Integrated Marketing Communication

Question: Write an essay on Integrated marketing communication. Answer: Integrated marketing communication or IMC plan is one of the most important aspects of the business that facilitates the organization to integrate its marketing, advertising, and promotional activities in an effective manner. It provides the process of communicating strategies and tactics. Moreover, it allows the organization to transmit business messages to other organization. With the involvement of developing integrated marketing communication (IMC), the senior management of the organization easily enhances its business opportunities in the global market (Yeshin 2012). In this context, the researcher has selected a consumer goods company named Ansell for developing IMC plan for a selected product. The researcher has chosen construction gloves product for developing the IMC plan. In this report, the researcher has discussed the communication objectives and creative strategies along with its media plan. The researcher has provided a brief discussion on the market potentiality of the particular product. Background information on product and organization: Ansell is an Australia company that manufactures medical gloves, protective gloves, and condoms. The organization was established as Dunlop Pneumatic Tyre Company of Australia Ltd in 1899. In 1929, the company merged with the Perdriau Rubber Company. The headquarter of the company is located in Melbourne, Australia. The revenue of the company is US$1.590 billion as of 2014. The net income of the company is US$206 million as of 2014. The CEO of the organization, Magnus Nicolin, has said that they have been trying to introduce a new range of products in order to enhance the business opportunity in the global market. Ansell has experienced several business solutions including medical solutions, industrial solutions, single-use solutions and sexual wellness solutions (Ansell.com. 2016). In this context, the researcher has selected the construction gloves for the particular research paper. The researcher will develop an IMC plan for promoting a newer version of the construction gloves in the market. The popularity of the products is quite high in the market. The researcher has selected the particular product, as the popularity of the product has been increasing within the construction industry. The product has a wide range of applications including demolition, handling sheet metal, woodwork, digging, general construction, steel work and sawing. In the newer version of the product, the organization will include extra durability to gloves so that the workers can employ the product for the long timeline. It provided the versatile protection for all types of tough jobs. The product is coated with Foam Nitrile and comes in various colors including black, gray and orange. Target audience: The particular product category of Ansell targets construction industry, as the workers need to be protected gloves to execute the construction work in an effective manner. Although the company has a wide range of gloves, the organization has categorized each product with its individual applications (hman and Sikblad 2012). Gloves provide versatile protection for all tough jobs. In the construction industry, the utilization of the particular product is very high. Moreover, engineers prefer this glove for executing daily tough jobs. Hence, the organization has divided the customer category into two sections including general customers and corporate customers. General customers facilitate to enhance the product promotion through the word of mouth (Shimp and Andrews 2013). On the other hand, corporate customers contribute in enhancing the sales volume of the business. In this context, the organization targets their audience based on several factors including cultural, demographic, and s ocial. Hence, it can be assessed that the prime focus of the company is to target workers of the construction industry in order to enhance the sales volume. However, the organization has been focusing on products durability, as it will facilitate them in engaging a huge number of customers in the market. Communication objectives: The prime objective of the communication is to gain the marketing managers approval regarding new version of product launching in the market (Belch et al. 2014). Ansell has huge customers base across the world. With the effective communication, Ansell has been its products knowledge in the global market. The CEO of the organization has agreed with the fact that the business communication includes several beneficial aspects such as generate awareness, compare products, enhance sales volume, managing brand equity and align employees. In this context, the researcher will be communicating with the several construction companies in orders to accumulate product feedback and current market statistics. Ansell will include extra product features based on the current market trends. The communication process will be executed in the both general and corporate level. Marketing officers will be able to enhance the process of new version product launch through effective communication with several industries (Percy 2014). In this context, the researcher has built communication objectives based on the research topic. To accumulate feedbacks from workers and staffs involved in the construction industry To generate the awareness of product among workers and staffs in the industry To compare products with another brand in order to develop the product in an effective manner To enhance the sales volume in an effective manner for expanding its business in the large demographic market Creative strategies: In this context, the marketing manager will involve several creative strategies for promoting a new version of the products in the market. Primarily, the marketing manager will arrange a survey process for collecting feedbacks from industry workers (Blakeman 2014). With the involvement of survey process, the marketing officers will be able to identify the key area of development. On the other hand, the marketing manager will include social media marketing ideas, urban marketing ideas, contest-marketing ideas, and marketing ideas for context promotion. Moreover, the marketing manager will engage five construction companies for sponsoring the new products to them. Consequently, it will facilitate the organization to enhance product promotion in an effective manner. On the other hand, the organization will reduce the price of the new product in order to enhance its promotion in both domestic and global market (Thorson and Moore 2013). The marketing manager will include 6 months timefram e for transmitting product knowledge of new gloves. Within this timeframe, the management team will accumulate product feedbacks in order to experience the growth opportunity in the market. Creative strategies facilitate the organization to promote the product in the large marketplace. Media plan: Media planning indicates the best media combination for promoting a range of products in the market. Media planning consists of several factors including the cost of media engagement, advertisement frequency, and the areas of telecasting. In this context, the marketing manager will involve the particular process in order to enhance the promotion of construction gloves. The marketing manager believes that the local media engagement will be the beneficial aspects of the product promotion in the market (Lusch and Vargo 2014). However, it will be a challenging task for the management to choose the proper medium for advertisement of the product. In this context, Ansell has strong business assets. Hence, it will facilitate the higher management to involve different promotional medium including televisions, printing media, and the online portal (Mihart 2012). The new version of the product development will be advertised in the large marketplace. Marketing manager of the organization believes the fact that the social media is one of the major platforms for promoting products knowledge in the large demographic areas. The media plan will be executed through a systematic process that includes market analysis, the establishment of media objectives, media strategy development, and implementation, and evaluation and follow-up. Through the engagement of following this process, the marketing managers will be able to choose appropriate Medias for promoting the new and improves construction gloves in the market. Budget: Budget is one of the major parts of the product development process in the business (Reinold and Tropp 2012). The budget development for new product consists of several phases including development, production, promotion, contingency budget and total budget. In this context, the budgeting will include manufacturing cost, promotional cost, warehousing cost, and distribution cost (Barger and Labrecque 2013). At the initial stage, the marketing manager will manufacture small units of products. In the beginning, 50 units of a product will be manufactured. The management team will be focused on the durability of the products. Moreover, the gloves will be modified as per the market feedbacks. The pricing of each unit will be $65. Manufacturing cost $1750 ($35/ unit) Warehouse cost $300 Packaging cost $250 Promotional cost $1000 Other cost $200 Total Budget $3500 With the involvement of following these stages, the marketing manager will be able to make a proper budget for the topic. The organization will distribute these products to the construction companies in order to collect new product feedbacks. The budget of the process may be increased due to the involvement of the enhanced promotional activities. Relevant legislation and ethics: The development process will include legislation and ethics in the process in order to uphold the proper work design in the business. In the product development process, the organization faces challenges for resource allocation. Legislation will be involved in the process in order to get rid of the business challenges (Barker 2013). The governments approach towards the ethical consideration will facilitate to uphold an enhanced work design in the business. On the other hand, the ethics are set in the business by the higher management. Ethical dilemma indeed affects the work culture in the business. The advertisement process also includes the ethical dilemmas including truth in advertisement, advertisement of harmful products and wrong advertising tactics (Schlinke and Crain 2013). In this context, the marketing manager will obey the legislation regarding product design, materials. The marketing manager needs to consider consumer law for executing the entire process in an appropriate way. Moreover, the organization follows several business legislations including product, liability regulation, environmental legislation, and the privacy laws (Shimp and Andrews 2013). The Australian consumer law is the national law for upholding the fair trading and consumer protection in the market (Percy 2014). Hence, it can be assessed that the regulation and legislation are the important part of the business to develop integrated market communication. Conclusion: It can be concluded that the integrated marketing communication is the gateway to obtaining success in the business. An integrated marketing plan consists of several processes including target audiences, communication objectives, strategically approaches, media plan, budgeting, and business related legislations. In this context, the researcher has identified each strategy of IMC in order to execute the process in an effective manner. The marketing manager has selected the product of Ansell. The product is construction gloves, and the researcher has focused on the development of the particular product. The researcher has selected this particular product, as the construction gloves are increasingly popular due to its durability. With the involvement of following this process, the researcher will be able to execute the development process in an effective manner. References: Ansell.com. (2016).Ansell Corporate. [online] Available at: https://www.ansell.com/en-US/About/Corporate/About.aspx [Accessed 30 May 2016]. Barger, V.A. and Labrecque, L., 2013. An integrated marketing communications perspective on social media metrics.International Journal of Integrated Marketing Communications, Spring. Barker, R., 2013. Strategic integrated communication: An alternative perspective of integrated marketing communication?.Communicatio,39(1), pp.102-121. Belch, G.E., Belch, M.A., Kerr, G.F. and Powell, I., 2014.Advertising: An integrated marketing communication perspective. McGraw-Hill Education. Blakeman, R., 2014.Integrated marketing communication: creative strategy from idea to implementation. 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