Uber’s Perception Map in terms of Brand Recognition and Convenience

Perceptual maps

 

Figure 1: Perception Map of Uber in terms of brand recognition and demand

The companies with low brand recognition cannot create much demand for their services in the market. Metlink though has higher brand recognition is unable to create demand in the market.   

 

Figure 2: Perception map of Uber in terms of convenience and demand

The companies which are able to provide convenience to their customers are able to maintain n their demand with the market. Metlink is not able to provide convenience, so their demand is low.   

Positioning and differentiation 

The drivers of Uber are allowed airport pickups, thus giving them an opportunity to increase the revenue of the organization. Zoomy does not have this facility, thus giving Uber competitive advantage in the market. Most of the consumers know about Uber, compared to Ezygo, thus further giving Uber more opportunity to increase their market share (Your favorite restaurants now deliver | Easy online ordering, 2018).  They are able to attract young customers towards their services and have given a consistent performance to them unlike Blue Bubble taxi services (Why to Choose Blue Bubble? 2018).  Uber has developed more additional features like Uber Eats, which allows the passengers to bring their own food. These services are not available in DeliverEasy ([email protected], 2018). Public transport or Metlink is not considered to be a great option for transport during rush hours, compared to Uber (Zoomy – A Better Way to Ride – Passengers, 2018).  The attributes used in the positioning of Uber are demand, convenience, and customer knowledge. Uber have positioned themselves in the market ahead of their competitors using all these attributes (Hire a Rental Car in New Zealand – See New Zealand the Ezi way! 2018).  Their products and services are better in terms of safety than their competitors. Uber provides better quality safety features than all of their competitors like Green Cab, DeliverEasy etc. The convenience provided by them is far better by any of their competitors in the market (Service Rates – Ezygo, 2018).       

The current target market of Uber New Zealand 

Market segmentation is defined as a process by which the potential market of an organization is divided into certain groups based on their characteristics.  Uber New Zealand uses all four type of market segmentation techniques to market their products to their customers (Cahill, 2012).  Based on geographic segmentation, the current target market of New Zealand consists of customers residing in urban areas of New Zealand.  The demographic profile of this current market shows that this customer group consists of men and women whose age lies between 18 to 40 years. Most of them are in their bachelor stages of life, some of them are newly married.  Most of the customers of this group are students and young professionals. Based on the psychographic segmentation, the current target market group of Uber consists of people who belong to a middle-class group and a majority of them are strugglers.  Based on the behavioral segmentation, this group of people seeks the benefit of cost-efficiency from Uber, New Zealand. The user status of this group can be described as the first time users of the service from the company (Shimp & Andrews, 2013). The personality of these group of people can be described as easygoing, ambitious and determined.   

Competitive Advantages of Uber over its Competitors

Recommended market segment 

Using the concept of market development approach, Uber can target a new group of potential customers existing in the market. It is recommended that they market their products to the senior citizens of New Zealand. These group of a potential customer can affect the profitability of the organization in a significant way (Katsirikou & Skiadas, 2012). The customer profile of the target market is as follows:

Age: 50 to 80

Gender: Both Men and women

Region: Both urban and rural areas of New Zealand

Occupation: Retired

Customer loyalty: softcore

User status: regular users

Benefits Sought: convenience

Social class: middle, working, and upper class.

Based on the demographic segmentation, the age of this group of lies from 50 to 80 years old, and this group consists of both men and women.  Most of them have arrived at the second and third stage of empty nest life cycle (Diamantopoulos, Fritz, Hildebrandt & Bauer, 2012).  These group of people is situated in the urban and rural parts of New Zealand based on geographical segmentation. A majority of them have retired from their occupation and a few of them can be physically handicapped. However, they are not the group of hardcore loyal customers, like their current target market. Based on the behavioral segmentation, these group of people wants convenience from Uber. The psychographic segmentation of the market reveals, that these group of people can belong from any class of the society.  The lifestyle of these group of people can be described as resigned.  

Product development approach

1. The products and services of Uber can appeal to their new and existing customers in a better way if they focus on developing a new product. These products should be able to provide convenience to the customers in an effective way. The products of the company should be innovative and creative in nature. The innovativeness of the product can be increased with the help of advanced technology and proper planning(Urde & Koch, 2014). The product should be able to solve the problems that their customers are feeling with convenient ease. Advanced technologies should be used to increase the usefulness of the new products to increase their sales. They should establish more offices to provide service to their customers with convenient ease. Uber is considered as the global leader in innovative application-based cab booking systems.  They should develop their customer care services, to further develop their brand image in the market.  They should promote their products with the help of web-based advertisement along with the technique of word of mouth form the customers.  

Uber already has developed processes to increase the efficiency of the products. Customers have to download and install the application and turn the tracking system on their mobile phones.  These customers can check the availability of the ride and book according to the availability.  However, these processes can be further simplified for the convenience of the senior citizens of the country.  The response time of the company should be increased so that the brand image of the organization develops.  The employees of the organization should be trained on how to communicate with the customers of Uber. They should also provide better special offers to attract more customers towards the organization (Urde & Koch, 2014).  Improving all these systems with the organization will able the company to sell their products in a better way to both their existing and new customers. The new customers will be excited to use the innovative products of the organization for the first time.  The existing customers of the organization will be benefitted from the service as it will increase the level of convenience of the organization.  Thus both of these groups will be benefitted from the innovative products of the organization.  Improving the response time will allow them to attract more customers towards the organization.    

1. Uber can differentiate itself from their existing customers in the market by developing more innovative products and services for their customers. The can improve the response time of their services to increase the efficiency of the service. They can provide better training to their employees so that they can increase the efficiency of the services of Uber. Improvement in the response time of Uber will allow them to differentiate themselves from the competitors available in the market (Hague, Hague & Morgan, 2013).  They can look for innovative ways to improve their products, and innovative products can give the company a competitive advantage over others in the market.  They can promote their products innovatively, to increase their sales and reputation of the company.  The promotional offers of the organization should prompt their customers to use their services in a better way.  They face stiff competition from a number of competitors, thus they have to develop more innovative products. The innovative products should allow the company to increase the competitive advantage in the market.

Market Segmentation Techniques used by Uber in New Zealand

Improving the products and services of the company will allow them to increase the number of customers of the organization.  Innovative products of the organization will act as an incentive to remain with Uber and use their services, while the new customers of the organization will be able to get the benefit from the innovative products of the organization.  They will able to use these products and enjoy the convenience offered by the products by Uber, New Zealand. They should develop these products so that these customers cannot switch to other companies for better services and products (Hague, Hague & Morgan, 2013). They should simplify the processes related to the products of the organization, making it much simplified so that customers of all age group can avail these services. The customer service of the organization should be better so that the reputation of the organization increases in the market and they can gain a competitive advantage in the market. They must market their products in the market with the help of strong advertising campaigns and they should not rely only on the word of mouth of their customers. They should address the complaints of their customers and provide quick services to increase the customer satisfaction score of the organization.        

References 

Cahill, D. (2012). Lifestyle Market Segmentation. Hoboken: Routledge, Taylor, and Francis.

[email protected], A. (2018). Green Cab – Rent a Car for Outstation | Local. Greencab.co.in. Retrieved 19 May 2018, from https://www.greencab.co.in/  

Diamantopoulos, A., Fritz, W., Hildebrandt, L., & Bauer, A. (2012). Quantitative marketing and marketing management. Wiesbaden: Springer Gabler.

Hague, P., Hague, N., & Morgan, C. (2013). Market research in practice. London: Kogan Page.

Hire a Rental Car in New Zealand – See New Zealand the Ezi way!. (2018). Ezicarrental.co.nz. Retrieved 19 May 2018, from https://www.ezicarrental.co.nz/ 

Katsirikou, A., & Skiadas, C. (2012). New trends in qualitative and quantitative methods in libraries. Singapore: World Scientific Pub. Co.

Service Rates – Ezygo. (2018). Ezygo. Retrieved 19 May 2018, from https://ezygo.co.nz/service-rates/ 

Shimp, T., & Andrews, J. (2013). Advertising, promotion, and other aspects of integrated marketing communications. Mason, Ohio: South-Western Cengage Learning.

Urde, M., & Koch, C. (2014). Market and brand-oriented schools of positioning. Journal Of Product & Brand Management, 23(7), 478-490. doi: 10.1108/jpbm-11-2013-0445

Why Choose Blue Bubble?. (2018). Bluebubbletaxi.co.nz. Retrieved 19 May 2018, from https://www.bluebubbletaxi.co.nz/why-choose-us.html 

Your favorite restaurants now deliver | Easy online ordering. (2018). Delivereasy.co.nz. Retrieved 19 May 2018, from https://www.delivereasy.co.nz/ 

Zoomy – A Better Way to Ride – Passengers. (2018). Zoomy.co.nz. Retrieved 19 May 2018, from https://www.zoomy.co.nz/passengers 

Metlink – Greater Wellington’s Public Transport Network. (2018). Metlink.org.nz. Retrieved 19 May 2018, from https://www.metlink.org.nz/