Abel Tasman National Park Marketing Mix

1. When ATE began to diversify its business, discuss what considerations relating to the marketing mix would it have investigated or thought about in the initial stages of their planning activities.

First of all, when we are discussing the marketing mix of ATE, we have to consider that ATE does not sell a product. ATE provides services and services are an intangible good which is quite harder to campaign for.

When they started to diversify their business 1982 and the year after that, John Wilson was trying to create a product that is styled like a package for his customers. First they started with just a water taxi, then when they began to diversify they added guided bushwalks, sea-kayaking and a night accommodation lodge.

At the beginning ATE had to find the price for their product which, I consider, was quite hard because of only very few experience in this kind of business and not that much comparable companies. Since this time the prices were rising until today, where they are a "high end" tour operator.

To position ATE captures during the early years was clearly defined as the only provider of a water taxi after the cyclone and later on as a growing tourism service company who was perceived by the customers as one of the famous tour provider in New Zealand because of the national campaign to attract tourists.

First ATE starts with personnel selling, then they started to advertise and were also part of a national marketing campaign to attract people to come and visit new Zealand. In 1994 ATE was one of the first who had their own website.

The process is an element of service that sees the customer as experiencing a companyÒ's offering. It's best viewed as something that your customer participates in at different points in time. ATE offers their customer services like taking them around while their luggage is already brought to another point or lunch is prepared there when they arrive.

People are the most important element of any service or experience. Services tend to be produced and consumed at the same moment, and aspects of the customer experience are altered to meet the 'individual needs' of the person consuming it. ATE started at the beginning to look after well skilled, well trained and customer service orientated people.

Physical Evidence is about the material part of a service like voucher for a booked tour with a logo of ATE on it. Four years ago they started to send presentations on CD to their clients.

2. Marketing decisions require the gathering and analysing of information that will assist in making the right decision. Elaborate on what macro and micro environmental forces that would have had an influence on the marketing strategies for this company. Provide examples to support your commentary.

The micro-environment

This environment influences the organization of ATE directly. It includes suppliers that deal directly or indirectly, consumers and customers, and other local stakeholders. Micro tends to suggest small, but this is not every time the way it is. In this context, micro describes the relationship between firms and the driving forces that control this relationship. For ATE it is a more local relationship, and they may exercise a degree of influence. In this case ATE has to look after the position and opinion of locals they have to cope with.

The macro-environment

This includes all factors that can influence the organization of ATE, but which are out of their direct control. ATE does not generally influence any laws, although it could be supposed that they could lobby or be part of a general tourism organization. It is continuously changing and as a consequence ATE needs to be flexible to adapt. There has been developed aggressive competition and rivalry in the market of tourism operators. The threat of substitute products and new entrants in the market they take part of is always there. The wider environment is also ever changing, and ATE needs to compensate for changes in culture, politics and economics. For example the actual discussion about decommercialising the national parks or run them as commercial businesses. Furthermore ATE thinks about his strategy in the market, concentrating now on its core business. The desinvestment of the bus line is a good example for that because the line did not fit anymore to their strategic business units.

3. In developing a growth strategy for ATE, Darryl Wilson's is contemplating building low season demand involving the targeting of conferences and weekend 'get-away' segments. Outline and elaborate on each stage of the research process that you would undertake to determine if these markets were viable. Your answer should include where and what data could be obtained, samples of secondary data, method of gathering data, a questionnaire, sampling method you would employ and how this would be obtained.

In the following I will give you an overview on each stage of a research process I would undertake in this special case of ATE:

1. The problem

How can we build up low season demand? What do our customers want and what are they expecting if they are being asked for conferences and weekend "get-away"?

2. Collect the data:

ATE could conduct a telephone