MAR002-2 Marketing Planning Assignment Sample

MAR002-2 Marketing Planning Assignment Sample

Introduction

Live Nation is an American entertainment company, and Live Nation operates its business globally. Live Nation Company’s main business segments are advertising, sponsoring live music entertainment, ticketing, and concerts of live music entertainment. Live Nation also serves as a place for entertainment for individual music artists and manages the career of music artists. This study utilises a variety of promotional activities, such as entertainment marketing strategies, digital and traditional advertising methods, and social media platforms, to market its products and music artists. Furthermore, effective communication with the target customer group is crucial and facing competition and the challenges posed by the COVID-19 pandemic. By selecting a suitable venue, curating a lineup of famous and upcoming artists, and offering additional entertainment or activities, Live Nation can generate excitement and attract potential ticket buyers through social media marketing, influencer partnerships, and incentives like pre-sale access and exclusive content. 

Background

Live Nation is the world’s leading live entertainment company, it is an American entertainment company, and Live Nation operates its business globally. Live Nation Company operates, promotes and manages ticket sales for live music or concerts. Live Nation also serves as a place for entertainment for individual music artists and manages the career of music artists.  Robert F.X Sillerman founded the Live Nation Company in 1996 as SFX entertainments, president and CEO of the Live Nation Company. Later in the year 2000, the SFX Entertainment Company was sold to Clear Channel Entertainment Company, and in 2005 the Clear Channel Entertainment company name became Live Nation. Michael Rapino became the CEO of the Live Nation Company. In 2010 Live Nation company, it was merged with TicketMaster company. Live Nation does 40,000 shows per year and 500 million tickets selling rate per year (Live Nation Entertainment, 2018). The Live Nation Company has 44,000 employees globally. Live Nation Company’s main business segments are advertising, sponsoring live music entertainment, ticketing, and concerts of live music entertainment. The Live Nation company headquarter is in Beverly Hills, California, USA. 

Explain an entertainment marketing plan

Promoting a product, music artist or band is called entertainment marketing. Entertainment is the primary medium for advertisement (Pasos, 2020). We choose product placement for an entertainment-marketing plan for Live Nation Company. The product placement-marketing plan first introduces the cinema sector, including all types of mass media (Bladen et al., 2022). Product placement becomes more creative and innovative promotional plans on digital platforms. Product placement is an advertisement type in the entertainment marketing industry but differs from other advertisements (Lefait and Villers, 2022). The product placement-marketing plan helps the entertainment company to focus on the entertainment product, meaning music artist or band. Product placement marketing plan does less prominent towards consumers than other advertisements (Levinson et al., 2021). A product placement-marketing plan allows for staying focused on the broadcast advertising medium for the target audience by using diverse, inspiring emotions in the advertisement. Copywriters, creative professionals and editorial directors are creating those diverse inspiring emotions to bring the desired messages to the target audience from the music artist and band (Gökhan, 2022). Product placement’s successful results have facilitated more music artists and bands to consolidate this marketing strategy into their marketing planning activities (Butler, 2019). The strategies for product placement are lingual, visual or both visual and lingual.

Live Nation Company created over 1.134 billion US dollars in 2021. Live Nation has faced a challenging year with the outbreak of the coronavirus (Statista, 2022). The presentation of bands, music artists and logos is used without any vocal massage, called the visual product placement strategy (Brodowsky and Schuster, 2020). In lingual product placement, the company use oral speech in advertisement with the bands or music artists’ product. 

Market analysis

SWOT 

Table 1: SWOT analysis (Source: Self-Developed)

Live Nation Company has a firm brand name in the live music entertainment industry. This company does 20,000 concerts annually with more than 2,000 music artists that help the company build a firm brand name. Live Nation has 200 million consumers worldwide with the help of 8,000 advertisers (Statista, 2022). Live Nation Company also has a website that helps the company to build a solid online presence in the market.

The consumers of Live Nation are most young people. The income of young people is less than that of other people because of that, young people may not find the ticket price pocket worthy. Live Nation Company also faces poor management systems, which lead the company to lose business growth. An insufficient budget or cash shortage can lead the company to a low liquidity position and lower business performance because that company can lose their consumer globally.

Live Nation Company also depends on famous music artists; poor management systems can affect the availability of those artists. Live Nation Company can attract more consumers through better marketing strategies and innovative ideas for creating a concert. This company can attract more consumers for better prices of tickets in live music entertainment companies. Live Nation can organise an eco-friendly show to create social and environmental awareness to retain more consumers.

The company can also apply a strategic marketing plan to create a strong online presence through television or social media platforms. Changing policies for public gatherings and epidemics can create a threat to Live Nation Company. Cancellations or rescheduling of events can create a market loss to live nation and the company also has a shortage of skilled staff that can create a delay in concert. 

Explain a promotional plan.

Promotional campaigns

Advertising campaigns can be considered promotional campaigns. An advertising campaign is a series of messages for advertising which share a single theme and idea that create an integrated marketing communication (IMC). A group of people can create a group of ideas or concepts in the IMC platform. Integrated marketing communication is theoretical approaches used by many know live music entertainment companies. The purpose of advertising campaigns is to focus on promotional advertising. This campaign creates the objective of marketing for a limited period. Advertising campaigns are built to achieve significant objectives or a group of objectives. Advertising campaigns can help Live Nation to attract more customers in concert and the company can achieve more economic growth.

There are many offline promotional tools available for Live Nation such as flags and banners, catalogues, classified ads and more. There are also online promotional tools available in the market for Live Nation such as blogs, email, lead generation, reviews, and forums.

Figure 2 shows the conceptual view of the promotional plan. Live Nation can implement that promotional plan in their marketing campaigns to attract more customers through globally. This promotional plan consists of both online and offline promotional tools and advertising campaign strategies. Live Nation can put flags and banners in the concert area or marketing area where the company can attract customers and also the company can make creative and eye-catching banners to attract customers. Live Nation can create innovative friendly catalogues and classified ads for newspapers to attract more customers. Through the email address of the target marketing area, the Live Nation company can find more customers and company can find more customer through blogs and lead generation.

Budget plan

Table 2: Budget plan (Source: Self-Developed)

The above table shows the budget plan of Live Nation and it is covering the entire budget for the concert including venue, decor and food. Live Nation is a well know music Entrainment Company globally and the company has a large number of customers around the globe. Live Nation Company can follow the above table for a better budget plan to do a successful music event. In this budget report, local and equipment rental is computed and the overall venue budget is 205,000 British pounds including staffing, toilet, parking and seating and the decor budget is 120,000 British pounds. The food and beverages budget is 140,000 British pounds. This budget also covers the insurance, event cancellation and public liability, which cost 575 British pounds per 450 tickets.

Promotional activities

Live Nation can employ various promotional activities to market its music event, including the use of digital platforms like Spotify and Youtube, as well as traditional advertising methods like roadside posters and bus shelters. With Spotify, Live Nation can create playlists featuring the event’s performers and share them with their followers to increase exposure and generate excitement for the event. Roadside posters or bus shelters can also be used to promote the music event in high-traffic areas. These displays can include the event’s lineup, date and location, and more in areas with a high concentration of music lovers to increase visibility and attract potential ticket buyers (Rehmat et al. 2021). YouTube can create promotional videos, share behind-the-scenes content, and live stream perforations, generating interest and engagement for the event. Collaborating with popular YouTubers or influencers can also help promote the event to their audience. Social Media Platforms such as Instagram, Twitter, and Facebook can be used to create event pages, share content featuring performers, and engage with followers, generating excitement and buzz for the music event. (Najmusaqib et al. 2021) Companies can also collaborate with social media influencers to promote the event to their audience. Influencer sales by giving influencers a unique discount code to share with their followers and receiving a commission for every ticket sold using their code.

Live Nation, a specialist in live events, earned a total of “6.27 million U.S. dollars” in revenue in 2021, a significant decline from its earnings of over 11 million two years prior. Ticketing revenue accounted for more than “1.54 billion U.S. dollars” in 2019, while concerts contributed “9.43 billion U.S. dollars” (Statista.com, 2022). However, the COVID-19 pandemic resulted in cancelling events and concerts in 2020, causing Live Nation to suffer a drop in revenue. It is uncertain how deeply the company will be impacted by the end of the financial year, but 2020 will be a challenging year for event operators. This highlights the need for event companies to develop contingency plans and adapt to unexpected circumstances in the future.

Marketing mix

The marketing mix includes the 4Ps:

Product: The product in the marketing mix for a music event consists of the event itself, such as the performers, venue, and overall experience. Live Nation can create a unique experience by curating a lineup of famous and up-and-coming artists, selecting a suitable venue, and offering additional entertainment or activities. VIP packages, merchandise and meet-and-greet opportunities can enhance the product offering.

Price: In determining ticket prices for a music event, Live Nation considers performers’ popularity, venue capacity, and ticket demand. They can offer discounts, promotional codes, and tiered pricing based on seating or viewing experience, with VIP packages available at a higher price (Hanaysha et al., 2021). To ensure profitability, the pricing strategy covers event costs, such as the venue, decor, and food/beverage expenses. Thus, to host the event will need to pay £205,000 for the venue, which can hold up to 36,500 attendees, and additional costs include £575 for insurance per 450 tickets sold, £120,000 for decoration, and £140,000 for food and beverages.

Promotion: Promotion aims to generate interest and awareness in the music event, and Live Nation can leverage different channels like social media, email marketing, paid advertising, and public relations. This includes using social media marketing to create event pages, share behind-the-scenes content, and partner with influencers (Ankur and Anupama, 2022). Email marketing can offer early bird access and updates, while paid advertising and public relations can reach a broader audience and secure media coverage.

Place: In the context of a music event, “place” refers to the event’s locations and distribution channels. Live Nation can select a venue that fits the event’s theme and is conveniently located for the target audience. The distribution channels can include online ticketing platforms like Ticketmaster and the event’s website. Thus, to boost visibility Live Nation can collaborate with local businesses for cross-promotion.

Communicating with the target customer

Effective communication with the target customer is a vital aspect of promoting a music event by Live Nation. The chosen target customer group for this event is aged between 18-35 years old, as they are the primary consumers of music and have a higher likelihood of attending music events (Rėklaitis and Pilelienė, 2019). This age group is known for engaging with social media and online music streaming platforms, making them more exposed to various music genres and open to new experiences.

According to Statista (2019), in 2021, nearly “92 per cent of U.S. marketers” in companies with more than 100 employees were anticipated to use social media for marketing activities, as compared to “86.2 per cent in 2013” (Statista.com, 2019). Social media marketing can be a powerful tool to promote Live Nation’s music event to its target audience, who are highly engaged with social media platforms. Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram can be used to create hype, share event updates, and generate conversations about the event. Partnering with influencers with a large following among the target audience can help increase event reach and credibility. User-generated content is another strategy that can create a sense of community and boost engagement by encouraging attendees to share their experiences and content related to the event using event hashtags. Email marketing effectively offers incentives, such as pre-sale access, discounts, and exclusive content. Local advertising can also increase visibility through radio, billboards, and flyers.

Competitive environment

Live Nation faces competition from other music event organisers in the US, such as AEG Presents, C3 Presents, and Bowery Presents. These competitors also host concerts and music events throughout the country. The business to which the organization is dedicated is defined, the needs that are covered with its products and services, the market in which the company is developed, as well as the public image of the company or organization (Fuertes et al., 2020). For organising a music event, Live Nation may encounter challenges such as competition from other event organisers, which can result in declining ticket sales. The availability and cost of venues and artist contracts may also impact the event’s profitability and success (Dincer and Yüksel, 2021). Thus, to execute a successful music event marketing plan, Live Nation should conduct comprehensive research on its target audience and competitors, create a clear branding and messaging strategy, utilise social media and email marketing, generate engaging promotional content, and collaborate with local businesses and sponsors. Measuring the campaign’s success through metrics like ticket sales, website traffic, and social media engagement can help adjust and improve the strategies employed.

Action plan

Conduct market research to understand the target audience, their interests, and the demographics needed for this music concert. Set clear event objectives such as increasing ticket sales, generating social media buzz, or attracting new sponsors. Develop a branding and messaging strategy that resonates with the target audience and reflects the concert’s unique features. Utilise social media marketing to engage with fans, promote the show, and generate interest using targeted advertising, influencer partnerships, and user-generated content. Create compelling promotional content through videos, images, or collaborations with music journalists and bloggers and influencers around the concert. Partnering with local businesses and sponsors to cross-promote the show and increase visibility can implement this music event successfully.

Recommendation

Improve customer experience

The company should stay updated on regulations and policies related to living events and public gatherings to mitigate potential risks. Implementing risk management strategies, such as contingency plans, communication strategies, and insurance policies, can prepare Live Nation for unforeseen events or circumstances that may lead to cancellations or rescheduling. Improving customer experience is crucial for success (McColl-Kennedy et al., 2018). Personalised VIP packages and interactive content, such as virtual reality concerts, can attract more customers and create a sense of exclusivity. Investing in data analytics will enable tailored offerings, improving the overall customer experience and increasing loyalty.

Incorporate new technologies

For achieving success in the face of the pandemic’s digital and virtual event shift, incorporating new technologies is critical for Live Nation’s success. These may include using social media platforms to engage with audiences, offering interactive content and live-streaming concerts (Hoyer et al. 2020). By exploring virtual and augmented reality experiences, the company can differentiate itself from competitors, attract new audiences, and create an engaging customer experience. Live Nation can stay ahead of the curve and continue to provide high-quality live entertainment experiences to its customers.

Conclusion

Live Nation is a leading global company in the live entertainment industry. It offers promotion, management, and ticket sales for live music concerts and serves as a platform for individual music artists and their careers. This study utilises a variety of promotional activities, such as entertainment marketing strategies, digital and traditional advertising methods, and social media platforms, to market its products and music artists. Furthermore, effective communication with the target customer group is crucial and facing competition and the challenges posed by the COVID-19 pandemic. By selecting a suitable venue, curetting a lineup of famous and upcoming artists, and offering additional entertainment or activities, Live Nation can generate excitement and attract potential ticket buyers through social media marketing, influencer partnerships, and incentives like pre-sale access and exclusive content.

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