Introduction
Ocean Beauty Center will be a full-service beauty and personal care salon committed to the provision of superior client contentment through offering quality products and exceptional services to the consumers. In addition, the salon will provide a pleasant workplace environment through satisfactory relationship between worth and price. Further, affable, just and inventive work atmosphere that values multiplicity, thoughts and hard work will also be core aspects of the firm.
Details of the company and business Goals
Business idea and main activities
Ocean Beauty Center is deemed as a full-service beauty shop. As such, the firm will provide a variety of excellent services and quality products that satisfy the needs of consumers by utilizing the services of its proficient and qualified personnel. Additionally, Ocean Beauty Center will provide customers with a relaxed and pleasant environment. Moreover, offering high and superior services as well as client fulfillment at apposite prices will be emphasized by the business.
The business will offer hair, nails and skin care services. Hair services will entail cuts, relaxers, colors, weaving, shampoo, conditioning and curling as well as reconstructing. Further, nail services will include pedicures, manicures and polish. Moreover, skin care services will encompass facials, massage and body waxing.
Business aims and objectives
Aims
The experienced team at Ocean Beauty Center, excellent locality, special and distinctive services as well as strategic management team will be critical in the business’ undertakings. The aims of Ocean Beauty Center will be
- To gratify client needs
- To provide the services required in the market
- To maximize the firm’s revenue
- To offer new products and services dissimilar from those of rivals to capture bigger market proportion as well as increased profit
- To ensure growth in terms of profit
Objectives
The short-term objectives of Ocean Beauty Center’s operation include
- To gain net revenue above forty percent
- To increase net proceeds by over thirty percent of sales in the second year of operation
- To augment the firm’s sales to thirty percent in the second year of operation
- To attain customer satisfaction through the provision of services that exceeds customers’ expectations.
In fact, customer contentment will remain core in the operations of Ocean Beauty Center in order to gain high and good repute. The firm will achieve good status and employee satisfaction through hiring highly expert personnel with professional beauty service credentials.
The long-standing objective of the firm will be
- To attract numerous and new clientele
- To build comprehensible client acquisition processes
The clients will be fundamental to the growth of the business as well as proceeds. In other words, the profitability of the firm will depend on the number of customers.
Mission statement
The mission of Ocean Beauty Center is to attract and maintain customers through the provision of convenience and high quality services that surpass the anticipation of the clients.
Business location
The firm will be situated in Al Ain near Al Jimi Mall “Carrefour” close to Dubai Islamic Bank, Al Jawhara Branch. The location will be idyllic and perfect since it will provide easy access to the customers.
Unique selling points
Excellent customer service, pleasant work environment for customers as well as the skills applied in operations will be critical aspects in the provision of services to clients. In addition, the firm will provide a variety of services to customers under one roof as well as extending the business operation hours. The firm will also employ highly proficient personnel to offer the various beauty services.
The provision of distinctive services that are not offered by other competitive firms in the beauty industry will offer competitive edge to Ocean Beauty Center over business rivals. Ocean Beauty Center will be the foremost and solitary beauty center offering the service in the entire Al Ain. The firm will utilize its proficient personnel to offer services.
The firm will also utilize exclusive and extraordinary ways in the provision of services. The exclusive and extraordinary procedures will add competitive advantage to the firm over its rivals. Ocean Beauty Center will offer free and extra services to devoted clients. For instance, hand of legs massage, complimentary blow-dry after coloring and hair cut as well as Moroccan massage after the special Moroccan bath will be offered to clients.
Target market
The target market for Ocean Beauty Center will be majorly females of all ages.
Key competitors
Ocean Beauty Center aims to establish itself as the leading beauty center providing high quality services to consumers. The business will cautiously select and hire personnel based on professional job qualifications in order to attain customer contentment.
The firm will face competition from a number of salons operating in the city such as Batavia Beauty Center, New Millennium Beauty Salon and Al Nada Beauty Salon among others. The firm will offer unique services as well as a business atmosphere that is pampered and relaxed to gain competitive advantage over rival beauty centers. In addition, the business will offer soft and hot drinks to the customers based on the services rendered. For instance, the clients will be provided with Moroccan tea and Moroccan sweet during Moroccan bath. Moreover, Ocean Beauty Center will offer extra free services to clients since the ministry regulates the prices.
Form of business ownership
The business will be managed by a sole proprietor.
General operational resources
The location of the business will be an ideal resource in the operation of the firm. In essence, the position of the firm will be unique and special in the vicinity thereby attracting numerous clients. In addition, highly qualified staff with credentials in beauty service will be significant in the achievement of the business’ success.
Environmental analysis
PESTEL analysis
Political environment
Political aspects have been found to be predominant influencing factor in the management and operations of Ocean Beauty Center given the fact that most of the beauty services salons are situated in countries that have experienced both political stability and instability in the recent past. However, UAE particularly Dubai where the business is situated is enjoying both political and social stability. Like any other industry or business, Ocean Beauty Center requires politically stable environment in order to achieve its goals. Ocean Beauty Center will thrive to expand since the country in which it operates enjoys political stability.
Economic environment
The recent economic boom in Dubai has resulted into many smaller businesses sprouting up due to increased demand of products and services. The disposable income has increased considerably and most businesses are transacted. Besides, spending on luxury and beauty products have increased tremendously. Therefore, the improved economic situations will greatly the growth and development of Ocean Beauty Center.
Social environment
Many social issues affect the industry. However, Ocean Beauty Center will align its services with the target market needs including age and culture. The most important social factor influencing the industry is culture. However, the services of the firm are aligned with the socio-cultural needs of customers. In Middle East for instance, the socio-cultural setting is such that women are adorned with beauty but under cover. Therefore, the firm is investing in areas where socio-cultural factors promote its business.
Technological environment
Ocean Beauty Center will incorporate online activities in its operations. As such, technology is integral for its success. However, the developed ICT infrastructures only support large businesses. As most of the operations rely on the availability and usability of information technology, the business will thrive to apply available technology to develop. In essence, technology forms an integral part of the firm. All aspects of the firms including sales, purchases, marketing, management, and operations depend on the development of technology. Therefore, Ocean Beauty Center will invest in cost effective technology.
Legal environment
Legal factors are critical for the establishment and operations of the firm. The legal requirement of Dubai supports the establishment and growth of businesses. As such, Ocean Beauty Center will comply with the legal requirements in order to operate effectively. Essentially, the legal environment is conducive and supports the growth and development of firms particularly businesses that adhere to the required regulations.
SWOT analysis
Strengths
The fact that Ocean Beauty Center will be holding the largest beauty salon in terms of value enables it benefit from the leading competitive positioning. In addition, the business’s broad target market segment increases its capabilities of expanding the customer base. Moreover, the firm has diverse service brand offerings. The Company’s brand offerings are aimed at providing excellent services to the customers. The diverse brand offerings will enable the firm benefit from increased capabilities of taking advantage of large clientele.
Ocean Beauty Center has well established differentiated strategy that distinguishes its services from competitors. Moreover, the business has adopted flat decentralized structures that ease management and reduces costs. In addition, the management and staff consist of diverse skills, which are resourceful to the Ocean Beauty Center. The shared values of the firm are easily understandable and well communicated to all members of staff. All the staffs at Ocean Beauty Center are highly skilled, experienced, motivated, and specialized. The personnel consist of a well-trained team that is proud, respects, and promotes the business brand values. The corporation also enjoys a strong reputation within the market because of quality, reliability, and exemplary services offered to its clients.
Weaknesses
The emphases on middle and up-scale beauty markets segment leave the firm susceptible to several possible large-scale economic downturns. In addition, the single market focus on high-end urban setting reduces the firm’s competitive edge. The high-end urban population represents only forty-five percent of the total market share. Moreover, the growth and expansion of superfluous beauty salons offer alternative high-end services to clientele. Further, Ocean Beauty Center differentiated strategy needs to be well communicated to the target markets. The firm has not yet fully developed to allow speedy delivery of services to the consumers.
Opportunities
The most probable opportunities are the vibrant growth in the middle and upper class market segment. In addition, developments in economic conditions and infrastructures that support the growth and development of businesses as well as growth in upper and middle-class presents new opportunities for the firm. Moreover, the increased growth of the industry in Middle East countries particularly in Dubai presents exploitable opportunity. Further, the growing purchasing power of younger women, which is regarded as the most active customer demographic presents new opportunity for the firm to exploit. The younger women generations between the ages of twenty to forty five are the largest purchasers of fashion and beauty services the business offers. Ocean Beauty Center is in a position to capitalize on this customer segment.
Threats
From the reports, it is easy for new competitors to enter this market with similar services and brand. The new entrant poses a potential threat to Ocean Beauty Center. In addition to the threats of new entrants, small and medium sized beauty salons offer substitute services. Besides, the probable economic slump that has greater effect on the business conditions and consumer confidence presents a greater threat to the operations of the business.
Characteristics of Target market
The target market for Ocean Beauty Center will mainly consist of young women between the ages fourteen to fifty-five. The market will consist of women individuals who are young, outgoing and full of life. Studies show that females gender represent approximately sixty-five percent of the total population while males accounts for the remaining proportion. Most importantly, the young women populace between the ages of twenty to forty-four years forms the bulk of Ocean Beauty Center market since the age bracket accounts for twenty-four percent of entire population. On the other hand, women between the ages of forty-five to fifty-four years account for approximately sixteen percent.
Young women populace especially between the ages of fourteen to thirty-five will also be major market target for Ocean Beauty Center due to their elastic reactions to marketing. Additionally, Ocean Beauty Center will target high-income earners since the richest individuals consume at least twice beauty service compared to the poorest individuals. Specifically, women of higher income earners account for approximately thirty percent users of beauty services compared to the fifteen percent by the less income earners worldwide. In essence, Ocean Beauty Center will target individuals whose incomes range between $500 and above.
Description of process used to arrive at this information
The target market information was majorly drawn from the market survey conducted to ascertain market needs of the firm. In addition, data from the industry and the national statistics was also used to provide the information. The market survey was conducted to establish market needs, target market as well as market trends.
Competitor analysis
Batavia Beauty Center
Batavia Beauty Center is the leader in the industry and controls approximately twenty percent of entire market share. In addition, Batavia Beauty Center has become tantamount with quality beauty services brands. In fact, Batavia Beauty Center has over three hundred branches all over the country. Further, the firm has distinct trademark as well as efficient delivery personnel. Moreover, Batavia Beauty Center product philosophy is centered on quality and consumer satisfaction thereby gaining competitive advantage over rivals.
New Millennium Beauty Salon
New Millennium Beauty Salon has diversified its operations in over 150 branches. The business brilliance of the firm’s management has led to its rapid expansion within the country. Further, New Millennium Beauty Salon low-price strategy has been vital in the attraction of consumers. The firm has also received various international quality accolades thereby amassing numerous consumers. Moreover, New Millennium Beauty Salon has been experiencing an increasing trend in revenues leading to augmented levels of growth.
Risk factors
The business may fail to attract potential customers. Given high competition and increased possibility of new entrants into the market, the business may fail to attract reasonable quantity of clientele that would enable it sustain growth in returns. However, the firm has identified potential primary target market that will provide distinct competitive advantage.
In addition, the location of the business may not be near majority of the target market. However, the firm is located at the business district center where most of the potential clients visit almost daily. The central location is also to increase the customers’ convenience and reduce costs of reaching the business.
Finally, the business may face unavailable or scarce beauty products. Most of the additives, shampoos and other products that the business utilizes will be imported in case they are not available locally. The process of procuring the products from abroad will increase expenses, which in turn augment the cost of services provided.
Marketing plan
Marketing strategy
Ocean Beauty Center will be using various marketing mix strategies to ensure that the services it offers are well positioned in the market. Included in the market skimming strategies are product and pricing strategies, placing strategies, and promotional strategies (Keller and Kotler 69). The marketing mix strategies will majorly be implemented through the application of mainstream and social media platforms.
Ocean Beauty Center will focus on the delivery of excellent hair and beauty services to the young women as the major market segment. The high-end young women that value excellent beauty services, support and knowledge are clearly differentiated in the market segmented. Within the market segment, the objectives of the marketing mix strategies includes
- To ensure sales increase by 40%
- To ensure increase in the sales margin by more than 20%
- To ensure increase in the presence of Ocean Beauty Center by 55%
The marketing mix strategies particularly the price and distribution approaches are aimed at attaining the set objectives. However, the major aim of the Ocean Beauty Center is to increase its market share and the brand awareness. Social media provides an avenue through which the business will attain its major objectives (Kraten 235).
The product positioning
Ocean Beauty Center will be dealing in varieties of fashionable and stylish services ranging from women hair beauty care to body message. As such, the Ocean Beauty Center will utilize its expertise and innovative capabilities to ensure development and sale of advanced services that offer varied choices for customers (McKeever 203). Moreover, the business will be offering auxiliary services as well as beauty products to suit the customer needs and bring convenience, which is a mixture of value and quality.
Further, Ocean Beauty Center will focus on its services and products differentiation, which is critical amid intense competition particularly in new markets where the business plans to establish. Ocean Beauty Center will differentiate its services in terms of augmented value, placing and pricing. In other words, the business will ensure that the offered services have additional value beyond the expectations of the customers (Kotler and Armstrong 203). Moreover, the services will be offered at a place, which is convenience to target clients. In essence, the firm will ensure that the customers receive their desired services beyond their expectations.
In the presence of increased competition, Ocean Beauty Center will ensure that its services are affordable to the target market. Ocean Beauty Center has introduced variety of services into the market. The innovative capabilities of the business expert personnel will enable the development of new services, offering varied choices to the customers. Moreover, auxiliary functions of Ocean Beauty Center services will be improved to suit the customer needs and bring convenience, a mixture of value and quality.
Intense competition in the industry requires that Ocean Beauty Center enhance its services differentiations through design, timeliness, affordability, form, conformance quality, durability and style. Most importantly, Ocean Beauty Center has succeeded in becoming pacesetter in the provision of beauty services in terms of both application and design. In essence, Ocean Beauty Center has achieved the competitive advantage through the application of its technological knowhow (Keller and Kotler 78).
The main objectives of the company products and services strategies include
- To increase the availability of the quality beauty service to the customers by 25%
- To improve the services quality by 65%
The objectives will be attained highly services to the clients through increasing the varied beauty services offered to the customers. The brand positioning will be attained through increasing the presence of the business in the beauty websites and other social networking sites.
Price strategies
As indicated, Ocean Beauty Center faces stiff competition from various fashion and beauty salons within the town. Therefore, pricing differentiation strategy will provide critical competitive advantage. Apart from the services range offered by the company, Ocean Beauty Center should also have the right price for its services to encourage the purchase so that the business can realize increased profits (Cole 201). In essence, price is a critical element in the business marketing mix since it will primarily be used to create sales revenue. Price is not only used in the marketing mix but also in the product development as well as managerial decisions.
As expected, the quality and value addition attract high prices. However, the prices of Ocean Beauty Center are middle-high with some beauty services targeting high-end customers while others will be tailored for low and middle incomers. The high-quality low-prices strategy will be applied particularly to outperform the competitors (Solomon 122). In addition, the pricing strategy will be aimed at widening the spectrum of customers Ocean Beauty Center is targeting. At the start, Ocean Beauty Center will be targeting customers at high-income level. Nevertheless, with the entry of more competitors the business will be forced to widen its scope and capture middle and low-income clientele.
The main objectives of the pricing strategies will be
- To attract and retain customers
- To attain at least 5% net margin
The actions in the pricing strategies will be aimed at attaining both the objectives particularly price discrimination in terms of place and class or the target market. Essentially, pricing strategies will be aimed at increasing the competitiveness of Ocean Beauty Center as well as widening the customer base (Stutely 108). In other words, the pricing strategies are aimed at increasing the market share as well as profit margins.
Placing strategies
Creating right marketing mix also involves offering the products and services at the right place and time (Cole 203). In other words, clients are supposed to get the products when are in need and at the most convenient place. The business is centrally placed to ensure that the clients get their services at the right time and in the most convenient place. Moreover, the up market position where the business is located will ensure that the customers will incur less cost to reach the Salon. Essentially, the central and up market location ensures convenience in terms of cost and time which will contribute insignificantly on the final prices on services.
Significantly, Ocean Beauty Center will adopt the business to customer contact strategy in order to directly deal with its customers. Direct interaction with the customers will be critical in knowing the customer needs, which leads to the development of the suitable services that suit their expectations as well as market needs (Kotler and Armstrong 213). Moreover, the direct sales of the Ocean Beauty Center beauty services will lead to the expanded market share. However, the business single physical location will still be limited to the potential customers. Therefore, the company will expand in various places of the town and nearby suburbs to reach all manner of customers.
The promotion strategies
Ocean Beauty Center will be most active in its promotional undertakings. The aim of the promotional strategy is to enable the business brands become a nationally recognizable logo. In the promotional strategy, Ocean Beauty Center will utilize various basic techniques to reach the customers. The promotion techniques the business will be utilizing include advertising, public relations, personal selling and sales promotions (Pinson 207). However, Ocean Beauty Center will majorly utilize innovative advertising to attract and inform the viable clients about the beauty services offered both in mass and digital media.
Ocean Beauty Center will be investing in both mainstream and social media advertising to increase awareness of the products to many customers. Besides, the brand awareness will also be improved through innovative advertising in mass media particularly in television and beauty magazines (Lee 314). Most of the services offered by the business will also be advertised in the online beauty magazine websites as well as the sites of collaborative beauty products companies. The major objective of advertising is to increase brand awareness of the services offered by Ocean Beauty Center to the target users.
Besides, Ocean Beauty Center will utilize corporate social responsibility to appeal to many people as a method of maintaining its public relations. The success of Ocean Beauty Center on public relations will improve its goodwill and attracts the public attention (Bradley 201). Further, Ocean Beauty Center will provide special offers such as free blow dry as a good way to stimulate and retain its customer’s loyalty. Moreover, the business will also extensively apply personal selling. Ocean Beauty Center sales representatives and services providers will be fully trained on the business’s services information and will be responsible for the provision of excellent customer beauty services.
The main objectives of the promotional strategies will be
- To increase brand awareness of the to the target services users
- To attract and inform its customers about the services offered by the business
- To make the brand appealing to many people and attract the public attention
- To stimulate and retain the customer loyalty
Most of the promotional actions will results in the achievement of the set objectives. Most importantly, sales promotion will result in increasing the brand awareness as well as maintaining the customer’s loyalty. In essence, the promotional mix techniques will result in the attainment of several sales objectives.
Summary
Ocean Beauty Center will be a full-service beauty and personal care salon committed to the provision of superior client contentment through offering quality products and exceptional services to the consumers. In addition, the salon will provide a pleasant workplace environment through satisfactory relationship between worth and price. Further, affable, just and inventive work atmosphere that values multiplicity, thoughts and hard work will also be core aspects of the firm.
The salon will operate with a mission of delivering services that augment the clients’ mental repose as well as physical look. The triumph of the business will depend on the firm’s location, work environment, convenience and the reputation of the firm. The business will be located in an area easily reachable to customers. Additionally, the business will provide a favorable work atmosphere by offering soothing and expert service to the clients. Further, convenience will enable the business to provide clientele with a range of services under one roof as well as lengthening the business hours. The reputation of the business proprietor and the beauticians through the provision of better individual service will be a key success factor. The Beauty Center will operate under the slogan of being the trendsetter in the salon industry.
Works Cited
Bradley, Nigel. Marketing research: tools and techniques. Oxford, Oxford University Press, 2013. Print.
Cole, Alex. The implications of consumer behavior for marketing: A case study of social class. Munich, GRIN Verlag, 2013. Print.
Keller, Kevin Lane and Philip Kotler. Marketing management. Upper Saddle River, NJ, Prentice Hall, 2012. Print.
Kotler, Philip and Gary Armstrong. Principles of marketing. Upper Saddle River, NJ, Pearson Education, 2013. Print.
Kraten, Michael. Business Planning and Entrepreneurship: An Accounting Approach. New York, Business Expert Press, 2010. Print.
Lee, Jennifer. The right-brain business plan: A creative, visual map for success. New San Francisco Bay, World Library, 2011. Print.
McKeever, Mike. How to write a business plan. Berkeley, Nolo, 2012. Print.
Pinson, Linda. Anatomy of a business plan: The step-by-step guide to building your business and securing your company’s future. Chicago, aka associates, 2008. Print.
Solomon, Michael. Consumer behavoir; Buying, having, and being. Upper Saddle River, NJ, Pearson Education, 2012. Print.
Stutely, Richard. The definitive business plan: The fast-track to intelligent business planning for executives and entrepreneurs. Upper Saddle River, FT Press, 2012.