An airline company I was very familiar with growing up called Cebu Pacific Airlines has upped their marketing strategy 8 years ago by strategically using the 4 P’s to the extent that captures the majority of the Philippine population.
They been extremely low key in the past, know as a third or fourth choice for an airline. But because of the recession and natural disasters, Filipinos are even poorer and will find the cheapest transportation despite the conditions. They capitalized on these events and focused on a whole new target market and decided to sell to the poor giving away promotions for very cheap (as low as $7 for domestic and $25 for international Asian flights) or sometimes free flights but charging excessively for other things such as baggage, food, special seat arrangements and the like. Although their initial target was lower income Filipinos, their pricing strategy created a waterfall effect and got the middle class, the rich and even the extremely affluent to book flights with them. This was because while all the other airlines were increasing their prices, Cebu Pacific cared less about making sure their customers felt like kings, focusing on things like efficiency and convenience. They positioned themselves as a very relaxed and fun company that did not care much about luxury and this was reflected in their flights. Their airplanes are small and crowded. They are not very clean, but the experience is a unique one. Experience a flight that offers live song and dance safety procedure announcement performances from flight attendants (10million views on Youtube), trendy music, games, basketball and other fun and quirky gimmicks, which made flights not only more bearable but hilarious to witness. They reached out to more travel agencies and hotels, and advertized more often in newspaper which propelled them even further. They were very succesful and quickly grew into the number 1 airline in the country. But this did not sustain them as gimmicks and promotions die and now their sales and stock price are starting to decrease. This shows that although a strategy could put you at the top, but if you can’t sustain it, it will die down.