ASTRO

Multimedia University Cyberjaya –Faculty of Management Marketing Plan for ASTRO

Mar. 2008 Group Term Project BMM6034 - Marketing for Management

TABLE OF CONTENTS

Introduction The landscape of the entertainment industry in Malaysia is dominated by two media giants Astro All Asia Plc, a subsidiary of the Measat Broadcasting network Systems Sdn. Bhd. (Astro) and Media Prima Bhd (Media Prima). The focal point of this paper is television broadcast. Definitively, the broadcasting & cable TV industry consists of all terrestrial, cable and satellite broadcasters of digital and analog television programming. Competition in broadcasting industry for both viewer ship and advertising is fierce. There is 3 PayTo-View based television network. Among them Astro is the biggest players in the field. Structure of Malaysia Television

fig 1: Structure of the television industry

The paper begins with an overview of the PEST, focusing on the aspects that have the greatest impact on the communication industry. The next stage is analyzing the marketing mix of Astro, this is a challenge as the company is both the provider of the media for advertisement and they also advertise themselves. The next phase was to employ marketing tools to comprehensively analyze the environment of the organization. These tools are SWOT, Five Forces. Market segmentation is one of the most important activities as success comes from understanding, reaching, serving and providing customers with the optimal marketing mix.

The final phase was Astro’s marketing

analysis.

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Overview of the Astro ASTRO ALL ASIA NETWORKS plc (Astro) is the region’s leading cross-media operator with directto-home (DTH) satellite television services in Malaysia, Brunei and Indonesia. It is also the leading commercial radio broadcaster in Malaysia and a major publisher of TV guides and lifestyle magazines in the region. Astro has formed joint ventures in other countries to launch new broadcasting, multimedia and Internet services. The Group has strategic alliances with leading software developers and content producers to jointly develop both technology and content to provide satellite-delivers, broadband, IP enhanced multimedia and interactive services over multiple platforms, including telephony, across the Asia Pacific region. Astro’s TV service, currently broadcasts 56 channels to more than 1.8 million subscribers, or some 34% of television homes. The Group now operates eight FM terrestrial radio stations in Malaysia, including the top-ranking stations for all the key Malay, Chinese, Indian and English vernacular demographics. These stations cumulatively reach more than 11 million listeners a week or 55% of all radio listeners, and command over 80% of the radio industry's advertising expenditure.

Mission It is our mission to create an organization that will exceed our customer's expectations in quality, on time delivery, problem solving, service and cost control. This will be achieved by continuously improving our process, our systems, and our services with the newest technological innovations available, as well as, a focused effort by our employees. We will dedicate our resources to our customers and we will re-invest our profits in our Business. We will make our best effort to promote from within and help our employees achieve their full potential through continuous education, training, and recognition of performance. We will share our success with our employees through the use of bonuses and other incentives in our overall scheme to empower our employees. We will utilize our best consultants, which are our customers, and our employees to further our mission, and help us make factual decisions that will maximize our opportunity for success. Our primary focus will be Heat Transfer Technologies, but we shall remain opportunists and consider other similar or related markets. We will be leaders in the development of new technology.

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Business Portfolio ASTRO’s objective is to maximize shareholder value by expanding its existing businesses and by investing and growing new opportunities in the media industry globally that offer sustainable revenue growth and the prospect of early cash flow generation. Astro has a 20-year exclusive license for satellite direct-to-home (DTH) transmission in Malaysia. The Group has set itself a number of key operational and financial targets. These are cascaded to the respective business units to ensure organizational focus and commitment to achieving its main objective. Performance against these targets is reviewed quarterly by the Board to ensure that the assets and resources of the Group are focused on maximizing long term value for shareholders. In addition to growth targets, we also closely monitor EBITDA margins and free cash generation as well as capital efficiency measures including return on the assets employed in our various activities. Proposed investments in new ventures are subject to robust scrutiny and similar strict investment returns criteria. Astro was incorporated in the United Kingdom and registered in England and Wales on 22 July 2003 under the United Kingdom Companies Act, 1985 and is registered as a foreign company in Malaysia under the Companies Act, 1965 of Malaysia. The Company listed on the Main Board of the Bursa Malaysia Securities Berhad ('BMSB') on 1 October 2003. The listed price is on the website with a delay of 180 seconds, the last price review, 29th June 29, 2006, was RM 4.52 closing for the day. The volume of outstanding shares is 12,221. Astro is the most profitable of the media groups and earns the highest volumes in terms of sales revenue and advertising expenditure, for all its activities, which stands at 80% of the industries total revenue for advertisements.

Our commitment to corporate responsibility extends to focus on our stakeholders: customers, colleagues, community, suppliers, environment and shareholders. We take pride in our proactive approach, and have embodied this in a Code of Business Ethics to guide us in our daily undertakings and actions. Astro has a 25% stake in a joint-venture with MAXIS Communications, an affiliate company and Malaysia’s leading mobile operator, to own 3G spectrum and provide 3G services

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PEST in Malaysia Political/Legal The political arena has a huge influence upon the regulation of businesses, and the spending power of consumers and other businesses. Decisions made by government affect our every day lives and can come in the form of policy or legislation. We can see that the political situation is stable in Malaysia. The Malaysia economy has benefited by the government being proactive and flexible in many of the sectors. In the multimedia and broadcasting arena however the government remains bureaucratic and many licenses, laws, regulations and unspoken expectations exist. Two of the most stunting to the growth of the industry are censorship and red tape. Malaysia ranks very low on the freedom of press index coming in at 122 (Mergent). Malaysia has many licenses and actions that promote monopoly and bad business conditions such as Made in Malaysia laws and exclusivity licenses have been practice in the past.

Economical All businesses are affected by economical factors both national and global. Interest rate policy and fiscal policy will have to be set accordingly. Whether an economy is in a boom, recession or recovery will also affect consumer confidence and behavior. Malaysia is a small and relatively open economy and there are several strong points that go a long way to ensure that Malaysia is a profitable and good place to set up a business, include the courtiers tenacity and ability to recovering from a very severe recession. This shows a proactive government that cares for the economic welfare of the nation meaning that investors are sure to get policies that will invest more in the country. The other important factor to note, is the high government spending, this may not be translated directly into sales for media groups but it affects the advertisement and consumption. The very low inflation and unemployment are two other factors that make Malaysia a good choice of a country to operate in. This means that the general populous has a higher more stable spending power and also more disposable income. This also indicates that Malaysia should have a higher standard of living and greater ability to spend on entertainment. Another advantage despite the slight dip in the economic growth rate that Malaysia has is a favorable prediction for growth in the economy. The last few years have seen growth percentages of about 6.6% per year. This means that companies should expect to have increasing sales in the future.

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Social The society is made up predominantly of a mixture of Chinese, Indian, and Malaysian people. Each of the different cultures has different religions meaning that there are various religions in Malaysia with the predominant one being Muslim. The percentage mix is 58% Malay, 32% Chinese with the remainder being largely Indian. The country used to have low literacy rate among women, however illiteracy is almost wiped out today. English is widely spoken, especially in business, and in urban areas. However, due to mainly political efforts to increase the usage of the national language over the past 10 years or so, many are realizing that the level of English competence, especially among business people is lacking, and not helping competitiveness with Singapore in particular. Currently a debate is being conducted through newspapers on the need to increase English language skills. After Singapore, Malaysia has possibly the best levels of English in the region. Bahasa Malaysia or more correctly "Bahasa Melayu" - literally "the language of the Malays", is the national language which all but a minority of Chinese whose families emphasize Mandarin/Cantonese and English, speak well. Illiteracy is almost eradicated with a strong lower to middle level education system. The different cultural pockets that exist within Malaysia create unique challenges for the entertainment industry. They need to strive to serve this fragmented market. Malaysians are very brand and ‘prestige’ conscious, and often base purchasing decisions on information from close associates and family. Special deals, free gifts, and discounts also have some measure of success in marketing.

Technological Changes in technology are changing the way business operates. The challenge these organization faces is to ensure that they can deliver on their promise. Those businesses, which are slow to react, will fall at the first few hurdles. This technological revolution means a faster exchange of information beneficial for businesses as they can react quickly to changes within their operating environment. Technology is vital for competitive advantage, and is a major driver of globalization. There is renewed interest by many governments to encourage investment in research and development and develop technology that will give their country the competitive edge. Malaysia has a variety of TV and radio stations and a good communication network. The 2020 vision is in place to enable Malaysia to attain standards similar to that of developed nations. This commitment to technological advancement comes at a time when several international companies have invested in South East Asia, one of the world’s fastest developing regions.

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Marketing Mix Analysis The 4 Ps are break down an organizations activities in a systematic logical way that enables us to better understand the purpose of the business. It is critical for a business to generate positive responses in the target market by blending each of the four Ps in an optimal manner. We shall begin the marketing mix analysis by looking at the 4Ps of Astro followed by a similar analysis of the marketing mix of Media Prima, spending time to briefly discuss the impact on the target market.

Astro Product; packaging, positioning and branding Astro offers DTH satellite programming to over 1,915,000 homes. Rather than focus on a single channel broadcast Astro has chosen to group two or three like channels together. The product line for Astro is both deep and long. For instance, National Geographic, Animal Planet and Discovery; which show documentaries, discoveries about nature, animals and different civilizations (still very traditional in their way of life) from around the world are packaged under the name learning. Then there are 7 mini packages which can be bundled into combinations allowing users to take 3-5 mini packages and 3 super packages.

Building your own choice of channels allows for greater

satisfaction through customization. This means the target market are more likely to get what they want leading to greater customer satisfaction and therefore continued subscription. The complete list of packages and a brief description of their content is as follows:Learning – documentary channels including Discovery, Animal Planet and National Geographic. Fun – children’s channels with both educational content and entertaining content both including movies, series and animated productions Variety – including movies, talk shows and series Sports – the top three sports channels which include live coverage. News – CNN, CNBS, Astro News, BBC Dynasty and Emperor – Chinese programming Movies – showing award winning block busters and epic mini series Astro Family – with the best vernacular drama and mini series, variety shows, documentaries and 16 radio stations. Astro Family is free and comes with each subscription. AstroLife is open to all Astro subscribers at no additional cost and gives viewers fun, action and excitement on and off the screen. All the major target groups, segmentation on the basis of language, are addressed in the combination of channels meaning that Malay, Indian, Chinese language are represented with Chinese receiving some of the widest variety of programming. Astro has, in the last year, dedicated more investment to local productions. Innovation is very important in the market as it promotes the

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development of local programming and content. Costs are high and the productions pale in comparison to Hollywood productions, however, in order not to alienate one of the key target groups, especially Malay, Astro needs to provide high quality and fresh content. Astro produces box movies, series, and animation and also has a budget for subtitling, and dubbing. Astro is a premium product that offers positions itself as such. The tag line “Making you life richer” gives a clear indication that emphasis is on diversity and quality. It positions itself to be a company that provides premium services. The branding includes the name Astro is written in each out door unit, dish, this has two unique advantages. One dishes are usually mounted on the roofs of buildings and two, this creates a platform for word of mouth advertising to take place as users ask the home owner where the dish is mounted about the product and service. The Astro subscription product has customer care which provides support, education on the use and services of Astro hardware as well as answers to frequently asked questions. It also provides billing and payment information. In the past year customer service deteriorated greatly brought about by complications caused by problematic new customer relationship management (CRM) software. The number of call drops was very high as the call center could not handle that volume of calls. There was also a (13.4%-9%)/9 = 48.8% increase in customer churn over the last reporting period indicates that the problem was too much for some customers to bear. Based on the 2006 subscription figure we can (1,915,000 * 13.4%) = 256,610 churned customers. This is incredibly high.

Price The product is a premium product and also a personal one as it is found within the viewer’s homes. The company’s positioning and pricing indicate this however, it tries to provide content and packages to meet the needs of the target market segments. In terms of pricing strategy, Astro enjoys abnormal profits with a 49% margin. With the current structure of the industry, it is a monopoly until very recently, it is expected that prices would be set very high to recover the cost of investment which is characteristic of a monopoly. There are two sources of revenue for Astro, advertisement and subscription. Subscriptions are not competitively priced as the company still operates in a monopolistic market structure and enjoys economies of scale, first-in the market advantage, greater coverage and has an established brand name. Advertisement revenue is greater than the revenue for FTA stations. This may be attributed to the company reaching a more specific target market with greater purchasing power, making advertisers more willing to place their advertisements on Pay TV. Pay TV will also have clear records of their viewers and can help advertisers profile these views and choose the most rewarding placement, that will attain high returns because efforts of advertisers is more specific to target market and can yield higher rewards.

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Promotion and Distribution The traditional distribution channels exist where the customers go to the company for set-up. Finding new successful channels of distribution is always a challenge however, the rewards of reaching the right target market is one of the most critical factors in a business. Astro has expanded its channel and activities beyond having traditional offices which means having customers come to it; it has taken the initiative to go to where customers are. One of its current marketing activities is in-store-marketing. This is in keeping with one of the more current marketing trends place promotion staff at malls and in major supermarkets. Astro has placed its services and products such as decoders; it makes use of promotion tables with point of sales material and provides subscribers an opportunity to pay their bills while they do their weekly shopping at Carrefour. For, the promotional activities the company outsourced to a marketing company that holds the license for in store promotion. The company has gone further to enhance this relationship by creating alliance. For instance one current advertising campaign pegged to the amount of money spent on groceries in Carrefour and get a free decoder and installation, the saving is RM 200. However the contract stipulates that the service cannot be canceled nor can a payment be skipped for the next 18 months. This locks the subscribers in creating high switching costs, because even if the service was to be cancelled this does not stop billing.

Promotion; Marketing Communication Programs The marketing communication mix is made up of five variables. Advertising is the most prominent one and the stations air short clips about programs aired, up coming shows and events and repeat the tag line. Astro has organized and sponsored F1 Concerts, Disney On Ice Shows, the Indian Film Festival, given away thousands of grand prizes and free tickets to sports, concerts and games. Sponsorships create means to reach audiences who are not tuned into the channel by branding the venue. Social responsibility can also take place in a way that generates good will; build brand image and reputation of the company which in the long run creates profit. Media Prima and Astro both sponsor events and give out scholarships. The build talent e.g., Astro Talent Quest attracts tens of thousands of entries every time! Free monthly movie tickets giveaways and tickets to international movie premieres are given out hot-off-the-press. And many Astro subscribers have been enjoying discounts and privileges for Astro sponsored events, shows and with retailers, restaurants, hotels and other lifestyle attractions.

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SWOT analysis SWOT analysis is an important tool to scan for the internal and external environment. SWOT is stands for strengths, weakness, opportunities and threats. This is an important part of the strategic planning process. The SWOT analysis provides information that is helpful in matching the firm's resources and capabilities to the competitive environment in which it operates. As such, it is instrumental in strategy formulation and selection. The internal factor and the external factors of Astro were identified and further explained as follows. Strengths for Astro: Astro is the Malaysia’s pioneer in the provision of cross-media interactive services. Astro also has approximately 100% market share of multi-channel subscription television. So it has a strong brand name and good reputation among the customers. On the other hand, Astro has reported continuing demand for its services. Group revenues rose 17% to RM2.013 million for the financial year ended 31 January 2006 while net attributable profit improved 57% to RM229 million, benefiting from lower taxes and reduced finance costs. The margin is incredibly high being 49% in the last quarter of 2005. Also diversity of channels (news, entertainments, sports and so on) and Customization of channel choices are other positive points of Astro. Continued demand for services in the last quarter of 2005 this was a growth rate of 17%. This has translated in to lower costs of provision in service of 0.08% due to economies of scale. Production in movies and animation have given rise to runaway hits such as Gansta, showing that despite stiff international competition award winning box office hits are a priority for this Media station. Weaknesses of Astro: Overall churn rate has increased over the years, with churn rate 13.4%. The main reason for this as previously reported by Astro, was unauthorized access to Astro transmission signals by cloned smart cards and set-top boxes. Also the economic base rate was changed in 2004. This gave a high base year effect. It was, therefore, no surprise that 2005 was extremely weak given the high base in 2004. Finally failure to keep continues subscription for some packages. Animation produced in the Philippines was below expectation output volumes; however there is a sizable collection with a variety of successful hits. Quality of customer care deteriorated drastically with a high percentage of abandoned calls as Astro was unable to handle the high volume of complaints. The customer relationship management a billing system is problematic in its implementation and use. Opportunity for Astro: Sun TV and Malaysia's Astro All Asia Network have entered into a $ 25 million agreement for the establishment of a joint venture to originate, aggregate and distribute television programming and

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channels for a global audience. Higher levels of local programming for Astro once Measat-3 is launched by end-06 should encourage viewers to subscribe and spend more time watching TV. Astro is expected to grow its small base of advertising revenue faster than the rest of the industry as it will be the primary broadcaster of the 2006 World Cup and 2008 Beijing Olympics.

Threat for Astro: The 20 year exclusive license to air Pay TV content, no longer hold and Astro finds itself fighting to maintain market share due to the entry of MiTV and Fine TV. They however had the first-in the market advantage.

SWOT Analysis of Astro Strengths

Weaknesses

- Diversity

- Failure to keep continues subscription for

- Customization of channel choices

some packages

- Largest media company in terms of revenue

- High customer churn 13.4%

and

- High cost of creating advertisements

profit

- Strong brand name

- quality of customer care declined drastically

- Pioneer with market leadership - 20 year exclusive DTH license - government backing - joint venture with Maxis, Malaysia’s leading network operator. - content provider with box office hits - entry into India and Indonesia Opportunities for both Astro and Prima

Threat for both Astro and Prima

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- Print media reduction profitability

- Market fragmentation

- Advertising increase by world cup and Beijing

- Viewers are less loyal to programs, meaning

2008

more fragmentation

- Loosening of regulations

- Limited television offerings

- huge untapped market of youngsters with

-

high spending power and strong traditional

disproportionately high

Cost

of

TV

advertisement

production

values

Analyzing market segmentation Market segmentation and accurate targeting is essential for business success. Segmentation is the process of dividing the market into potential customers. Targeting is the marketing technique that aims at group of customers with specific characteristics. Malaysia is unique in that it has a very dominant pay TV provider which has more than 24% share of television audience. The most comprehensive summary of the television industry segmentation in Malaysia is provided in a report by CIMB.

Figure 3: Pay-TV stations in Malaysia TV Typ Langua Stations e ges Brief Description - Astro Ria Pay- Malay Locally produced Malay language programming. TV - Astro Pay- Malay Various Asian films. Prima TV - Astro Pay- Indian Entertainment for the ethnic-Indian community. Vaanavil TV - Wah Lai Pay- Chinese Entertainment for the ethnic-Chinese community. Toi, etc. TV (b) Foreign Pay- Various Includes HBO, Discovery, National Geographic, AXN, Phoenix (HK), channels TV Nickelodeon, Star World, ESPN, CNN, BBC and Al-Jazeera. Source: Companies, CIMB Research

The Malaysian market is multi-cultural, multi-ethnic and multilingual. In order to serve the market well the TV companies have created various offers. Astro has 34% industry penetration. House hold penetration by ethnic group in 2005 is as follows: Malay 23.5%, Chinese 48.4%, Indian 55.5% and others 10.1%. The customer churn was expected to drop to 8% however independent report, show that is has risen to 10%. The group with the highest churn is Chinese followed by Malay, then Indian and finally others. Others are

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disproportionately high considering they are only 10% of viewers but in the first quarter of 2006 they make up 6.9% of the customers who discontinued their service. Retaining competitiveness and market share is possible only through making use of marketing intelligence. Customer satisfaction indexes are surveys carried out several times a year among other things it tries to gauge customer satisfaction for the various services provided by the multimedia industry. However recent information is lacking indicating that this tool is not actively used.

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Porter’s Five Forces – TV Industry Analysis The state of competition in an industry depends on five basic competitive forces i.e. entry, threat of substitution, bargaining power of buyers, bargaining power of suppliers, and rivalry among current competitors. (Porter, 1980) Understanding the dynamics of competitors within an industry is critical for several reasons. First, it can help to assess the potential opportunities for your venture, particularly important if you are entering this industry as a new player. It can also be a critical step to better differentiate you from others that offer similar products and services. However, as companies operate in a dynamic environment, porter’s model can also be used to try and figure out what areas of the industry can be improved to make it more profitable. The objective of this analysis

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is to investigate how Astro need to form its strategy in order to develop opportunities and protect itself against competition and other threats. ASTRO is one of the foremost and established brands pay-TV industry in Malaysian market. In the other hand media Prima is a free TV service in Malaysia and is the main competitor of ASTRO in this industry. Since these two organizations have so much in common we are not going to repeat the common parts and just mention the differences when it was necessary. Threat of New Entrants – Medium. This is no surprise, in the capital-intensive TV industry the biggest barrier-to-entry is access to finance. To cover high fixed costs, serious contenders typically require a lot of cash. When capital markets are generous, the threat of competitive entrants escalates. When financing opportunities are less readily available, the pace of entry slows. Meanwhile, ownership of a TV license can represent a huge barrier to entry. However investors shy away from Malaysia due to lack of freedom of press. Licensing is the most major barrier to entry in this industry. Astro had exclusive license for 20 years however two new players have entered the field. Power of Suppliers In order to operate and run a TV station you need both hardware (transmitters, satellite, studios, and other properties) and content. For instance Taiwanese commercial television companies produce quality game shows, social and global debates, and television drama series in Mandarin. These programs are popular in Asian countries such as Malaysia. The role of content providers (film-making companies, TV producers, advertisement producers, application providers, content providers, hardware providers) is the creation of TV programs and contents subsequently broadcast by the TV channels. Within this segment we can find companies focused on the creation of content (film-making companies) and companies integrated originally with the TV channels. The critical success factors of content producers in order to acquire a strong bargaining power of the TV channels are as follows: size, attractiveness of the offered product, technological leadership. The suppliers are fragmented which makes the supplier power low. Besides media prima has its own production of content in all languages. Due to diversity of Astro, needs more content than prima. When people pay for something they expect higher quality. So Astro needs more programs and buys more programs from US, china, and India along with the home made programs. And they try to maintain the high quality and brand new programs with a dominance of English language. On the contrary Media Prima usually broadcasts second hand or outdated American movies and series and most of its programs are home made mostly in Malay, Chinese, or Indian languages. Both ASTRO and Prima have their own

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content producer and event management sectors but it seems that international content proves more popular. Powers of Buyers Usually TV stations provide two kind of products; TV programs and advertising time, which both will increase with the better popularity of the stations. Since there is no monetary transaction between viewers and the TV in the case of Media Prima and every Malaysian household can receive the signals for free. The buyer power is high as the switching cost does not exist; it is simply a click of a button. Chances are that viewers will end up watching one of the other Prima stations keeping the audience with the conglomerate. On the other hand the power of buyers in the case of Astro is relatively high and they try to force down the prices and demand for higher quality. Buyers can switch to other pay TV operators or Prima TV. To combat this power Astro tries to offer them basically the same products (TV channels) at various prices under various packages and promotions. The diversity ensures that ASTRO captures a wide range of client’s middle income to high level income. But in the case of advertising air buyers it’s a little bit complicated. First of all the main problem is the advertisements are shifting towards other rivals (e.g. print media, radio, internet, billboards, etc.) and the share of TV industry is shrinking year by year. As in this case the bargaining power of advertisers is relatively high for both Astro and Media Prima. Availability of Substitutes For analyzing the availability and threat of substitutes we should take a focused look at the entertainment industry which people can spend their time and money on them instead of TV. Since both Astro and Prima are in the same industry the Substitute analysis is the same for both of them. Among the main substitutes you can name Cinema, theater, books, newspapers, magazines, internet, sports and other established forms of media. Unfortunately the number of substitutes for TV industry is very much but surprisingly the threat is not so high. Due to nature of TV, its availability and the low cost of watching TV most of the time TV users prefer to stay home and watch TV. The reason of sticking to TV might be the high cost of other activities, the availability of TV, laziness, or less time consuming. Competitive Rivalry There is a fierce competition among the Malaysian TV operators and it seems that the competition is not going to become softer in the future. Only three big groups of TV channels– Media Prima, Astro and RTM- have the biggest market share in Malaysia and other competitors are trying to increase their share and reach to the big players of the market, among them we can mention MiTV and Fine TV.

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Threat of entrants (Low) Viewers (high)

Threat of substitutes (Medium) Cinema, theater, print media, sports Clubbing, internet

Buyer’s power

Industry competitors (Low) Media Prima MiTV RTM Fine TV

Advertisers (high)

Gov. licensing Huge capital Brand name

Supplier power (High) Specialized Equipment Broadcasting rights (high)

Figure 6- Porter five forces completive analysis for ASTRO

Analysis of marketing program The Malaysian TV industry trends run opposite to the trends of the Asian TV media. Specifically the growth rate in revenue of print versus TV is exactly the opposite.

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Television has a very low revenue share. Media Prima and Astro should find a way to boost this. The broadcasting TV and Cable TV market is expected to grow in value steadily for the next few years. This means more revenue and can only be done through the implementation of better service practices and innovation in the content of the service provided.

Fig 9: Broadcasting forecast

Customer Analysis of Astro The consumer purchase decision making and a secondary survey to understand who is buying here are the results represented in graphical form. We shall base our recommendations of the marketing programs towards the end of the paper.

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Demographics The profile of the people surveyed for this questionnaire showed that majority were male, aged between 26-35 (see appendix). Most of the users in this bracket would be in the lifecycle phase of having a young family. It also supports the general stereo type that males are more likely to spend on entertainment and technology. how did you know about satellite first time? experimental 0.08% source public source commercia source

public source 37%

personal source 0%

experimental source

32%

commercia source personal source

31% 10%

20%

30%

40%

Fig 10 : Source of initial information Commercial sources are the most important sources meaning that personal selling and promotions can be very rewarding in terms of returns to the company. The criteria for selecting satellite indicate that the quality of programs followed by the price is two key determinants for consumers that get satellite. what are your criteria for selecting satellite? choosing many programs

19%

others sensor ship categorization services

15%

quality of programs availability

37% 0.08%

price

29% 0%

5%

10%

15%

20%

25%

30%

35%

price

availability

quality of programs

services others

categorization choosing many programs

sensor ship

40%

Fig 11: Criteria of Selection The buying roles in families varies and it is necessary for Astro to understand how it may influence the buyer behavior and reach the target market in a way that would yield rewards for the company in the form of closed sales.

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who is the initiator in your family? 30% 25%

26%

23%

20%

23%

16%

15%

12%

Series1

10% 5% 0% Series1

father

mother children

23%

16%

friend

myself

23%

12%

26%

Fig 12: Initiator role in the family who is the major influencer in your family for buying satellite?

12% 0.05% 0.05%

brother

17%

father mother

19%

children

10%

friend myself

12%

husband

21%

marketing compaign

Fig 13: Influencer role in the family who makes the decision to purchase the satellite? 90% 80% 70% 60% 50% 40% 30% 20% 10% 0%

85%

15% 0.08% father

mother

children

0.08% friend

0.08% myself

Fig 14: Decision Maker role in the family There are several other figures and more data that was collected please see appendix

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Appendix 1:

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Appendix 2 Questioner 1-How old are you? 15-25

26-35

36-45

other

2- Gender? F M 3-why do you need satellite TV? (You can choose more than one) Entertainment

news

knowledge

stock market

4-how did you know about satellite firs time? a) b) c) d)

Personal source( family, friends, neighbors, acquaintances) Commercial sources ( advertising, dealers, displays) Public sources (mass media, consumer rating organizations) Experimental sources ( examining, using the satellite)

5-what are your criteria for selecting satellite? Price

availability

Categorization

quality of programs sensor ship

services

others

6-rate the following criteria from 1-5 based on your preferences? Price

quality of programs

Repetition of programs

services Variety of channels

7-who is the initiator (how needs satellite TV) in your family? Father

mother

children

friend and relatives

8- Who is the major influencer in your family for buying satellite? Father

mother

children

friend and relatives 22

9-who are the frequent users of satellite TV in your household? Father

mother

children

friend and relatives

10-who makes the decision to purchase the satellite? Father

mother

children

friend and relatives

11-How long will it take for you to (answer with hour, day, week, month...) a) Feel a need for satellite TV………….. b) Gather information about satellite TV………….. c) To evaluate other alternatives…………….. d) Purchase ………….

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References: Bibliography Kotler, Philip, Swee Hoon Ang, Siew Meng Leong and Chin Tiong Tan (2003), Marketing Management, An Asian Perspective, 3rd edition, Singapore, Prentice Hall. Kotler, Philip, (1999) How to Create Win and Dominate Markets, The Free Press, New York, MALAYSIAN BUSINESS MAGAZINE,

MAY16TH - 31ST, 2006

Web references The Asia-Pacific Media Sectors: A Company and Industry Analysis (March 2005) http://webreports.mergent.com (June 2006) Astro website : http://www.astro.com.my/v5/ (June 2006) Astro All Asia Website http://www.astroplc.com/05/ (June 2006) Media Prima website http://mediaprima.com.my/ (June 2006) Malaysian Communication and Multimedia Commission(MCMC) website http://www.cmc.gov.my/ (June 2006) Fine TV website http://www.finetv.com.my (June 2006)

MiTV website http://www.mitv.com.my/portal/index.asp (June 2006)

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