Principles of Marketing: Head and Shoulders vs Pantene

This report covers the marketing principles of Head and Shoulders and Pantene, including target market, product/brand, price, place, and promotion. It analyzes the effectiveness of their marketing strategies and compares their market share, product offerings, pricing strategies, distribution channels, and promotional activities.

Principles of
Marketing

Table of Contents
INTRODUCTION...........................................................................................................................1
FINDINGS.......................................................................................................................................1
CONCLUSION................................................................................................................................4
REFERENCES................................................................................................................................5

INTRODUCTION
This report covers the Marketing Principles namely- Product, Price, Place and Promotion
together known as the “4Ps” of marketing. These 4 components should be used in a proper
manner in order for the marketing strategy to be effective.
The brands chosen for this report are Head and Shoulders Shampoo and Pantene Lady's
Shampoo. Being a renowned name in the hair care industry, Procter and Gamble are market
leaders with earning a total of 20% from both Head and Shoulders and Pantene Shampoos.
This report is aimed at carrying out in-depth secondary research about the two chosen
brands and analyse the effectiveness of marketing mix for them. An overview of the brands is
provided with their values and competitive positioning.
FINDINGS
Target Market – Head and Shoulders shampoo targets brand conscious higher middle
class people, people who care about their hair and early adopters. The brand mainly focuses on
men of middle age who have dandruff problems with initial advertising done showing that the
shampoo is almost 100% effective from the first use. Many other features were introduced to the
product in the later years such as volume boost and hair-fall therapy for the younger segment.
Pantene on the other hand has a target audience of women who are in their mid-to-early 40s, who
are more proactive on living a healthy lifestyle and feel more confident when their hair look
good. Since most commercials in the market are targetted towards women, men are never
implied on using these products. Therefore, Head and Shoulders has taken the advantage of
offering products that are targetted more towards men. The brand focussed on the issue of people
having dandruff which in turn reduces their confidence. Pantene targets women who are unhappy
with their hair or have hair problems, are seeking solution to the same and are interested in
beauty.Both the brands have almost same communication tools for promotions like television,
social media, Internet, magazines, billboards, magazines, flash mobs and road shows etc. Pantene
currently has a market share of 14% while Head and Shoulders has a market share of 9%. Head
and Shoulders has a product definition of cleanliness and removing dandruff while Pantene
defines its products as transforming and making the hair stronger and healthier.
Product/ Brand – Head and Shoulders offers products ranging from shampoos to
conditioners targetting various hair concerns like hair fall, itchy scalp, cool menthol, dry-scalp,
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smooth and silky etc. with the main focus on dandruff. Pantene is a brand that is endorsed by
celebrities, most popular and reputed hair care brands globally. With a unique product line, the
brand easily occupies the top slot. It offers various products in various ranges with new add-ons
on the list frequently such as the latest addition to their list being the waterless collection.
Products like shampoo, hair mists, hair masks etc. Pantene has the major ingredient vitamin pro-
v present in all of their products. The brand is giving all of its products and packaging an
overhaul. The new bottles of the products are shinier, more colourful with a different shape than
the old bottles. Also, instead of having all the shampoos and conditioners bottles arranged
together in the usual way as before, they will now be arranged according to the hair type with
styling products like mousse also placed alongside. Head and Shoulders on the other hand has
come up with taking a big step of introducing first recyclable shampoo bottle that is made from
beach plastic. The brand believes that the packaging of products plays a crucial role in
consumers choosing the products and has plans of focussing on the packaging of their products
besides the waste generated during the manufacturing of the products. The company has reduced
the weight of its packaging per fluid oz by more than 30% since 2008.
Price – Head and Shoulders relies on a reasonable pricing strategy to attract new
customers as well as maintain the loyalty of the existing ones since the products offered are
affordable and not heavy on the pocket. The products are available in different sizes depending
on their price so customers can easily purchase the products depending on their personal needs.
Pantene on the other hand, follows a competitive pricing strategy. The products offered are
priced similar to its competitors. By offering the best value products for similar price range,
Pantene has been able to attract in new customers and provides discounts and offers like free
sachets with big bottles for the existing customers.
The brand adopts value pricing policy at regular intervals in order to adjust with the
purchasing power of the customers. Head and shoulders follows penetrating pricing strategy in
order to sell high volumes and reach a large customer base globally and comes up with various
discounts and offers and incentives as the sales is higher during the summer season resulting in
higher sales and greater revenues. Whereby, Pantene aims at providing best products at the best
price to retain existing customers and to attract new ones.
Place – Head and Shoulders is a popular brand spread across several countries of the
world having a distribution channel that follow conventional route of FMCG marketing, i.e.,
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from factory to distributor to whole seller to retailer to customers. The products have a presence
in from small retail shops to supermarkets in rural as well as urban areas. Pantene also follows a
similar distribution system as that of Head and Shoulders shampoo. Both the brands follow direct
marketing, with Pantene having a better presence on social media and products are available on
the brands' websites as well. The distribution system of any brand needs to be excellent else the
products will not be accessible to the customers which may lead to a loss of customers overtime.
Pantene follows an intensive marketing strategy and follows an omni channel distribution system
of its products where it has integrated stores online and offline to allow customers easy access to
the products. As far as Head and Shoulders is concerned, the brand should open up on social
media as well where it can sell more products through digital platforms. This will not only allow
the company to have more sales but also maintain a long-term relationship with its customers.
The brand should also focus on improving its website by making it more customer friendly and
easy to navigate. The brand can have company-operated retail stores where it offers all its
products. Both the brands try to make their products available to as many retail stores as
possible.
Promotion – Pantene uses multiple channels to promote its products including traditional
media like advertising through television and radio due to their reach to a large number of people
at the same time. The brand also uses ways like promoting through social media as the usage of
Internet is growing day by day. Head and shoulders on the other hand relies mainly on its
marketing team for conducting promotional activities and has a policy that is not only creative
but also informative to the customers. The company has launched many campaigns and
advertisements on various channels like advertising through television, radio, billboards at
strategic places, pamphlets, magazines and posters to create and maintain their brand visibility
time and over. Both the brands are positioned as affordable brands when it comes to the pricing
of the products. The brands have more or less similar promotional activities like hiring
influencers such as bloggers or celebrities on social media to promote their respective brands.
Pantene does various sales promotion like taking part in various trade exhibitions and events and
undergoes personal selling with its large sales force in various parts of different countries. Head
and Shoulders lacks rigorous promotional activities with mainly focussing only on traditional
ways of advertising and promotion of its products and therefore needs to cope up with other
brands such as Pantene and its other competitors.
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CONCLUSION
From the above report, it can be concluded that both Head and Shoulders and Pantene as
brands serve different target audience having different concerns and issues and the brands
working on solving them with Pantene having a larger market share in the idustry than Head and
Shoulders. Moreover, both brands have a variety of products under their distinct product lines
addressing to different hair concerns with Pantene having more extended products under its
product line. The pricing strategy of Head and Shoulders is more reasonable with Pantene
offering various discounts and schemes and running various offers on the products. The brands
also have different ideas on improving the packaging of their products and hence attract more
customers and reach to an increased number of them globally. Both Head and Shoulders have
different distribution channels serving to a large customer base and the products being made
easily available to the customers irrespective of their location. Both the brands have almost
similar promotional strategies with Head and Shoulders paying more focus on the traditional
ways of promoting and advertising.
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REFERENCES
Books & Journals
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marketing course. Journal of Marketing Education. 26(2). pp.145-153.
Kotler and et. al., 2012. Principles of marketing: an Asian perspective. Pearson/Prentice-Hall.
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33(1). pp.10-15.
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Munoz, C. and Huser, A., 2008. Experiential and cooperative learning: Using a situation analysis
project in principles of marketing. Journal of Education for Business. 83(4). pp.214-220.
Shaw, E.H. and Jones, D.B., 2005. A history of schools of marketing thought. Marketing theory.
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Online
REDUCING WASTE AT HEAD & SHOULDERS. 2019. [Online]. Available
through:<https://www.headandshoulders.com/en-us/about/sustainability/reducing-
waste>.
OUR PRO-Vnutrient story. 2019. [Online]. Available
through:<https://pantene.com/en-us/pantene-story>.
Pantene Gets a Makeover. 2019. [Online]. Available
through:<https://www.popsugar.com/beauty/New-Pantene-Packaging-7719446>.
Pantene Marketing Mix Strategy 7Ps Analysis. 2019. [Online]. Available
through:<https://www.essay48.com/term-paper/13858-Pantene-Marketing-Mix>.
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