Goodyear Case

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+ Threats: Continental Tires was developing Aqua Contact at that time and was believed to launch in 1993, one year after the introduction of Aquatred. Any fault of Aquatred or mistakes of Goodyear’s communication strategy will be taken advantage of by Continental Tires.

- To overcome such challenges, I come up with some ideas:

- About distribution channels of Goodyear, I strongly recommend the use of both large tire chains and small independent tire dealers to maximize the product coverage on market for replacement parts.

- About advertising strategy, it would be better to design strategies that targeting the new features and durability of Aquatred. Campaigns may include test drives on cars equipped with Aquatred in wet road condition, car races sponsors, product placement in retail stores must be the same throughout distribution channels, product displays had to be eye-catching, and employees at retail stores could get through a small training at Goodyear to know well about the new product thus lead to a more convincing advice given to customers (Koch and McGrath, 1996).…

- Pricing strategies of Goodyear also need to be reconsidered. Higher price may not in favor of normal customers of retail channels thus may cause a decline in the sales volume. If Goodyear insisted to position Aquatred as an expensive product, their marketing campaigns had to persuade customers of the superior quality of Aquatred.

References:

- Indiatsy, C. M., Mwangi, M. S., Mandere, E. N., Bichanga, J. M. & George, G. E. (2014). The application of Porter’s five forces model on organizational performance: A case of Cooperative Bank of Kenya Ltd. European Journal of Business and Management, 6(16), pp. 75 – 85

- Ommani, A. R. (2011). Strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threats (SWOT) analysis for farming system business management: Case of wheat farmers of Shadervan District, Shoushtar Township, Iran. African Journal of Business Management, 5(22), pp. 9448 – 9454

- Bitner, M. J., & Zeithaml, V. A. (2004). Service marketing. New York: McGraw Hill.

- Blair, D., & Sisakhti, R. (2007). Sales training: what makes it work”? T+D Magazine, August, available

at: www.astd.org/astd/Publications/ TD Magazine/ 2007_pdf/August/0708_ExecSum.htm

- Richard L.Oliver, ‘When Consumer Loyalty?’ Journal of Marketing 63 (Special issue 1993), 33-44.

Word count: 1300 words