IMC's Impact on Consumer Behavior: Mercedes-Benz Case Study

The study assesses Integrated Marketing Communication (IMC) strategies employed by Mercedes-Benz to influence consumer perceptions and behaviors. It analyzes different advertising methods, including traditional media like TV commercials and modern digital platforms such as social media and email marketing. The investigation also explores the brand's image creation through IMC tools and its effects on consumer decisions. Additionally, it evaluates how cultural factors may impact consumers' responses to these communications in diverse markets.

MARKETING
COMMUNICATION

Table of Contents
INTRODUCTION...........................................................................................................................3
MAIN BODY...................................................................................................................................3
A. Analyses of the organisations range of products and specific product and also profiling of
target market...........................................................................................................................3
B. Strategic marketing communication plan........................................................................11
CONCLUSION..............................................................................................................................17
REFRENCE...................................................................................................................................18

INTRODUCTION
Marketing communication is a complex and fundamental part of a company’s efforts.
They are those methods which are used by the company to convey the promotional messages
about the products and services. The main motive of this is to maximise the volume of sales with
the help of persuasive, informative and favourable messages. Organisation undertaken in this
report is Mercedes which deals in automotive industry (Luxton, Reid and Mavondo,
2015). It serves products and services like auto mobiles, luxury vehicles, financial services, auto
mobile repair, etc. This report will analyse the range of products and services and profiling the
target market. It will make critical analyses to evaluate the characteristics, features and
effectiveness of the marketing communication tool. It will further devise a strategic marketing
communication plan to market the product in the UK. This will further evaluate the elements of
communication process within the global context.
MAIN BODY
A. Analyses of the organisations range of products and specific product and also profiling of
target market.
Company overview
Organisation undertaken in this report is Mercedes which was founded in 1926 in
Germany. The brand is famous for its luxury vehicles, cars, buses, etc. and is one of the biggest
vehicle selling company of premium brand. From its initial stage of production, the company is
highly focussed towards reputation of its quality and durability. Its S class products is considered
to be of special class for flagship models which provides luxury in its operations, functioning,
quality and durability (Parente and Strausbaugh-Hutchinson, 2014) . The upright radiator
grille topped by the unmistakeable star herald in the new dawn.
Marketing communication
Marketing communication is a set of methodologies and tactics which are to be adopted
by the company to the relevant messages in an appropriate and suitable way to their current and
prospective customers about the offerings of products and services. This strategy is used by the
company or individuals so that they can reach to the target market effectively and efficiently.
Communication plays a very crucial role in a company. Therefore, Mercedes will understand the
value of communication from the business context.

Communication makes people aware about the new products and services or
modifications in the products which are offered by the company. It plays a great role even in
every day operational issues by clarifying doubts and making the efforts of the people. It is
extremely crucial in developing any relationship.
Marketing communication is the manner in which a Mercedes exercises various methods
in which their products, services and brands are presented and considered to the audience
through contrary forms of media either offline or online (Bacile and Swilley, 2014) . It
modifies marketers to communicate, influence, motivate and remind the customers of their
products or services through different forms of media. It is an important aspect to business today.
Companies in present business world uses various forms of marketing communication to
be able to get across to their audience and develop their own reputation. It represents the
vocalization of a brand and is a form in which a company can make over a dialogue with
consumers. This is essential because building a relationship or an understanding with a business
or company assist consumers to understand more about what they want to buy or what they can
buy. This helps in promoting customers to become more interested to a products or services of
Mercedes. It offers a range of products such as luxury vehicle, buses, coaches, truck and internal
combustion engines and along with it offer services which involves Financial services and auto
mobile repairs. By providing range of services they are able to satisfy customers needs and
wants.
Mercedes deals with a range of product and one of it's product is Mercedes-Benz it is a
series of full sized luxury flagship vehicle. Earlier it was known as Sonderklasse and was
officially introduced in the year 1972 and is been in the market ever since (Blakeman, 2018) .
It has targeted audience belonging to upper rich business class who will purchase the product as
an status symbol. The Mercedes Benz wide range of products namely, V class, CLA coupe, CLS
third generation, G class, S class, GLE SUV, B class, etc. In this, the Mercedes Benz S, etc. The
S class has a unique features which comprises of high speed, sun roof, safety assistant, design,
class, style, comfortable, ensure higher status, etc.
Marketing communication tool
They are referred to various marketing tools which are used to promote the S Class
product of Mercedes. A marketing personnel has a variety of tools for generating awareness and

supporting the selling efforts. The following are the tools which will be used by the Mercedes to
communicate its products to the target market:
Advertising: This is one of the most common and effective way of promoting the
products and brands. It is useful for the organisation to reach wider audience within a shorter
period of time (Petersen, Kushwaha and Kumar, 2015) . This is a highly prevalent
marketing communication method. It is generally any paid form of non personal promotion of
products or services by an identifies sponsor. Some of the common advertising tools are print
media in newspaper and magazines, broadcasting on television and radio, networking on
satellite, wireless and telephone, etc. Advertisements will be effectively beneficial because it is
one of the easiest way to promote the product. For instance, the company will do advertisements
on airports and on business magazines because its target customers are of premium class.
Characteristics of advertising are discussed below :
 Non personal: It is a kind of non personal form of communication within the target
audience. This addresses a large number of people at a particular time.
 Paid form: This tool is not free of cost and advertiser or the company has to spent a
considerable cost for preparing message, buying media and monitoring advertising
effects. For this, the company also prepares a budget.
 Wider applicability: This is a popular and widely used means for communicating with
the target market and is used not only by the big companies but also by museums,
charitable institutions, etc. to inform and persuade a customer for their offerings.
 Varied objectives: This aims to accomplish various objectives. It is targeted to maximise
sales, create and improve brand image, face competition, build relationships, etc.
 It is an art: In present business world, the advertising task is highly complexes and
complicated (Lusch and Vargo, 2014) . Creation of message and presentation requires
a good deal of knowledge, creativity, skills and knowledge and experience. Therefore, it
is regarded as an art.
 Persuasive: It means that the common intention of advertising is to identify and
differentiate one product from another in order to persuade the customer to purchase the
products.
Positive Negative
 Reaches to wider range of audience.  It involves money which a company

 It help in differentiation of a product
along with it it influence customers
needs pay in order to advertise the same
in different form such as newspaper and
magazine.
 Different forms such as newspaper are
not able to influence customers as they
are being used by individuals in order
to gain news and they tend to ignore
advertisements.
Sales promotion: Products and services can be promoted through discounts, coupons,
loyalty clubs, memberships, specially designed deals, attractive packages for loyal customers,
etc. They are another most important and effective marketing communication tool. The aim of
this is to encourage short term sales by maximising awareness of brands (Carroll, 2015) . It
helps to draw attention of the people and offers an invitation to engage them in a transaction by
providing them with various types of incentives.
Characteristics of sales promotions are discussed below:
 This is directed for multiple intentions like to maintain sales during the off season, to
maximise sales, competition, clearance of stocks, increases image, etc.
 Its efforts are concerned with special selling efforts for the particular time period in form
of short term incentives and schemes which are undertaken at consumer, dealer and sales
man level.
Positive Negative
 Helps to attract customer by offering
discounts and coupons.
 Focus on increasing short term sales.
 More focus on increasing short term
sales.
 It reduce the profit margins as company
is providing discounts and coupons.
Personal selling: It is marketing communication tool which is useful and takes place
when the marketer or sells representative sales products and services to the customers. It is

highly recommended sale because it build relations between the organisation and end user. In
this, there is a face to face interaction with one or more buyers for the intention of making
presentations, clearing queries and receiving orders (Fill and Turnbull, 2016) . It is an act
through which the buyers are conceived to purchase the products of the company.
Characteristics of the personal selling are discussed below:
 Personal form: It is a form of communication which includes an interactive relationships
between the seller and buyer.
 Development of relationship: This gives an assurance of developing relationship
between the buyer and the seller. It is useful in generating sales for the company and in
most cases even after realising the short comings of the products, customer purchases it
due to strong relationships.
 Flexibility: This enables a lot of flexibility and assures customisation in sales
presentation which can easily be modified or altered as per the requirements of the
customers (Vernuccio and Ceccotti, 2015) .
 Direct feedback: This facilitates prompt feedback because of direct and face to face
interactions between the buyer and seller and it is useful in bringing required changes in
the promotion of sales.
Positive Negative
 It is a two way communication and this
provides instant feedback of the buyer.
 This is most effective tool to directly
reach to the audience.
 This is a expensive method and requires
heavy investment of capital.
 It is highly labour intensive method
which requires large pool of workforce
to carry our personal selling
successfully.
Direct marketing: It allows organisation to communicate directly with the end customer.
There are various tools for direct marketing like e mail, brochures, text messages, etc. This is
useful because the message is directly communicated with the end user. Companies will use this
by having a database of customers’ contact details through which they will send the marketing
materials which makes it easier for customer to make online purchases (Muñoz-Leiva and et.

al., 2015) . It seeks to bring an action in a selected group of customers in response to the
communication by the marketer.
Characteristics of direct marketing are discussed below:
 Segmentation and targeting: Direct marketing is a very suitable tool through which a
person can reach to its specific target audiences.
 Optimisation of marketing budget: It is useful in addressing the online marketing to a
specific audiences which enables to set realistic goals and improves sales.
 Maximising sales with existing customers: It is useful in directly communicating with
the present customers to keep developing the relationships and generates new sales
opportunities.
 Up-gradation in loyalty strategies: Direct contact with end users will enable to
customise the promotions, e mails and offers to develop instant relations (Tomše and
Snoj, 2014) . Therefore, for maximising the sales, the company can make
combination of direct marketing methods and loyalty programs.
Positive Negative
 It is a useful tool in making direct
contact with the present and potential
customers to promotes goods and
services.
 It is a cost effective tool and powerful
at generating sales.
 The writing personalised e- mail can be
very time consuming.
 Customers or people generally do not
respond to the e mails. Thus, there is a
low response rate.
Social media marketing: This concept is most crucial and in present business scenario,
its gaining a lot of attention. It is the process of promoting businesses or websites through social
media channel. The main purpose of this kind of communication tool is to provide customers
with the information about the products, services and enterprises. This is concerned with network
or mode of social interactions. It includes, text, videos, audio, posters, images, etc.
Characteristics of social media marketing are discussed below:
 Participation: This type of tool inspires contributions and feedback from the public. It
involves delivery of the thoughts, ideas and actions at the time of online conversation.
This further tries to bridge the gap between the company and the customers.

 Openness: The success of social media is highly dependent on the level of honesty,
transparency and authenticity (Lusch and Vargo, 2014) . It emphasise on maintaining
trust worthy relations with the customers and any fake communication can be harmful
and destroy online reputation.
 Build communities: The websites of social media further enable to develop communities
rapidly which helps in communicating more effectively. Communities further shares
common interest and helps in knowing about the target audiences.
Positive Negative
 With social media, the large number of
customer can be tapped.
 It is the most effective and cost
efficient technique.
 It hinders the privacy concerns.
 It has destroyed the productivity of the
products and offerings.
Thus, Mercedes S class will use the above mentioned promotional tools because these
tools will be useful for the company in effectively and efficiently promoting the products. These
tools and techniques will help the company in maximising the brand awareness (Bruhn and
Schnebelen, 2017) . It further maximises the customer aggregation by analysing the needs of
the target market. The primary benefit of using these promotional tools for Mercedes S class will
be to generate sales and profitability.
AIDA model of communication
It is a model which is used by marketers in marketing that determines the various steps
and stages through which customer goes through. This model has been reviewed and modifies
multiple times. It was developed by E. St. Elmo Lewis, in 1898 (Who created the AIDA model,
2019). The primary intention of developing the model was to maximise the sales through
effective interaction between the buyer and seller. Mercedes will use this model because the
company deals in luxuries products which are highly expensive and customer will have several
questions in mind before purchasing the product. The following are the stages through which
customer goes:
 Attention: The first impression is always considered to be the last impression. So the
company will use various tools of advertising and promotional methods such that it
builds attention in mind of the customers. Sometimes, the Mercedes Benz S class

assumes that people are already aware of their brand and services due to their strong
brand awareness but this is just not sufficient and organisation needs to concentrate on
various tools of marketing.
 Interest: Once the attention is developed in the minds of the customers, then the next
step of the Mercedes Benz S class is to create interest in the products. It is one of the
most essential step (Pawar, 2014). This is because if customer feels that the product is
not suitable for them then they will never reach towards the purchasing or buying stage,
so it becomes highly important to develop the interest. Mercedes Benz can do this by
giving detailed information to the customer about the relevant products with various
benefits.
 Desire: If interest in the s class product of the Mercedes Benz has been created then, it is
the responsibility of the seller of the company to create a desire in the mind of customer
for the product. This stage can be accomplished when the customer who has a desire in s
class compares the product of the company with that of the competitors. In such cases,
the brand is required to highlight the features which the customer may not experience in
other products.
 Action: As soon as desire is fulfilled then the customer of s class must think of buying
the product. In this stage, the ultimate goals of the Mercedes Benz and seller is to make
sales of the s class. For this purpose, the company will offer free trial, effective and
efficient customer services, etc.

Source: AIDA Model. 2019
B. Strategic marketing communication plan.
A strategic marketing communication plan is a plan to communicate the marketing
strategies or messages to target customer audience. This plan is very crucial for the businesses
because it helps in making customer aware about the products and services offered by the
company (Cornwell, 2014). This plan is successfully implemented only when market
segments are clearly defined, so the strategic plan which is focussed more, that results in a more
effective communication plan.
This marketing communication plan is very crucial because it supports mission and the
objectives and goals decided by the company. It stresses on marketing and communication and
assures that all activities work together to support the big picture. Good and strategic marketing
communication plan is participative, dynamic, measurable, flexible, etc.
Summary : Mercedes Benz is a auto mobile industry which deals in producing high class
cars, vehicles, buses, etc. They are more concerned about the design and style rather than its
speed (Dahnil and et. al., 2014) . They have produced their S class segment of the product to
attract the upper class people of the society for whom the prices does not matter much. It has a
top speed compared to its all other models, sun roof, adjustable driver seat, passenger seat, etc.
which has highly influenced the upper class class people.
Illustration 1: AIDA Model. 2019

Vision: The vision of the Mercedes is to be premier auto mobile dealership, provide
exceptional value to its customers through service of highest quality.
Mission: The mission of the company is to promote the Mercedes Benz brand by
developing and implementing strategies which results in higher sales and exceptional after sale
services to the customers leading to optimum return on investment for the shareholders.
Business objectives: The following are the major objectives of the Mercedes and they
are discussed below:
 The company aims to assure relevant customer satisfaction and wins over customers with
outstanding quality.
 With the application of digital technologies, the company aims to be at the forefront, both
with the product and services and the entire value chain.
 The growth strategy is designed to ensure that our Mercedes-Benz Cars division will play
the leading role in the premium segment worldwide over the long term.
 They aim to work in teams whose diversity in terms of gender, nationality and age is of
great importance.
Marketing mix
The marketing mix is a set of activity which are utilized by the company to boost its
brands or products in the market. It uses multiple areas to focus them as a part of encompassing
marketing plan. This group of marketing variables which are combined and controlled to
generate the desired response in the target market. This is a crucial marketing tools and
techniques which is composed to influence the demand for the products offered by the firm. It is
important for the Mercedes because it is helpful in handling plan for the company which
provides success to the company. The following is the marketing mix of the Mercedes Benz:
Product: This represents an item or services which are designed to satisfy the customer
needs and wants. To effectively market the products and services, it is crucial to identify the
differentiated and unique product (Mihaela, 2015). Mercedes Benz is a luxury brand which
needs no formal introduction and the product is s class is a true essence of luxury in its own. The
Mercedes can boast about its products as not only it has the best of design and luxury but also the
best of technology. It offers wide range of products namely, V class, CLA coupe, CLS third
generation, G class, S class, GLE SUV, B class, etc. In this, the Mercedes Benz S class has been