Grow your Positioning Strategies for business

Political: Understanding the politics and political leaders of the new country is very important. Starbucks has to be aware of any political issues and a conflicts happening in the target country and it has to make changes in its plans according to that. For e.g. Iraq war had a negative impact on Starbucks business.

Economical: Economic stability of the target country is very important. Growth, GDP, inflation etc. are some of the very important factors to be considered. Economic slowdown in 2000 impacted Starbucks business development strategies and revenue in many countries. Countries which are vulnerable to these economic slowdowns should not be targeted.

Technical: Technology dependency is increasing these days. So Starbucks has to implement software packages like CRM, SCM etc. for better running of operations and for better relationships with customers and suppliers.

Three Micro Environmental factors impacting Starbucks are as follows:

Suppliers

Starbucks depends upon the relationship with suppliers and quality of beans provided by the suppliers. Any issue or conflict with them can put a full stop on Starbucks business

We have already discussed that the customers will be targeted on the basis of their age for the two products we have selected. Now we will try to find out the positioning strategy for these products to the selected target market. Positioning is defined as the way we want the customer to perceive our product. I feel that the first sugar-free ice stalled product should be positioned as healthy product. Customers who are very health conscious should be able to relate themselves with this product. It will be marketed by advertising some of its health benefits to the customers. Oreo Frappuccino will be positioned as a finger licking or very tasty product. If you have one you will not be able to resist yourself from having other one. These types of taglines can be used while advertising these products. Positioning strategy also says that the customer should be able to connect itself with the product. Customer should be able to see benefits in the product and it should be worth buying. Customer should be able to see a value in the product.

Different ways and mind-sets of the customers is called buying behaviour. All the customers select a product on the basis of different thoughts (Howard, 1994). Some focuses on the quality of the product and for some customer, price of the product is very important. Some also get influenced by the promotional offers and discounts. All these things come under buying behaviour of a customer. On the basis of buying behaviour of target customers marketing and advertising strategies are developed. A market research agent will be helpful for Starbucks to know buyer behaviour in the target country. The two buyer behaviour situations are as follows:

• In the initial 3 months Starbucks should give discounts and combo family offers to attract more and more customers. It should also implement these promotional strategies during weekend and special occasions like festivals, public holidays etc.

Social media is also very helpful in knowing the behaviour of the customers. Youth can give their feedback in these sites and even Starbucks can get its questionnaire of market research filled from the users if these social networking sites.