Professional Documents
Culture Documents
PANADOL
MARKETING STRATEGIES
GROUP MEMBERS:
ZAINAB LAKHANI
IFRAH JAVED
AHSAN AFZAL
OVAIS RAJPUT
AMNAH FIDA
TABLE OF CONTENT
Acknowledgement................................................................................ 3
Executive Summary.............................................................................4
Research Methodology.........................................................................5
GLAXO-SMITH-KLINE:............................................................................ 5
A Brief History.................................................................................... 5
GSK: Mission & Strategy....................................................................5
GSK Pakistan...................................................................................... 7
GSK Product Portfolio.........................................................................7
Panadol................................................................................................ 9
Consumer Behavior Model.................................................................10
What is Consumer Behavior Model?...................................................10
Current Consumer Behavior Model at GSK.........................................12
Modifications and Recommendations...............................................16
Competitive strategies at Panadol......................................................19
Introduction:.................................................................................... 19
What Panadol has managed?...........................................................20
Competitive advantage:..................................................................20
The competitive strategies:.............................................................21
The four P’s:....................................................................................21
Recommendations...........................................................................22
Company`s Value definition practice of segmentation, targeting and
positioning:........................................................................................23
What is Value?.................................................................................23
How GSK applies this Module?.........................................................25
How can they modify their current practices?..................................26
GSK’s Value Creation Effectiveness....................................................27
Existing Practice..............................................................................30
Recommended upgrade...................................................................31
Communicating Value........................................................................34
Why is there a need of marketing communications?........................34
Direct mail..................................................................................... 34
Telemarketing................................................................................ 34
Magazines..................................................................................... 34
Electronic media............................................................................ 35
Current communication program of Panadol....................................37
Analysis and recommendations for GSK...........................................39
Conclusion.........................................................................................42
ACKNOWELDEMENT
First of all we would like to thank Allah Almighty for giving us the resolution
and determination to complete this report. We have taken efforts in this
project. However, it would not have been possible without the kind support
and help of many individuals. We would like to extend our sincere thanks to
all our fellow colleagues and group mates who directly or indirectly
participated in working on this project. We would like to give due credit to
our teacher Mr. JAVED AHMED for guiding and mentoring us throughout
the supervision and support that he gave, truly helped the progression and
smoothness of our work.
We are highly indebted to GLAXO SMITH KLINE for their guidance and
constant supervision as well as for providing necessary information regarding
the project & also for their support in completing the project.
Our grateful thanks also go to the staff at GSK, notably Mr. ASAD AHMED
assistant brand manager for the wellness program for providing us with the
necessary information and assistance needed in accomplishing of this feat.
We would like to express our gratitude towards our parents for their kind co-
operation and encouragement which helped us in completion of this project.
Furthermore, we would like to express our special gratitude and thanks to the
staff at GSK for giving us such attention and time.
EXECUTIVE SUMMARY
Panadol has become a renowned medicine throughout
Pakistan. Panadol (paracetemol) is a product by the
Glaxosmith cline used for reducing the fever and relieving
pain. Compared to its competitors like Ponston, Brufen and
Dispirin it occupies a greater market share which makes it a
market leader in the running. Panadol has managed to create
many more products which although have not yet made it in
Pakistan but are widely available in the west.so our interview
with the marketing manager helped us in understanding what
are the marketing strategies employed by the Gsk for
Panadol. According to the manager there isn’t much need to
promote the medicine; the main promotion is done through
the word of mouth of the sellers of medicine of pharmacy
stores since panadol is an over the counter medicine and
through the prescription of the doctors. The one
recommendation that the manager gave was that Gsk should
try to increase the product line. however on research we
found out the panadol has already diversified into producing
a range of products for back pain, for flu for children,for
women but they all have not yet made it into pakistan.so our
recommendation to Gsk is that if they want to remain a
market leader they either need to expand their market share
by bringing in the new products and making people aware
about them so rather than taking dyclo or calflam they would
prefer panadol specific pain relievers. We also analyzed their
consumer behavior practices and how the consumer goes through the 5 step
process when purchasing Panadol. we discussed their current practices and
also provided an upgrade for their consumer behaviour model. we worked on
how GSK can make improvements at defining value that is how can GSK be
more effective and efficient in segmenting, targeting and Positioning of the
market.
RESEARCH METHODOLOGY
This report was made by gathering relevant data from the specified
documents in order to analyze the material and arrive at a more complete
understanding and historical reconstruction of the GSK`s product Panadol.
This report hopes to shed light on the five marketing modules and relate them
to GSK
All of the data for the report was collected through the online resources and
the GSK`s own website. The literature review of the modules was written on
the basis of class lectures, Harvard business reviews and personal knowledge.
The application of modules to GSK is written on the basis of an interview
that was held with the Assistant brand manager at GSK Mr. Asad Ahmed. The
report uses qualitative data from primary and secondary sources
Increase growth,
Reduce risk and
Improve our long-term financial performance.
1. Panadol
2. Panadol Extra
3. Panadol Rapid
4. Panadol Night
WHAT IS CONSUMER
BUYING BEHAVIOUR?
It is the study to understand the purchase behavior
and the processes of any consumer when they purchase
a product or a service to fulfill their specific needs. It also examines the
impact and importance of each step of the process in the buying behavior of
the customer.
Cultural factors also have an important role in the purchase decisions factors
such as religion effects what a person would chose to buy and reject. For
example if a Muslim family wants to go for a dinner they won’t prefer a
restaurant which sells pork or alcohol. Moreover, social class also affects
purchase decisions as a person belonging to upper class would want to own
branded products to maintain their status. Gender also has a vital role as the
purchase behavior of men and women differ in different societies.
CURRENT CONSUMER BEHAVIOUR
MODEL OF PANADOL
We visited Glaxo Smith Kline(GSK) for our final term report. There we met
the assistant brand manager of the wellness program which includes Panadol,
eno and iodex.
Q2. How do you trigger the need for your product and
make the customers aware of it?
Ans. Their consumers are mostly the one who has problems such as pain, flu,
fever etc. They don’t resort to the doctor for such issues and usually resort to
self medication to tackle it. I will provide some statistical data to prove my
point. This data was obtained by a survey conducted by Panadol.
Below is the graph which shows why people generally use Panadol.
WHEN DO YOU CONSUME PANADOL?
HEADACHES
3% FEVER
18% 23% PAIN
PRESCRIBED BY DOCTOR
18% OTHER
39%
This pie chart shows that only 11% people use Panadol when prescribed by
doctors. The rest 89% take it on their own for fever, pain headache or some
other reason.
Below is the graph of the percentage of people who would resort to a doctor
in case of flue, fever and pain.
This graph clearly shows that most of the people don’t visit the doctors for
issues like fever, headache and pain.
15%
The graph shows that mostly people use Panadol either when they are told by
a friend and family or at their own jurisdiction. A very low percentage of
people rely on advertisement and other reasons.
ANS. There are many competitors of Panadol these mainly include Ponstan,
Disperin, Brufen and other pain killers available in the market.
Q6. How do you differentiate Panadol from all the other competitors’ which
assists consumers in the evaluation process?
Ans. They have a team of experts and researchers who deal in this area. They
get feedback from the customers on their satisfaction they get from the
product. They mainly concentrate on the effectiveness and the quality of their
product. They try to maintain it and even upgrade their quality continuously.
Even with all these measure it’s unpredictable because the level of
satisfaction each person gets differs as they have different problems and they
even take it in different dosages. But they do try to maintain the post purchase
behavior of their customers as much as they can.
This shows that mostly consumers consider Panadol to start showing its
effects in less than an hour. This is very good.
MODIFICATIONS AND
RECOMMENDATIONS
There is an only so much you can do in terms of
advertising and promotions when dealing with
pharmaceutical industries. As it deals with
medicines and life saving drugs direct
promotions to the end consumers is not always
the answer. Mostly companies have to take a back route in order to increase
the sales and market share of their product.
I would recommend some strategies that GSK can use to improve its
consumer behavior model which will over all benefit its marketing plan for
Panadol
The current market share of Ponstan is higher than Panadol in rural areas.
Hence they should concentrate more on rural areas while conducting their
awareness campaigns as these are the markets they can exploit to increase
their market share.
The basic use of Panadol is mild flu, fever, cold, pain and headaches. These
problems don’t usually trigger the visit to a doctor and people mostly resort to
self medication. Awareness that taking Panadol will be safe and have next to
no side effects will aid the purchase process as consumers won’t think twice
before buying and using Panadol. This will affect the consumer behavior
positively and increase the purchase of the product.
This will help first stage of the consumer behavior model of awareness and
problem recognition as it will help make people more health conscious they
will get more knowledge about their immune system and problems such as
cold, fever, pain etc. They will be more aware of the safety aspect of Panadol
and trust it more.
This will aid the second stage of the consumer behavior model which is the
information search stage. Being aware of Panadol and its usage and dosage
will assist the consumers. They will be more comfortable using Panadol as
currently none of its competitors are advertising their products.
This will be beneficial because when the consumers search for information
and evaluate alternatives for their need of a pain killer. Panadol will be the
only option in their mind due to the vast advertisements and promotions. This
would be very beneficial for Panadol and its market share.
This will improve the effectiveness of the last stage of post purchase
behavior. As consumers will be more inclined towards using a medicine
which they believe cares about them and their response. It is a medicine
which people usually resort to while self medicating. Hence knowing the fact
that the company cares about them they will trust the brand more which will
give consumers confidence and belief in the efficacy of Panadol even after
purchase. This will lead consumers to re purchase the product and even
recommend it to their friends and family.
Introduction
Panadol is a GSK’s trade name for paracetemol. Paracetemol is a commonly
prescribed and a widely used drug. The 2 main functions that this medicine
caters to are that it helps in reducing the fever and relieving pain. However in
today’s market the word paracetemol has been replaced by Gsk’s Panadol.
Not only Panadol is one of the most inexpensive medicine but also effective
and is safely given to children, adults and even the aged without heavy side
effects. The main competitors of Panadol are:
Expand market
Defend market share
Expand market share.
Panadol can be seen to employ the third strategy that is the expand market
share. Market share is defined as the percentage of the total market that a
company controls for a particular product. So expanding it would mean
increasing that percentage. Expanding the market share means widening
profit margins and increasing earnings for the company. Day by day as the
number of patients coming in increases so does the prescription.
Competitive advantage:
The main competitive advantage that Panadol has is that it is the most
inexpensive and has the least side effects. However, looking at the chart we
notice that dispirins is the cheapest drug. But it should be noted that disprin
has heavy side effects. And the main purpose why dispirin is taken for is the
thinning of the blood. While the other 2 that is Ponston and Brufen are
relatively expensive.
Medicine PKR
Panadol 132.59
Dispirin 47.00
Ponston 236.6
Brufen 430.
The competitive strategies:
Since Panadol is a market leader it does not really need to employ attack
strategies. So it focuses on employing defending strategies. Defensive
marketing strategies are majorly used by the market leaders to maintain the
market share. These strategies include:
However this type of defense can also be risky .a perfect position in defense
leads to the assumption that there will be no change in the market. So the
recommendation for Panadol in this case is to make sure that since medicine
like Dychlo and Calflam and rising and occupying a certain portion of the
market to spread awareness of their other products.
The four P’s:
Product The product provides 3 times more value as it effects quickly, relives
pain and reduces fever. Branding is an identity of the product. And the
product is a well established brand.
Place It is widely distributed in Pakistan and is an easily available over the
counter medicine.
Price Relatively affordable by the middle class, lower class and upper
middle class.
Promotion Does not need a lot of promotion most people are aware of the usage
and it’s widely recognized.
RECOMMENDATIONS
The one main disadvantage that Panadol has is that
even though it has diversified into producing a well
range of products for women, children and specially
designed to relieve pain of specific parts of body there is very little awareness
of it. Few people are actually aware about the different products and not
much is being done to promote it.
What is Value?
Value can be defined as the satisfaction and the
utility that customer receives by consuming a product
for instance a chilled cola or a juice will provide
maximum value or utility on a hot day. The basic
aim of a marketing department in any company is
to maximize the value that it will be providing
through its product to the consumer. A company
does so because maximum value means more
satisfied consumer and the consumer will be
willing to pay more price for the product which
ultimately means more profit and that is the core
purpose of any business. So it can be concluded
that a company maximize its value so that it can cash it in terms of profit.
What is segmentation?
Segmentation can be defined as grouping consumers by some criteria, such
that those within a group will respond similarly to a marketing action and
those in a different group will respond differently. Segmenting of market can
be done on different bases which include sex age race income educational
level marital status and etc. segmenting market is like dividing up the entire
market in different parts and then catering those different parts with different
offers.
What is targeting?
After segmenting the market, targeting is a process of selecting the segments
that the company will be catering basing their decision upon the profitability,
their core objective, their mission or any other thing which makes them
thinks that they should target this segment. Different strategies including the
marketing mix that is the four P`s are made according to these target markets
They also added the word `transparency` when they were describing their
values which according to them meant that they do not hide anything like the
ingredients from their consumers they conduct researches and programs to
aware the consumers regarding the consumption of the drugs and pain killers.
They have conducted programs in rural areas to spread the awareness
When it came to segmenting, we asked the manager that how they segment
their market. The answer he gave was that they have segment the market on
the basis of types of pain, different needs and the age groups. Based on
different needs they have divided their market like cold, fever, cough, pain,
flu and others cardio, neurotic or dermatology problems. They cater each
segment with different product for example for the muscular pain they have
Iodex as their product which fights for the market share against vintogen and
other renown brands, for the age group 3 to 13 they have Horlicks for
dentistry needs they have sensodyne and macleans as their premium products
and like this they segment their market.
For differentiation or positioning the target market the manager said that they
differentiate on the basis of effectiveness of the product for example the GSK
`s product Panadol extra may be affective at areas where other brands such as
Dispirin may not work as effectively as Panadol extra. Efficacy of the product
is that point or trait where they differentiate or position their product in the
market. Being a market leader GSK positions Panadol as perfect solution for
fatigue or headaches .with their tagline and campaign with theme of “Panadol
your personal doctor” they have successfully positioned their product as a
solution or tablet that should be there in home every time.
Quality
EXISTING PRACTICE
Product line management: Panadol is the most profitable product for GSK. As
stated by Mr. AsadAhmed in the interview it is a “revenue generating
machine” for the company. How ever the company plans to build on the
reputation and market share of this successful product and introduce more
variations of this same product inside the market. Mr. Asad told us that
different variances like Panadol for women and Panadol for flu are to be
introduced in the future in order to destroy the market of their competitors
and possible drive them out of the industry. Hence the variances will need
another year for approvals and the advertising campaigns are already in the
pipeline and are being worked upon.
Branding: As stated before Mr. Asad emphasized on Panadol’s brand image
of being the safest drug in the Pakistani market. He believed that when
customers think of Panadol them instantly think of safety and lowest
possible side effects. However he also stated that this brand image of
Panadol’s needs a lot more awareness as most of the people/customers are
still not aware of this distinctive safety image of the drug.
Pricing: Mr. Asad told us that a tablet of Panadol costs a consumer just 75
paisa’s which is incredibly low. The company uses economical pricing
strategy, offering high value at a low price so that every patient in need can
afford it.
Distribution: Panadol is the most widely used medicine inside Pakistan and
this massive usage is an example of the drug being widely available
throughout the country, whenever and wherever the customer needs it.
GSK uses the distribution channel #3 which has been explained above.
The product is transferred from manufacturer to the whole seller, then to
the retailer and then finally to the consumer. This channel enables the
company to distribute its product in incredibly remote places at a very low
cost. According to Mr. Asad there are fifty intermediaries working with
GSK in order to distribute the product throughout the region
RECOMMENDED UPGRADE
Product line management: Panadol is a very vital product for the company
which has an incredibly good reputation inside the market. It generates large
sums of revenue and therefore this product line should be expanded further in
order to increase revenues and profits for the company. Although Mr. Asad
talked about the introduction of new variances but he was not sure of when
exactly they will be launched and what exactly would be the company’s
marketing plan these new variances. Our recommendation would be that the
company should not waste more time in introducing these new variances.
The environmental conditions of a huge city like Karachi have been getting
poor day by day. Attention paid by the local government towards improving
the health care facilities have drastically gone down hence there are now
thousands of local residents falling down in different illnesses such as flu
fever and body pain every day. The market for the new variances is huge and
it should be seen as an opportunity and a market gap by the company. New
variances like Panadol for flu and Panadol for women should be introduced in
order to provide specific and specialized treatments for flu and for women.
These variances would further communicate the company’s core value of
“patient first” to the consumers and would make them believe that the
company understands its responsibility of catering to every new need of the
consumer.
This extension of the product line would provide a number of benefits to the
company such as :
1 Leverage costs would be drastically reduced via economies of scale.
Economies of scale is basically a stage in which as the company increases its
output its average cost per unit tends to fall and move towards an optimum
point.
2 Competitors would be defeated by enabling one-stop shopping. By
introducing a cure for every disease, GSK would ensure that Panadol
becomes a brand for the whole family and customers do not feel the need of
taking a risk of consuming new unknown brands to cure their illnesses.
3 More choices would be offered in the market that is more closely tailored to
specific customer requirements. Different customers have different types of
illnesses hence new variances would be able to cater the need of every
customer individually and specifically.
4 Access incremental profit opportunities would be availed and higher profit
margins would be achieved. Since Panadol is already a market leader in its
market, people would not have much problems in trusting its new variances
hence there would be increased sales, revenues and profits for company.
On the other hand the company will face a few drawbacks as well. Each and
every item added to a line has associated costs. Some of these costs are
visible, some are hidden in traditional financial accounting, including:
1 Administration: the cost of setting items up for processing, reviewing their
status, and placing purchase orders
2 Cannibalization: diverting sales from other models rather than generating
true incremental volume
3 Inventory: disproportionate safety stock is required to maintain service
levels when volume is spread across multiple models
4 Repair parts: separate inventories of model-specific parts may need to be
provided throughout the market life of the product
Hence the company will have to manage these costs effectively in order to
fully avail the advantages of product line expansion.
Branding: as Mr. Asad pointed out in his interview Panadol’s brand image is
all about safety and minimal side effects. Although it is a healthy brand image
to have but it has to communicated to the audience and to the market on a
larger scale and majority of the users of Panadol still do not know what does
the brand of Panadol really stands for. GSK hasn’t introduced any advertising
campaign in the last 5 years. They communicated to their customers through
their products only. Hence the company needs to make more use of digital
and print media in order to communicate their brand image clearly to the
consumers.
Panadol is arguably the safest drug to use inside the market. According to Mr.
Asad all the other drugs in the market such as Ponstan and disprin carry a lot
of side effects. They cause severe headaches with additional dosages and
seriously damage the patient’s health. Whereas on the other hand Panadol
almost has zero side effects hence this image of intense safety should be
communicated to the consumers through different advertisement campaigns.
The advertisements do not need to be fancy or persuasive, they can be simple
and informative, informing the general public about the safety feature of the
brand of Panadol. A clear brand image will yield a number of benefits for the
company:
1. Easier client recognition: it will reduce client recruitment and
advertising costs so you can grow your business faster.
2. Expressing competitive advantage: it will provide an advantage over
competitors and protect the value of the business
3. Expressing position and space in the market: the company would get
known in the market as standing for and owning a position that its
competitors cannot claim
4. Increased response rates: Tapping client benefits in branding increases
the reaction rate from the company’s activities
5. Lowers costs of communication to clients: Brand consistency can
dramatically lower the cost of communicating to the clients
6. Recruitment of new employees: Great staff want to be associated with
and work for a great legal brand
Hence our recommendation for branding is that the company needs to be
more vocal about its distinctive brand image inside the market.
Pricing: As stated by Mr Asad the prices charged by GSK for their product
of Panadol are minimal. These prices are fixed by the Government of
Pakistan through its health ministry and pharmaceutical companies cannot do
much about them. Based on the value and the price charged, panadol’s
pricing would come under the heading of price penetration. Price penetration
is charging low prices and offering high quality in return.
According to Mr Asad although the government regulations would never be
removed from the pharmaceutical firms but if we make an assumption that
they are removed than GSK can charge around Rs20 for each set of 12 pills
and this would increase the company’s profits by 20 percent.
Increase in prices would defiantly lead to higher revenues because the
demand for Panadol in Pakistani market is inelastic i.e. changes in prices do
not drastically affect the demand of the product. An increase in price would
still keep Panadol as a very cheap product, one which constitutes a very small
proportion of a consumer’s income, plus although there are other competitors
in the market like ponston and disprin but still Panadol is the market leader
and just because of a minor increase in the price a consumer would not stop
buying Panadol put his/her health at a risk.
GSK enjoys a number of benefits by having a price inelastic demand:
1. There are several opportunities of increasing the prices of their products
inside the market. And as stated before this increase in prices would
almost certainly increase the revenues.
2. Increase in prices would not drastically bring down the sales units.
Since demand is price inelastic a slight increase in the prices would not
stop the consumer from the buying the product.
3. Profits are mostly constant i.e. they might be increasing at different
rates but most of the times they are increasing; very rarely there’s a
decrease and change in the pattern of profits.
4. Constant profits make financial planning a lot easier. Lack of
uncertainty helps a lot in making future plans and determining the
success of those plans in the future
Hence increasing the prices of Panadol can generate large sums of revenues
for GSK but the Governmental price controls do not provide permission to
the firm to do so thus there is not much the company can do in the pricing
department. However the company can invest in research and developing
new methods of reducing costs in order to increase its profits.
Distribution: distribution is basically a process of making a product
available to the consumers wherever and whenever they want it. There are
four main channels of distribution and the one which GSK uses involves the
transfer of good from the manufacturer to wholesaler to retailer to final
consumer. Panadol is a consumer good which caters to the needs of a large
number of people. Anyone can get sick anytime and can use the drug hence
the market for the product is massive. In order to facilitate this massive
market the product has to be distributed in masses to each and every
reachable location of the country.
There are a number of intermediaries involved in the distribution of Panadol,
50 to be exact. Whole sellers play a very vital role in the distribution of the
product. They are responsible for buying the product in bulk from GSK hence
the risk of a large sum of the product is lifted off from the shoulders of the
company and is transferred to the whole seller’s books.
Distribution of Panadol in the urban areas is quite satisfactory but it is the
remote rural areas in which the company needs to focus and improve its
distribution. The company needs to locate its specific distributors in these
rural areas in order to look after Panadol’s distributions.
Major problem in these rural areas is the cheap production of copies of
Panadol. Different copies of the drug are produced and sold to the general
public in these areas. Due to these copies the company not only loses its
market and potential revenue but also faces a risk of getting consumers post
purchase dissonance and a deterioting brand image of the product.
Employing sales personnel and regional heads in these remote areas would
provide a number of advantages to the company:
1. Increase of sales
2. Increase of revenue
3. Protection of brand image
4. Highlighting the company’s “customer first” value
5. Possibility of increasing its share of the total pharmaceutical market of
the country
Direct mail
Telemarketing
Magazines
Electronic media
1. The first step is identifying the target audience. The target audiences are
the existing customer or the potential new customers. Target audience
identification is essential for further development and overall success of
the communication program. Once the audience is identified, the next
part is assessing the present company or brand perception within the
target audience. Based on the results from the audience analysis the
message should address the requirements.
3. The third step is the design of the message. The designing of the
message follows the objective of the message. The design of the
message has to address the following four points, content of message,
message structure, and message format and message source.
5. The fifth step is related with the financial estimates of the whole
expenditure. Companies need to decide budget of sales promotional and
other activities. The common methods followed are an affordable
method, percentage of sales method, competitive parity method, and
objective-task methods.
Upon our visit to GSK for our final term report, we met the Assistant Brand
Manager of The Wellness Program, which includes Panadol, Eno and Iodex.
We questioned him about the communication programs that were carried out
for Panadol, that how the firm does promotes the product, maintain sales,
advertises, creates and maintains PR and how effectively is all of this carried
out. We asked a few questions related the topic, to which he answered as
follows.
Panadol promotes its safety profile. We make sure our consumers are aware
of the benefits Panadol has over other competitive products. We can’t say that
there are no side effects of Panadol, but they are very less as compared to
other products in the market that promise the same results.
Q2. The Manager told us that Panadol is recommended by the doctors to their
patients when they complain of pain and headaches. On this we posed the
question that an average man wouldn’t go to a doctor if he has a headache, or
he wouldn’t be aware of what painkiller they are taking.
We have expert marketing teams that go and educate the doctors about
Panadol. And as far as an average man is considered, we have programs that
educate and make the chemists more aware, so that they recommend Panadol
to such people. Many people actually listen to what the chemist says as well
therefore we conduct such awareness programs too.
Along with this, as Panadol puts huge emphasis on its Safety Profile, the
doctors are chemists are specifically taught about the proper dosage of
Panadol.
Q3. What does the firm do for advertising and promotions of Panadol,
considering it’s a pharmaceutical product?
The Assistant Brand Manager told us that there have been no recent
advertising or promotional campaigns for Panadol. Panadol is already an
established brand so there is no need to promote the product further as such
as it has already penetrated in the market.
There have been no advertising campaigns for the past 5 years for Panadol;
however, they do have a few upcoming advertising promotional projects
which are in the process of approval from the government. It is usually a very
lengthy process at takes up to a year or so.
Q4. When we asked about how they go up against their competitors, we came
to know about their strategy of promoting Panadol in certain areas.
The Manager told us that through research, they have found that Ponston (a
competitive Product) is more popular in rural areas. So they carry out their
lecture and awareness sessions in rural areas. They cannot use electronic
media in those areas so they send their teams to carry out such interactive
educational sessions that are helpful to the consumer as well as are a good
way to promote Panadol.
Q5. What sort of advertisements have you planned when the government
approves your campaign?
We do not need PR as such right now; therefore we don’t have a very strong
PR. It depends on our marketing strategies, if we need it we will increase the
PR accordingly and we will do it easily.
Q6. How do you manage your relations with consumer? Is there any direct
contact that you maintain?
No, we don’t have direct contact with out end consumers. But we do conduct
surveys every now and then that help us know if the consumers are benefited
properly or not. I think that a lot more can and should be done in this area and
we plan on working on this as well.
The manager told us that next they plan on focusing on promotions and
awareness through advertising campaigns. The Ads will be functional,
Informative and emotional in nature, given the culture and traditions. We can
definitely make the whole campaign better, including research, PR,
promotions and advertisements, but our immediate focus will be improving
our advertisements.
ANALYSIS AND RECOMMENDATIONS FOR
GSK
IMPROVING PERSONAL RELATIONS
IMPROVING ADVERTISEMENTS
The assistant brand manager of GSK Pakistan Ltd. admitted that there has not
been much emphasis on the advertising campaigns of Panadol; however, they
plan on changing that now. Though the brand has not been seen on any media
in Pakistan for the last few years, the firm has asked for the approval from the
government regarding the matter. Since that is a lengthy process, the firm is
not expecting any responses for at least 6 months to 1 year.
DTCPA have following main characteristics, that will be in favor of GSK pak
Ltd. and also beneficial for the consumers.
This cannot be done for all pharma products, however, in case of Panadol;
this could prove to be beneficial for the company as well as the consumers.
GSK Pakistan Ltd should carry out campaigns to not only recommend their
product, but also to gain feedback on how the already present consumers feel
about the effectiveness of the product. Thus GSK Pakistan Ltd. should focus
on direct communication with the consumers.
CONCLUSION
GSK is one of the leading pharmaceutical companies of Pakistan and Panadol
is arguably its biggest source of revenue. In this report we analyzed the
product of panadol through the three major modules of marketing,defining-
creating-communicating value. After the analysis we provided
recommendations and upgrades which might help the product prosper further
in future. However the analysis is based upon the information provided by the
company’s marketing department only and for complete feasibility analysis
of the problem and recommendations the financials of the company would
also be required.