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Title: Marketing plan for Onepair – e-commerce for selling socks ... to look at the company again, after the strategies and goals have been more settled.
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Title: Marketing plan for Onepair Level: Final Thesis for Degree of Master of Business Administration in Marketing Management Author: Elin Svensson
Study programme in Master of Business Administration in Marketing Management
Title: Marketing plan for Onepair Level: Final Thesis for Degree of Master of Business Administration in Marketing Management Author: Elin Svensson ABSTRACT Title: Marketing plan for Onepair – e-commerce for selling socks Level: Final assignment for Bachelor Degree in Business Administration Author: Elin Svensson Supervisor: Akmal Hyder Date: 2009 - 04 Aim: During the second quarter of 2008, e-commerce increased with 21,1% compared to the same period 2007. The most popular products were books, cd’s, clothes and electronics. The reason why the turnover kept increasing for e-commerce while the traditional market was facing an unstable period was the new solutions possible on the web. Because of this structural change regarding e-commerce I found it an interesting case for a thesis. The subject for this study was a small company providing socks through the web, www.Onepair.se. The overall aim was to develop a marketing plan for the company. Research questions that are part of this aim are listed below.
Title: Marketing plan for Onepair Level: Final Thesis for Degree of Master of Business Administration in Marketing Management Author: Elin Svensson marketing activities and further plans etc. The company has during the last year gone through a change where the targets and missions have been moved and changed. This continuous change made the marketing plan a challenge. It would therefore be interesting to look at the company again, after the strategies and goals have been more settled. Contribution of the thesis: The study can of course be valuable for Onepair but also for other companies that are using or are interested in e-commerce. The thesis can also be a guide for companies or others when comparing different features regarding socks. Key words: e-commerce, socks, quality, price, service.
Level: Final Thesis for Degree of Master of Business Administration in Marketing Management
Title: Marketing plan for Onepair Level: Final Thesis for Degree of Master of Business Administration in Marketing Management Author: Elin Svensson
This thesis aims to evaluate a marketing plan for Onepair, a small company, providing socks through the web, www.onepair.se. As I have the opportunity to get an insight into the company’s thoughts and strategies, I find the task very interesting. I also find it interesting to analyse both the product and the way of selling it, the distribution channel. Is the product unique itself? As many people in today’s society is more or less dependant on web-services this way of selling is a very up-to-date and hot topic. During the second quarter of 2008, e-commerce increased with 21,1% compared to the same period 2007. For the consumer, a fast delivery is most important. The most popular products are books, cd´s, clothes and electronics. The turnover for 2007 was 18 thousand million SEK. Of course a weak economic climate will affect the e-commerce but not as it did the year 2000 when e-commerce more or less disappeared, says Jonas Arnberg, Handelns utredningsinstitut (HUI). E-commerce is going through a structural change where it is getting more and more common to use the web for shopping.^1 An estimation of the turnover for 2008 is 21 thousand million SEK, an almost 17% increase from 2007. That would be 4% of the total retail trade. The reason why the turnover keeps increasing for e-commerce while the traditional market is facing an unstable period is the new solutions possible on the web. Sms notification is one of these new solutions. The prospect for the future is that e-commerce will continue taking market shares from the traditional retail, Figure 1.^2 (^1) Uppsala Nya Tidning, p. A19 (080826) (^2) e-barometer for Q2-2008 (presented by “Posten” and HUI)
Title: Marketing plan for Onepair Level: Final Thesis for Degree of Master of Business Administration in Marketing Management Author: Elin Svensson Figure 1 The belief in future e-commerce for the consumer (yellow) and the business (orange). (Figure from e-barometer) The reasons why Onepair is chosen as the company to be studied are several.
Onepair is a web based company providing one product to a rather large customer segment. There is one distribution channel, the web, where the customer can view the assortment, take advantage of different offers, buy the product and pay the product. Prior to do the marketing plan, the external environment is scanned. Competitors are identified and the market situation is analysed. As the company is very small with only two people involved and a very limited amount of documentation, it is a challenge to find the information needed to do the plan.
Title: Marketing plan for Onepair Level: Final Thesis for Degree of Master of Business Administration in Marketing Management Author: Elin Svensson Table 1 Models and tools used in the empirical part Model/tool Section Appraisal chart Section 4.2. SWOT Section 4.2. Opportunity matrix Section 4.2. Threat matrix Section 4.2. MIO-model Section 4.2. 4 P´s Section 4.2. Marketing positioning chart Section 4. Porters 3 basic strategies Section 4. Section 4 , empirical data and analysis, contains data and facts provided from Onepair together with data from other sources. The data is analyzed by using models and tools described in the theory. In this way data gets more available to the common eye. In section 5 there are conclusions and reflections.
Title: Marketing plan for Onepair Level: Final Thesis for Degree of Master of Business Administration in Marketing Management Author: Elin Svensson
Most of the information in this study is primary data from an interview with the founder of Onepair and from a survey in form of a questionnaire with potential customers. Information from personal interview with the founder is qualitative whereas information from the questionnaire is both qualitative and quantitative (numeric). There are also secondary data provided from the web and articles/literature.
When choosing a method for data collection the type of desired information must be stated. In Harward family research project six data collection methods are described.^3 As the main focus here is to write a marketing plan for a company without history and with very bare documentation there is a need to collect as much information as possible about Onepair and the surrounding market. Secondly, information from the consumer’s opinion about the company is of interest. Interviews are one way of gathering data for research. There are different techniques to use for interviewing depending on the aim of the interview as well as the extent of the research. A personal face-to-face interview most probably requires more of the interviewer/researcher than a questionnaire. On the other hand, with a face-to-face interview, it is easier to avoid misunderstandings such as the meaning of different phrases etc. Prior to carrying out an interview it is important to identify the type of answer that is desired and to formulate the question to get the right type of answer. Misinterpretation of the questions is rather common, thereof it is important to be clear and explicit. When coming to (^3) Harward family research project, number 5, 2004
Title: Marketing plan for Onepair Level: Final Thesis for Degree of Master of Business Administration in Marketing Management Author: Elin Svensson It may be difficult to get enough participation. Below are listed factors that increase respectively decreases the motivation of the participant 9 . Increasing motivation
Title: Marketing plan for Onepair Level: Final Thesis for Degree of Master of Business Administration in Marketing Management Author: Elin Svensson The chosen method, interviewing people in the street, aims to serve the research question “Investigate the consumer’s opinion about the company and the product.” The questionnaire includes seven structured questions with both quantitative and qualitative data as output. Six out of seven questions are forced-choice questions. This method is mainly chosen due to the advantages listed below. To give the consumers a background and a brief introduction to Onepair an information sheet was constructed and showed to all participants. The interview was performed in the middle of the day during 4 hours. A disadvantage is that the place and time for the interview may affect the selection of participants and also the outcome of the questionnaire. As the target market for Onepair is thought to broad, this was not considered as a major source of error. Below are advantages and disadvantages with this type of survey/questionnaire. Advantages
Title: Marketing plan for Onepair Level: Final Thesis for Degree of Master of Business Administration in Marketing Management Author: Elin Svensson
With a personal interview there is often more depth in the information compared to a survey, an advantage regarding the information but a disadvantage regarding time. A personal interview is often time consuming.^11 In this context a personal interview is performed with the founder of Onepair. The objective with the interview is to get to know the company’s mission, key features, future prospects etc. This in turn serves the overall aim to write the marketing plan. Advantages
Title: Marketing plan for Onepair Level: Final Thesis for Degree of Master of Business Administration in Marketing Management Author: Elin Svensson
Validity and reliability are concepts concerning the quality of the research. For quantitive research, validity is to measure what was intended to measure. Reliability is the extent to which results are consistent over time. A high reliability means that results can be reproduced with the same method over time.^14 For the questionnaire, a test for reliability could be to use the test-retest method at two different times. If the reliability is high the outcome should be similar. The reliability for the methods used in this study must for the time when they were used be regarded as high. A weakness when it comes to checking reliability in this context is that both the studied company and the surrounding market are changing rapidly. The interview questions in this thesis were carefully formulated to get a high validity. Concerning the questionnaire, the questions were put in a way to avoid misinterpretation, an example is forced-choice questions. Many respondents (160) are in this case more representable for the potential customer group. This is further increasing the validity. (^14) Golafshani, The Qualitative Report
Title: Marketing plan for Onepair Level: Final Thesis for Degree of Master of Business Administration in Marketing Management Author: Elin Svensson In the planning process and in marketing in general one keystone is to define the mission. The mission should focus on one or several goals. Peter Drucker does in Kotler and Keller state a few questions to define the mission: 18
A marketing plan is a document describing actions necessary to achieve marketing objectives. It can be written for one year, annual marketing plan, or for several years. The marketing plan may be included in the overall business plan. 19 Some companies have a well written and documented marketing plan whereas others do not have it at all or they just have it in their minds. The marketing planning process is often divided into several steps. The names of these steps vary depending on the literature but the content is often the same. 20 , 21
Title: Marketing plan for Onepair Level: Final Thesis for Degree of Master of Business Administration in Marketing Management Author: Elin Svensson
The aim here is to get a view of the company’s situation of today. The market has to be defined and analysed. This includes the surrounding market and the competitive situation. 22 Information search followed by a summary of gathered information is often necessary to get a good view over the company. Information may be searched in different media, for example articles, web, statistics, brochures and yearly reports. To use Google or other search engines is another way to gather information. With models and tools, information can then be transformed to useful information about the present situation of the company.^23 A useful tool for analysing the situation is a chart describing the importance of different properties vs. how well the company is doing regarding this property. There should be one chart for each target segment to get an understanding whether the company is using the right arguments for the right consumer group. It is important to be critical when choosing properties. An example of a chart of this kind is shown in Figure 3 below. This chart is a way to get a view over what is already good and what can be improved and how to place resources on the right place at the right time. 24 (^22) Andberg och Eliasson, p. 14 (^23) Andberg och Eliasson, p. 32 (^24) Andberg och Eliasson, p. 40
