Case Study: Our Perfect Wedding Essay

Claire has do a reasonably good hypothesize closely tar ride markets for her innovative meshwork secondaryd line of descent, and understands the germane(predicate) need quite well. But for the merchandising scuffle, she as fallen short because its non clear whether this business involves maven strategy or nearly(prenominal) strategies. For example, a marketing mix that appeals to diligent couples would not be the equivalent as a marketing mix that appeals to the companies that remuneration for net summons.Claires target markets atomic number 18 engaged couples /newlyweds (for cave in put down) companies that target newlyweds with both goods and work (with the advert of web pages) and friends and family of the couple to be married (whom the advertisers want to reach). Claire has done a reasonably good job about target markets for her new web based business, and understands the relevant needs quite well. But for the marketing mix, she has fallen short because its not clear whether this business involves one strategy or several strategies.For example, a marketing mix that appeals to engaged couples would not be the similar as a marketing mix that appeals to the companies that pay for web pages. Claires target markets are engaged couples /newlyweds (for gift registry) companies that target newlyweds with both goods and services (with the advertising of web pages) and friends and family of the couple to be married (whom the advertisers want to reach). What may or may not be obvious at first is that there is little about this business that requires that it be focused only on customers or advertisers in the said(prenominal) city or metro area.To the contrary, gift-givers who are inclined to get on the internet to check a wedding registry cleverness be equally willing to order gifts from distant companies (advertisers), e particularly if the company provides special services such as gift wrap, individualisedized gift cards, and oral comm unication direct to the recipient. Even for local customers, there may be a number of mail order, catalog, and specialty retailers in distant locations who are raise in reaching this target market. Simply focusing on retailers or service providers in the local area to generate website listings and advertising r pull downue may not make sense.Similarly, there is little reason that the registry service should be limited to local couples-a user of the Internet usually doesnt roll in the hay or care whether the base operation for a website is nearby or far away. To the extent that there are advantages of localizing aspects of the service, Claire could potentially set up a segmented approach in which diametric parts of the website were designed to appeal to heap from different areas. As a start, for example, she might gauge about retailers or advertisers who have facilities or base operations in her own area and who in like manner are targeting customers in other(a) places.Lets think about the marketing mix that Claire rears for each of these target markets. For each group What is the specific reaping (and what are its benefits)? What is the price of obtaining those benefits? How are the benefits promoted? And (to a lesser extent) what is Claires social function in the place arrangements between the advertisers and their customers? How does her current geographic focus draw into play? The benefits for engaged couples seem pretty clear. The $20 price to register is not a oversize investment if it saves beat and leads to the desired gifts quite than things that are not of interest.So, it is unlikely that price sensitivity should be big concerns unless other services appear that will provide the service (and/or other superior benefits) for free. This is certainly a possibility because revenue from advertisers could pay for the services provided if enough advertisers and customers can be attracted. If the couple doesnt know about the service and doesnt know to look for it, they wont sign up. There is also some evidence for this diagnosis because the chief(prenominal) flurry of activity came after Claire finally got some assist with publicity.That attention and interest simply wasnt forthcoming from her limited advertising. Claire should work harder to get more publicity. There also seems to be a very all-important(prenominal) role for word-of-mouth referrals here. For example, there is no explicit discussion in the obtain about how friends and family of the couples are supposed to learn about the website, exactly it would certainly make sense to develop ideas that could be shared with the registered couples about how to inform gift givers about the website, what it is supposed to do, and how it is supposed to work.Furthermore, the relationship with couples who do sign up needs to be a close one, even if for only a short time period. Most couples are not going to be repeat customers but on the other hand, couples who are ab out to get married often know others who are at the same life stage especially the among the younger first time married. Claire needs to think about how to stimulate word-of-mouth referrals so that people who do sign up help to bring in surplus customers. Since she doesnt have a lot of money, one way to do this is to think in terms of marginal revenue from new customers and what it might cost her to acquire a customer.It might be better and cheaper to claim couples who recommend the service to a friend a $5 or $10 rebate on the $20 fee, or perhaps she could write in code them in a bi-monthly drawing for some more substantial boodle like a honeymoon trip. So far, Claire has not done a particularly good job of giving advertisers a reason to bargain into her service. She is basically change a professional service to them, but some of them cant evaluate it in advance and they are unclear about its benefits. The comparison with the cost of a Yellow Pages ad is enkindle because i t provides a sort of reference price for the advertiser.Yet, the advertiser probably sees some sort of Yellow Pages listing as a must buy. possibly this sort of website advertising will become a must buy, but probably not until more of these companies target customers who think of the web as the place to look for this sort of information. Claire is also being a crisp production-oriented in the way she is thinking about her product. She designs web pages in her other job, and so she is thinking about potential advertisers who need a web page.But companies that already have a good web page might be more interested in something else, like a banner ad or button ad at her website that would appropriate a net surfer to click over to get their be message. Companies that have already invested in a website know that they face the same problem that Claire doesthey want to attract people to the site. So, for them the value of banner ads (perhaps at a lower cost, or even with the fee based on the number of click-through from Claires website) might be easier to see. Claire also might think about the pricing arrangement for advertisers.She currently bundles the price of the on-time service of preparing the web page and the ongoing online web page. She might want to charge on an individual basis for the preparation of the web page and/or allow customers to have something more elaborate than a single page. Claires service in galore(postnominal) ways operates with the same approach as a magazine attracting an sense of hearing and advertisers who want to reach that audience. Yet, most companies that sell advertising media time and pose rely on personal selling and/or offer incentives to advertising agencies or others that refer business.Claire hasnt done much personal selling to advertisers, even after her direct response mailing didnt work. The case offers several hints why she didnt like the job she had doing personal selling, and she is bad-tempered doing other thin gs. It is likely that if she is going to need to get help if the personal selling parts of her promotion blend is going to be handled well. Since she doesnt have a big budget, she might think about nerve-racking to find someone who would sell advertising space on her website on a straight commission basis.That way, she would not have much write down until she had revenues. Of course, the salesperson would still need to have a good accounting to tell, and that might depend on having a way to better cook the link between the advertisers sales and visits to the websites. For example, if Claire could convince advertisers to offer a small discount to customers who purchased because of the website she might be more favored in getting customers to tell the advertisers that I am an OurPerfectWedding. com customer. The case also portrays her as a doer not as a planner, which is in part true.She had an idea but doesnt have a precise plan for what needs to be done. Rather, she hasnt yet rightfully make the investment of time and money to give her idea a chance to work. Shes a doer when it comes to some things but has not really been a dedicated doer when it comes to getting this business started. She probably wouldnt have the time to do that unless she gave up her full-time job or really cut back on her social life. While it is not hard to think about different things that Claire could do, what is perhaps more relevant is what is she willing to do.