Marketing and Campaign Revisions

Our competitors are stealing our customers through stronger, more appealing advertising campaigns. I do not believe that our marketing gains the attention of the younger consumer. The younger consumer makes up a large portion of the consumer population, and many of them now hold after school and summer jobs. We are losing the youth base to other mass merchandise retailers such as Wal-Mart and Target. Celebrity endorsements, brighter colors, and more vivid pictures are several ways in which we can reinvigorate our advertising campaigns. If we are to gain the attention of our younger customers we need to consider their interests. These interests include the Internet, athletics, and television. We must grab the attention of the youth through trendier, more current methods of advertising both through the media and the Internet.
 

One popular advertising method is the use of celebrity endorsements. In our current marketing campaigns we have utilized this method with such celebrities as Rosie O’Donnell and the Judds. Though they each are very popular among today’s adults, they do not have a strong following among the youth of America. Our recent back-to-school advertisements have drawn a large amount of criticism. One critic stated that the 30-second music video shows Rosie rapping what’s hot as kids model the newest, hippest K-mart apparel, and that truth be told, the song is insipid, and the only thing less cool than Big K for a lot of kids is going back to school. Rosie O’Donnell and the Judds appeal more to the soccer mom generation of our society. I realize that this section of customers is a large part of our consumer base, however, we need to diversify our advertisements. We need to appeal to more people than just this one section of consumers. In this, I feel that we should employ the services of a celebrity who is more popular among the youth. I have several suggestions for celebrities who would be appropriate for gaining the attention of younger people in our society. Such stars as Will Smith and the Backstreet Boys would be effective spokespersons for our corporation. Another method we could employ is the use of a universally popular spokesman such as Michael Jordan. Jordan appeals not only to the youth of society, but also to those adults who have enjoyed watching him play basketball over the years.

 Though celebrities are appealing to most of our society, we can also use "real people" whom our consumers will relate to. We can employ actors who will portray normal consumers shopping at our stores. These actors could talk about the low prices, friendly employees, and the useful products that they found while shopping at K-Mart. Consumers enjoy listening to people like themselves who have found good deals and who have found the products that they need. If we used this technique we could run several commercials with people of all different ages and races. This advertising campaign would appeal to several varying groups and would bring them to our stores. The youth are one group of consumers who we could target with actors of their age group.
 

 Another area of advertising that we should focus on is our print advertisements. Our advertisements are promoted in a weekly Sunday circular distributed to 68 million households. The advertisements which we mail to consumers and which are placed in newspapers do not grab the attention of the younger consumer. Our advertisements are not colorful, do not make a statement about our stores, and do not put a new spin on our products. First of all, we must change our colors from orange and brown to brighter, more vibrant colors. I would suggest that we change our colors to yellow and green. These colors are vivid and will grab the attention of our consumers, especially the younger consumer. Younger adults seem to be drawn more by more lively colors. If we change our colors, we will begin to change our image from the old, plain K-mart to the new, more exciting K-mart. Next we will need to have our advertisements make a statement about our stores. One technique, which we can utilize, is the "real people" campaign.
 

Like the television commercials, our print advertisement can have real consumers who use our products. Examples include models (with seemingly real names) modeling our clothes, using our products, or shopping in our stores. These models should not be unrealistically handsome, but should instead seem to be normal, everyday people who enjoy wearing our clothes and using our products. Naming these models would make them even more realistic and would give our customers the feeling that others use and enjoy using our products. We must also make a statement about our stores. We need to illustrate in our print advertisements that our stores are somehow better than our competitors. The first method through which we can accomplish this is by lowering our prices. I realize that we cannot afford to lower our prices drastically, but we could find ways to beat out other stores. We could guarantee that we will meet or beat the prices of our competitors. This would take away any reason for consumers to shop at stores other than K-mart. The younger consumers will appreciate not having to spend their hard-earned money on a product that they could find at a cheaper price at another store. If our prices were competitive then consumers would strongly consider shopping at our stores.
 The newest, most effective way to gain the attention of today’s youth is through the Internet. Nearly 65 per cent of teens up to age 19 claim to have used or subscribed to on-line services during the last 12 months. The Internet is growing in popularity and is becoming a large advertising market, just as television did when it originated. Numbers of web surfers are expected to increase to 320 million by 2002. All varieties of products and services are now being sold on the Internet, and almost every web page has some type of advertising banner. Today many people are spending less time watching television and reading the newspaper and are using this time to search their interests on the Internet. The majority of the people who are using the Internet are the youth of today’s society. Internet ad revenue totaled a record $1.2 billion for the third quarter of 1999. If we wish to have a larger youth consumer base, we must utilize this new tool to advertise our stores.
 

We currently have an Internet web-site, www.bluelight.com, which is our advertisement for K-mart in this growing market. Though we have a web-site, it has several problems that must be addressed in order to gain the attention of younger consumers. These problems are similar to those that we have been having with our print advertisements. First, our web-site is lifeless and lacks the vibrant colors that are so effective in gaining consumers’ attention. Next, the web-site is not interactive and does not take advantage of the technology available today. The last major problem that the web-site has is that it focuses largely on the background of the corporation. Our web-site discusses the history of K-mart, corporation facts, and other information, which does not interest the younger average consumer.
 In order to address the problems, which we have with our web-site, we must first create a better layout with more vibrant colors. Our current web-site just shows pictures of sales products and lists their respective prices. We need to make the products that we advertise on the Internet more interactive. I suggest that if a consumer clicks on an advertised product then the product will be shown in use. Another example of this is that if pieces of clothing were advertised and a consumer clicked on this article then it would be modeled by a "real person." We should finally consider the amount of space that is set aside for background information. I do not believe that consumers are interested in our corporate information. This information just takes away from the creativity of our web-site, and I feel that a majority of it should be removed. The younger consumers will really enjoy an interactive web-site, which is more technologically advanced. With so many web-sites on the Internet we must use all available technology to gain the attention of the youth.

 Most importantly I believe that K-mart needs an effective sales gimmick. Like Wal-Mart’s happy face and Target’s bull’s eye, we need a symbol that will become synonymous with K-mart. I believe that the "K-mart Star" would be a perfect symbol for our corporation. We could use the star in numerous advertising and marketing campaigns. Our motto could be "Shop at the superstar of superstores" and this motto and the star symbol would be immediately thought of when K-mart is mentioned. A star, though a simple symbol, could become very popular among our consumers. Younger consumers are attracted to such sales gimmicks and are likely to shop at our stores because of our advertisements.
 

 Our marketing and advertising campaigns are in need of renovation. If we are to gain the attention of the youth consumer base we must make our campaigns livelier. To do this we should use more vibrant colors, employ the services of more popular spokespersons, make our web-site more interactive, and invent an effective sales gimmick. The younger customer is becoming an integral part of our business and we should focus more of our advertising campaigns on this group.