Q1 Answer
Coca-Cola Company uses various multinational strategies to enhance efficiency in its operations. The strategies are in the categories of growth and marketing strategies. Product development strategy is a strategy that Coca-Cola Company utilizes in venturing international markets. The strategy involves continuous designing of unique products that are competitive in the market. Under this strategy, Coca-Cola Company focuses much on the continuous execution of market research geared towards identifying the changes of the customers’ preferences. This helps the company to design and develop unique products or redesign the existing products to meet such needs. The needs of customers change from one region to another thus compelling the company to use this strategy to address the needs of specific regions to foster satisfaction.
Besides, strategic positioning is one multinational strategy used by the Coca-Cola Company in venturing into various regions where it has business operations. Under this strategy, the company focuses on proving unique products and services to various world markets when the competition is very low. This implies that the company ventures into other new markets before its rivals. Also, it implies that the company produces unique products and places them in the market before its rivals concentrate on producing their new brands with similar features. This is a competitive strategy that makes the company stand as a market leader in the beverage industry. This is part of penetration strategy for the company. Under the same strategy, the company provides its products and services with differentiated needs to different market segments. For instance, the companies consider providing products that meet the different needs of the people of different cultures. However, most of its products are standardized meaning that the company offers products with similar features to various regions (Bailey, 2014).
Furthermore, Coca-Cola Company also uses diversification strategy as one of its key multinational strategies. The company is well known for having a variety of brands such as soft drinks, energy drinks, water and other brands. Under this strategy, Coca-Cola Company focuses on providing international companies with a variety of products where they can choose those which meet their needs. Each customer is at liberty to make such a choice thus able to attract more customers. It is also a competitive strategy that makes the company more competitive since it has many substitute products implying that if the one product fails to conform to the needs of the customer, the customer can choose another product (Bailey, 2014).
Finally, Coca-Cola Company uses differentiation strategy as a multinational strategy to foster competitiveness and growth. Much focus on this strategy is ensuring innovativeness in production that assists the company to provide its customers with products that differ in uniqueness and quality from that of its competitors. Besides, under the same strategy the company differentiates itself from other through its communication to customers. The strategies give the company the power to offer information to its customers through various strategies. Coca-Cola Company is more conscious of providing quality service to its customers. In all the regions it operates, the company employees are ever committed to providing quality services that differentiating the company from its rivals.
Q2 Answer
Coca-Cola Company operates in international division structure because its staff operates in isolation from the head office. The company uses various divisions in the continents where it has operations. According to Bailey (2014), each division is headed by a president who oversees the running of the company’s business in those regions. The company has five divisions depending on the various regions where it operates. The five continental divisions that the company has internationally include Pacific group, Europe division, Latin America group, Eurasia & Africa division and North America Group.
After separating its structure into various divisions, each division has its subdivisions. Each divisional unit operates as the domestic unit. This is to mean that each division uses a functional structure in which it’s various departments. For instance, it has departments such as marketing, finance and human resource that help to promote efficiency in the company operations. All the same, all the departments have an attachment to the main division which is in the home country.
Q3 Answer
The three legs of the strategy tripod include industry-based, resource based and institution based. Analyzing Coca-Cola Company regarding the three legs, Coca Cola Company is conscious of meeting the needs of the industry which involve the provision of quality products that satisfy the customers as well as developing the industry. This is to mean that Coca-Cola Company operations are subject to the conditions provided by the industry. The company has been able to offer products to various regions of the world which are conscious of the customer. Besides, the company is considerate of the employee satisfaction. As a result, Coca-Cola Company provides conducive working environment for its employees. The company ensures this by providing a good package to the employees, offering training and other career developmental incentives (Moye, 2016).
Also, the Coca Cola Company bases its operations on the available resources. Coca-Cola main resources include capital, assets and human resources. These resources are very key for the company in venturing in various segments. Coca Cola Company has enough capital resources that assist it in expanding its products to emerging markets of the world without any problem. The company is profitable thus able to retain some of the profits for business expansion. On the other hand, the company has a competent and committed team of employees which work very hard towards attaining its goals. It human resource has capabilities in product designing, development, and marketing. Finally, the company has enough assets giving it a financial strength hence able to meet its obligations without any problem.
Finally, under institution based strategy, Coca-Cola Company is considerate of the social differences of the regions where it operates. This is to imply that the company puts a lot of concern on the social responsibility of the people of the society where it has business. The company has taken various initiatives to ensuring that the community remains satisfied all through. For instance, the company provides clean water, supporting events such as Olympics and employing from the community among many others. These three legs of the strategy tripod for Coca-Cola Company are in line with its multinational strategies (Moye, 2016).
Q4 Answer
The multinational approach of the Coca-Cola plays a great role towards enhancing the innovativeness of the company thus giving it a competitive advantage over the other rivals in the market. Coca-Cola Company focuses on designing new products that meet the changing needs of its customers. Its uniqueness of the products gives the Company competitive advantage over its competitors like PepsiCo Company. Its positioning strategy allows the company to place products in the market earlier than the competitors’ think of venturing the market with same. Besides, the capabilities of teams also play a great role in giving the company competitive advantages in giving quality customer service better its rivals.
References
Bailey, S. (2014, December 2). Investing in Coca-Cola: The world’s largest soft drink company. Market Realistic. Retrieved from http://marketrealist.com/2014/12/investing-coca-cola- worlds-largest-soft-drink-company/
Moye, J. (2016, January 19). One Brand’ Strategy, New Global Campaign Unite Coca-Cola Trademark. Coca-Cola Company.com. Retrieved from http://www.coca- colacompany.com/tastethefeeling/
