The purpose of this paper is to illustrate the importance of studying the internal and external market forces that could contribute to a company’s sales decline. This piece also delves into the ensuing strategies-revamp in the corporation’s marketing mix to counter declining sales. As a scenario, this study would be taking the point-of-view of a Marketing Manager idealising and justifying the team’s actions in a sales boost bid.
For this paper, studies would be based on the national carrier of Malaysia, Malaysian Airlines System (thereafter referred to as MAS). They have been dogged by continuous sales decline since the beginning of this decade. In the beginning of 2006, the company recorded some RM 10 billions of loss for just over the past 2 years.
As of February 2006, the newly government-elected CEO Idris Jala overhauled operations to introduce the Business Turnaround Plan (BTP). According to the plan ‘MASWay’, their aims are to reach profitability by 2008. This paper would build upon the several successes of the BTP to date, to provide more recommendations for battling their dwindling sales.
Current Market Situation
For the Financial Year ending 2005, MAS posted a total loss of RM 1.3bn. This was shocking as it does not represent the Asian aviation industry in its entirety. Regional competitors are not merely sustaining but instead are posting profits through consecutive quarters. After the BTP implementation, MAS posted a gross profit of 240Mil for the 3rd quarter ending September 2006.
MAS revenue postings from its several destination sectors 2001-2005
As illustrated above, MAS’s servitude towards several destinations is low-yield and needs appropriate actions to improve sales figures. Under the newly-implemented BTP 2006, many of these low-yield routes have been terminated or reduced in frequency. Domestic routes have been reduced from 118 to 22, whilst international routes from 114 to 90.
‘The Asian Business Aviation
References: Kotler, Philip (2006), ‘Principles of Marketing’ 10th Edition, Prentice Hall. MAS Annual Reports 2001, 2002, 2003, 2004 and 2005. Available at www.malaysiaairlines.com Monster Blog (www.monsterblog.com.my 23rd December 2006)