Developing and Managing Products

No one wants to to have the same thing constantly over and over again. So a company cannot last that long without innovation. Over the years from when they were first established back in 1940 McDonald's has come a long way. McDonald’s  menu is more than just (delicious) burgers and (outstanding) fries. From Snack Wraps to McCafé to Premium Salads, they proudly offer variety, quality and fun-filled value in all of our restaurants. This is definitely a step up from when they used to just sell burgers and fries. Their innovation goes beyond just products. They just recently started changing the look of most McDonald's within the United States and I have to say the new look is absolutely appealing. 

But with products, they just recently started using new more sophisticated soda machines. 
These machines allows the company to put many different drinks in one machine and they all come out of one place. It saves a lot of money and satisfies the customers greatly.

Also McDonald's just recently released a new burger. It is called the Cheddar bacon onion burger. Now while I haven't tried it yet I heard that it has been selling well and McDonald's profits have increased. Definitely sounds like something that I have to try very soon. 

Since I've started this blog I must have said this more than a million times but McDonald's is number in it's industry and there are many reasons to why that is. But I know one reason for sure is that it continues to change every year. It bombards customers with new products all the time that we can't help but try. McDonald's is truly and innovative company.

Intergrated Marketing Communications

Promotion is a an attempt of marketers trying to inform persuade and remind potential buyers of their product to influence an opinion or elicit a response. No company can really survive in the market without promotion. That is why they all work on promotional strategies. A promotional strategy is finding optimal uses for the elements of promotion which are: advertising, public relations, personal selling, and sales promotion. Also these are known as the promotional mix.  

Advertising is impersonal, one-way mass communication about a product or organization that is paid for by a marketer. McDonald's advertising is one of the best in it's industry. I don't really have to prove this because it speaks for itself. There are not much places in the America you can go without seeing A McDonald's. They have many billboards all over the country and their commercials are expected for daily television. 

Public Relations is the marketing function that evaluates public attitudes, identifies areas within the organization the public may be interested in, and executes a program of action to earn public understanding and acceptance. Recently this year, McDonald's paid to get it's name on the trending list for twitter. Which lead to people watching their commercials about farmers who supply them. That made McDonald's image increasingly better. 
 
Sales promotion is marketing communication activities other than advertising, personal selling and public relations that motivates consumers to go buy a product. McDonald's uses this several ways. One way is through coupons which are certificates that allows you to buy a product for a cheaper price. Another way is through sweepstakes and and contests. One more is through premiums. A premium is getting another item offered after proof of buying the original item that was being promoted or sometimes it's the same product you get free.

Promotional strategy is close to the process of communication. Communication is the process by which meanings are exchanged or shared through a common set of symbols. A company cannot survive as well without selling it's message through communication to potential buyers. Which now takes us to Integrated Marketing Communications. This is the careful coordination of all promotional messages for a product or service to assure the consistency of messages at every contact point where a company meets the customer. This is a concept many companies have adopted to try to keep it's message the same.

Product Concept

                                             


                                            Product

Everything favorable and unfavorable, that a person receives in an exchange.

  McDonald's sells many different products to it's customers and ingredients that come in that product whether they want it or not.


                                  Types of Consumer Products

There are four different types of consumer products convenience products, shopping products, specialty products, and unsought products.

convenience products- its inexpensive and has little shopping efforts.

shopping products- more expensive and in few stores.

specialty products- a buyer spends a lot of time looking for a certain item and wont except any thing other product to replace it.

unsought products- a product that no ones much about or a product buyers don't look for as much.

The consumer product McDonald's sells is a convenience product because the products they sell are not expensive and are very easy to get because there is a McDonald's on almost every corner.

                                        Product Mix

All the products that an organization sells.

When McDonald's first started it sold only about 6 items. Its main focus was on burgers. As they grew and expanded nationally and globally in the 1960s they had to expand their menu. Now they have about  90 different items on their menu.

Sales Promotion and Personal Selling

Sales promotion is marketing communication activities other than advertising, personal selling and public relations that motivates consumers to go buy a product. For example, coupons are considered as a sales promotion. Coupons are certificates that allows you to buy a product for a cheaper price. I don't know about anyone else but coupons definitely work on me. Coupons allows me to buy products i normally wouldn't buy or to eat at restaurants I normally wouldn't eat at. I would like to shake the hand of the person who thought of that idea because it has helped many get many things for a very cheaper price. This is probably my favorite type of sales promotion. Sales promotion is a good form of marketing as compared to advertising and other types because it is much much cheaper and you can, also, tally how many people actually bought your product due to the promotion because you can track coupons.

McDonald's every few months sends out a little coupon book to promote its food. Some times you can find them in newspapers, other stores that are partners with them, go in to a store and ask if they are handing out coupon books, or even now just recently they have been giving coupons out on the back of receipts.

One more type of sales promotion is sweepstakes and and contests. This doesn't every really motivate me to buy anything because I usually never win. The feeling of getting excited that you might win a lot of money a very cool prize is good and all, however, when you see that you didn't win the feeling just turns to anger and disappointment every single time. So I always say to myself why even go through the unnecessary space. Fortunately, I did win once but you have to continue reading to find what it was.

McDonald's does the monopoly sweepstakes. The sweepstakes allows the customers to collect tokens which are given on certain items in the menu. In order to win a customers has to collect all the tokens of a certain property of that color and they win the prize.

Another form of sales promotion is premium. Premium is getting another item offered after proof of buying the original item that was being promoted or sometimes it's the same product you get free. Once again I don't know about anyone else but I am always encouraged to buy an item if I am getting another one free. It's products for the price of one, what a good deal. A premium that McDonald's does is with their happy meals. You buy it and get a toy as a little some thing extra. Another premium they offer is sometimes they'll give you two burgers for $4 or $5.

As you can tell McDonald's does a lot of sales promotion, even their promotion goes on 24/7. I guess that is why McDonald's is dominating it's industry. Well I told you I would tell what I won, now is that time. As i mentioned McDonald's sweepstakes monopoly earlier, well due to that I won medium French fries. I know it's much but hey, it was free food from the place that makes the best French fries.

Personal selling is a purchase situation involving a personal, paid-for communication between two people in an attempt to influence each other. Everyone does personal selling because to get a job we all have to sell ourselves. Personal can be better than other types of promotions depending on the characteristics of the consumer and the product.

Advertising and Public Relations

Advertising is impersonal, one-way mass communication about a product or organization that is paid for by a marketer. Judging by the fact that McDonald's is the leading company in it's industry it must doing very good in the advertising department. McDonald's is one of the strongest brands in the world, and one of its key elements is that it's omnipresent. Everywhere you go in America, you see McDonald's. And it's not just the sheer amount of stores themselves — its highway billboard signs are ubiquitous for road-trippers, the bright Golden Arches are instantly recognizable to every passerby and its TV commercials are an expected part of people's daily programming. 

McDonald's spends almost a billion every year on advertising. Luckily for them it is not a advertising response function. They always make their money back. They especially advertise a lot through sponsorship. They sponsor little leagues around the country of America, Hockey in Canada and even the Olympics. Also, they have spokespeople to represent them. Mostly athletes such as Lebron James, Patrick Chan, and Cassie Campbell. 

In my opinion I feel McDonald's over advertises. They are just all over the place. Regardless of anything they are going to sell because they have stores in so many different locations. It's at the point that they are the only food option in some areas. But of course as a McDonald's customer I am not complaining. 

Retailing

If you ask most people regardless of where in the world to name fast food restaurants I can almost guarantee that McDonald's will be in the first three that call. That is because McDonald's has 33,000 different locations spread out across the world that spans across 119 countries. Franchising plays a big role in McDonald's growth and success. Almost eighty percent of McDonald's stores are owned by independent people. That means the big boys at top don't really do much work but sit back and watch the money come in as random people all over the world do all the work. Must be hard work too,seeing that McDonald's is at the top of it's industry and one of the biggest franchises in the world.

However they are not that lazy. The success of a franchise also depends on the amount of support it gets from the parent company. In this particular area McDonald's is second to none.  Owner/operators of McDonald's franchises receive their initial training and support during the first year, and then ongoing support throughout their ownership with newsletters, cooperative purchasing, 24-hour telephone support, and field operations.

I recently visited a McDonald's location at 57 Empire Boulevard in Brooklyn. I've been there before and it is generally a good place to go, sometimes. But if I was to judge the store off that one experience,  I probably would never go back. It was super packed and they had the audacity to only have two registers open. I mean your billions of dollars rich and you can't afford to have another worker on the pay roll. The line was moving so slow.


The worst part was that when i finally got to the register that's when they wanted to start rushing, I didn't even get my exact order because the lady at the counter was very intimidating. Their lucky I know that it is usually not that crazy otherwise I would not be going back.

Consumer Decision Making

Many is very well advertised. It has many commercials on television, handing out coupons on the streets, and it has many posters and billboards. This is the reason why many people choose to eat there. McDonald's isn't promoted in it's home country but all over the world. There is more than one in almost every major city in the world. McDonald's advertising catches the attention of everyone, from kids to adults of all races. McDonald's is now selling selling other items to compete with other stores. For example coffee to compete with starbucks. Now its easier for a customer to get a quick bite to eat with coffee withot having to make two stops in two different stores. McDonald's even its internationally store changes it menu to have some special dish in the country its in. Theses are just a few things it does to influences it customer to buy their products.