Good Essentials Of Marketing Research Paper Example

Adriana Mills

Marketing Essentials: Case of Pantene Shampoo
Adriana Mills

Introduction

This report is based on a survey research conducted on Procter & Gamble’s Pantene Shampoo to analyze its market mix having been identified as an underperforming product in the store. Pantene Shampoo which is a hair care product branded under Procter & Gamble. It has been observed that the P&G has faced significant decline in the sale of its brand Pantene since past few years (Neff, 2011). As a result, this report aims to determine the factors of product’s marketing mix due to which the customers switch to competitor. In addition, in order to increase the sale, the recommendation is provided through modifying the marketing mix.

Overview

Procter and Gamble is an American-based multinational corporation with its operations in more than 180 countries. The company offers wide range of product mix including skin care, snack foods, small appliance, household cleaner, body wash, baby cleaner and many beauty products. The company objective is to enhance the lives of their consumer through providing its customers with superior quality branded products and services. However, in order to sell the product, the company uses different distribution channel such as grocery stores, merchandisers, salons, departmental stores etc. The vision of company is to get share of almost half of global world population. Therefore, in the coming five years, P&G focuses to add around 1 billion more customers through customization and diversifying its product mix. The Pantene shampoo is one of the famous and one of the strongest brands of P&G in terms of market share and profit.

Applied Market Research

Since the past few months, a dramatic decline has been noticed in the sale of Pantene Shampoo. The researchers keenly focus to investigate the reason of less demand of the product by the customers. However, the company has wide variety and ranges to fulfill the demand of potential customers. Thus, most of the variables that are taken into account are lack of innovation, high competition, specific target audience and high prices compare to its close competitors. In order to examine the reason behind the decline in the sale, firstly the recent marketing mix of Pantene is analyzed.

Marketing Mix

The marketing mix of Pantene consists of four approaches including product features, price, place, promotion and advertising. These are the point of consideration in marketing when an item or service is underperforming and customers are not purchasing it. They are what the marketers analyze and consider to build the brand for market competence.

Product

Pantene shampoo includes both shampoo and conditioner. The company offers wide range of shampoos with distinctive features such as color care, smoothing, curl care, milky extra, anti hair fall, antidandruff, deep black etc. Considering the needs and preferences of the customers, the product is available in different ranges that include bottle and sachet packaging. The available sizes of products are 100 ml, 200 ml, and 400 ml. However, analyzing the need for proactive and healthy living life style, the whole product range is mainly designed and produced to target women in the age range of early to mid-forties since they have been identified as the ‘hair-conscious’ population in the market. The research and development department of Pantene puts great emphasis on scientific research and innovation, where the various efforts such as the addition of Pro-Vitamin B-5 in its shampoo product line all aimed at achieving the best product outcome is one of the many examples (Gareri, Appenzeller, Walasek & Koren, 2011).

Price

Promotion
The promotion of Pantene shampoo is the most important aspect on which the company bears huge budget that helps firm to attract more customers over its competitor. Therefore, in order to promote the product, Pantene advertizes its shampoo using various channels, which help the firm to target different market segments. The advertizing is done through magazine, billboard, TV commercial and shows due to which the firm is able to make the potential customer aware and up to date with the uniqueness of the product (Ragavendran, Devakumar & Upadhyay, 2009). However, the promotion and advertisement largely depends upon ethnicity and hair types. As a result, the product is marketed through taking different famous celebrities including Rachel Hunter, Shilpa Shetty, Sonali Bendre, Angie Everhart, Simone Singh, Kelly Lebrock, etc.

Place

Pantene has efficient distribution channels through which it products are made easily available everywhere in different ranges and units. The launch of its restructuring global program helped the firm to reorganize its work process and culture and has since sped the delivery of the product. The product is distributed and placed through grocery stores, merchandisers, salons, departmental stores such as Kirana stores, Reliance Fresh etc. Moreover, the company also uses its unique stand on which the product is mounted and separately displayed to catch the attention of the customers (Bajpai and Saxena, 2011).

Variable and analysis

When the customers are asked about the innovation and modification in the product, about 60 percent of the respondents answers showed that there has been no significant improvement in the product ever since it was first launched; something that sadden them as they expected that the company would improve with the technological changes or at least change the packaging to become more alluring. However, 35 percent agreed the experience and feel uniqueness and sense of newness, to some extent in the product. On the other hand, it has been proved that the marketing strategies of the product does not contribute to the sales decline of the product as 60 percent of the interviewees responded claiming that the use of efficient marketing channel by the company indeed influenced, 35 percent to some extent with this. However, about 5 percent gave a different opinion responding that market efficiency do not completely influence sales and performance of the product in the market.
Conclusively, it saliently came out from the studies that, in regard to the features and attributes of the product, 45 percent of the respondents use Pantene because of its extensive care features which is the prime purpose why the need a product of that nature. The other 35 percent respondents choose the product because it has varieties and ranges that satisfies the customers. They have used it for quite some time making them grow preference to it. As it may seem, the core factor that drives the competency of any product and gives it a competitive advantage in the most competitive market is its price. The lower the price the higher the sales for most of the non-luxurious commodities. However, in the case of Pantene shampoo, only 20 percent of the respondent preferred the product due to its price strategy, which means the company does not have attractive prices compared to its competitors and this is a factor to greatly consider if big sales are anticipated.
In the perfect competition market, one of the efficient ways to get most of the market share is through actions of enhancing the promotional activities especially through intervention such as discount offers among others. The result of survey shows that the company does not focus on discount offers as 45 percent of the respondents reported that the product does not have any discount offers while 35 percent claimed to be getting some discount offers to some extent. On the other hand, 20 percent of the customers agreed that the product has different benefit offers than just discounts. In addition, through the open ended questions, it was determined that most of the customers face serious quality issues in which many problems seem to relate to the seasonal modification of the product. Also, the customers’ feedback included dandruff problems when using Pantene shampoo due to which customers prefer switching to well known competitors brand.

Recommendation for modifying marketing mix

Based on the analysis of the study that was done bassd on the results of the data collected, it is recommended that, firstly, company should invest in R&D to get the solution of customers’ problem relating to dandruff issues. However, due to this research, the company has to bear costs and make huge investment, but bringing new innovations to the product is the most effective solution to get the sales back in line. In addition, due to number of products, the customers usually choose brands that have seasonal modification. Thus, Pantene has to focus on improving and customizing the shampoo ingredients based on the different seasons.
The outlook of the product is the first factor that attracts the customer. Thus, when it comes to design and packaging of the product, it has been noticed that the close competitor of Pantene which is Sunsilk of Unilever uses differentiation and unique strategies. Recently Sunsilk changed the design of the bottle where its new bottle shaped the Lady’s figure. Thus targeting the psyche of women, this design helps firm to give the impression that the product is made to fulfill the women needs the most. Therefore, Pantene cannot get the first mover advantage, but adapting similar strategies by changing the design of the product to give more customer oriented image, the company can attract more potential consumers.
Although company uses value pricing strategy, but it has been observed that, compared to its close competitors including Sunsilk, the products are slightly expensive. Therefore, in order to boost sales and sell existing items on the shelves, the best strategy is to introduce discount offers. However, this might decrease the profit of the company to some extent probably by 10%, but at the same time, it can save the firm from bearing huge losses. The discount offered can include coupons and complementary products such as sachet of conditioners. Moreover, researches show that young girls tend to get more attracted to the attributes of the product through watching advertisement. Pantene shampoos’ advertisements mainly focus the mid to 40 age group women. Therefore, the company has great opportunity to make the new advertisement that is young generation oriented. This way the company can increase its potential customers which help firm to gain more market share.

Conclusion

The globalization has resulted in fierce competition between the companies. As a result, firms, in order to get more market share, either diversify or adapt differentiation strategies. The drawback that Pantene face relies extensively on its marketing strategies where most of the budget goes to advertising campaigns. Thus in order to boost the sales, the company has to focus on other marketing mix including adoption of different strategies and effective discount offers. Pricing has also been identified to be a key determinant in consumer behavior. The cheaper the price the huger the sales volume. The company, as already recommended should find ways of lowering the price while at the same time keeping almost the same range of profit margin. If these are done, Pantene Shampoo will rise up rejuvenate and become a market giant once more.

References

Ragavendran, P. G., Devakumar, G., & Upadhyay, S. (2009). A study on brand awareness of shampoo products for Cavinkare Pvt. Ltd: Analysis, 8(2), 33-40.
Gareri, J., Appenzeller, B., Walasek, P., & Koren, G. (2011). Impact of hair-care products on FAEE hair concentrations in substance abuse monitoring. Analytical and Bioanalytical Chemistry, 400(1), 183-188
Sigurdsson, V., Foxall, G., & Saevarsson, H. (2010). In-store experimental approach to pricing and consumer behavior. Journal of Organizational Behavior Management, 30(3), 234-246.
Bajpai, N., & Saxena, R. (2011). A Study on the Determinants of Consumer Preference towards Various Brands of Shampoo in Bhopal Region. Journal of IPM Meerut.
Neff, J. (2011). Pantene Set to Try Again to Reverse Slide. Retrieved 20 December 2014, from http://adage.com/article/news/pantene-set-reverse-sales-slide/148250/
Appendices
Summary of Survey result
a) Does the product focus on innovation to meet the customer changing demand and preferences?
• Not at all
• To some extent
• Often
b) Does the product use efficient marketing channels to attract the customers?
• Not at all
• To some extent
• Often
c) Which feature of the product attracts you the most
• Price
• Varity and range
• Extensive care
d) Are you satisfied with the quality of the product?
• Yes (7)
• No (13)
e) If No, what problems do you mostly face in the product? (some answers)
1) The dandruff issues which cause the hair fall.
2) The hair mostly gets rough in a day to which it is needed to wash the hair almost daily.
3) No change according to seasonal. Which I believe should be there, as many other brands have different ranges for different seasons.
f) Does the product offer enough discount offers?
• Not at all (9)
• To some extent (5)
• Often
Respondent 1
a) Does the product focus on innovation to meet your changing demand and preferences?
• Not at all
• To some extent
• Often
a) Does the product use efficient marketing channels to attract the customers?
• Not at all
• To some extent
• Often
b) Which feature of the product attracts you the most
• Price
• Varity and range
• Extensive care
c) Are you satisfied with the quality of the product?
• Yes
• No
d) If No, what problems do you mostly face in the product?
The dandruff issues which cause the hair fall.
e) Does the product offer enough discount offers?
• Not at all
• To some extent
• Often
Respondent 2
a) Does the product focus on innovation to meet your changing demand and preferences?
• Not at all
• To some extent
• Often
b) Does the product use efficient marketing channels to attract the customers?
• Not at all
• To some extent
• Often
c) Which feature of the product attracts you the most
• Price
• Varity and range
• Extensive care
d) Are you satisfied with the quality of the product?
• Yes
• No
e) If No, what problems do you mostly face in the product?
The hair mostly gets rough in a day due to which it is needed to wash the hair almost
daily.
f) Does the product offer enough discount offers?
• Not at all
• To some extent
• Often
Respondent 3
a) Does the product focus on innovation to meet the customer changing demand and preferences?
• Not at all
• To some extent
• Often
b) Does the product use efficient marketing channels to attract the customers?
• Not at all
• To some extent
• Often
c) Which feature of the product attracts you the most
• Price
• Varity and range
• Extensive care
d) Are you satisfied with the quality of the product?
• Yes
• No
e) If No, what problems do you mostly face in the product?
No change according to seasonal. Which I believe should be there, as many other brands have different ranges for different seasons.
f) Does the product offer enough discount offers?
• Not at all
• To some extent
• Often
Respondent 4
a) Does the product focus on innovation to meet changing demand and preferences?
• Not at all
• To some extent
• Often
b) Does the product use efficient marketing channels to attract the customers?
• Not at all
• To some extent
• Often
c) Which feature of the product attracts you the most
• Price
• Varity and range
• Extensive care
d) Are you satisfied with the quality of the product?
• Yes
• No
e) If No, what problems do you mostly face in the product?
f) Does the product offer enough discount offers?
• Not at all
• To some extent
• Often
Respondent 5
a) Does the product focus on innovation to meet the customer changing demand and preferences?
• Not at all
• To some extent
• Often
b) Does the product use efficient marketing channels to attract the customers?
• Not at all
• To some extent
• Often
c) Which feature of the product attracts you the most
• Price
• Varity and range
• Extensive care
d) Are you satisfied with the quality of the product?
• Yes
• No
e) If No, what problems do you mostly face in the product?
Dandruff that mostly bring out in cold weather but Pantene has no such solution of this
problem.
f) Does the product offer enough discount offers?
• Not at all
• To some extent
• Often