Executive summary [302638]

[anonimizat], because IMC has rewoven the traditional ways of marketing and it plays an important role in communicating the brand’s message to their audience. It is an important opportunity that creates brand awareness at a fair and favorable price for the company’s [anonimizat], it is building a healthy relationship with the customer.

CRM SIKER GROUP is a well-known company in the market of constructions from Romania and appreciated for their impeccable work. The biggest problem of the company is the ineffective promoting policy. [anonimizat]. [anonimizat] a strong IMC strategy with a positive synergistic effect among their consumers.

The proposed strategy will certainly increase the number of consumer and sales and it will also improve the company's relationship with its current customers. Trust and professionalism will be the cornerstone of CRM SIKER GROUP’S IMC strategy.

Introduction

This report communicates the result obtained from the analysis and evaluation of CRM SIKER GROUP’S [anonimizat]- [anonimizat]. The recommendations purpose is to create a positive synergistic effect using simultaneously commercials TV with print advertisements and also commercials TV with online advertisement ([anonimizat], Instagram, Youtube and an appropriate website).

The report is structured in four parts: “General information about the company CRM SIKER GROUP and its products”(a briefly presentations of the company and its objectives), “Current integrated marketing communications strategy of the company CRM SIKER GROUP” ([anonimizat]),“Evaluation of IMC strategy and tools the company has selected to reach its objectives” (comparison between the company’s marketing objectives and its marketing communications objectives) and “Recommendations for the company CRM SIKER GROUP regarding its actual and future integrated marketing communications strategy”. The report presents important information and solutions for the company; solutions that could improve the business activity of CRM SIKER GROUP.

[anonimizat] 2007, in Romania is classified as a small and medium enterprise (SME) with a total of 24 employees. The company's activity is based on execution and installation performance systems of aluminum windows and doors. [anonimizat] (Profilco) and Germany (Schoko). [anonimizat]: dimension, coefficient of heat transfer or sound transfer and price. Schoko profiles have the following sizes: 60, 65, 70, 75 cm and the coefficient of heat transfer as following: 1.8, 1.6, 1.4, 1.2. Profilco profiles have only three sizes: 50, 63 and 70 cm with the following heat transfer coefficients: 2.1, 1.9 and 1.75. Schoko profiles have a lower price than Profilco profiles (there is a price difference of 20% between them) because Schoko has a higher heat transfer coefficient and that makes it weaker in terms of quality.

An equally important element for the product is the glass. Choosing the type of glass used is a complex process that takes into account the following aspects: the type of isolation (soundproofing or thermal insulation), the features and functions of the glass, the type of building that it will be used for (e.g., an apartment or an office), the parameters of insolation and the design desired by the customer (e.g., the customer wants a glass blue and transparent). The glass supplier of CRM SIKER GROUP is SUKI. The aluminum windows and doors result from combining all constituent elements bought from different suppliers (Fig. 1.1).

Regarding CRM SIKER GROUP’S objectives, the company wants to represent a benchmark in the field in which it operates, finding the right solutions to meet their customer needs and creating a partnership based on trust and mutual respect with them. The engine development of the company is represented by specialists with theoretical and practical experience in construction. Also, another important objective is obtaining customer satisfaction through quality and modern construction, adapted to the customer expectations and to the current market trends and to achieve an optimum report between quality- price, in order to increase sales and visibility of the company in the construction market.

CRM SIKER GROUP operates in Bucharest, focusing on large-scale projects such as buildings (e.g., apartments), SPA centers, estates and commercial centers. The target market description is:

Geographic:

Density : Urban

Region: Domestic

Demographic:

Age：20-65 years

Gender: females and males

Social grade: A, B ( Middle and Upper Social Class)

Income: High, top 22% of salaried class

Occupation: Higher & intermediate managerial, administrative, professional occupations and executives

Family: Young and Single, Newlyweds, Full Nest (I, II, III), Empty Nest (I,II)

Psychographic：

Personality: sophisticated, trendy, high self-esteem, independent, aspires to obtain success and power, ambitious, modern

Lifestyle:  willing to pay for experience and quality, like to participate at events

Behavioristic：

User status: non-users, regular users, ex-users

Usage rate: heavy usage

User occasion: Regular personal occasions

Degree of loyalty: hard core loyal, soft core loyal, switchers

Benefit sought: quality, reliability, excellence

CRM SIKER GROUP is perceived by their actual customers as a strong company (even though it is a SME one), with a strong position in the business world of construction and a name that inspires quality and reliability. This is also the image that the company wants to have in the mind of their clients.

Current integrated marketing communications strategy of the company CRM SIKER GROUP

The integrated marketing strategy of CRM SIKER GROUP is based on a combination of classic marketing tools, mostly a traditional advertising effort. The company's strategy is incomplete and uncoordinated enough. The synergistic effect of their integrated marketing communications is very low. The company does not have a specialized department for marketing and communications. The elements are not connected well and the message is not clear or consistent and it does not reflect the potential of the company and their products and services. The only effective connection is established by using the Direct Mail (the organization sends monthly to their customers’ reminder messages about their products and services) and the sales promotions (personalized gifts, offers and discounts for existing clients). Increased customization using online and offline methods makes the client come back for more. This method helps the company to achieve its two objectives, persuasion and action of their existing clients.

The objectives of the marketing communications of CRM SIKER GROUP are: informing customers about their products, services and terms of sales; persuading customers to choose the company’s products and services; inducting action, more specific, creating a purchase behavior.

Fig. 2.1” Primary tools of the marketing communications of the company CRM SIKER GROUP”

Source: made by student Andra Modreanu based on the information accumulated by studying the company

The primary tools of the marketing communications used by the company in order to achieve their objectives are: Direct Response Advertising (Online advertising, a classic website, Direct mail), Trade-and Consumer-Oriented Promotions (Bonus packs, discounts for existing customers who want to continue working with the company, gifts to loyal customers), Personal Selling and Word-of-Mouth Influence.

Promotion is a core element of any business, but the enterprise CRM SIKER GROUP does not value this opportunity efficiently to increase awareness and sales. First of all, the only way the company promotes its product in the online space is through direct e-mail and a website, (http://www.crmsiker.ro). The website is not in line with current requirements, it is not well structured and the information presented is incomplete. The graphic of the website is old-fashion and do not reflect the potential of the company. Furthermore, the information presented on the site is no longer valid and the images do not integrate properly in the page. Another important element, that is not on the website, is the price of the service and products that the company has to offer (Picture 2.1).

Among the components of the promotional mix, the enterprise CRM SIKER GROUP, uses also sales promotion (bonus packs and discounts for existing customers in order to induce loyalty and a new collaboration between the company and the client), consultation programs (the client is guided to a proper offer, based on what he or she is looking for) and personal selling. The last one (personal selling) is mainly used. The company is the one that directly contacts the potential buyers in order to inform them about the services and products and to answer the (potential) client’s questions. For example, CRM SIKER GROUP customers can benefit from a 10% discount on labor if they want to collaborate again with the company for a project. The reduction is granted from the second work done together and continues throughout all collaborations. However, on religious holidays, both customers and suppliers receive a symbolic gift from the organization (e.g., diaries, pens or calendars printed with the company’s name and logo).

Because the construction market is small, very restricted and the target market of the company is focused on wealthy and well-known business people, visionaries and modern, the Word-of-Mouth has a major influence on the business activity of the organization. A well done work for a client is a future recommendation for the company and CRM SIKER GROUP values properly this opportunity.

Evaluation of IMC strategy and tools the company has selected to reach its objectives

Based on the information presented, the IMC strategy applied by the enterprise is not effective and does not contribute significantly to the achievement of the marketing objectives- increasing visibility in the market, sales and number of customers. Even though the company is appreciated in the market of constructions for their quality products and services, their communication model does not sustain this fact. It is a discrepancy between what the enterprise represents (seriousness, professionalism) and the message. For example, the total number of visitors of the website is 5,830 and none of these visitors become clients of the company. This conclusion has been made after a telephone research conducted by the company. Customers were asked to answer some general questions about how was their experience with the company, if they were satisfied or not, what could be improved or changed from their point of view and what influenced them to choose this company.

None of the current or former clients have seen the company's website and their choice was based only on recommendations received from their business partners which collaborated with the company for a project and, on the other hand, very important for them were the constructions made by the company which appeared to be appreciated in the market of constructions. Word-of-Month, personal selling and their impressive portfolio seems to be the only elements from their IMC strategy that brought customers to the company.

However, there is a small synergistic effect, used to inform and persuade existing customers to collaborate with the company for further projects – the direct mail campaigns used along with offering to the customers personalized discounts and gifts. This strategy combined with the positive results achieved in terms of construction, seems to work for the company, because 5 of 6 clients decide to continue working with CRM SIKER GROUP after their first collaboration with the company.

The promotion policy of the enterprise is an important component of the marketing programs and communications. In order to achieve its objectives, it is indicated for the company to have a good offer based on product characteristics, properly valued and transmitted through a communication system. The product and the service of the company should be made known by highlighting the met needs of the customers and the achieved level of client satisfaction. It is necessary for CRM SIKER GROUP to use the best means of communication that they can control and to make their presence felt, both in the online space and in the physical one.

Recommendations for the company CRM SIKER GROUP regarding its actual and future integrated marketing communications strategy

The target market of CRM SIKER GROUP can be found online, they spend a lot of time on the internet and the enterprise should value this opportunity. First of all, the company should find solutions for their actual problems regarding the communication model: the website should be updated and improved, especially in terms of design. The company should also include information on all available prices, quality of the material used and testimonials. The rubric “About us” should contain a video presentation about the company (the manager of the company should be the one that presents the company and its interests, because he also is the person that communicates most with the actual and potential customers, informing them about the company’s products and services and he is also the one who creates the offers and persuade – continue to value the Personal Selling element of initial IMC strategy, the customers to work with the company. He is the best engineer), the employees, the products of the company, the equipment used for production and testimonials in the “Portfolio” rubric which will present the opinion of important individuals from the construction market about the enterprise CRM SIKER GROUP and how good and efficient their collaboration with the company was been- in this way, the enterprise will continue to value the positive Word-of-Mouth influence, that is very important in the construction market and connect it with the website). The company should also invest in SEO. Search Engine Optimization (or SEO) is the process of getting your website to rank on the first page of search results that your target audience is looking at. For example, CRM would want its website to be the first option for the search criteria: “best quality windows from Bucharest”. This will help the enterprise to increase visibility and send the potential customers to their website. Furthermore, CRM SIKER GROUP can use the PPC-Pay Per Click tool in order to attract even more visitors through the website by generating clicks.

After analyzing the company, the following measures are proposed (based on the available budget of the company allocated for the promotion strategy) to improve and extend the IMC strategy of CRM SIKER GROUP, in order to obtain a significant contribution of the strategy in the process of achieving the marketing objectives: Romanians individuals have a fairly developed sense of humor and a strong sense of patriotism. To correlate these two important features, I propose to the company to create a simple and comic character which will spread the message in the virtual environment. The character will be named “Gica”, a well-known name, full of traditional significance to the Romanians people. The company will present Gica’s reasons for choosing the company's products and services and the satisfaction received after making this choice. Every reason will be presented in a short and funny way. For example, I have design the following proposal for the first commercial with Gica (Picture 4.1):

The action starts in a large bedroom where is resting a middle-age gentleman. He is a business man, a very successful one actually. It is his day-off and he decided to rest a little bit today.

The alarm clock rings and he wakes up and goes to the window.

He sees a beautiful, blonde lady. She is happy and she is singing cheerfully. Gica cannot hear what she is singing because the window is closed and the glass component of the window has a very good coefficient of soundproofing. It is a window from CRM SIKER GROUP.

He opens the window to hear her and then he closes it quickly, because he discovers that the young and beautiful lady is not a good singer, she actually is a very bad one.

Gica laughs and continues to admire the beautiful woman with his windows closed. He is grateful to the company CRM SIKER GROUP because he can enjoy the beautiful scenery without being disturbed by noise.

This video will go viral. The company will post it on Youtube, on the Facebook page that will be created and on their Instagram account with the hash tag Gica (#Gica). In order to obtain a good synergistic effect, Gica will not only be used in digital marketing campaign, but also he will be present at the big business fairs and exhibitions, organized each year at Romexpo for the construction market. He will be meeting potential clients and will present to them the company and its services and products.

At the moment, CRM SIKER GROUP does not have a Facebook page, although all their competitors have one. The main advantage of Facebook is the fact that the company can select the desired target group. In this way, all the necessary information and promotion will focus strictly on the selected target. Another advantage is the possibility to measure the impact of the promotional campaigns through Facebook, using reports generated by Facebook Insights. I have the following proposal for the company’s Facebook page (Picture 4.2):

To increase the synergistic effect even more, I propose to the company to use also both the digital marketing and print advertisement, in order to increase sale. The print advertisement will help the company to increase their visibility in the marketplace and this element will should include: printing the cars of the enterprise with information such as name, telephone number, company logo and slogan; business cards, flyers and brochures representative for the company’s activity (Pic. 4.3).

Picture 4.3 “Proposal of business cards and letters for the company CRM SIKER GROUP”

Furthermore, the company should also keep their initial synergistic effect, used to inform and persuade existing customers to collaborate with the company for further projects – the direct mail campaigns used along with personalized discounts and gifts offered to the customers, because this strategy had good results in the past. For a more efficient outcome, their strategy should embrace the opportunities of using digital marketing in their communication model, correlated with their participation at the fairs and exhibitions relevant for the constructions market and print advertisement also. The company's visibility on the construction market and the sales will increase considerably on long term.

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Pay-Per-Click Marketing: Using PPC to Build Your Business

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