Nokia’s Smartphones and Marketing Strategy
Introduction
The aim of this research proposal is to examine the impact of marketing strategies on the share price of the Nokia Company (Thietart. et al. 2001). This will help determine how consumers attitude towards certain products affect the progress of the mother company and its investors.
Justification of the proposal
Recently, Nokia relieved over 10,000 employees on the fact that it was running high costs whose returns did not favour the number employees. Nokia has been top in the industry for a number of years in the recent past. However, the recent increase in the highly revolutionising telephony industry brought a challenging situation to the company. According to Bradley (2010), just like any other technological industry the rate of obsoleteness, innovation, and invention change in a click of a second. As noted by Thietart et al. (2001), one marketing decision that one uses today may not be as applicably relevant as tomorrow.
Numerous sources have warned and tried to imply that the company equity value was significantly reduced to $25.91 billion from the time of the leak (Eaton 2011). Technology has in many occasions encompasses the investor capital accruing immense viability potential for sales, a competitive advantage and market share (Bryman & Bell 2003). However, Nokia seems to experience a hard time as indicated by RIMM research in motion of dropped sales from 4.8% to 2.5% of the smart phone industry. In essence, the company is at a worse situation according to the Research in Motion. Further illustrated by Eaton (2011) that the dropping shares of over $6 accompanied by plummeting market shares, hence, the Blackberry and Playbook together with a variety of other E-series phones do not contribute or all add up to lack of a signature product. As the telephony market shifted to smartphones, Nokia made its strategic steps on Windows based phones (Branding Strategy Insider 2010). The company market pressure and reducing product equity and preference by customers, puts it at risk of facing a struggling market in the near future (Keller 2001 p. 14). It is with this tone that this paper is compiled into an expression of immense hope that it will yield a great marketing strategy that will see the company sway high into its reputable position through a turnaround in product decision and marketing strategies.
Approach and Research Objectives
The research will target market segments of Nokia and its marketing strategies. This will put more emphasis on how well the company responds to pressure from its competitors (Aaker 1991). The face of the company is the greatest factors that either attracts or chase customers and investors from the activities of that specific company (The Opinion Leaders 2011).
The researcher will use questions to attain data for this research and some of them are the following:
- What strategies does the Nokia Corporation use to market its products and the quality of phones they sell to the consumers?
- Do the strategies use deliver to the company? How credible is the company to the outsiders who are the consumers? Does the marketing strategy motivate buyers to buy more of the Nokia products or it has no impact on the spending habit?
- Do the products satisfy consumers’ needs? If no, what do they expect from the products that the Nokia Company does not provide?
The research has objectives that must be met in order to achieve or attain accurate results. These objectives include:
- To examine the impacts of using marketing techniques by the mobile handsets manufacturing companies.
- To determine what the prices of mobile phone handsets have to do with the share price of the company in investment markets.
- To evaluate the weaknesses and strengths of the strategies used by Nokia company in its products distribution and promotion.
Overall design
The research shall be conducted majorly on Nokia as a company putting more weight on its products. An extensive review of the company history dominance and market share shall be critically analysed to have an idea of the company reputation, and present position in the market (Brady et al. 2008 p. 153). The company’s global coverage shall be significantly considered in determining the sample size and the approach towards meeting the general or segmented consumers in overall. Branding of the product shall also be considered according to the class, coverage or region together with the user occupation ease of use and ease of understanding of the features (Casestudyinc.com, 2011).
Procedure and Data collection
Data will be collected within the company. This will be through analysis of their promotional strategies, their financial information, their general operations, together with the marketing goals and objectives (Casestudyinc.com, 2011). The researcher shall move to unrecorded data, this will involve holding interview with various employees and company stakeholders. As suggested by Business Daily (2011), these interviews shall consist of both online, face to face and offline interviews. All the interview information shall be gauged under one footing. The research shall move to the external environment involving customers, external stakeholders and the competitor analysis (Ferrell & Hartline 2008).
Works Cited
Aaker David. Managing Brand Equity: Capitalizing on the Value of a Brand Name. New York: The Free Press, 2001.
Brady James, Joseph Cronin Jr., George Fox, & Charles Roehm. Strategies to offset performance failures: The role of brand equity. Journal of Retailing, 84 (2) (2008): 151-164.
Branding Strategy Insider. Marketers Need To Better Understand Creativity, the branding blog. 2010. Web.
Bryman, Alan, & Edward Bell. Business research methods. Oxford university press, New York, 2003.
Business Daily. Struggling Nokia yet to attract serious suitors. 2011. Web.
Casestudyinc.com. Nokia – A struggling market leader. 2011. Web.
Eaton Anna. Struggling Nokia Shutters Stores, Sells Messaging Business to Synchronica. 2011. Web.
Ferrell Helen and Steven Hartline. Marketing Strategy. London: Cengage Learning, 2008.
Keller Kevin. ‘Conceptualizing, Measuring, and Managing Customer- Based Brand Equity’, Journal of Marketing, 57 (1) (2001): 1–22.
The Opinion Leaders. Technology Companies Struggling for Market Share. 2011. Web.
Thietart Raymond. Doing management research: a comprehensive guide to Co-creating value for luxury brands. London: Press publications, 2011.