Evaluation Essay on Whitespa: Enhancing Clarity of Marketing Plan

Introduction

From the previous assignments, there were several comments regarding the Marketing Plan for Whitespa. One of the comments was about the SWOT analysis for Whitespa. The threat, as well as the opportunities at Whitespa, were not explained vividly, especially on the threat part as more analysis had to be done. These comments are important because they will help to enhance the clarity and eventually the quality of the marketing plan to ensure there is no fault or misguiding information which may prevent the business from attaining its long and short goals as well as objectives. These comments will improve the plan by helping to check the threats as well as the opportunities that may be related to Whitespa. Appropriate measures will be adopted to ensure that these states threats and opportunities are improved in the plan to ensure that they do not affect any goal or objective in the future. Opportunities and threats are the chances that Whitespa has as well as the factors that are vital to the growth of the company. Therefore, these comments will be used as issues of concern to improve the Whitespa Marketing Plan and ensure that it is good. This new part of the plan will try to explain the pricing as well as the distribution strategy of the company and the integrated marketing communications plan.

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Pricing and Distribution Strategy

According to Karray, (2013), pricing and distribution strategy is an important part of this marketing plan because it focuses on how the services offered by Whitespa will be provided to the customers and what costs. Whitespa is a center created purposely for beauty as well as selling fitness products. Since its inception, that company has managed to become among the best in the world. Several pricing strategies will be used by Whitespa. Since the company has emerged as one of the best, it has encountered stiff competition from companies that have been present such as Ultra Beauty and Blue Spa (Karray 2013). As a result, one of the pricing strategies that will be used by Whitespa is value pricing its products. With this pricing strategy in place, Whitespa will reduce the prices of its products and services because of external factor such as competition which may decrease the revenue of the company. The second pricing strategy that will be used by Whitespa is the pricing of premium products (Karray 2013). As much as some of the prices of the products and services will be lowered due to the stiff competition, there are certain service or products of Whitespa which are unique since its rivals do not offer them. These products or services are considered premium, and their prices will be high.

In the current business world, the distribution of the products or the services that a company offers has become a significant issue in improving its competitive advantage. According to Karray (2013), this case is the same for Whitespa, and one of the distribution strategies that will be used by the company is selective distribution because its primary market is in Houston, Texas hence most of the products and services will be offered there (Karray 2013). Also, the company will employ intensive distribution because the company has a secondary market for its products and services across the United States. Therefore, several small outlets will be established in different cities in the US.

Integrated Marketing Communication Strategy

The integrated marketing communication strategy is the other issues that the Whitespa will have to focus on to ensure that its business is successful. In this section, Whitespa Company will develop a message strategy that will be used to explain what the brand is all about (Kitchen & Burgmann, 2010). The message strategy that will be used for Whitespa is a unique selling proposition. This strategy enables the company to highlight the unique services and the products that it offers (Kitchen & Burgmann, 2010). Therefore, the Whitespa will make its consumers aware of the skin care products that are not offered by its competitors. The other message strategy that Whitespa will use is the brand image (Kitchen & Burgmann, 2010). The brand image messaging strategy will be used by Whitespa to create itself as a beauty and fitness brand. According Kitchen & Burgmann (2010), this approach will influence many people psychologically to start using their product or services since there is an increase in demand as well as fitness services.

Apart from the message strategy that will be used by Whitespa, the company will also employ the media strategy (Kitchen & Burgmann, 2010). The media strategy of Whitespa will employ the appropriate media mix to attain the desired results from the advertising campaign which will use different features of the social media such as Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram (Kitchen & Burgmann, 2010). In these social media networks, the Whitespa will produce different content types. When the same content is used frequently, the users will be bored, and they will not be attracted (Kitchen & Burgmann, 2010). Therefore, Whitespa will be producing different types of content and posting them on its social media sites so that the customers can be appealed. The second media strategy that will be employed by Whitespa is influencer marketing (Kitchen & Burgmann, 2010). Through influencer marketing, a person who has a wide or a well-connected influence, especially on social media, will be used to market the products. According to Kitchen & Burgmann (2010), this strategy will involve the selection of certain celebrities either known or upcoming to market the beauty and fitness products through their social media networking to reach a high number of people since they have a lot of followers.

Public Relation, Sales Promotion, and the Personal Selling Point

Public Relations

The public relations plan refers to the measure that the Whitespa will put in place which engages as well as inform the main audience, develop important relationships and help to bring back vital information back into the organization for analysis as well as for an action to be taken (Grunig & Grunig, 2013). In the public relations plan, Whitespa will inform its key audience of the goals that it aims to achieve, which is to produce and distribute its beauty and fitness products to different places (Grunig & Grunig, 2013).

The next step that Whitespa will follow in the development of public relations is to identify its target audience whereby the main ones are females who are into beauty products and individuals who take fitness activities seriously. Once Whitespa has identified its target, proper research will be conducted to identify the buying behavior of the consumers so that these products will be produced in line to those behaviors (Grunig & Grunig, 2013).

After that, the key message of Whitespa Company will be relayed to the consumer. The key message that will be relayed by Whitespa is that it is the leading in the selling and distribution of quality beauty and fitness products in the US (Grunig & Grunig, 2013).

The public relations plan will then indicate the tactics that Whitespa will use to achieve its objectives. This marketing plan explains that the main tactics Whitespa will use to reach its audience to increase the advertisement and distribution of its beauty and fitness products. This tactic will be expected to be done every day so that the products offered at Whitespa can attract new consumers (Grunig & Grunig, 2013).

The last measure that Whitespa will undertake is to measure the success it has achieved from these tactic. According to Smith & Zook (2011), the best approach that will be used is the use of Key Performance Indicators such as Revenue growth rate, relative market share and the cash flow forecast.

Sales Promotion

Sales promotion is one of the major activities that has helped several companies to be successful in their operations (Khang, Ki, & Ye, 2012). According to Khang, Ki, & Ye (2012), In this marketing plan, Whitespa will develop a sales promotion plan whereby it will seek to stimulate its sales by taking part in activities such as special offers, discounts, demonstrations, giveaways, point of sales displays, trade exhibitions and merchandising.

These activities will be vital in helping the company to attract more customers to buy its products even after these promotional activities have ended (Khang, Ki, & Ye, 2012). While using these activities for sales promotion, Whitespa will be keen on these costs to avoid spending a lot of money and then incur loses.

Personal Selling Strategy

Whitespa will employ the personal selling strategy to help in selling its products to its consumers (Cummins, Peltier & Dixon, 2016). In this, Whitespa will employ various individuals who will help the company to sell its products after meeting physically with the customers. Since Whitespa has different department stores, it will have various staffs who will be advising the customers on the available products and how they are used (Cummins, Peltier & Dixon, 2016). The products that will be sold using this technique are those of high value so that the customer can be convinced to go for it.

Online and Direct Marketing Plan

Online Marketing Plan

The development in technology has led to the rise in the digital marketing tools that have been used widely by various companies. Therefore, to keep up with the competition that has been developed by the digital marketing tools, Whitespa will develop its online marketing plan to help in attaining some of its business goals (Smith & Zook, 2011). The first step that will be undertaken to develop an online marketing plan is to focus on the environment which entails the market as well as the competition available. Whitespa will achieve this strategy by analyzing and working according to the market trends, the competitive advantage of the competitors as well as the SWOT analysis (Smith & Zook, 2011).

The second step that Whitespa will undertake to develop its online marketing strategy is to understand its audience (Smith & Zook, 2011). Understanding the audience will in essential since it will enable Whitespa to develop proper communication channels that will be used to reach them.

The third step is to develop the online goals that will guide it to conduct its social media activities appropriately. The main goal that will be used is to increase traffic in its social media networks (Smith & Zook, 2011).

After that, Whitespa will develop the strategy and creativity which entails the action that will be taken. In this case, Whitespa will create links that will be posted online, which, when accessed by the clients, they will be redirected to its Website (Smith & Zook, 2011).

After these activities have been attained, Whitespa will begin advertising and even selling some of its products through the online platform. The money that will be used for the online marketing plan will be allocated in the budget to prevent the company from going into financial constraints. According to (Smith & Zook, 2011), the key performance indicators will be used, such as the Revenue growth rate, relative market share, and the cash flow forecast to find out if the strategy that Whitespa has used is successful.

Direct Marketing Plan

As much as the online marketing plan will be beneficial to the activity of Whitespa, direct marketing will add more advantage to it. When using the direct marketing plan, Whitespa will have to communicate directly with its selected customers through different media (Armstrong et al., 2014). These customers will be determined by looking at those who have placed a certain order, those visiting the store or its website. Some of the methods that will be used by...