Background Information of Natural Evolution and ‘Max Protein Banana Bar’

This is a continuation of the study being conducted in assignment 1. Assignment 1 was aimed at conducting an organizational analysis of the company ‘Natural Evolution’. The analysis did find a need to design a comprehensive and strategic marketing plan to support an effective launch of a product “Max Protein Banana Bar”.

Hence, this study is actually about designing a strategic marketing plan to support the launch of a new product. In a marketing plan, it is essential to use the contemporary marketing tools and theories, so that, the target population is effectively accessed (Dangelico & Vocalelli, 2017). Nonetheless, competitor companies of ‘Natural Evolution’ are more effective in regards to reaching to the target audience.

             The chosen product is “Max Protein Banana Bar”. The product is made up of excellent quality ingredients. It is also gluten-free. The flour used for the product is locally sourced. The target age group is 20-50. The product is a potential selection considering an increasingly growing bent of people towards organic products. However, an effective marketing communication will be needed as the competitors of ‘Natural Evolution’ are comparatively more effective in accessing to the target audience. The company has a few issues due to many reasons. Employees are overloaded with work and hence, not being able to avail of the work-life balance.

The company’s financiers are not pro-changer. The executive level staffs are indeed friendly and supportive. An adequate support from the Australian government can be expected as the new product is organically sourced. Small-scale investors are earning good profits from the stock exchange market. On a whole, the company is in a good financial situation.

2. Segmentation, targeting and positioning approach

2.1 Problem statement

            The company ‘Natural Evolution’ faces the problem of increased manufacturing cost. The manufacturing cost could not be reduced as the company did not want to compromise with its products’ quality. However, it has a real good opportunity in the form of organic products. However, it may not be able to enjoy the opportunity due to its inefficiency in marketing communication. It lags behind to its competitors in terms of reaching or accessing the target market. There can be several reasons for the fact; however, ineffective marketing communication is one of the reasons.

The company follows a traditional marketing approach of which most are outdated and are not effective as well. Moreover, it misses on a few potential communication means like paper advertising, TV ads, social media promotion etc. There is an urgent need to address the profit margin, which is being affected by increased manufacturing costs and uncompetitive marketing strategies. A competitive marketing communication is required to promote the launch of “Max Protein Banana Bar” to help the product reach to the target audience (Natural Evolution Foods, 2018).  

Organization and Situation Analysis

2.2 Discussion of a potential market segment 

            The potential market segment chosen for this report are customers who are increasingly becoming inclined to organic products. There are ample reasons for why those specific customer groups are inclining to organic foods. One of the reasons is definitely the pricing. Organic products can be cheaper than the inorganics as the farming process of inorganic products does not involve the use of any pesticides, sewage sludge, ionizing radiation, genetically modified organisms and synthetic fertilizers. Organic products are exclusively grown and naturally extracted from plants. ‘Side effects’ is another reason, which attracts people towards organic products.

It contains little or no side effects as organic products are sourced from plants and prepared naturally without using any kind of chemicals. Additionally, the production of organic products has little or no adverse impact on the environment. A company that does or plan to offer the organic products will have a good reputation build up in the sight of the local government and consumers (Lee & Yun, 2015).

            According to Meier et al., (2015), the overall awareness of consumers on organic food products is soaring. Their attitudes towards the purchase of organic foods are mostly positive. Consumers are being motivated to these products due to their rising concerns for health, lifestyle, environment, their subjective norms and food product quality. The changing consumer behavior and the benefits of organic foods are two of the reasons behind a boosting consumption of organic foods.  

2.3 Discussion of target market and positioning 

Target market

            The target consumers are the people falling in the age bracket of 20-50. A market segmentation theory is a helpful guide towards identifying the target market. The theory says that the target market can be identified by a few variables like geographic, psychographic, demographic and behavioral. A behavioral segmentation will be used for this report to identify the target market. Behavioral segmentation helps to identify the target market based on consumers’ buying behavior (Coskun, Ozgur, Polat & Gungor, 2016). For example, budgeted phones are shipped to the Asian countries whereas high-end phones for the Western like the United Kingdom, the United States of America, Australia

, New Zealand and others. On a similar note, ‘Natural Evolution’ was able to understand the emerging trend for food and beauty products. People especially belonging to the age group 20-50 are now increasingly getting aware of the impact of foods and beauty products that they consume. They have a number of resources in the form of articles in newspapers, websites, popular magazines etc. to be aware of the emerging trends.

Evidence of Research

These resources are not just educating consumers on the harms of consuming the inorganic food products but also on the benefits of organic food products. Decision making is now much more matured, which is both an opportunity and challenge to the business. Those who are flexible with consumers’ behavior they will have little or fewer troubles from changing consumer buying behavior. ‘Natural Evolution’ is one of those few companies, which want to remain flexible with the changing pattern of purchase.  

Positioning

            “Natural Evolution will make the people’s life enjoyable with organically sourced food products at relatively low prices”

3. Three Marketing and 3 Financial Objectives

3.1 Marketing objectives and goals 

            The ultimate goal of marketing is to enhance the profitability margin for ‘Natural Evolution’. The goal can be attained with the help of the following objectives:

• To target the new customers
• To increase the sales
• To grow the market shares

There was the need to target new customers as the target market is a booming prospect and also that the ‘Natural Evolution’ had no other option than to go with this. The company did not also want to compromise on the products’ quality. Hence, the only way to perform better than the competitors and grow the market shares also was to go with a different concept and targeting a new set of customers. An increment in sales and so in market shares should possibly do the needful for ‘Natural Evolution’.

3.2 Financial objectives and goals 

            The ultimate goal in financial terms is to attain the wider profit margins. The goal will be served from following financial objectives:

• To have wider profit margins
• To achieve a growth in revenues
• To have a diverse revenue base  

Product

            According to the ‘Marketing Orientation Theory’, products should be appropriate to the target audience. The appropriateness needs to be managed along the price and products’ quality. It means products should be demanding for its target audience. For example, it is not appropriate to offer luxury cars to customers who cannot afford it. They should rather be offered the budget cars with appealing features. Similarly, low-cost cars with average features should not be offered to high-end customers as these customers can afford and also prefer to have the luxury cars (Hafeez, Noor, Shariff & Lazim, 2013).   

            The product to be launched is the “Max Protein Banana Bar”. The product is made up of high in quality ingredients. It is also gluten-free. The product is both tasty and good to boost instant energy. Unlike chocolate the product will not melt when kept inside the bag. The product is healthy, natural, organic and vegan-friendly. The bar is a perfect partner for those who do a lot of physical exercises and need an instant energy booster. 

Quality of Presentation

Price

            Price is an essential component of marketing mix theory. As opined by Weisstein, Kukar-Kinney & Monroe (2016), pricing should essentially be more effective than competitors and bearable to target consumers. Both high and low-end consumers want the best deal. The best deal is unarguably the one, which is superior both in terms of products’ quality and pricing. However, this is indeed difficult to remain both cost-effective and offer quality products.

For example, the case study company ‘Natural Evolution’ has been offering quality products; however, failed to remain a cost-effective service provider. On the other hand, its competitors offer similar kinds of products at cheaper rates. According to Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs, marketers need to have the ability to effectively understand the buying behavior of its target consumers. Pricing is one of the factors, which affect the buying patterns of consumers. Hence, setting up of price is a critical part of a strategic and comprehensive marketing plan (Karnatovskaia, Gajic, Bienvenu, Stevenson & Needham, 2015).    

Place

            As stated by Arnett & Wittmann (2014), the place of sales is an important part of the marketing mix and must be planned carefully. It means that all products may not necessarily be suitable for bigger platforms like supermarkets. Such products can also be sold through the small-scale retailers. The purpose should be to reach to the target audience all the time. For reputed and bigger companies, it is advisable to go multiple ways like going to supermarkets as well as for small retailers. On the other hand, for potential but relatively smaller companies, it is better to stay confined to small-scale retailers (Eshuis, Klijn & Braun, 2014).

In the context of the ‘Natural Evolution’ Company, it would be much better to remain confined just with small retailers. “Max Protein Banana Bar” is a kind of a chocolate in terms of shape and physical layout. However, it is very different than a chocolate in other ways. It is indeed an energy booster, which unlike a chocolate does not melt in a bag. It is an easy and safe way to generate or boost instant energy. Moreover, at small-scale retail shops, the product can be made readily available and accessible to customers. More consumers will be able to know about the product and use it as well.

Promotion

The importance of promotion can be understood from the theory of planned behavior. The Theory of Planned Behaviour suggests that intentions for different kinds of behaviors towards a product or service must be predicted with maximum accuracy (Kautonen, van Gelderen & Fink, 2015). The theory further suggests to take into consideration a number of variables like attitudes, perceived behavioral control and subjective norms to effectively understand the reasons behind consumers reacting so differently to a product or service. The theory provides a baseline for thing such as what makes consumers behave so differently in certain situations. Such predictions can really be helpful in promoting and changing diverse decision-making behavior through messages (De Leeuw, Valois, Ajzen & Schmidt, 2015).

Segmentation, Targeting, and Positioning Approach

In the context of ‘Natural Evolution’, a number of promotional strategies can be adopted like paper advertising, TV ads, social media promotion etc. Paper advertising is one of the most commonly used modes of promotion. It is an appropriate mode of promotion for small retailers. It is one of the cheapest ways to reach to a thousand or millions of people in a shorter period of time. ‘TV ads’ is about promoting the product while during the popular TV daily soaps, sporting events and entertaining programs.

Social media promotion is a potential platform to reach to a thousand or millions of people in a very short span of time. Social media platforms such as YouTube, Facebook, and Twitter etc. can particularly be very handful. The number of subscriptions for a page on YouTube is a good way for both making the publicity and generating revenues. A number of likes, comments for a Facebook page are also a way to generate views and revenues. Twitter can be used to interact with the audience and respond to their queries.

4.2 Marketing strategy proposed implementation 

Communication: It is a very vital phase of implementation. ‘Natural Evolution’, in particular, will have troubles because its employees are already overburdened with work. There is no work-life balance for employees. As financiers are not the pro-changer, they will have a resisting tendency towards the proposed marketing plan. On the other hand, the company has good support from its executive level staffs, the Australian government and the small-scale investors. An effective communication will hold the key to motivate employees and financiers for their contributions. This is also necessary to effectively explain the implementation plan to executives and small investors. Moreover, there will also be the needs to seek an approval from the local government (Chen & Zhang, 2014).

Communicating the end goal: The end goal is to increase the profit margin. Hence, it is necessary to communicate the rationale for the marketing plan. The expected benefits to the business must also be explained. For example, ‘Natural Evolution’ will be able to offer the organically sourced food products at even a cheaper rate than its competitors. Revenues will widen up and so the market shares (Berson, Halevy, Shamir & Erez, 2015). Moreover, benefits will be for all who contributes to the implementation.

Monitor the progress: Marketing plan needs to be treated as a living document that means a continuous monitoring of the plan. The implementation process needs to be reviewed against several variables such as follows: (Bryant et al., 2014)

• Was the product able to hit the target market?
• Is the budget on target or else?
• Have any of the tactics not worked?

Consider the adjustments: It is important to be aware of the market trends in regards to technology, competition, suppliers, customers and other external factors to be able to make adjustments when needed. This will help ‘Natural Evolution’ to effectively maintain its marketing plans (Kumar, 2015).

Develop the contingency plans: It is a fact that all marketing plans will not work. Hence, it is important to develop contingency plans, add new steps if needed into the actions, extend the time frames and upgrade the marketing objectives.

5. Budget Allocation for Promotion Mix

TV ads	AU$279.68 to AU$2014.61 for a 30-second commercial
Paper advertising	AU$4100.68 for 1/8 page ad
Social media marketing	AU$400 to AU$22,000 per month

Table 1: Expected Budget Allocation

Conclusion

            In summary, this can be said that “Max Protein Banana Bar” could be a potential move for ‘Natural Evolution’ in regards to increasing the profit margin. It is due to the rising popularity of organic food products in Australia. Consumers are increasingly getting informed on the harms of inorganic foods and the benefits of organic food products. ‘Natural Evolution’ had previously lacked in effectively promoting the products. Consequently, its competitors took the advantage. However, this marketing plan should definitely work in favor of the company.

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