‘‘An investigation of the effectiveness of the marketing strategy

adopted by 02 (UK) and Mobilink (Pakistan) for contract (post-paid) or

(pre-paid) customers’’

AIM:-

To explore whether or not a marketing strategy successful in one market can

be transferred from one culture to another (02 to Mobilink or Mobilink to 02)

Objectives:-

-Identify the segmentation, targeting and positioning of both companies

-Evaluate customer relationship management

-Analyse effectiveness of brand management

MBA, BBA ,International Relations projects are available with Harvard

referencing and all are plagiarism free projects.

Contact

Jahanzeb

00923004604250

sparklessoft@gmail.com

www.sparklessoft.com

Context:-

An idea of evaluating business research initially takes place in your mind

when you feel that something going on is doing so quite differently from the

way you were expecting or when un- necessary success or an obvious failure

occur again and again in any field of modern business. How long will it be

before everyone on Earth has a mobile phone? “It looks highly likely that

global mobile cellular teledensity will surpass 100% within the next decade,

and probably earlier,” according to Hamadoun Touré, secretary-general of the

International Telecommunication Union, a body set up in 1865 to regulate

international telecoms.An enormous change in the field of telecommunication

has already been seen by the researcher in Pakistan as well as in emerging

economies countries like India, China before I came to the United Kingdom in

2006. Despite of having some doubts about the instability in the life of the

Government of Pakistan from the last three years, The telecommunication

sector is still one of the most rapid growing sectors in Pakistan.

Telecommunications has become one of the most important infrastructures

that are essential to the socio-economic well-being of or technology driven

world any nation. The globalization of world economy has further amplified

the importance of telecommunications to the nation’s economy. The rationale

for critically investigating the two major organizations marketing strategy are

to come up with answers of those questions or business thoughts which were

started to arise in my ideas when I joined 02 as their network user in the result

of contract. I have been using 02 mobile connection and phone for last three

years. And to critically analyse the each and every aspect of their marketing

strategy and its effectiveness was nearly dream to me as I had seen the

mobilink (Pakistan) with the quite various way to acting upon on its marketing

strategy and its effectiveness in Pakistan.

Literature review

A marketing strategy normally includes the segmentation, targeting & positioning and

in all you focus on consumer behaviour along with brand managing. As a strategy,

marketing seeks to develop effective responses to change market environments by

defining market segments and developing and positioning product offering for those

target markets.( Hooley, Saunders, Piercy, 2004) One of the most important parts

of making the first aspect of marketing strategy appropriate is to analyze and

acknowledge the existence and potential of your customers and divide them into a

segment and target them accordingly. “Usage, segmentation and relationship

marketing are the key marketing activities to obtain the desired results of retaining

more customers, upgrading more customer relationship, getting better customers and

using existing customers as advocates acquiring new customers”(Weinstien,2004).

Art Weinstein (1987, p 3) has called segmentation “The key to marketing success”

(Cahill,J.D,2006 pp3)

According to Albinsson and Hensimark (2004), Satisfied customers are less price

sensitive they buy additional products and stay loyal longer. In the telecommunication

sector it’s not very easy thing to retain your customers with you for a long time

because of rapid waves of development and the entry of new companies into the

market who attract existing as well as new customers to think for a change and

especially these companies always focus on their pricing when they enter the new

market. So, knowing your existing customers’ needs and fulfilment according their

desire and the market position are other important challenges to organisations which

already exist in this sector. Segmentation provides the opportunity for an organisation

to critically analyse and evaluate the socio-economic group of customers you have

segmented and target them after having market research and surveys. In the process of

market research you get the chance to know your competitor’s positions even you

know about their strengths their weaknesses and you forecast yourself for the future.

If we just have a look at our chosen companies for dissertation mobilink and 02 we

will come to know that how effectively these companies targeting their segments.

Let’s start with mobilink which is the largest cellular company in Pakistan operating

throughout the country. Mobilink is an Egyptian company which started its operations

in Pakistan in 1994 and now enjoying over 28 million active customers growing day

by day. They were the first in the market in 1994 with the GSM (global system for

mobile phone) technology. At that time they had a different market strategy from

what idea for customers to have a SIM card which they use in any phone, their

segment and target market now become all of the the country. As far as the concern

of market research which has been described above did not has a need to check the

competitors’ strength because they were only in the market with that new technology.

But now their market is quite different even being in the market for 15 years they are

being pushed away by another 4 companies in which Telenor, Warid and Ufone are

prominent. 02 which is the leading UK company was born in 2002, it was a relaunch

of the former BT cell net and since December after leaving Vodafone behind, it has

become the market company with over 16 million customers. The O2’s success comes

from in the market focusing on the facilitation of existing customers as well as the

creation of gaps in the market with the continuous reducing price plans for contracted

customers.

According to Al Ries and Trout (2003), positioning is not what you do to a product,

Positioning is what you do to a mind of prospect. (Kotler, P pp-135).Positioning is

considered one of the key elements of quick success of any company. Before

launching of O2 in UK market it was a great challenge to O2 management not only to

create and cover the gaps BT left behind but to establish such a position which could

lead them into a leading company. They knew that market was captured by Vodafone

with their position of quality and high price. So, the O2’s position came in front of us

as low price comparatively with more minutes and free weekend calls. Similarly, for

being an oldest company in Pakistan’s market mobilink had its positioning

surprisingly very high because of their coverage in more areas of country till the

Warid comes into the market. But Warid had a quite massive research and the

knowledge of market their focus was on all big cities and villages and with the low

price mobilink could not sustain their same positioning in the market. One of the

another aspects of marketing tools that every marketing strategist needs to focus like

all other engineering firm telecommunication company should also possess its

contingency plan particularly when any company comes in the market and starts to

cover its shares.(Barton, 1993). When Warid came into the market its first attack was

on mobilink by giving them tough time for pricing but unfortunately its been seemed

they did not recover that launching and they did not have any contingency plan for

their pricing. Similar happened here when 02 introduced their weekend plan for

contract customers T-mobile and 3 did not compete it and 02 made his position very

strong in the market.

Customer Relationship Management is another very important area to keep business

smooth especially when you feel and face highly competitive environment in the

market. According to Nguyen (2007) “The customers are always right’’. Historically

Mobilink had a real weak relationship with their customers as it has been mentioned

above the launching of Warid had a very strong effect on breaking the position of

mobilink in the market because they had a huge knowledge through surveys,

interviews that what customers liking or not so when the Warid came in 2005 their

target market was all post paid customers of mobilink who were being operating

under the brand of mobilink Indigo.

It was seen all the industrial customers moved to Warid because of fully flexible

tariffs with low pricing and having being given them the offer of keeping their same

numbers which was considered a real surprising thing for the customers of that time in

Pakistan.

Managing one’s brand has also become the biggest challenge for all mobile phones

network providers. After the creation of 02 it was also a massive task for the

management of 02 to focus on their brand in comparison with their competitors

Orange and Vodafone who were not only investing on their brands through

customers’ offers campaigns but also issuing the handsets along with tariff to their

monthly customers with their own logos on the handsets. “The official reason of that

the operators wanted to make their services easier to use by also getting involved in

the design of the applications and user interfaces in the mobile phones” (Vesa, 2005)

A month ago researcher went to Bristol. Orange company had a massive campaign for

their brand at Cabot Circus shopping Mall, their manager was among the people

listening their ideas, thinking and recommendations to improve the brand and

especially was just focusing on the importance of Orange brand saying that how u get

into when at first you just hear about the word Orange. “Managers must spend more

time with their customers listening to their needs and interests and how their brand

can meet those needs” (Beverland, 2005)

Similarly Mobilink was seen much conscious about its brand imaging after WARID

came into the market. But the concept of employees training, general surveys

campaign and running charity organizations to build up a strong brand image like

European companies

Research Methodology:

Burns (1994) has defined Research Methodology as a ‘Systematic investigation to

find an answer to a problem’. In this section, different approaches and methods have

been defined, which will be used to collect the data and full fill the objectives set for

this research.

Research paradigm (WHY phenomenology)

In this process the dissertation researcher would use phenomenology because he is

going to check effectiveness of marketing strategy which is quite related to subjective

approach. Answer cannot be in numbers that is why phenomenology will b used

Research approach

A qualitative approach will be used in this research, which will help in understanding

how the mobilink and 02 are applying their marketing strategies in Pakistan and UK

respectively. This research approach will also help me in making any necessary

changes to my objectives, depending on my findings. Not just that, it will assist me in

understanding the change in the strategies and environments of telecommunication.

Although, this method of research is time consuming and difficult to analyse but it

will give me deep knowledge of my topic.

Quantitative research approach will also be used in this research. This will help in

gathering a large amount of data relevant to my research in a economical way. The

reason for choosing this approach is that, the data collected from these two companies

by this technique would be easy to compare, and it would be easy to focus and cover

different situations radical changes arising into the mobile phone industry

Research method

Interviews will also be conducted in understanding the complex situation, and where

in-depth information would be needed, because interviews can explain any situation

better than any other way of research. One drawback which interview may have

would be the information gathered by the interview, could bias, as it is related to the

interviewee perception and view point.

Number general articles and case studies, will also be reviewed during the research

process, as it will help in giving a more thorough analysis of the mobile network

industry.

Sampling

Sampling criteria will be from interviewing the different departments like marketing

department and other departments of both the organizations.

Ethical Consideration:

As interviews would play a major role in understanding the working of the

telecommunication industry in the country, the researcher has to conduct a number of

interviews with different individuals related to the organisation. In respecting the

privacy of the people and keeping the ethical issues into consideration, all the

respondents will be kept anonymous. Further, a copy of the research will be sent to

those companies, who would be kept in focus in this study.

Methods of analysing primary data

Microsoft Excel most of the time will be used to analyse primary data

Time Plan:

Time plan allocated to the researcher for the submission of this research is 8 months.

So the first phase, of the dissertation would cover the literature review of the

telecommunication industry which is expected to be done in 2 month time. Research

methodology plays a very crucial part in this research, and hence more time has been

allocated for completing this part, i.e. 2.5 month. Then it would be the analysis stage

that is going to take further one and a half to two months of time. Final drafting will

be done then finally the report will be handed over to the University.

Bibliography

References:

Gorden E, greenley. (1989), “An understanding of marketing strategy”, vol. 23 No.8, pp. 45-58

Nghuyen, H., Joseph, S., Newby, M. (2007), “Strategies for successful CRM implementation”, vol.15 No.2, pp. 102-115

Beverland, L. (2005), “Brand management and the challenge of authenticity”, vol.14 No.7, pp 460-461

Barton, L. (1994), “Marketing planning and tools”, vol.12 No. 11, pp. 41-46

Sigala, M. (2006), “Mass customisation implementation models and customer value in mobile phone services”, vol.16 No.4, pp. 395-420

Albinsson, M and Hensimark, O (2004), “Customer satisfaction and retention”, vol.14 No.1, pp. 40-57

Kotler,P.,Dibbs,S.,Simkin,I.2004, Market segmentation. 3rd ed. NY: Haworth press inc,10 alice street Binghamton

Daniss, J, Cahill.2006. Lifestyle market segmentation. NY: Haworth press Inc, 10 alice street Binghamton

Vesa, J, 2006. Mobile services in the networked economy: Yurchak printing Inc)

Hooley, J, Garaham., Saunders, A, John., Piercy, 2004. Marketing strategy and competitive positioning. 3rd ed. UK: prentice hall international UK limited.

Kotler, P. 2003. Marketing Insights from A to Z. New Jersy, USA: Wiley & sons

[WWW] http://www.businesslink.gov.uk/bdotg/action/layer?topicId=1075308409 ,20

November, 2009

[WWW] http://www.mobilinkgsm.com/about/about.php, 23 November, 2009

[WWW] http://www.o2.co.uk/, 21 November, 2009