The Strategic Marketing Mix

Introduction Marketing mix is an amalgamation of elements which are essential for marketing and for promotion of the product or service. It is a framework and a useful business tool for analyzing, interpreting and hence executing marketing strategies. It is a determinant to enhance the market share, achieve exponential growth and create a wave of brand image into the minds of customer base. The Australian company Halfbrick Studios, located in Brisbane adopts a perfect blend of marketing mix in order to target the customers globally by aiming at global competency and introducing various games which had a perfect balance of each domain of marketing mix. The Company Profile Halfbrick Studios is a video game developer company who have developed some of the most interesting games like Fruit Ninja, Jetpack Joyride or Age of Zombies etc which spread like viral across the game enthusiasts around the globe. The customer base of the company is rising at a highly exponential rate of 750,000 per day. This is really a surprising figure of data and hence we will focus our study towards the marketing strategies and the 4P of marketing mix on Halfbricks Studios company. The innovation at company results into a perfect recipe which includes price, promotion, product and place as its key ingredients. The company calls for Halfbrick Fridays five to seven times a year when all the employees of all the departments in the company come together over a platform for innovation. Brainstorming sessions are carried out and outcome of these sessions are the innovative gaming ideas and methodologies which influences and attracts the whole world and make them glued to their smartphones. The strategies adopted by the company lies inherently in the style of coding which is hardcore, well constructed, and is based over a uniform platform of C++. Marketing Mix of Halfbricks Studios There are 4 Ps initially defined for the marketing mix are product, price, place and promotion. The company is dynamically updating the strategies for the marketing mix to incorporate the changing demands, needs, styles of the target customers. The strategies are timely updated and monitored by the managing heads in order to best fit the market. The prices of the products or say games are manipulated to earn maximum profits but also create sense of excitement and want in the minds of customers. The introduction of free Fruit Ninja game was one of the strategies of the company to make players addictive and hence buy the game later on to unlock the new arenas of excitement. This was an essential use of price attribute of the marketing mix. Even other games are present to the target customers at a minimal price and hence they are able to sustain the magic of the company and yet have become one of the most well known companies to fly a splash over the world market of gaming. The place of their operations, i.e. Brisbane is highly appreciated by the team all over the world where ever they go for business purpose as being really supportive and cordial for the success of the company. The organization considers Brisbane as a part of their identity and an essential part of the marketing strategy of the company. There were plethora of possibilities for business expansion but a great decision by the team was to remain functional from Brisbane itself because they love the culture and the atmosphere of the city which is a catalyst for their exponential growth and progress prospective. The price attribute undergoes various changes for targeting the upcoming markets but, the place attribute of marketing mix is still stable for functioning and this epic decision have made wonders happen to the organization. The products or games developed by the company are world famous and are being played by millions of users around the globe. Fruit Ninja itself has thirty million downloads a ll over the world and hence is grossing for enormous profits for the organization. The promotional aspect is widely focused upon by transforming the business concepts and models to align with the demands of the customer base. Earlier on the launch, most of the revenues were just from the commissions to create games for Playstation. Now, an ecosystem comprising of digital strategies and promotional aspects using the digital technologies to continuously evolve the distribution strategies. One of the most innovative promotion tricks and techniques were aiming at merchandising the game and its exciting heroes or features. For example, Fruit Ninja was highly popularized by various other games, fruit snacks, clothing range, plush toys and various other related merchandise for it. Hence, the company is digitally manipulating the target consumers and overpowering their mindset with a perfect blend of reasonable cost, place of functioning, high quality, attractive and gluing product games and innovative marketing promotional strategies adopted by the organization. By this ways the company has evolved from the cocoon of dormancy to become the leaders of the world in terms of gaming and equipment by gaining a competitive advantage over others of the genre. The needs of the customers are well mapped with the quality and interface of the high quality graphic games designed by the company and therefore, have an edge over their competitors. The culture of the organization is fun-filled and innovative to regards and acknowledge ideas and suggestions to improve and work upon products to make them fine day by day. People are assets and selection procedure of the company selects the best suited and cultural fit employees to work for innovation and coding of the company. The process is brainstorming of ideas and coming out with a fresh new concept to be implemented effectively and so that the strategy and idea can be mapped into the effective applications and games giving rise to more effective games like fruit Ninja to capture the world by its amazing aura. Into the competition There are various competitors for the company present in Australia namely Acheron Design, Redtribe, Tantalus Media and Torus Games. Torus games was developed in 1994 and have provided games like Rise of the Guardians, Monster Jam, barbie, Scooby-Doo etc. The advantage that the company has over the Halfbricks Studio is that it provides games for numerous platforms which outperforms the company under study. In addition, they also create engines and tools to concentrate over the superior content, quality and cross platform design and development. They lack innovative design strategies and do not provide free games in order for gaining profits by revenue collection like Halfbricks. So, in terms of price Halfbricks is ahead of Torus games due to huge success of Fruit Ninja and Age of Zombies over Rise of Guardians. This was a result of price attribute of marketing mix. The process for Halfbricks is innovative by inclusion of Halfbrick Fridays and is based completely over coding in C++ but development of tools and engines with the games and a wide coverage of gaming consoles is an advantage of Torus. The place attribute cannot be much compared as both are located in Australia but Halfbrick being in Brisbane and Torus in Melbourne, there is a factor or competitive advantage. Regarding promotion, both uses digital marketing, but Torus games believes on the concept of Push or Pull and serves the customers internationally via social media or help present in England to cover up vast areas. The Change Story Hence, it is prominent that the marketing mix is an excellent strategy to have a deep insight into the mindset and strategies of the organization and in this dynamic world, the organizations are adopting and adapting to changing practices and policies of marketing in order to expand their and to attract numerous customers into their pockets. It is a critical aspect of producing a required product using efficient processes by harnessing the talent resources of the people of the organization in an open environment and culture and by introducing the product at the right market and with a reasonably good price and with effective and innovative promotion practices and techniques to service the customers and to win their future collaboration.