The Marketing Strategies for Mercedes-Benz - Research Proposal Example

Marketing Research Proposal Mercedes-Benz of the of the Number Marketing Research Proposal Mercedes-Benz Summary The market research project entitled, The Marketing Strategies for Mercedes Benz, hopes to discover more information on the marketing trends and targeting customers from the age group 27-37 years in the USA. The project deals with the customer preferences and apprehension on Mercedes Benz and how to enhance the customer loyalty and attract new customers for the Mercedes Benz (Ahuja 50). Research Problem The major challenge faced by the automobile company Mercedes, is the high maintenance cost of its product, the Mercedes Benz, due to which the lack of customer loyalty and retention is the problem that is faced by the company in this dynamic competitive market (Kalpan 5-20). Therefore, the main concern of the company is to attract potential automobile users in the USA from the age group 27-37 years and evaluate their expectation on cars in the near future. Research Question What are the marketing strategies adapted by the company Mercedes Benz in USA and the factors that influence costumer from age 27-37 years to buy premium cars? Research Objective To find out the existing and potential customer need in the USA premium car market. To evaluate and implement marketing strategies to attract potential customers of age group 27-37 years to buy premium cars. To find out the reason for concerns over the USA current and potential premium car users. To analyze the extent of change in customer satisfaction due to change in customer expectations over the services quality and high maintenance cost of the Mercedes Benz car. To examine the customer perception over the brand Mercedes Benz in respect to its competition. Therefore the researcher would suggest strategic and tactical actions for slowing down the rate of customer loss, increase customer satisfaction and attracting customers for Mercedes Benz. Literature Review Moving to the higher car market segment and selling premium cars can result to be the best marketing strategies for the automobile companies. Though companies are trying to enter a new market by creating a niche for itself or diversifying their existing vehicle line, technologies and effective strategies in selling high end cars at higher price range requires efficient marketing approaches than those positioned as affordable vehicles. The marketing strategies applied for premium automobiles, needs to focus on the quality it is providing, luxury, its safety, premium maintenance service and extending these features to meet the preferences of the customers (Dvir and Strasser 831). The marketing and advertising strategies planned must not leave any ambiguity on the premium value of the car. To achieve that, firstly the vehicle and the brand must be of high-quality themselves. The propagation of the product features and attributes must be in such a way through the audio and visual medium that it will allow its buyers to gain a high sense of priority and exclusiveness as if they are special. The communications strategies must be implemented in a way that make their customer realize that they are investing on high worth, top-quality product. Promotions on premium magazines, television channels and shows attracting HNI audiences, radio ads should be the main target (Saridakis and Baltas 5-10). The vehicle brand should position itself as the car with style, comfort and luxury. Self-indulgence must be the key factor of the marketing strategy. The attributes of the car, from its premium quality seat material, color, texture, interior and exterior designing, the ambience, experience of riding it, the technology used are the main areas that should be highlighted when planning the selling proposition. The experience of uniqueness and comfort on entering the car and forgetting the disturbances outside its window thereby marketing the luxury of the riding experience are the sellable factors of the premium car segment (Löffler and Decker 720-730). Companies should make an effort to push the brand in the market. Customers should get a reason to boast about their purchase of the luxury car brand. For example, Rolls-Royce sells its stability, robustness and strength as a luxury brand along with its brand heritage. Some automobile companies associate themselves with racing teams promoting itself as the car with speed, adventure and excitement thereby, attracting customers of age group from 20 to 35 years with less time and greater commitments, who love to experience the adventure and have high adrenaline rush. The car features may include hand polished wood interior, technology used in the music system or driving experience, its GPS system advancement which are used to push the sales of the vehicles (Saridakis and Baltas 5-10). Companies selling both high valued premium car and cost effective cars must keep in mind that the marketing strategies should not involve in highlighting features of both the segments with price and feature comparison as it may lead to customer loss in the premium segments. Since there are a lot of mid-price models of cars now, which includes similar features in their product as the premium car segment, they might attract the customers towards itself. Rather, companies having premium car segment must promote them by creating a brand image and identity which is exclusive, focuses on the owner’s experience by driving it and not on the mileage it provides or how fuel efficient it is (Löffler and Decker 720-730). To increase the communication with its target market, luxury car companies must maintain accessibility to its customers through social media, point of sales customer service, online advertising, free service warranties, insurance coverage and free replacement of vehicle parts, sales promotions. The companies must build on their reputation of quality, prestige, brand heritage which makes it a globally acceptable brand. It must have its own identity and class (Dvir and Strasser 831). Research Methodology Sampling population Sample is a small or specified group of data collected from a larger population, analysing which the researcher inferences on the entire population targeted for the research (Kothari 20). In this research, the researcher needs to carry out survey on the potential customers in USA aged between 27-37 years, willing to buy the premium cars. Sampling Strategy The researcher would use random sampling strategy to execute the research. This strategy deals with a specified size of sample where all its subsets are given equal priority and prospect. Therefore, any given pair of elements has the equal chance of being selected as the other pair and this way it minimises biasness and simplifies the analysis (Mackey and Gass 30). The researcher needs to define a group of 500 potential customers from the age group 27-37 years who are willing buyers of the premium automobile segment in the USA market. The 500 customers would be surveyed with the help of questionnaire out of which 250 customers would be shortlisted and analysed to infer to the research problem. This methodology is used because it is simple and every individual in the group has an equal chance of being selected as a potential and as a result the analysis is highly representative of the population sample which is being studied. It is easier to draw statistical inferences from the sample representing the entire population. Data Collection Procedures Qualitative and Secondary Research Researcher would be performing a secondary research. Secondary research would include secondary data analysis which would be collected from the internet. Based on these data, we would design the questionnaire. Qualitative research would also include open ended questions asked to target automobile users about their preferences. Based on the secondary research, quantitative research would be executed further (Flick 40). Secondary research can also be conducted by the researcher by referring to the journals, books available on the marketing strategies implemented by various premium automobile companies like Mercedes Benz, BMW and Audi. Based on these studies, inferences on future strategies can be implemented by the companies and further analysis can be conducted to attract new potential customers and how to retain them (Kalpan 5-20). The researcher can be aware of the strategical drawbacks faced by the companies in the past and restructure its new marketing plans to re-launch its brand. These data collected can be analysed through different techniques and compare the competitive market of premium automobile car segment and recommend strategies for Mercedes Benz (Rossi, Wright and Anderson 55). Quantitative and Primary Research The researcher would be conducting a descriptive analysis by following the survey method. The tool used for this purpose would be a questionnaire. The universe, from which the respondents would be drawn, would include premium car users in the automobile market of USA of age group from 27 years to 37 years. This design of the questionnaire would be dependent on the findings of the qualitative research. Ethical Issues and tactics During the research conducted by the researcher, some ethical considerations must be obeyed such as to keep the personal details of the customers as anonymous. For example the name of the customer, address which is not important for the performance of the analysis should not be included in the questionnaire. The data collected through the survey should be safely preserved and not to be shared with a third party who is not concerned with the research being performed. There should not be any kind of force on the customer group who are contributing their inputs in the survey or there should not be any kind of influence on them while filling the survey form. The questionnaire should be framed in such a way that the participants are not hesitant to fill in the form. Before distributing the questionnaire to the target sample group, they should be well informed about the purpose of the research and they have the full right to deny to be part of the survey if they are not comfortable answering the questions (Le Cordeur 10-11). Plans for data presentation, analysis and interpretation Based on the secondary research, the questionnaire for the primary research would be framed by the researcher. The locations would be selected in the USA premium automobile market. The areas would be selected on the basis of the most number of premium car showrooms present as well as customers living there having a high standard of living and high income. They would be segmented as the potential target group of high class customers. 500 questionnaires would be distributed among the target group out of which 250 forms would be randomly selected for analysis. Analytical approaches like regression analysis, correlation and cluster analysis would be performed based on the independent and dependent variables. From the statistical outcomes achieved, a detailed study of marketing research would be done through which the company Mercedes would be able to strategize its marketing plans to attract more customers in the age group 27-37 years in buying their vehicle brand, the Mercedes Benz. Time Plan Conclusion This research proposal is the initiation of the research report. Based on the proposed research problem, the research analysis would be conducted. The company, Mercedes Benz would infer the marketing strategies on customer retention and attraction in the USA market based on the deductions and statistical results. Works cited Ahuja, Puja. "Luxury Cars: A New Definition of Necessity in India." International Journal of Commerce, Business and Management (IJCBM) 3.2 (2014). Print. Dvir, Eyal, and Georg Strasser. Does marketing widen borders? Cross-country price dispersion in the European car market. Boston: Boston College Department of Economics, 2014. Print. Flick, Uwe. Introducing research methodology: A beginners guide to doing a research project. UK: Sage, 2011.Print. Kaplan, Alexander. "Design, Construction And Testing Of The Most Efficient Exhaust For A Mercedes-Benz C-Class." Agricultural Systems Management (2012): 5-22. Print. Kothari, Chakravanti Rajagopalachari. Research methodology: methods and techniques. Italy: New Age International, 2011. Print. Le Cordeur, Kerryn. "Mercedes-Benz races ahead with innovative advertising: advertising@ work." Journal of Marketing (2012): 10-11. Print. Löffler, Michael, and Reinhold Decker. "Realising opportunities in the premium automotive market via context-oriented new product positioning." Journal of Marketing Management 28.5-6 (2012): 716-732. Print. Mackey, Alison, and Susan M. Gass. Second language research: Methodology and design. London: Routledge, 2013. Print. Rossi, Peter H., James D. Wright, and Andy B. Anderson. Handbook of survey research. United States: Academic Press, 2013.Print. Saridakis, Charalampos, and George Baltas. "Modeling price-related consequences of the brand origin cue: An empirical examination of the automobile market." Marketing Letters (2014): 1-11. Print. Appendix Questionnaire Gender: a) Male b) Female Age: a) 25-27 b) 28-30 c) 31-33 d) 34-36 e) 37-39 Annual Income (in $): a) 20000-40000 b) 40001-60000 c) 60001-80000 d) 80001-100000 e) above 100000 Perceived Status: a) Working Class b) Middle Class c) Upper Class Do you consider Mercedes Benz as a luxury car? a) Strongly Disagree b) Disagree c) Neutral d) Agree c) Strongly Agree Do you agree with the tagline of Mercedes Benz “The best or nothing”? a) Strongly Disagree b) Disagree c) Neutral d) Agree c) Strongly Agree Rate Mercedes for the following: Quality: a) Least important b) Unimportant c) Neutral d) Important e) Most Important Safety: a) Least important b) Unimportant c) Neutral d) Important e) Most Important Style: a) Least important b) Unimportant c) Neutral d) Important e) Most Important Heritage: a) Least important b) Unimportant c) Neutral d) Important e) Most Important Class: a) Least important b) Unimportant c) Neutral d) Important e) Most Important Can automobile marketing influence you buy decision? a) Strongly Disagree b) Disagree c) Neutral d) Agree c) Strongly Agree Do you think the marketing of Mercedes Benz as effective? a) Strongly Disagree b) Disagree c) Neutral d) Agree c) Strongly Agree Online marketing of Mercedes Benz through YouTube, social media, email is the good. a) Strongly Disagree b) Disagree c) Neutral d) Agree c) Strongly Agree Rate the premium car brands you will consider buying: Mercedes Benz: a) Strongly Disagree b) Disagree c) Neutral d) Agree c) Strongly Agree BMW: a) Strongly Disagree b) Disagree c) Neutral d) Agree c) Strongly Agree Audi: a) Strongly Disagree b) Disagree c) Neutral d) Agree c) Strongly Agree Jaguar: a) Strongly Disagree b) Disagree c) Neutral d) Agree c) Strongly Agree Porsche: a) Strongly Disagree b) Disagree c) Neutral d) Agree c) Strongly Agree Factors important for buying a premium car: Brand: a) Least important b) Unimportant c) Neutral d) Important e) Most Important Price: a) Least important b) Unimportant c) Neutral d) Important e) Most Important Advertisement: a) Least important b) Unimportant c) Neutral d) Important e) Most Important Safety: a) Least important b) Unimportant c) Neutral d) Important e) Most Important After sales service: a) Least important b) Unimportant c) Neutral d) Important e) Most Important Maintenance cost: a) Least important b) Unimportant c) Neutral d) Important e) Most Important Fuel efficiency: a) Least important b) Unimportant c) Neutral d) Important e) Most Important Interest rate on loan: a) Least important b) Unimportant c) Neutral d) Important e) Most Important Rate the attribute needed to be present in your luxury car: Wooden finish interior: a) Least important b) Unimportant c) Neutral d) Important e) Most Important Audio controlled steering: a) Least important b) Unimportant c) Neutral d) Important e) Most Important Advanced GPS: a) Least important b) Unimportant c) Neutral d) Important e) Most Important Advanced audio/video players: a) Least important b) Unimportant c) Neutral d) Important e) Most Important Weather control technology: a) Least important b) Unimportant c) Neutral d) Important e) Most Important Mini Bar: a) Least important b) Unimportant c) Neutral d) Important e) Most Important Wifi Access: a) Least important b) Unimportant c) Neutral d) Important e) Most Important Read More