MKT 500 Assignment 3

Assignment 2: Part B: Your Marketing Plan

Chet L. Walker

Strayer University

Dr. Alex Onukwugha

MKT 500 – Marketing Management

13 November 2019

Introduction

Branding strategies helps a business to add value to the company and build brand equity. When a company integrates branding strategy with cross-channel marketing, it grows and reaches its target audience. Through brand strategy and cross-channel marketing, a company reaches its target customers that help to build product value from the customers’ perspective. Branding strategy varies depending on the market campaigns, budgets, and target audience. Companies can employ multiple strategies to ensure successful campaigns and reach a broader market. A brand goes beyond the company’s name or logo and includes what people say about the business, products, or services. It is the perception that customers have towards the business and how they define the market. With the ever-changing customer environment, branding is rapidly evolving. Aspects such as social media, millennial age, and leadership are influencing how companies think about branding and how they engage with audiences.

Brand Strategy

In the modern world, customers show their relationships with brands based on shared values. Companies and businesses need to choose the branding strategies design to influence people to stop and pay attention. In my market, Creative Cuts and Styles focuses on enhancing haircuts and style experiences for every man who seeks our services to fit his personal needs (Glanfield, 2018). Customers visit barbershops with different individual needs. Some want a professional cut that is acceptable in the workplace, while others need a customized cut that fits their fashion and style for a specific event. Employees in the business have the training and motivation to provide services that prove creativity and fits customer needs. Especially for Millennial customers, employees should be willing and can produce their best innovation to design styles and cuts that fit this segment of customers. The name of the company shows that our business offers creative hairstyles and unique, organic care for aftershave services.

Furthermore, slogan, company’s logo, and color palette play an essential role in branding. These elements help to convey the image of the company, the messages on the company website, and employees’ relationships with customers. The slogan of Creative Cuts and Styles is “customers have excitement, youthful and bold experience from creative and trusted employees.” The primary purpose of the business is to ensure customers receive their customized air cuts to fit their personal needs and go home happy and feeling energized (Glanfield, 2018). The slogan is emphasized by the company’s logo showing the aspect of excitement and boldness covered on both sides by trustworthy and dependable employees. The company’s name, logo, and slogan will influence customers to stop and pay attention to our business. New customers would like to experience the excitement that creativity and trusted employees offer. As a result, customers will want to revisit the barbershop for customized haircuts that fit their personal needs.

According to Birren (2016), color plays a crucial role in capturing the attention of customers. Colors affect decision making on the items or services customers want to buy. This concept refers to color psychology, the study on how colors relate to human behavior. Our logo has a blue color on the top and the bottom as well as red color in between. According to color psychology, blue means customers have peace, trust, stability, and harmony with our brand. Blue can also show professionalism and confidence in the brand. Red, on the other hand, represents passion, youthfulness, boldness, and excitement. This means customers will have the enthusiasm and youthful experience from passionate employees. The colors integrated into the logo can influence a customer to stop and pay attention to the services offered in the shop (Birren, 2016). Lastly, Creative Cuts and Styles will introduce dread styles. This is because of the rising demand for dreadlocks styles among the millennial customers and the trend in the men’s hair care industry.

Market Analysis

Creative Cuts and Styles will target millennials as the primary market and professional customers as a secondary market. The primary market includes customers between the age of 16 and 25, mostly men. This segment will consider both white Americans and people of color. Most of these customers are in high school and college levels of study hence easily accessible in universities and high schools around the Houston area. Millennials consider the style and changing according to trends as vital factors to influence their making decisions. Therefore, this market will require innovation and creativity as well as training employees to meet their needs. The secondary market will involve most of the working customers who seek to look clean and professional as they go to their workplaces. Mostly, this segment does not consider trends or complicated styles. Most of these customers will have a specific hairstyle or cut customized for them anytime they visit the shop. For this segment, we will concentrate on the people who work around the Houston area and online customers who visit the shop for customized styles.

Position Statement

The position statement describes how a business is different from competitors, how customers may benefit from the services or products, and how these benefits are marketed to the target market. Creative Cuts and Styles is a unique business that offers different services as compared to other competitors (Kladou et al., 2016). The business target new customer segments and provides differentiated prices to our customers. The business has a website that allows customers to choose different hairstyles and cuts as well as booking platforms to enable customers to secure appointments for specialized and customized services. Our position statement is as follows. “For professionals who seek customized hairstyles and cuts as well as millennials who seek to move with the trend, Creative Cuts and Styles provides professional services and organic care for aftershave services. Creative Cuts and Styles provides customized services that fit your personal needs at an affordable price, with a variety of hairstyles to select your preferred style.”  

Customer Behavior

Creative Cuts and Styles target customers who consider unique lifestyles and changing with the trends in the market. Customers in this segment have a taste for a stylish, fresh, and unique look when they go out to meet their peers in school, games, or parties. The other target customer segment is the working population. This group includes people who recognize professionalism as a core for their operation. Employed individuals believe in neatness and presentable glooming that influence their colleagues at work to respect them. Professionalism also helps them to influence clients and look formal in the activities they undertake. Our position statement is relevant for the target customer because it ensures professionalism and creativity in the services offered. The working population is assured of professional services that will leave them neatly groomed. The millennials, on the other hand, are assured of getting haircuts and styles as per their needs. The logo and slogan sum it up with the assurance of quality experience full of excitement and youthfulness from competent, passionate, trustworthy, and professional barbers. Lastly, brand extension promises the millennial who would wish to seek dreadlock care to attend the shop for professional and customized services.

References

Birren, F. (2016). Color psychology and color therapy; a factual study of the influence of color on human life. Pickle Partners Publishing.

Glanfield, K. (2018). Brand Transformation: Transforming Firm Performance by Disruptive, Pragmatic and Achievable Brand Strategy. Routledge.

Kladou, S., Kavaratzis, M., Rigopoulou, I., & Salonika, E. (2016). Journal of Destination Marketing & Management.