Outline marketing plan for Asuk Creative Limited a B2B provider of Internet services continue...

Objectives

The objectives are each built around the SMART criteria (specific, measurable, actionable, realistic and timed).

• Increase market share. ASUK Creative Limited currently holds 2 per cent (200 servers) of the UK dedicated server market (approx immediately 10,000 dedicated servers). ASUK should plan to increase this steadily to 16.7 per cent after four years. Since the market share has risen from 0 to 2 per cent in one year without increased marketing, this is a realistic target.
• Streamline ordering processes. The new web site called DediPower.com should incorporate online facilities for order processing, upgrades and support. The development of these features can continue over time but a fully featured site should be ready for launch.
• Increase brand awareness/brand building. By launching a new site, ASUK can take advantage of a fresh start but still use all the advantages of an established company. A brand image of power and quality, yet competitive prices should be established through intensive marketing and excellent CRM. The company plans to have a powerful brand name within six months of launching the site.
• 
• Create self-contained entity for possible initial public offering (IPO) or trade sale.
• ASUK can aim for an IPO within three years, being sold either to a competitor or to a diversifying larger company. The sell value is currently £300,000. A target should be set to have this at £1 5 million within three years.
• Expansion into international markets. The launch of DediPower means that foreign clients will become more accessible. The improved site will have support for international sales.
• Improve CRM and customer support. By improving these fundamentals, ASUK aims to sell additional products to its current clients. Currently, 25 per cent of clients have bought additional services, and the aim is to increase this to 55 per cent within a year.

Strategies by target markets

• Current customers. By rebranding, enforce customer loyalty and improve service level. Also provide an easier product upgrade path. Better support and customer self-service should also be provided.

• Domestic. Build brand as a high-quality service with lower-value pricing. Offer three core incentives to show confidence in the product: thirty-day money back guarantee, UK price matching initiative, no minimumcontract. ASUK will be the first company in the UK industry to offer all these incentives together in a genuine fashion.

• International. Key strengths to marketing include sustainability and experience. The product will be positioned in the market as a high-end service, offering good performance for companies that have interests across Europe.

The marketing mix

• Price. Although prices should be offered on a price match guarantee within the UK, they should be based around a product-line pricing strategy; that is, each customer can start with a basic product and build layers on top to create their custom product.
• Product. The product is to be sold individually, but a discount should be offered for multiple sales and/or prepayment packages. Customer loyalty could be rewarded with additional free services.
• Promotion. ASUK should base the promotion around an online marketing strategy, using online targeted banners and search engines, complemented by increased exposure on the major Web hosting guides. Publication to online and offline trade magazines of press releases and adverts will reinforce the respectability of the brand.

Evaluation and control

• Monitor market share and company growth rate. Frequently obtain market share statistics. An estimate can be made by obtaining the total number of dedicated in the market segment and calculating the percentage of them that ASUK holds.
• Occasional customer surveys to ensure support satisfaction is increasing. ASUK already has the facility to conduct customer surveys online. These should be conducted half-yearly to ensure that satisfaction objectives are met.

• Demographic analysis of buyers and potential buyers. To determine whether ASUK is penetrating all potential markets sufficiently, customer account details should be collated and analysed to produce maps of customer distribution.

Outline marketing plan for Asuk Creative Limited a B2B provider of Internet services

This subsection was kindly supplied by Craig Martin and Spencer Tarring, ASUK Creative and Brunel University respectively.

Background

ASUK Creative Limited (www.asuk.com) was formed in 1998 to provide a complete set of services, from consultancy to hosting, in the business-to-business Internet industry. After introducing a small range of low-cost dedicated servers in 1999, this small Internet design company began to make an impact on the market. Its servers were the cheapest in the UK, and potential clients flocked to find the catch. At first, progress was slow, but Web-hosting guides and directories quickly picked up on the low prices, and market penetration began. Although ASUK Creative manages to compete successfully on price, it struggles to compete with the big players and the more established brand names such as Fasthosts (www.fasthosts.co.uk) and Dellhost (www.dellhost.co.uk) in the field of support and reliability. Growth over the first two years was steady, but at the end of 2001, ASUK faced a declining growth rate. ASUK's corporate Web site focuses on other parts of the business, such as Web integration consultancy and database programming, that are in decline. This is stunting the growth of the dedicated server product, while the market is growing rapidly. ASUK Creative Limited needs to take advantage of this growth by improving its marketing output.

Audit

Initially, an analysis of where ASUK stands can be achieved through a SWOT and PEST analysis as shown below:

SWOT

Strengths

• competitive pricing on products;
• no minimum contracts, whereas other competitors demand 12 months minimum;
• quality and performance;
• flexibility in product variations;
  
• friendly service;
• offers twenty-four hours, seven-day support;
• existing loyal customer base;
• recognized brand.
• Weaknesses

• small company in comparison to competitors;

• low capital;
• lack of product resilience;
• poor support response times;
• budget network operations centre;

• only the English language supported by the sales and support teams;

• online documentation thin and outdated;
• under-staffed.
• Opportunities
• * fast-growing international markets;

• poor competitor services, bad reputations;
• large growth in dedicated server market;

• partnership opportunities with automated administration developers, opening the market to less experienced users.

Threats

• competition increasingly dropping prices;
• market saturation: many companies are trying to take advantage of the increase in market worth;
• technological advances cause hardware to devalue quickly;
• failure of suppliers to deliver mission-critical services;
• decrease in bandwidth costs means more companies can afford in-house operations, eliminating the need for hosting companies.

PEST

Political

• law in regard to copyright: since dedicated servers are not controlled by ASUK, it must ensure all users understand the law;government actively encouraging use of Internet.

Economic

• worldwide recession looms;
• introduction of the euro;

• fraud: the increase of credit card fraud has had two effects. First, ASUK receive more fraudulent orders; and second, real customers are less willing to give out card details.

• Social and cultural
• Language barriers: ASUK supports only English.

Technological

• bandwidth usage; that is, easier access by users means that bandwidth levels are increasing;
• speed of hardware redundancy (depreciation).

After carefully assessing ASUK's position and its strengths and weaknesses within its existing market, the owners came to the conclusion that it would be in ASUK's best interest to differentiate the dedicated server market from the other services it provides. This would entail establishing a separate entity, which in effect would require the building of a new brand. After they had conducted a survey of existing clients, it became apparent that the following features were needed:

• the ability to manage services online;
• the ability to upgrade services online;
• more reliable technical and telephone support;
• easier server management software for inexperienced users.

In order to build this brand, ASUK must eliminate these weaknesses identified by the survey, and add additional value to the service under the new brand. To encourage consumption and recognition of the new brand, the company needs to offer some value-added incentives. After assessing the existing market, ASUK identified three fundamentals employed by the industry that could also help obtain a competitive advantage;

1. thirty-day 100 per cent money back guarantee (risk reversal program);
2. UK price match;
3. no minimum contract.

With the newly developed brand, ASUK will have the mechanism to penetrate fresh high-growth market areas such as Asia. For example, in India, dedicated server sales will hit $43.1 million by 2004; together with an annual growth rate of 146 per cent for the Application Service Provider (ASP) market, this gives opportunity and potential for ASUK to diversify into new market sectors.