Case study:

You are the Brand Manager of a leading marketing company in Rwanda. Your duty is to plan, develop, and direct the marketing efforts for a particular brand or product. Your company has just signed a very important contract with a worldwide company: Vodafone. Your company has decided to give you the responsibility to complete successfully this contract.

Your customer, Vodafone, decided to top the Rwandese market of telecommunication, as it believes it can be very profitable to do so. However, Vodafone does not have enough knowledge of the rwandese culture and rwandese consumer behaviors to define a clear branding strategy. It is your role to define the communication strategy for Vodafone who wants to become the first telecommunication company of the country.

As a first assignment, you will have to choose 1 of the 3 products Vodafone wants to implement on the rwandese market (please find below information regarding those different products). Your job is to conceptualize an aggressive but wise branding strategy for this specific product.

Your objectives are:

To define the 4 values (functional, emotional, existential and appropriation) to be attributed to the product you chose.

To define the marketing-mix (Product, Place, Price, Promotion) for the product you chose, and to describe the identity of the final customer (Person).

To use your skills, your knowledge and your imagination to develop a storytelling to advertise the product you chose. You will have to describe the main aspects of a visual and written communication strategy, in line with the global branding strategy of the company.

Background information is there to help you; it is not exhaustive information, you will have to conceptualize complementary information or to document yourself in order to achieve your objectives.

Background information:

About the market:

Telecommunications market in Rwanda is one of the fastest growing markets in Africa. The number of mobile cellular is 6,000,000 for a total population of 10,000,000. Rwanda's internet and broadband sector has suffered from limited fixed-line infrastructure and high prices, but developments in the fixed network market are beginning to change this. The operators are rolling out national fibre-optic backbone networks which also allow them to connect to the international submarine fibre-optic cables that landed on the African east coast in 2009 and 2010. These cables have given the entire region fibre-based international bandwidth for the first time and brought to an end its dependency on satellites. Accordingly, Rwanda has laid more than 1,865 miles (3,000km) of fibre optic cable since 2009. However, only about 8.3% of the population has currently access to the internet.

Rwandese telecommunications market remains oligopolistic, with 2 major players and a few secondary operators: South Africa's MTN enjoyed a monopoly until 2006 when the fixed-line incumbent, Rwandatel became the second mobile operator. The launch of services from South African's Millicom/Tigo in 2009 sparked renewed subscriber growth, though competition has eroded mobile services revenue. Indian's Bharti Airtel, which ranked among the top 5 globally, is the third player on the market. It decided in 2012 to invest US$100 million over three years with an aim of achieving quick penetration and become the second operator in the country. Finally, in June 2013, the Rwandese government signed a deal with KT Corp from South Korea to develop a 4G internet broadband network. For this purpose, KT Corp is going to inject about $140million into a joint venture company, by 2016.

About the Customer:

Company presentation

Vodafone is a British multinational telecommunications company, a market leader in world telecom. It is among the top three companies listed in London Stock Exchange with a market Value of around $135.7 Billion, annual revenue amounting to $74.4 Billion and an annual profit of around $11.1 Billion.Vodafone is boasted of nearly 440 million customers worldwide. It is spread across 65 countries, operating in several African countries: Egypt, RD Congo, Ghana, Mozambique, Tanzania, Lesotho, South Africa and Kenya.

Company's objectives and means

Vodafone would like to commercialize 3 different services in Rwanda:

1)"Vodafone Mobile Connect USB Modem", a USB modem offering 3G broadband access services. Its commercial strategy will be to offer free USB modem for any new customer subscribing for at least a year. Moreover, Internet access will be accessible to half of the price offered by the market leader, MTN.

2) "Vodafone comprehensive package", a Mobile phone service covering the entire country. For Mobile services, special offers will also be developed, in particular offering free Nokia smartphones to any new customer subscribing for at least 2 years. Its main target is the poorest Rwandans, deep in the countryside.

3)"Vodacoin", an easy and ready to use money transfer service integrated into all Vodafone mobiles. Through the sending of digit codes within SMS, subscribers can send money to any other Vodafone subscriber. The offer is free for the first 100 uses and is then charged 20 Rwf per payment.

Its budget plan for advertisement in Rwanda is $15 million annually. The customer is ready to invest $250 million on the rwandese market to achieve a very quick penetration and to become the first operator in the country within 5 year. Vodafone secured a deal with Nokia, a leader in technology services, to develop infrastructures to reach rwandan people all over the country.

Branding management

Branding worldwide vision

Vodafone focus on what makes people's lives easier. Vodafone vision: "we're happy with everyone sharing our ambition. That way, we're far more likely to achieve it." Vodafone values: outstanding data services and products, backed up by the best customer experience in the business; exceptional customer service. Hands-on, positive and always looking for fresh ways to deliver: "by listening to our people, we've found that three things sum up what we're all about:

Speed - we're focused on bringing innovative new products and services onto the market quickly Simplicity - we make things easy for our customers, partners and colleagues Trust - we're reliable and transparent to deal with"

Its targets are big - which means millions of customers using its data services every day.

Brand identity

"Our brand is one of the strongest and most identifiable things about us. In fact, we're one of the most widely-known brands across the world.

But what do we mean by a 'brand?' It's not just our logo, our advertising or the events we sponsor. It's what we say and what we do. It's who we are as an organization.

So what do we stand for? Well, we're customer-obsessed. We're passionate about what we do. We're ultra-reliable. And we're always itching to explore, grow and develop.

In short, we're all about the future. All around the world, technology's connecting the different areas of our lives. Whether it's texting, emailing, calling or browsing, technology has the power to enrich everything we do.

We call it connected living. And at Vodafone, it's a way of life we're pioneering - right here, right now."

Corporate responsibility

"We're keen to reduce our impact on the environment - both individually and as a company. That's why we're continually introducing initiatives to tackle waste, energy use and even the pollution caused by commuting. And we're always looking for ways to help our suppliers and customers to be more climate-conscious." It's impossible to cover the sheer range of charity events and fundraising activities we sustained. Our people have jumped out of planes, walked on fire and run huge distances to help those in need."