Marketing Plan Outline (First Half)

I spoke with Ashley from class earlier and she was wondering if we needed to answer each of the questions in the Guidelines PDF that the professor posted or if those are just questions that are supposed to help in keeping us on track. I'm not sure to be honest so I'll ask him in class tomorrow so we can all get an answer and hopefully a little more guidance on what he expects this project to be.

For now, I've finished about half of the outline for the marketing plan. Obviously we still need to put in the information, but at least now when we have group meetings we will have something to start filling in information as we go.

I'll finish writing the other half of this either later today or tomorrow, I have some other stuff to finish up for my night class this evening.


(Header - start)
Procter & Gamble, Inc.
Marketing Plan
(Header - end)

I. Executive Summary

(I have an executive summary that I wrote for business administration classes that I got an A+ in so I'll post that on the blog as well later this evening when I get home.)
This should be about two paragraphs long, or about half a page, depending.

II. Environmental Analysis

This is not an environmental analysis in that it should talk about the company’s environmental friendliness, but rather should talk about companies current situation in regard to the marketing environment. It should talk about the marketing environment, the current target markets as well as the companies marketing objectives and performance.

This paragraph should talk about the current state of the company, and maybe give some information about the background and potential hard times that it has faced.

A. The Marketing Environment

1) This should be anywhere from one to two paragraphs in length. It should talk about the competition and what locations are most competitive and which areas should be focused on more so than others. What is our current market share and what is the share of the competition?

Bare in mind that our competitors are mainly:
- Colgate (Brand owned by Colgate-Palmolive Company)
- Arm and Hammer (Brand owned by Church and Dwight Company)
- Sensodyne (Brand owned by GlaxoSmithKline)

Toothpaste brands that are owned by Procter & Gamble:
- Crest
- Oral-B

2) This should be between one and two paragraphs and it should talk about some of the economic forces that are in play. Are there any trends in events that can cause economic forces to help our company or damage our company? What is happening in the country where our company is doing well that may be holding them back or helping them push ahead?

3)  This should be about the same length as the others mentioned above. It should talk about any political forces that may be taking place that can either put us at an advantage or disadvantage. Is there anything in particular that our company should be careful of and keep track of due to possible changes in the political environment? What rules and regulations do we have to follow in order to continue with business as normal in any country that we operate in? Are there any new rules that we should be wary of and if so why?

4) Length about the same. This is technically “Legal and Regulatory Forces” but it coincides with the #3 above so if there is an abundance of information we could include that information here.

5) Technological forces, length about the same. What technology do we use to produce our products? Have there been any technological breakthroughs that could benefit or harm us? If so, what are they? Alec mentioned that children’s toothpaste cannot be used in fluoride otherwise it can cause Fluorosis which causes white spots on the child adult teeth later in life. Is this something that we should be concerned about and what other ingredients can we include that would benefit children’s dental hygiene?

6) Social forces, same length. What things in society could affect our company image, our sales, our method of doing business? What could we do to better promote our brand given this social environment?

B. Target Market(s)

Two paragraphs here. Given the information that is mentioned above, the locations that are doing well and that are not doing well, where should we be trying to market this product? What about our product  is beneficial to people in different regions or locations?

C. Current Marketing Objectives and Performance

This should be about half a page or slightly longer in length. It should talk about what our objectives are with our product. We are trying to market Crest toothpaste for children so we should be aware of the type of people who typically buy a product like this and products that are similar to it. Does the product fit in with the rest of the products that wee currently make? How will we be packaging this product and what do we expect will come from our advertising efforts? Will we offer warranties and is there a particular strategy that we would like to use for this product?

III. SWOT Analysis
No paragraph necessary here just a note - let’s try to make this as long as possible because I feel like we could put a lot of info in here. The sample plan shows this as 2-3 pages so lets try to get at least 2.5 pages out of this section. Whoever does this section, if you need help check out the sample I've posted on the blog as well as the guidelines on Titanium.

These points below should be 1-2 sentences each.

A. Strengths

1

2

3

4


B. Weaknesses

1

2

3

4

C. Opportunities

1

2

3

4

D. Threats

1

2

3

4

E. Matching Strengths to Opportunities/ Converting Weaknesses and Threats

1

2

3

4

5

6

IV. Marketing Objectives
 To be continued…..