Integrated Management Project

Introduction

The main theme of the study is to develop the integrated management project and identifying different issues within the organization. In the case of this research study, Total, the world's largest petroleum refining company has been selected. The organization has a wide and broader customer base in the United Kingdom. In this study, the failures or the challenges faced by the organization in recent years will be described. Range of theories and models will be applied for identifying appropriate disciplines in marketing management structure and also for creating absolute solutions for the challenges occurred to the organization.

Identifies an issue in your organisation that has multiple and varied approaches to its resolution

It can be noted that in the case of the recent challenges, the management department has expressed that the recent challenges include in meeting the energy needs and wants of the growing demographics of the country. There are 7 billion people current surviving on the earth and it will tremendously increase in 2040 where there will be approx 9 billion people. Thereby, it has been the recent challenges in the specific automotive lubricant industry, where the resources are decreasing in a huge manner (Lemes et al. 2017). On the providing of the energy and resources to the automobile industry, the social, as well as human developmental needs, are also changing at the same rate. Different challenges are attached to global warming and there, the energy also needs to meet the core developmental needs. 

People

“How does your problem or solution impact on the team & company?”

It can be acknowledged that this challenge has impacted the management team and the organization. In this particular scenario, the management team of Total has also expressed that they have applied core abruptions of performance procedures, leadership and steps for managing creativity and innovation for mitigating the challenge. The marketing communications of Automotive Lubricant Total are changing since most of the Total who are in this business believes that lubricant selling makes them achieve good margins (Le et al. 2019). Automotive Lubricant today is every man's need in the UK as every household has either a two-wheeler or a four-wheeler. The automotive lubricant Total, therefore, requires continuous marketing communications to keep the customers informed and also tell about the prevailing discount. A big challenge today is the shift of consumers from traditional medium to digital mediums. Meeting this shift will need the new mediums to be used in place of or in integration with traditional mediums. The Total has also recognized the need to augment the integrated marketing communication strategy by involving the new mediums. In this study, the existing process has been studied in detail and all the constructs have been looked into very carefully (Cowger et al. 2016).

Financial Aspect

“How will your solution improve/ impact positively on the financial aspect of the company?”

The desired solution is much needed for mitigating the core challenges. Thereby, in the modern era of globalization, it is much needed to transform the normal methodological solutions into some more strong and competitive. Therefore, the financial aspects need to be emphasized to some co-lateral extents (Sarwar, 2018). The process that has been described below has been taken out from the data collected from all the Total that were considered while doing sampling for the case study method for this research. The process adopted currently by Total is similar. The detailed stage-wise discussion has been represented below:

In the UK the Total has started the formulation of marketing communication strategies by reviewing the preplanned marketing plan. Within the review of the marketing plan, the objective of the designated person is to have a close look at key areas of marketing background. This objective has been coined as objective 1 of stage one of the process and the executions included in this stage has been named as step 1, step 2 and step 3 of this respective objective to be achieved (Onsager, 2019). This has been represented in figure 1 given below:

 

 

These steps include a description of the products that have to be advertised by the company, assessment of the market to be served and evaluation of the competition as shown in the figure above. The Step 1 of stage 1 is the description of the products to be advertised by the company which includes scrutiny of the product biography which is done by preparing a product grid; The Company assigns product managers for the execution of this step who prepare the product biography. This product biography includes USP of the product, packet size offered of the product, features, price of the product and finally the entire description is handed over to the creative team which utilizes this information as a background of message. With the help of this manner, it can be observed that the energy can be provided to different types of human developmental needs and wants in a much easier manner (Alsharhan and Rizk, 2020). This marketing management process involves the core scenario of the leadership and performance management spectrums those are much needed by the population of the country in the same period.

Marketing

“How does your problem/solution impact on the marketing dimensions?”

The problems that are related to the scarcity of energy resource or the natural resource in the market have also impacted on the marketing dimension. The prices of the goods and services have been increased by the organization. It is because there are less supply and more demand in the market. However, the negative impact of the challenges on the marketing dimension can be also be mitigated with the help of the above business management model. In step 2 of model 1 of stage 1, the marketer assesses the market that has to be served. This is done by using internal products and sales report. The execution is done by the market research manager. The manger here prepares the product category comparison sheet. This sheet includes information about products offered within the same category and sales of different products within the sales category (Mount field et al. 2019). The comparison is made based on product features, prices of different products, USP of different products, sizes available of different products and the sales comparison of different products within the same product category. The entire information helps in understanding product performance which further leads to a decision on the positioning.

The third step is the evaluation of the competition. This starts with looking at the product biographies of products offered by the competitors within the same category with the help of market research report, understanding the competitor performance when it uses marketing communication. This includes the previous marketing communication used by competitor using agency or market research report. Within the product categories the Total look into the products offered by the competitor, revenue contribution by different products and differences in the prices. In marketing communications, various mediums are studied. Every media vehicle is studied closely with every single detail. In this case, also every media vehicle used by the company is closely looked into. The first medium included hoardings, banners & posters within which several banners, posters and hoardings used, sites of placement of banners, posters and hoardings, sizes of banners, posters & hoardings, money spent, media audience, geographies Targeted, use of several lit and not- lit hoarding were accounted for (Ikram et al. 2020).

Strategy

In this section, different types of business strategies for the company Total and different business models as well as strategies will be presented. In this specific issue, there are different marketing management models and strategies have been used by the organization those are mentioned in the section below:

With the help of visual models and mathematical models, the organization has optimised for lubricants and wall lubricants under which the creative used, paint size of the wall, contract amount per region, contractors employed, quality of paint used, colours used, workshops included, money spent, media audience, geographies targeted, sizes of the shutters painted, several shutters painted, the period of the campaign and sites of wall lubricants were looked into. In the television advertisements, money spent, media audience, frequency of the advertisement, channels targeted, geographies targeted, period of the campaign, the visuals used, endorsee used advertisement length in seconds; time slots used and viewership was seen.

On the other hand, with the help of visual business models as well as computer models, the company targeted the marketing communication mediums and designs for protecting from further challenges (Sharma et al. 2017). In the radio the channels targeted, frequency of the advertisement, period of the campaign, time slots used, geographies targeted and message dictated were seen. In the newspaper advertisement, the quality of the paper, choice of page, colours preferred, subscriptions, news agency employed, space used in centimetres, readership, frequency of the advertisement, money spent, media audience, geographies targeted and creative used were studied. In the sponsorships and events, media audience, geography targeted, money spent, details of the event sponsored, the period of the campaign and tools employed at the event were seen. The entire exercise leads to the analysis of the product performance and impact on revenue after using marketing communication given to accounts executive (Ali and Hama, 2016).

 

Operations Management

“How does the problem/solution impact on the supply chain, procurement and operational management issues?”

It can be noted that the solution has tremendously impacted the supply chain as well as operational management procedures. It can be noted that it vastly impacted the target audience selection categories and classifications, where there are also different classifications in the same period. The next stage the Total selects the target audience. This stage involves marketing manager who begins the execution of this stage by having one objective that is a description of the target audience. The selection is done based on certain classifications. These classifications are general classification, domain classification, brand classification and thereafter profiling of target audiences done. Step one includes general classification that determines the general characteristics of the target audience. In the General Classification, the manager prepares general audience demographic table which involves the use of market research report that studies various aspect like the number of service centres, number of petrol pumps, usage of vehicle, number of dealers, number of vehicles owned, number of mechanics, different vehicle Total, occupation of the owners of the vehicle, number of individual users, the general income of these individual users, number of commercial houses, geographical distribution and age segregation of the users. This set of information is generated from market research reports, reports from service centres, information available from RTO, financial institutions and company's sales reports. The entire information is used to prepare a grid that shows the classification available for profiling. In the step 2 domain classification is done where the objective of the marketing manager is to determine the use of attitude of the target audience in a particular product category. The domain grid is prepared based on products served. This includes internal reports of variants and considers category used behaviour also which reflects the usage of diesel engine oil, passenger car motor oil and motorcycle oil and the overall grid which is the outcome of this step shows overall usage in a particular category for brand classification.

Furthermore, the third step is the brand classification where the job of the marketer is to classify the target audience based on brand purchase intentions. In the brand classification a common grid is prepared using domain classification and brand usage reports that include Diesel engine oil, passenger car motor oil and motorcycle oil within which the various brands in the category are placed on the grid and thereafter this information is utilized for classification of profiling the target audience (Uygun and Dede, 2016).

Project management

“Consider the models for managing change and other project management theories or models.  Can any of these be applied to your problem area?”

It can be noted that there are different aspects of the managing change and implications of project management that can be done and formulated with the help of six sigma and applying three steps those are “DMAIC, which stands for Define, Measure, Analyze, Improve and Control; DMADV, which stands for Define, Measure, Analyze, Design and Verify; and DFSS, which stands for Design For Six Sigma”.

With the help of the “DMAIC, which stands for Define, Measure, Analyze, Improve and Control; DMADV, which stands for Define, Measure, Analyze, Design and Verify; and DFSS, which stands for Design for Six Sigma”, in the automotive lubricant industry, Total decide the positioning elements that they want to use. This step has a single objective which is to decide the positioning elements. The single-step targets on deciding and determining the positioning elements that will help in creating the base for the communication strategy. To decide the positioning elements the company uses the output from the marketing plan for positioning where product benefit orientation and user orientation are accounted for (Willoughby et al. 2017). In the product benefit orientation, the company chooses the selection of benefit whether it is emotion, character or an attribute whereas in user orientation reference to brand attitude is made with the help of market research report. The output leads to the creation of the base of communication. This stage has been represented in figure 4.4 given below.

In the next stage is the decision on the final communication objective where the communication objective has to be framed by determining and choosing elements for setting the communication objectives. This is done by using the output of the previous step, category need, brand awareness and brand attitude. In the category need the requirement is based only if the company is launching a new product. In brand awareness, the company decides whether it wants recall or recognition. In the brand attitude, the company focuses on the involvement of the consumer in the product and decides the action based on the involvement. The two types of involvement referred here are low involvement and high involvement and the actions targeted are transformational or informational (Klychova et al. 2016). These elements together lead to the development of statement for communication which helps in the final selection of media element. This stage has been represented in figure 4.5 below.

The last stage is the final decision on selecting a marketing communication vehicle where the company aims at providing a final allocation of media vehicles to accounts executive. This stage involves a single step which is choosing the required elements needed for communicating the objective and comparing mediums across the requisites. The primary elements are considered using internal approvals and discussions. These include communication objectives decided, volume and sales target and the budget that has got sanctioned. After this decision on necessary media selection component is made. These include opportunities to see and reach. Here the necessary elements which are important for achieving communication objectives are taken into account. These elements include frequency needed, time available to process the message and visual content. In the frequency, there are two types of bifurcations which are done-one is high and the other is low. When the company aims at high frequency the mediums targeted are television ads, radio, newspaper, hoardings, banners and posters. When the company targets low frequency the mediums are sponsorships and events, wall lubricants and shutter lubricants and magazines (Reddy and Rashmi, 2016). The next requisite is the time available to process the message. There are two-time slots that are considered which are long and short. In the long one, the company chooses wall lubricants and shutter lubricants, newspaper, magazines, sponsorships and events, hoardings, banners & posters. In the short time slots, the company chooses radio or television ads. The third requisite is the visual content where the company decides whether there is a need for visual content or not. In case if the visual content is needed the company selects from television, sponsorships and events, magazines, newspaper, wall lubricants  & shutter lubricants, hoardings, banners and posters. On the other hand, if the company does not require visual content to communicate the message then radio acts as the best medium (Navarrete et al. 2019). After this complete selection and consideration of elements and looking into the brand recall, brand recognition, brand attitude strategy and brand awareness strategy the memo that is created here is handed over to the accounts executive of the creative company. This memo has minutest of the detail which goes into the selection of any medium chosen for communication

 

Conclusion

All the stages of integrated marketing communication have been seen carefully as executed currently by automotive lubricant Total in the UK. The specific steps in each of the stages in also seen in detail. Various constructs have been highlighted which play a key role in the decision-maker in each of the steps. The entire process has been explained with a view to the current scenario. It can be concluded that after considering these elements, the media selection option is looked into for achievement of communication objectives. Here brand recall, brand recognition, brand attitude and brand awareness strategies are considered. If the objective is brand recall then the selection is made from radio, wall lubricants, shutter lubricants, television ads, sponsorships and events, hoardings, banners & posters. If the communication objective is brand recognition the company selects television ads, hoardings, banners and posters, magazines, wall lubricants & shutter lubricants. If the objective seeks high involvement of the consumer and the message is informational then the company chooses from newspaper, magazines, sponsorships & events. If the company aims at high involvement and action-based results from consumers which are known as transactional the company chooses from television ads, magazines, hoardings, banners & posters. If the involvement of the consumers is low and the message is informational in that case the selection is made from television, radio, newspaper, magazines, wall lubricants, shutter lubricants, sponsorship and events. If the involvement of the consumers is low but the company aims at transactional nature of the message then the selection is made from television ads or newspaper.

 

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