ISME/SKILLNET/GCD

(CERT. IN SME MANAGEMENT MARKETING & SALES)

URBAN PLANT LIFEImage : Inside the Bonsai, Cacti & Succulents Area

Due date : 16th April 2014Student: Nigel Betts

GCD Student No: 2892145Griffith College Dublin

Urban Plant Life Strategic Marketing Plan 2015

Contents

Image : Feature in Irish Times Weekend 25th Jan 2015

Section 1:

1.Introduction & review of company/current approach

Section 2:

2. S.W.O.T analysis & competitive analysis 3. Strategic Plan

Section 3 :

4. Project summary Including recommendations , review and evalution

5. Appendix6. Information sources

Section 1 : Introduction & review of company/current approach

Urban Plant Life actually started out as Plant Life in the early 1980's supplying an interior landscaping, plant rental and maintenance to corporate clients.

The corporate customer is quite varied from offices,government departments, management companies, sports venues,entertainment venues, event companies and film/tv/advertising production companies.Urban Plant Life also offers a Christmas tree service to these clients.

The film and tv portfolio in particular is quite varied from the “Far and Away “ Tom Cruise film to current clients like the production company working for the Sky Atlantic series “ Penny Dreadful “.

A number of years ago Sam Smyth the owner/ manager opened up the garden centre at 110/111 Cork Street, Dublin 8. The garden centre is fairly unique in that it is the only urban based garden centre in Dublin as most of Urban Plant Life's competitors are based in Dublin's greater environs. The garden centre featured a number of years ago on the RTE series “ Fergal Quinn's Retail Therapy “. It can be viewed at www.plantlife.ie. This project will look only at the issues facing the garden centre.

The main issues that the company faces is that despite the newer website design, sales are low and footfall is not as high as the garden centre would wish, this affects cash flow and the garden centre's ability to implement changes.

At present the garden centre does have a website which allows customers to buy plants online. There was a previous website, the current incarnation has existed since February 2014.

Social media numbers are quite good but engagement numbers can be improved.

These are some of the areas that the project will seek to examine. The internal and external environment that the business currently operates in. An analysis of our competitors. Strategic plan. Finally all the areas looked in the project will be examined, reviewed and conclusions drawn.

Images : Plants in the glasshouse / One of our vans outside corporate client / Website image

Section 2 : S.W.O.T analysis & competitive analysis

Strenghts Weaknesses Opportunities ThreatsPersonal service. Leads to return customers and an advocate for business both online and off line

We have low numbers of traffic and sales currently on website and social media.

As a smaller company compared to competitors our ability to make changes increased.

Current cash flow affects ability to bring in needed changes and to compete on a level playing field with our competitors.

Good staff knowledge of products.

Databases not connected making it harder to make use of. e.g for promotional use

Expand our existing local custom e.g reaching out to gardening /allotment groups.

Greater marketing budget of competitors.

If we continue prompt action to customer queries on social media/phone. Builds customer trust.

Marketing approach requires improvement.

Greater use of social media tracking & analysis tools, allows for prediction of customer behaviour and changes in customer trends.

The current website requires more frequent improvements. Otherwise sales will continue to be low and we will lose online sales.

Current Facebook page is quite strong. It is important that this continued and can be improved on with sugggested changes

When money is spent on marketing.Little analysis on it's success or otherwise.R.O.I – Return on investment

We need to regularly benchmark against our competitors.

If we do not run some regular events or competitions our current good engagement numbers on social media may stagnate and reduce. Footfall may also as well through garden centre.

Competitive analysis Arboreteum Home & Garden Centre

The Orchard Garden Centre

Johnstown Garden Centre

Newlands Garden Centre

Mr Middleton Gardenshop

Howbert & Mays

Mr Middleton Gardenshop is our nearest competitor and has based their business model selling heavily around an online mail - order shop as well as having a physical shop. Most of the others have morphed from the garden centres that they started out as, they now sell you the whole lifestyle package.

Geography means a lot less nowadays, if your competitor has a better online offering than yourself. Your website is your window to the world and this is how you will be judged against competitors. All of the competitors we benchmark ourselves against taken note of technology changes and have implemented these changes already so it is important that we complete this process soon,if we are not to fall behind.Current research now shows the customer does not always finish their buying journey on the smartphone but tends to start here, even if this just an initial information search.

Most of our competitors websites have a good basic design, easy to use and navigate through. Anything that slows down the buying process should be avoided. A customer is less likely to stick on the site, if there are certain barriers to the final sale in the way e.g too many clicks to get to final purchase. Currently for customer the buying journey is not as easy as it could be on our website.

All would currently have less social media posts than ourselves. Currently we are only staying ahead of them at certain periods due to our level of posting and the content within those posts. Creating good and relevant content in your posts is important, but this alone will not yield the required engagement numbers required. They have also increased engagement numbers and followers by running regular events, competitions e.t.c both off and online, this helps to boost numbers over both social media, their website and customers instore.Running these type of things would help to make us more visible within the market and means that customers are more likely to talk about us within their social circle on and offline

Our marketing budget is smaller than most of our competitors, so we must be creative in our approach.Most social media marketing is very cost effective, so we must maximise its use. A strong online presense can make you appear bigger than you are and can give you a competitive advantage against a competitor.

Strategic PlanWhen conducting the research for this project there were three things that I kept upmost in my mind and the solutions in the next section was based around this.

Who are our target customers and what is the best way to reach them – Lifestyles/ Habits e.t.c What is our U.S.P ( Unique Selling Point ) and how we can best convey this to our existing and future

We are Dublin's only urban based garden centre. Our current limited marketing budget and how to maximise those resources – creative solutions

During my primary research at the garden centre I have observed we have two distinct customer types, so the approach would be slightly different.

An older existing population surrounding the garden centre in the local area – who are less likely to be tech savvy. The solution would follow a more traditional promotional approach. It could be done through paid media – newspaper / magazines / promotion material & radio promotion. Also running events at the garden centre encourages greater footfall through the garden centre. Promoting that we are a local business is also a strong selling point.

Apartment/ flat dwelling/ commuting & young families They are likely to be time poor, more tech savvy and live more of their life online. Social media is woven into their life and those in their social circle. They looking to re-connect with a more tradition natural way of life – e.g growing their own produce or having an alloment. With this demographic the owned media approach works best. What encourages greater engagement here is adding value to the customer – content ( blogging, regular social media updates, online competitions ).

We need to emphasise that we are Dublin's only urban based garden centre more in any promotion. Whether that is on or offline. Most of our competitors are based on the city's environs and it requires that you have transport. We are well served by and are close to public transport. We should use this fact in any of our marketing. We should also push that we can deliver locally for larger items thanks to in-house transport available to us from the corporate side of the business.

We have a limited marketing budget that fact can't be denied. In the next section I have outlined some creative solutions to this. Most are easy to implement, are cost effective and will improve the customer online and offline experience. 75 % of the total marketing budget per annum should be directed to maximising the marketing possibilities of paid media and promotion of garden centre events as they happen. The balance of this budget 25 % should be put into digital and other promotion – Facebook/ Google / text marketing / viral marketing / budget for running new garden centre events & cost of prizes offered online. The current budget that is spent on yearly marketing is € 4000.00 – based on spend during 2014.

So how long should it be before we start implementation. As outlined in the next section – the process has already started in relation to the website improvements. We are also entering the most busy period for garden centres excluding Christmas.

I would like to have implemented this plan in part or full by the end of my current contract. I believe that this a more than generous timescale to judge its success or otherwise. I would set aside some time prior to the contract ending to seek to make or suggest further improvements for the future in a follow up report. If the proposed changes garner greater sales, I believe the current marketing budget should be re-examined and increased.

Section 3 : Project summary Including recommendations,review & evaluation

Website & social media recommendations Need to change hierarchy of certain things on the website e.g Click and Collect feature.

Johnstown Garden Centre have this at the top of their website, we do not and it is hard to find. Content is key. It drives traffic to website & social media / Gives a richer customer experience /

Increases revisits and new visits. We now have added a Wordpress gardening blog to the current content and are looking at ways to share content like this

There are social share buttons on each product page. It is important that Facebook and Twitter in particular are also moved to the website landing page.

Reduce the steps from landing page to shopping cart. Too many steps means that there is likely to be higher dropout prior to purchase.

Customer behaviour has changed – the smartphone has now become most people's first point of information search access with social media and websites. The purchase may finish on a pc/ipad or netbook sized screen device. So a mobile enabled website has become a must for us which is currently in train.

To help boost trust and encourage the consumer to buy from us v our competitors, we need to examine how to add extracts from magazines/web or newspapers onto our website. During January we were in weekend edition of the Irish Times. e.g add to website – What the media say or put article into our blog and allow click through via website link.

Look over the current website and change a text heavy section like the ' About Us ' section or ' Corporate '.

We do garden design from time to time as part of our offerings – as yet we have not promoted that we do this. This should included into any further website improvements.

Look at changing the banner at the top of the page – streamlining dropdown sections and allowing for seasonal changes e.g Christmas Shop .

Better use of existing databases – Sage CRM/ Excel / Arantico e.t.c

All of these changes should be driven by putting yourself in your customers shoes. How does your site operate for your customer and it's ease of use. It should also be noted that a website should be examined regularly, as it should not stand still and become staid and out of date.

Garden centre recommendations

One of the major ways to garner footfall to the garden centre is to run an event, remember to always come at it from the point of the person,publication or website that you want to target – what can we do for them. Most media whether traditional or digital are always looking for extra content.

Here is short list of who to consider.

Papers – weekend sections or ones that have gardening sections within magazines or supplements. Magazines – e.g Irish Garden/ Garden Heaven or Garden.ie website. Gardening clubs or gardening organisations e.g R.H.S.I – Royal Horticultural Society of Ireland. Garden bloggers or garden writers – e.g Jane Powers/ Fionnuala Fallon & Ali Rochford. Lifestyle websites e.g Evoke.ie. Think about inviting a celebrity – general or garden related that garners press coverage. Urban Food Market – set up a number of an event of pop-up stalls of Dublin based food producers who might want a bit of their own self promotion, this is also likely to garner more press/online interest.

Is Your Plant In Trouble – Maybe We Can Help ?Hold it in the polytunnel right next to the stand with the sprays and fertilisers – so people are looking at products while the talk is going on – and maybe have a money off promotion for anyone attending the event – maybe even link it to a promotion of a new product launch. This idea could amended say at Christmas e.g making a Christmas display for the home and would encourage more Christmas sales and also during the Summer e.g Making up a Summer basket.

Childrens Gardening LessonLinking up with a local school as we have done previously – running a how to class, then letting them upload pictures of their plants to our social media. This may encourage their parents to visit the garden centre.

Our competitors are doing variations on these ideas. It does require a bit of preplanning and organisation e.g deciding who does what on the day of these events, who is responsible for event planning e. t.c

In observing the social media stats of our competitors through Facebook analytics , events always bring up engagement numbers, increase likes e.t.c

Also think about running regular social media giveaways. It does not have to be large very e.g voucher or free ticket to a gardening event say : Bloom or Dublin Garden Festival.

Review & evaluation

In looking at the areas covered within this what we have sought to do is to look at the current business approach of Urban Plant Life .

I have looked at what our competitors current approach is, looking at what our strong points are, areas in need of improvement and opportunities that we can seek to exploit in the future.

The current approach requires improvement . The business has engaged in marketing previously, but it has up to now not been a connected approach, each was done on an individual basis. So offered the business a limited degree of success from their implementation.

A major part of this project has sought to look at the two areas that were need of improvement within the business, those being the areas of driving more traffic to our social media, increasing sales on our website and also looking at options that will also increase the footfall through the garden centre.

As outlined earlier within this section, we have started the process of making changes after meeting our digital media provider – starting with probably the most important one, mobile enabling the website. I would like to have implemented most of the changes contained with this project by the end of the new placement period. I believe that this a realistic time period to have implemented these changes and to have judged whether they have worked or are in need further changes.

I have sought to be realistic in what will be achievable, I would like to see a 10 % rise in the amount of visits & engagement on our social media and a 7.5 % boost in current online sales. At present according to current research average general online sales run at about 8 % in Ireland , the numbers in comparision for England are much higher at about 18 % . These numbers are current as of end of 2014 and set to increase.

I would also like to have implemented some of the areas outlined within garden centre recommendations before the end of the new placement period of six months. I believe however that is still need for further improvements on the website and general/ digital marketing approach which I have included within the appendix section of this project.

Appendix

I have included an appendix due to the the limits of the scope of project. It has not afforded me to into go into greater detail, so I have just given a short outline of some extra changes that should be implemented and that I would like to examine over the extended time period now afforded to me within Urban Plant Life.

When starting this project I believed that the recommendations contained within it would be suggestions for Urban Plant Life to implement directly themselves. However since then I have been given an extension of 6 months working directly for Urban Plant Life till September 2015 on a part – time basis. I have observed over the time of my existing placement that due to the workload of others within the office that has been a need for someone to cover the social media / digital marketing & general marketing workload even if that is on a part – time basis. A suggestion moving into the future is that even when my time in Urban Plant Life has ceased , that the company employ someone directly or on a fixed placement period as I feel that there will be a continuing need for this role within the company. This will give the company the freedom to make seasonal website changes, so that the website will stay current and up to date. This will also allow for continuing marketing and daily social media duties to be done by a dedicated person freeing others in the office to do their day – to – day duties rather than having to slot them into their busy existing work day. As a result I believe that this will be of more benefit to the company in the long term.

I would like to make changes area in another text heavy section - the corporate section, streamlining it and adding images to it. People due to the rise of the use of smart phones now scan text to a greater degree, this if implemented would I believe of benefit to the existing website and would benefit the corporate side of the business. I would also seek to look at the areas of creating greater uptake of our existing loyalty card scheme, examining the benefit of mining our database for future marketing possiblities e. g text marketing. I would also like to examine the area of viral marketing and how a possible future marketing campaign could be constructed around a promotional idea as another way of driving more footfall to the garden centre and increasing our visibility to the public that don't already know about us. I have already made a start in this regard.

Images: A recent fashion photo shoot at the garden centre/ Garden Heaven Annual 2015 & our advert in the magazine

Information sources

588 word count not in main count – Cover/Contents/Appendix & Information Pages

3000 word count main project

Total Word Count 3588

Sources

All photos have been sourced from Urban Plant Life's Facebook Page & Website :

https://www.facebook.com/UrbanPlantLife/ & https:// www. plantlife .ie/

Text Sources

Tutor/Mentor Handouts

Customer Analytics – How Analyzing Real People Will Improve Your Business – Kissmetrics.com

IPSOS/ Google – The New Multi – Screen World ( Understanding Cross – Platform Consumer Behavior )

Handout – Book Extract adaptivewebdesign.info/1st-edition/chapter-1.html Chapter 1 : Think Of The User, Not The Browser

Also information contained within in – class notes & handouts / GCD Moodle daily course notes

Other

Attendance at Bord Bia – One Day Social Media Workshop October 29 th 2014

“ Exploring The Opportunity Of Using Social Media To Grow Your Business “ given by speaker Krishna DeSee : KrishnaDe.com / Twitter @KrishnaDe/ Facebook – Facebook.com/KrishnaDe also available on other social media channels and two interviews given on Down To Business with Bobby Kerr Newstalk Radio via

Krishna De's Linkedin profile page

BBC NEWS AT SIX – 20th January 2015 – John Lewis Department Online Christmas Details

Some of our plants at Dublin Castle film set – Sky Atlantic series' Penny Dreadful '