Stage 8- Commercialization

The New Product Development Process

Stage 8- Commercialization

The New-Product Development Process (NDP) is outlined above by Kotler & Keller (2012).

Commercialization is the final stage of the NDP which takes place after a successful test marketing stage. During the commercialization stage, plans for full-scale manufacturing and marketing mix must be refined and completed, and budgets for the project must be prepared (Pride et al, 2011). The introduction of new products incur huge financial costs for an organisation and can take several years after the initial commercialization decision to be properly introduced (Mcdaniel et al, 2011). 

Commercialization incurs the company’s highest cost to date and the following factors needs to be considered (Kotler & Keller, 2012);

When? (Timing)

When a company has almost completed the development work on its new product, the company faces three choices;

1.      First entry- Enter the market first to lock up key distributors and customers

2.      Parallel entry- Coincide with the competitor’s entry.

3.      Late entry- Delay launch to learn the size of the market.

Where? (Geographic Strategy)

Companies select markets based on potential, local reputation and cost of communication media.

To Whom? (Target-Market Prospects)

The company needs to target initial distribution and promotion.

Example of Commercialization

In 2013, Slazenger launched their new range of cricket products in Halifax, England. Slazenger chose to launch their new products at ‘The Cricket Asylum’ in Halifax which is a specialist cricket shop, this allowed Slazenger to reach their fans and target market directly. By launching their products in a specialist cricket store, Slazenger managed to keep costs minimal as well as making sure that every customer visiting the store would be interested in cricket and therefore interested in Slazenger’s new products. 

The new products were launched in January 2013 which marked the start of a new cricket season with England playing test matches in India and also marked the start of an Ashes year therefore at this time, there is a high amount of interest in cricket and cricket equipment which will increase Slazenger’s sales and profit.

Commercialization of Quick Baseball

To commercialize Quick Baseball, I applied the following criteria to my new sports format (Kotler & Keller, 2012);

When: Quick Baseball will launch just before the start of the MLB season (February 2015). The launch will occur at this time because the target market will be aware of the upcoming baseball season so interest will be high.

Where: Quick Baseball will be launched in the USA, this is due to the large number of baseball players in the USA. (See Appendix B for Number of Baseball Players in the USA).

To Whom: The target market will be the viewers that currently watch MLB in the USA- Approx. 1.01billion people (Calcaterra, 2014).

How: I created a logo for my product at the product development stage of the NDP. Quick Baseball also passed the test marketing stage so now I am going to promote my product on social media and in Baseball magazines across the USA.

Words- 497

References

Calcaterra, C. (2014). Comment of the Day: How many people really watch MLB games?. (online) Hardballtalk.nbcsports.com. Available at: http://hardballtalk.nbcsports.com/2011/09/15/comment-of-the-day-how-many-people-really-watch-mlb-games/ (Accessed 3 Feb. 2015).

Kotler, P. & Keller, K.L. (2012) Marketing Management. Global Edn. Harlow: Pearson Education.

Mcdaniel, C.D, Lamb, C.W, & Hair J.F, (2011) Introduction to Marketing 11th Edn. Ohio: South-Western Cengage Learning.

Pride, W., Hughes, R. and Kapoor, J. (2011) Business. 11^th edn. United States: Western Cengage Learning.

Statista, (2015). Number of softball players & baseball players in the USA, 2014. [online] Available at: http://www.statista.com/statistics/227429/number-of-softball-players-and-baseball-players-usa/ [Accessed 3 Feb. 2015].

Appendix

Appendix A- Number of Baseball Players in the USA

(Statista, 2015)