy will involve communicating with target audience to persuade and convince them for the business product. The promotional activities will be aimed at reaching the target market to create awareness of the businesses coverage, product offers and physical evidence. The business will use local commercial TVs to reach vast mass watching. This will boost awareness of the business and communicate about the products that the business is offering. The business will also use it website to give detailed information about the products, offers and show physical evidence of past successive deals. The business will also use engage in partnerships to sponsor events that will create good publicity. These events are like local beauty contest or schools beauty contests. Lastly, the business will manage it social media pages. Social media will create awareness and direct potential customers to the business website. The business will use these channels to reach customers in all areas. Physical product strategy This strategy will involve creating videos and photos and letting them accompany the promotional messages. This will enable provide physical evidence to customers about the quality of service that they are offering. This will also be enhanced by encouraging customers to give testimony about the businesss products (Sharma, 2014). The physical evidence will allow customers interact with the Lifestyles production products and rate them according to how clear and quality of images are. Marketing Budget The marketing activities are set to use AU$ 30000. Advertising Commercial TVs 10000 Sponsoring Events 8000 Opening offices 1000 Managing social media And website 2000 Calendar of Marketing Activities The marketing calendar shows the schedule of marketing activities that will be carried our for a period of one year to implement the marketing plan. Evaluation The lifestyle production marketing plan will take approximately one year. The marketing plan has objectives that will be achieved through implementation of the marketing strategies. The business will create new demand by increased promotional activities. The promotional activities will base on product, service, price and coverage. The promotional activities will be vigorous on the peak season when there are more events. For instance, there will be more promotional activities in August, December and Aprils. During these periods in a year, there are more weddings and celebrations in the society. Therefore, the business will increase its products awareness in these peak seasons to increase demand of the products (Jones and Rowley, 2011). The TVs will be used because of it appeal and ability to show the businesss physical evidence of the product. The company will use it website throughout the year to update customers and visitors about the ongoing offers. The business will also use the s ocial media to advertise it product. The business will upload photos and short videos on social media to create awareness to social media users about the products and the offer that the business is giving. Partnering to sponsor at least on beauty event will be aimed at creating good public relation with local community. The marketing strategies will be evaluated on the set objectives. First, the promotional activities will be evaluated on the number of new customers visiting the premises or inquiring for the business product. Secondly, increasing coverage will be evaluated on opening of Darwin and Sydney offices for the business to serve a wider range of customers. Third, the product package will be evaluated on bases on how many customers purchased for the package instead of the ordering one product. This will involve analyzing number of customers who bought video plus photo package instead of video or photos separately. Conclusion The lifestyle production marketing plan will be achieved by the first analyzing the eternal and internal situation of the business. This will give an insight if the existing situation of the business and the industry. This will enable the formulation of the marketing objectives and strategies that will increase the businesses sales. The business marketing plan will give a budget outlay and schedule that is time bound for the marketing activities of the business. Therefore, the marketing plan will be used as a tool of creating focus, activities and standards for evaluating the marketing process. References Austrade.gov.au. (2017). Australian business and environment laws - Austrade. [online] Available at: https://www.austrade.gov.au/International/Invest/Guide-to-investing/Running-a-business/Understanding-Australian-business-regulation/Australian-business-and-environment-laws [Accessed 22 Apr. 2017]. Tradingeconomics.com. (2017). Australia | Economic Forecasts | 2016-2020 Outlook. [online] Available at: https://www.tradingeconomics.com/australia/forecast [Accessed 22 Apr. 2017]. Blankson, C., Motwani, J. and Levenburg, N. (2006). Understanding the patterns of market orientation among small businesses. Marketing Intelligence Planning, 24(6), pp.572-590. DeMers, J. (2017). Forbes Welcome. [online] Forbes.com. Available at: https://www.forbes.com/sites/jaysondemers/2016/11/16/7-technology-trends-that-will-dominate-2017/#7f6b6f0f4a51 [Accessed 22 Apr. 2017]. Jones, R. and Rowley, J. (2011). Entrepreneurial marketing in small businesses: A conceptual exploration. International Small Business Journal, 29(1), pp.25-36. Lifestylevideos.com.au. (2017). Lifestyle Video Productions. [online] Available at: https://www.lifestylevideos.com.au/index.html [Accessed 22 Apr. 2017]. Maritz, A. (2008). Entrepreneurial Services Marketing Initiatives Facilitating Small Business Growth. Journal of Small Business Entrepreneurship, 21(4), pp.493-503. Senapati, M. (2014). Marketing of small business, A case of small business in India. IOSR Journal of Business and Management, 16(5), pp.08-11. Sharma, M. (2014). Creative Marketing for small businesses. IOSR Journal of Business and Management, 16(7), pp.69-77.