Unilever strategic marketing

“150 million times a day, someone somewhere chooses a Unilever

product”

Annie Kao Suzanne Haffenden

Who are Unilever

 Origins of Unilever  Operational style  Strategic style  Examples of strategic

style  Competitive environment  Current strategies

 Simon Clift  Marketing lessons

learnt  Future prospects

Overview

The origins of Unilever Unilever is an Anglo-Dutch multinational corporation that

owns consumer products in;

   Food and Beverages    Cleaning agents    Personal care

Created in 1930 from a merger between the British soap maker Lever Brothers and Margarine Unie

As palm oil was a major raw material for both soaps and margarines

  Unileverlisation   Mergers and acquisitions – grew through

repeated mergers of companies who usually retained their names and brands. This encourage strong belief and initiative to de-centralise control

  Conglomerate

Operational Style

Strategic Style

  Research and Innovation   Localisation   Diversification into a broad category   Multiple segment specialisation - developing

products to target every segment. Serving multiple markets whilst differentiating products in a way that meets needs of each segment

  Developing in emerging markets

 Brand Expansion

 “The Beauty Soap of Film Stars”

 Icon Brand

Unilever Brands

Unilever Brands

 Localisation  Building businesses organically  The world's biggest ice cream company  Ben & Jerry's

.   Research and Innovation   Different needs for different hair types

 Concentrating on emerging markets  Understanding different consumer needs  Offering products at different price points

Developing and Emerging Market Opportunity

 Bottom of the Pyramid

 Multi-trillion dollar opportunity

 Billions of people out of poverty in the next 10 years

Developing and Emerging Market Opportunity

Competitive environment

  Key Competitors   Proctor and Gamble   Nestle   Colegate-palmolive   Kraft   Supermarket private lables

  The management of the smaller brands slowed down its growth.

  Whilst their competitors concentrated on global development and economies of scale.

Current Strategies

 Downsizing brand portfolio –stream line the business portfolio to reflect vitality concept

 1,500 – 400 master brands  Also, acquisition of high profile food brands

Unilever’s Growth Matrix

Simon Clift

 First chief marketing officer for Unilever “Unilever was effectively a holding company – a conglomerate. That led

to a very complex brand portfolio, with thousands of formulations, positionings, and ways of developing advertising.”

  (Marketing Week)

 Centralised marketing culture  Concentrates on building the brands  New Unilever brand identity

Simon Clift

 Dove and Lynx

Marketing Lessons learnt

1.  Be forward thinking and with constant innovation – looking beyond organisation’s walls.

2.  Defend its territory through growth and diversification

3.  Bigger is not always better. companies need to contract and recognise its

weaknesses.

Future Prospects

  How will Vitality be brought amongst all their brands?

  How will they overcome two contradicting values?

Thank you for listening….

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