An Over View Of The Product Super Jam Marketing Essay

As a kid, Fraser Doherty from Edinburgh, Scotland was always interested in the creative process of coming up with simple products or services that people wanted to buy and was always trying to grow vegetables and look after chickens in his parents garden. At the age of 14, his grandmother taught him how to make jam, and the same day he made a few jars and sold them to the neighbours. He enjoyed making jam that people enjoyed and saw it as a possible way to make a little extra pocket money. But he had no idea that, over the coming five years, this tiny enterprise would grow into a multimillion dollar company Eat Super Ltd. It now supplies ASDA, Tesco, Waitrose and many other huge supermarket chains.

Super jam is a product. Basically a product is what satisfies customer needs. Products are tangible physical real or touchable goods. So in order for a consumer to buy this product they must like it. There must be a connection. This connection could be in the form of taste, advertisement, aesthetics and or many other reasons. Companies must always delight the customer in any possible way. As a result companies must be customer driven. At the end it mainly all comes down to the customer. Therefore there are elements that must be considered so that products or even services may be brought to the market that will offer value to consumers and satisfy their demands and that is called the Marketing Mix. It is also known as the 4Ps. The 4Ps are Product, Promotion, Price and Place. Also there are the 7Ps and they are physical evidence, product, price, place, promotion, people, and process. These above principles are used by business as tools to assist them in pursuing their objectives. . The firm can thrive only if consumers see a need that its product can resolve, become aware of the product and its abilities, decide that it is the best accessible solution, proceed to buy it, and become satisfied with the result of the purchase.

The current UK jam market has been growing slowly, but product innovation has boosted its image in the downturn. The jam category has been stifled by being perceived as old fashioned and unhealthy .The recession boosted consumer interest in foods that have the youth and health factors. This lead to manufacturers to boost the jam category with healthier varieties in unusual flavours and additional pack sizes .There are several methods to ensure success with branding. It is essential to choose the right name, using the correct advertising, applying the finest strategy, and using the most significant application techniques are some ingredients needed to make a branding effort successful. Branding is an efficient marketing strategy tool. Nowadays, branding is experiencing a new popularity resulting from new, pioneering applications. Hence, the name of this brand is created superjam. It is hip modern and catchy. Superjam has a value proposition which forms the basis of the Unique Selling Proposition (USP). The USP is the key differentiator which is reinforced by branding.

As the marketplace becomes more global, new branding opportunities will develop. Consumers’ tastes and preferences will also change with the values and norms of the time. Brand owners and marketers must continue to monitor these situations if they hope to be successful in the future. (Rooney 1995)1. Super Jam’ key differentiation from other brands is its superfluity content which underscores the brand’s health focus. Super Jam markets itself as a forward thinking company with a nod towards the traditional. The Company’s marketing efforts have focused on underlining a value for money preposition along with a caring image.

CRITICAL SUCESS FACTOR

Question 1:

The strategies used in Superjam as a product is what made it successful. It is very customer centric. Therefore, they used E-marketing as a strategy. The well documented use of blogs, some social networking websites or even free to use internet sites to communicate with customers is a great strategy. This would be considered qualitative research methods. Qualitative inductive research is crucial to create developments in marketing communications, branding and advertising. The idea here or the advantage of this is to observe the consumer behaviour. It is defined by (Solomon at al., in 2002, p.5) as the study of the processes involved when individuals or groups select, purchase, use or dispose of products, services, ideas or experiences to satisfy needs and desires. The responses from the consumers may define the success of the marketing strategy. It also helps marketers to identify opportunities and threats. Then this leads to and helps in the marketing research. It forecast the marketing strategy decisions and makes these decisions more effective. The marketing research is ultimately the link between consumers, the public and the marketer.

The launch of a charitable project in 2008 called the SuperJam Tea Parties is part of a great marketing strategy to enhance and maintain the brand. The face to face consumer communication is vital. It gives the brand a great relationship with the local committee. The role and participation of the founder is an excellent way of branding and marketing strategy. He shows the human modest side of him, since it is rare that people or customers interact with the founders of a company or a business. It provides customer communication, feedback and satisfaction. It gives a brand a more social home cooked and modest image. People usually will positively relate to it. Without doubt it is a very smart successful strategy and it provides new ways for growth paths. This is certainly inventing a new value system by his hands on approach and participation in selling his product in supermarkets and tea parties. Ultimately you want to seek significant potential competitive advantages on your competitors. SuperJam has so far hosted over 100 tea parties in England, Scotland and Wales for elderly people who live unaccompanied or in nursing homes.

There are other key concepts of marketing that must be held in consideration and they are: needs, wants, demands, markets, exchange, transactions and relationships, value and satisfaction, products. They have a simple marketing strategy and they have a definite purpose. They have a clear purpose with well defined objectives. Strategic marketing planning is to define target markets and segments, then setting out the direction and competitive approach that the organisation wishes to take within these markets. (Baines et al., 2008, p180). In addition, the planning process includes analysis where you develop strategic plans and carry out the plan by the process of (implementation) which then leads to measure results by the process of (control). Strategic plan includes the mission, the strategic objectives, and the external and internal strategic audit, the SWOT analysis which stands for strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, and threats. In addition, there must be a portfolio analysis.

Question 2:

Consumer behavior must be taken in consideration. Since customers always are irrational. One day they want something the other day they have something completely different to what they got. They strive to be different. They always look for fresh ideas, new products, like to explore. They do not behave randomly. Their behavior is a complex combination of rational and emotional factors and conscious and unconscious processes which comes from internal and external factors. So a marketing decision maker must always remember that consumers do not act their age, their class, or even sometimes their sex. Ultimately consumption alters by situation, time and varies by consumers. Many businesses just evaporate from the market unless they diversify. They must always have new ideas. Super jam has a value proposition. Value proposition forms the basis of the Unique Selling Proposition (USP). The USP is the key differentiator which is reinforced by branding.

Super Jam can enhance the brand and increase sales by the following the below ideas, suggestions and strategies such as supplying to more retail shops inside EU and entering the American, Middle East and Far East markets. In order to enhance sales outside EU, they need to find new distributers and suppliers who have wide distribution networks which follows hub and spoke model. So that it can reach many direct and indirect customers. Also, the introduction of innovative models like tiny jars, Sachets, and packets for airlines, cruises and hotels is another great way to familiarize the product to other customers and help to make it global. Attaining cost leadership by setting up new production plants to increase the production capacity, so that the cost of production can be reduced resulting in low price quality product .New flavors can be introduced after conducting market research which suites global taste. Tying up with hotel chains and supplying products through their shops and restaurants. The formation of alliances with any company producing bread and introduce combo packages [bread and jam] at feasible price. Supplying schools and kindergartens is another strategy. Moreover, the introduction of advertisements in health care magazines and diet centers, such as weight watchers. They can diversify by introducing new products like their own brands of breads; jam flavored donuts, peanut butter, ice cream toppings, jelly or even honey.

Introducing loyalty programs to online registered customers and providing them with free Recipe booklets, gift baskets and coupons are many ideas and ways to increase sales. Changing the appearance of the outside packing on the basic of occasions such as Halloween, Easter and Christmas and also gift baskets at the time of these occasions is another fun idea to attract customer’s attention. In addition, changing the shape of the jar so the jam can be easily squeezable is another strategy. Furthermore, the jar may reflect the image of any famous cartoon character or kid celebrity such as Hannah Montana makes it more appealing for children. If brand strength is the degree of attachment to a brand, and brand value is based on the future earnings of a brand then the higher the brand strength the higher the brand value.

Managers of brands (not necessarily marketers alone) should therefore manage, and seek to maximise, both brand strength and brand value. The natural long-term outcome of this should be increased profitability. (Wood 2000)2

SWOT ANALYSIS

SWOT analysis is a tool used to evaluate the strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, and threats of an organization and its environment. It is the first stage of planning process and helps marketers to identify the factor which is favorable and unfavorable to achieve corporate objective.

STRENGTH

1 Underlining value for money along with a caring image.

2 Good Brand Names and reputation.

3 Loyal customers

4 Quality of the product.

5 Low prices compared to competitor

WEAKNESS

Lack of wider range of distribution channel to reach more and new customers.

Lack of big media advertisement.

Limited product range.

Lack of Capital for investing in global scale operation.

OPPORTUNITY

Tap the Untapped market. Moving to new region and countries by direct exporting, appointing sales subsidiary or production subsidiary

Tie up with retails hotel group and Air line industries to attract new customers.

Introduce some character which is quite popular among children’s and elders. Associated with the jam for advertisement.

Acquisition and Merger of any existing company within or outside the country, which enables global entry.

THREATS

Competition in the home market with traditional company.

Competition between players in pricing the products.

Competitors have better distribution channel which enable them to reach more customers.

CONCLUTION

To sum up, super jam as a product reached it target customers with ease because of it superior quality and traditional image. But as time passes, like every other product, sale of super jam will also reach its saturation point and later decline in sales and reputation, unless any kind of re engineering of its marketing strategies are not introduced into the product and service. They will have to target new regions & customers by way of expanding globally by introducing new proactive marketing strategies and there by attaining first mover advantage in the market.