Marketing Dental Floss Flossing example essay topic

Marketing Dental Floss Flossing: A new secret to good health? Introduction: Dental floss is one of those products we never notice on the shelves in the stores and never pay too much attention to in our bathroom. At the same time for many people it is a part of the "before going to bed" ritual along with brushing teeth, taking shower, etc. and etc. Those who don't use it on regular basis still have it in their bathrooms, because: 1. A mouth hygiene care item in regards to which everybody wants to be unlike everybody and thus follows the traditional patterns. It's the way it is for years - dental floss regular item in a regular bathroom picked up at a regular store right next to toothbrush and toothpaste.

2. Sometimes it's an extremely useful means of eliminating unwanted stuff stuck between your teeth. 3. It doesn't even take much space on your shelf: ) ) It doesn't cause any inconveniences.

Besides everybody knows the common truth about dental floss: Flossing helps clean teeth in the areas that brushing alone just cannot reach (between the teeth and under your gum line). Flossing and then brushing helps remove plaque, a sticky substance that accumulates and hardens over time. Left untreated, plaque deposits can eventually lead to gum disease and tooth decay. Being currently in maturity stage of its life cycle with rather steady curve, showing no surprises for a product in this category, floss has great potential for conquering the market again and experience its new growth stage resulting in turning the trend upwards as opposed to slightly declining current trend. It has that potential same as milk does. It's "very good for your health" and the target segment includes adults and heavily involves kids, what gives a hope to raise a generation of heavy users.

What has already been done in this direction: Many developments in dental floss came about in an attempt to make flossing more appealing to children and adults. Flavored flosses and multi-colored flosses were attempts to inspire children to floss regularly. Parents have always been able to offer incentives to their children to brush and floss. Problems: Until now, the parent never really had the means to determine whether the child was actually compliant. Intuitively, children usually don't have the motor skills to floss their own teeth until they are 5 or 6 years old - and even then, they should floss only with adult supervision until the child can trusted. A slip can cut the gum and raise the risk of infection.

Just about everything seems more important to a child than good dental habits so unless the parent is going to stand over their child's shoulder every morning there is a good chance that there are regimen lapses either in flossing or brushing that the parent is not aware of. How to get to the new growth stage? Wise marketing programs should be developed and implemented respectively. To do this, a marketer should clearly understand behavioral specialities of the target audience, and then use those to identify present problems and work out ways to cure those. Behavioral aspects connected with the product should be carefully treated and considered, such as: . Low Involvement a very routine and very lightly differentiated product from the customer's perspective, brands are either not distinguished or following the choice on primary tooth care belongings like tooth paste and / or tooth brush (for example many people use Oral B) o Consideration Set of categories Toothbrush is perceived to be the primary tooth care item and dental floss is getting the "leftovers"o Perception A tooth care activity that can be skipped, at least as a regular, and everyday one Brand Association A message to be emphasized in different ways - cool kid with white teeth and good breath Experiential marketing Use of dental loss with different situation for instance parents together with children flossing each other or flossing after meals.

Consumption situation of the product, e.g. attach samples to products, which usually make you feel like using floss, popcorn for instance. In order to understand how good the ground for potential marketing actions is, let's look at couple fact below: According to St. Luis Post Dispatch: SS 1 in 7 children have tooth decay, SS Tooth decay is the single most common chronic childhood disease; five times more common than asthma and seven times more common than hay fever. SS Twenty-five percent of children suffer 80 percent of tooth decay. SS 1 in 5 parents actually teach there children about the importance of general dental care. Poor dental care can escalate into health problems such as a poor diet due to difficulty in eating, not being able to speak clearly, or having low self-esteem because of bad breath or disfigured / discolored teeth. However, these problems can be prevented if parents use fluorides, and brush and floss their young children's teeth every day.

In addition, educating children on the importance of regular oral hygiene should be the number one priority. What to do to and where to start? Thus marketing should target the decision maker and influence, and finally the user directly, as soon as all three are to be communicated in appropriate ways. As soon as modifying the product is obviously not an objective in this case, modifying the market becomes crucial and comes within different strategic and tactical moves: 1. Work with parents in a way to have them understand that they should teach children the skills and behaviors that help maintain good dental health.

Helping children develop good preventive oral health care habits can be very difficult. But it is a common goal that should be shared by both parents and childcare providers alike. The real task is for parents to show their children that brushing and flossing is fun! Creating good oral hygiene habits at an early age is essential to the healthy development of a child's teeth and gums. In this instance, companies need to educate parents to socialize with there children.

Children acquire skills, knowledge and attitudes from a young age. If companies educate adults who in turn educate their children this in turn could result in increased product usage. In this instance consumer socialization is important. 2. Issue reminders to the fact that dental treatment is generally not reimbursed by the National Health Schemes of some countries and is too expensive.

Therefore, proper dental care such as regular flossing is important. Create and encourage slogans such as "A Little Flossing Just Might Save Your Pocket", which could be a suitable slogan directed towards parents. This in turn will appeal to the economic emotions of parents. This advert could be used as sensory image that would provide negative reinforcement to adults. In other words, lack of flossing could lead to expensive operations, dental treatment etc. 3.

Launch and encourage social activities which are capable of establishing the perception: "Flossing is cool" or acceptance of slogans such as 'You " ll want to join the Flossing Club": this statement could appeal to the kid's reputation and affiliations within certain groups. Therefore, if a child does not floss, his peers may view him as "nerdy" or "uncool". Here it shows to boys who are very proud of their clean white teeth. This could appeal to young children. 4. Start over competition with toothpicks - Come up with a restaurant distribution option.

Why do toothpicks own the restaurant dental care market? Why can't you get a piece of dental floss in a restaurant to get that piece of lettuce or corn out of your chompers. 5. Large NGO's, Commercial companies such as Colgate or Braun, Government agencies, schools and the like should be encouraged to promote the importance of oral hygiene and in this case flossing. A well formulated program directed towards personnel developing the programs and activities for kids as well as employed for the presenting of the above should be developed. The program should be broad, unbiased, and consistent with the values and morals of many societies, culture and subcultures...

Sustainability: The Dental Program must have the ability to be sustained over time with an objective to educate rather than the purpose of profiting... Mensurability: In addition to measurement of costs, the dental program incorporates methods to measure the effectiveness of the program... Individual Respect and Dignity: The Dental Care campaign should stress individual respect, compassion and dignity... Flexibility: The Program must be flexible in order to meet changing needs of the population... Goal / objective orientated: SS Allow parents to recognize the importance of oral health for there children's well-being in the context of health development and to rethink current situation i.e. flossing is necessary and thus floss should not be taken for granted. SS To drastically rise awareness 6.

Come up with a promotion channels diversification: instead of using dentist offices think about targeting other channels. Dental floss would be so much more useful if it was readily available when you need it most. Marketing dental floss samples through dental offices isn't a bad idea, but that is the last place the prospect needs dental floss. When you leave the dentist, that's the most through flossing I'm going to have for six months. Maybe dental floss companies need to segment by need cause it never seems to be around when the customer needs it! Do a joint marketing campaign with microwave popcorn where you get a dental floss sample attached to the popcorn bag.

How many times do you microwave a bag of popcorn and get a piece stuck in your teeth? This is especially problematic if you get the popcorn from a vending machine and pop it up at work (based individual customers' opinion, so the concept should be tested at this stage). You end up cramming someone's business card or the edge of a matchbook in your teeth. 7. Last in this list, but not the least one is creating new use situations, which would not be able to contribute to sales significantly, but at the same time are a nice complementary segment. Possible uses suggested at web sound like fun (what again can be used for attracting higher attention), but in reality these and probably many other activities and tasks need the floss...

Truss poultry for cooking. Fill the cavity with stuffing, cross the two legs, and tie legs together with Oral-B Mint Waxed Floss. If necessary, sew the cavity closed... Repair the mesh screening on playpens. Sew up the rip with Oral-B Mint Waxed Floss...

Cut a birthday cake. Oral-B Mint Waxed Floss cuts cake into neat slices... Lift cookies from a cookie sheet. Slide a strand of Oral-B Mint Waxed Floss between fresh-baked cookies and the cookie sheet... Repair a tent or backpack. When hiking or camping, Oral-B Mint Waxed Floss makes a durable, strong thread for tough repairs...

Sew buttons on heavy coats. Use Oral-B Mint Waxed Floss as a durable thread... Hang pictures, sun catchers, or wind chimes. Oral-B Mint Waxed Floss is stronger and more durable than ordinary string...

String beaded necklaces. Oral-B Mint Waxed Floss is thin enough for small beads, yet stronger than thread... Slice cheese. Oral-B Mint Waxed Floss cuts neatly through cheese for clean slices. Items 1 through 5 represent finding new users and increasing use, and #6 is solely covering creating new use situations. Summary: Is the breakthrough at this point of maturity towards the Renaissance possible for dental floss?

1. Dental floss has been recognized by our group as an "What if no... ". product 2. with the assumption that it will always be in the marketplace (at least in the reasonable horizon) 3. it's in maturity stage with some decline in recent decade 4. with the wide target segment of people buying convenience goods for dental care with focus on those who do care 5. it's priced low and is affordable to any consumer (countries with disposable income of $10 are not in scope) 6. suggested directions for developing, expanding and consumer-to-product connection strengthening should be analyzed and ranked in urgency and / or potential impact basis, some concepts are to be checked for correctness (as soon as they are first time expressed ideas), and afterwards implemented as marketing actions and components of company philosophy. 7. communication strategy should involve channels, that allow to enhance awareness and keep brand loyalty (for individual brands - price and points of difference should be stressed, when applicable), meaning keeping the consumer from switching to substitute products. The message to be used in promotion is inconvenience of unavailability of floss when it's necessary and discomfort as a result (meaning making the consumer, plus 8. Appendix: Three simple steps to flossing: A. Using 18 inches of dental floss, wrap it lightly around your middle fingers. B. Firmly grasp the dental floss with your index fingers. C. Forming a C-shape, carefully slide the floss up and down between your tooth and gum line and gently slide the floss in between both sides of your teeth..