An integrated marketing communication campaign for Wei Wei Cold Store

• Main Author: Tamura, Mariko C.
• Format: text
• Language: English
• Published: Animo Repository 2020
• Subjects: Food industry and trade; Marketing
• Online Access: https://animorepository.dlsu.edu.ph/etd_masteral/6258; https://animorepository.dlsu.edu.ph/context/etd_masteral/article/13308/viewcontent/TAMURA_MARIKO_11794046_1Edited.pdf
• Institution: De La Salle University

Wei Wei Cold Store also known as “Wei Wei” is a brand of retail stores in the Philippines selling particularly niche products such as hot pot balls, buns and other hotpot-related food products. Since 1996, Wei Wei has been serving customers who are familiar with hotpot, the Filipino-Chinese community, which is then highly concentrated at the Chinatown, Manila, Philippines. This is why the first store of Wei Wei was located in Arranque, Manila where the target market resides. However, during the course of time, more consumers are being open to other cuisines and Filipino-Chinese community has also expanded its ground outside Chinatown. This provides Wei Wei the opportunity to expand market as well, thus they opened another branch in Cubao, Quezon City in 2013. Another opportunity opened when more and more foreigners who are fond of hotpot (a.k.a steamboat, shabu-shabu) increased in the metro, which mostly resides in Bonifacio Global City (BGC), Taguig City. Thus, the third Wei Wei branch opened at Market! Market!, BGC in 2017. Despite the niche nature of Wei Wei, Wei Wei is still part of a Php 7B-industry (Euromonitor, 2017) of the processed seafood and meat industry. And the growth is expected to reach even Php 50B by 2020. Awareness of hotpot as a dish is also growing not only in the Philippines but in the entire world with famous hotpot restaurant chains like Hai Di Lao sprouts across continents. The potential of the Wei Wei business is indeed promising but as an imported frozen product, Wei Wei is faced with high overhead costs for freezers and chillers, importation expenses and large storage facilities. This makes the business require high capitalization and operational costs, that even if the opportunity is large, Wei Wei is still limited for expansion due to financial and facilities issues. Yet, Wei Wei is a strong business with generated gross sales of Php 103,000.00 in 2019, even with the 9-digit sales; Wei Wei is still not meeting the conservative sales increase of 5% per year now that it has three branches. And interestingly, Wei Wei have a very small competition in the field with only potentially direct competition, Save N Fresh and Jash Mart, both of which may be popular with the Filipino-Chinese community but still not as commercialized and established as Wei Wei. With high capitalization requirement, it is also hard for new entries and competition to compete with Wei Wei especially with almost 25 years of operation. Thus, Wei Wei is faced with the challenge of increasing sales but to increase it conservatively and manageably that the operations can actually manage the potential demand from the existing supply (and the costs it may entail). Facing this challenge, a consumer profile survey in 2019 was conducted to learn about the characteristics of Wei Wei customers. And the survey revealed that a number of customers have been mid- to long-term customers. They are aware of the brand and highly satisfied but also revealed that they shop at Wei Wei for only 0 to 3 times per month as they do not necessarily make hotpot on a regular basis. Yet, when asked if they are willing to purchase more, most of the customers agreed for the right reasons which they said to be if there is a special occasion and if there are more dishes they can use with Wei Wei. Having new products and sales promo will also encourage them to buy more at Wei Wei. In this case, customer loyalty then is revealed to be high with Wei Wei and has a potential to increase sales given the right circumstances. It is then considered that if Wei Wei can retain loyal customers, then it can have a potential to increase sales manageably by at least 5% which is a believed trend in loyal customer retention according to research firm, Bain and Co. (Reichheld & Schefter, 2000). However, customer loyalty requires a customized marketing and communication strategy. In fact, a loyal customer is actually determined by three determinants which is continuous patronage and repeat purchase (Kincaid, 2003) and willingness to recommend (Kuusik, 2007). Thus marketing activities and tools required for Wei Wei loyal customers must meet all three determinants as well as provide a special experience which promotes trust and value to the target market, based on the conducted survey and focus group discussion (FGD). After determining the consumer profile of the Wei Wei loyal customers which are ages 28 to 35 years old working individuals residing in Metro Manila, it was then revealed that Sales Promotion and Digital Marketing particularly Social Media and Website provides highest value to the existing loyal customers. The research revealed that Wei Wei customers still prefer shopping at Wei Wei stores for the enjoyable experience thus they appreciate immediate gratification of sales promo, and tangible materials like flyers, brochures and posters. Social media was also provided great significance as it meets Wei Wei customers of accessible information, truthful reviews, and even easier recommendation. Some also revealed to be influenced by influencers; yet mixed sentiments were revealed for ads especially the ones with high frequency as it gives negative impression and nuisance to a number of respondents. For the communication, Wei Wei customers preferred direct and fun-loving key message. It is a factor which also matches their impression of Wei Wei which they perceive as a fun and enjoyable product because of the variety, and variety in shapes and colors. However, they also wanted a direct approach in terms of key visuals – to see food when food is marketed while not forgetting to associate experience with the food. Since Wei Wei customers also revealed that they consider Wei Wei as a sharing-food, the main key message and visuals revolved around a celebration, which is also one of Wei Wei customers’ potential reasons to buy more. n summary, Wei Wei customers consider Wei Wei as a fun and enjoyable food that they like to share with their family and friends. Though their top-of-mind idea of Wei Wei is for hot pot, they are willing to use it as ingredients for other dishes because it is easy to prepare or whenever there is a special occasion. Based on these consumer truths, product truths such as long shelf-life, trusted product certified by both global standards and FDA, and well as its variety of different colors and shapes, the big idea “if there’s a meal, there’s a WEI” was developed. The big idea shall be the anchor for the entire campaign’s key messaging and visuals. Associating the big idea with a popular phrase “where there’s a will, there’s a way” makes it easy for the target market to recall, while the word play of using WEI instead of ‘way’ represents the playfulness and fun nature of Wei Wei as its brand personality. Anchored on the big idea, the customer loyalty-focused IMC campaign’s main strategy is to create content and materials on marketing tools which are confirmed as influential towards customer loyalty on all previously identified determinants. Sales promotions and social media are top tools which Wei Wei customers has proven to be most effective on all three determinants, thus, tactics of the campaign are centered on these two IMC tools. As part of the “if there’s a meal, there’s a WEI” campaign, the “Cook Your Wei” series shall be one of the primary tactics of Wei Wei for its loyal customers. The Cook Your Wei series is a monthly online recipe of popular Filipino dishes on special occasions using Wei Wei ingredients to be published on Wei Wei social media and website, integrated in in-store materials via flyers and brochures, and sales promos. The main content shall be in the form of a maximum 10-minute recipe video and a recipe article, supported by 10-seconds teaser video, flyers, brochures and a discount promo. A loyalty stamp card shall also be aligned with the Cook Your WEI series to promote a habit of using Wei Wei products in different dishes as well as to increase purchase frequency of Wei Wei customers. As a secondary influential tool, Wei Wei shall also partner with a mid-tier influencer in the peg of Panlasang Pinoy. The Cook Your Wei series shall be primarily scheduled on lean season of April to August 2020 but shall be available until December 2020. Moreover, a Birthday with Wei Wei bonus promo shall be executed for the entire year. The mechanics of this promo is that for every purchase of Php 1,000.00 on a customer’s birthday week, the customer will get 200g of Wei Wei assorted balls and buns. The birthday promo is intended to emphasize Wei Wei as an ingredient to birthday celebrations while rewarding the customer for remembering Wei Wei on their birthdays to strengthen customer relationship. The Christmas Basket bundle promo with free item is also another tactic to associate special occasions with Wei Wei. The Php 1,500 worth of Christmas Basket includes Wei Wei favorite products and a free Wei Wei branded serving dish. In a nutshell, most of the marketing activities shall be scheduled during lean seasons with peak season promotions to communicate Wei Wei’s key messaging. This integrated marketing campaign costs Php 1,233,450.00, roughly about 25% of Wei Wei’s overall marketing budget, which is only practical as this campaign is entirely dedicated to loyal customers only. The remaining budget for Wei Wei can then be utilized for other marketing activities such as the yearly-participated food expo. Furthermore, the campaign is expected to generate approximately Php 5,815,000.00 gross revenue derived directly from the sales promotions, and engagement from at least 6,000 Wei Wei customers and their extended network.