1. Age: ___________________________________________________________
2. Area you live: ___________________________________________________
3. Area you Shop most: ______________________________________________
4. Hobbies if Motorsport related: _______________________________________
5. Favourite Motorsport Magazine if any (Please Circle):
A) Bike Trader
B) Dirt Bike Rider
C) Motorcross
D) Bike
E) Other
6. What is your average spending on leisure products a year including games consoles and toys over £100: __________________________________________
7. How important is appearance and graphics of a product to you (Please Circle):
A) Very Important
B) Quite Important
C) Not Important
8. Do you think function is more important than appearance in a product you purchase (please circle)?
A) Yes
B) No
9. What type of advertising do you respond most to (Please Circle)?
- Magazine (specific genre or not)
- Flyers
- Direct mail shot
- Radio
- Sales call
10. Do you shop through internet or retail stores? __________________________
11. Do you use mail order services? ______________________________________
Thank you for your time.
By using questionnaires Power Leisure can asses what mediums of advertisement it can use to the most effect and can enforce advertisement of the business in places where target audience is most populated to attract as many customers as possible to make larger profits. The business can asses what should be in the advertisements to attract most customers and can try to link the marketing campaign to the interests of the potential customers. I could also use observation to help my research. As part of my marketing research I will also find out about the main competitors of Power Leisure by using both primary and secondary research using internet and catalogues to fill out a form with the information of the company and also will be speaking to the competitor’s store owner if required to find out information which is not available from desk research. By finding out certain information on the competitors it can help me in my marketing campaign to think about the location of the retail store and ads in regards to the shop’s success and how the companies target audience effects their location. I will also be able to see what kinds of advertisement the more successful competitors use and can try to use these same successful ways of advertising to advertise Power Leisure products and can also help my marketing campaign when deciding pricing policies while entering a heavily competitive market. There are advantages of opening the store in Hove to the community and business surrounding. More jobs are readily available to the local public and also gives the public alternatives and a larger choice of products to buy from the different motor sport stores and can also provide more taxes for the local government. For other businesses it opens up a healthy competition. There are also disadvantages for other business by opening the store as it could mean a price war which is good for the consumers but could lead to loss of profits and therefore a high turnover of existing employees.
Suppliers (Media)
I will also need to find out costs of different advertising media by using internet and speaking to the owners of the magazines, radio e.t.c. that I wish to promote the products with. As Power Leisure is a small business it cannot afford heavy advertising such as T.V commercials to promote the products within the budget allowed for advertising of about £6,000 and it would be impossible to go nation wide because Power Leisure could not supply that much, the finance most probably coming from a back loan as there is not enough savings or any retained profits to finance the marketing project.
After reviewing the results from my market research it has helped me make decisions regarding the types of media to use, the target market, the location of the business and the best ways to promote the products and make the business more renowned on its opening.
Competitors
I used Another form to find out information on the close competitors in the area.
Power Leisure motorsport retailer form
1. Company Name: __________________________________________________
2. Location of store: _________________________________________________
3. Range of products: ________________________________________________
4. Target market:____________________________________________________
5. Average annual turnover: ___________________________________________
6. Types of advertising used: __________________________________________
One close competitor to Power Leisure is Quad World which is based in the town centre in Brighton; it sells the same types of product but at higher prices and is targeting a similar market. Although they have a very high annual turnover averaging around £600,000 its costs are much higher than that of Power Leisure, Their main advertising media is simply shop window displays and advertisements in local papers. Another competitor is Best Bikes which is on the outskirts of town selling similar bikes but with a small variety of products and a similar target audience and a smaller annual turnover. To advertise their products they mainly use flyers and leaflets plus shop window displays. For Quad World to be on the centre of town it means they are open to a lot more potential customers who are already shopping and in a buying mood and links to the same target market as Power Leisure targeting anyone who could essentially afford a Playstation could afford one of the bikes however being based in the centre of town the rent costs are much higher requiring a much higher turnover to make the same profit. As these products are not bought on a daily basis by most people as long as Power Leisure’s marketing gets good product awareness people will be willing to travel to an out of town area. There are two possible circumstances to having my business located near another selling similar products, it may increase the awareness of my shop and provide an alternative for people looking to purchase these leisure goods or the shop which has already been established in the area and posses more customer loyalty will simply out sell Power Leisure’s goods. But with certain innovative ideas to promote the products and higher quality goods, sales and profit should be high.
Data analysis
The information the questionnaire provides shows that the customers tend to spend on average £200 to £400 a year on leisure products which will help Power Leisure decide on price ranges of the products when advertising the different goods. When asked what type of advertising the potential customer would most respond to, magazines tended to be then medium of choice. This will help me make business decisions for the marketing campaign as it will mean most of the advertising budget should be spent on magazine advertisements as it will be the most beneficial to the business. T.V. or Cinema advertisements were not included in the survey as Power Leisure would not be able to afford such type of promotion for their products. It seems sales calls are the least effective way to advertise the products as sales calls tend to be a bit intrusive and irritating to the customer. Although the store is based in hove, People who spend most money on these types of product tend to live and shop in the Sussex area. This would help me decide on location for main advertising. The questionnaire shows that the most read and favourite type of motor sport magazines is Bike Trader so Power Leisure will assure to be putting sum kind of advertisement for their products in this publication as it will be targeted at people interested in those products and will also be available to a large audience to attract as many customers as possible. Most people asked tended to do Dirt biking as appose to any other motor sport so the Dirt bike products will be a main part of the advert designs. Also most people thought that function was more important then the appearance and graphics of a product they purchase them also thought appearance was very important so this will be kept in mind in the advert designs as Power Leisure’s Adverts will emphasise the quality of the products as well the aesthetics of it. Internet and mail order services do not service as a feasible option of local advertisement but has a huge potential for future growth.
Questionnaires can be very effective when carried out by these types of small businesses. They are very cost-effective and are familiar to most people and are also easy to analyse, as it is a primary source of research it means the questionnaires are based on what the business needs to know.
The legal constraints which could hinder the types of advertising mentioned above could be false claims on ads of quality or specification. The business cannot use brand names existing and are not entitled copy other people’s designs. Other constraints which could have made the marketing plan not work are that there may not be sufficient demand in the area for two businesses offering exactly the same product, also money may have been a factor as the most effective advertising can cost a lot and also there is a time limit leading up to the opening of the shop to try to get as many customers to know about the store.
The cost of advertising on T.V for even a very small advertisement could be up to 50,000 pounds, too much for a small local business like Power Leisure. The cost of promotion in the local trade magazines and motor sport magazines mentioned for a quarter page advertisement is around £250 per issue. The cost of flyers to be produced is basically nothing and to produce about 5000 would cost £100. Direct mail shots can be about 50p per shot and about 5000 would be sent in the local area. As the shop is selling motors sport goods it is necessary to have links to the professional sport and another way to improve awareness is by sponsoring. Sponsor of a reasonably well known biker could cost up to £1500 pounds according to the SDBA. An association for professional motor sport racers.
Final marketing plan
In conclusion the marketing campaign for Power Leisure would consist of by weekly quarter page colour advertisements in two main motor sport publications, by advertising in these magazines it is an easy way of communicating with the target audience. Also we will have an advertisement in local trade magazines such as Friday AD and as originally planned this is to be followed by direct mail shots in areas where houses are known to have on average one acre of land as these people are more likely to have access to the use of one of our bikes. Flyers will also be put out to the public and mainly in the Sussex area containing examples of the products with full specs and price, contact numbers and place of store. The final marketing spearhead for Power Leisure will be radio advertisement which is cheaper than T.V and is still quite attentive. It will be about £400-£500 for a 5 minute slot period with the local radio station. In order to increase awareness and achieve repeat sales to try and grow in to this industry I will need to use more different types of offers and advertisement to attract more customers and increase the awareness of the new shop. This includes below the line promotion. A showroom acting as a window display will certainly catch the attention of passers by to even just have a look at the bikes. This would in turn lead to more awareness through word of mouth. Another project to improve customer needs is a 2nd hand bike service working as an after-sales service. Most local competitors do not usually provide any technical help after their bikes are sold and cannot be returned if any problems occur which shows some bad customer relations with in the industry which I will try to improve by buying back 2nd hand bikes and even offering an upgrade of bike if the customer has simply out grown the bike, and the customer can also be reassured with a 6 month guarantee so that if the product goes wrong in the few months after being purchased they can take it back to the shop and get it repaired with no additional charge to themselves. This will also provide a cheaper alternative for other potential customers who cannot afford the first hand bikes. As the shop opens in December it should definitely have the largest sales during this time up to Christmas so a Christmas price reduction could be introduced to encourage the consumers to buy as Christmas presents and then become regular customers when the prices go up after Christmas. The shop could afford the reduction in price as sales would be unusually high.
To attract further more customers on the open day I will have 2 more types of presentation. By getting a reasonably famous dirt bike rider who is being sponsored by the shop to come to the shop on the opening day which would be free as he is obliged to do so as part of his sponsorship deal. This will hopefully attract the public, increase awareness and help the image of my store. But to be fair most motor sport racers aren’t that well known but the main idea of him being present and the 2nd presentation of the opening would be a demonstration by him to show how the bikes should be used and to push the bikes to their maximum limits to try to impress a crowd there and hopefully encourage customers to buy, also allowing test runs for the public on the opening day will increase the chances of sales.
Bibliography
Internet sites:
www.tutor2u.net
www.sba.co.uk
Radio Stations:
Southern FM
Magazines:
Bike
Bike Trader
Motorcross
Dirt bike rider
Newspapers:
Advantage
The observer
Friday AD
The Times
The local Times
Television:
Top gear
Books:
GCSE Business Studies- second Edition (Alain Anderson)
Business Studies NOW for GCSE- second edition
(Karen Borrington and Peter Stimpson)
Retailers:
Felbridge Motorcycles
Best Bikes
Quad World
Crawley down garage
Appendix