Holistic Marketing

Holistic Marketing concept is based on development,design and implementation of marketing programmes, processes and activities that recognize the breadth and inter-dependencies.

Social Responsible Marketing:

Corporate Social Responsibility of classmate. For sale of every four notebooks, Re 1 is donated to the foundation that manages the education of poor and needy.

Integrated Marketing:

Classmate employs all components of Integrated Marketing Mix to reinforce the brand image and increase sales.

Relationship Marketing:

Customers are being provided with all the variants that satisfy their requirements. For dealers and retailers, classmate offers discount on other stationery products like geometry boxes, pens and pencils to ensure a good relationship. The discount percentage depends the facts and quantitative report presented by dealers.

Internal Marketing:

Classmate's marketing manager is entrusted with responsibilities of developing and managing all the aspects of email programs to successfully drive traffic, building membership loyalty, increasing member to member and community engagement, generating incremental member guaranteed content and creating upgrades.

Brand

A brand is a name, term, symbol, design or combination of all these, intended to identify the goods or services of one or group of sellers and to differentiate them from competition.

It is the seller's promise to deliver the same bundle of benefits/services consistently to buyers.

Classmate as a brand promises to deliver notebooks of high quality and Eco-friendly paper.
It is the pioneer of organization of the notebook industry.

Classmate with its product features  and customer value have ensured that the customers always prefer classmate over its competitors.  Also the number one status of the classmate notebook has been the status symbol for the customers.

Classmate has always catered to the requirements of the target group by introducing variants. This helped classmate to strengthen the loyalty factor and this helped in establishing the emotional connect with the brand.

Classmate puts in a lot of focus on brand management.It consistently delivers the product that matches the expectations and also provides additional features. It enhances the emotional connection within the people by its ad campaigns which focus on uniqueness and also specialties in a kid.
The market mix component are well put in to use to maintain the brand image.

These pictures show different cover designs, variants and also an example of promotions that classmate has done to maintain its brand and number one position in terms of market share.

Analyzing Markets and buying behaviour

Markets:

• There are two markets. Consumer Markets and Business Markets.
• If a company directly sells its products to customers then it is called B2C selling and if company sells to another company , this process is B2B selling.

Buying behavior:

1. Problem Recognition                   
2. General need description            
3. Product Specification                   
4. Supplier Search                           
5. Proposal Solicitation
6. Supplier Selection
7. Order-Routine Specification
8. Performance review

Characteristics of B2B and B2C Marketing:

Classmate is a notebook priced at Rs 40.  Classmate implements B2C marketing. The look and cover always change according to trends.

In B2C marketing the social acceptance and image are of high importance. Classmate made sure that there is high quality and also enjoyed the I.T.C. image . This ensured high approval.

There are different preferences for the customers. So it is important to satisfy all their requirements and preferences. For example a person might want plain notebook, another might want broad ruled notebook, and some other might want single ruled notebook, classmate made sure that it had all variety of notebooks.  Multipurpose books have also been launched for the college students.


Classmate has dealers and retailers as intermediaries between the company and customers.
Transaction between dealer and classmate can be a B2B transaction and similarly transaction between dealer and retailer is also B2B.
Here the sales of classmate to dealers depends on facts and figures of all the variants that are sold. If the sales of one particular variant is more then there is a possibility that the dealer wants more of that variant. Same applies to the retailer dealer transaction. The B2B marketing depends on quantifiable results.

                                       

Segmentation, Targeting and Proposition

Segmentation divides market into well defined slices which consists of a group of customers who share a similar set of requirements. Segmentation consists of different variables like Geographic, Demographic, Psycho-graphic and Behavioral.

Targeting is selecting selecting specific segment(s) which company and marketers feel could generate  maximum revenue.

Positioning is the act of designing a company's offering and image to occupy a distinctive place in the minds of the target group.


Classmate as it is a stationery product hence it targeted the students segment. Their main target is school children and other students (graduation and post graduation). Their marketing and promotions and IMC marketing mix were always student targeted. Classmate also made sure to win over the influences (parents, elders ) of school kids.

"For the Big Ideas in you" made the students feel that they can do great things and hence they were associated with the brand . They positioned themselves as brand that is made for students with big ideas.

Recently Classmate changed its tagline to "Because you are one of a kind". In the last decade, there has been a lot of pressure on school students to get into foundation classes, do what top scorer in their class gets. There was no encouragement for their real talent. By changing tagline to this and conducting an ad campaign, they tried to make every child feel unique and special and also influence the parents.  This has been a hugely successful positioning and campaign.
                             
       

Sales Management

Sales management is attainment of an organization's sales and goals in an efficient and effective manner through planning ,staffing, training ,leading and controlling organizational resources.

Promotion component of Marketing Mix has personal selling, advertisements, public relations, sales promotion and direct marketing under it.

Personal Selling:
Direct oral communication explaining the features of the product and persuade the customer to buy. This has the advantages of flexibility, minimizes wasted effort and facilitates buyer action. It  has disadvantages of high cost, message inconsistency and sales person motivation.

Classmate employed this personal selling in the introductory stage. Classmate employed sales person, agents and jobbers to go to different schools in rural areas. Also these sales people went to different stationery shops and convinced them to buy classmate notebook.

Classmate identified wholesalers in different regions and sent their sales representatives to convince and persuade the wholesalers to buy the product.

IMC and Promotion

IMC marketing consists of Advertising, Sales Promotion, Events and Experiences. Public Relations and Publicity,Direct Marketing, Interactive Marketing, Word of mouth marketing and personal selling.

Classmate IMC marketing mix.

Advertisement link:

http://www.afaqs.com/advertising/creative_showcase/index.html?id=36228&media=TV&type=Indian

 

I.T.C. also sponsors for events in different events. Depending on the event and the place where it is sponsoring, I.T.C. makes sure that the concerned products are present on the banners there.

 I.T.C sponsored Inter-bang event in SIBM and made sure that classmate appeared on the banners.

Distribution

Classmate's main manufacturing unit is at Bhadrachalam , Andhra Pradesh. After it is manufactured it is dispatched to various places to make it available for the customers. This is done by intermediaries i.e. distribution channels.

• At the time of launch, classmate hired agents to distribute the notebooks in the villages. A district was assigned to an agent and he distributed the books to school children. 
• After make a mark , Classmate's agents to distribute to the mom and pop stationery stores.
• Now classmate has many agents and many distribution channels. 

The transportation channel carries the goods carries from main manufacturing to regional and from regional to state warehouses. Here the agent or a jobber is hired to personally go to prescribed locations to deliver the books and transactions are done through the jobber. The jobber gets certain commission from the company. 

Classmate is in the maturity stage of the ILC and hence it tries to increase its coverage area by reaching to more people.
During the intro stage it focused on the rural area schools and then to the metro cities.
During growth stage it increased it reach in all possible dimensions.
Now being in the maturity phase classmate tries to maximise the revenue.

In PUNE, Pradeep book depot at Hadapsar, Bharat depot at Pimpri are the whoslesale dealers for classmates. And in India there 75000 stationery outlets.

Price

.
Company follows the mentioned steps in pricing a product:
1) Selecting Pricing objective : Classmate objective is to maximize market share
2)Determines the demand
3)Estimating cost
4) Analyzing Competitor Cost
5)Selecting a pricing method:  Classmate adopts perceived value pricing
6)Selecting the final price

Product

Product Levels

(Transformations are the multi purpose books etc)

Product Differentiation:

Durability,conformance quality, reliability,repair ability, style, performance quality differentiate a product 

Classmate is a non-durable product. The style, brand image,the cover design, trivia and the quality of paper and also the C.S.R. activity differentiate classmate from its competitors. Customers also take into account of the conformance quality which means the degree to which all produced units are identical. 

Services Differentiation::

Ordering ease, delivery, installation,customer training,customer consulting, maintenance repair and returns differentiate services

Classmate is available at all the mom and pop stationery stores and also kirana stores hence it is easily accessible and the returning of it is also easily if in case of any damage. 

Design Differentiation:

Classmate has very good cover design that differentiates it from its competitors. The customers register the design at the first look and hence prefer classmate over others.

Product Hierarchy

Linking this to the 3C model

Linking it to the life cycle concepts, 

Development stage consists of need family, and item. If an established brand introduces a new variant  then product line is also included.

Introduction stage consists of the item that is launched in the market

Growth stage consists of the competitors i.e product line and product class.

Maturity stage consists of the product type, different types of variants. 

Marketing mix classmate

Marketing mix is a tool that marketers use to determine what the business is offering the customers and how it is bring the product and services to them. It basically involves 4P s. Product, price, place and promotion .

Life Cycle

Any product has five stages in the life cycle. Development, Introduction, Growth, Maturity and Decline. The typical life cycle of a product can be shown by this diagram.

The  percentage of customers in each stage caan be described by the normal curve given by Evrett Rogers

Classmate is in its maturity stage.

Competition and Industry

• Classmate offers products in the stationery industry. The categories are notebooks,geometry boxes, pencils, pens , etc. 
• Classmate was a pioneer in the field of brand notebooks but there were entrants into the market which identified themselves as competitors to classmate. 
• The local notebooks were always a competition to classmate. But the customer value of classmate weighed higher than that of local notebooks. 
• There were other brand notebooks that entered the industry. One such example is Navneet. Being in the field of publication and binding since long time, 
• Navneet has made a mark and this helped them in raising their value compared to local ones. Navneet was priced lower than classmate. It also offered some extra information and the cover was also good. But this did not take away the numero uno status of classmate. 
• Classmate's image benefit and satisfactory individual psychological benefit helped it maintain the top slot. T
• he promotions, advertisements, competitions also made classmate a stand out player in the industry with around 20% market share. 

       As a customer,a person has lot of choices on which notebook one must buy. The competitors in the industry become the choices for the customers. The sales of the company depend on the customer decision making which in turn is dependent on the customer value that is being offered. Classmate with its strong customer value and also promotion tactics, is the top player where it sells thrice more than its immediate competitor i.e. Navneet.  There are other competitors like Solo, Boss, Built etc.

NavNeet and Bilt are the main competitors of Classmate.               

The others are different unrecognized local note books of different companies. Classmate has overtaken them in notebooks and multi subject note books.

Customer Decision Making

 

• Customer identifies the need or the problem that has to be fulfilled or satisfied.
• Then the customer searches for information which comes from his/her or other trusted members' experience.
• There are a list of alternatives that would be available after the search. These are evaluated based on the value that is offered.
• After deciding on what to purchase , the customer makes the purchase.
• Post purchase evaluation is done based on the "behavior" of the product. If the product is satisfactory the customer might buy again or/and recommend the same product to his friends and relatives.

Classmate's Customers and their decision making

•  If the customer is buying for the first time, he/she looks at these attributes and also there might be someone who triggers the customer to buy classmate.

• If the same customer is satisfied with the notebook after he bought it, he will again buy without any second thought and there becomes loyal to the brand.

VALUE

Customer Value

Customer value is defined as the difference between the perceived benefits and the resources spent.

Psychological cost can also be called as risk.

There are also other benefits other than the above mentioned ones and they all can be clubbed into a benefit which I call the Psychological benefit.

For classmate:

Corporate Social Responsibility (C.S.R.) of classmate adds to the image benefit and also the psychological benefit. Classmate donates Re1 per every four classmate books sales to a foundation that looks after poor and needy.

Value for consumer, customer and retailer:

Retailer is the shopkeeper, customer is the parent and consumer is the kid. (example)

Classmate- The entry

Notebook Category
 

• An unorganized sector/category.
• Poor quality local notebooks (poor paper quality, binding, cover)
• No brand notebook till 2003 (till classmate entered)                         

Requirement (need)

• Good quality paper binding and nice cover.

 Specific Requirement (want)

• A notebook with an image i.e. brand. 

Demand

• People were ready to pay little extra for their specific requirements.   

Opportunity Identified 

• I.T.C. identified an opportunity in this sector and they sensed that they could well become the market leader in this category.

Product Features

• Very smooth paper which can be recycled and ozone treated environment friendly, elemental chlorine free paper.
• Attractive cover.
• Trivia