FINAL: OBJECTIVES

The goal of any marketing plan is to 'attract new customers by promising superior value and to keep and grow current customers by delivering satisfaction'. (Book page 5)

Another key goal of a marketing plan should be customer relationship management, the overall process of building and maintaining profitable customer relationships by delivering superior customer value and satisfaction. It deals with all aspects of acquiring, keeping, and growing customers. (book, page 13)


The objective 'states the marketing objectives that the company would like to attain during the plan’s term and discusses key issues that will affect their attainment. For example, if the goal is to achieve a 15 percent market share, this section looks at how this goal might be achieved.' (book page 56)

    Marketing objectives for Phileas Fogg's Seaweed Snack product: to grow market share by delivering superior customer value. Hopefully in doing so some profit is attained, but as with all new products, the company will probably lose money the first few years. Since the product is new, the objective would be modest, to grow market share to 10% of the market by the end of the first year and 25% by the end of 3 years, constantly revising such numbers at the beginning of every year to make sure they are realistic and revising the marketing strategy if the market share is not meeting that objective.
    Main factors that would prevent the company from attaining such goals is that the snack food market is a mature market with lots of competition from established companies and in a bad economy such as now, it might turn out to be that the only way to grow market share is to take market share away from competitors, which isn't always easy. Also competitors might have a cost advantage due to economies of scale and long standing relationships with distributors that give them favorable terms.
    On the other hand, even in a bad economy people are always eating snack foods as eating is a necessity and there are always those consumers who are not satisfied and looking to try something different.

[NOTE: For purposes of these blogs, all references to 'book' refer to Armstrong & Kotler (2011). Marketing: An Introduction, 10th Ed. Prentice Hall Publishing]