Marketing Mix Strategy For Crest Toothpaste

Positioning Statement

It is identified in the first assignment that the major problem for Crest is lack of product diversity and limited presence in the international market. In the current business scenario, this is one of the major challenges being faced by them due to the reason that limited product diversity and market presence is further restricting the market potentiality for Crest (Bykadorov, Kokovin & Zhelobod’ko, 2014). Thus, it is important for them to change their current product and market strategy to enhance the future opportunities. It is identified that the major objectives of Crest will be to increase their existing market opportunities by enhancing the product diversity and expanding the market presence.

This report will discuss about the new positioning statement of Crest, which will be applicable with the current business situation. In addition, the marketing objectives will also be discussed in this report to overcome the identified issues. In accordance to these objectives, this report will recommend an ideal marketing mix strategy.

The new positioning statement for Crest will be “dental care at your hand”. This is due to the reason that according to the formula for creating positioning statement, it is important to align the distinctiveness and benefits of the product with that of the audience. Thus, as per the stated positioning statement, stating dental care will convey the fact that customers will be able to have holistic dental benefit from using Crest (Chik, 2015). This is distinctive from other competitors due to the reason that majority of the brands are focusing on a particular benefit to reach out to the customers. In addition, the target audience of Crest is the customers already being affected by dental problem or they are aware about the dental care. Thus, providing the autonomy to them by stating that dental care at their hand will be effective in reaching out to them. Thus, this new positioning statement will help Crest to have a favorable brand image in the market. It is expected that customers should recall Crest not only as mere toothpaste but as component of dental care. This is due to the reason that using Crest will help the users to avoid dental problems including the gum and teeth problem. Thus, positioning it as a dental care product will help to cater to larger customer sections.

Initiating marketing objectives will help to overcome the identified issues from the last assignment. The following section will discuss about the effective marketing objectives for Crest.

• To be a prominent name in the dental care industry in the global scenario. It is targeted that minimum of 20 percent of the annual revenue of Crest will be gained from the foreign markets within the next 2 years.
• To have more market penetration across different customer segments. It is targeted that more variants will be launched in the market to cater to different taste and preference pattern of the customers. This will further help to have more market penetration in the existing market. It is targeted that sales revenue will be increased by 10 percent in next one year with the help of the new variants.  

Currently, Crest is only being available in the form white toothpaste, while their competitors such as Colgate is available in different variants and products. Thus, it is recommended that product diversity should be increased by Crest in terms of different varieties and items (Park & Han, 2013). Crest branding should be used in introducing other dental products such as toothbrush and mouthwash. This will help in further expansion of the brand along with covering more customer segments. It is also recommended that Crest toothpaste should be made available in different flavors, which will also help in reaching out to the customers having different taste and preference pattern. In the recent time, it is identified that toothpastes are being introduced on the basis of market focus strategy. Thus, it is recommended that Crest should come up with products specific for the children in terms of design and flavors (Lewis & Winkler, 2015). This will help in effectively targeting the specific customer segment. It can be concluded that diverse product portfolio will help Crest in having larger customer segments for targeting along with having more sales revenue. International market is having more diverse customer segments and having diverse product portfolio will help Crest to meet these differences.  

Marketing Objectives

It is recommended that Crest should follow the market penetration pricing strategy due to the reason that toothpaste is a necessity product and it is being used by almost all the customer segments. With the help of the market penetration pricing strategy, Crest will be able to have the cost leadership advantage over their competitors and can attract larger customer sections. It is identified that Crest is not having any differences with their competitors in terms of product composition and thus initiation of the market penetration strategy will help in gaining competitive advantages over other players in the market (Ingenbleek, Frambach & Verhallen, 2013). On the other hand, it should also be noted that dual pricing strategy should also be effective for Crest due to the reason that premium customers will prefer more niche products. Even though the market share for the premium dental products is low compared to the mainstream products, but the profitability level is more with them. Thus, it is recommended that Crest should have their sub brand for catering to the premium customers. This brand will be positioned as a higher end compared to the existing products. It will help in catering to both mass market as well as premium customer segments (Spann, Fischer & Tellis, 2014). However, the pricing approach of Crest should be competition based in order to have the parity with the price of the competing products. This will help in catering to larger segments and increase the sales from different foreign locations.

Currently, Crest is available in different offline mediums ranging from hypermarket to convenience stores. Thus, the offline market is well distributed for them. However, it is recommended that Crest should also increase the visibility of their products in the online mediums also. This is due to the reason that there are number of online grocery marketplaces is gaining popularity in the market and it will be beneficial for Crest to have more target segments through the online mediums also (Lu & Liu, 2013). In addition, it should also be noted that in the international market, there are number of regions where the offline retailing is not efficient and proper. Thus, online presence for Crest will help in more market penetration. In addition, distribution strategy for Crest should be extensive as they have currently due to the nature of their products. It should also be noted that traditional channel of distribution involving the distributors and wholesalers will be beneficial for Crest (Khader et al., 2014). This is due to the reason that toothpaste should be made available in remote areas also, which will be made possible only with the help of the deep market penetration of the wholesalers and distributors.

Promotion is one of important elements for Crest as they are operating in the of fast moving consumer goods category. It is recommended that Crest should initiate both the traditional and online mode of promotion. This is due to the reason that initiation of the Omni Channel promotional medium will help in catering to more number of customers (Verhoef, Kannan & Inman, 2015). It should also be noted that online promotion including the social media marketing will further help them to determine the feedback of the customers and offer the products accordingly. Communication is one of the important factors to be considered in the contemporary approach of promotion (Ailawadi & Farris, 2017). With the help of the social media marketing and promotional activities, Crest will be able to meet the customer expectations effectively and ideally. The traditional mode of promotion should include both the television and print media to reach out to maximum number of customers.  

Conclusion: 

This report concludes that new market development and increasing the product diversity are the most important objective for Crest. In accordance to these objectives, positioning statement is being discussed in this report. In addition, the major four elements of marketing mix strategy are also being discussed in this report. These four elements will help Crest to have the effective fulfillment of objectives being identified. This will further help them to enhance their future business opportunities in the long term.

Reference: 

Ailawadi, K. L., & Farris, P. W. (2017). Managing multi-and omni-channel distribution: metrics and research directions. Journal of retailing, 93(1), 120-135.

Bykadorov, I. A., Kokovin, S. G., & Zhelobod’ko, E. V. (2014). Product diversity in a vertical distribution channel under monopolistic competition. Automation and Remote Control, 75(8), 1503-1524.

Chik, A. (2015). Recreational language learning and digital practices: Positioning and repositioning. In Discourse and Digital Practices (pp. 124-141). Routledge.

Ingenbleek, P. T., Frambach, R. T., & Verhallen, T. M. (2013). Best practices for new product pricing: impact on market performance and price level under different conditions. Journal of Product Innovation Management, 30(3), 560-573.

Khader, S., Rekik, Y., Botta-Genoulaz, V., & Campagne, J. P. (2014). Inventory management subject to multiplicative inaccuracies. International Journal of Production Research, 52(17), 5055-5069.

Lewis, V., & Winkler, R. (2015). Product diversity, demand structures, and optimal taxation. Economic Inquiry, 53(2), 979-1003.

Lu, Q., & Liu, N. (2013). Pricing games of mixed conventional and e-commerce distribution channels. Computers & Industrial Engineering, 64(1), 122-132.

Park, S. H., & Han, S. P. (2013). From accuracy to diversity in product recommendations: Relationship between diversity and customer retention. International Journal of Electronic Commerce, 18(2), 51-72.

Spann, M., Fischer, M., & Tellis, G. J. (2014). Skimming or penetration? Strategic dynamic pricing for new products. Marketing Science, 34(2), 235-249.

Verhoef, P. C., Kannan, P. K., & Inman, J. J. (2015). From multi-channel retailing to omni-channel retailing: introduction to the special issue on multi-channel retailing. Journal of retailing, 91(2), 174-181.