Windows hybrid tablets IMC plan

Abstract

The Microsoft Malta Office was set up in 2003 as a Sales, Marketing and Services Management office. Although the Maltese subsidiary does not sell tablets and PCs directly to consumers, the company in collaboration with its local partners creates marketing activities to promote Windows hardware (Edward Portelli, personal communication, 24 April, 2014). The Maltese tablet market has experienced an exponential growth. In fact, the sales of devices went up from 6, 700 in 2012 to 18,480 in 2013. Moreover, this research reveals that a favourable positive macro-economic environment could boost the sales of tablet sales even further. On the one hand, some laws, such as the Eco-Contribution and WEEE could increase costs sustained by companies (A. Ghio, personal communication, July 11, 2014). On the other hand, the increase of disposable income for Maltese households, the One tablet per child project and the drop in the price of devices should have a positive impact on the sector (European Commission, 2014 a; Passport, 2012). The Windows hybrids are the focus of this IMC plan. These devices offer high performance (Passport, 2012). Their key strength is the content creation as they are designed to replace laptops and netbooks (Passport, 2012). Moreover, they can be used for media consumption, therefore, they also compete with media tablets (Passport, 2012). Hybrids should appeal to corporate road warriors and to students who need a device with high performance and a keyboard to carry out complex tasks (Passport, 2012). However, the focus groups sessions that were organised for this research project revealed that the Maltese corporate road warriors do not consider hybrids as a replacement for their laptops. Whereas the focus group meetings with university students revealed that they preferred hybrids to laptops to carry out complex tasks like editing documents, while on the go. Therefore, they were selected as the target market of this IMC plan. In the next stage of the research, a questionnaire was used to obtain relevant information about the target market in order to create efficient and tailored marketing activities. Apparently, university students gathered their product information about tablets mainly through on-line sources. They researched about products on the internet and read online reviews. This was usually followed by word of mouth (WOM). It transpires that WOM had a key role in the "pre-purchase search" (Schiffman, Kanuk, Hansen, 2012 page 70). This study also highlighted that the purchasing decision was mainly influenced by the performance, connectivity and operating system of tablet PCs. The price of tablets was the fourth most important product attribute for the survey respondents. The majority of students would spend between € 251 and € 500 on a tablet. However, a large number of respondents affirmed to be ready to spend more than € 500 to purchase 2-in-1 tablets. Interestingly, they would spend more than €500 if it was possible for them to partially pay the device through the Maltese government's student grant. It was also worth noticing that students used their tablet mainly for surfing the internet, checking e-mail, accessing to social media and communicating. Whilst, listening to music, taking notes and doing research were other frequent activities carried out with a tablet. Finally, this research pointed out that the five main Windows tablets makers2 were top of mind for only 11.35% of students. This research reported that 4.26% of respondents owned Windows Tablet PCs. The situation analysis has indicated that one of the key objectives of Microsoft Malta was to increase the brand awareness of Windows tablets by 30% in Malta. Moreover, during this year, 25% of the university students will be made aware of Microsoft hybrids' attributes and benefits. ("comprehension"). Furthermore, 20% of them should desire to purchase a hybrid ("conviction"). Finally, the IMC plan aims to increase the sales of Windows hybrids by at least 8 % in a year. Viral videos, Facebook competitions, public relations, sales promotions, banners ads and endorsements by local celebrities will be used in order to achieve the aforementioned objectives.