Increasing the Consumption of Low-Fat Milk, Essay Example

Increasing the consumption of low-fat milk and whole grain carbohydrates

Goals

The marketing plan is intended to convince a large portion of the public to change their behavior in terms of the quality and type of both the milk and carbohydrates they consume daily. This is intended at ensuring that the there are reduced cases of health complications related to the consumption of high fat milk and refined products such as diabetes and heart diseases.

Objectives

• To increase the consumption of low fat milk in homes by 15% in the next 6 months.

This will be achieved by increasing accessibility of the people to the milk and increasing the advertisement geared towards improving the product awareness.

• To increase the consumption of whole grain carbohydrates by 20 % in the next 2 years.

This will be achieved through using mechanisms that increase the awareness of the product and the resultant advantageous in terms of health of using the product.

• To reduce the cases related to the consumption of high fat milk and refined carbohydrates by 10% in the next 5 years

Progress will be analyzed according to the medical reports from the medical institutions.

Selected audiences

The audience in this situation will be the families and homes in which the two products are used daily in large quantities. Other institutions such as schools and hospitals in which such products are used on several occasions as food for the people within will also be targeted.

In general the regular consumers of the two products are the best target audience because they provide a good platform to evaluate the impact of the marketing strategies employed so as to achieve the stated objectives.

Core strategy

This will be based on the four components of marketing mix which are Product, Price, Place and Promotion.

Product

In this case the change of behavior in the consumers from consuming the high fat milk and refined carbohydrates to consuming low-fat milk and whole grain carbohydrates is the product under scrutiny. All marketing measures used should aim at triggering the change of behavior (Kotler, 2009).

Price

Whole grain carbohydrates and low fat milk are usually sold at prices higher than the other versions partly because of the higher production costs incurred and also because of the higher demand due to the associated health advantages. The target audience will definitely object to paying higher than usual for products. They should, therefore, receive enough conviction as to why it is worth spending higher than usual (Adcock, 2001).

Place

Availability of the products to the consumers is vital. Any marketing strategy is bound to fail if the intended consumer has limited or no accessibility to the product being promoted especially when there is easier access to the alternative (Guiltinan, 1996). The shopping malls and supermarkets should be encouraged to stock the two products accordingly to meet the demand as required.

Promotion

It is only through product promotion that the consumer’s interest in the product is raised. Advertisement through the media should be employed to reach a large portion of the target audience at any given time. Advertisements for foodstuff are effective if they appear on the televisions during meal times. At this time one thing is usually on the minds of the target audience; a nice meal (Dev, 2005).

Evaluation

The achievement of the stated objectives should be obtained from the relevant sources such as food and health organisations. In addition the progress of the, marketing plan can be evaluate from the sales reports of the shopping malls and supermarkets that stock the products.

References

Adcock, D. et al. (2001). Marketing: principles and practice (4th ed.).

Dev, S. et al.  (2005). “In the Mix: A Customer-Focused Approach Can Bring the Current Marketing Mix into the 21st Century”. Marketing Management. 14 (1) pp. 23-45.

Guiltinan, F. et al. (1996). Marketing Management: Strategies and Programs. McGraw Hill: Irwin.

Kotler, P. et al. (2009). A Framework for Marketing Management (4th ed.). Pearson Prentice Hall.