Introduction
This report is the pre requisite of the course Marketing Research under Institute of Business Studies, Darul Ihsan University. It is important us to know how make research proposals. So I have chosen this research topic to submit a proposal.
Scope
This is a very practical life orientation report requiring us to choose a particular product, select market, collect secondary information about the market and identify the feasible of promoting the product to that market. I also had to follow all the Promotion related procedures and come up with marketing strategies. I had a scope to assume some aspects of the selected market on the basis of cause-effect relationship.
OBJECTIVES OF THE PROJECT
I have decided the following objectives for this project work;
• To determine an effective sales promotional strategy for SIC
• To develop an effective advertising strategy for SIC
Methodology
This is a secondary as well as primary data based research report. SIC has a manufacturer plant of Pet Bottles in Bangladesh. I choose Pet Bottle to promote in the local market. I started collecting information about different aspects of Market through internet (web site) & different books & journals regarding pet products. After collecting such secondary data, I could identify feasibility of local market.
Research Design
We have followed the conclusive research design. More specifically we followed the causal research design; where by developing hypotheses we tried to find out the cause and effect relationship.
Methods of Collecting Data
Our survey method was in telephone interview, email, questionnaire where the respondents were in different place. We distributed the questionnaires among the respondents then we requested them to answer the questions according to their opinions.
Determination of the Sample Size
We followed the quota sampling process. So total number of samples of this research is 60. These respondents were from different range groups to make our findings more accurate.
Design Of the Questionnaire
We have designed the questionnaire in such a way, that by analyzing the responses we can find out information to fulfill our demonstrated objectives, which are mentioned above.
Statistical Tools Used For Data Analysis
For analyzing the data I will use SPSS. It is statistical software for any type of research work, which is conclusive. We already mentioned that our research work is close ended. So we used here SPSS easily. First we have to prepare a database according to the questionnaire. After that each of the questionnaires was used as an individual input. After finishing it we will find out the percentage of each response individually. I will also show those graphically specially in pie chart. Then I will use the cross tabulation between two questions for proving our hypotheses.
Data Collection
The researcher himself will collect the data from the respondents. It will be done by following personal interview method to collect data. The field work will not be subcontracted to others. I the researcher will do it myself. So the quality of the collected data will be as much as better.
Data analysis
After collecting the data I have to analyze those. I have already mentioned that SPSS will be used to do that.
• First we have to prepare a database according to the questionnaire .The database will contain all the responses of the questionnaire.
• After that each of the filled questionnaires will be used as an individual input.
• After that we will find out the percentage of all the responses. That will be also showed graphically.
• Then we will use the cross tab to prove our hypotheses. Here we will cross tab between 2 questions to make our findings more clear.
Limitations
This report is not without any limitation. Promotion process was a new topic for me to deal with. The time that we had to collect information & write down the report was not sufficient. Since, Bangladesh is a developing country with low technological background, so, collecting information about Bangladesh was a tuff job. Beside these limitations we tried to make our report as complete & accurate as possible.
Reporting
As it is a project related with internship project (BBA499) so we have to submit 4 final reports as well as 2 drafts of that. I will try to submit few intermediate reports. I will submit a hard copy of the final report. After all the formalities there will be formal presentation in front of a viva board.
Introduction
TM International Bangladesh Limited, a joint venture company of Telecom Malaysia and A.K. Khan & company Ltd of Bangladesh has started its commercial operation in Dhaka as a GSM 900 cellular phone operator on 15th November, 1997. Moreover TMIB has started its operation in Chittagong in March 26, 1998. Aktel is the market follower in telecommunication service in Bangladesh and are controlling 14% of the total market share.
According to Rahman, Khan, and Islam (2003-2004) stated that the market share & sales growth rate of Aktel is now decreasing at a great extent as well as the customer satisfaction, and loyalty levels of Aktel are decreasing. They also have noted that the network, product type, and price have relation with this situation. Therefore in this study the researcher intends to investigate whether there are relationships among network, product type, price, & sales growth of Aktel in Bangladesh or not.
Problem statement
In an earlier study (Islam, 1998) identified that internal marketing has significant importance in service organization. The author also stated that internal marketing is the antecedent of success of external marketing. The firm can serve the outside customers effectively by practicing internal marketing among the employees. This current study will extend the previous study and will investigate whether there is a relationship between internal and external marketing or not.
On the other hand, Islam (1998) stated that the external marketing considers the aspects of needs, wants, demands, quality, creation, relationships with customers, and customer satisfaction in order to exchange goods and services between producers and customers. According to Philips Kotler and Armstrong (1996) stated that the success of an organization mainly depends on two factors such as customer satisfaction and customer loyalty.
Therefore this study will use customer satisfaction and organization commitment as the factors of internal marketing, and sales growth and competitiveness of external marketing. Then the researcher will investigate whether significant relationships exist among customer satisfaction, organization commitment, with sales growth and competitiveness of Aktel in Bangladesh.
Purpose of the study
The purpose of this study is to present and test a model, which identifies the relationship between the two, factors such as- customer satisfaction and organizational commitment with sales growth and competitiveness of Aktel in Bangladesh.
Customer satisfaction and organizational commitment, two factors of external marketing are the key components of a successful and prosperous organization. More satisfied customers have been linked to higher profit margins, higher organizational commitment, greater customer retention and repeat purchases (Berry & Parasuraman, 1992; Corad, Brown, & Harmon, 1997; Jones & Sasser, 1995). Competitors within similar industries with the same types of technology, pricing strategies, etc. increasingly look to these two variables to create competitive advantage (Koch-Laabs, 2001). The competitors of Aktel are: Grameen phone, City cell, Sheba telecom, and some coming new companies. It also becomes clear that successful marketing can only be implemented if the firm is involved not only in external but also in internal marketing with its factors (Kotler & Armstrong, 1996; Lovelock, 2001).
There is a great importance of internal marketing in the context of service organizations. The successful service company must first satisfy the employees before it tries to sell its services to customers (Sasser, 1976; Zeithml & Bitner, 2003). In Bangladesh similar type of study was conducted (Islam, 1998) where the researcher only identified that internal marketing has significant importance in service organization. The researcher did not consider the factors of internal and external marketing and their relationship in that study. The present study aims to identify whether the customer satisfaction, organizational commitment has any relationships with sales growth and competitiveness of Aktel in Bangladesh.
The Design – Methods and Procedures:
Research Design
To obtain the research question’s answer, Descriptive Research Design has been selected. Descriptive Research has an important objective: gives description of something marketing characteristics of function (Malhotra, 2001) and also the description of phenomenon or characteristic associated with an object population (who, what, when, where and how of a topic, Copper, 2001).
Sampling Method
To investigate the factors for distributor’s acceptability, Non-probability Sampling Procedure has been used. The sampling unit was selected through Convenience Sampling: where the selection of the sampling unit is left primarily on the interviewer (Malhotra, 2001). The reason behind choosing convenience sampling is many but here most importantly, there is no appropriate structure or framework that can aid to select the sample. Farther, these procedures are both time saving and inexpensive.
Research Instruments
To investigate the research questions, there is lack of secondary data. So to collect the primary data the researcher has followed the questionnaire method, which is provided and developed by the organization. The researcher has also used some secondary data collected from different sources such as annual report, sales report, journal and textbook to explain the concept.
Sampling Design Process
To investigate the distributor, population of this study has been selected from different whole sale market of mobile sales of Dhaka City. The sample area has been selected on the basis of organization’s interest. The sample distribution is as follows:
Area No of samples
Elephant Road (Estern Plaza, Nahar plaza, Motallib Plaza) 30
Dhanmondi 10
Uttora 10
Mirpur 20
Wari 15
Motijhill 15
Total 100
Data Collection Procedure
The researcher distributed questionnaires among volunteer participants. This approach has been selected because it is appropriate for this kind of survey in Bangladesh considering the poor mailing, Internet communication and fax systems.
Data Analysis Procedure
This study has used specific procedures for data analysis. Excel has been use to determine the percentage of sales growth, mean and standard deviation of the findings.
Limitations of the Study
This present study is limited by a number of factors. The sample population is limited in terms of its size and composition. The sample will be drawn from Dhaka City only, and will not include retailers and dealers from other region. The convenience judgmental sampling method will be selected rather than other sampling procedures, so there is a possibility of sampling error. The sufficient literature of important concept of public recognition is not available. No study on the related topics has been conducted earlier in King Brand Cement. Time and money is also a limitation.
Discussion and Examples of “Strategies”:
1) Market Penetration Strategy: Giving free goods and services to existing customers.
If you are a new Grameen Phone customer then you will get 100 SMS free.
2) Market Development strategy: Bangladesh IT education offer free fundamental course for three months with some other long-term course.
3) Service Product Reformulation: Private bus services arrange mineral water bottle and soft drinks for the passengers when the urgency was published in a media.
4) Market Extension Strategy: The Diagnostic center are attracting the target customer by their high quality decoration and sophisticated Diagnostic equipment.
5) Product range extension strategy: Dhaka Lavinchi hotel is providing transport services is extending their service from residence for the customers.
6) Market segmentation Strategy: Dominious Pizza in Bangladesh offer 50 Taka package for the couple.
7) Product Development Strategy: Some coaching center like Nexzen in Bangladesh are arranging seminar and consultancy service for the career development of the student.
8) Product diversification strategy: Sheba world the mobile company is not only distributing connection but also they are importing mobile phone set.
9) Lateral Diversification Strategy: Toyota car company has their own ware house at Banani for the need of the customer.
10) Longitudinal diversification: Beximco groups was use to produce consumer product but the acquire building technology and now they are in construction building.
