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Internal Operating Environment for Comic Relief

1.0Internal Operating Environment

1.1Comic Relief Objectives

Comic Relief's main objective israising money from the general public by actively involving them in events andprojects that are innovative and fun. It also attempts to inform, educate andpromote social change (Comic Relief, 2005).

1.2Comic Relief Resources

The marketing resources of ComicRelief are limited, especially when considered in comparison to a commercialfirm. Comic Relief's fundraising costs are covered by sponsorship in cash orin kind so that every penny raised goes to charity. Therefore Comic Relief hashad to be inventive in its marketing activities.

1.3Comic Relief Culture

The culture of Comic Relief matchesits brand image; cheerful, caring and confident (Adkins, 1999, p174).Marketing is fundamental to what Comic Relief do.

1.4Role of Marketing inComic Relief

Whereas commercial organisations mayhave a number of marketing objectives, such as increasing market standing orimproving profitability (Brassington & Pettitt, 2000, p900), a charity likeComic Relief has only one target, to raise as much money as possible for itscauses. Therefore Comic Relief can measure how well its marketing has done byanalysing how much money is raised.

Comic Relief is unique in that theGovernment, corporate donors and individual suppliers fund its marketingactivities. One hundred percent of personal donations go to worthy causes(Comic Relief, 2005). The more money Comic Relief raise, the more the money spenton marketing can be said to work. The method and timing of the donationlead to evaluation of the marketing activity that initiated the donation.

1.5Evaluation of Marcomms

McCarthy (1964, cited in Mohammed& Pervaiz, 1995) offered the four Ps (product, price, place and promotion)as the combination of factors that satisfies the target consumer. Thisapproach is now used to evaluate Comic Relief's current marketing marcomms.

When considering the product orservice Comic Relief provides there are two aspects that need to be looked at.First of all Comic Relief provide the service of raising money for worthwhilecauses. As part of this, Comic Relief provides a number of products. Theseinclude ring tones, the Dubble chocolate bar (made from fairly traded cocoabeans), a Nationwide credit card and books written by J.K. Rowling (ComicRelief, 2005). These products offered by Comic Relief will now be analysed.

Evaluating these products, it can beseen that Comic Relief provide a variety of different types of products.However, they all have a similar style of packaging (where appropriate); namelysimple, bright and loud. The books have Harry Potter themed packaging.

The pricing of these products is setby the partners involved. For example, Nationwide set the APR available on theRed Nose credit card it launched with Comic Relief. The products that ComicRelief has greater control over in terms of pricing policy, such as thet-shirts and ring tones are priced just slightly higher than comparableproducts. The ring tones cost 3; comparable ring tones cost 2.

Comic Relief utilises numerousmarketing channels. Retailers such as TK Maxx (t shirts) and Sainsbury's (rednoses) sell Comic Relief merchandise. Comic Relief also has a strong onlinepresence. The Red Nose Day website increased its market share in the weeksleading up to 2005's Red Nose Day. Of all Internet traffic directed at theonline community sector, the Red Nose website was responsible for 11.4% on RedNose Day itself (Hitwise, 2005).

Most of Comic Relief's marketingactivity is concerned with promotion. Since RedNose Day's conception, morethan 2050 celebrities have been involved (Comic Relief, 2005), the most notablebeing Lenny Henry, Billy Connolly, and John Cleese. Using the VisCAP model ofpresenter characteristics (Brassington & Pettitt, 2000, p581), it can beseen that these people are highly suitable for the promotion of Comic Relief.They are all highly visible, i.e. very well known and are highly likeable andtherefore attractive to consumers of Comic Relief.

Now the traditional four P's havebeen used to analyse Comic Relief, there are three more Ps that can beutilised. These are people, process and physical evidence.

The attitude and behaviour ofvolunteers in Comic Relief has been praised (BBC News, 2005). The process ofhow the service is delivered by Comic Relief is noteworthy because Comic Reliefutilises other companies to deliver its services. For example, BT sets up andmanages the telephone network needed on Red Nose Day (Comic Relief, 2005).

The seventh P that is used toevaluate Comic Relief's marcomms is physical evidence of quality. In ComicRelief's case this involves the information given to the public about how themoney raised is being used. Comic Relief's main strength is the ability todemonstrate that the funds raised are used efficiently. It does this mostlyvia mini-documentaries as part of the Red Nose Day televised shows.

The philosophy of Comic Relief is touse comedy and laughter to get serious messages across. This is uniqueamongst its competitors.

Overall, it can be said that a largepart of Comic Relief 's success is down to its success at marketing. It haslimited marketing resources, yet has an amazingly strong brand presence andextensive brand awareness.

2.0Recommendations

The author would like to put forward that Comic Relief isan excellent marketeer and has utilised its limited marketing resourcesextremely well to gain and maintain a strong brand presence over a number ofyears. With such a successful company, it is difficult to identify to identifyareas for improvement or new marketing activities to be tried. However, theauthor will make several suggestions for improvements to Comic Relief'smarketing marcomms.

It has been identified that ComicRelief is currently not gaining any marketing information at all. It does notrecord which marketing activities have prompted particular donations. A smalland simple change could garner much more detailed marketing information so thatnot only the effectiveness of the whole campaign, but the effectiveness of theindividual elements of it could be analysed.

Comic relief offers a strong onlinepresence, it should further increase this, by trying to create an onlinecommunity that has useful information all year around, not just on Red NoseDay. This will ensure that the brand of Comic Relief is in consumers' mindsyear round. It could perhaps provide diaries of volunteers, methods of gettinginvolved at home and polls on topical issues. All of these features wouldchange regularly and therefore encourage repeat viewings.

Comic Relief currently offers mobilephone ring tones, which is an excellent use of current technological trends.They should take advantage of another emerging trend and use viral marketing toadvertise Comic Relief. Viral marketing is the uses of electronic media tostimulate and encourage word-of-mouth or electronic message disseminationbetween individuals (Morden, 1993, p 101). This method of marketing would fitwell with Comic Relief's confident and cheeky brand image.

The Dubble chocolate bar needs to beavailable in more stockists for it to be a viable product. It is currentlyavailable in a limited number of stores. It does not have much penetrationinto the confectionary market.

Comic Relief needs to integrate theirmarcomms offering more. The American Association of Advertising Agenciesdefines IMC as 'a concept of marketing communications planning that recognizesthe added value of a comprehensive plan that evaluates the strategic role of avariety of communication disciplines, e.g., general advertising, directresponse, sales promotion and public relations - and combines these disciplinesto provide clarity, consistency and maximum communications impact' (Keller,2000, p267). Even looking at the packaging of the various Comic Reliefproducts, it can be seen that there is a big difference in the looks of thevarious products offered. This needs to be addressed.

The final recommendation offered bythe author is that of increasing the number of promotions with other brands,such as the Persil Go Red Campaign. This campaign was a success for bothparties involved, and similarly well thought out campaigns could also have thesame effect. Care has to be taken to ensure that the companies that are chosento take part are appropriate. By this it is meant that their brand valuesmatch those of Comic Relief. Persil provided a 'synergistic brand fit withComic Relief's emotional values and brand attributes (Adkins, 1999, p172).

Bibliography

1)Adkins, S.(1999). Cause Related Marketing, Who Cares Wins. Oxford: ReedEducational.

2)Brassington, F.and Pettitt, S. (2000). Principles of Marketing (2^nd ed.)London: Pearson Education.

3) All About Us Comic Relief.http://www.comicrelief.com/ (29^th Apr. 2005).

4)Dibb, S et al.(2001). Marketing Concepts and Strategies (4^th ed.) Boston:Houghton Mifflin.

5)Jobber, D.(2001).Principles & Practice of Marketing. (3^rded.) London: McGraw-Hill Publishing Company.

6)Keller, K. (2000).'Strategic Brand Management: Building, Measuring, and Managing Brand Equity', Journalof Consumer Marketing, 17, (3), p263-72.

7)Kotler, P et al.(2001). Principles of Marketing (3^rd ed). London: PearsonEducation.

8)Morden, A. (1993). Elementsof Marketing. (3^rd ed.) London: DP Publication Ltd.

9) 'Online Communities', HitwiseCompetitive Intelligence.

10) http://www.hitwise.co.uk/info/(24 Apr. 2005).

11) 'Red Nose Day: Your comments' BBCNews http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/talking_point/4336791.stm (30th Apr 2005).

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