Marketing Plan For Star Hub Limited: SWOT Analysis, Target Market, And Hubbing Strategy Essay.

Positioning Map for Star Hub Limited

Question:

Discuss about the Service Marketing Plan StarHub Limitied.

In this competitive world, all the companies and the organizations that exist today need to perform in an efficient manner to ensure that it stays ahead of the competition. In order to stay ahead of the competition, a company needs to device an efficient marketing plan (Lovelock, Christopher and Patterson 2015). An efficient marketing plan is important in the day and world of today as there are many companies all over the world that provides similar products. The companies need to strategize a competent marketing plan in order to publicize and inform the consumers or the customers about the product or the services offered by the company to the customers. A sound marketing plan is required also in order to attract the attention of the consumers. This report discusses the marketing plan for Star Hub Limited, a company based in Singapore. The write up mentions the positioning map of the company and provides the situational analysis for the company. It discussed the target market of the company, then moving on to the positioning part. The write up then discusses the marketing objectives of the Singapore based company. The report then discusses the audit for the company before moving on to recommendations and conclusion.  

Positioning Map

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The positioning map of a company is a tool that helps the marketing team of a company to deal with the product that they are marketing a specific product (Kotler 2012). The positioning map helps to strategize and develop a marketing strategy for a new product. In Singapore, the leading telecommunication companies are Singtel, M1, Star Hub, Q Max, Bluefish, Alcom, Brocade, AlcaTel Lucent, Absolute Telecom and 3R communication. The positioning map for Star Hub Limited indicates that the company provides adequate service to all areas and at a cheaper price range. Star Hub Limited is a company that provides high speed of delivery and is less expensive.  

SWOT Analysis

Star Hub Limited is one of the three major telecom companies of Singapore. A service-marketing plan is required to analyze and device a plan for guaranteeing better options for attracting and luring the consumers to opt for the services of the company. The SWOT analysis of the company is essential for finding out the strengths, weaknesses, threat and opportunities of the company while working in the global scenario. SWOT analysis is a useful technique that is used for identifying, understanding and analyzing the strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threats (Armstron et al. 2014).  

The SWOT analysis of Star Hub Limited lists the strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threats of the company.

• Star Hub Limited was the first to launch streaming service
• It has many reward points and loyalty program
• There is a free caller ID for the youth plan ("Starhub Ltd Official Website" 2017).
• The company was the first to offer bundling services ("Starhub Ltd Official Website" 2017).

• One of the main weaknesses of the company lies in the fact that it has a disruption of internet broadband service.
• The taxes that are levied by the government towards the companies, act as a hindrance to the company. It blocks the smooth flow of the business that could be achieved if severe restrictions and taxes were not imposed on the company.

• There are many new opportunities in the form of new markets in which the company can expand its business with the help of mergers and acquisitions.
• The company has a 24 hours enquiry message platform.

• The stricter regulation of the government act as a threat to the company.
• New Telco competitors have emerged in the market that provide similar services like Star Hub Limited.

Strengths	Weaknesses
1.      Star Hub Limited was the first to launch streaming service. 2.      The company has many rewards point and loyalty programmes 3.      The company provided free caller-ID for youth plan 4.      It was the first to offer bundling services	1.      Internet broadband service disruption is one of the weaknesses of the company that plagues the company. 2.      The company puts less emphasis on the customer retention aspect
Opportunities	Threats
1.      There is a scope to build 24 hours enquiry message platform for the company. 2.      There is a lot of opportunities for the company to achieve a lot through merger and acquisition.	1.      The major threat that Star Hub Limited faces is the existence and emergence of new Telco competitors in the market that provide similar services like StarHub Limited. 2.      Stricter regulation from the government often act as a threat to the company.

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Each and every company in this world needs to identify and analyze its target market. By identifying and analyzing the target market, the company can spread its operations to that specific market and thus contribute and add to the profitability and development of the company. Star Hub Limited strives to achieve the target market of entire Singapore. It does so by acquiring new companies whose services are similar or complimentary to the company (Gordon 2012).

SWOT Analysis of Star Hub Limited

The vision of the company is to be the first choice of communication, information and entertainment services for the consumers in Singapore. The mission of the company is to provide all the businesses, houses and every citizen in Singapore with best in class services with respect to multimedia. The core values of the company are to work with integrity supported by teamwork and continuous creativity in the process, which will help in providing excellent service to the customers (De Prato and Jean-Paul 2013).

The company generates its revenues mainly from five segments that are cable TV, fixed network, and broadband, sales of equipment and mobile. The company follows a strategy known as Hubbing, which helps them to grow in each of the business segments individually. The Hubbing strategy helps the company to reduce the churn rate, which measures the amount of customers who has stopped using the service that is provided by the company. The strategy helps the customers to subscribe to the services of the company and is unwilling to shift to other service providers (Singh, Pangarkar and Heracleous 2014). It also helps in maintaining the cost efficiency of the company as it promotes many services to take place simultaneously with a single advertisement. It enables the company to perform cross selling to its existing customers, which helps them in maintaining low marketing cost. The company also earns better average revenue for the number of customers that subscribe to their services (Huang et al. 2014).

The main problem of the distributed denial-of-service (DDoS) is that it causes huge spike in the internet traffic as the access is done through many infected computers. This causes the network to slow down and get access in to various servers. The problem started because of the two attacks that happened on Friday in the United States. The company endorsed the fact that these attacks were done because of an incident that happened in US. The Cyber Security Agency and the Infocomm Media Development Authority had confirmed the attack as it happened to Dyn, an US-based Domain Name System (DNS) (Alharbi, Ahamed and Hang 2017). The company gave a press release as a word of mouth that they were inspecting the networking logs and were confirmed that the DDoS attack was intentional and malicious in nature. It caused some issue regarding the connection of web for some of the customers who had access to broadband. The company mitigated the attack by considering the restoration of the service within a stipulated time that was around two hours. The customers were constantly updated about the progress in the work via the social media and the hotlines. The company filtered the unwanted traffic that was present in the network and even increased the capacity of the DNS, which helped in managing the internet load (Collins and Shah 2016).

Fairness is usually associated with the judgment of an outcome that whether the process that is implemented to reach the outcome is acceptable and reasonable or not. This helps in getting a fair judgment about the prices with respect to the standard products. Secondly, the evaluations of the price and the assessment regarding the fairness of the price can be compared. This pricing policy helps in maintaining the relationship with the customers and the company. This help the customers, as they receive rewards from the company because of the relationship they have invested in the company (Aghaei et al. 2014). The company stands a chance to gain at the same time because it lets them to increase their customer base. The theory helps in comparing the influence of perceived fairness with the exchanged relationship between the customer and the company. The customer attributions and the distribution between the cost and profit helps in establishing distinction between the transactions. The company is transparent about the price that it gives to the customers. This helps them in keeping a wide base of customers and they become loyal to the company because of the no hidden cost in the pricing policy of the company (Kwak, Marina and Joseph 2015).

Target Market for Star Hub Limited

The Integrated Marketing Communications (IMC) is the coordination of the different promotional elements and various other activities that are related to marketing, which helps in communicating with the customers of the firm. It is a continuous process in business that helps in tackling the different activities of communication strategically. It helps in recognizing the relevant persons that form an important part of the communication network. The external customers who form a part of this chain are the prospective customers, investors, suppliers, the interested groups and the public. Most of the companies have realized that effective communication network with various stakeholders and customers are more than the traditional tools that are used in the communication process. This communication network helps in avoiding the duplication of the products and the strategies and develops an efficient and effective marketing communication programs. The company, StarHub maintains a transparent communication pattern with the investors and the customers because it helps them to provide support to the customers with their pricing policy. The investors are also aware of the amount that they are investing in the company by keeping a track of the financial activities of the company. This helps in building trust and relationship with the customers and the investors (Belch et al. 2014).

Perception is what the customer and various investors see and understand about the company or the organization. They associate the company along with the products that are given by the company. This helps the company in establishing a brand image in the minds of the customers and giving them the benefit of using their products. The company gains as they stand to make profits because of a large number of goods sold. Customer satisfaction is the feeling or the pleasure that the customer derives after using the products or services that is being provided by the company. This helps the company in rising up to the expectations of the customers. Service providers depend mainly on the customer satisfaction process and make it their topmost priority, as it helps in retaining the customers for a longer period. This customer satisfaction process leads to frequent visits to the stores repeatedly by the customers so that they can purchase more of the same products. This helps to increase its customer base and maximize its profit making capability. The customers who are satisfied will stay for a longer period with the company and is likely to invest more amounts in that particular company in the future (Bansal and Shirley 2015).

The tolerance zone is divided in to three parts that are more than acceptable that is equivalent to delight, acceptable that is equivalent to satisfaction and unacceptable, which amounts to dissatisfaction in the end. The customers that have a wide zone of tolerance level due to low involvement in the strategical process will directly have a wide tolerance level with respect to performance. This will result in either high levels of dissatisfaction or satisfaction. The four variables in the creation of satisfaction helped in concluding that the tolerance zone with respect to the responses of the behaviors leads to a disconfirmation of expectations. When the customer progresses in the service system, it helps them in differentiating the poor and the good quality with respect to the service. The tolerance level of the customers for the StarHub Company is very high, as the customers receive high quality of service from the company. The complaints that the customers place in the company is immediately dealt with, which helps them in satisfying the customers largely (Hseih et al. 2013).

Mission, Vision, and Core Values of Star Hub Limited

Star Hub Limited as a company is one of the leading telecom companies of Singapore. It faced a serious issue of distributed denial-of-service (DDoS) during the period of the attack on the twin towers in New York City. The Star Hub Limited is a leading telecom companies of Singapore that falls under the purview of the telecommunication infrastructure of Singapore. The Singapore Telecommunications Law is strict and has many regulatory bodies that control the business operations of the companies that fall under the purview of the Singapore Telecommunications and Media regulatory framework. One of the leading telecom companies of Sinapore, Star Hub Limited depends largely on the local and domestic business for its revenue generation. The company however faces few weaknesses and threats that need to be dealt with using the help of few recommendations and strategies. Thus, the two recommendations for the company are as follows:

1. The company, Star Hub Limited must compete with the new and upcoming competitors in order to maintain its position in the market. The company should increase its area of service as well as provide a strong and adequate service to all the areas that are covered by Star Hub Limited (Sharma and Lambert 2013). By acquiring new companies like Cyberway, Star hub Limited has broadened its horizon of service. The company need to device and formulate newer and innovative ways by which they can hold on to its consumer base. The company has to adopt a consumer oriented service-marketing plan in order to increase the profitability of the company. In the sector of services marketing, the business to consumers is important as consumers form a large part of such businesses ("Starhub Ltd Official Website" 2017). The business should look into the components of the marketing mix, that is the seven Ps (Huang, Rong and Sarigöllü 2014). The seven Ps consist of components like price, product, place, people, promotion, process and physical evidence (Khan 2014). All these factors are important in achieving the desired profitability in a company, which is based on the service sector entirely. The company, Star Hub Limited, also should keep in mind the seven Ps of the marketing mix and achieve a higher productivity. The marketing mix consists of 4Ps and 7Ps. Star Hub Limited must concentrate its energy in the two Ps, namely, promotion and product. The promotion refers to the communications related to marketing. It may comprise components like PR, advertising, direct marketing and sales promotion. The company should concentrate on these steps in order to gain recognition from the consumers as well as from the market. The promotional mix of PR, advertising, sales promotion and direct marketing must be there to maximize the effect of the promotion. The message strategy has to be deviced that highlights the part that is to be communicated. The company should employ the channel /media strategy in order to reach the target audience. It should create appropriate and effective advertising campaigns. The message frequency should be decided as to in what frequency the message is to be communicated.
   
   
2. The product of the company, which is, in this case, the service that is provided by the company is the main highlight of the company. So, in order to attract the consumers and thus increase the revenue, the company should concentrate on the product design, prdoduct assortment, branding, services, returns, managing products guarantees and warrantees and packaging and labeling. The product design of Star Hub Limited should consist of a good quality and well planned out service for the customers especially based on the needs of the consumers. The product assortment of the company should bring out different plans and services that the customers can use and enjoy. The branding of the product is of the utmost importance in this competitive world as without a good brand name, no customer is going to have the confidence to try out a new product or service. The packaging and labeling of the product is also very important in the present day and age. The packaging of the product should attract the attention of the customers and the consumers, which will thus lead to higher revenue. The complimentary services like after sales service is also necessary to keep the consumers happy and satisfied and thus help the company to gain customer retention. The guarantees and warranties of a product is necessary as it helps to provide a refund or an exchange or a free of cost servicing of the product. It is important to keep the customers satisfied and get their value for money. The returns are also important for any product in the market. In the case of Star Hub Limited also, it is important as it provides the capacity to get return the product or services that they do not like. The company should manage the products through the life-cycle of the product.

The Singaporean company, Star Hub Limited, is often affected by the rules, regulations and restrictions imposed by the government. This often hinders with the business operations. Therefore, the solution to this problem is that the company can expand its business ventures overseas that can bring with it lesser hassles like this. Overseas investment is important for any company in the world of today. Thus, it is important for Star Hub Limited, too, to expand its business operations on a global scale.

Conclusion

In the world of today, companies need to find out ways and methods to achieve maximum output and productivity. The ways and methods that need to be adopted by a company in order to increase the profitability and productivity of the company include various means and steps. Some of them involve a robust sales plan, or a marketing plan, or a very adequate service plan. Star Hub Limited is one of the leading telecom companies of Singapore after Singtel and M1. It faced many problems but found appropriate solutions for tackling those. The company should focus its marketing strategy towards focusing towards the seven Ps (Wilson and Gilligan 2012).

References:

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