Infiniti

Infiniti G20 Positioning Executive Summary The performance of Nissan’s latest addition to its luxury car brand Infiniti, the G20, has not met management’s expectations. The goal of this report is to identify the target segment and look at how to reposition the G20 to better meet the desires of that segment. The G20 has been facing somewhat of an uphill battle since its introduction. Not only was Nissan late to the game with the luxury Infiniti brand but G20 sales have likely been harmed by the poor reception of the Q45, released earlier. Compounding this, the current advertising strategy has not been well understood by the general public, leading to confusion and a lack of awareness of the G20’s features.

Analysis While Infiniti has broken its consumers down into three distinct segments, it is not clear that they have made a concerted effort to particularly target one of them. There are a set of defining feature in each segment that directly affect the possible effectiveness of advertising directed toward that group.

Segment One For segment one, this defining feature is that they place the G20 right in the middle, and well behind the BMW 318i, on their rank of preferences. The G20 does worse with this segment than some non-luxury vehicles, despite this segments aspiration for German luxury (they rank BMW 318i as first), which is something Infiniti claims to offer. This suggests that this segment is not worth pursuing when there are more friendly segments to look into, especially when it is taken into account that that segment one is the smallest of the three segments.

Segment Two Segment two is the largest segment and has the second highest income. This segment also ranks Infiniti as a very close third. Importantly segment two also engages in activities that provide the opportunity to advertise, such as watching television or reading magazines, opportunities to push Infinity up their list of preferences. In addition to this, their lower income when compared to segment one may make them more willing to compromise from their most desired and more expensive Audi 90 to the more affordable but still respectable G20. Overall segment two is a good segment to advertise to.

Segment Three Segment three is the second largest segment. The defining feature of this segment is that Infiniti is tied for their top preference against the Saab 900. Although this segment, on average, has the lowest salary, it would be unwise to ignore the people who like the G20 the most. Especially since the G20 is intended to be Infiniti’s entry level car. In addition to this, although they do not watch as much TV as segment two, they are still reachable through their high readership of magazines. Overall segment three is also a good segment to advertise toward.

Positioning To further explore what options Infiniti has in regard to the positioning of the G20 a positioning map was created that located the G20 as well as competing products along a chart of the perceptions of consumers. A two-dimensional map was used as a third dimension did not capture significantly more variance.

The initial map showing the G20’s perception among those polled is actually fairly positive, with similar perceptions to the BMW 318i. That people like the car when they learn about it suggests that the poor sales have mostly been a communication issue caused by the perplexing advertisements used to this point. That said there is some room for improvement.

With its current perceptions the G20 is predicted to take a 12.21% market share. This and all following evaluations are made using the share of choices parameter, as this seems more realistic. People likely compromise every day, cars are not an exception. Looking at the original map the G20 falls between the BMW318i and the Honda Prelude. This is initially positive as Infiniti’s goal is to offer German luxury in a Japanese car. Trying to expand off this good direction this report’s analysis suggests that the G20 can in fact reach beyond a 14% market share.

This can be accomplished by changing the priorities of the current marketing plan and moving to a more communicative strategy that touts build quality and makes the G20 seem like a rare and successful car. The largest factors affecting the market share were not features of the G20, but perceptions that it is poorly built or unreliable. Infiniti needs attacked this perception head on if they want to achieve a 14% market share for the G20. Perhaps sponsored reviews in magazines would be a good place to start for this.

The “interesting” advertisements Infiniti has been using to this point are shown to be even further off the mark in this analysis, with people actually having a higher preference for uninteresting cars. At first this may seem to be in conflict with the preference that is shown for unusual cars, but these are actually two different things. An unusual car can be uninteresting, but still be rare. This feeds into a greater perception that people want nice things and unique things, but still want to go unnoticed. It is the same reason the home owner down the street guts and renovates their entire house, and then paints it all white. They want the best and to be unique, but not to make a statement. Moving towards more traditional luxury car advertisements may be helpful for increasing the market share of the Infiniti.

The preference analysis also suggests that Infiniti should push the sportiness of the G20 less and instead focus on the perception of comfort and roominess. While many people may like a sporty car, those with the budget to purchase an entry level luxury sedan could get more power from the more traditional sports cars that will be in their price range. Advertising the G20 as sporty will actively hurt its image as comfortable, since suspension and steering will be harsher in a sporty car. This is an anathema to luxury and comfort.

The data also suggests that Infiniti would do well to position the G20 as a good value.

They could perhaps promote the features you get that are like those of a BMW but at a lower cost. This idea that the Infiniti line up is a good value is key to following Lexus’ break out in the American market. It is a delicate line to walk though. Infiniti doesn’t want to seem like a bargain brand knock off, but like the real thing that’s on sale for a limited time.

Justification of Assumptions and Limitations of Analysis What is probably the largest of the assumptions made in this analysis is that market share in the entry level luxury car market is well molded by share of preferences. While it may be reasonable to expect that at the highest levels of the luxury car market first choice may be a better model, at this level outside constraints are probably still very important and people will be forced to compromise.

In addition, this report assumed that all of the G20’s possible competitors were included in the data collection. This is likely not true, especially considering the obvious omission of a Mercedes-Benz vehicle. This is a limitation as the predicted market share may not accurately reflect the real world where people have more choices.

This report also assumes that the data collected on preference and perception is accurate and reasonably reflects the greater population that is in the market for a car in this price range. If this data is inaccurate or contains unknown errors, the outcome of this report will be flawed.

Conclusion While Nissan has been struggling to move its latest addition to its luxury brand, Infiniti, this report maps a way forward toward greater success. By targeting segment two and three Nissan will have a more concentrated group to focus on. By changing how, what and where they advertise, Nissan will be able to move the perceptions toward a point where there is more market share. It is important to note here that just because a feature might be considered good, it does not necessarily give more market share when it does not match the rest of the package, or isn’t something the target wants, such as the sportiness issue mentioned earlier.

One of the most important things Nissan can do is to make clearer advertisements for its Infinity brand. People's overall perception of the G20 is positive, but if the ads don’t clearly communicate the features, people won’t realize that it could be the car for them.

Original Perceptions

New Perceptions