Trials 94/100

Essay Marketing strategies, including pricing, promotion and global marketing strategies are highly critical in achieving businesses' marketing objectives of sales, market share, and profit by leveraging business positioning and by manipulating consumer demand. Pricing strategies including price skimming and penetration pricing crucially maximises market share and profit, as demonstrated by Apple's strategic pricing of its iPhone products. Promotion strategies, include advertising and relationship marketing then leverages business' positioning and differentiation to maximise sales and long-term profit as exemplified by Woolworths' success in a competitive duopoly competition. Ultimately, global marketing strategies, specially standardisation and customisation are foundational to transnational corporations like Apple by maximising international competitiveness and sales. Hence, marketing strategies leverages consumer's perception on businesses to maximise sales, profit and market share. Pricing strategies the deliberate manipulation of sales price, to maximise market share and profit as it alters consumer's perception on a business's positioning. Price penetration is when businesses set introductory prices in a way that it undercuts its competitors. The impact is the increased affordability of the product hence attracting price-sensitive consumers from competitors as the barrier to entry is low, directly increasing market share albeit lower profitability potential. Businesses should then leverage these customers by slowly increasing the price provided that the quality of its products match price and quality interactions. In doing so businesses uses the consumer base from initial price penetration to maximise long-term profit hence fulfilling its marketing objectives. Conversely, price skimming is when businesses set a high initial price to capitalise the initial inelasticity of demand. This allows the business to maximise profit margins during absence of competition, directly leading to profit. Price skimming further creates a barrier to entry with its price accessibility, which attracts high socio-economic class consumers who value status over competitive pricing. This results in loyal customers and willing to pay a premium, resulting in profit. Hence, in leveraging price and quality interactions, pricing strategies maximises market share and profit. Leading electronics retailer Apple demonstrates how pricing strategies maximise profit. Apple operates under a highly competitive electronics retail industry and understands the importance of business positioning to maximise brand differentiation. In response, Apple uses price skimming on its iPhone series like iPhone 17 Pro Max setting a sales price over twice the production costs. In doing so, Apple creates an aura of status which is highly valued by its primary target market of high socio-economic status families. This not only maximises its profit, but results in a loyal customer base retained by the business rather than one particular product. Consequently, Apple is able to secure 70% global premium electronics market share, demonstrating how pricing strategies maximises market share and long-term profit. Where pricing strategies contributes to businesses positioning, promotion strategies capitalises this to maximise sales and profit. Advertising refers to the mass, unselected promotion to general audience. One immediate advantage is increased brand exposure which directly correlates to increased potential customer base and subsequent sales. Furthermore, in recent years of rapid technological advancement, mass advertising strategies, specially social media advertising (SMA) maximises cost efficiency through economies of scale while avoid the costly printing fees of physical posters. This profit but often fails to retain customers due to its non-selective nature. In response, businesses often utilises personal selling and relationship marketing. By checking with existing customers, they feel valued and is likely to make repeated purchases, resulting in long-term sales and profit. Hence, promotion strategies increases market exposure to maximise sales and profit. Australian retailer Woolworths exemplifies this idea. Woolworths operates in a highly competitive duopoly with Coles, hence market share and customer retention becomes significantly important. Woolworths utilises mass advertising emphasising and promoting the green in its branding which symbolises freshness. Consumers thus associate the brand with freshness generating a competitive edge for Woolworths, increasing market share. Woolworths further utilises loyalty programs, specifically its Everyday Rewards systems where repeated purchases generates sales discounts. This is highly effective in retaining consumers as Woolworths retains its 37% market share and $50.9B revenue in FY25, demonstrating how promotion strategies maximises profit. Global marketing strategies directly impacts business' global competitiveness through development of competitive edge through standardisation or customisation. Standardisation refers to the strategy of assuming similar needs in international market to maximise 4P cost efficiency through economies of scale. This allows businesses to develop identical, or similar product or promotion directly benefiting from cost advantages of scale. Although potential compromise of market share in regions with high cultural differences, it maximises the ease of international market entrance if its brand remains highly consistent across the globe in a way that brand recognition and awareness, leading to sales. In stark contrast, customisation is when businesses develop different strategies by accounting for the cultural differences across nations. When businesses position themselves as cost competitive, they must consider whether the pricing point is viable in countries with varying economic status. By accounting for the average wage, businesses can ensuring pricing strategies truly leverage consumers perception of business to increase in local sales and customer loyalty. Hence, businesses must carefully evaluate the most suitable global market strategies as it influences position competitiveness of the business to increase sales. Apple utilises a combination of standardisation and customisation to achieve the objective of sales. To differentiate itself from Samsung, Apple uses consistent, minimalist design across its e-commerce and physical stores. This creates a premium image crucial to retain its pricing target market, ensuring the sustainability of sales. To address local disparities in culture, Apple alters its promotion strategies. For instance, in creating a Lunar New Year themed promotion video in China, the 10 million views generated a 6.9% increase of sales in the same month. Hence, Apple's global marketing strategies, combining standardisation and customisation, significantly boosts its international competitiveness and sales. In conclusion, marketing strategies of price, promotion and global marketing leverages marketing's strategic positioning and differentiation to maximise sales, profit and market share. Apple's clear use of price and quality interactions to capitalise its positioning leads to long-term profit and market share, and Woolworths' combination of advertisements and relationship marketing led to market share and sales. Report 1.0 Executive Summary FlipTech (FT) is an Australian manufacturing business. It is currently facing - growth in demand in international market - high lead time and defects - high staff turnover and dissatisfaction It is hence advised that the business - understand Operations' interdependence with HR / dependence on HR's development and HR's dependence on Operation processes - improve training, performance appraisal and mentoring and coaching in HR development - improve benefits and communication in maintenance. - utilise technology to achieve low lead time and high quality - quality management to improve quality. 2.0 Interdependence between key business functions FT's Human Resources (HR) management is fundamentally interdependent with operations management. Operations relies on proper acquisition and development from HR to have high quality transforming resources of Human Resources to maximise the quality of the transformed product. Operations also rely on HR's trained staff to deliver customer services so operations can collect information of product defects for product quality improvement. In response, operations ensures the efficiency of process layout and task design. This maximises the HR labour efficiency and productivity. Operations further purchase leading-edge and safe technologies to simplify HR tasks. This reduces accidents and low productivity. 3.0 Human Resources Processes HR processes include - acquisition - development - maintenance - separation Due to FT's existing HR issues of poor communication, inadequate training and limited career progression, it is advised that the business improve its development and maintenance process. 3.1 Development Development refers to the total upskilling of individual workers. To address FT's issue of inadequate training, FT must leverage training and development to train its staff to effectively operate machineries for its design and assemblage of appliances. By leveraging online courses and assessments, HR ensures employee's engagement with the training and to maximise labour production. This further results in legal compliance of Work Health and Safety Act, preventing hefty fines and employee dissatisfaction due to workplace accidents. FT should also utilise performance appraisals. By setting realistic Key Performance Indicators (KPI), FT provides a clear objective to production quality and quantity. This motivates staff, increasing satisfaction and productivity. The results of performance appraisals further provides quantitative input for administrative or developmental purposes, allowing HR to use specialised mentoring and coaching to address concerns. This makes employees feel valued, increasing job satisfaction. 3.2 Maintenance Maintenance refers to how businesses retain staff. In response FT should enhance communication between employer and employees by increasing employee participation. This directly increases job satisfaction as employees feel valued by the business, reducing absenteeism or voluntary turnover. This fosters a two-way communication as employers convey their concerns of the business to employees, and HR can implement specialised strategies to reduce staff turnover. HR can also bundle monetary and non-monetary benefits like flexible working conditions. This directly motivates staff and reduces voluntary staff turnover. 4.0 Operations strategies Operation strategies refer to including: - performance objectives - cost, speed, flexibility, dependability, quality - new product and service design and development - supply chain management - logistics, e-commerce, outsourcing - technology - established and leading edge - inventory management - FIFO, LIFO advantages and disadvantages, of holding stock, JIT - quality management - control - assurance - improvement - overcoming resistance to change - global factors - economies of scale, global sourcing, scanning and learning, research and development To address a manufacturing business' lead time and product quality it is advised that FT uses technology and quality control. 4.1 Technology Technology, both established and leading-edge, refers to the application of scientific knowledge in operations management. 4.1.1 Established FT should utilise established technology, specifically Computer Aided Manufacturing (CAM) in its manufacturing of toasters, kettles and air purifiers. As established technologies were well known for over a century, they can achieve millimetre or sub-millimetre precisions. Consequently, FT can assemble exquisite products of high precision. This directly reduces product defect rates or malfunctioning, leading to customer satisfaction. In addition, the high transforming resources quality minimises wastes, reducing expenses and allows FT to achieve cost advantage and direct focus to applying leading-edge technology or HR processes. 4.1.2 Leading-edge technology Leading-edge technology is the application of newly developed scientific knowledge. FT can consider research and development on specialised robotics machine learning logistics systems for its inventory management. This technology can calculate the most efficient amount of stock to be stored, directly enabling JIT inventory management in response to the sudden growth in demand. This further reduces lead time as goods are stored and distributed effectively, resulting in competitive edge. 4.2 Quality management Quality management including: - control - assurance - improvement are all applicable to FT in improving product quality. 4.2.1 Quality control Quality control is the inspection of post-transformation output to identify defects. FT should consider utilising acceptance testing in response to rising product defect rates. By inspecting toasters, kettles or air purifiers manually or automatically, FT prevents post distribution issues resulting in warranty claims. This not only improves customer satisfaction and competitive edge but prevents costly waste of production by identifying issues early. This improves quality and cost leadership. 4.2.2 Quality assurance Quality assurance is the pre-emptive check for defects before production. By complying with international standards like ISO 9001 FT ensures quality of the product meets quality expectations. This directly reduces costs associated with retrieving post-production failures, improving product quality. 4.2.3 Quality improvement Quality improvement refers to the continuous improvement of products. It is advised that FT leverage the interdependence between HR and operations for quality improvement. Firstly, as HR improved its maintenance process enabling a two-way communication, workers can effectively report structural issues otherwise not discoverable through control or assurance. This directly improves product quality. The collaborative corporate culture further accelerates employee's identification of bottlenecks that affects the critical path of the production, allowing operations to control and improve to minimise lead times. Operations should further analyse customer concerns collected via warranties and customer service. This allows FT to address client-side dissatisfaction specifically, leading to improved quality and competitive edge. Hence, Quality management is highly critical to improving product quality. 5.0 Conclusion FT is facing low job satisfaction and high staff turnover. In response FT should leverage the interdependence between HR and operations, improve development and maintenance, and utilize technology and quality management to maximise job satisfaction, product quality and minimise staff turnover and lead time.