Abstract
Recently, prices of commodities, especially the nonferrous metals, fluctuate wildly,
while those industries are going through the process of global integration. Limited by the
geographic distribution, China’s copper production cannot meet the demand of its economy
development. China’s demand to copper resources soars since 1980s, and till 2012, its total
copper consumption reached 7.68 million tons, became the top one in world copper
consumption. China’s strong demand also pushes up the international price of nonferrous
metals.
Company F, as one of the largest companies in copper industrial, wishes to expand its
Africa-produced copper cathode business on Chinese market, due to the continuously
development of Chinese economy and sluggish recovery of global economy. The thesis
takes the copper cathode, one of the most popularly traded commodities and industrial
products, as subject, use marketing strategy theory, especially the industrial product
marketing strategy as guideline, studied on its strategy and implantation scheme on
Chinese market.
By studying the marketing strategy of the Copper Cathode of Company F’s Africa
smelter on Chinese market, the thesis analyzed the internal and external environment
through PEST model, Five Force model, and SWOT model, found the weakness and
threats of Company F, such as not setting the brand tactics, entering China market late;
short in customer accumulation, no business entity, substitution threats, etc. In the
meantime, the analysis also found out the strengths and opportunities of Company F, such
as cost advantage, technology advantage, good brand image in copper industry, etc.
Based on above analysis, the thesis positioned domestic copper fabricators as target
market, and carried out related marketing strategies and implementation scheme: to design
the copper cathode based on customer preference, and setup direct communication
platform with end-users; to apply the pricing method, which is more suitable to Chinese
market; to promote product brand and company image on China market; and to apply with
different distribution channels in different period.
As commodities, there is similarity of the marketing strategy of copper cathodes. The
analysis and research results in this thesis provide the reference for industrial insiders,
especially for overseas copper producers entering Chinese market. In addition, the copper
cathode discussed in this thesis is produced in Africa. There’re many researches on the
exploration, development, and investment of copper mines in Africa, but few of which are
about the marketing strategy of African copper cathodes in other countries, like China. This
thesis makes up this shortage.
Meanwhile, the thesis forecasts the distribution development trend, to which oversea
copper producers would apply after their entering China market, and provides the
information for copper cathode import agents, and points out their development area in the
future.
Keywords: Marketing Strategy; Distribution Channel; Industrial Products; China Market;
Africa-produced Copper Cathode