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Introduction

Business Studies and Economics coursework How does McDonalds attract its customers? By Lucy Sargent McDonalds started with one restaurant in the US in 1955. Today McDonalds is the largest and best-known global foodservice retailer. With more than 32,000 restaurants in over 120 countries, their global market potential is enormous. I am going to investigate how McDonalds attracts its customers by marketing. I will research into the products McDonalds sells at what prices and where and how it promotes theses products. The main group McDonalds target are about 10-25 years old. Market segmented Like all firms, McDonalds uses the 4Ps of marketing to attract its customers. The 4Ps are: 1. Product. The firm must come up with a product that people will want to buy. It must fulfil some of the customer's needs and wants. 2. Price. The price of the product must be one that the firms target customers agree with and afford - without being too cheap. 3. Promotion. The product must be promoted so that potential customers are aware that it exists. 4. Place. The product must be available for sale in a place that the customer will find convenient. ...read more.

Middle

McDonalds budget is much larger than that of a smaller private company. McDonalds uses both informative and persuasive adverts, the informative ones are about eating healthy and the persuasive ones persuade people to buy the food sometimes, with TV adverts they show people eating the food and really enjoying it. There is a theme tune for McDonalds, which is Justin Timberlake's song "I'm lovin' it." This will attract a lot of customers as Justin is a very famous star and a teenage heartthrob and the song is very famous. Although advertising gives people information and makes them aware of the product, subsidises newspapers and magazines so they cost less and makes money for the firm because it will hopefully pull in more customers, it can make a lot of people want things they do not need and costs money so the firms have to charge more for their products and if the adverts do not work then the money is wasted and the opportunity cost of employing people in advertising is they could be spent on making things. McDonalds is a very famous brand name, and because it is famous more people are attracted to it than a restaurant that is not as well know. ...read more.

Conclusion

McDonalds ha special offers a lot like buy one get one free, discounts and competitions which not only keep the customers they already have, but get new customers in. I think that the advertising attracts new customers but the convenience keeps the customers returning. However, the evidence that I have found out from my questionnaires show that most people have seen adverts, but are not temped by them. This might be because there are so many of them and McDonalds is everywhere, so they might just annoy people. Also McDonalds has economies of scale, which attracts customers because it's a large firm so it is able to cut costs and get more profit. This will lead to more customers and make it bigger still. I think that McDonalds is more successful than burger king and KFC and it attracts more customers because burger king and KFC cannot cut costs as much as McDonalds because they are smaller. But McDonalds has to be careful and make sure they do not have diseconomies o f scale which happens when firms get too big. Conclusion Overall, I think McDonalds is doing very well at the moment and will continue doing well if it satisfies its customers wants and needs. I think my investigation has been very successful and worthwhile. ...read more.

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