Part D: Your Marketing Plan: Presentation

MKT500 Marketing Plan

Eric Brown

MKT500 Marketing Management Strayer University

Dr. Lisa Amans

September 1, 2020

Question 1

Great Travelers Airline Marketing Plan is a private independent airline operating a fleet of aircrafts for economic and VIP class travelers. The fleets comprise of aircraft not more than 65 fleets. Ideally, the company is located in major cities across the entire United States. In addition, the company is specializing on providing ultra-low-cost carriers and niche services. The airline company plans to offer outstanding regional flights for both business, economic and VIP clients, with the best comfortable seats, personalized entertainment system and variety of beverages and food stuff for the customer convenience and comfort.

Based on the positive feedback received by the Great Airline Travelers Express Limited from the customers, the company has come to the realization that customer service is vital in sustaining competitive advantage. Additionally, the company has found out that social media is necessary tool in providing outstanding and impeccable customer services for every individual passenger. Great Airline Travelers Express Limited has come to understand that one unhappy and unsatisfied customer has the ability to warn or discourage potential customers from subscribing to the services of the company and this has negative impact on the returns of the company.

The feedback from the customers concerning the company’s services will be utilized in promoting excellent customer services so as to enhance, profitability, passenger retention and boost the overall Great Airline Travelers Express Limited growth. The customer feedback concerning comfort, safety, bookings and general services are good. The Great Airline Travelers Express Limited will use the feedback to ensure that all the company’s culture is customer-centric.

The company will seek to research, evaluate and keep high customer value so as to increase profits, attract more customers and maintain customer loyalty. Based on the customer’s feedback, the Great Airline Travelers Express Limited will use the customer’s feedback on services offered to improve communication and customer experience. The company will achieve its goals based on customer’s feedback through focusing on what the passengers want or need and develop services around those wants and needs. Similarly, the company will utilize customer’s feedback to carry out self-evaluation so as to find out what customers think about company’s services.

Finally, the Great Airline Travelers Express Limited will use the customer feedback to promote and encourage exchanging of customer’s information among the company’s departments. This is key in ensuring that all departments provide ultimate customer services and applying of customer’s feedback and suggestions in order to make change on customer services.

Question 2

A pricing strategy is a method used to establish the most appropriate price for a service or product. Pricing factors include manufacturing costs, competition, market place, market condition, and quality of the product. Appropriate pricing strategy is the key to success for Great Airline Express Limited. If Great Airline Express Limited sets low travel prices, the demand will be very high, but the profit margin will significantly reduce. Besides, if the company sets high travel prices, profit margins will significantly increase, but the demand will absolutely decrease. Great Airline Express Limited can choose different pricing strategies so as to enhance the growth of the company.

One of the pricing strategies that Great Airline Express Limited should adopt is demand-based pricing. During high demand times like festive seasons and holidays, Great Airline Express Limited should increase their travel prices and reduce the same tickets prices during off season. Demand-based pricing will increase the profit margin of the company significantly. It also offers the company flexibility to adjust their ticket prices depending on the nature of the season.

In addition, total customization strategy can be used by Great Airline Express Limited. The company should divide prices according to the classes which are economy, business, and first class. The regional airline should adjust the number of seats allocated to every fare class. This strategy is vital because it will provide Great Airline Express Limited unique selling advantage and creates higher price points. It will also enhance profitability due to the differentiation factor. Additionally, this pricing strategy will help the airline to know their customers better through loyalty programs, cookie tracking, and registered users because it will help them to provide personalized pricing.

Finally, Great Airline Express Limited can use competitive pricing strategy. Airline industry has increasingly become complex and fierce in competition over the past decades. Great Airline Express Limited should strive to continuously offer low-cost prices as compared to their competitors. The company should offer low cost travel tickets but maintain high quality customer care services, offer outstanding regional fights for both business, economic and VIP clients, with the best comfortable seats, personalized entertainment system and variety of beverages and food stuff for the customer convenience and comfort.

Distribution is the process in which a product or service is made available for consumers. The Great Airline Express Limited uses multi channel distribution strategy. The company can use mobile and social media platforms such as facebook, twitter, and instagram to distribute their products to their customers. This will enable consumers to book tickets directly from travel meta-search portals. The company can use instagram posts that promote premium products and motivate consumers to envision dream destinations. The Great Airline Express Limited can find the right touch between direct sales and social media channels because they are very important for airlines industry.

New social media technologies will enable Great Airline Express Limited to reach customers in real time during their research. They can also personalize the travel experience for instance; Great Airline Express Limited can use facebook profiles to personalize in-flight magazines placed on every seat to celebrate the 5th anniversary of its inter-city travels. The cover of the magazine should contain the passenger’s photo and name, basing on the seat assignments, and the content should be geared toward each person’s interests in life. The Great Airline Express Limited should advance their specific destination content and inspirational media in order to remain relevant in the search or inspirational part of the customer’s travel booking journey.

Furthermore, Great Airline Express Limited can use direct channel distribution strategy to reach their customers. The regional airline has several digital platforms at their disposal that can help enhance direct revenue channels, while avoiding the use of indirect channels. The Great Airline Express Limited can change their search paradigms available to customers from route-based searches to interest based, theme based, and map based search experiences. The airline can also improve their social media pages to engage consumers and attract those directed by search engine pages or meta-search pages to make the most from direct channel of distribution.

Question 3

Integrated marketing communication is a strategy to develop a unified and seamless experience for customers to interact with the brand. It is process that is created to ensure that all communication and messaging strategies are consistent across all channels and are customer centered. For Great Airline Express Limited to build long term brand relationships and deliver value, careful planning and integration of marketing mix elements into a unified market offering to satisfy customer’s needs is required.

The Great Airline Express Limited should not only have same indent, slogan, and brand colors splashed across all their marketing channels, but it will also include a coherent story through everything the airline does. The regional airline will plot all customers touch points across the consumer lifecycle so as to successfully integrate all the marketing channels used. The Great Airline Express Limited will integrate company website, public relations, facebook, instagram and twitter in their integrated marketing strategy. The company will review and re-evaluate their social media tools so as to increase efficiency, effectiveness and profit gain. Great Airline Express Limited will always update their website to reflect new software updates and the modern technology advancements.

The diagram below is an integrated communication plan of Great Airline Express Limited.

Message strategy

Great Airline Express Limited- the best way to fly in America at low-costs

Media strategy

Great Airline Express Limited has implemented the use of social media campaigns, brochures, and magazines. Social media strategy has helped Great Airline Express Limited to enter into the market and obtain competitive advantage. The company has also been able to attract and retain a large number of consumers.

Question 4

Public relation is a management function that will help Great Airline Express Limited establish and maintain communication with the public. The Great Airline Express Limited will involve their employees in their public relation strategies. Employees should interact well with the general public, colleagues, and customers. Excellent customer care services are also an effective public relations stunt. The Great Airline Express Limited should also implement the use of podcast to communicate with its employees and the clients, and the public.

Moreover, the airline should utilize their social media platforms like Facebook, Instagram, and twitter to talk about diversity, inclusion, and equity initiatives. Diversity, inclusion, and equity initiatives will enhance the public relations of the Great Airline Express Limited; hence attracting more customers and retaining the existing customers. Furthermore, the regional airline should offer free snacks and magazines during festive seasons and holiday to their clients. This will make the customers feel that they matter to the company and they are cared for.

Sales promotion is the process in which a potential customer is persuaded to purchase the product. The airline industry is currently very competitive so Great Airline Express Limited should work extra hard to keep their clients happy with their promotional offers and services. The Great Airline Express Limited can keep their clients happy by offering them free gifts and services. They should offer surprise upgrades and complimentary meals. They can also offer toys to the client’s children and wheelchairs for elderly people. Additionally, the Great Airline Express Limited can use joint promotions to enhance the growth of the company. They can team up with credit companies and hotel chains to offer special rewards and promotions.

Personal selling is a process by which a company’s sales representative meets with a potential customer for the purpose of transacting sales. The Great Airline Express Limited sales agent can use a personalized approach, designed to meet the customer individual needs and to inform them of the comfort of their aircrafts and low travel costs that the company offers. The sales agent should also give the potential client an opportunity to ask questions; the sales person should be able to answer the questions and concerns raised by the client. This will make the customer to be emotionally connected to Great Airline Express Limited because of the services offered and low costs of travel. The company gains the clients trust and receives information for their customer data system.

Question 5

Online marketing is the process in which a certain product or service is advertised to potential customers through digital strategies. The Great Airline Express Limited will continue to use the three social media platforms facebook, instagram, and twitter to market their products (Ida, 2020). Additionally, the company will utilize the company websites and podcasts to market their airline. Social media marketing is very effective because it is used by millions of people across the U.S. It is also cost effective and can steer a lot of traffic to the company’s website. Similarly, these social media platforms can share basic information about Great Airline Express Limited and raise brand awareness and promote positive word of mouth. Facebook will enhance Great Airline Express Limited profile by encouraging existing and potential customers to click the like button on the company’s facebook page.

Direct marketing is a form of communicating an offer, where a company communicate directly to preselected clients and supply a method for direct response. The Great Airline Express Limited can utilize Email marketing, email marketing entails sending commercial messages to a group of people using email. Email marketing is cheap and reaches an already engaged audience. Email marketing can also be measured easily. In addition, leaflet marketing can be used. Leaflets or flyers can be distributed through letterbox drops and handouts. This marketing method is cheap, simple, and a very effective way of reaching customers.

Question 6

Social responsibility marketing is a marketing philosophy that a company should take into consideration. The Great Airline Express Limited should embrace diversity, equity, and inclusion. The company should employ workers from different background, gender and races in order to advance their brand. Furthermore, the Great Airline Express Limited should conserve environment by optimizing flight routes (Ivan & Kristina, 2019). This will help the company to reduce the charges paid for pollution certificates. Besides, the Great Airline Express Limited should adhere to regulations pertaining carbon offsetting and reduction that gives airlines restrictions on carbon emission. The company should also purchase lighter fleet which is more efficient and use new air traffic control to save emissions.

References

Ida, A. I. P. (2020). The effectiveness of Online Marketing Trends: B2B and B2C Application. Jurnal IImiah Manajem dan Bisnis 5 (1), 90-98.

Ivan, S., & Kristina, M. (2019). A review of Corporate Social Responsibility assessment and reporting techniques in the aviation industry. Transportation research procedia 43, 93-103. Retrieved from https://scholar.google.com/scholar?as_ylo=2019&q=airline+pestle+analysis&hl=en&as_sdt=0,5#d=gs_qabs&u=%23p%3DYri6Gn5ys90J

Tracy, L. T., & Michael, R. S. (2017). Social media marketing. Sage.

Instagram

Twitter

Integrated Marketing

Communications

Facebook

Public relations

Website