Question

write a marketing plan in the tone of a Chief Marketing Officer at Apple. The purpose of a marketing plan is to guide your marketing efforts (e.g. which strategy you will pursue, objectives to achieve, specific actions to achieve the goal, etc.) in the coming year, the audience of your marketing plan is the management team. These individuals are familiar with what the company is doing right now, and they are expecting you to tell them what they should do next.

Analyze Apple's product, the Apple watch, its competitive strength, and provide instructive feedback for the strategy you crafted. Apple watch is employing a broad differentiation strategy, and its product information, target market, market penetration are facts that everyone knows. I recommend that you conduct a competitive strength analysis that includes at least three major competitors of Apple watch. This analysis will enable you to conclude if Apple watch holds a competitive advantage over rivals, and get a clear picture of Apple watch’s strengths and weak spots. Based on this information, you can provide better feedback for strategy crafting.

Develop a 4Ps mix (product development, price, promotion, place/distribution) based on your conclusion achieved above. Since Apple Watch is a market leader, there will be many competitors who employ offensive initiatives to attack Apple. Therefore, in your 4Ps mix, you also need to consider how Apple should respond to potential attacks.

please help. The report should be between 3-5 pages, and tone (as listed above) should be from the stance of a marketing manager addressing a marketing team within the company.

Answer 1

PRODUCT:-
The Apple Watch intends to satisfy the demand for a extremely customizable better-looking smartwatch ready to enhance the smartphone (in this case the iPhone) capabilities. it's additionally a product that presents a superior worth proposition to the client supported a complete integration of the merchandise with the Apple hardware (iPhone, iPad, macintosh computers) and software package surroundings (iOS, iTunes, App Store, etc.), a sturdy construction created with fine materials, associate degree innovative style that clearly stands out and additionally adds incalculable customization prospects through wristbands matching all designs and tastes. and every one these benefits ar wrapped in Apple’s client service. It exploits then personalization, integration, design, simple use and repair as some way to maximise the further worth offered to the client as come for his/her investment.

The company contains a unified product point that software package and hardware works seamlessly and within which solely the screen and back materials ar completely different reckoning on the version. Apple edges then from a high margin product while not acquisition in further prices derived from the advanced handling from massive product diversity with many various clastic options and add-ons.

An important point for Apple is that the product presentation and packaging. Since the corporate –as declared within the initial assignment- targets a client willing –and able- to pay a lot of for the Apple’s exclusive style and whole, packaging needs to be given per this segmentation. this can be no exception within the Apple Watch. A white minimalist box –with the whole worth clearly assumptive a crucial industrial role- within which each and every detail has been fastidiously thought provides the client the impression that what he/she simply bought are a few things distinctive which is able to distinguish its owner from the group.

And as a part of Apple’s strategy, the Apple Watch solely includes the fundamental accessories (watch, power adapter and charging cable, the wristband and directions manual). It permits those users World Health Organization solely would like the fundamentals to start out victimisation it and forces those others World Health Organization wish a lot of to shop for any needed accent. This distinguishes yet again the Apple Watch from most of the opposite smartwatch makers that attempt to counteract Apple by providing worth for cash as well as several accessories as transport cases, further wristbands, etc. Even one thing basic because the second year guarantee is obtainable by Apple as an additional. as a result of premium stigmatisation doesn't touch on obtaining the maximum amount as attainable out of the customer’s investment, however regarding singularity and exclusivity. Everything else needs to be bought singly.

Abbildung in dieser Leseprobe nicht enthalten

Apple Watch Sport, Apple Watch & Apple Watch Edition

According to the Boston Consulting cluster Matrix (to perform product portfolio analysis supported their market share and growth rate) the Apple watch would presently be a star as its quickly growing market share remains unbeatable and, as some statistics show, has become in 2015 once just some months within the market, absolutely the market leader. Its money generation capability is well higher than average though not akin to the iPhone that remains Apple’s bestselling product.

PRICE:-
While price-setting is usually troublesome thanks to the pressure within the demand, value interrelationships and within the completely different degrees of competition, Apple follows a transparent selling strategy supported differentiation that stresses the merchandise worth, capabilities and benefits and permits the corporate to sell the merchandise with margins notably on top of those of its competitors.

Apple isn't the price leader. the corporate has ne'er used penetration evaluation to realize market share quickly, as Apple has managed to quickly become the leader in several product segments short once its entrance despite its relatively higher evaluation. What Apple very will would be a form of market-skimming, or in alternative words enter the market with a brand new product priced on top of the competition to maximise initial earnings with early adopters. however a crucial distinction needs to be observed here. Most corporations employing a worth skimming strategy tend to lower their costs over time as customers begin to lose interest or new merchandise seem. Apple has solely done it in only a few occasions and with minimum discounts, because the company manages to sell their merchandise at high costs over most of the merchandise life cycle.

With the Apple Watch Edition priced at eleven.000€, the corporate brings differentiation to an entire new level by attempting to enter a brand new section dominated till recently by corporations with no –or terribly few- technological background. Apple is then the primary technological company providing a smartwatch aimed toward the watch luxury market and is, at constant time, the primary company with a product within the watch luxury section with a robust technological background. In each cases these variations can still enable Apple to cost its merchandise while not having to essentially tie them to competitors’ costs.

It is clear then that the corporate uses differentiation additionally as a worth strategy. If its whole stands out among several others, Apple’s customers should consequently be able to pay quite the typical for a product which will place them within the reduced cluster of these designated to be noticed and be checked out.

PLACE:-
Apple presently pursues a technique to position its merchandise in as several places, and as on the point of its target client, as doable. The Apple Watch contains a reserved house in every of the corporate sales points.

As a corporation with a transparent specialise in differentiation, the Apple Stores ar the company’s direct sales channel and ar formed to speak Apple’s commitment to style and distinction. Apple locates its stores in strategic places of most major cities or malls and pays heaps of attention to the subject style with semitransparent glass stairs or huge glass façades (like the one amongst the Apple Store on Yew York’s fifth Avenue). With the arrival of the Apple Watch in April 2015 these stores became even additional exclusive. Any client considering the acquisition of the gold Apple Watch Edition is invited to enter a space separated from the remainder of the shop and rest well. There associate Apple worker offers him individual recommendation and therefore the quite service and a spotlight somebody would expect a prime luxury whole would dispense to a possible client.

Among Apple’s own points of sales {are also|also ar|are} the Apple retailers that are reserved areas inside the shop of a partner company. they permit the corporate to hide a way larger territory with a fraction of the investment required for associate Apple Store. These Apple look areas ar adorned in line with the Apple Stores’ company image and supply the client -at a smaller scale- a similar product expertise one would realize at a daily Apple Store. In Germany they'll be found within Saturn or Mediamarkt.

The Apple on-line store, during which the corporate offers its whole product portfolio, is in an exceedinglyll|one amongst|one in every of} the quickest growing sales channels and thru a giant provision network allows customers to shop for on line and receive the merchandise in a short amount of your time while not paying any further transport prices if they reach a minimum order amount.

Another sales channel, maybe less legendary and advertised, is that the Refurbished Apple Store through that the corporate sells at discounted costs came back merchandise that can't be sold as new any longer or merchandise from client claims that have already been repaired.

Apart from the before mentioned direct sales channels, the corporate contains a immense network of freelance retailers United Nations agency sell Apple merchandise to the tip client. Apple exerts heaps of pressure on these retailers imposing its company tips in order that the general client expertise resembles the maximum amount as doable that of normal Apple Stores.

PROMOTION:-
Apple could be a company that invests massive sums of cash to market its merchandise through several and totally different platforms. On TV, in specialised magazines, billboards, by language agreements with others corporations (Apple INC. + Nike Inc. to market the Greek deity fitness tracker), mobile advertisements in underground systems, trams and buses, etc. Apple is usually on the look for the correct spot wherever any promotional activities might have the most important impact. one amongst the fields during which the corporate has been historically terribly active is in product placement. these days there several common yankee shows during which actors ar seen employing a mackintosh, associate iPhone or additional recently sporting associate Apple Watch.

Some terribly noted advertisements just like the painting Apple Macintosh business, thought-about by several because the best Super Bowl business of all time, or the video series during which Apple ironically mocks Windows disadvantages demonstrate Apple’s creative thinking in his quest against the established order and his predilection for ads and commercials with a deep impact on consumers’ opinions and behaviors.