M

G2
06
Fin
al
As
Dennish
Chand
s111010278
Lautoka

sig
Campus
Semester 1 -
2020
Failure is inevitable, a handful of reputable businesses have launched products that have
failed drastically and yet they remain at their peak today. Failure has always been part
and parcel of every success story but it is how you manage post failure that creates the
rejuvenation process. Take for example the biggest advertising campaign budget
McDonald’s ever made; a total of $100 million was spent to launch their Arch Deluxe
Burger in 1996. The Arch Deluxe Burger failed harshly. [ CITATION McG08 \l 1033 ] Although
due to their strong public relation grasp, McDonalds still remains the top most priority
restaurant around the world and in the hearts of millions of families. Similarly, this case
study encompasses around a company that sells beauty products. The case involves the
company launching a face cream for the purpose of removing acne. Regrettably, the
product backfires and customers start complaining of skin irritation and false advertising
of the product. This case study will start off by gathering a clear understanding of the
scenario and elaborate on the factors that might have led to the unsatisfied customer
pandemonium, it will then further discuss some of my personal views along with text
book definitions on the resolution techniques from a Public Relations Officer’s
perspective and furthermore embark on eight strategies that need to be considered
respectively in order to avoid any further product failures. Eventually the case study will
conclude with a summary of the entire case study along with the things that I have
learnt through the process of this essay.
To begin with, lets acquaint with the company and the issue. According to the case, XYZ
Company is a manufacturer specializing in skin and hair care products. The marketing
department along with Research and Development department with the authorization
of the company CEO introduce a herbal face hydration and acne removing face cream.
Upon further breaking down of the case, it turns out the company cut corners in lab
testing where the product was only tested for texture and packaging. The product
testing phase completely ignored to make any attempts to execute any ingredient
testing. This can easily be seen as a bypass of health codes. This bypass of testing further
stirred false marketing of the product; since the product was not precisely tested, the
claims of the product being useful for skin hydration, removing acne without leaving any
scars and giving a lighter complexion was not relatively correct. Furthermore, it is noted
that the company had also failed to notify the Food and Drug Association on this brand-
new product before making it available to the consumer market. FDA even goes on to
put blames on the company for not practicing procedures before launch. In statements
provided in the case, it is inevitably noticed that the main idea behind this product was
to create maximum profits as the Head of Research and Development, Pita thought that
the product would be of great profit. All in all, XYZ Company with the launch of this
poorly planned product has created a distrusting gesture within the minds of existing
and potential customers. There can be no doubt that the company has now shifted its
main motives to generate maximum profit.
However, there are systematic public relationship methods through which the company
can bounce back from a crisis as such. Putting myself in the shoes of the Public Relations
Officer I feel the steps disused by Meg Carpenter in a blog post on Talk walker greatly
relates to the case study. I have used important points raised in the blog to give
suggestions on how the issue can be resolved. [ CITATION Car19 \l 1033 ]
Ideally the first step to take would be to formulate a Public Relation crisis plan. This plan
must be carefully articulated and should be approved by all of the company authority
holders. Having a ready-made plan for any PR crisis helps in the execution timeline and
in avoiding any blunders. It also ensures that every response to the public is well thought
out and is mechanized to create maximum positivity. In the case for XYZ, I would suggest
that the PR Officer must appoint a spokesperson who can effectively speak on behalf of
the company, the officer must also produce dummy crisis to the team members and
decide on the best response that can be used practically. By doing so, this would ensure
the public’s negative descriptions of the product is neutralized and minimum harm is
done to the company brand name.
Secondly, before any press release is drafted the PR officer must ensure to gather actual
facts of the crisis. With the facts, PR officer can easily understand the situation that led
to the crisis. These facts would eventually be useful during drafting an explanation on
what went wrong. The facts can also be used to get ideas on what part of the product
must be relooked at for future production. XYZ Company PR officer in this case must
request a report from the marketing and research & development departments before
articulating any press release. The reports should be detailed and must document every
step of the product launch process. Some important questions that the report must
answer include; what happened? Why did it happen? And how will it be solved? Once
the reports are received, it must be carefully reviewed and any press release should be
conscience and easily understood. It should have a thought-out tone that is parallel to
the level of crisis.
Once the press release is approved, the PR officer must begin to decide on the mediums
of distribution. There may be various modes of message distribution for example social
media, television, print media and radio. Companies often use more than one media
platform, depending on the products communication need. In a scenario as such,
characteristics of each media platforms must be considered. In XYZ Company scenario,
social media would be viable since the media platform involves communication between
the customer and the company. This can be used to a great advantage as it would give
the opportunity to listen to customer reviews and give back constructive responses. It
also creates a forum where people can dampen their negative thoughts of the company.

All responses must be thought out and should contain uniform tone. It is also very
important to double check any response before publishing. XYZ Company must ensure
all responses are apologetic, accept the mistakes and include an explanation to what
went wrong. The public must feel that their voices have been heard and leave the forum
with their problems solved.
With all that, the question that still remains is how can products be launched without
any catastrophe. Unit 8 of MG206: Marketing Principles and Strategies course work
includes PowerPoint presentation that contains information on Eight Major Stages in
New-Product development process. The processes include; idea generation, idea
screening, concept development and testing, marketing strategy, business analysis,
product development, test marketing and commercialization. Each step must be
executed respectively to minimize risks of product failure.
To start off, the first step is to generate an idea. Through a systematic process
companies generate numerous ideas. Two sources of idea generation are external and
internal. External sources include customer feedback, competitors, suppliers, etc.
Internal sources include the company’s research and development team, own
employees, etc. Let’s take the example of XYZ Company, the idea to launch a new face
care cream generated internally from Romy and her team from the marketing
department. The credibility of internal source is debatable since it belongs from the
same company. External sources on the other hand are often good idea sources since
the information generates from an independent party.
Furthermore, the second step is idea screening. This process is mainly to filter out any
ideas that might not feasible. The idea screening is done in consideration of; the
importance to start a new product, the existing machinery being able to produce the
product and existing market position being able to market the product.