ASB2113 Marketing Communication-My Way Café

My Way Café is known café among the college students and youngsters in Bangor, United Kingdoms. It has been in operation for two to three months and is considered as a small restaurant. My Way Café is a locally based restaurant, known to its local passerby and local people in that region or nearby. The restaurant serves a variety of foods to its customers ranging from beverages to snacks. Some of the ranges of menu offered by the restaurant are Spanish Tapas, Homemade Soups, and Hot Panini, Burgers, Sandwiches and others. The location of the restaurant is some way between the College Road and highways.

The College Road offers huge number of young customers to the café coming in regularly or on weekly and monthly basis. The café offers comfortable environment to the customers to come and relax. The seating is made comfortable, outdoor seating arrangement, free Wi-Fi for the customer to relax and spend some time with friends. The business has a great chance of expansion and growth in future (tripadvisor 2017). The paper discusses about the internal and external analysis of the café to know its potential growth. Further, it analyses the marketing communication strategy that the café can follow to attract its targeted customers. Implementation and evaluation of the plan has been discussed in the last section.

Analysis of Promotional Situation 

Internal Analysis 

Marketing communication and evaluation strategies is one of the most important activities a company should carry out to understand its position in the market and in the mind of the customer. Marketing communication is a medium between the consumer and the company that helps them to interact with each other and understand their needs. It helps the organization to display the services and products that it is offering to the customers (Fill 2013).

The company sets a particular set of strategies and messages that it conveys to the consumers through these marketing communication tools (Pelsmacker et al. 2018). The customers and the external stakeholders of the company are encouraged to offer the business its responses. Thus, marketing communication acts as a persuading tool for the target audience of the company.

My Way Café is a small business; however, it does own a department that is involved in marketing and promotional activities. Even though it does not have a specific market communication plan for targeting it customers, yet the company is well involved in carrying out a daily interacting activities with the customers (Pelsmacker et al. 2018). This is visible as there are no clear evidences available on their promotional and communication activities since it has been in operation. Thus, the company has been mainly involved in direct communication activities with its potential customers for displaying its products and services.

The direct communicating activities that My Way Café has implemented are by offering sample snacks and beverages to the passer-by (Pelsmacker et al. 2018). The sample snacks are offered by the staffs of the café in a moral uniform of the company. The samples are offered to everyone; however, focusing more on target customers of the business. Other communication strategies implemented by the business is touch point strategy in which the staffs in the restaurant interacts with the daily and loyal customers visiting the restaurants and know their opinion about their service and products. They are offered with special menu and offers from time to time.

My Way Café did not use any advertising agency; however, it did print leaflets for its marketing strategy (Hollensen 2015). It used traditional advertising medium for marketing its products through print media. It used the printed leaflets for distributing it to the customers visiting the stores on the day of its inauguration. Since that day onwards there was no advertising initiative carried out by the company to attract potential customers. Thus, through the evidences the only initiative the company has taken for promoting its products is through communicating with its customer directly.

External Analysis

Consumer Analysis

Customers are one of the most important factors for the company as it helps the company to increase its sale and be in business. Even though all types of customer visits the café in some time or the other, yet there are certain specific ranges of customers that are maximum seen in the restaurant compared to others (Wood 2014).

It has been seen that mainly three type of customer segments visits the store in a daily basis such as the university students, sports fraternity and the office goers. From the customer segment, it is seen that the customers visiting the stores mainly seek relaxation and some valuable time with their friends and with themselves. The sports people visit the café for relaxing and sipping coffee with their friends. The café also experiences tourists visiting their stores during seasons, as the city of Bangor is famous for its tourist spots such as the hills, beaches and others.

Competitive Analysis

Bangor city offers a competitive environment for the fast food industry (Fleisher and Bensoussan 2015). This is because there is large number of cafes and restaurant that serves similar kinds of food items and service to the customers at reasonable price like My Way Café (Percy 2014). There are many small and big restaurants found in the Bangor University for the students and working class. Some of the biggest competitors of My Way café are Abbeyfield Hotel Restaurant, Whistle Stop on The Pier, Boatyard Inn, Harp Inn and others.

Thirty-two restaurants are there near the Bangor University, which offers tough competition to the company. Other than this, there are large numbers of other Italian, Indian and multi Cuisine restaurants that offers their items at reasonable price to the customers. the competitors of the café does not follow any communication strategy just like My Way Café, which makes the competition even tougher (tripadvisor 2017).

Social and Cultural Environment 

Mountains and hills surround Bangor and it is one of the less costly cities in UK. This offers students and sports person an ideal place to stay. The city is well positioned for sports and other activities. Moreover, the university also offers excellent sport participation for the students in activities such as Squash, Football and others. This shows that the potential customers for My Way Café are the students and the sportspersons. The social environment of the region such as the beaches, forest and hills attracts many tourists from time to time. Such positive factors have a positive impact on the café and help them to boost up sale all year round from tourists as well as the locals (Monster Career Advice 2017).

The students and tourists for its technological facicilities such as the Wi-Fi also prefer the café. This is because nowadays students and other young customers are very obsessed with Smartphone and love to visit cafes having Wi-Fi facility. My Way Café wins over its competitors on this ground as most of its competitors are small, does not have a dining area and thus does not offer Wi-Fi facility (Monster Career Advice 2017).

Marketing Communications Plan

Strategies and Tactics

Segmenting and targeting are two most important part of marketing for a company as it helps the company to indentify its potential customers and design its strategy according to their needs (Percy 2014). However, there are two types of customers that a company targets, one is primary customers and the other is the secondary customers. Primary market are the one that the company targets directly, whereas secondary customers are the one that a company gets from targeting its primary customers (Pelsmacker et al. 2018).

My Way Café segments its marketing according in two types such as demographic segmentation and psychographic segmentation. In demographic segmentation its targets the young customers as well as the middle aged customers (Pelsmacker et al. 2018). In the middle aged customers it targets the college students of Bangor University that loves to spend time with their friends in the café. On the other hand, for middle-aged customers its targets the office goers and working class those take out some time to relax with their friends. While segmenting its market on psychographic basis, it targets the customers that love to visit Bangor to enjoy and relax themselves and the students that loves to spend quality time with the students.

Primary market that the café targets are the young customers and sports fraternity mainly because the area in which the café is operating has maximum of young university students (Leino and Leino 2017). Thus, the company gets most of the students as their regular customers. According to the café the primary customers are the one that can be targeted directly and the one that the visits the café regularly. On the other hand, the secondary customers according to the company either are the one that visits the café by listening to others or while visiting Bangor at some point of time and love to sit and dine. Thus, the secondary customers according to the café are the tourists that visit the café occasionally(Wood 2014).

Goals and Objectives

From the above market segmentation strategy of the company and the communication objective that the café needs to attain, it can be seen that the main aim of the company is to grow (Wood 2014). Being a new entrant in the market, it will be beneficial for the company to design a expansion and growth plan. The main objectives that the company wants to attain is to increase its brand awareness by 100 percent, improve its positioning strategy and attain brand image by 5 percent and increase customer acquisition by 5 percent. The café also wants to improve its customer retention rate by 100 percent. My Way Café wants to achieve these goals within next three years of its operation.

Proposed IMC Plan

My Way Café to attain its objectives need to develop a good integrated communication plan for its business by which it will expand its reach and attract more customers in future. Marketing communication can help the company to stand as a differentiator in the industry where there are so many similar firms, offering similar service (Baker and Saren 2016). This is because; marketing communication will help the company to set their own brand image in the mind of the customers. Thus, My Way Café should use different communication strategy to connect to its potential customers.

The communication strategies that the café will use are Direct Marketing, Push Communication strategies and profile communication strategies. The communication strategy that the café will use should ensure that it is unique and position the brand the company differently in front of its competitors. This will help My Way to become a unique brand in that area. However, while planning the communication strategy it is important that the company keep control on their costs (Belch et al. 2014). This is because the company is new and would not be able to take up huge investment in this stage of operation.

Direct marketing

Direct marketing through internet offers the company to reach out to large number of customers (Risselada et al. 2014). The communication takes place in a two-way basis and is interactive. Thus, the café will directly communicate with the target customers, which will also prove to be less expensive for the company.

The direct communicative strategy that the café will use is Facebook, Twitter, Snapchat, emailing and others, as the young customers and working class are readily available in these sites. Moreover, secondary customers such as the tourists are also available in these sites. Moreover, personalized message will help the brand to form a relationship with the customers and respond to their grievances in a better way. This will also help the brand to alter their packaging strategy if demanded by the customers.

Push communication strategies

For the push strategy, the café will use Bangor University through which it will attract the university students by offering those discounts and commission to the college (Tussyadiah 2016).

Profile communication strategies

Profile communication will help the café to attract high-level customers and their choice. This can be done by the café by improving the quality of their product and service delivery by altering their packaging system, referral system, uniform of the staffs, restaurant design and interiors and other facilities (He et al. 2013).

Thus, the company can use these integrated communication strategies to attract potential customers and target new customer base. in order to implement its communication strategy efficiently and make it available to the customers, the company needs to formulate a message. This is because while carrying out communication strategy it is also important the café improves its brand positioning and awareness in the eyes of the consumers. However, apart from these the company should also formulate three message for its targeted customers that synchronizes by the communication that the café ill follow. Message should be the one that offers right amount of information to the customers.

Advertising messages

Mission: Message should be clear and directly target the potential customers

Values: customer satisfaction, friendliness, value added and affordability

Slogan: Customer Satisfaction is our motto

• My Way offers the best fat free food products and beverages at some of the most affordable price.
• Looking for quality time, quality meal and quality day out with friends? Visit My Way Café
• We are ready to serve you throughout the day with breakfast, lunch and dinner.

In order to implement a plan in reality with expected outcomes it is very important to strategize and formulate a budget and process of implementation. This not only assure that the company is focused on the aims and objectives but also the allocation of the resources that the company has is efficiently used (Henninger et al.2017).

Budgeting is important as it recognizes all the aspects of a activity and analyses the cost accordingly this further helps in the hassle free implementation of the plan and the strategy taken by the management of the organization. The budget of a particular company can be evaluated or accounted o the basis of the favorable time period. It can be formulated annually, bi-annually or even weekly as is preferred by the management. It helps the management of the organization monitor the resource allocation and ensures that the effectiveness of the allocation is optimum (Becker et al. 2014).

The budget time period that is evaluated are for three years, the allocated amount for the time period is £600 for the marketing communication which is 3 percent of the total budget of £20, 000. The company has to inform the respective managers and line of authority about the budget so as to keep them at par with the strategies developed in the process. A budget channelized the strategies in the mapped direction to get the desired result out of the plan (Belch et al. 2014).

Aforementioned the time period that the budget covers is for three years and the medium of communication that are chosen will be allocated with the price on the basis of the contract that has been formulated by the company and the third parties involved in implementing the marketing communication plan. As the time is more than a single financial year the plan has to be more precise and detailed in order to keep up will all the aspects and employee affect tactics for a period of three years. The budgeting has been done on a monthly basis to make the process of information easy to understand. The particulars of the budget process have been stated clearly in the budget table (Belch et al. 2014).

The budget that has been allocated is 600 and the below table explains the division of the resource based on the medium of communication.

Control is an important aspect of any marketing communication. The company is always expected to have a contingency plan in order to combat any issues and to avoid the challenges that may arise from any miscommunication. The key objective of the organisation is to create brand awareness and position the brand image in the minds of the consumers and prospective consumers. The messages communicated to the target market by the company should be monitored in order to control any negative publicity and negative brand image (Jeffres 2015).

 The area of marketing communication that is being focused by My way café is in the digital front which is the most recent development in the marketing communication arena, one of the major disadvantage of this platform is that the organisation has very limited means of control over the messages and public feedbacks that the organisation will receive form the digital marketing platform. For example: if the company posts a picture or a poster in Facebook the comments that are going to be posted by the people are not under the control of company (McQuail and Windahl 2015).

Conclusion 

The key objective of the company is to create and develop brand positioning and brand awareness and this plan that has been discussed above has taken the route of digital marketing. As the target market segmentation opted by the company are young group of people who are tech savvy digital marketing is the easiest and the most effective way to reach to the intended target market. The goal of the marketing communication plan is to create value customer relationship along with gaining an edge over the competitors.

The marketing plan will also ensure feedbacks form the customers directly as this is one of the major advantages of digital marketing. With the help of the feedbacks form the customers the company can incorporate changes and development in the process of operation as well as it will give the company an in-depth idea about the requirements of the target market.

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