Marketing Strategy For McDonald: Targeting Kiwi Pavlova And Happy Meals Essay.

Develop and present a marketing strategy suitable to promote your brand/product from the categories below. You will pick a product and decide and justify your target market based on their buying behaviour. You will design a marketing strategy for the target market including a communication slogan which should be incorporated as part of an IMC campaign.

In 1920, the concept of fast food was pop-up. From that period, there is continuous increase in the international fast food chains. The fast food industry also attracts many new business corporations due to its potentiality. This report discusses the McDonald, an international brand serves food, beverages and drinks to the customers including burger and fries. In 1954, there journey began with a contract based agreements between McDonald brothers and American businessman (Dunlap, 2018). Soon, McDonald becomes one of the world largest food chains by making their presence in more than 100 countries. In addition, they also have a huge customer base of around 69 million individuals and from these, most come in the list of loyal customers. The company strategy is tended towards delivering value to the employees, customers and community. In addition, the culture prevailing in all their restaurant chains are also promoting global youth employment.

The vision statement of McDonald is focused toward becoming modern and progressive burger corporation and deliver superior customer experience and service. Moreover, there mission statements are focused on the actions related to CSR activities nurturing whole community (Specter, 2015).

In New Zealand, there are various products of McDonald uniquely made for the customers. The list of these major products is (Schlossberg, 2015) –

• Georgie Pie – Made from quality New Zealand beef with classic Steak Mince and this all baked in the Stores of McDonald annually.
• McMuffins – this product is raised from the various regions such as Taranaki and Waikato with the help of farmers.
• The Boss – This category includes beef patties, lettuce, tama to and also includes two quarter pound.
• Kiwi Burger and Big breakfast – Consists of double sausages, has brown scrambled eggs and a toasted muffin.
• Happy meals – This makes the children happy came up with their parents. With every box of food, the company delivers something new such a toy made of characters in the movie - Hotel Transylvanian 3.
• Kiwi Pavlova – This product is only available in summer and spring months.

These all make the New Zealand menu more delicious and gives value to the customers.

In New Zealand, McDonald running 167 restaurants and it is estimated that these chains are serving estimated one million people each week.

McDonald also segments the market on various basis such as geographic, demographic, psychographic or on behavioural basis. This helps them to penetrate the market in an effective way and save huge amount of costs in terms of wastages of resources and money (Leavy, 2010). Segmentation, targeting and positioning (STP) play an important role in giving strategic and operational benefits to the company and also increase the competiveness in the market.

McDonald use these ways for segmenting the market –

• Geographic Factors – Under this segmentation, McDonald divides all markets into several geographic areas. McDonald is a global organization and so they have universal presence and one can find its outlet anywhere. In respect with metro size and city size, it diverse from under 5000, 20000-50000 and 50000+. Their outlets can be found in some parts of rural areas too. New Zealand is one of the favourable market places for McDonald as there it is a well-maintained economy (McDonald, 2016). McDonald also gets benefit in terms of tax relaxation. Moreover, the economic policy of country also remove any barriers to entry into the market and thus it is well suited in align with McDonald strategies. On the other hand, McDonald can also lose their strength in New Zealand if they did not consider some of the drawbacks of economy such as culture disparity, strict law in property, etc. However, the business model of McDonald is uniquely fitted with every nation and satisfies the needs, wants and taste of each and every consumer (Purdy, 2017).
• Demographics Factors – These factors are considered to be significant in process of the segmentation. In New Zealand, there is a scattered population divided on the basis of age, gender, income and lifecycle of family. However, majority of products of McDonald are served to all sorts of people. They also not differentiate their customers on income level basis and thus individuals belong to all income class welcomed by company. In New Zealand, the customer cannot ignore fast food as they have outlets per capita more in comparison with other nations. Behind Mexico and United States, New Zealand is also third in OECD with a confounding 65.6 percent of Kiwis above the age of 15 classes as either being obese or overweight. In New Zealand, McDonald and KFC are leader in fast food marketing. Everywhere, their products and slogans are being inundated in various places like TV, billboard and many more. McDonald New Zealand spokesperson i.e. Simon Kenny also gave a response that obesity in related with Fast Food is a problem in New Zealand and to make substantial resolutions, there is a requirement of wide multi-sect oral approach.
• Psychographic Factors – McDonald also divides their customers on basis of social class, lifestyle and personality. Majority of their products are available to all sorts of people, however some of their expensive meals are for individuals who did like to buy products of ‘M’ range category. New Zealand is famous and concern for its education sector and in there different groups of people are having different attitude, values and lifestyles (Dwyer, Edwards, Mistilis, Roman & Scott, 2009). From a long period of time, McDonald products are leading in fast food outlets and they are also leading for all generations.
• Behavioural factors – Behavioural factors differ as per several variables factors from customer to customer like patterns of eating, usage rate, price sensitivity, loyalty towards brands. McDonald makes their platform ready for all type of occasion however, in New Zealand, many go there due to celebrate the birthday parties of the kids. The company Happy Meal products are there to satisfy the hunger and celebration in an effective manner. Moreover, most of the people population s positive towards the brand.

In respective with targeting of McDonald, let consider two target profile within the segment, -

To position the products in to the minds of targeted segment, McDonald uses various offers and strategy. As it is the final step in S-T-P planning approach, in-depth knowledge of market segmentation is required. In order to position their products, McDonald uses various insights of segments related to the consumer behaviour and developed through a market research. In align with continuous promotion and advertisement, the company also undertake various CSR activities as in New Zealand customers are now more concern about the environmental and community aspects (McDonald & Rundle-Thiele, 2008).

Consumer Buying Behaviour is the act of decision making where several individuals involved in buying and using products (McEachern, Schroder, Willock, Whitelock & Mason, 2007). For understanding their buying behaviour pattern, it is required to understand that - what are the factor purse consumers in taking purchase decision, what reasons influence them during buying, and the varying factors in the New Zealand society.

New Zealand is shifting in various ways and often at a quicker rate than individuals may considered (Wiles, Allen, Palmer, Hayman, Keeling & Kerse, 2009). Before it was not important to understand the change but now companies and various brands need to ensure that they have sufficient data regarding past, present, and future trends to meet the needs of target groups and segment. The cities in New Zealand are becoming more multicultural and this affecting the individual cultural perspectives. By the year 2025, half of the population in New Zealand will reach an age of 45 and it can be anticipated that working population includes 65+ year old people (Terry, 2015). In addition, the age group including 50+ comprises of small business owners and this cluster is significant for the development economy and society.

Consumer Buying Behaviour

In other developing nations such as China, the Middle East and India constantly to outgrowth for fast food chains, the companies need to adapt new strategies in the developed countries to maintaining competency and profitability. Both Australia and New Zealand along are considered to be a mature market for fast food market (Wan Hassan & Awang, 2009). Moreover, the total fast food consumption is very high.

McDonald products Kiwi Palova and Happy meals ruled the market in fast food sector and a large segment of the marketplace outfits to the disorganised native fish and chip shops (Bell & Neill, 2014). However, the consumer demand and behaviour change with an increase in Asian immigration into New Zealand and this result to the Asian street food mainly in the urbanised areas of the nation. There is also a commitment made by McDonald for sourcing chicken elevated without regular usage of antibiotics.

Most of the consumers are happy with the real taste of Kiwi Pavlova. For almost an era, no actual New Zealand feast would be without the crowing treat. Moreover, a new list in the Oxford English dictionary tells that that meringue-based dessert was developed in New Zealand (Chapman, 2010). In addition, the consumer is also shifted towards more healthier products and thus aim to go with children Happy Meals products in fast-food menu of McDonald.

With the help of their happy meal products, McDonald targets mostly the children who come up with their family and parents. They also offer various cinematic toys to these children as an extra such as incredible movie character toys, minions’ toys, and so on. In 2018, McDonald also announces that 50 percent of Happy Meals menu will be listed globally at the end of 2022. In addition, they will have caps of 600 calories (Smh, 2018).

With the new changes, the viewpoint of customer stands on that they still want to choose classic McDonald items for their children but also appreciate the added choices and the work, company are doing in nutrition and ingredients.

In respect with other segments, McDonald is successfully established a superior structure in modelling the requirement of the marketplace. It makes use of concept and philosophies such as actions of consumers and product appeal to its benefits. It is assumed to have a key focus on the potential performance of the organization in a distinct market. Also, there is a strong business environment in New Zealand and thus McDonald is uing full potential of the developed economy by sourcing of adequate resources and exploits them in making various product categories and foods.

In last, Customer possesses different attitude and belief towards various products. These beliefs and attitude make up brand image and impact the consumer buying behaviour. This attracts the marketers and wants to modify with such beliefs and attitude of the customers in relation to various ad campaigns. Also, McDonald delivers superior service to their consumers which last a good impression so that they can come back again. McDonald customer profile is highly diverse (Liu & Jang, 2009). For instance, Family comes with their children in respect with a sweet treat, Kid visits McDonald for seeking of fun and young adults come for a value meal.

Ethical marketing strategy ensures that the wants are real and that the products and services meet those requirements (Murphy, Laczniak & Wood, 2007). From a long period of time, ethical marketing strategy is proved successful and operative as consumers get their required aids they anticipate from using the products or services offered by the organization.

McDonald became the leader in the fast food industry due to their diversification of products, affordable and reasonable prices, worldwide serving and intense promotional activities. The company also have a strong focus on customer service and response to competition. One of the major strategies of McDonald is to invest continuously in advertising and focus their menu items towards children and families producing recognizable icons. The key success factor of McDonald is their customer satisfaction rate and fast service.

Below there is a marketing strategy based on the target market and the 4Ps. These four Ps are Product, price, place and promotion that are aligned with the target market.

Product – A product is a commodity that is delivered to a respective customer as per his requirement and needs. It includes both tangible and intangible elements.  McDonald is a food service business and has a product mix mainly comprises of foods and beverage products. Some of their main products categories are – Hamburgers and sandwiches, Snacks and sides, Salads, Fish and Chicken, Desserts and Shakes. Above in targeting section, two products are states, i.e. one was Happy meal and second was Kiwi Pavlova. The first product was Happy Meal and it basically targets the kids as kids certainly love a treat and McDonald make menus according to them only. With Happy Meal, McDonald also creates a toy zone where the children get various characters of toys after purchasing of happy meal. Such as Peni parker, Spiderman, Miles Morales, etc. (McDonalds.com, 2018). The other product was the Kiwi Pavlova. This product was sold into summer season only. The demand for this product is very high due to various controversies between Australian and New Zealand in relation to the recipe. For other segments and geographical area, McDonald has a diverse range of portfolios. Moreover, some of their product categories like beef sales depend on country to country. For instance, In India, eating beef is known to be a sin for people and have a negative effect on society culture and that is why in some of the states, the government also make it banned.

Price – The pricing strategy of McDonald is developed to reflect the affordability of the customer. This is one of the significant and distinct aspects of McDonald that the people and customer get the meal at reasonable prices. In New Zealand, the target market is middle income and higher in comparison with the other burger chains as price are competitive. In response to ethical strategy, the company use two set of pricing strategies – first is bundle-pricing strategy and other is psychological pricing strategy (Liz, 2015). In respect with first strategy, McDonald offers various discounted meals and related products bundles for prices that are discounted. For instance, consumers can buy a happy meal or an extra value meal so as to improve cost and product value. In psychological pricing strategy, McDonald uses prices that assume to be more significant such as $__.98 instead of turning it off to the nearby dollar. This stimulates consumer to perceive affordability in purchasing the product. Both these elements of the strategy encourage consumers towards various product categories of the company. The current price of Happy Meal in New Zealand is $5.60.

Place – McDonald practice a typical franchise retail model covering various geographic location in all towns of New Zealand. A customer can easily locate the outlet of McDonald located in close proximity to the main road or highway in relation with place utility. The company also have a planned strategy to enhance customer satisfaction by providing ample parking space as well as security services. Most of their outlets in New Zealand also equipped with kid playing areas, ATM machines and some of along with Supermarket chain to improve customer satisfaction. The key places where McDonald issues its products and services are – Restaurants, Kiosks, mobile app of McDonald, Postmates website and application. Their mobile app and postmates come in the virtual element of area where customers can get the necessary information about the company’s products. For instance, companies’ mobile apps for both Android and iOS help customer to check real-time price of happy meal products, Kiwi Pavlova and other sides’ products. Sometime, McDonald launches various offers such as giving of side product with the main item so as to increase the respective sales. This element of their 4ps also supports the company vision and mission statement, which is related to serving more number of customers around the globe.

Promotion – McDonald also takes the help of an integrated marketing communication mix to ensure a global level of corporate reputation consistence. In 2014, McDonald switches their strategy and move to more online based promotion, however, offline promotional strategy was not discontinued. In respect to their various products categories like happy meal and Kiwi Pavlova, McDonald used digital marketing, SEO, tech and content marketing on various mobile application and websites. In align with them, the traditional mechanism was also followed like CRM, marketing via billboards, television, print media, celebrity endorsements, etc. To attract number of consumers, McDonald also proposes rebate vouchers and free gift for certain product portfolio and packages. In New Zealand, one of their unique promotional strategies is Maccas where one can play monopoly game to get vouchers and other discounts (AdAge, 2013). In promotion of Happy Meals, McDonald uses new set of toys and characters and advertise it via online channels and television so that families can come up with their children on their demand. Moreover, their promotional budget is high from other competitors like burger king, pizza hut and dominos and this is the reason that why people prefer McDonald to other in New Zealand.

It is true that words change meanings. Using slogan with product or brand is connected with human psychology. However, Slogans work slowly but their effect is long lasting. It is not just a tagline that advertisers create but good slogans play with the customer minds. McDonald keeps changing slogans for their every product line and this shows an ideal representation of the brand. In respect to the Happy Meal product category, various slogans can be used or propose, like – The greatest Kid Meals. In the same way, for Kiwi Pavlova, it can be said as a flavour of new taste!.

The first slogan was proposed for Happy Meal category, which shows that people will get best kid meals in McDonald. The Happy Meal by McDonald is more than a product, which connects kids and children to a brand. The slogan – ‘The greatest Kid Meals’ is relevant because with delicious kid food, the company also gives various toys made of cinematic characters and this extra accommodation do children attract towards the brand. Moreover, the slogan of Kiwi Pavlova i.e. Flavour of new taste! Also helps company to highlight their new receipt, which was also in controversies between Australia and New Zealand.

This, it can be said that slogans not only influence the customer's mind but also create a sense of relationship between customers and brands.

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