Executive Summary
A significant percentage of firms in the contemporary world are battling with consistent client involvement in addition to continuous growth in sales volume. Consequently, a marketing plan is essential since it specifies a company’s advertising approach for the eventual achievement of organizational financial goals (Srimek, Pranee, Suwandej, and Saisama, 2022). The marketing plan details the marketing strategy that a company will use to sell its goods. Failure to develop a marketing plan, on the other side, may result in a low budget, financial difficulties, and poor customer volume. This is particularly likely to result in a company failure in the worst-case situation.
1.0 Introduction
This report will establish the undeniable need for a marketing plan for the Brighton Palace Pier, as well as discuss the different consumer interaction tactics and research methodologies that might be used to construct a marketing strategy. The SWOT and PESTEL assessments, as well as the consequences for the marketing strategy, will be discussed and applied to the organization. To achieve the marketing goals, segmentation, targeting, and positioning will be investigated. Following that, the company’s marketing mix plan will be designed, which will comprise free perks, campaigns, offers, discounts, prices, location, and promotions.
In addition, various marketing and communication initiatives will be implemented to boost the brand’s impression. As a result, a marketing timetable and budget will be established, providing a clear sense of direction for the administration of the company’s marketing operations. Finally, a performance assessment will be supplied to analyze Brighton Palace Pier’s performance review. As a result, this research offers a marketing strategy for Brighton Palace Pier that will allow it to outperform its competition and stay at the top in the tourist sector market.
2.0 The Brighton Palace Pier
Brighton’s seafront serves as the city’s central site, drawing both tourists and investment. The seaside is the city’s major entertainment area, with approximately 13 kilometres of entertainment and events, as well as hundreds of shops and recreational choices. The Brighton Palace Pier, often known as the Palace Pier or Brighton Pier, is a recreational pier with an amusement park that opened in 1899 and cost £137,000 to build (Thabit, and Raewf, 2018). It has everything needed to develop a prosperous market that has been expanding for decades ranging from carnival rides on the pier including cup-and-saucer activities, a traditional carousel, and a haunted house ride.
According to Choi, Lee, and Alcorn (2020), Brighton Palace Pier is the most visited pier in Britain and the fourth most popular tourist destination in the country, attracting around five million visitors each year as its services and goods cater to both foreign and domestic markets. It is accessible daily (excluding Christmas Day) and is open for an extended period during the spring and summer. There is no admission fee to visit Brighton Pier, but you will have to pay if you want to ride any of the attractions. On the pier, there are several food options and drinks. Also, there are three taverns, hotels, and fast-food premises among them. Popular alternatives at the amusement centre include chicken and chips, burgers, hamburgers, and pizzas.
3.0 PEST Brighton Palace Pier Marketing Environmental Analysis
As argued by Thabit and Raewf (2018), political issues are important in identifying the aspects that might affect a company’s long-term prosperity. Brighton Palace Pier is vulnerable to a variety of various types of geopolitical environmental problems. To be successful in such a volatile business, the corporation must diversify its exposure to the systemic risks of the political climate. Brighton Pier Group can extensively examine the industry’s many political variables, such as taxes, employee benefits, safety regulations, regulatory pricing restrictions, crime, and bureaucracy that might affect its operations in the long run.
Furthermore, Brighton Palace Pier should be aware of economic elements that influence company performance, such as the economic cycle, lending rate, currency exchange, savings rate, and rate of inflation, which drive aggregate investment and aggregate demand in a country. Brighton Pier can anticipate the growth trajectory of the entertainment sector as well as the organization’s growth trajectory by using the country’s economic elements such as growth rate, inflation, and other industry economic indicators. Other economic aspects that Brighton Pier should examine when doing the PEST analysis, as highlighted by Chapman, Light, and Richards (2021), include labor costs, the efficiency of bankers, and the skill set of the workers.
Besides, the cultural and style of doing things in community have an impact on organizational structure (Krizanova, Lăzăroiu, Gajanova, Kliestikova, Nadanyiova, and Moravcikova, 2019). The community’s common beliefs and opinions have a considerable impact on how advertisers at Brighton Pier identify customers and create marketing messages for consumers. Leisure interests, attitudes, culture, and class structure are all social variables that Brighton Pier’s leadership should examine while performing a PEST analysis.
Technology is another factor that is fast affecting many industries. A company should do not just a technical analysis of the industry, but also an accurate analysis of how rapidly technology influences that market. Slower rates provide for more time, yet quicker speeds of technological change may leave a firm with little time to adjust and stay successful. Technical analysis includes considering the market’s different impacts, such as the rate of technological diffusion, current technological breakthroughs, and the implications of technology on service providing.
4.0 Brighton Palace Pier SWOT Analysis
The strengths of Brighton Palace Pier lie in the numerous services offered to a broad variety of clients, as well as the fact that it is in a large metropolitan region, making it a comfortable drive away from home (Opresnik, 2018). The management team has many years of experience operating an amusement park and hence has the necessary skills to operate the company. Aside from its affordable rates, it is also globally known, with a diverse range of entertainment items and experiences that have generated lasting equity since 1889. According to Cadenas (2021), Brighton Palace Pier has attempted to refocus and re-energize the beachfront, making it more family-friendly while still preserving its unique reputation for record-breaking adventures.
Although Brighton Palace Pier is now showing an increase in visitor attendance, its weaknesses seem to be leveraging its frequent management changes and deterioration of the Victorian colonnade along the Madeira Terraces to the east of Brighton Palace Pier and the arches to the west which support the A259 (Stephenson, 2021). Because the number of visitors is high, queues are lengthy, causing restless consumers to seek amusement elsewhere. Another flaw is that the retention rate of teens and young people has continued to decline due to their belief that there is nothing new to learn.
Brighton Palace Pier is excellently positioned to take advantage of the many opportunities available by ensuring that customers’ demands are addressed. Brighton Palace Pier has created a 21 and over nightclub to raise ticket sales and reclaim the declining retention percentage of its young adult market. As a sports bar and restaurant, the club has various extravagant themes each night to attract a fresh audience of sports fans. In addition, with the completion of the British Airways i360 in 2016, the neighbouring retail units and public space received a high-quality makeover in spring 2017.
Other big theme park rivals, such as Landal GreenParks and Dreamworld, are a serious threat, as are other economical leisure activities like miniature golfing or going to the movies (Chernev, 2020). Other risks include the current Covid-19, which has quickly expanded throughout multiple UK states. Some families may be hesitant to visit a theme park where there are hundreds or thousands of other people who may be infected with the fatal illness. Severe weather conditions may force the park to shut down temporarily.
5.0 New Marketing Objectives
Brighton Palace Pier also requires the development and implementation of a sound marketing strategy, as well as a well-experienced staff to manage the marketing strategy. The marketing strategy must be well-formulated, with offline as well as online segmentation, so that the business can drive market demands and work on the most recent implications with strategies such as mobile marketing, sales, and offline marketing (Magalhes, Pereira, Cardoso, Cairro, and Figueiredo, 2020).
First, as Rivza and Plmte (2021) argue, Brighton Palace Pier should diversify and promote itself to become financially sustainable by implementing significant expansions, alterations, repairs, and restorations, as well as by offering a diverse range of food and entertainment activities to appeal to the target demographics of families and young people. To do this, the management at Brighton Palace Pier should set specific goals that will help generate more revenue while also raising awareness of Brighton Palace Pier and making the rides the most popular attractions in neighbouring attractions.
Creating a more interactive and engaging user experience is one of the critical marketing goals for differentiating the Brighton Palace Pier and providing it with a distinct advantage in its unrivalled customer experience. It is one of the most crucial techniques to implement. The user experience should have well-equipped components that combine real and virtual entities to engage visitors.
Another important marketing goal is to create an improved website development that includes things such as high-quality photographs, videos of the tourist sites, running discounts on fares, and visitor testimonials. These interactive elements on the website keep visitors entertained and pique their interest.
6.0 Marketing Mix of the Target Market
6.1 Product
Since 1899, Brighton Palace Pier has provided merchandise to its tourists via its major channel, theme parks (Choi, Lee, and Alcorn, 2020). To remain competitive, Brighton Palace Pier ought to diversify its income streams by introducing motion simulators and renovating older piers to boost security and public image. Brighton Palace Pier can reach the target demographics of families, teenagers, and young adults thanks to the motion simulators. Brighton Palace Pier can also consider offering a diverse range of entertainment, retail, and dining options for visitors of all ages.
6.2 Price
The current price plan for Brighton Palace Pier’s online daily tickets is proving to be beneficial in terms of increasing tourist attendance (Heaven, Weston, and Briggs, 2019). To boost attendance even further, the pier ought to package online daily tickets with one-day cheap parking at a discount. Season pass holders who are 21 and over enjoy a reduced rate at Brighton Palace Pier’s exclusive nightclub, in addition to advantages such as free admission on certain days and free special events. To cater to more budget-conscious families who still want the full V.I.P. experience, online promotions provide a discount on days, regardless of the credit card used. Extended hours for special events also provide additional value to consumers aged 21 and over who are ready to pay a premium over the standard one-day entry. Another trait is that hard liquor and beer are priced more to increase profits.
6.3 Promotions
Brighton Palace Pier must attract more consumers for its marketing efforts to be effective and this is when using promos comes in handy (Morgan, Lane, and Styles, 2020). Families may come to enjoy the rides and attractions, which are all themed appropriately, and can conclude the day with a 45-minute-long firework show synced to a succession of popular contemporary music singles, thanks to sales incentives.
Advertising to get positioning messages to the public, improving the UK’s Tourist Department to keep people informed of all current promotions, and installing Go-cart Track Signs around the tracks are other promotional techniques. Freeway and site signage, sales pamphlets informing the public of all the activities discovered, and providing player prizes, and community participation are also other tactics.
7.0 Marketing Budget (Including product cost, sales price, promotion)
Salazar, Mills, and Veríssimo (2019) define marketing expenditure as expenses printing promotional brochures, magazine ads, advertising staff salaries, and the expense of social media promotion are all examples of costs directly tied to the sale of a product, service, or brand. If the expenditure is required to execute a campaign, but the firm would suffer the expense whether the product is sold, it is considered an operational expense. Operating expenditures include stationery, utilities, insurance, and supplies.
Brighton Palace Pier’s unique marketing costs include:
Hiring skilled specialists with the expertise to discover new consumers, prepare a sales technique, and establish a long-term connection incurs personal selling expenses. The marketing budget comprises the cost of hiring, onboarding, and training a sales consultant, as well as pay costs.
Brighton Palace Pier should also budget for the upgrade of its website and other digital channels. The webpage, blogs, newsletters, and social media strategy all seek to generate interest in the company’s activities and “pull” consumers towards the brand. On the upper hand, Ugolkov, Karyy, Skybinskyi, Ugolkova, and Zhezhukha (2020) argue that the cost of designing a new website is initially high, but after the site is up and operating, the continuing maintenance expenses are often minimal.
Other expenses include advertising agency charges for managing television advertisements, radio advertisements, film crews, print advertising, brochures, copywriting, and traffic generation. Billboards, transportation advertising, websites, newspapers, social media, trade publications, TV, radio, and cinema are among other alternatives.
Direct marketing campaigns, printing, and mailing are other significant marketing techniques that should be funded. Flyers, postcards, sales letters, coupons, special offers, catalogues, and brochures are all examples of direct mail.
Brighton Palace Pier should think about marketing wages and expenses to pay marketing experts such as a marketing team, content writer, computer programmer, email advertising consultant, communications director, and social media team leader as suggested by (Basil, 2019).
Conducting consumer research and surveys is another costly venture. Although market research seems to be costly, Brighton Palace Pier may get a lot of information at a low cost through the internet and industry periodicals.
Marketing consulting services, a website content management system, sponsorships, statistics, video marketing, and trade show displays are some of the additional marketing expenditures Brighton Palace Pier may incur.
8.0 Marketing Performance Evaluation
Marketing plans serve as templates for the overall business strategy, setting out every detail of what’s to happen in the next season, and are susceptible to change or review based on market changes (Kauffmann, Peral, Gil, Ferrández, Sellers, and Mora, 2019). Marketing should not be implemented and then forgotten; rather, it should be constantly analyzed, assessed, and modified to fit the firm’s aims and the customer’s wishes. Learning how to identify if a marketing plan is generating the greatest results feasible saves effort and resources while also assuring the sustainability of the organization.
Return on Investment is one approach for determining the efficacy of a marketing campaign. This is usually a significant problem when it pertains to sales promotion or any other corporate cost. The purpose is to establish if the money invested in the marketing plan was rewarded, which often means calculating the amount spent on each campaign and the number of sales produced by each campaign.
Examining sales data is another method advocated by Zhang, Cheung, and Law (2018) for measuring the value of marketing to the company. Analyzing the statistics may be the easiest and fastest way to assess if the method is working.
Furthermore, Lies (2019) contends that customer comments and reactions might provide information about the value of marketing activities to overall business performance. Customer feedback in any form may help determine the kind of reactions that marketing evokes. Internet and in-person surveys, frequent client services ratings, and online conversations may all provide information about what your customers think of the offer and which efforts are most successful.
Marketing reach expansion is another important metric to consider. If the marketing effect is increasing, the strategy’s efficacy is most likely to blame. Marketing that expands to new places, whether via customer recommendations or organic growth, shows a popular and successful product or experience, as well as an efficient promotion message. The increased marketing budget is just another sign that the present plan is working well and has garnered extra backing from the business.
9.0 Conclusion
This marketing plan is intended to aid Brighton Palace Pier in creating a new marketing campaign by outlining the marketing strategy and business plan in detail. The overall purpose of the firm and the amount of rivalry within an industry have been analysed. Additionally, many business-related factors have been observed, including consumers’ uncertainty about the performance of services, and competition. Marketing strategies were devised to mitigate the effect of these concerns. The creation of marketing strategies in branding and marketing mix strategies enables Brighton Palace Pier to assist in establishing a relationship with the target audience and competitive advantage, therefore differentiating the firm from its rivals.
10.0 Reference List
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11.0 Appendices
Appendix1: SWOT Table
Appendix 2: PESTEL Table
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