MKTG101 Marketing Fundamentals Report: Nike Shoe Marketing Analysis

This report provides an in-depth analysis of Nike's marketing fundamentals. It begins with an overview of marketing research and planning, highlighting how businesses like IKEA utilize research to understand consumer behavior. The report then focuses on Nike, analyzing its competitive landscape within the footwear industry, particularly against rivals like Adidas and Puma. It examines Nike's product offerings, with a focus on innovation like the HyperAdapt 1.0, pricing strategies, and promotional activities. The report further discusses the implications of Nike's current strategies and offers recommendations for future success, including adapting to the online ecosystem and refining pricing strategies. The report concludes by emphasizing the crucial role of marketing research and strategy in today's dynamic business environment, underscoring the need for companies to proactively analyze the market to gain a competitive edge. References to relevant academic sources are included to support the analysis.

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MARKETING fundamentals

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Table of Contents
Marketing Research and Planning.............................................................................................2
Competition for my favourite product.......................................................................................2
Implications for future and Recommendations..........................................................................4
Conclusion..................................................................................................................................4
References..................................................................................................................................5

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Marketing Research and Planning
Marketing research is undertaken by a business that helps the management to explore various
information relating to the marketing strategy and plan. It is known to be one of the critical
components of marketing and operational success. Once management has developed an
important base of marketing research, marketing campaigns can be developed as per the
requirements and needs of consumers (Johanson and Mattsson, 2015). Any firm undertaking
significant marketing research can strategically build marketing objectives for the segmented
market and thus move closer to its vision. One company that excel using marketing research
is the IKEA who use ‘chatbots’ to retrieve response from consumers rather than putting
traditional form of questionnaire (Rezvani, 2016). This also develops a sort of social aspect in
relation with online surveying process. Today’s market demands a deep insight into
consumer minds and thus IKEA marketing strategy seems to be a sign of their efficiency as
using this tactic help the company to well assess responses of customers and modify their
activities as per respective opinion.
Competition for my favourite product
Competition is related to external behaviour which influences the targeted behaviour through
various elements like attitudes, perceptions and resources. Every business goal and marketing
intended is to surpass the competition by offering more satisfaction to the customers through
their products and put some influence in the industry. My favourite product from the products
of Nike is the Nike shoes. Nike stands with monopolistic competition in the footwear
industry with including a diverse portfolio (Axelsson and Easton, 2016). The intense
competition from Adidas, Puma and Reebok has pressurised Nike to reposition in the market
on various other elements such as premium design and product differentiation. Hence, it
requires Nike to takeout advance market research by combining advanced technology so as to
offer superior products. One of the company differentiated product is HyperAdapt 1.0 that
eliminates a multitude of distractions and really advantage performance (ndtv.com, 2016).
This shows that Nike offers innovation and better value products through its market research
in various areas like metabolic cart, kinematics and ankle range of motion. However, Adidas
shares are rising in the U.S. dive stock price of Nike in relation with shifting customer

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preference. In essence, HyperAdapt comes at a crucial time reflecting Nike innovating in the
industry with pop-culture allusions from the film i.e. ‘Back to the Future’. Below, Nike shoe
marketing mix is being elaborated -
Product – Considering Nike shoes, the business of Nike progressively adds more product
lines like the company provides running shoes, tennis shoes and also for many other sports
containing cricket. In addition, the company is continuously doing innovation in this segment
due to high competition in the market. For instance, Nike introduces ‘HyperAdapt’ by
stepping into future of footwear with self-lacking shoes technology that senses and adjust
according to an individual foot. This innovation helps Nike to be on distinct position in the
footwear industry and attain competitive edge in the industry with the other players (Adidas,
Reebok and so on).
Price – Nike always focuses on designing price to be competitive to other fashions Shoe
distributor. The company target customer demands for premium products and hence, the
company uses vertical integration in pricing. It helps Nike to regulate costs and impact
product pricing. Nikes adopt value based and premium pricing strategy for its targeted
segment. The company accepts customer perception in value based pricing strategy and on
the other hand, their premium price is related with the premium branding (Zambrano et al,
2017). For instance, the business uses big celebrities to endorse its products especially shoes.
Example, Cristiano Ronaldo did the advertisement of Nike shoe i.e. Mercurial Superfly.
Promotion – Promotion is an important tool for any business firm who seeks to increase its
sales and revenue with high brand awareness. This aspect involves the approach of Nike
adopts to communicate with its target market. Nike is continuously increasing its promotional
budget yearly and yearly to maintain strong brand image throughout the world. In 2019 alone,
Nike's promotion and advertising costs amounted to nearly 3.75 billion U.S. dollars
(statista.com, 2019). The company also undertake various sponsorship events such as the
Golden West Invitational and Hoop It Up. It increases the brand image all over the world
with contributing its shoe market to huge success.

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Implications for future and Recommendations
In relation with marketing implication, it is important for Nike to change its traditional
strategy of promotion by moving to online ecosystem. It implies that Nike needs to cut for
print and television promotion and increasing to the social media. With regards to this, Nike
can use its web resources to smartly position itself.
Other than this, the pricing strategy of Nike shoes is high. Nike can regulate it based on
consumer groups and needs. This help the company to penetrate niche segment of the market
effectively as well also helps in building customer loyalty. The company can also increase its
market presence in emerging nations and to those marketplace, where there is high growth
potential to ensure its constant leadership in the international athletic footwear.
Conclusion
Marketing research and strategy plays an important role in this dynamic and complex
business environment. Due to changing customer demands and high competition, any
enterprise functioning on a small or large scale needs to carry out proactive analysis of the
market to gain competitive advantage. Taking example of Nike, it is one of the well-known
and successful brand established world-wide. It has a lot of strength in its shoe product
portfolio, however, in certain areas, the company can reform its marketing strategy
collaborating with the customer’s needs and environmental opportunities.

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References
Axelsson, B. and Easton, G. (2016) Industrial Networks (Routledge Revivals): A New View
of Reality. London: Routledge.
Johanson, J. and Mattsson, L.G. (2015) Internationalisation in industrial systems—a network
approach. In Knowledge, networks and power (pp. 111-132). London: Palgrave Macmillan.
ndtv.com. (2016) Self-Lacing Shoes By Nike, 20 Years After 'Back To The Future' [ONLINE]
Available from: https://www.ndtv.com/world-news/sportswear-firm-nike-unveils-first-self-
lacing-shoes-1288123 [Accessed 10/08/2019].
Rezvani, M. (2016) Ekka: Why your chatbot needs a vertical focus [ONLINE] Available
from: https://venturebeat.com/2016/11/06/why-your-chatbot-needs-a-vertical-focus/
[Accessed 10/08/2019].
statista.com. (2019) Nike's advertising and promotion costs from 2014 to 2019 (in billion
U.S. dollars) [ONLINE] Available from: https://www.statista.com/statistics/685734/nike-ad-
spend/ [Accessed 10/08/2019].
Zambrano, D.S., Mayorga, O.T., Ramirez, A.R. and Bustamante, F.P. (2017) Evaluation of
Consumers Motivations of Sportswear Teams in the City of Bogota. European Journal of
Sustainable Development, 6(3), pp.295-302.