Apple IPhone 7 Plus- 128GB Marketing Essay.

1. You will recommend a Brand Positioning for your Brand and Sub-Brand. Explain why this will appeal to your Target market and why this Brand Positioning provides a Point-of-Difference (also known as a Unique Selling Proposition) for your Brand and Sub-Brand, compared with the competitors. Draw two Positioning Maps. 

2. Recommend a Marketing Mix (the 4Ps) which will effectively implement and communicate your Brand Positioning: - 

PLC and the Diffusion of Innovation

a) Identify the stage your product is in on the Product Life Cycle (PLC). 

b) Then, based on the stage your product is in on the Product Life Cycle, you will identify the consumers you will be targeting in terms of the Diffusion of Innovations. 

Positioning by brand and competition for Apple iPhone 7 Plus-128GB

A marketing strategy assists any company to increase sales and achieve competitive advantage. It is made up of various activities in the field of marketing which deal with the analysis of the strategic situation of a company and selection of different strategies, which contribute to the company’s goals. This report will cover the marketing strategy of apples iPhone 7 plus- 128GB. It will cover the marketing mix, segmentation and positioning of this product.

Table: Segment Attractiveness Table. ‘Y’ refers to attributes being suitable, whereas ‘X’ refers to attribute not being suitable. The two symbols in the cells for the ‘COMPANY OBJ & RESOURCES’ column refers to the suitability of the brand(iPhone) and the sub brand (7 Plus) respectively

The target segment chosen is age 20-30 because its size and growth is very high. This market segment is attractive, as it will offer long-term profit potential for the iPhone 7 plus-128 GB. This segment of young people is millenials who like state of the art phones and like moving with the latest trends. This market segment is also larger than the rest hence the company will be able to generate business and get higher sales volume and profitability. An attractive market segment has untapped potential hence gives a company opportunity to expand market share (Armstrong et al, 2015, p.32). The segment that has been chosen for the iPhone 7 Plus-128GB will give the company an opportunity to expand its market share, as it is a segment that has a rapid growth rate. Despite the fact that competition is high, this segment likes being associated with certain brands and the iPhone 7Plus-128GB is a strong brand which fits this target market well.

The Apple iPhone 7 Plus-128GB will be positioned by brand and by competition. Positioning by brand will involve looking at the attributes and the benefits of the product. The attributes which are most salient to the consumer will be used in marketing .In this case, the Apple iPhone 7Plus-128Gb has a good reputation in the market for its enhanced features like its camera quality and efficiency. It has other unique features like a sapphire crystal lens cover and a back-illuminated sensor that creates a refined image for customers (Davari & Strutton, 2014,p.570). The camera quality has been maintained with improvements in subsequent generations. Its simplicity and adaptability also attracts consumers. Apple has cemented its brand as the provider of high quality and value priced mobile phones with great features. Apple also uses a high-end tack and its consumers believe that the more expensive a phone is, the more intrinsically valuable it is.

Marketing mix of Apple iPhone 7 Plus-128GB

Positioning by competition will involve Apple demonstrating the superiority of the iPhone 7Plus-128GB among other phones which are available in the market. In this case, Apple’s iPhone 7Plus-128GB is competing against the Samsung galaxy S7 edge-256 GB and Oneplus 3T 128GB. This strategy will enable Apple to establish a powerful brand by comparing its rates and services to that of its competitors (Davari & Strutton, 2014,p.572). Consumers will have a reason to buy Apple’s product as the company will spell out why the iPhone 7Plus-128GB is better than the other phones.

Apple’s marketing mix shows how the company matches its business strategies to the market conditions as pertains to the iPhone 7Plus-128GB. It gives an outlook of how market conditions can be effectively addressed through product, promotion, price and place (Urde & Koch, 2014, p.485). Apple is one of the top companies in the world and is an example of how a marketing mix can lead to business success.

Apple continues to expand its product mix. Products mix usually determines the output of a business. iPhone is one of the major products that Apple has. The product in this case is the iPhone 7Plus-128Gb, smartphone 1080 x 1920 pixels, 12 megapixels and with a battery life of 13 hours. The phone also has a state of the art camera (Khan, 2014, p.95). The product features appeal to the market segment, which is 20-30 year olds who live a fast-paced life and would like smart-phones with great cameras as they keep on taking pictures or videos of their everyday lives.

Place involves distribution channels of a product. Apple uses selective distribution, which leads to some degree of exclusivity. Apple has given authority to some sellers so that it has control over place. They sell their products through Apple stores, Online Apple store, authorized retailers, telecommunication companies and fulfillment services. The most visible place to sell Apple’s iPhone 7Plus-128Gb is in an Apple Store or Online App. Authorized retailers like Wal-mart or Target are also used. Telecommunication companies that sell iPhone units are also used in marketing the company’s products (Huang & Sarigöllü, 2014,p.120). Consumers can also get the iPhone 7Plus-128Gb from Amazon and E-bay. The distribution channels used by Apple are very comprehensive.

The promotion activities emphasize Apple’s premium image and quality of the products, which it has. Promotion enables Apple to reach its target buyers. It includes advertising, personal selling, sales promotions and public relations. The company advertises through the company website, Apple stores and technology news sites. Personal selling is done in form of the employees of Apple Stores who provide product specific information, in this case relating to the iPhone 7Plus-128GB, with an aim of convincing store visitors to buy (Hollensen,2015,p.35).Sales promotions occur in the Apple stores where special offers are given and some models sold at discounted prices. Public relations is used in optimizing Apple’s corporate image through events, leaks of new product features, interviews and press releases which lead to positive publicity for the company.

Distribution channels for Apple iPhone 7 Plus-128GB

Apple makes use of a premium pricing strategy. The prices represent the company’s products while meeting consumer expectation. The prices of Apple are relatively high and helps to maintain the high-end image of the company and its products like the iPhone 7Plus-128GB (Urde,2013,p.750).The pricing strategy leads to niche marketing hence attracting small market share with people from middle and upper classes. Premium pricing however leads to higher profit margins.

The Apple phone products are in the ‘Soon Maturity Stage,’ which is a good thing for new products like the iPhone 7Plus -128GB. The market for this product is steadily growing and the product modifications and improvements to the production process will give the iPhone 7Plus-128GB a competitive advantage (Hollensen, 2015,p.40). The consumers being targeted with this innovation are the 20-30 year olds who belong to the middle and upper class in the society.

The type of consumer products represented by Apple’s iPhone 7Plus-128Gb is a specialty product. These are products with unique characteristics or brand identification for which a special group of customers are willing to make a special purchase effort. The specialty product needs a special purchase effort but applies only to certain consumers (Huang & Sarigöllü,2014,p.120). In this case the iPhone 7Plus-128GB is targeted to a certain niche market due to its high price.

Product

Core- Convenience, Safety

Actual-iPhone 7plus-128GB

Augmented-12 Mega Pixel Camera, Sapphire crystal lens cover, Back-illuminated sensor

The product will implement and communicate brand positioning due to the unique features, which it offers.

The product, iPhone 7Plus-128 GB will be displayed at Apple stores and Retail stores in Australia. A rotating cell phone display stand should be used and it should be in an area that can be clearly seen by customers. The retailers will have a sales promotion staff on the floor specifically for the product and their role will be to talk to customers and convince them to purchase (Slack, 2015,p.70).This will effectively communicate the company’s brand positioning, as a specific niche will be targeted. The sales promotion staff will do live demos of the phone and the stand will be attractively decorated so that it attracts consumers.

The company will have an integrated marketing communication, which will involve horizontal, vertical, internal and external integration. External integration for Apple’s iPhone 7Plus-128GB will use external partners in advertising and PR agencies so that a single integrated and cohesive message is delivered.

The message will be ‘Portrait Mode, Practically Magic.’ This will emphasize on the fact that portrait mode on the iPhone 7 Plus helps you take great portraits by creating a depth-of-field effect that blurs backgrounds and brings faces into beautifully sharp focus. Taking a professional-looking portrait is as easy as snapping a photo (Leonidou, Katsikeas & Morgan, 2013,p.160).

Promotion activities for Apple iPhone 7 Plus-128GB

The promotional tools that will be used in advertising the phone are Television, Social Media and Online Media.

Online Media will advertise the product via Apple’s website and emphasize on its greatest feature, which is the camera.

Social Media will involve advertising on platforms like facebook, twitter and Instagram.

These particular modes of advertising have been used as the target market as people who are mostly on social media and spend a lot of time online. Most of them also watch television hence the Television adverts will be a good way to reach them.

The recommended price for the product is AU$1,229 and the strategy used is status quo pricing. This will effectively communicate the brand positioning as Apple and iPhone are known as high quality products that target a certain niche of high and middle-income people.

Conclusion, ethics and social responsibility

The marketing mix for the iPhone 7Plus-128 GB will help the company in attracting and retaining its customer base as it is targeted towards a niche market. The marketing mix is internally consistent as it is marketed as a prestige product. The pricing that has been set is premium; the places where it is sold are where these prestige clients frequent, the promotion is directly targeted towards the niche market and the product has been made of highest quality material and tailored to the market by giving it unique features (Rosenbaum-Elliott, Percy & Pervan,2015,p.50). The product is ethically, social responsible as it has an improved camera, increased internal storage and is water resistant, and this increases the life cycle of the technology. The product is energy efficient and prevents components from going back directly to landfill due to its water resistance. The marketing mix plan will be implemented in a way that complies with corporate social responsibility by revealing all features to consumers and emphasizing to them the importance of a clean environment and explaining to them how the product meets sustainability goals (Schiebel, 2015,p.710).

A compliance program will be in place to specify Apple’s policies, procedures and actions within the process of manufucturing and selling the iPhone 7Plus-128GB so that there is prevention and detection of violations of laws and regulations. The triple bottom line emphasizes sustainability through profitability and Apple will use this in the marketing and sales of the iPhone 7plus by focusing on how the community is affected by the product (McDonagh & Prothero,2014,p.1190), how the product enhances environmental sustainability and how profits are affected.

References

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

Davari, A. and Strutton, D., 2014. Marketing mix strategies for closing the gap between green consumers' pro-environmental beliefs and behaviors. Journal of Strategic Marketing, 22(7), pp.563-586.

Hollensen, S., 2015. Marketing management: A relationship approach. Pearson Education.

Huang, R. and Sarigöllü, E., 2014. How brand awareness relates to market outcome, brand equity, and the marketing mix. In Fashion Branding and Consumer Behaviors (pp. 113-132). Springer New York.

Khan, M.T., 2014. The concept of'marketing mix'and its elements (a conceptual review paper). International journal of information, business and management, 6(2), p.95.

Leonidou, C.N., Katsikeas, C.S. and Morgan, N.A., 2013. “Greening” the marketing mix: do firms do it and does it pay off?. Journal of the Academy of Marketing Science, 41(2), pp.151-170.

McDonagh, P. and Prothero, A., 2014. Sustainability marketing research: Past, present and future. Journal of Marketing Management, 30(11-12), pp.1186-1219.

Rosenbaum-Elliott, R., Percy, L. and Pervan, S., 2015. Strategic brand management. Oxford University Press, USA.

Schiebel, W., 2015. CSR und Marketing. Corporate Social Responsibility: Verantwortungsvolle Unternehmensführung in Theorie und Praxis, pp.705-720.

Slack, N., 2015. Operations strategy. John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.

Urde, M. and Koch, C., 2014. Market and brand-oriented schools of positioning. Journal of Product & Brand Management, 23(7), pp.478-490.

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