Year 12 IB Extended Essays 2018

psychographic segmentation, which divides the market based on people’s features and

lifestyles. Red Bull understood that the ingredients within their product would allow people

to stay up later at night, and hence marketed their products majorly toward young nightclub

goers in Europe (International Directory of Company Histories, Vol.60, 2004). The primary

reasoning for this segmentation being that their financial size as a company and status as a

brand at the time was not large enough to sustain the currently used marketing tactics.

Regarding the seven P’s of Red Bull’s marketing mix during this time, Red Bull was able to

develop a product that satisfied the needs of a target demographic, that being young people in

Europe, and delivered it to locations frequently visited by them. Red Bull also carefully

considered competition when establishing their marketing mix, as there was almost no

competing products in the region giving themselves an advantage regarding marketing and

customer loyalty. According to Red Bull themselves, the 1987 launch of the drink was not

only the launch of a completely new product, it was in fact the birth of a totally new product

category (Red Bull, 2018), however whether this is stated because it is truthful or because

Red Bull is attempting to appear superior to competing energy drink companies is unknown. ! Moreover, as they began to expand further domestically and eventually internationally, Red

Bull reconsidered their marketing mix due to their growth as a company and brand, as well as

changes occurring in the external environment, specifically the advancement of the Internet

and technologies such as computers and mobile phones. With respect to the 7 P’s, Red Bull

kept their product, processes, physical evidence, and prices the same, however, they decided

to implement major changes to promotion and place. What initially began as traditional style

billboard and word of mouth advertising in Western Europe transformed into worldwide

social media marketing, marketing through athletic sponsorships as well as hosting extreme

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