BP Helios Strategy, Essay Example

Recently, British Petroleum (BP) initiated a new marketing campaign entitled “Helios” that was intended to inform consumers of their effort to increase the amount of fossil fuels they provide to match a growing demand, create more advanced and effective manufacturing and delivering processes, and creating a new form of gasoline that will lower carbon emissions into the environment (Smith). Despite the launch of this initiative in 2001, not many customers are aware of the campaign. Therefore, there is a clear need for the company to find a way to effectively communicate its “Helios” strategy to consumers.

The goals of the “Helios” campaign are profit, sales, customer satisfaction, and social responsibility. In order for BP to ensure that their marketing campaign is effective, they should focus on the last two characteristics, customer satisfaction and social responsibility in their advertisements. Before a marketing plan can be developed, BP executives must first consider who their customers are; the most effective marketing campaigns are designed to target the people who are most likely to utilize the product (Developing Successful Marketing and Organizational Strategies). According to “The History of Gasoline Marketing As a Guide to Marketing Theory”, important characteristics of the consumer group that should be considered are the types of gasoline people purchase in different locations, which location buy the gasoline most frequently, the gender and other demographics of the driver, and how far the typical customer usually drives (Hogarty).

If BP uses the above strategy to create a marketing campaign for a target customer group it will be successful in spreading its “Helios” message. Since BP is already prominent on television, the best means to do so may be in the form of a television commercial on a channel in which the majority of its consumers would be most likely to watch. According to the textbook, the three questions that we must ask ourselves when developing a strategic marking process are how we should allocate our resources in order to achieve our goals, how we should convert our plan into physical actions, and how our results compare with our plans and whether potential deviations lead to a requirement for new plans (Developing Successful Marketing and Organizational Strategies. Since BP should develop a television commercial to spread its message, it needs to first develop an itemized budget for this marketing plan. To do this in the most efficient manner, it should consult its marketing and accounting departments to determine the quantity of finances that are necessary. The budget consider the amount of staff that would be needed to work on this project, how much money it will need to record the commercial, and the cost of publishing the commercial on its choice network. Next, to convert their plans into physical actions, they need to write a script, hire actors, purchase props, and strike a network deal. At the end of the actual filming, BP should assess whether the commercial met its goal and rewrite and reshoot parts of the commercial as it sees necessary during the final editing process.

Works Cited

Developing Successful Marketing and Organizational Strategies. (n.d.). Print.

Hogarty, T.F. The History of Gasoline Marketing As a Guide to Marketing Theory. American Petroleum Institute, n.d. Web. 16 Sept. 2013.<http://faculty.quinnipiac.edu/charm/CHARM%20proceedings/CHARM%20article%20archive%20pdf%20format/Volume%201%201983/73%20hogarty.pdf>

Smith, Ian. Good Content Strategy or Public Relations. Intelegia, 24 Jan. 2011. Web. 16 Sept. 2013. <http://www.intelegia.com/en/2011/01/24/good-content-strategy-or-public-relations/>