Marketing Strategies Of Coca-Cola And Apple

Marketing approach of Apple

Discuss about the Marketing Strategies Coca Cola and Apple.

In the present business scenario, marketing holds an important part for the success of the organizations. However, different organizations adopt different types of strategies and policies in order to position their products in the market accordingly. Brand identity, brand image and exposure get increased to a broader extent which helps in better positioning of the product or the brand the market (Urde 2013). Coca-Cola and Apple are the two companies among the contemporary business organizations which have opted for extensive and innovative marketing approach (Armstrong et al 2015). This approach helped them in unique positioning of their brand and products in the mind of the customers.

This report will discuss about the  marketing strategies being implemented by these two organizations. In addition, the competitive advantages that they have gained from their marketing activities will also be discussed. This report will analyze these aspects on the base of two articles being published in Forbes and Smartling.com.

The marketing approach of Apple is quite unique when compared to other brand or their competitors. While the advertisements of electronic gadgets are quite flashy and loud, Apple opted for simplistic approach. Their advertisement is very simple and informative in nature without having any loud proxies (DeMers 2017). The print advertisement of Apple also portrays their simplicity which goes with their product. According to Apple, in the crowded market of loud advertising campaigning, their marketing approach offers a fresh air for the customers. With the help of this marketing approach, they positioned their product as a simple and user friendly devices which can be operated by everyone. Thus, it enabled them to relate their product’s characteristics with that of their marketing campaign.

Coca-Cola is known for innovative and extensive marketing approach around the world. Compared to Apple, they promote more extensive and aggressive marketing approach. Coca-Cola serves huge and diversified sections of customers all over the world. Thus, they promote customization in their marketing approach (Smartling 2017). The advertisement of Coca-Cola are being made and personalized according to the social background of different regions and cultures. However, one aspect they kept same for all over the world is the association of their product with that joy and happiness. They positioned their product as a complementary of happiness. The market where Coca-Cola operates is highly price sensitive and competitive. Thus, they involved all the possible types of marketing media such as, event sponsoring, social media marketing and television commercials (Tuten and Solomon 2014). This type of extensive marketing campaign helped them to place their brand effectively in the mind of the customer. Thus, brand recall will be more in the case of Coca-Cola over its competitors.

Marketing approach of Coca-Cola

Apple follows a certain approach in targeting and segmenting their customers and accordingly they design their advertisements and other promotional activities. Apple gains their competitive advantages in mostly two ways which are pricing strategy and product strategy (Ellickson, Misra and Nair 2012). Apple implements their pricing strategy in such way that it will attract the particular segment of the customers and will help to maintain their exclusivity. Apple has successfully implemented the Segmentation, targeting and positioning (STP) strategy. The customer segments of Apple are the ones who are fond of modern gadgets having updated technologies, rich designs and exclusive. Thus, Apple always comes up with updated gadgets every time and they make extra effort in enhancing the aesthetic value of the products. Moreover, the pricing strategy of them filtered out the customers belongs from lower end of the pyramid. The target customers of Apple are the higher end customers looking for device for their professional and musical purpose.

In positioning the products in the mind of the customers, the advertisement plays a key role for Apple. The simplistic approach of their advertisement implies a positive and favorable impact on their targeted customers (Shakhshir 2014). It is due to the reason that higher end customers are more attracted by the simplistic approach rather than loud and vivid approach. The promotional activities of Apple are being advertised in the mediums which will reach out to the higher end customers. For instance, commercials in news channels, putting up banner in the elite regions help them to target the particular segment.

As earlier discussed, Coca-Cola maintains extensive marketing strategies. The key competitive advantages gained by them are through their interactive and innovative customer relationship management. Participative marketing is one of the key aspects of the marketing strategies of Coca-Cola (Calin 2012). It helps them in targeting their diversified customers according to their own set of criteria. The advertisement, product sorting and promotional activities are mostly based on the socioeconomic cultures of the target regions. Another marketing strategy that is helping them in gaining competitive advantages is the diversification strategy. By implementing this strategy, Coca-Cola introduced various kinds of beverages for different set of consumers. Thus, the business risk associated with the single type of product get reduced and divided in various products. Moreover, it helps them in targeting the various set of requirements of diversified customers from different regions around the world. Thus, they can have their presence in every segment of beverages available in the market.

Evaluation of the marketing approach of Apple

The marketing strategies helped Apple to unique positioning in the mind of the customers. However, not only the positioning but also they have gained competitive advantages from their marketing strategies. Apple has effectively implemented the Porter generic strategies in their organizational strategies to gain competitive advantages. According to the Porter generic strategies, the aspect to gain competitive advantage is the cost leadership (Valipour, Birjandi and Honarbakhsh 2012). In the case of Apple, they do not actually give efforts for cost effectiveness due to their higher end market concentration. However, one characteristic that helps them in cost controlling is having their own set of forward integration. Apple mostly sells their products through their own resellers which help to them to avoid the cost of third party retailers.

The main concentrated strategy for Apple is their differentiation strategy. According to the second principle of Porter generic strategies, product differentiation is another way of gaining competitive advantages (Valipour, Birjandi and Honarbakhsh 2012). The products of Apple are of different software and unique designs which differentiates them from their competitors. Though, various organizations produce gadgets similar to Apple, but there are no close substitutes to them. In this case, the brand value of Apple also contributes in providing different and distinctive customer experience. The last principle is focus. According to this principle, Apple operates in the niche market having a specific target market. The focused market of Apple is the higher end customers from all age groups. According to that, they implemented their pricing, promotional and product strategies. It helped them in gaining extensive market penetration in their targeted market segments.

Coca-Cola has a huge number of customers around the world with extensive market penetration. Due to this, the brand identity is enormous and is being recognized around the world. Ansoff matrix is to be used to determine the market development and market penetration of Coca-Cola which helped them to gain competitive advantages (Wagner III and Hollenbeck 2014). According to this matrix, the first point is market penetration which is being done by existing products in the existing market (Baker 2014). Coca-Cola periodically introduces different variants of their existing products during various festive seasons to attract more customers. Moreover, in few cases they market their products in associating with different other brands such as movie franchisees to market their existing products.

The next point of Ansoff matrix is product development which denotes introducing new products in the existing market to increase the market share (Yang 2012). Coca-Cola continuously evolves their product variants such as introduction of Coca-Cola vanilla which helps in offering various products in a single market. Thus, it helps in gaining more market share and having more options to take on the competitors. The next point is market development which refers to entering in new markets with the existing products. It helps in expansion of the market with the same product portfolio. Coca-Cola introduces same product under different brand name to meet the requirement of the new market. For instance, they introduced Coca-Cola Zero which is a rebadged version of Diet Coke to target the male customers. The last point is the diversification strategy (Kumar, Gaur and Pattnaik 2012). Coca-Cola time and again acquired brands such as Minute-maid and introduced products such as Winnie the pooh roo juice which are completely different from their area of operation. It helps them in operating in different business areas and reducing their associated risk from single area of operation.

Conclusion

Having analyzed the competitive advantages of Coca-Cola and Apple, it can be concluded that they have gathered a favorable amount competitive advantages from their marketing strategies. It is being learnt that the marketing strategies of both Coca-Cola and Apple are effectively aligned with their organizational objectives. The marketing strategies of both the organizations are being designed in such as way that it will effectively reach out to the targeted segments of both the organizations. The entire marketing strategies of them are being implemented according to the requirement and expectation of the customers from their brand.

References

Armstrong, G., Kotler, P., Harker, M. and Brennan, R., 2015. Marketing: an introduction. Pearson Education.

Baker, M.J., 2014. Marketing strategy and management. Palgrave Macmillan.

C?lin, G., 2012. Strategies for increasing marketing flexibility: An application of the service dominant logic. MB School.

DeMers, J. (2017). Forbes Welcome. [online] Forbes.com. Available at: https://www.forbes.com/sites/jaysondemers/2014/07/08/heres-the-simple-secret-to-apples-marketing-success/#58414eba11e3 [Accessed 28 Jul. 2017].

Ellickson, P.B., Misra, S. and Nair, H.S., 2012. Repositioning dynamics and pricing strategy. Journal of Marketing Research, 49(6), pp.750-772.

Shakhshir, G., 2014. Positioning strategies development. The Annals Of The University Of Oradea, 977, pp.416-437.

Smartling. (2017). What Makes Coca-Cola a Global Marketing Success? | Smartling. [online] Available at: https://www.smartling.com/blog/what-can-we-learn-from-coca-colas-global-marketing-success/ [Accessed 28 Jul. 2017].

Tuten, T.L. and Solomon, M.R., 2014. Social media marketing. Sage.

Urde, M., 2013. The corporate brand identity matrix. Journal of Brand Management, 20(9), pp.742-761.

Valipour, H., Birjandi, H. and Honarbakhsh, S., 2012. The effects of cost leadership strategy and product differentiation strategy on the performance of firms. Journal of Asian Business Strategy, 2(1), p.14.

Wagner III, J.A. and Hollenbeck, J.R., 2014. Organizational behavior: Securing competitive advantage. Routledge.