Marketing Case Study

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APRIL 23, 2020
MARKETING MANAGEMENT
TO: DR. ASHRAF TALAAT
BY: HEBA ELKARKARI
TRAP-EASE
ASSIGNMENT

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FINAL EXAM CASE STUDY
Trap-Ease: The Big Cheese of Mousetraps
1. a- Martha and the Trap-Ease investors believe they face a once-in-a-lifetime
opportunity. What information do they need to evaluate this opportunity?
First of all, I believe it’s clear that Martha and the investors didn’t conduct a SWOT analysis for
the business or at least it wasn’t done properly. Therefore, I will start by explaining the SWOT
analysis mechanism and the reason behind its importance.
A SWOT analysis is a compilation of the company's strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and
threats. The primary objective of a SWOT analysis is to help organizations develop a full
awareness of all the factors involved in making a business decision.
Perform a SWOT analysis before committing to any sort of company action, whether they are
exploring new initiatives, revamping internal policies, considering opportunities to pivot or
altering a plan midway through its execution.
SWOT analysis is used to discover recommendations and strategies, with a focus on
leveraging strengths and opportunities to overcome weaknesses and threats.
It is impossible to accurately map out a small business's future without first evaluating it from
all angles, which includes an exhaustive look at all internal and external resources and threats,
SWOT accomplishes this in four straightforward steps that any business owner can understand
and embrace."
Therefore, once risks are identified, they can then decide whether it is most appropriate to
eliminate the internal weakness by assigning company resources to fix the problems, or to
reduce the external threat by abandoning the threatened area of business and meeting it after
strengthening their business.
The Internal factors are the Strengths (S) and weaknesses (W), which are the resources and
experience readily available to them.
Some commonly considered internal factors are:
Financial resources (funding, sources of income and investment opportunities)
Physical resources (location, facilities and equipment)
Human resources (employees, volunteers and target audiences)
Access to natural resources, trademarks, patents and copyrights
Current processes (employee programs, department hierarchies and software systems)

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The External factors are the External forces that influence and affect every company,
organization and individual. Whether these factors are connected directly or indirectly to an
opportunity (O) or threat (T), it is important to note and document each one before starting the
business.
External factors are typically things their company do not control, such as the following:
Market trends (new products, technology advancements and shifts in audience needs)
Economic trends (local, national and international financial trends)
Funding (donations, legislature and other sources)
Demographics
Relationships with suppliers and partners
Political, environmental and economic regulations
After they create their SWOT framework and fill out SWOT analysis, Martha will need to come
up with some recommendations and strategies based on the results. Accordingly, she must
think that these strategies should focus on leveraging strengths and opportunities to overcome
weaknesses and threats.
This is actually the area of strategy development where any business has an opportunity to be
most creative and where innovative ideas can emerge, but only if the analysis has been
appropriately prepared in the first place.
 True, they really had once in a life time opportunity, because Trap-Ease is a new
and innovative idea for a mouse trap so it would have been a great potential for the company’s
growth and profit. However, while she was starting the new business with such an opportunity,
it was vital to know how to appropriately evaluate it. Therefore, here are some points Martha
and the investors must have considered when evaluating this business opportunity:
1. Market Size
One of the most important factors when evaluating a business opportunity is market size. A
market research here is extremely important. In order to figure out if there is a market for the
opportunity — and how big that market is.
Before they move forward, they want to be sure the demand is there. they don’t need to appeal
to a massive market, but it does help if they understand the market. Additionally, knowing how
engaged the market is and how likely they are to pay for what’s being sold can help for sure.
2. Relationships
Does the business opportunity come with some relationships? For example, do they have an
“in” that can help them to leverage the opportunity? If they know someone who is technically
minded, that can help them with certain aspects of the opportunity.

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What are their relationships with potential investors or customers? When they have more
relationships, the opportunity is likely to run smoother.
3. Ability to Manage Cash Flow
Next, you need to look at the ability to manage cash flow. Is there start-up funding for the
business? What about ways to keep funding the business each month. Figure out how the cash
flow will be managed, and take a look at the business plan. They want to make sure that the
business is likely to sustain itself after a period of time.
4. Management Skillsets
What are the skillsets of those involved? If they are evaluating their own business opportunity,
they need to be honest about what they bring to the table, and what they need to make up for.
When looking for a business opportunity to invest in, they must look at the management. What
skills do they have? Are they appropriate and diversified? Do they trust their competencies of
the principals to make the opportunity a success?
5. Passion and Persistence
Even if there is a bit of a talent deficit, it’s possible, in some cases, to make up for that with
passion and persistence. Are they working with people who will get the job done?
Do they trust that they have the passion to make things happen? Will they approach problems
with a can-do attitude in order to solve them?
When dealing with their own startup, they need to make sure they have the passion and
persistence for the opportunity.
If they’ve done their research, and they are confident in their team and their plan, then being
able to push through is vital.
Once they’re done evaluating the business opportunity, it’s time to decide whether it’s a good
idea to make a move. Sometimes, the answer is no. Going through the exercise can help them
make these decisions faster — before they waste too much time on “opportunities” that really
aren’t.
Conclusion from all of the above, preparing a proper SWOT Analysis and answers to these
and other “marketing research” types of questions would have given the investors a better feel
for the challenges facing them in marketing the mousetrap, and accordingly they lost the
opportunity.

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1. b- How do you think the group would write its mission statement? How would you
write it?
A powerful mission statement in any business says to both employees and potential customers
that they value quality products and services at competitive prices. A mission statement
articulates the purpose of the business. That makes it an important part of any brand building
plan. We should carefully consider how the right mission statement can work for our business.
Any businesses need a mission statement because a well-crafted mission statement focuses
the business for both employees and the target audience. It serves as a framework, giving
everyone involved a launching point to build from when establishing the brand. For consumers,
it sets the company apart from the competition without limiting the business purpose.
A mission statement should tell others why the business exists and what makes it different.
The strong statement should focus on these four elements.
Value – What is the value of the business to both customers and employees?
Inspiration – Why should people want to work for the company?
Plausibility – Make it sound reasonable
Specificity – Tie it back to the business
 In our case their mission statement is
“If a man [can] make a better mousetrap than his neighbor … the world will make a beaten
path to his door.”
In my opinion it might fit any organization, rather than vividly capturing the essence and
importance of their particular business, it is Unclear, unoriginal, and uninspiring, and ends up
sounding aimless rather than directional, and empty rather than uniquely compelling. A strong
mission statement should cause a positive emotional response. Every word matter.
Accordingly, I think that the mission statement should be written in a such a way where it
describes how this mouse trap is something different and innovative compared to its
traditional counter parts because i think if the difference is clearly mentioned in the mission
statement than it would definitely catch the interest of the customer when they are deciding
on which mouse trap to buy.
Therefore, the mission statement of Martha and Tap-ease should for example be as follows:
“We are providing an innovative animal friendly product which is efficient, easy to use, free
from mess, safe in every human way”

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2. Has Martha identified the best target market for Trap-Ease? What other market
segments might the firm target?
In order to answer this question, we need to answer another question first, which is how to
identify a target market:
Every sales team and entrepreneur need to know their customer. Who is the ideal fit for
our offering? What are their interests and priorities? Answering these questions can help
us prioritize the deals we're most likely to win.
A target market is a group of customers for which our products and services are aimed.
It's usually first defined by an industry.
To Identify our Target Market, we should do the following:
- Analyze our product or service.
- Check out the competition.
- Choose criteria to segment by.
- Perform research.
a- Analyze our product or service.
By taking a look at what we're selling so we'll understand which consumers would get
value out of our product. The questions below will help with the brainstorming process:
What need does our product or service fill?
Are there any problems or pain points it solves for?
Who would benefit most from our product or service?
b- Check out the competition.
By performing analysis of our competitors to see who they're targeting. Taking a look at
their customer base and see if we can find an area of the market we could focus on that
they might be missing.
c- Choose criteria to segment by.
A target market can be segmented by a few different variables. Consumers can be split by
demographic, geographic, and behavioral factors.
Most common ways to segment a target market are by: Age, Gender, Income, Location,
Behavior, Lifestyle, Values, Interests.
d- Perform research.
As we begin to narrow our market, it's time to research further. What marketing strategies
should we use to reach our potential target market? Is the target market large enough for
our product or service? Market research will help to figure out which target market.
Picking the right target market can tell us a great deal about our business. Are we looking
to become a true velocity business, or do we see ourselves as a steadier flow of pipeline
with enterprises and consumers?

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 In our case I think Martha targeted correctly but not enough and let me explain you
how:
Women are a good target market: because they don’t like the mess or the risks created by
traditional mouse traps. They also are concerned about the safety of children and pets that
may be around the home because once the spring-loaded trap has caught a mouse, one
often has a mess resulting from its action. The mess leads to diseases that may be carried by
mice.
 However, I believe Martha had to consider the following while targeting this
segment:
The female segment of the market is an under-developed opportunity, possibly the number
one opportunity, for those who really understand what women really want. Women are now
the key decision-makers when it comes to buying.
Women, as consumers, are clearly not a homogenous group that behave and act in a
predictable way. Women will spend more with a brand that ‘gets it’ without trying too hard.
Different women have different needs and wants.
However, they are all in different situations, depending on age, whether they have families,
and so on. If you focus on one type of woman, you risk alienating large sections of the female
population, and the male population as well. You actually need to go deeper to find out what
motivates your target market. Issues such as age and income are often far more important.
There is no one-size-fits-all guide to marketing to women. Every customer base is different,
and here are some general dos and don'ts:
- Build relationships. Gather customer intelligence and use personalization tools to
target female consumers with specific messages.
- Avoid negative campaigns - give positive reasons to buy.
- Be aware that women usually shop around and do their research before they buy. Be
sure to promote added-value details such as after-sales service.
- Don't stereotype women
- Don't go to extremes. Marketing to women is about catering to all their needs - not just
focusing on the ways in which they differ to men.
 Therefore, in my opinion Martha could have divided the target segment of women
into different groups by age, profession, marital status as detailed above and then
created different ways to sell Trap-Ease to each group of women.
 There are a number of other market segments that Martha could have targeted
such as follows:

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- Any business that handles or stores food and consequently, is attractive to rats and
mice would be a potential target.
- Restaurants because of the presence of food and food products and also because
these establishments cannot use chemicals near food.
- This also should suggest food wholesalers or warehouses where large quantities of
food may be stored in the channel of distribution.
- Food manufacturers also need rodent protection.
- Sea ports where containers arrive most of the time full of rodents from different
countries all over the world.
- Another potential market is research laboratories. Here, researchers use large
numbers of mice in research projects, because they must work in areas where
chemicals would not be allowed and traditional traps would have the same messiness
problem, these companies might be a target market.
- These exterminator companies might also sell the traps directly to consumers with
whom they deal.
- Animal lovers as this product does not really kill the mouse and it also is less of a
threat to the other animals.

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3. How has the company positioned the Trap-Ease relative to the chosen target
market? Could it position the product in other ways?
First, what is the definition of Positioning:
Positioning defines where your product (item or service) stands in relation to others offering
similar products and services in the marketplace as well as the mind of the consumer.
The key to ensuring successful product positioning is to present our products in the most
honest, impactful way possible. The whole point is to stand out and be unique. We need to
capture our audience’s attention and hold it.
“Great communicators have an appreciation for positioning. They understand the people
they’re trying to reach and what they can and can’t hear. They send their message in through
an open door rather than trying to push it through a wall.” – John Kotter
 The company has positioned the Trap-Ease to be more effective compared with
traditional spring-loaded traps or poisons. Consumer could use it safely and easily with
no risk of catching their fingers while loading it. It posed no injury or poisoning threat to
children or pets. The Trap-Ease created no clean-up problem and no unpleasant mess.
The user could reuse the trap or simply throw it away.
 Actually, Martha had a great invention in hands and it was unique and special. However,
she didn’t use this opportunity efficiently and unfortunately she had a poor positioning
for the Trap-Ease. Therefore, I will describe now the steps that she would have taken in
order to achieve a great product positioning:
a- Know Your Target Audience
Never give her target audience what they need. Give them what they want. People don’t
buy what they need. They buy what they want. It’s Martha’s job to discover everything
possibly can about the target audience. Understanding demographics, lifestyle, and
spending habits can make the difference between reaching and distancing the target
audience. If she can make her product positioning feel natural and unobtrusive, it can add
a massive amount of value to her marketing.
b- Tell Them Who We Are
Establish brand credibility and she can establish a long-term relationship with target
audiences. People that trust a brand are much more inclined to purchase from that brand.
Without making promises or claims that can’t be verified or aren’t true. Honesty and
transparency are the best policies and will promote healthier product positioning.

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c- Provide Evidence
She can’t build brand credibility until she proves that her brand is reliable and trustworthy.
The best way to establish credibility is by presenting evidence. Customer reviews,
testimonials, case studies, sales numbers, and statistics are just a few methods that can be
used to great effect. Reviews are especially powerful.
d- Value Proposition
Her value proposition needs to answer a crucial question; How can the product improve the
lives of her customer? Her target audience will dismiss her product in a heartbeat if they
don’t perceive any value. This is the most important aspect of product positioning and one
of the hardest to execute effectively. She should Discover the most valuable aspects of her
product and then look for ways to promise and deliver on that value.
e- Unique Selling Proposition
How is Trap Ease product unique? What distinct problem does it solve? In order to make
this work for her product positioning, she needs to pinpoint exactly what makes her products
and brand unique. Then, convey those elements to her target audience. People love to
have ownership in brands and products that are different and can stand out.
f- Segment her Market
She can’t appeal to everyone in her target market without customization. Separation of
audience into groups with shared traits, habits, and needs is very important. Once this is
accomplished she’ll be able to speak to the individual wants of each group with more
authority and influence.
g- Carefully Craft her Message
Each market segment has difference communication requirements. The medium, channel,
voice, and tone of each segment should feel custom and personal. She should have started
by creating a positioning statement for each of her segments:
h- Define her ideal target customer
Decide how her product will impact the target customer. Determine how she will fulfill
product claims. Once she has determined these qualifiers she can begin crafting custom
messages that speak to the values and interests of each segment.
e- Know her Competition
Knowing the details of her competition is the key to differentiation in product positioning.
There are a few ways to differentiate products and brand:
Innovation. Like in our case where the product is unique and memorable then she has an
edge over the competition.

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Improvement. Make a better mousetrap and market it better than the competition.
Core values. Stand out from the crowd with admirable core values and policies that can’t
be replicated.
i- Showcase her Expertise
Demonstrate why her target audience should do business with her company. What makes
her the best? Why is her product a better choice than any other product in its category?
Demonstrations, testing, and trials can be very effective product positioning tools.
Especially that she had won awards, been highly ranked, and professionally reviewed so
that’s the perfect opportunity to showcase the efficacy of Trap-Ease product.
j- Focus on Competitive Advantages
At the end of the day, it boils down to building a competitive advantage. What we’re
selling doesn’t matter as much as the way it’s being sold. Of course, we can’t expect to
sell a product that doesn’t work and doesn’t deliver on claims without eventually going out
of business. Ultimately it’s the way we build a competitive advantage that will set our
product positioning apart.
Second, could it position the product in other ways?
 Trap-Ease could also position the product as causing less waist because it is re-useable
or they could lower its cost and make it more affordable. By making it “the most
affordable, innovative mouse trap” on the market they could probably gain some more
demand.
 Another way in which they could position their product would be by having an incredibly
good customer service team that could deliver services to their customers that were
having problems using the product. By having a good customer service team, they could
build better relationships with their customers and increase their customer equity.
 The company should connect the features of the mousetrap with the wants of their
target customer. They should position it in a way that the customer will be willing and
able to buy it, in order to generate a larger demand. Trap-Ease could have spent more
money in advertising promoting good quality trap.
 The company has featured Trap-Ease it in two magazines: People and Good
Housekeeping and plus Trap-Ease has won the Good Housekeeping Seal of Approval,
and beat out over 300 new products at the National Hardware Show which helped to
promote the product. Martha has also set up distribution contacts with national grocery,
hardware and drug chains, to avoid wholesalers/middlemen.

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 I think what she did wasn’t enough at all and that Trap-Ease should have been more
advertised by placing an advertisement on TV shows that the targeted market segment
usually sees, and by targeting Social Media Marketing as well.
Conclusion: I believe if Martha didn’t ignore the ten elements described above, would have
achieved great product positioning.

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4. Describe the current marketing mix for Trap-Ease. Do you see any problems
with this mix?
Along my answer I will develop each of the 7Ps of the marketing mix in the diagram above,
explaining what Martha had done wrong in each one.
“It has been said many MANY times in business, that if you don’t know your target market well
enough and didn’t figure out what they exactly want, you will commit an entrepreneurial suicide,
and the business will inevitably fail…”
On the other hand, she can be sure to attract mountains of profits when she has a deep
understanding of these concepts. If she had understood this fully, she would have known
exactly how to maximize profits on her own sustainable business or help become a valuable
asset within her company and gain endless promotions.
Sadly, for Martha, this concept is glossed over as “everyone seems to know what it is” and is
disregarded as basic knowledge.
The marketing mix definition is simple. It is about putting the right product or a
combination thereof in the place, at the right time, and at the right price.
The difficult part is doing this well, as she needs to know every aspect of her business plan.

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1. Product:
A product is an item that is built or produced to satisfy the needs of a certain group of
people. The product can be intangible or tangible as it can be in the form of services or
goods. We must ensure to have the right type of product that is in demand for our market.
So during the product development phase, the marketer must do an extensive research
on the life cycle of the product that they are creating.
A product has a certain life that includes the growth phase, the maturity phase, and the
sales decline phase. It is important for marketers to reinvent their products to stimulate
more demand once it reaches the sales decline phase. Marketers must also create the
right product mix. It may be wise to expand our current product mix by diversifying and
increasing the depth of your product line.
 The Trap-Ease mouse trap is a new and innovative idea for catching mice in a
more safe, hygienic and effective way and it does not create a mess while or after
the mouse is caught.
 I believe it’s great product when starting a new business, however and as
mentioned above they need to think in updating features to stimulate more
demand and maintain continuity in the market.
All in all, Martha must have asked herself the question “what can I do to offer a better
product to this group of people than my competitors”.
2. Price
The price of the product is basically the amount that a customer pays for to enjoy it.
Price is a very important component of the marketing mix definition. It is also a very
important component of a marketing plan as it determines our firm’s profit and survival.
Adjusting the price of the product has a big impact on the entire marketing strategy as
well as greatly affecting the sales and demand of the product. This is inherently a touchy
area though. If a company is new to the market and has not made a name for
themselves yet, it is unlikely that your target market will be willing to pay a high
price.
Although they may be willing in the future to hand over large sums of money, it is
inevitably harder to get them to do so during the birth of a business. Pricing always
help shape the perception of your product in consumers’ eyes.
When setting the product price, marketers should consider the perceived value that
the product offers and which pricing strategy are they going to use, whether Market
penetration pricing, Market skimming pricing or Neutral pricing.

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 Trap-Ease price is $2.99, in my opinion this price is high justified by the above
bold sentence especially when compared to its closest competitors and from the
customer’s point of view that may not be worth the added value in the product
itself. The retailers are given no motivation to sell the product in their stores and
no incentive is offered to invite consumer to purchase. The problem is when
prices are too high, it will make costs outweigh the benefits in customers’ eyes,
and they will therefore value their money over her product.
 I think under one condition, this price can be considered acceptable if Martha was
smart enough from the start to position the product correctly, using a quality
differentiation strategy showing how the product is unique, added value, can be
reused, animal friendly, clean, safe and all what have been mentioned in details
in the previous question.
3. Place:
Placement or distribution is a very important part of the product mix definition. We have
to position and distribute the product in a place that is accessible to potential buyers.
This comes with a deep understanding of our target market.
 Trap-Ease is located in the top hardware, grocery and drug chains; this is not
offering enough market coverage. Transportation of orders to retailers is not
being done in a timely manner. The Trap-Ease is not sufficiently exposed to the
customer.
 Martha had to understand the target market inside out in order to be able to
discover the most efficient positioning and distribution channels that directly
speak with her market.
4. Promotion:
Promotion is a very important component of marketing as it can boost brand recognition
and sales. Promotion is comprised of various elements like: Sales Organization, Public
Relations, Advertising, Sales Promotion.
Advertising typically covers communication methods that are paid for like television
advertisements, radio commercials, print media, and internet advertisements.
In contemporary times, there seems to be a shift in focus offline to the online world.
Public relations, on the other hand, are communications that are typically not paid for.
This includes press releases, exhibitions, sponsorship deals, seminars, conferences,
and events.
Word of mouth is also a type of product promotion. Word of mouth is an informal
communication about the benefits of the product by satisfied customers and ordinary

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individuals. The sales staff plays a very important role in public relations and word of
mouth.
It is important to not take this literally. Word of mouth can also circulate on the internet.
Harnessed effectively and it has the potential to be one of the most valuable assets we
have in boosting our profits online.
An extremely good example of this is online social media and managing a firm's online
social media presence.
Our combination of promotional strategies and how we go about promotion depends on
our budget.
 Here, the product won the first place over 300 new products at the National Hardware
Show in Toronto which helped to promote the product, in addition Canadian Business
magazine had written an article about the mousetrap, and the television show
“MarketPlace” and trade publications had featured it.
 Martha had budgeted approximately $60,000 for the first year. She planned to use
$50,000 of this amount for travel costs to visit trade shows and to make sales calls on
retailers. She would use the remaining $10,000 for advertising. Because the mousetrap
had generated so much publicity, however, she had not felt the need to do much
advertising. Still, she had placed advertising in Chatelaine and in other home
magazines.
 Here we have a problem because the allocated budget seems not enough in addition
that the allocation itself wasn’t correct justified by my explanation above about promotion
techniques.
 She missed totally the digital and social media marketing which represents now agreat
percentage from any successful marketing. People using online shopping are often into
quality, ease of use, and innovativeness and don’t mind spending a little more money to
get what they want. It is also a high profit market because it reduces transportation costs
and there are no middle man costs. They should have promoted over the internet for
certain sites that they think their target market will be visiting.
 They should also have thought about putting out ads on TV. In this changing high tech
environment magazine ads aren’t enough anymore.
5. People
Thorough research it is important to discover whether there are enough people in our
target market that is in demand for certain types of products and services.

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The company’s employees are important in marketing because they are the ones who
deliver the service.
It is important to hire and train the right people to deliver superior service to the clients,
whether they run a support desk, customer service, copywriters, programmers…etc.
When a business finds people who genuinely believe in the products or services that
the particular business creates, it's is highly likely that the employees will perform the
best they can. Additionally, they'll be more open to honest feedback about the business
and input their own thoughts and passions which can scale and grow the business.
This is a secret, “internal” competitive advantage a business can have over other
competitors which can inherently affect a business's position in the marketplace.
 In our case, Martha didn’t give any importance to the human capital, because its
clearly mentioned in the case “Martha was the company’s only salesperson, but
she intended to hire more salespeople soon.”
 Therefore, she missed the opportunity to have a good professional sales and
marketers team that can be able to market the product efficiently.
6. Process
The systems and processes of the organization affect the execution of the
service. “So, we have to make sure that we have a well-tailored process in place to
minimize costs.” Process refers to the flow of activities or mechanism that take place
when there is in an interaction between the customers and the businesses.
 Martha had to make sure that the company processes are sound – that her customer
experience is as it should be and that their business delivers its service in a correct,
timely and uniform manner. This means that she should have delivered her service
with personality. If she was confident about her processes, this in fact liberates her
and the team to be personal and attentive in her delivery. And that’s wonderful
for branding and gaining positive testimonials. unfortunately, she did nothing from all
of the above.
7. Physical Evidence
Physical Evidence is about what it says on the tin – the idea that our service business
needs to “look the part”. How can an intangible service achieve this? It’s about how your
premises and other assets (along with your service delivery) match
our branding message. How do our premises and other facets of our business look?

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Are we portraying the right type of physical evidence that will attract our target market
to do business with us?
 I believe that Martha also didn’t give consideration to packaging or to the type of
service that can be achieved through the physical evidence.
 Like the others, it cannot stand alone, but great physical evidence can greatly help
her business set the right tone and thrive.
Conclusion:
“For one there had not been enough repeat buying. For another, she had noted that many of
the retailers kept their sample mousetraps on their desks as conversation pieces—she wanted
to traps to be used and demonstrated. Martha wondered whether consumers were buying the
traps as novelties rather than as a solution to their mouse problems.”
 This paragraph shows enough how the marketing mix she applied was really poor and
bad. Bad marketing is characterized by poor company objectives. The objectives could
be lack of profitability, low volume in the market share or production capacity utilization
or even low sales rank in the market, lack of stability which includes low variance in
profitability. The effects of poor company objectives are that they are never suitable,
measurable, acceptable or motivating. Another effect of bad marketing is outdated
competition strategies. The outdated competitive strategies would include offering to
buyers poor quality products at high prices, or making products of lower quality than
competitors. The competitive strategies in a marketing essay would be low cost
leadership e.g. small scale production, hard to manufacture product designs,
unpredictably increasing product costs to counter the losses incurred.

 It is also characterized by poor market niche identification. Here the product targets few
potential consumers making it hard to archive the company objectives like the one on
profitability. In addition, bad marketing leads to poor market objectives, this means that
the company can’t achieve viable level of sales as well as increase or maintain,
maximize cash flow or sustain profitability. Bad marketing experiences problems in
laying out marketing strategies. This simply means that the marketing objectives as
outlined can never be realized. As a result, there would be low willingness or ability by
consumers to buy the product, decreased level of consumption and replacement due
to decreased rate of purchase, loss of consumers by lack of line extensions, lack of
bundling ability as well as trailing in the price/cost dominance.

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 Quality of marketing programs also play an important role. The effect of bad marketing
on market is viewed firstly in the manner in which consumers are informed, persuaded
and influenced to consume a product. Poor promotion is viewed through inefficient
hence ineffective advertising, poor publicity, and inadequate sales promotions without
clear promotions objectives, quality information and poor criteria for measuring success.
Poor promotions objectives don’t provide information, doesn’t increase demand
differentiate the products nor stabilize the sales.
 Poor pricing is another bad marketing factor. With the main aim of company being
increased profitability, poor pricing of products without consideration of the consumer
leads to lose of trust in individuals on a given company and product which lowers sales
and profits.

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5. Who is Trap-Ease’s direct competition? Who are indirect competitors?
Direct competition is any company that offers the same thing as us while indirect
competition refers to a business whose products or services is different from ours but
potentially could satisfy the same need and reach the same goal.
With greater success comes greater competition to acquire more customers. How we go
about monitoring our competition is important to achieving sustainable growth.
To succeed in growing our business, we have to understand what direct and indirect
competition in our market is. Their influence matters as an unseen, yet ever-present,
element that impacts our business. They compete with our brand and join in on the fight for
customers’ attention.
Therefore, by discovering how we can uncover both direct and indirect competition we’re
up against, shape our strategy, and build a sustainable business for the future.
 Even though Trap-Ease has a patent on its mousetrap, it does have competition. People
may tend to think that a patent protects a firm from competition. Obviously, the
traditional, spring-loaded trap, sticky pads, or tape, and poison are all direct competitors.
Although the Trap- Ease trap has significant advantages, its price means that for many
low-income consumers who probably have more mice problems, Trap-Ease is too
expensive.
 Consumers who have better incomes and who may not be excited about dealing with
dead or alive mice will probably simply turn to exterminators to take care of their
problems. Although exterminators are more expensive, the benefits of having someone
else take care of this unpleasant problem will be attractive to many consumers. Thus,
Trap-Ease finds itself with direct competition both above and below its relative price.
This competition significantly reduces the size of the target market.
 I think indirect competition can be with pesticides, pets like cats, and Ultra– Sound
Repellent.

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6. How would you change Trap-Ease’s marketing strategy? What kinds of control
procedures would you establish for this strategy?
For any decision to be taken at corporate level, we need the right strategic tools. Ansoff
matrix is one of them. Ansoff matrix helps a firm decide their market growth as well as
product growth strategies. The 2 questions which the Ansoff Matrix can answer is “How
can we grow in the existing markets” and “What amends can be made in the product
portfolio to have better growth”.
From the above two questions, it is clear that Ansoff’s matrix deals with the companies’
external market scenario as well as the product portfolio which the firm has. The matrix
is divided in two quadrants – The product quadrant and the market quadrant. The
Product quadrant on the X axis is further divided into Existing products and New
products. The market scenario on the Y axis is divided into existing markets and new
markets. Thus the Ansoff’s matrix divides a firm on the basis of the products it has –
existing products or new products, as well as the markets it is in – existing markets or
new markets.
Depending on the characteristic of each, the marketing strategy is decided. These
marketing strategies are as follows.

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Market Penetration, Market Development, Product Development and Diversification.
a- Market Penetration:
In the Ansoff’s matrix, market penetration is adopted as a strategy when the firm has an
existing product and needs a growth strategy for an existing market. Most telecom
products are existing in the market and they have the same market to supply. Thus in
such cases the competition is higher and you might have to go out of the way to satisfy
your market or to increase your firms market share.
Several things have to be considered when adopting the Market penetration strategy.
By using market penetration, we are ensuring that only the existing resources of the firm
are used and no extra costs need to be incurred in setting up a new unit for. At the same
time, our current group of employees are the best people to notice any growth
opportunities in the existing market. Thus they need to be used optimally by providing
them the right information at the right time. There needs to be a combination of
marketing and sales promotions if we have to grow in an existing market with an existing
product, which is not our case here.
b- Market Development
Market development is the second market growth strategy which can be adopted as per
the Ansoff’s matrix. The market development strategy is used when the firm targets a
new market with existing products. Every other day we hear of one or the other
companies thinking of lunching their products in a new country. That’s the perfect
example of market development. Similarly, on a micro level, expanding from a current
market to another market where your product does not exist is also an example of
market development.
For market development, we have to treat our product as a new entrant in the market.
Thus there are several factors which influence the market development strategy of a
firm. If the product already has a high brand equity, it possibly just needs distribution
points in the new market (Example – Walmart). The same goes if the product is a needs
product and known to be of high quality. On the other hand, if the product is not
established in our current market, it is not recommended to start a market development
strategy. We need to first satisfy our existing markets.
The risk factor of a market development strategy is higher. This is because lots of
investment needs to be done when entering new markets. We need to advertise and
market our product for the customers to adopt it. For the same we need to invest in
admin expenses, advertising expenses, possibly new production facilities, so on and so
forth. Thus we might have to develop new strategic business units itself to have a strong

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market development. This is exactly what is done in international firms, wherein the unit
in another country is treated as a separate business unit or a profit center.
c- Product Development
Product development in the Ansoff matrix refers to firms which have a good market
share in an existing market and therefore might need to introduce new products for
expansion. Product development mainly happens when we have a good customer base
and we know that the market for our existing product has reached saturation. Thus we
cannot apply the market penetration strategy. We can therefore opt for a new product
development strategy which satisfies our existing market.
The product development strategy, like the market development strategy is risky. This
is because product development involves investing in developing a completely new
product. The product will also need further investments for distribution, marketing and
manpower. Furthermore, by introducing a wrong product which does not gain
acceptance in the market, we might be affecting our brand equity. Thus plotting our firm
in the right quadrant on the Ansoff matrix becomes critical.
d- Diversification
Diversification is a strategy used in the Ansoff’s matrix when the product is completely
new and is being introduced in a new market.
However, Diversification should be taken as a last option and should be adopted only
when the company is very strong financially. As seen in the above two strategies, if the
product or the market changes, the company has to do some heavy investments to be
successful. In case of Diversification, both product and market are new and hence the
amount of investment required would be high thereby considerably increasing the risk
factor. Therefore, we see larger groups with deep pockets and multiple SBU’s actually
using the process of diversification.
 After explaining the four different strategies, we can conclude that Martha with Trape-
Ease invention, applied the Diversification strategy as the Product is new and the market
is new because it’s a start-up company who is trying to have a market share and attempt
to leverage any brand recognition or customer loyalty in the new market.

 However, Martha had a poor diversification strategy as a natural result unfortunately to
her poor marketing mix, described in details previously. Therefore, I will try here to
explain her the steps that must be followed in order to have her business on track again:

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The question of when and how often a business should update their marketing strategy
is related to a whole variety of forces – the industry, target buyers, market trends, sales
cycle and other specific needs a business may have. That’s why we need to create a
structure to plan, track and reassess our strategy, correcting and potentially overhauling
as warranted.
That system looks more or less like this:
 Build a detailed strategy designed to achieve your business goals.
 Monitor her results. Quarterly reviews are an excellent opportunity to review her goals,
tactics and the outcome of her efforts to make sure she is on track to hit her milestones.
 Think small. Monthly reviews are a great way to keep individual channels on track.
 Reviewing her efforts on a monthly and quarterly basis will help you determine if a
strategy shift is in the cards.
Keeping in mind that changing the direction of their marketing strategy is not a decision to
make lightly. After all, careful planning alone takes a lot of time, not to mention the hours
and costs spent on implementation and potential lost revenue as they work to establish a
footing in new areas. More importantly, when the change is significant, the effects will flow
through their entire business. If that flow in turn throws their whole company out of balance,
it can be difficult to right the ship – especially if you lose good people in the process. Which
will lead us to:
 Team
If she has been thoughtful and intentional with her hiring practices, her team is likely her
greatest asset, and everyone is clear on their roles and responsibilities. But when changing
marketing strategy, first step is hiring a marketing and sales team that is professional to
market and sell the products.
It’s worth considering how the new strategy will affect the daily responsibilities of my people
and the chain of command. Therefore, coordination with HR to figure out what
communication needs to happen for a seamless transition.
 Work
Her work is her company’s output: the services, products, profit, revenue, change or impact
you’re making in the community – on a business level and on the team and employee levels.
Unless the plan is purely to cut costs in preparation of a merger or acquisition, a change in
strategy is typically developed for the very purpose of improving a business’s output. That
said, even if that’s the motive, it’s important to consider what impact the new strategy will
have on all levels of the work being performed.

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 Systems and Structure
Whether a small team of resourceful collaborators, or large distributed workforce with rigid
duties and outsourced talent all over the country, any business is built on systems,
structures and processes that keep our business running efficiently.
A significant strategy change warrants a full review of these systems and structures. With
the new direction, therefore, the structures should provide the organization, guidance and
capacity they need in order to see their plan through. Which will be implemented through
rules, policies, structures or processes that will need to evolve.
 Culture
If they enjoy a strong company culture, this is a big one. Along with the tangible elements
they can control and map out – like our culture code, mission statement and values – there
are the unspoken ideals, personalities, attitudes and goals that motivate their team to
perform and which guide their hiring and firing.
Will a new strategy align with the culture? Will it help it? Strain it? Therefore, she must
consider interviewing a few employees who exemplify her culture to see how they feel about
the change.
Conclusion:
Considering the Interrelation between these factors, it’s important to keep in mind is that a
change in any one of these four aspects business affects everything it’s connected to. The
business is in balance because each aspect is in sync (i.e. her structure is aligned with her
culture, which is aligned with her team, which supports he work – and so on).
Which also leads to the same result I began with which is based on a CORRECT
MARKETING MIX. Therefore, even if she chose the right strategy which is Diversification,
but she didn’t implement it well, because it’s based on poor or even non-existent marketing
mix, the result will be poor as well. Therefore, she may need to redo her 7ps correctly and
it automatically end up with a successful business marketing strategy.
Also, if she had started successfully with the Diversification strategy because it’s a new
product belonging to a new company, she would be able to apply other strategies easily
when she had already satisfied the market and wants to expand from the current market to
another where her product does not exist by applying the market development strategy.
Under the same context, she can then apply the Product Development Strategy, where she
has a good market share in an existing market and therefore might need to introduce new
products to the markets.

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Marketing control procedures applied:
Marketing control is used by small business owners to monitor and evaluate their current
marketing strategies to identify needed adjustments and set guidelines for the future to achieve
marketing and business goals. Although businesses and marketing firms have designed many
marketing control techniques over the years, a handful of techniques stand out from the rest.
 I will apply five major marketing control techniques which are competitor analysis,
customer analysis, testing research, customer feedback and cost analysis.
a- Analysis of Competitor Offerings and Strategies
Trap-Ease business owners need to know how their products, services and marketing strategy
compare to local, regional, national and international competitors to retain existing customers
and attract new ones. Competitor analysis involves checking out the new products or services
offered by our competitors, examining their marketing strategies and determining whether they
are succeeding or failing with their businesses. Then, use this information to adjust our
strategies accordingly. For example, they could hire a mystery shopper to shop at our
competitor's store to acquire information or visit businesses similar to our own in other regions
and speak with their owners to get ideas.
b- Existing Customer Analysis
Another way to monitor and evaluate our marketing is to perform an existing customer analysis
to provide a detailed picture of the types of customers buying our products or services. An
analysis involves gathering data about our customers during or after check out and then
tabulating this information in a spreadsheet for comparison. For example, they might gather
data about their customers such as their geographical location, average age and sex. In
addition, they might gather spending habits data such as average purchase amounts, amount
and type of foot traffic before and after advertising and coupon or discount usage.
c- Testing Research with a Focus Group
Once we identified the target customer base, they can determine the potential success of a
new product or service, the marketing methods needed to promote and sell it and the financial
impact of a planned marketing strategy through prerelease group testing. One example of
testing research involves communication with a focus group of 10 to 15 people from our target
customer base. Ask them to discuss in general the products and services they like and dislike
to help them brainstorm ideas for the future, or ask them to try one of our new products or
services and provide feedback.
d- Customer Opinions and Feedback
Customer feedback is a marketing control technique similar to testing research, but instead of
gaining insight into future products and services, we evaluate customers' opinions of existing
products or services and the marketing methods we currently use. Customer feedback might
involve inviting our customers to complete a survey, offer opinions through a suggestion box

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or respond to specific questions in-person or over the phone after they've purchased a product
or service. Other customer feedback methods include asking our employees for feedback and
maintaining a list of the types of products or services customers have inquired about that you
don't currently offer.
e- Cost Analysis and Comparison with Budget
Small-business owners use cost analysis to create an overall picture of the cost of existing
marketing strategies to reduce costs, weed out products and marketing strategies that aren't
working and create a new budget to use moving forward. To perform a cost analysis, we need
to look at the current costs involved with all aspects of our business including inventory,
distribution and the current costs of our marketing strategies. After we determine the costs, we
compare the numbers with our existing budget and the costs of alternative marketing methods.
Conclusion, by applying these marketing control procedures they will guarantee them a
successful business.