The strategic marketing plan of Tarsius Inc. / Jennibeth Fornis Paglinawan

Year : 2014

Number of Pages : 99 leaves

Adviser : Prof. Edison D. Cruz

Executive Summary

Tarsius Inc. is a technology start-up company that provides augmented reality technology solutions that aims to create value to its customers which are primarily businesses by increasing engagement through imaginative and relevant AR solutions. The company started from a pitching boot camp by a group of friends, colleagues and siblings and was launched in October 1, 2012. Despite the exciting innovations and high growth projections in the AR industry, selling the technology and capturing the main stream market was very difficult. It was projected in Gartner's most recent hype cycle of technologies (2013), that AR can possibly be embraced by the mass market after 5-10 years. Tarsius Inc. is no exception to the challenge of adoption of this technology. As a tech start-up company, there were also internal issues that impeded the growth of the company such as loss of technical and financial strength of the company due to the pull out of the investor and the technical team. These occurrences were attributed to lack of understanding of the nature of running a tech start-up business in an entrepreneurial manner during the incubation phase and lack of understanding of the situation of industry and the challenges inherent in the AR industry that the company should find ways to strategically overcome. Recognizing the potential of the business despite the challenges that the company faced and is still facing both internally and externally, a strategic marketing plan was prepared for Tarsius Inc. to provide better understanding of the internal and external situation, challenges and key success drivers from which competitive advantages may be drawn, identify areas to focus on, develop specific strategies, and identify the direction and future course of action of the company. It is essential for any business to identify the key sources of its main bottom line which is cash. In this regard, it is not an option for a start-up tech company like Tarsius Inc. to just wait and see. Actively identifying and pursuing the appropriate markets during the different stages of growth of the industry and market is essential to identify the potential sources of cash flow. In this strategic marketing plan for Tarsius Inc., it was identified that the company shall pursue customer-centric marketing instead of product-focused marketing. This is because for the early market of AR, the concern of the customers is not to be provided with extremely technologically perfect product or service (since there are no industry standards yet). The customers are willing to pay when AR companies provide exactly what they need and are continuously provided with their need to foster loyalty. The need should address specific pain points of the customer and must have high impact or relevance to their business. Other highlights of the strategic marketing plan are (1) to maximize online marketing activities and integrate it with offline marketing activities (2) to extend the market through productization of AR to increase awareness in the mass market and capture end-consumers and (3) to extend the product and service offering by providing non-AR solutions to interested clients.