Repositioning brand image for yamaha sirius RC f1 a case study for yamaha vietnam

TRƯỜNG ĐẠI HỌC MỞ TP.HỒ CHÍ MINH
HO CHI MINH OPEN UNIVERSITY

UNIVERSITÉ LIBRE DE BRUXELLS
SOLVAY BRUSSELS SCHOOL
ECONOMICS & MANAGEMENT

MMA7
HUỲNH NGUYỄN VĨNH KHOA

Repositioning Brand image for
Yamaha Sirius RC FI
A CASE STUDY FOR YAMAHA VIETNAM
MASTER PROJECT
MASTER OF MARKETING AND ADVERTISING

December 25, 2013


Guarantee
I guarantee this is the study that I had made myself. The databases and the conclusion in
my study are faithful. I will be responsible for this study.
Student Signature

Huynh Nguyen Vinh Khoa

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Acknowledgement
I would like to express my sincere attitude to the following people without those

help, support and encouragement; the successful completion of project would not have
been possible. I want to thank Mr. Nhut – my tutor guide, for helping me and clarifying
my issues as when they arose.
I am highly indebted to all my classmates and my friends who were a part of my
survey, helped me in my endeavor and spurred me to achieve something worthwhile and
enduring. This project is successful by all your cooperation. I take no credit for this
achievement but take the responsibility of any mistakes and inaccuracies.
Sincerely,

Huynh Nguyen Vinh Khoa

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Abstract
Doing business in emerging market gives motorbike producers many difficulties in their
business. To sustain and develop in increasingly competitive marketplaces, Yamaha
consistently try to meet the need of customers and sell more their products. Positioning
the image of product in customer mind is one of the effective solution to attract customer
to buy company’s products.
The aim of this paper is to investigate the antecedent and consequence of brand image to
customer in motorbike industry in order to gain an optimal level of brand positioning for
Sirius RC FI. There are 3 purposes of this study. First, we explore the significance of the
three constructs including: product quality, brand concept in Customer’s mind and how to
send brand concept to Customer’s mind based on existing literatures. In addition, their
relationship would be verified through empirical data. Finally, each element will be
experimented in case study to understand the level of their impact on one other.
To achieve that goal, questionnaire survey is used to clarify the research questions. The
targeted interviewees are 50 current Yamaha customers who were randomly chosen in
Yamaha heads and Yamaha users via motorbike forums in Vietnam. In the questionnaire,

customer’s perceptions about the Sirius image based on some significant characteristics
including performance, design and durability are observed, how to get into Customer’s
mind. Quantitative data has been adopted under presentation of descriptive, bivariate and
regression analysis.
Finally, some conclusions have been drawn:
-

Product quality significantly effects on customer satisfaction which also
considerably and positively effect on customer loyalty.
Design, price and services are the important factors to influence customer’s
buying intention.
Changing Sirius RC FI concept from “Are you stylish ?“ to “Show your style”
to get more attraction from customer to Sirius RC FI

The influence of the Brand image of Sirius RC FI and Yamaha services on customer
satisfaction is stronger and more positive than that of customer satisfaction on customer
loyalty. This means that choosing right brand positioning is a better way to attract
customer buying intention.

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Table of Content
I. INTRODUCTION
1.1 Project Background
1.2 Overview of motorbike industry in Vietnam
1.3 Project objectives
1.4 Research questions
1.5 Structure of the thesis
II. LITERATURE REVIEW

2.1 Product quality
2.1.1 Definition of quality
2.1.2 Definition of perceived quality
2.1.3 Measuring product quality
2.2 Brand Concept in Customer’s mind
2.2.1 Definition of Brand concept
2.2.2 Definition of brand position
III. RESEARCH DESIGN & METHODOLOGY
3.1 Research design
3.1.1 Research approach
3.1.2 Conceptual framework
3.1.3 Hypothesis
3.2 Operationalization of variables
3.2.1

Product quality

3.2.2 Brand concept in Customer’s mind
3.3 Pilot survey
3.4 Sampling and Data Collection

IV. SITUATION ANALYSIS

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4.1 PEST Environment Analysis
4.2 Yamaha Motor Vietnam Analysis
4.3 Market and Target Customer Analysis
4.4 Competition Analysis

V. SWOT ANALYSIS
VI. MARKETING OBJECTIVE
VII. MARKETING PLAN
VIII. MARKETING PLAN STRATEGY
REFERENCES
APPENDIX: Questionaires

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I. Introduction
1.1 Project Background:
In the contemporary world, when developed countries are becoming saturated with new
investment, there is tendency of intensifying business investments into developing
economies due to the great opportunity it might bring. Doing business in such emerging
markets (EMs) is actually challenging but promising.
London & Hart (2004) asserted that winning a market of four billion people in the
developing world would be a tremendous success for MNEs. Meanwhile, Prahalad &
Hammond (2002) mentioned that most entrepreneurs and customers in EMs are poorly
served by low quality-vendors. Therefore, it would be promising that MNEs could win
this market by offering better product quality.
On the other hand, investing in emerging markets raised controversial discourses among
scholars. De Soto (2000) argued that it is costly and complicated for entrepreneurs to
enter the formal economy of the EMs. It is seen that the legal systems of those markets
are still unstable and need to be adjusted by time-consuming processes.
In short, regardless of disadvantages that EM might bring, there is still an optimistic way
for MNEs to seek customers in those markets due to its abovementioned advantages.
Peng (2001) concluded “emerging economies are likely to become the new battleground
for international business”.
Among many industries, motorcycle industry in emerging markets is considered as a

fruitful area for investment. Vietnam is classified as a Big Emerging Market that has 3
main characteristics. Firstly, the market entry is low and population is large. There is a
high possibility of long-term growth if motorcycle makers enter the market early. Market
penetration ratio, which is calculated by dividing the total country population by the
number of passenger vehicles in operation. However, there is high risk of failure due to
many factors, such as unstable legal framework and low customer spending power.
Hence, investing in such markets requires a proper business strategy and marketing
strategy. Doing business in emerging market gives motor-bike makers many difficulties
in their business. In order to develop in the marketplace, they try to develop multi-types
of product to meet customer’s needs.
The current motorcycle market in Vietnam is developing with high competition among
various manufacturers which have a lot of marketing strategies to attract target customers
such as Honda, SYM, Piaggo, SH, Dylan, etc. Honda is believed to hold 65 percent of the
market share, followed by Yamaha with 25 percent, while the remaining 10 percent
belong to Suzuki, SYM and Piaggio. Regarding the coverage, Honda now has 640
authorized dealers HEAD across the country, while Yamaha 540, SYM 310, Suzuki 120
and Piaggio 90. Yamaha made a lot of effort to expand the product which ensure the
quality as well as reasonable price. Yamaha motor Vietnam have provided a range of
products which currently stands in different stage in the product life cycle (PLC).

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In the motorcycle with gear segment, Yamaha Sirius RC FI and Luvias GTX FI are the
main strategic products of Yamaha in electronic fuel injection technology in 2013. Sirius
version accounted 28% in Yamaha revenue, and also 25% in motorcycle market share in
Vietnam. To continue of this successful, Yamaha launched Sirius RC FI and Luvias GTX
version to Vietnam market in 2013. However, Sirius RC FI with the new save energy
technology and the slogan “Are you stylish? “ was failure and could not meet the sale
expectation compared to previous Sirius version. This put Yamaha has to make decision

to repositioning Sirius RC FI image to target customers to increase sale target.
The aim of this paper is to investigate the appropriate way of positioning Sirius RC FI in
customer’s mind and increase the recognition of customers to Yamaha services quality.
1.2 Overview of motorbike industry in Vietnam:

Prior to 1990s, most of motorcycles in Vietnam were imported and the market was small.
But this was changed due to the entering of foreign firms which had begun investing in
Vietnam after 1990s. Recognizing the market potential, Suzuki, Honda and Yamaha
which are Japanese firms have a strong presence in the Vietnam market. Vietnam market
becomes a fierce competition between Japanese, Taiwanese and Chinese motorcycle
manufacturers. In contrast, the increasing motorcycle usage such as pollution is a price to
pay.

Vietnam motorcycle market, the fourth largest in the world, has shown signs of
saturation, with annual output having exceed demand, prompting producers in the
Southeast Asian country to speed up their exports to other markets.
In Vietnam, motorbikes are the most popular mean of transportation which has a
population of 90 million people and 37 million registered motorbike, according to the
Ministry of Transport.
Table 1: Manufacturers of current motorbikes [Source: W&S Company Limited]
Frequency
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Percent


Total
Honda
Yamaha
SYM

Suzuki
Piaggio
Kawasaki
Kymco
Lifan
Sufat
Others

5,255
3,578
1,256
300
219
129
40
23
19
11
34

100%
68,1%
23,9%
5,7%
4,2%
2,5%
0.8%
0.4%
0.4%
0.2%

0.6%

Table 2: Plan to purchase motorcycles within 1 years [Matrix SA] [Source: W&S
Company Limited]

Total
No intention
Don’t know
Have intention

Individual
Frequency Percent
6,344
100%
2,500
39.4%
882
13.9%
2,963
46.7%

Family
Frequency Percent
6,344
100%
1,408
22.2%
1,656
26.1%
3,280

51.7%

With motorbike sales totaling 3.1 million units in 2012, Vietnam is the fourth largest
motorbike market by sales, after China, India and Indonesia. In recent years, Vietnam is
emerged as a key manufacturing base for major motorbike manufacturers such as Honda,
Yamaha, Suzuki, and Piaggio. But motorbike sales in Vietnam have started to decline
largely due to a slowdown in the country’s economic growth. In 2011, motorbike sales
were down 6.6% compared to 2010, marking the first decline since 2000, according to
the Vietnam Auto, Motorcycle and Bicycle Association.
To survive, several motorbike manufacturers are trying to export their products to the
other markets. Honda Vietnam, Yamaha, SYM, Suzuki and Piaggio – the five largest
motorbike manufacturers in the country were expected to raise their annual capacity to a
total of 5.5 million units by the end of 2013, up from the 4 million units in 2012. And this
means these motorbike producers will have to put more focus on the international market.
Many producers have already started to export their products to other Asian markets. The
export value of transport vehicles, mostly motorcycle, produced in Vietnam rose 32.2%
last year to $4.6 billion, accounting for 4% of Vietnam’s total export revenue.

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Source: Asean Automotive Federation
However, this doesn’t mean that the motorcycle manufacturers won’t focus on domestic
market, the strategy they need to do right now is to find a way to increase the need of
customer’s motorcycle buying. The country’s two largest motorbike manufacturers,
Honda and Yamaha, which account for over 90 percent of the local market share, may
experience another bad year in 2014.
According to a source close to these firms, Yamaha sales may drop by 10 percent to
750,000 this year, while Honda expects to hit around 1.5 million to 1.9 million this year.
The drop in sales in Vietnam came despite a number of promotion programmes and

discounts, including offers to pay registration fees. According to motorbike companies,
their factories in Vietnam produce 5 million vehicles per year, but only 3-3.5 million of
them are sold in the domestic market. Many have plans in place to export already
assembled motorbikes to foreign markets, according to Saigontimes Newspaper. Sales of
automatic motorbikes saw a better year, which accounted for 40% of vehicle sales during
the year. And even though sales on the whole were down, producers have been making
long-term business plans, including developing new models.
Although it has been estimated that the Vietnamese market will reach a saturation point
when it reaches production levels of around 4.5 million a year, companies still see
potential here.
Motorcycle production in February 2012 was recorded as 66,400 units. Compared with
the 57,967 units total recorded for the same month of the previous year, this is an increase
of 8,433 units or 14.5%, and production increase on the same month of the previous year
for three consecutive months.

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Figure1: Business Management Performance between Honda and Yamaha [ Source:
Yamaha Motor ]
The figure above show that Honda has business performance higher compared to
Yamaha, but Yamaha sales is stable than Honda, this lead to the potential for Yamaha to
develop.

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Figure 2: North sales result of Yamaha 2013
The figure 2 show that Sirius RC FI account for only 10% compared to Sirius RC (old
version) and its rival Wave RSX. Although, Wave RSX has the sign of falling down, but

Sirius RC (old version) increase significantly. That why Yamaha make a question about
the brand concept of Sirius RC FI now is appropriate or not?
1.3 Project objectives
This thesis has two main objectives related to brand image of product on customer’s mind
and increasing product sales. First, the study explores the significance of each construct
based on existing literatures. In addition, their relationship would be verified through
empirical data. Furthermore, we could measure the level of impact of each element on
one another and to which direction it is in the case study. The final goal is to find out the
appropriate brand concept to convey to customer’s mind to gain higher customer’s
buying intention.
The objectives of this paper can be specified as follows:
1. To find out the appropriate brand concept to convey to customer’s mind
2. To encourage customers to buy product and use Yamaha services.
1.4 Research questions
According to research objective above, the following research question would be
developed as follow:
1. Does customers know about the Sirius RC FI concept?
2. Which characteristic of product do customers concern the most?
3. Beside the product, which factors customers concern to gain buying intention?
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1.5 Structure of the Thesis
The thesis is divided into of 10 separate chapters in a constructive arrangement. It starts
with the introduction chapter of what the project is about, the project background, the
industry overview and the project objectives and structure of the thesis followed by the
research questions.
The second chapter is to review all the related literature on which the author based to
produce hypothesis and argument
The next chapter is research design and methodology providing reader with the idea of

how this thesis is made to get what it aims to. Data analysis would summarize some
techniques used in this project which are descriptive analysis, factor analysis, reliability
testing.
Chapter IV would be situation analysis which analyzed all the collected data from the
questionnaire provides the result of relationship investigation between the constructs.
Chapter V is the SWOT analysis of product quality and product image to customer’s
mind. This will be the premise for the next chapter VI to clarify marketing objective.
Then, it will carry out the marketing plan in chapter VII and marketing strategy in
Chapter VIII.
Chapter IX is the financial analysis. And the conclusion will be summarized all the key
finding of research as well as limitations, contribution to managerial context and its
limitation that needs to be improved.

II. LITERATURE REVIEW
2.1 Product quality
2.1.1 Definition of quality
Quality is the key to success in building customer value and satisfaction. Kotler (1994)
observes that even the best marketing department in the world cannot sell products
which are either low quality or do not meet customer’s need. Quality has been described
as “the single most important force leading to economic growth of companies in
international markets” (Reeves and Bednar et al, 1994). Quality is crucial to any business
organisation. The lesson of successful Japanese firms has been studied by many analysts,
in which product quality have been found as the key element for their strategic
ingredient. (Jacobson & Aaker et al, 1987).
Definition about product quality could be found in an early research by Juran (1974)
which defined quality as “fitness for use”, the extent to which a product successfully
serves the purpose of the user. This definition emphasized quality as a function of a
product.
On the other hand, many scholars thought it impossible to define quality as it is
considered synonymous with innate excellence which cannot be analysed but only

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recognized through experience. (Ophuis & Van Trijp, 1995). Similarly, Montgomery
(1996) defined: “Quality is the extent to which products meets the requirements of people
who uses them”. This definition explained the quality under customer’s perspective;
quality can be seen by comparing the customer’s perception about it with their
requirement of the product.
As can be inferred from these definitions, there are subsequently two different
approaches to quality: firm-based and customer-based quality, which is also known as
subjective and objective quality. Several researchers (Garvin 1984; Holbrook and
Cortman 1985, Parasuraman, Zeithaml, and Berry 1985, Dodds and Monroe 1984) have
emphasized the difference between objective and perceived quality.
Regarding to objective quality (e.g. firm-based quality), this term is used to describe the
actual technical superiority or excellence of the products (Hjorth-Anderson 1984; Monroe
and Krishnan 1985). Moreover, it is measurable and verifiable on some predetermined
ideal standard or standards (Zeithaml, 1988). Although there may be some concerns
about what the ideal standard is, the belief that quality can be measured on the
basis of several technical measurements forms the core of this approach. Some
standards has been presented includes: Shewhart's Economic Control of Quality of
Manufactured Product, Juran's Quality Control Handbook (1974), using of process
control charts and statistical sampling, Total Quality Management (TQM), and tactics,
such as quality circles.
In short, objective quality is quality that can be measured, standardized and widely
accepted by majority, which is called “firm – driven objective quality” (Main 1994) or
“producer defined quality”.
Conversely, researchers and experts in general cannot come to an agreement of what the
ideal standards for quality should be (Zeithaml, 1988) because quality is perceived only
by customers. “Only customer who can judge quality, all other judgements are essentially
irrelevant” (Gronroos (1990) and Zeithaml (1990). Reeves and Bednar (1994) believed

that such global definition for quality does not exist, rather, different definitions of
quality is appropriate under different circumstances Therefore, we need the other quality
definition approach which is perceived quality.
2.1.2 Definition of perceived quality
In contrast to objective quality, perceived quality is defined as the consumer’s perception
about the overall superiority or excellence of the product or service with respect to its
intended purpose, relative to alternatives (Aaker, 1991). This perspective is similar to
user-based definition of quality by Garvin (1984). Under the customer’s perspective, a
qualified product should meet or exceed customer’s expectation and make them satisfied.
Therefore, quality would differ by individual and depend on the user’s perception.
Zeithaml (1988) claimed that companies must learn how consumers perceive and
evaluate it instead of relying on firm-driven objective measures of quality to understand
market-driven quality.

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Besides, customer plays a key role in quality, particularly in service sector according to
Gronroos (1990) and Parasuraman et al (1985). In view of that, quality definition was
governed by the extent to which a service met the expectations of customers since they
believed that only customers judge quality, whereas all other judgments are essentially
irrelevant (Zeithaml et al., 1990). This point of view is strengthened by Gronroos (1990)
by saying that "It should always be remembered that what counts is quality as it is
perceived by the customers" and Buzzell & Gale (1987) by “Quality is whatever the
customers say it is, and the quality of a particular product or service is whatever the
customer perceives it”.
Nonetheless, service scholars were not the only supporters of a customer-orientation
quality. The profit impact of market strategy (PIMS) program database, which is
primarily composed of manufacturing firms, also uses this quality approach (Bednar and
Reeves, 1994).

In conclusion, to evaluate and measure accurately the quality of product, we should better
in favour of customer perception about the product, which also means perceived quality.
2.1.3 Measuring product quality
Many studies have been conducted regarding to the quality’s measurement methodology.
While we can find numerous topic of service quality, the same for product quality seems
to be less.
Different definitions about quality provide different ways to measure it. However,
according to Reeves and Bednar (1994), even though our product is a manufacturedproduct which focus mainly on “conformance to specifications”, we can still apply the
same measurement as service product of how strong the product meet or exceed
customer’s expectations for it. The most popular model of measuring service quality is
introduced by Parasuraman, Zeithaml and Berry in 1985, in which they determined
quality of service as comparison between customer expectation and perceptions of
performance based on twenty two specific dimensions.
There are three related literatures that the author found about this topic. Whereas Garvin
(1987) proposed eight dimensions of quality: (1) performance, (2) features, (3) reliability,
(4) conformance, (5) durability, (6) serviceability, (7) aesthetics, and (8) image, Hayes
(1998) measures it by only three dimensions: (1) interior quality, (2) instrumentation and
(3) drivability. Recently, Brucks, Zeithaml and Naylor (2000) represented 6 dimensions
to measure quality of durable goods (including automobile vehicle).

Table 3: Automobile product quality dimensions by Zeithaml (2000)
Dimension

Zeithaml (2000)’s meaning

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Ease of use

Involves the consumer's ability to start and operate the product as well as
clarity of instrumentation and instructions.

Versatility

Involves the number and complexity of the characteristics that distinguish the
model or brand from a stripped-down model, the characteristics that enable
the product to perform more functions or allow the consumer more flexibility
in using the product.

Durability

Involves the length of time the product lasts and works properly and how well
the product holds up under adverse conditions, such as weather, heavy, or
misuse.

Serviceability

Involves the consumer's ease of obtaining repair service (i.e., access to
service centres and/or se of self-service), the responsiveness of service
personal and the reliability of service (i.e., whether the service is performed
right the first time).

Performance

Refers to how well the product does what it is supposed to do.
For automobile product, high quality involves power safety, and comfort. To
achieve high performance quality, a product must perform well and it must do
so consistently. This consistency can be referred to as reliability or
dependability.

Prestige

Involves how well the product communicates priority to the purchaser and
relevant social groups of the purchaser. Prestige involves some visible
inherent characteristics of the product, such as appearance, but also includes a
less tangible social component that is reflected the product or brand's image.
The social component of prestige can be understood as fulfilling a symbolic
need.
Source: Brucks, Zeithaml and Naylor (2000)

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2.2 Brand Concept in Customer’s mind
2.2.1 Definition of Brand concept
Brand concepts are defined as unique, abstract meanings associated with brands. This
arises from a particular combination of attributes, benefits, and the marketing efforts used
to translate these benefits into high-order concepts. Although brand concepts reflect both
tangible (i.e., what the brand actually does) and intangible (i.e., the way people think
about the brand abstractly) aspects of the brand, over the years, both practitioners and
academics have grown to realize that establishing abstract brand concepts on the basis of
motivational and emotional meanings induces more favorable consumer responses than
focusing on superior functional attributes. This explains the increasing prevalence of
abstract brand concepts imbued with human-like values, goals, and emotions through
processes such as anthropomorphization (e.g., California Raisins), personification (e.g.,
Jolly Green Giant), or user imagery (e.g., the Mountain Dew “dudes”).
For multinational companies (MNCs), one of the biggest challenges lies in carefully
managing these abstract brand concepts across different cultures. This implies that global
brands need to convey abstract concepts that not only are consistent across borders but

also resonate with consumers of different cultures. Consistency in brand concepts across
borders allows MNCs to lower marketing costs and more easily manage advertising and
promotions across countries. However, MNCs also need to localize advertising and
promotion by incorporating concepts and ideas that align with local cultural value
priorities. The expectation is that a “cultural matching” between the abstract brand
concepts and consumers’ value priorities will facilitate brand penetration in the local
markets. However, because considerable variation exists in value priorities across
cultures, several issues arise.
2.2.2 Definition of brand position
It prefers to “target customer’s “reason to buy your brand in preference to others. It is
ensures that all brand activity has a common aim; is guided, directed and delivered by the
brand’s benefits/reasons to buy; and it focusses at all points of contact with the consumer.
So, to do brand positioning, you should make sure that answer all those questions below:








Is it unique/distinctive vs competitors?
Is it significant and encouraging to the niche market?
Is it appropriate to all major geographic markets and businesses?
Is the proposition validated with unique, appropriate and original products?
Is it sustainable – can it be delivered constantly across all points of contact with
the customer?
Is it helpful for organization to achieve its financial goals?
Is it able to support and boost up the organization?
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III. RESEACH DESIGN & METHODOLOGY
3.1 Research design
3.1.1 Research approach
Deductive research is employed for this research because it is based on comparing relevant
existing literature review with empirical observation, therefore we could draw logical
conclusions from findings (Collis and Hussey, 2009). This is testing hypothesis, which is also
adopted in this study.
According to Saunders et al (2003), the best approach to use for a study depends on the purpose
of the study and the research questions. Both methods refer to the way researcher chooses to treat
and analyses the data. In qualitative research, the aim is to get better understanding of the subject
being studied, hence conducted by gaining large amount of data from different research
documents. Whereas quantitative method is more structured, reliable and objective since it uses
number to transform into information so that we could easily gather, collect and statistically
analyzed data. This study adopted quantitative method by means of appropriate techniques
including structured questionnaires, statistical analysis.
3.1.2 Conceptual framework
According to the two aforementioned hypothesizes, a research framework was developed to
explore the impact of product quality on customer satisfaction. The result should be able to
verify if high level of quality can lead to high level of customer satisfaction and subsequently
resulting in enhancing customer loyalty. Furthermore, the level of quality can illustrate the brand
image to customer’s mind. The conceptual framework of this paper is described below. Each cell
indicates the construct and arrows present casual relation between two different constructs.

3.1.3 Hypothesis
Based on the literature review presented in earlier chapter, there are two hypotheses in this
research. They are listed below as:
- Hypothesis 1: Product quality has a positive influence on customer satisfaction
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- Hypothesis 2: Customer satisfaction has a positive influence on customer loyalty
- Hypothesis 3: Brand image gives better recognition about product knowledge and product
involvement. Then, this lead to purchase intention of customers.
3.2 Operationalization of variables
The following section describe the operationalization of variables based on the constructs’
definition used in related literature. Upon 3 hypothesis’s, there are 4 different quantifiable
variables which are product quality, customer satisfaction and customer loyalty, brand image
recognition. The author would base on related literature to adopt items for measuring each
variable. All variables would be measured by coding it in a seven-point Likert-scale ranging
from 1 to 7 point, equivalent from “extremely agree” to “extremely disagree” in each of question
to define the degree of agreement form interviewee.
3.2.1 Product quality
The logic of designing this questionnaire is to begin with choosing dimensions first, then
choosing items and finally wording it in a meaningful way.
The dimension of product quality in this research is primarily based on Brucks, Zeithaml and
Naylor (2000) which includes main six dimensions equivalent to more than ten items for each.
However, we cannot cover all these dimensions in the questionnaire due to its limited length.
Therefore, the most influential one affecting to overall quality were chosen., thus three
dimensions to be selected are performance, durability and design.
 Cubic centimeters
 Chain size
 Micron
 Oil capacity
 PSI (pounds per square inch)
 Tire size
3.2.2 Brand concept in Customer’s mind
3.3 Pilot survey
In order to measure the reliability and validity, the questionnaire needs to be pretested through a

pilot study with a non-probability sampling – judgement sampling. This survey is conducted by
inviting five respondents including three current customers and two company staffs who have
good knowledge about the product and its customer. This pilot carried out under personal
interviews. After receiving comments from respondents, the author have revised and developed
the questionnaire to increase the accuracy of the survey. Some overlap questions were removed;
others were added and edited to increase the validity of the final result.
3.4 Sampling and Data Collection
Population is the universe of units which consist of all the characteristics that the researcher
requires. It is impossible to investigating all the population if it is too large. Hence, to save the
18


expense, time and inconvenience, sampling is essential for researcher by reducing the number to
a manageable size to select a representative sample (Collis & Roger Hussey, 1997).
There are two types of sampling: probability and non-probability. While with probability, every
unit has a known chance of being selected from the population by using a random selection, nonprobability allows some units has more chance to be selected than others.
For this study, population is all current customers of investigated motorbike models with all
types of age, gender, place of living, occupation and so on. Hence, it is necessary to select
sample from the population based on these standards, which means non-probability should be
adopted as some units are more likely to be targeted.
Quota sampling, one of 3 types in non-probability sampling, is a technique in which participants
are selected according to pre-specified quotas that are thought to have major impacts on findings
of the study. Hence, quota of different types of people to question is given to interviewers (Shiu,
Hair, Bush and Ortinau, 2009).

IV. SITUATION ANALYSIST
4.1 PEST Environment Analysis
Not known for modern conveniences, Vietnam has a very inconvenient transportation system,
Motorcycles are currently playing a big role in road transportation in the Vietnamese society.
Motorcycle is used as a personal mean of transport due to its convenience and mobility as the

public transport is still underdeveloped, affordability as the Vietnamese’s current living standard
is still low to afford automobile and suitability with the current condition of road transportation
in the country.
4.2 Yamaha Motor Vietnam Analysis
Yamaha Motor Vietnam Co., Ltd. is a joint venture of Yamaha Motor (Japan), Hong Leong
Industries Berhad (Malaysia), Vietnam Forest Corporation and Co Do Mechanical Factory
(Vietnam), was founded in 1998 to focus in manufacturing of motorcycles and accessories. In
2007, Yamaha with strong market demand coupled with aggressive service campaigns and brand
promotions, had managed to expand unit sales by 42.7 percent to 500,000 units. With regard to
production capacities, Yamaha planned to expand total production capacity in the five ASEAN
countries (Thailand, Vietnam, Malaysia, Philippines and Indonesia) to 4.7 million units during
the period of 2008 to 2010.Yamaha, the second largest motorcycle manufacturers in Vietnam
after Honda Vietnam had planned to built capacity to 700,000 units annually with the operation
of its second plant by 2010 (Yamaha Motor Co., Ltd. Annual Report).
In 2013, Yamaha has launched two new products as Sirius RC FI and Luvias GTX FI. The
concept for Sirius RC FI is “Are you stylish?”, but this concept actually was not accepted by the
customer because of its design not as well as the old version of Sirius RC.
4.3 Market and Target Customer Analysis
Sirius RC FI target customer is:

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Figure 3: Customer Profile [ Source Yamaha ]
As you can see the figure above, on the left is the Sirius RC FI target customer when its first
launching in the beginning of 2013, and it was not successful. On the right, this is my
repositioning target customer for Sirius RC FI with a little change:
Target customer should be:












Male, age from 20 – 35
60% single
Living area: town, 2nd city, mountain
Occupation: farmer/Freelancer/Worker/Officer
Hobbies: Internet & Social network, sport, hang-out & Travel, like watching TV, etc.
Characteristic: Young & dynamic
Economic
Family oriented
Usage: go to work, travel/shopping/ family usage
Customer benefits: fuel consumption/Economic, strong & powerful engine, convenience
storage (helmet )


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4.4 Competition Analysis

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As you can see on two mind map segment above, the two main competitors of Sirius RC
FI are Wave RSX and Sirius RC (old version)

The current concept of Sirius RC FI now is “Are you stylist?” compared to “Reach your
top” of Honda Wave RSX and “Street performer” of Sirius RC is not strong enough.
Although Yamaha indicated that Sirius RC FI inherited the design concept from Sirius
RC, but in actually Sirius RC FI design is not really strong, it looks like Taurus - the
lower level product of Yamaha. This means Yamaha want to position Sirius FI in the
higher level, however their design does not meet that requirement.
Compare to its rival product, Honda Wave RSX:
Honda Wave RSX

Sirius RC FI

Stregth
. Wide trunk, long body,
well design, stable when
operation, powerful light,
multi-color
. Wide trunk, Fuel injection
technology, reasonable
price, strong engine system

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Weakness
Expensive price, engine
system not strong
compared to Sirius RC or
RC FI

. Design not well, noise
when starting engine, when
driving at high speed will
have the feeling that your
motorbike is flying


Services comparison between Yamaha and Honda, this is based on the interview with
random customer using Honda or Yamaha services




Honda
Have a lot of Head in many cities
Price for spare elements is higher
Services to customer is good





Yamaha
Have fewer Head compared to
Honda
Price for spare elements or repair
is cheaper
Services also good enough

V. SWOT ANAYLYSIS

VI. MARKETING PLAN



Increase sales for a younger demographic
Create a different way to express the younger way of living



VII. MARKETING PLAN STRATEGY
Marketing to young males in the rural
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

o Young, dynamic
o Lower income
o Interest in product
o Want to show the way of living
Differentiate Yamaha motorbike Sirius RC FI from Honda Wave RSX and Sirius RC by
stressing rural background of target customer and connecting their branch of service with
Yamaha motorcycles

In brief, the brand image I want to position Yamaha Sirius RC FI is:

From the way of showing your individual stylist

To the way you

express your stylist to
your family, your
friends and your life

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