Essay: Analysis Of Integrated Marketing Communication In Twelve Cupcakes.

Demonstrate the understanding related to the integrated marketing communication by analysing the real campaign and to exercise the strength and weakness of the campaign of the company.

The aim of the report is to demonstrate the understanding related to the integrated marketing communication by analysing the real campaign and to exercise the strength and weakness of the campaign of the company. The integrated marketing communication is the use of the marketing strategies that are required to optimise the communication of a consistent message of the brands of the company to stakeholders. The company that has been selected for the analysis is twelve cupcakes. The advertisement that is presented in the report is a Singapore advertisement campaign that was run by the company.

Twelve cupcakes is a company that came into existence in Singapore in the year 2012, July. The brand offers the freshly baked cupcakes to their customers that are handmade from scratch daily. Along with this, the company make use of quality gourmet ingredients and prepare different types of cupcakes which improve the customer experience. The company offer cupcake moist, fluffier, and less sweet with the smooth frosting that enhances the palate. Twelve Cupcakes operates the business in Singapore, Jakarta, Taipei and Hong Kong (Twelve Cupcakes 2018) 

In the Singapore market, there is growth in the consumption of the baked goods by the customers. The value and volume growth of 2017 was in line with the respective CAGRs seen over the review period as a whole. Cupcakes are mainly used by Singaporeans as a snack or dessert. In the Singapore market, the artisanal producers are dominating the market which includes BreadTalk, Four Leaves, Bengawan Solo and Twelve Cupcakes (Euromonitor International 2017). The consumer of twelve cupcakes generally likes to consume cupcakes that are less in sweet because they are health conscious with quality ingredients, smooth frosting and fluffier. The company ensure that they are able to meet entire needs of customers present in Singapore market by offering them good quality products. Along with this, at the time of occasion the company ensure that they offer an attractive discount to their customers.

Twelve Cupcakes Company offer its products to different customers that fall under different segments which means that company make use of differentiation or multi-segment targeting strategy. In this strategy, the company targets all customers that are segmented by them in Singapore market.

The market segmentation of twelve cupcake company is given below: -

• Demographic segmentation: - In these segmentation groups of a customer are divided on the basis of age, gender, income, education and many other characters (Kotler 2015, 252). Twelve cupcake company offer the products to different age group people which include 5-15 years, 15-25 years and above with the middle and high-income group. The company segments men, women and children.
• Geographic segmentation: - Company segment the market on the basic physical location or region. Twelve cupcakes company offer the products through different outlets in the market of Singapore.
• Psychographics segmentation: - The company segment this group on the basis of lifestyle, socially and personality characteristics (Wilson & Gilligan 2012, 112). Twelve cupcakes believe in consuming the sweet products is preference reflect a lifestyle of the people lives in Singapore.  

Customer Needs

Twelve Cupcakes Company serve its products and services to different segments which include mainly the people that fall under the age group of 5-15 years and 15-25 years as it is mainly chosen by them. The company mainly target kids, girls and another person who loves to consume cupcakes as it is their favourite dessert and this age group like to consume sweet products more. Along with this, the company offer a different discount on the cupcakes due to which most of the people prefer to consume cupcakes offered by Twelve Cupcakes Company.

Twelve cupcakes make use of different ways of promoting the brand and their products on the market. In the Singapore market, one of the major communication objectives of the company is to generate the awareness about the product and service of Twelve Cupcakes Company. Moreover, the communication contributes to increasing the brand value and reputation in the market. Communication through advertisement contributes to promote the product and making the customers aware of the offers that are provided by them. 

Marketing communication is one of the important elements to generate the awareness about the product in the market of Singapore. The campaign of the company is the advertisement campaign for the year 2018. The advertisement is effective promotion tool that is used by the companies to communicate about the products to a large number of customers. Traditional media and social media are used by the company to promote the products in Singapore market (Belch et al 2014, 52). Twelve cupcakes make use of print media and social media or internet for the promotion of their cupcakes and this is clear from the below-given advertisement.  

The company twelve cupcakes make use of the social media for promoting products in the market because this is the way through which they can target huge large number of customers (Castronovo and Huang 2012, 117). The below given is one of the advertisements of the company which is available on social media or on the internet. (Please refer appendix 1 for the article)

The above advertisement of twelve cupcakes is new advertisement in which they provided the attractive offers on occasion of Women’s day in the year 2018. The company shared the details related to the offers that they are going to provide to their customers on the occasion of women’s day. The company made use of social media as this was effective way to spread the details for the offer. Moreover, this advertisement campaign leads to numerous numbers of strengths and weaknesses which are discussed below with the help of models and theory.

Targeted Customers

Strengths 

Large target audience

The strength of the company is that social media is effective channel through which they can target large number of audience. The advertisement campaign can bring the changes in the preference of customers towards the product (Danaher and Rossiter 2011, 35). This reflects the implementation of the Hierarchy effect model. It is a model which reflects how advertisement of the company influences a consumer’s decision to make the purchase of product or service. This model includes the stages which are: Awareness and knowledge stages, liking and preference and conviction and purchase stages (Investopedia 2018). Twelve Cupcakes strengths of advertisement are related to the stages of model which is given below: -

Awareness and Knowledge stage: - In this stage, the consumer is aware about the product or service. Twelve cupcakes model is making use of this model due to which they believe in generating the awareness and knowledge related to the offer that they are providing on occasion of women’s day. 

Understanding the preference of customers

The social media advertisement is one of the effective ways to understand the preference of customers. This was also discussed in the model of Hierarchy effect as this is one of the stage of this model which provide the strength to company.

Liking and preference: - Company also understand the liking and preference of customers due to which they are offering products that are mainly liked by customers with discount so that they can meet the preference of customers for products at affordable prices. Moreover, the feedbacks of the customers can easily be acknowledged by the company.

Connection with customers

This advertisement campaign helps the company to get connected with the customers which is strength of this campaign. Considering the Roy Morgan research, advertisement through online source is one of the way through which the company connect with the customers.

No involvement of endorser

The advertisement campaign that is done by the company doesn’t involve any endorser due to which the advertisement was not as attractive. According to the TEARS model which includes trustworthiness, expertise, physical attractiveness, respect and similarity are the components (Freeman and Chen. 2015). The implementation of this model provides the support to the Twelve Cupcakes. The lack of endorser makes the advertisement less attractive. 

Management of advertisement

Twelve Cupcakes company needs to manage their active advertisements as they have to update they have to keep updating the interactive advertisement on social media. This includes the expertise character of the TEARS model in which the characteristics of expertise include skills, knowledge, ability and other elements. The lack of advertisement affects the handling of the advertisement.

Conclusion 

In the end, it can be concluded that marketing communication campaign of Twelve Cupcakes Company is effective and the company is able to meet their decided objectives. The report includes the details related to the customers to whom the company serve their products and services and meet their desired needs . The advertisement campaign of the company reflects that they make use of both traditional and social media tool to promote the products in the Singapore market. It is recommended to the company to make the print more visible for which they can use newspaper for advertisement as this helps in communicating a large number of people. The company should involve the celebrity while promoting the products. The company should bring diversification in their product line which is must for them. Moreover, the company should give a decent and accountable message to negative feedback provider customers because they are ultimately affecting the value and reputation of a company. This will also allow them to be active on the social media account 

References 

Belch, George E., Michael A. Belch, Gayle F. Kerr, and Irene Powell. 2014. Advertising: An integrated marketing communication perspective. US: McGraw-Hill Education.

Castronovo, Cristina, and Lei Huang. 2012. "Social media in an alternative marketing communication model." Journal of Marketing Development and Competitiveness 6(1): 117.

Danaher, Peter J., and John R. Rossiter. 2011. "Comparing perceptions of marketing communication channels." European Journal of Marketing 45(1/2): 6-42.

Euromonitor International. 2017. Baked Goods in Singapore https://www.euromonitor.com/baked-goods-in-singapore/report

Freeman, Karen S., and Cathy C. Chen. 2015. "Wither the impact of celebrity endorsement." In International Conference on Communication, Media, Technology and Design, pp. 661-676.

Investopedia. 2018. Hierarchy-of-Effects Theory. https://www.investopedia.com/terms/h/hierarchy-of-effects-theory.asp

Kotler, Philip. 2015. Framework for marketing management. India: Pearson Education.

Patisserie, Glace. 2013. Twelve Cupcakes. https://petulantchild.wordpress.com/tag/glace-patisserie/

Peres, Renana, Eitan Muller, and Vijay Mahajan. 2010. "Innovation diffusion and new product growth models: A critical review and research directions." International Journal of Research in Marketing 27(2): 91-106.

Samiksha, S. (2018). 5 Important Concept of Marketing Management Philosophy. https://www.yourarticlelibrary.com/marketing/5-important-concept-of-marketing-management-philosophy/1076

Singapore Promotions. 2018. Twelve Cupcakes: $2 off any purchase above $8 at all outlets! Valid on 8 Mar 2018. https://singpromos.com/dining-restaurants-food/twelve-cupcakes-2-off-any-purchase-above-8-at-all-outlets-valid-on-8-mar-2018-215019/

Twelve Cupcakes. 2018. About Us. https://www.twelvecupcakes.com/about.htm

Wilson, Richard MS, and Colin Gilligan. 2012. Strategic marketing management. New York: Routledge