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The coollink limited in nigeria

INTRODUCTION - COMPANY INFORMATION

Coollink limited is a subsidiary of STEAM Broadcasting & Communications limited, Nigeria. Coollink is one of the renowned and registered Internet Service Provider (ISP) based in Nigeria.

Coollink customers are referred to as Clients and its services cuts across Nigeria in its totality. Coollink's sell vsat equipments to its clients and also offers after sale services depending on the agreement with each and every client. It's necessary to point out that Coollink has two groups of Clients which are:

  1. Cooperate bodies that comprises, financial institutions, oil companies, insurance companies, higher institution of learning, governmental bodies who require vsat solutions (ku band and c band)
  2. Individual clients who require fixed wireless broadband for small office and home office (SOHO)

For the purpose of my work, I'm will be focusing on Consumer market and not business market.

QUESTION 1:

a. Market segmentation is the course of splitting a very large market into segments of different buyers who will respond to different product and service offerings and market mixes. The formulated different segments are used as criteria for product targeting. In other words, there is need to understand that there are various customers with diverse needs and a market should not try to please all of them with the same offer. Research has further confirmed organizations that target specialty market tends promote its product and services more successfully than a business aiming all the market.

Mentioned below are some of the various approaches by which an organization can segment its products and survives, and each of these approaches has different variables.

Geographic: when market is segmented by attacking a particular region, state, climate, cities, countries or even neighbourhoods.

Demographic: market is segmented using variables such as age, Income, Occupation, Education, Ethnicity, Nationality, Religion, Social class etc Gender, housing type etc.

Psychographic: the variables used here area activities, interests, opinions, attitudes, values, emotions, lifestyle amongst others.

Behavioural: market is segmented with usage rate, user status, potential, benefits sought, brand loyalty, first-time, etc.

The product and service I would like to focus on are the sale Vsat equipment and customer care service respectively.

Market segmentation with reference to Coollink can be seen under Geographical Segmentation and Behavioural Segmentation. These two were chosen after series of market researches.

Geographical in the sense that Coollink has only two base stations which imply it can only offer services to prospective clients within those particular vicinities.

Behavioural on the other hand is inherent in both individual and cooperate clients, because the fact remains not all homes, offices and cooperate bodies in Nigeria of today can afford the charges that comes with internet services. The few that has internet services do so because of their social class, Clients that appreciate what they will benefit from using internet services all over i.e. In other words, there is a driving force.

Below are some of the reasons (benefits) amongst others why Coollink has chosen to segment its market

  1. It helps to identify which market it wants to serve since it acknowledges that there are various consumer with different characteristics that defines them,
  2. It helps to recognize what each and every Clients needs are, in order to proffer better solutions since client needs differ,
  3. It helps assures the highest return for marketing/sales expenditures,
  4. It increases profits for business, business can raise average prices and subsequently enhance profits through market segmentation
  5. There is better opportunities for growth since segmentation build sales,
  6. Through targeting, we can achieve competitive production and marketing costs which in turn increase the market share,
  7. Helps to understand who contenders area and why they are contenders,
  8. Helps recognize small, but important segments of the market in other words; it allows management to focus more on the most profitable buyers.
  9. It helps in the process of allocating funds to different segments of the market
  10. It assist in the process of choosing the proper media of marketing communication and promotion based on the attributes of each segment
  11. It guides to develop products that really match the market requirements.

b. A Customer according to Wikipedia (Accessed: 14 January 2010) “is a broad label for any individuals or households that use goods and services generated within the economy”.

Coollink's customers referred to as CLIENTS can be grouped into two categories which are:

  1. Cooperate bodies that comprises, financial institutions, oil companies, insurance companies, higher institution of learning, governmental bodies who require vsat solutions (ku band and c band)
  2. Individual clients who require fixed wireless broadband for small office and home office (SOHO)

Customer buying behavior is the study of how and why people buy goods and services, it covers the decision making processes. Kotler (1996) cited that buyer's decision process passing through five stages that is: need recognition, information search, evaluation of alternatives, purchase decision and post purchase behaviour.

There are internal and external factors that influences costumer buying behaviour and these factors can be categorized under Personal factors (that is, Demographic factors like sex, age, race etc), Psychological factors (that is, motive, perception, attitude, ability, knowledge, personal experience lifestyle, etc) and Social factors (such as leaders, family, friends, reference group, social class, culture and sub-culture)

In the case of Coollink, the factors that influence the Clients buying behaviour can be tagged under:

  1. Psychological factor
  2. Social factor.

The following are the reasons why the above named factors influence coollink clients buying behaviour

  1. Coollink is a renowned service provider; Clients fear the danger of consulting other service provider who might not adequately provide the kind of service required.
  2. Coollink launches various adverts in both print and electronic media which gives the prospective client the awareness of the strength and capability of the product and services they offer
  3. Coollink product and services gives comfort and convenience because it offers its Clients the opportunity to enjoy additional services like VPN (virtual private network) which is the ability to network different offices as proffered by the Client, Coollink also provide WAN (Wide area network) and LAN (local area network in which other internet service providers do not possess all these facilities
  4. Coollink also appreciates its Clients by giving good customer service and after sale service.
  5. Coollink's product gives value for money, after purchasing of Coollink product and services provided, Clients appreciates the fact that though it comes expensive but eventually realizes it is worth the money value.
  6. Also there is a Pride of being associated with coollink because it is a sister Company to other renowned group of companies all over Nigeria.
  7. Coollink also offers from time to time Sales promo which also encourages prospective Clients

With all the above in place, customers will remain loyal since stays satisfied. It has also positively affected the growth of the organization which has in turn enhanced profit

QUESTION 2:

According to bitpipe.com (Accessed: 22 January 2010), “Business Process is a set of coordinated task and activities, conducted by both people and equipment, that will lead to accomplishing a specific organizational goal”.

On the other hand, SHIVAUN O'BRIEN (Accessed; 22 January 2010) sees Quality standards are “statements outlining the key elements of a quality programme”. It can also be seen as a structure for achieving a renowned level of quality within an organization.

Coollink as an internet service provider has numerous business processes with some standards in place. For the purpose of my assessment I will focus on only the processes involved in,

  1. Bidding for proposals
  2. Dealing with Customers complaints

Bidding for proposals:

Coollink acquires some of its Clients through bidding for proposals. The process involved is simply responding to various adverts in the newspapers or journals whereby corporate bodies requests for proposals from various capable internet service providers. We thereafter collate our documents and submit our proposal for bid, then wait for the shortlisted companies to be notified.

The process here appears straightforward since we have been going through this process for a long time, but yet we still make some preventable mistakes which in turn lead to the loss of some important clients.

The mistakes ranges from submitting a proposal without putting a vital document, last minute rush due to registrations we have to do, late submission, getting the adverts late and cost estimate.

In order to achieve adequate quality and excellence, the above process can be enhanced by putting the following in place

  1. Appointing competent professionals as committee member who will be fully responsible to search for adverts, preparing and submitting proposal in order to avoid not putting crucial documents and late submissions
  2. Renewal with professional bodies should not be done at rush hours, since this is one of the basic requirements when bidding, then we should ensure all the memberships are renewed as at when due and not when we have proposals to submit.
  3. Team work is also very important

Dealing with Clients complaints:

After a client acquires the necessary products, and the installation takes place. So it is expected that from time to time, Clients would have one thing or the other to complain about. They could either call our customer care line for an immediate solution or we could send an engineer to the client to provide the solution.

The question here is at what pace do we provide these solutions? This is when quality service comes in. In order to achieve adequate quality and excellence, the above process can be enhanced by putting the following in place

  1. It is necessary to have a mission statement (clearly understood by the employees) which will define the purpose of its services (excellent service) and what makes it significant amongst other internet service providers.
  2. There should be adequate provision for telephone lines and receivers in order not to keep clients waiting
  3. There should be provision for personnel to work during the weekend in order to attend to clients as at when needed
  4. Proper training should be given to the Customer care officials and technical team in order to satisfactorily attend to clients
  5. Proper motivation has to be in place and this is when employess will see Clients as always right
  6. Also employing people because of their competence should come first and not because they are cheap
  7. Additionally, I will like to suggest even if clients do not complain, we should call from time to time to confirm they are enjoying the services we have rendered since some unsatisfied Clients may never complain
  8. Team work is very necessary, a boss has to be close to the employee in order to

QUESTION 3:

MARKET SHARE (CASH GENERATION)

From the above analysis, it can be deduced that Coollink's product is a very strong STAR (high growth rate and high market share) on its way to becoming a cash cow. At this stage, Coollink uses large amount of cash in order to generate large amount of money because of its high growth rate, its investing more for future growth.

On the other hand, Coollink's Service is at the stage of Question mark (high growth rate and low market share) which consumes large amount of cash and do not generate cash. At the Customer care service level, efforts should be made in order to improve and not become a dog but a star. The best way to deal with this is to invest heavily in order to gain market share.

Product life cycle according to EPSILONINDUSTRIES (Assessed 28 January 2010) is “Generally a marketing term used to refer to the explosive growth, plateau, and decline of a product or brand, a product life cycle can also refer to the iterative process of improving a product over time through major redesigns or replacement of obsolete versions”.

The position of the product (equipment for Vsat) on the product life cycle is on the maturity stage due to the fact that of the collink's product is well known.

The position of customer care service provided in coollink is at the growth state, the reason is that we need to invest in this aspect in order for us to meet up to standard in order for customers to be really satisfied

QUESTION 4:

According to the U.S. office of Personnel Management (Accessed: January 24 2010), “Planning means setting performance expectations and goals for groups and individuals to channel their efforts toward achieving organizational objectives. It also includes the measures that will be used to determine whether expectations and goals are being met”.

Marketing planning is the setting of future marketing objectives for product, service, brand, or product line and the determination of appropriate strategies, tactics and resources to be used in achieving such objectives. It involves the development of a logical process for establishing marketing goals, plans to achieve these goals, allocating budgets for different marketing activities and evaluating the target market segments.

There are various stages involved in marketing planning process which varies from organization to organization, with reference to Coollink; the following are the basic marketing planning process:

  1. Research on what the customer needs in order to improve: thorough research is made on what the customer wants and why they want, and this is achieved by giving out questionnaires to prospective Clients.
  2. Research on various manufacturers of products (equipments for c band and ku band) there are and taking time to analyse who will best serve the society in relation to customer needs
  3. Evaluation the two steps above in relation to the economy situation
  4. How the said products will be advertise in order to reach the prospective clients, research on what and what newspaper people read and radio stations rating on order to place adverts in the right places
  5. Review: where there is a evaluation between what was planned and what has been achieved in order to continuously improve Measure performance, they access the strength and weakness of the product

Marketing planning process is very important to Coollink and any organization due to the following reasons:

  1. It helps the marketing team deliver a plan and budget the management could relate to
  2. It gives the opportunity to access the consumers to serve and how best they can design products and services that will provide better value(i.e. competitive advantage)
  3. It enables the marketing manager develop his managerial ability
  4. It also gives marketers the opportunity to recognize that there may be a good reason to go back and adjust a prior step before completing the plan
  5. It brings about clearer definition of marketing objectives and policies and improved marketing practices
  6. It assist management to seek continuous improvement in marketing performance
  7. It focuses management's attention on threats and opportunities
  8. It improves communication and co-ordination amongst members of the organization
  9. It ensures that there is a clear understanding of the information needed to make the required decisions
  10. It increases the possibility of project success, reducing overall project cost, and shortening project life cycle
  11. it designs incentives pay plans do not only motivate and reward frontline staff fairly but also to align activities with corporate mission

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Printed by:

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Double line spacing

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