Marketing Plan of FORD MOTOR

Marketing Plan of FORD MOTOR Executive Summary The main objective of this assessment is to accomplish a detailed marketing plan of the Ford Motor Company within the perspective of the international automotive industry. In doing so, the paper would focus on epitomizing an appropriate company profile of Ford Motor, considering the financial overview of the company, formulating a SWOT Analysis, reviewing the current marketing situation of Ford along with a BCG matrix, and creating a comprehensive competitive review of the industry.Advertising We will write a custom assessment sample on Marketing Plan of FORD MOTOR specifically for you for only $16.05 $11/page Learn More Furthermore, the paper would illustrate the potential marketing strategies of the company with consideration of the marketing research, brand positioning strategy, brand-positioning map, target market, and marketing mix. To conclude, the appraisal shall focus on assembling applicable recommendations together with an apposit e conclusion. Introduction Presently, globalization has transformed the pace of the entire global commercial structure and the business environment influencing every sphere of the international trading issues both optimistically and pessimistically. The positive affects of globalization include the fact that together with many other industries, the automobile industry has also become open to the whole world and this has resulted in the business of Ford Motor to reach the market to a far-reaching level. Widely extensive international market means increasing sales and consecutively, higher annual profit margins for the motor company. However, despite of so many benefits that Ford Motor is receiving, a major issue that remains with the impact of globalization on the company is that the firm now requires a quite high amount of expenditure on carrying out its marketing activities. Company Profile Bloomberg Businessweek suggested that Ford Motor Company, one of the globe’s biggest vehicle manufacturers, started its journey in the twentieth century with brands that comprise of Ford, Lincoln, and Mercury (1). It is important to note that Ford runs in two main parts, namely, Automotive and Financial Services the Automotive sector consist operations of North America, South America, Europe, Asia Pacific Africa and Volvo; on the other hand, the Financial services consist operations of Ford Motor Credit Company and Other Financial Services. Ford is a multibillion-dollar automobile manufacturing business based in the United States with excellent trends as one of the largest industry players, which provides quality products and services to customers all throughout the globe; the company has over 5,000 Dealer Communication Network, such as FordStar, a largest interactive distance-training network in the world.Advertising Looking for assessment on business economics? Let's see if we can help you! Get your first paper with 15% OFF Learn More Fin ancial Overview Being such a giant player in the global automotive industry, Ford Motors possess a strong financial position enough well built to compete with the market leaders of the industry. According to Bloomberg Businessweek (1), year over year, Ford Motor has observed revenues shrivel from $129.2 billion to $105.9 billion, although it was capable to raise net income from $2.7 billion to $14.8 billion; reduction in percentage of sales, general, and administrative costs from 16.58-12.46 percent was a key-component in the bottom line growth in the face of falling revenues. The following table shows the five years financial review of the motor company for a better understanding of the Ford’s financial position: Determinants of Financial Position FY 2006 FY 2007 FY 2008 FY 2009 FY 2010 Revenues $143,249 $154,379 $129,165 $105,893 $27,592 Total Revenues $160,065 $170,572 $145,114 $118,308 $29,893 Cost of Goods-Sold $145,066 $142,667 $121,737 $99,934 $24,233 Gross -Profit $6,970 $20,431 $14,908 $12,583 $4,750 Total General-sales and Admin-Expenses $19,148 $21,132 $21,414 $13,194 $2,654 Other Operating-Expenses $19,148 $21,132 $21,414 $13,194 $2,654 Operating-Income $-12,178 $-701 $-6,506 $-611 $2,096 Net Interest-Expense $414 $-650 $-1,110 $-1,306 $-344 Earnings of Discontinued-Operations $16 $41 $9 $5   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚   _ Net-Income -$12,613 -$2,795 -$14,7660 $2,717 $1,687 Table 1: Financial Overview of Ford Motors Source: Self-generated from Bloomberg Businessweek (1) On the other hand, increasing rates of oil and gasoline prices, taxation rates, fluctuated global demand for manufactured car, and rising competitive pressure through domestic production intensity, recession’s effects, and the economic conditions of the automotive industry as a whole are notable to put external impacts over the financial position of Ford Motors. During the global financial downturn, the company suffered a loss of $6.3bn, and ca rried out 2600 job cuts; the company cut salaried employment costs by 10 percent by lowering compensations of the white-collar employees and sold off Jaguar and Land Rover for $2.bn to Tata Motors.Advertising We will write a custom assessment sample on Marketing Plan of FORD MOTOR specifically for you for only $16.05 $11/page Learn More According to NASDAQ (1), such adverse impacts of the recession were clearly visible in the company’s revenue and consequently on its share prices; the following figure (a five years stock price graph) gives an apparent idea of how the external economic environment of the industry affected the stock prices of the company in 2008 to 2009 period: Figure 1: Five Years Stock Price of Ford Motors Source: NASDAQ (1) SWOT Analysis of Ford Motors A brief account of the SWOT analysis of this automotive company has illustrated in figure 1: Figure 2: SWOT Analysis of Ford Motor Strengths:Advertising Looking for assessment on business economics? 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Get your first paper with 15% OFF Learn More Brand awareness Financial capability Experience Promotion Leadership Diversified product line Weaknesses: Increase production and operating costs Lack of experience in new market Rules and regulation Opportunities: To be market leader in automobile industry Increase Interest Development of es of Some Products Car-models The company usually launches different cars in different countries; Ford-Taunus, Ford-Scorpio, Ford-Sierra, Ford-Fiesta, Ford-Festiva, Ford-Figo, Ford-Focus, Ford-Fusion, Ford-LTD-II, Ford-LTD (Crown-Victoria), Ford-Mainline, Ford-Marauder, and Ford-Maverick are significant among those Van-models Most well known ones are Ford-Aerostar, Ford-E-Series, Ford-Econovan, Ford-Endeavour, Ford-Freestar, Ford-I-MAX, Ford-Thames-300E, Ford-Thames-400E, Ford-Transit, and Ford-Windstar SUV-models The company has considered Ford-Bronco, Ford-Edge, Ford-Escape, Ford-Everest, Ford-Excursion, Ford-Expedition, Ford-Explorer, Ford-Fiera, Ford-Flex, Ford-Freestyle, Ford-Fusi on, Ford-Taurus, and Ford-Territory to be the best SUV-models Truck-models Ford has launched countless truck-model throughout its history, which includes Ford-Mainlin, Ford-N-Series, Ford-Panel-truck, Ford-R-Series, Ford-Ranchero, Ford-Ranchero, Ford-Ranger, Ford-Ranger-EV, Ford-Super-Duty, and many more Tractor-models Ford-600-Series Tractors and Ford-Workmaster are one of the company’s renowned tractor-models; some other types comprise of Ford-Powermaster, TW10, TW20, TW30, TW15, TW25, TW35, and so on Bus-models Ford Motor’s buses has manufactured for a number of purposes, for instance, for school-transport, public transport, and for industrial uses; Ford-Transit bus/van, Ford-E 450 Super-Duty minibus, Ford-B Series, Type-C-conventional-bus, Ford MB-IV100, Ford-MBC-IV 200, Ford Specialty-Trolley, Transit-Suburban Bus, Ford-G 99 7, Ford-R-Series, Ford-rader, Ford-Hawke, Ford-ET7, Ford 19B-29B, Ford-7 2B, and Ford-ET 7-Aqualina are most widely used throughout the world Table 4: Diversified Product Line of Ford Motor Source: Self-generated Price: Ford set the prices of the products by keeping in mind about the quality and production costs of the cars. It also considers the income levels of its targeted customers. Place: Ford has hundreds of showrooms throughout the world where it does its placements. Promotion: This vehicle-manufacturing firm is recently undertaking several strategic approaches to increase its sales-configuration; its advertising strategies are now concentrating on gratifying and impressing the people who put across abhorrence over Ford’s cars. Its latest shove for inducing the customers has designed for its critics; the firm provided hundred customers a car for a period of 6 months and requested them to accomplish diverse journeys every month; at the journeys, agents used their Fiestas to distribute Meals on Wheels along with many other offering for the customers like treats to the National Guard. The customers q uested for exiting-adventures, or even for mere entertainment within the activities; in addition, after all these, Ford marketed the stories of those missions on You Tube, Flickr, Facebook, and Twitter that contributed significantly over Ford’s marketing activities.The promotional strategy of the Ford varies accordingly with changing consumer trends, demands, and other external circumstances. The company plans the promotional packages depending on the factors such as different seasons, New Year festivals, Christmas Eve, occasions like Valentines Day, Easter Sunday, Mothers Day, Fathers Day, Halloween, etc. The reason for these strategies lies behind the fact that most of the customer groups of Ford will be having a fluctuation in demand of the products offered by the company depending on these specific periods of the year. The customers more often like to buy more private-cars during festive events. During New Year, Christmas, Mother’s day, Father’s Day the numb er of people visiting the Ford Showroom raises for which reason depending on the type of festival or occasion, Ford sets special offers; for instance, special promotional packages that include discount-vouchers, money-off coupon codes for great discounts, and many other packages for clients as well. These offers will help the company to gain competitive advantage over the competitors by augmenting sales during these special periods of the year. This strategy benefits the company by generating an interest among the new Ford customers for being loyal in order to gain full advantage of the promotional packages, which in turn, would raise the profit margins of the company together with the advertising campaigns. Recommendation As the car manufacturing companies are showing positive attitude to save the world from global warming, they are producing environment friendly products. The competition is becoming high day-by-day among the companies; therefore, Ford Motor should launch new envir onment friendly brands considering purchasing power and attitude of the customer. To hold its existing global market share, the company needs to amplify its annual budget for RD to introduce quality products and develop technology. The rationale of this recommendation is the competitors of Ford offer differentiated environment friendly products at comparatively low price. As Ford has corporate social responsibility, it should consider safety issue more carefully; otherwise, brand image of the company would be destroyed. As a result, Ford always should remember the consequence of Ford Pinto the oldest model of the company, which was the cause of the accidental death of several people. That model also collapsed only for the safety problem; so, it should offer quality products to protect the passenger from accidents, save the money of customers, and reduce other problems. Conclusion Being one of the most popular brands in world, Ford has always concentrated on serving its customers wit h highest level of satisfaction. In so doing, it has undertaken countless marketing strategies throughout its history. Additionally, during recession, due to financial-losses, it fell behind in terms of marketing activities. However, Ford is recovering from this by undertaking numerous development-policies through which it has expected to lead the market in future. Bloomberg Businessweek. FORD MOTOR CO (F:New York). 2010. Web. Ford. Annual Report 2009: One Ford. (2009). Web. NASDAQ. Ford Motor Credit Company (F) Stock Charts. 2010. Web. https://www.nasdaq.com/symbol/f/stock-chart