Marketing at vanguard Essay

vanguard prides itself on providing low price and high value to the node and it is heads core competency. However, Vanguards world changed when in mid-2003, Vanguards niche market was invaded by commercial banks, investment banks and insurance companies referable to deregulation in the pecuniary services industry.Vanguard took advantage of the Internet technology for customer transactions and different innovations to offer no load bills to the investors. Vanguard successfully employed Six Sigma methodologies in order to continue to offer high value at the lowest cost to the customer.Some of the threats that could peril Vanguards prosperity or survival in the future include excessive customer segmentation where the varied offerings available confuse the customer and the investment brackets are not particularly transparent. Vanguard could encounter a significantly challenging situation if it is inadequately prepared to compete with the influx of firms in the industry. At the p resent time, Vanguard does not havea reform selling strategy that fits in well with overall vision of the company. For example, Vanguard is perplexing where sales and marketing efforts fit in the corporate dashboard.The dashboard is a communications tool that offers an overall view of the condition and consummateance of the company in key indicators or drivers for success. Management was constantly provided with the dashboard and updates at board meetings. Thus, Vanguard efficiently used this tool to organize its marketing and sales efforts in support of the overall strategic objectives.Vanguard has to take proactive steps in order to guard against unusual declines in stock market indexes. In addition to insulating their margins and maintain their market presence during times of economic downturn, they have to ensure that continue to deliver superior customer service than their competitors. For example, client gladness is above expectation during boom years. However, customer s atisfaction is intertwined with market performance. Vanguard should continue to educate the customer of staying the course and emphasizing the advantages of long-term investment strategies.depth psychologyVanguard is torn between staying the course and going the investment company route where it can provide a whole array of products and services to everyone exchangeable to one-stop shopping rather than focusing of customer segmentation. There is a tradeoff identified in the SWOT analysis where offering the customer the lowest cost cannot successfully co-exist with high value at Vanguard. Vanguard can only offer the customer with the low cost, as it is not expending many resources in its marketing efforts.Vanguard has the option of pursuing international involution at this time. However, it has not developed a concrete strategy on how to compete in the United States in times of economic downturn as well as in face of increased competition. If Vanguard expands overseas, it is not ex pected to perform well as these competencies are absent in its overall strategy. How can Vanguard be expected to compete in face of other challenges such(prenominal) asinstitutional and regulatory hurdles as well as smaller populations overseas?Marketing segmentation was a competency that has worked for Vanguard in the past. However, customers may resent excessive categorization based on perceived investing habits or income extrapolations by Vanguard. The customers may view Vanguard as a Big Brother who pries into his or her personal lifestyle by monitoring their investment trends and then tailoring an investment plan for them with those assumptions.If you examine the potential hind end market sizing, the United States presents a wide array of opportunities with its varied ethnic groups. Companies such as Metlife and Citibank have done well by tapping into those markets and creating an investment niche. preferably than market segmentation based on investmenthabits, age or income i t may be advantageous for Vanguard to pursue these markets after conducting market tests or investment studies.Even if Vanguard decided to aggressively target certain niche targets in its sales and marketing campaign, the potential dividends reaped from doing so are remote expected to outweigh the costs as it currently spends about 20 cents out of every $10,000 invested to drum up new business which is well at a lower place industry norms. Certainly newspaper advertisements as those presented in Exhibits 7 and 8 in ethnic newspapers and print media should not become a financial policy change to the company and eat up a significant portion of the sales and marketing budget.Vanguard has prided itself for innovation and dedication to continual improvement in the financial arena. Perhaps, Vanguard can benefit from its sales and marketing efforts if it is dedicated to ensure development and maturity of the program. One solution toward this goal is to brainstorm a clear vision and miss ion statement as to what the long-term aims and objectives of the sales and marketing program are and how will they complement the overall strategic objectives of the company as a whole, not just the four individual business units.RecommendationsThe dashboard at Vanguard is a critical tool to evaluate and assess performance. Vanguard should move ahead and incorporate reliable sales and marketing growth data into the dashboard metrics in order to ensure that marketing is presented as an avenue to support the achievement of goals in the various businesses.Vanguard would greatly benefit from partnering with brokers in order to garner a better share of the clients holdings from other financial institutions. It should consider investment in increased customer awareness and education in order to so.In terms of advertising, Vanguard should institute a customer referral program that encourages existing customers to actively voice their loyalty and satisfaction with the service they have rec eived to prospective clients.Tasteful and creative advertising and marketing efforts that reaffirm Vanguards core beliefs of staying the course and themes of long-term investment should be implemented. Prospective Vanguard customers are usually lured in by the highest gold market account interest rates offered and not by fancy commercials or elaborate marketing efforts.Vanguard should not consider international expansion at this time as part of its growth strategy at this point in time. It should focus primarily on the Unites States where even a individual digit market share gain and translate into significant revenues.