By Mr. Vidsanu Vongsurakrai. BBA#13

www.manager.co.th - ???????? ??. ??????????????? Yaris Marketing Plan Contest 2007

Hmm?I truly have no idea how to begin this piece of writing and for that I must admit that this is quite a new and unusual experience for me as well as my teammates who are still astonished by the fact that we have just achieved something rather large on our very own.

This entire surprising incident has begun on a fine afternoon when a group of marketing students and one accounting major got together and thought to ourselves that we are presently on the verge of graduation but our resumes were merely nothing than a blank piece of paper with our names on it. All at once, we immediately realized that it was time to take some action. And I would like to take this opportunity to thank one of our dearest friends Mr.Nattawat Samattadol (Save) for initiating this whole marketing contest spirit but never really got around to do it. We had many options available for us but deliberately chose to engage in the Toyota Yaris Marketing Contest 2007 as it was the only one that gave us adequate time to accomplish before the deadline.    

Our team (Yaris Me) composed of Mr.Anuthep Ariyaphanneekun (Nu), Mr.Kittipon Nampitch (Beam), Miss Natnich Suksawasdi (Nat), Miss Orapa Tachochavalit (Pup) and Mr.Vidsanu Vongsurakrai (Mark). Our task was to relaunch Toyota Yaris marketing campaign with the assigned budget of 1 million baht. We started off by conducting both primary and secondary research to gain a general idea of what the symptoms of the problem are. As a result we have found out that most of our target audiences are having difficulties understanding the current marketing campaign designed by Toyota. Knowing that, our first priority was to come up with a brand new marketing campaign with new and easier to understand ideas. And so we spent some time drawing up a new campaign only to realize that no matter how good our marketing communication is, if the product itself does not deliver what customer want then there is no point trying to rework the current marketing campaign.

Moving from a production-oriented team to a customer-oriented one, our further research has revealed that most of our target audiences think that the design of Toyota Yaris is odd but it does look good when being modified. Another factor that we have come across is the fact that the best selling model, E, is the least expensive one of all. Adding these factors together became a clue that product adjustment was needed and I believe that this is our biggest selling point.

Our team has introduced the concept of ?Mass customization? to the car industry or allowing our customers to specify some attributes and features of their car to meet their needs and preferences. By doing so, we are able to deviate customer?s value point from buying a car for its function to buying one for its fashion.  As a consequence, adjustments made to the actual product have led us to make adjustments to the marketing campaign. Because we want our target market to perceive our product as something that can represent their unique tastes, lifestyles and preferences, we tried to promote the idea of individuality and resulted in a new product development called ?Yaris Me? with the slogan ?The car I call myself?.

Luckily, out report was good enough to get us to the second round with only 5 finalists from over a hundred participating teams. What has made it more difficult for us was the fact that we were the only team to write a report in English and accordingly we were asked to carry out our presentation in Thai.