VIETNAM NATIONAL UNIVERSITY, HANOI SCHOOL OF BUSINESS TRAN VINH QUANG SOME DIGITAL MARKETING SOLUTIONS FOR APPOTA JOINT STOCK COMPANY Major: Business Administration Code: 60 34 05 MASTER OF BUSINESS ADMINISTRATION THESIS Supervisors: Dr. Tran Doan Kim Hanoi - 2012 LUAN VAN CHAT LUONG download : add luanvanchat@agmail.com TABLES OF CONTENTS AKNOWLEGEMENT. iv TABLES OF CONTENTS. vii LIST OF TABLES AND FIGURES.
CHAPTER 1 - LITERATURE REVIEW .1 Overview of marketing .1 Marketing in general .3 Shift in marketing management .2 The advantages and disadvantages of digital marketing .3 The factors that influence in Digital marketing .3 Majors marketing tools in digital marketing .5 Social media marketing .6 Search engine marketing. CHAPTER 2 - ANALYSIS OF DIGITAL MARKETING SITUATION OF APPOTA JSC .34 vii LUAN VAN CHAT LUONG download : add luanvanchat@agmail.2 Products and services .2 Digital marketing macro-environment analysis .1 Legal – political environment .3 Social – cultural environment .3 APPOTA‟s Digital Marketing situation analysis .1 Company factors influencing marketing activities .2 Market factors and trends .3 Future competitors and Appota analysis .4 Current major marketing tools .4 Evalution of Appota‟s digital marketing. CHAPTER 3 – SOME DIGITAL MARKETING SOLUTIONS FOR APPOTA JSC 63 3.1 Recommended in major digital marketing tools .2 Social media marketing .1 Action plan for each step .2 Budget and other resources.4 Control and Evaluation .3 Other suggestions for company.70 viii LUAN VAN CHAT LUONG download : add luanvanchat@agmail.1 Differentiation-Focus to market segment .2 Focus in product‟ development and innovation .3 More suggestions to improve .79 APPENDIX 1 SAMPLES OF WEEKLY CONTENTS PROVIDED TO APPOTA USERS .80 ix LUAN VAN CHAT LUONG download : add luanvanchat@agmail.com LIST OF TABLES AND FIGURES FIGURE 1-1: CONTEX OF DIGITAL MARKETING .10 FIGURE 1-2: THE SONG‟S TREND IN GOOGLE TREND .21 FIGURE 1-3: THE MODEL OF SOCIAL MEDIA .23 FIGURE 1-4: THE MODEL OF WEB 2.24 FIGURE 1-5: RELATED WORD IN SEARCHING .27 FIGURE 2-1: APPOTA‟S MAJOR MILESTONE: .35 FIGURE 2-2: APPOTA‟S BUSINESS MODEL.36 FIGURE 2-3: VIETNAM SMARTPHONE OPERATING SYSTEM SHARE.38 FIGURE 2-4: APPOTA‟S USERS BY MOBILE PHONE OPERATING SYSTEM .39 FIGURE 2-5: APPOTA‟S TOP & BIGGEST APPLICATION DEVELOPERS AND CONTENT PROVIDERS .40 FIGURE 2-6: IT INDUSTRY - REVENUES AND GROWTH RATE .42 FIGURE 2-7: INTERNET USERS - NUMBERS AND GROWTH RATE .45 TABLE 1-1: PROS AND CONS OF ONLINE ADVERTISING .17 TABLE 1-2: COMPARING BETWEEN TRADITIONAL MEDIA AND SOCIAL MEDIA .22 TABLE 1-3: SEARCH ENGINE MARKETING – SEO & PPC‟ PROS AND CONS .28 TABLE 1-4: MOBILE PHONE FEATURES AND IMPLICATION FOR MARKETERS.30 TABLE 2-1: NUMBER OF TELECOM, INTERNET SERVICE PROVIDERS .47 x LUAN VAN CHAT LUONG download : add luanvanchat@agmail.com ABBREVIATIONS 2G 2nd Generation Mobile System (usually GSM) 3G 3rd Generation Mobile System (usually UMTS/WCDMA) SME Small and Medium Enterprise MI Mobile Internet SP Service Provider CS Content supplier DEV Developer CP Content providers TELCO Telecommunication Company NO Network Operator ISP Internet Service Provider ADV Advertising HR Human Resource IP Internet Protocol ADSL Asymmetric Digital Subscriber Line MBA Master of Business Administration LAN Local Area Network R&D Research and Development ROI Return on Investment SWOT Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats SMS Short Messaging Service IOS Apple mobile operating system Android Google mobile operating system FI Founder Institute Mobile website A website that programed to compatible with mobile device ARPU Average Revenue Per User xi LUAN VAN CHAT LUONG download : add luanvanchat@agmail. The thesis title Some Digital Marketing Solutions for APPOTA Joint Stock Company 2.
Purpose The purpose of this thesis is to suggest some marketing solutions with action plans to be used in a year to continue growth of Appota with existing products. In order to do that, the thesis focuses on reviewing and summarizing the theory of marketing and digital marketing with major tools; applying the reviewed literature to analyze Appota situation now; and propose some solutions to enhance the digital marketing in Appota. The thesis necessity Appota is a SME (Small and Medium Enterprise) in the information and communication technology founded in Dec, 2011. Within a year of start-up, it has achieved a significant growth in terms of both revenues and headcount.The company currently has employed more than 60 headcount who obtain many years of experience in mobile content.
Appota has become a premier partner to many big companies in the same industry and a leading-edge smartphone content provider in Vietnam. With the market share of more than 60% of smartphone users including iOS and Android mobile users, Appota is one of the most disruptive start-up in Vietnam ICT industry. The company intends to increase its market share to be the dominance and keep the impressive growth to extend business to South East Asia with the target of coverage over 20 million smartphone users. Being one of the co-founders of the company and take responsible for all sales & marketing activities, I have been working with both Sales& Marketing team to gain market share, attract customer, monetized products and services, build customer database, keep strong relationship with partners.
We have tried a lot of new marketing strategies or plans to find the best approach for the company. Based on the research in marketing activities and with an insight of company situation, my 1 LUAN VAN CHAT LUONG download : add luanvanchat@agmail.com finding in this thesis is to address the digital marketing with specific solutions as a strong tool for the company to keep the growth. Scope of research APPOTA follows a new model in Vietnam with no competitors currently, moreover it has only one year of operation. Therefore, instead of implementing industry analysis (including competitors) and SWOT analysis (that provides understanding about Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats) the thesis focuses on suggesting some practical solutions for the company.
This thesis offers an idea for the company on how they could apply the marketing solution, especially eMarketing to keep the growth of market share and growth of customer base in the target segment. Which theories can be applied in Digital Marketing at Appota? 2. What current digital marketing practice at Appota? 3. How to improve Digital Marketing and other suggestion to Appota? 6.
Methodology and Limitations of Study The thesis based on a qualitative research and a case study method for analytical purpose to suggest or explain why or how something is happening. Appota‟s specific data collection was carried out by interviews. In the interviews, Appota‟s representatives like CEO (Chief Executive Officer), CMO (Chief Marketing Officer) and Product Director provided very valuable ideas and information on the subject.Besides, author‟s own observations and experiences were also used in data collection and analysis. Secondary data has been computed by research of documents, annual/quarterly reports of Appota.
Significance By reviewing the theory of digital marketing, this research benefits Appota in proposing marketing tools to increase the market share and improve the revenues which contributes to the company‟s development. 2 LUAN VAN CHAT LUONG download : add luanvanchat@agmail. Expectation Digital marketing is being well applied in many companies around the world so the same methodology can be applied in the scenario of other companies in the same industry with some adjustments. Follow-up Further study will be carried on upon the result of this thesis in applying some digital marketing solutions for the company.
Other way of study will be analyzing the impact of the competition on the company and steps toavoidor come over unexpected impacts 10. Structure The first chapter is an introduction with concentration on marketing in general and marketing tools, especially digital marketing. The second chapter describes actual state of the company regarding its products and services, customers and current marketing practice. The third chapter concentrates on marketingsolutionsfor the company with a specific action plan.
3 LUAN VAN CHAT LUONG download : add luanvanchat@agmail. CHAPTER 1 - LITERATURE REVIEW 1.1 Overview of marketing 1.1 Marketing in general Marketing can be found everywhere as people nowadays are bombarded with television commercials, direct-mail offers and sales calls. Simplified, marketing is only a two-way process, even though four stages can be recognized which are designing, developing, delivering and determining value1. Baines stresses that a two-way process includes customer and marketing organization.
The four stages are there to ensure that the whole process will be successful. Customer is the one who has the power to make the final decision and has a strong input. Additionally, marketers must specify how to satisfy customers‟ needs. In Vietnam, perspective to marketing is very different.
They emphasize the importance of market segmentation and positioning instead of other features. As can be seen, marketing is a wide and versatile term, which includes many dimensions of business activities. Whatever determination is used, the terms value, customer needs and information are often mentioned. Therefore, when thinking of promotion, which is a vital part of the marketing process, it is good to bear in mind that many features influence the result.2 Marketing management Marketing deals with identifying and meeting human and social needs.
When YouTube realizes that people want to share their video and interact in a simple way, or when WhatsApp realized that people want to chat via mobile phone‟s data plan rather than to pay money for SMS, they demonstrated marketing savvy and turned a private or social need into a profitable business opportunity. It is the reason why marketing is also defined as “meeting needs profitability”. 1 Baines, Fill, Page, “Marketing: Case insight”,Oxford University Press, 1st edition, 2008, pg.17 4 LUAN VAN CHAT LUONG download : add luanvanchat@agmail.com Based on that concept, there is a formal definition about Marketing provided by American Marketing Association: “Marketing is an organizational function and a set of processes for creating, communicating, and delivering value to customers and for managing customer relationship in ways that benefit the organization and its stake holders”.2 “Marketing management is defined as the art and science of choosing target markets and getting, keeping, and growing customers through creating, delivering and communicating superior customer value.”3 Marketing management consists of important tasks4: Developing marketing strategies and plans, meaning to identify potential long-run opportunities given its market experience and core competencies Capturing marketing insightsthis step is to understand what is happening inside and outside the company. Connecting with customersthis task is to consider how to best create value for the chosen target markets and develop strong, profitable, long-term relationships with customers.
Building strong brand: It requires the company to understand the strengths and weaknesses of the brand with customers, define its value to bring to the customers in considering its position in the market and anticipating its competitors‟ move Shaping the market offerings: Define the value package the company wants to offer to its customers Delivering value: It is to determine how to properly deliver the value embodied by the products and service to the target market. 2 Philip Kotler and Kevin Keller, “Marketing Management”, Pearson Prentice Hall, 12th edition, 2006, pg.5 3 Philip Kotler and Kevin Keller, “Marketing Management”, Pearson Prentice Hall, 12th edition, 2006, pg.5 4 Philip Kotler and Kevin Keller, “Marketing Management”, Pearson Prentice Hall, 12th edition, 2006, pg.29-30 5 LUAN VAN CHAT LUONG download : add luanvanchat@agmail.com Communicating value: This task is to adequately communicate the value embodied by the products and service to the target market. Marketing communications activities are the means by which the company endeavors to inform, persuade and remind customers – directly or indirectly about the brand it sells. Creatinglong-term growth: This step considers a long-term view of company‟s products and services, and how profits should be grown.It get involvements of initiating new products or services, organizing marketing resources and maintaining a process to implement and control the marketing plan to ensure the efficiency and effectiveness of marketing activities and how both could be improved.