Introduction
Nestle chocolate chip cookies are cookies that have butter and margarine as primary components in addition to chocolate. They are created by Tool House Inn in The United States and have historical significance with the recipe that is used to make them having been discovered in the 1930’s. They are sold globally by chains that offer own versions of prebaked packaged forms of cookies and ready-to-cook versions. For the Nestle Toll House Chocolate Chip Cookie Dough, their main competitors are several hotel and eatery chains that sell freshly baked cookies to customers in shopping malls and retail chains. This makes them to have a differentiated competition from Nestle Toll House cookies. The aim of this paper is to describe a suitable promotional strategy for Nestle Toll House Chocolate Chip Cookie Dough that involves advertising, personal selling and sales promotion.
The suggested promotional mix for Nestlé Toll House Chocolate Chip Dough is aimed at coordinating marketing activities. This will involve specific strategies in sales promotion, personal selling and advertising. They will all aim at interacting directly with Nestlé’s customers, creating awareness of the product. This will be done through questions and answer sessions with customers to persuade them of this product. The promotional mix for this product has been developed after a careful analysis of market dynamics and customer perceptions taking into account strengths and weaknesses of each strategy for the target market.
Personal selling
This will be done using phone calls and face to face conversations with the target market. Here, the target market will be given opportunities to ask queries and raise concerns which will be answered and addressed directly. Prospective customers will be allowed to test the product before they buy it. The company will offer prepared cookies from the dough to customers along the streets and public places. The clients will have an opportunity to taste cookies made from the dough then make decisions to purchase it. This will allow customers to have full information on how to prepare cookies from the dough before they make the decision to buy the product. This strategy will especially be used in new locations where the product has launched lately and in locations where sales have diminished due to entry of other competing chains.
Sales Promotions
Using this promotional tool, the company will be aiming at encouraging customers to buy the cookie dough by placing discount coupons on each packet that customers buy. Nestle will also create posters and signs in chains that carry its dough products. In this strategy, Nestle Toll House will induce sales through attracting attention of the customers inform of purchase incentives of offers and coupons to build long-term preference of the Dough brand.
Advertising
Nestlé’s Toll House will use paid advertising on television broadcasts, radio programs and placing ads on websites to persuade customers to choose its Chip Chocolate Cookie Dough over other forms of cookies that its competitors are offering. The communiqué on the advertising channels will be specific on the advantages of preparing cookies using this dough than buying precooked cookies by competitors. For each of the target market groups, a suitable advertising channel such as web ads for the youth and television for older generations will be chosen through which the message will be put across. The advertising strategy will educate the public via stores that they will access the Cookie dough and the nutritional value of the cookie Dough. The frequency of the adverts featuring the Nestle Toll House Chocolate chip cookie dough will be high across the audiences to make the product more legitimate.
In conclusion, the whole promotional mix strategy will involve a combination of the above sub strategies of advertising, sales promotion and personal selling with the ultimate aim being to capture the attention of potential customers to accepting and making the dough product their preferential brand when they think of cookies.
