Research Strategies For Small Business Tourism

Introduction

In the recent past, young entrepreneurs have had myriad of huddles and challenges in their various enterprises. This has made it very difficult for majority these businesses to realize their expansion objectives (Romano, 2009). The major contributing factor to this situation is the flooding of the market by many business operations which deal in one line. This therefore has led to stiff competition being witnessed in the market (Mowlana, 2003). This cut-throat competition has compelled young businesses to develop mitigation strategies that can allow them survive in the market amidst the prevailing unfavorable conditions.  

Businesses may decide to resort to internal or external ways to face the problems in the market the major one being competition. Internal ways may include reducing their human resource so as to cut down on expenses such as salaries and wages and instead use the difference in product awareness (March, 2009). Others revert to external measures such as hitting campaign trails about their products and services in areas they think the product is not quite known. Apart from this the businesses use the electronic media, print media and social sites to market their products. And the games becomes doing what your competitor does to the customers better or even do what your competitor is not doing so as to cut the edge well above contemporary businesses (Kotler, 2012).

In the city of victoria is a small business enterprise that owns a farm and also manufactures wine. The business venture is known as Grivellia Ridge Company. It has not been an exception as it has also faced the wrath of competition in an equal measure just as other businesses. Since its establishment in the town Grivellia Company has enjoyed broad customer base due to its high quality wine and good customer service. However, it the recent month, the company has realized that there is a paradigm shift. Many of its clients who used to patronize the outlet are no longer seen. The company believed that this was an indication that there are very strong competitors who have entered into the wine business and are doing better than them. For this reason, the company resorted to serious marketing and sales strategies that could see them reclaim their lost status. The strategies included remarketing their products and services afresh in Victoria town and other towns within the region such as SA, VIC, QLD and NSW. To lure customers, they offered after sales services such as bearing the transportation cost for those customers that bought goods in bulk. They also extended credit discounts in certain months. For example in the month of February, the company was giving a discount of 15% to all its customers who bought goods during that month. An online platform was also created by the company so that its loyal customers could get updates in their smartphones regarding various offers that the company could be having at particular times. All these were mitigation strategies to help the company remain competitive in the market.

Figure 1 above is a graphical representation of the number of products that were bought before marketing and other strategies were done and prices of the products after. In all the products, the number after were always higher than the number that was bought before doing campaigns. The most bought product and which had a great difference between the two periods of time is 2016 pinot grigio. The quantity bought was about 225. The lowest differences were observed in single vineyard 2014 chardonnay and 2015 pinot.

According to the pie chart above, it can be seen that customers who got discount on prices were many compared to those who did not enjoy any price discount. Seventy one percent (71%) received the discount while twenty nine percent (29%) did not enjoy any discount.

It is very clear from the results presented by the graph above that the quantity of cases purchased on discount were far much more (681) than those that were not purchased on discount (117).

The pie chart above indicates that majority (61%) of those who buy from them come from Victoria. This is followed by 21% who hail from NSW. The least number (1%) hailed from QLD.

The reason for carrying out this short research by Grivellia Ridge Company was so as to determine if the marketing campaigns the conducted about their products and services had an impact. To be able to determine the impact, elements such as increase in the sales volume were taken into account. This increase was realized by comparing the sales volume before and after marketing. It is common to realize an increase in the sales especially after a rigorous marketing exercise. This was the case with Grivellia Ridge Company which experienced an increase in the sales volume. The evidence to this are confirmed by figure 3 in the results section where the quantity of cases bought on discount was far much higher (681) than those that were not discounted (117).

This short study had factors that led to the results being the way they are. Other than these there are other factors which the study could not analyze such as the geographical positioning of other cities in the region in relation to Victoria where the company is situated. Due to the distance, the prices of the commodities might be a little higher due to the cost of transportation. This in turn causes the demand for various brands of wine to go down thereby reducing their sales volume. The contrary to this fact is also true. The other factor could be government policies which are always strict on alcohol and its affiliate products. This makes the company incur more expenses and passes the same to consumers and this tend to discourage the customers hence low sales volume.

Conclusion

If the results of this study are anything to go by, then companies experiencing various challenges in the market such as low sales volume and stiff competition should try to go the Grivellia Ridge Company way since it is a testimony that robust marketing campaign can lead to positive impact. This positive impact can be manifested in the increase in sales volume among others. This study therefore recommends that the more resources be added towards marketing so as to increase awareness and therefore increasing the level of sales.

References

Romano, C. (2009), ``Research strategies for small business: a case study'', International Small Business Journal, Vol. 7 No. 4, pp. 35-43.

Mowlana, H. and Smith, G. (2003), ``Tourism in a global context: the case of frequent traveler programs'', Journal of Travel Research, Vol. 33 No. 3, pp. 20-27.

March, R. (2009), ``Tourism marketing myopia'', Tourism Management, Vol. 15 No. 6, pp. 411-15

Kotler, P. (2012), Marketing Management: Analysis, Planning, Implementation and Control, Prentice-Hall, Englewood Cliffs, NJ.