DB Schenker Marketing Mix (4Ps) Strategy

Marketing Mix of DB Schenker analyses the brand/company which covers 4Ps (Product, Price, Place,
Promotion) and explains the DB Schenker marketing strategy. The article elaborates the pricing, advertising &
distribution strategies used by the company.
Let us start the DB Schenker Marketing Mix:

Product:
DB Schenker is one of the most prominent logistics services and railroad network operators in Germany. The
main service of this company as a part of its marketing mix is the logistic service i.e. basically product delivery.
Individuals, as well as enterprises all across the globe, utilize their services to send their gifts, documents, and
products to respective places. DB Schenker offer a range of products and services and their portfolio of service
can be broadly classified as:
• Land Transport
• Air Freight
• Ocean Freight
• Contract Logistics
• Lead Logistics
• Special Projects like Smart Box

Price:
DB Schenker has a variable pricing for the different kind of service that it offers. Pricing is something that is
strategizing by the company based on the product size, place and urgency of the delivery. They also keep an eye
on the competitors while deciding its pricing across the geographies.

Place:
Beginning in Germany, DB Schenker y operates in the European market predominantly where it exercises its
competency on the rail division. Globally it operates in more than 20 countries. Its operations are spread across
the entire Germany, mostly through rail networks. Being centrally located in Europe, DB Schenker also plays a
pivotal role in the logistics service in Europe.

Promotion:
DB Schenker promotes itself by tie-ups with several agencies and via sponsorships and commercials. Currently,
it has increased its digital presence and hence promotes through social media platforms. It also posts videos of its
highly automated service to attract its prospective customers.

Since this is a service marketing brand, here are the other three Ps to make it the 7Ps marketing mix of DB
Schenker.

People:
DB Schenker is spread across more than 2000 regions around the globe and connects in excess of 72,000
representatives worldwide to give dependable and quick support of its customers. It additionally draws in its
representatives in different preparation programs to develop the required soft skills and technical expertise to be
at the top of the game as far as logistics are concerned.

Process:
 DB Schenker implements state of the art technology and processes to implement their logistic services. They use
automated vehicles to bring goods to man to handle around 40,000 order lines a day. It also provides storage
space enough to keep the proper storage and delivery of a huge amount of cargo. With the current era of
automation in place, DB Schenker are implementing it to its fullest to ensure safe and efficient logistics service
across the globe. This has increased their staff productivity by almost 60% and decreased their storage footprint
by almost 20%.

Physical Evidence:
DB Schenker is recognizable with its logo of DB in red. The logo can be found in its warehouses, trucks,
packaging materials and other delivery mediums as well. Apart from these, it tries to maintain its presence
through its business cards, brochures, and even websites. However, its biggest physical presence are its trains,
containers etc. Hence this concludes the marketing mix of DB Schenker.
About DB Schenker:
DB Schenker is a division of German rail operator Deutsche Bahn AG that provides logistic services. It
comprises a logistic division that provides air, land and sea freight as well as has a rail division made of
European rail freight companies. From 2007 onwards, they have succeeded in positioning themselves as one of
the global logistics service providers with a strong foundation in the rail division. DB Schenker’s services ensure
seamless transfer of goods and ensure that the supply chain remains lean as well as optimized.

DB Schenker SWOT Analysis, Competitors & USP

SWOT Analysis of DB Schenker with USP, Competition, STP (Segmentation, Targeting, Positioning) -
Marketing Analysis
Go to:

 Strengths
 Weaknesses
 Opportunities
 Threats

DB Schenker

Parent Company Deutsche Bahn

Land transport, global air and ocean freight, sophisticated logistics solutions and
Category global supply chain

Sector Transport and Logistics

Tagline/ Slogan Automotive Powerhouse; Delivering solutions

To provide seamless, one-stop shop logistics solutions covering front-end and

USP back-end services

DB Schenker STP
Segment Businesses with transportation requirement

Target Group Automotive, aeroparts, consumer, high-tech and fashion & retail industries

Positioning Global logistics expertise with a strong rail foundation

DB Schenker SWOT Analysis

Below is the Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities & Threats (SWOT) Analysis

of DB Schenker. Strengths are:
1. It has done marketing campaigns in around 20 countries
2. It has decided to set up its first global Solution Competence Center outside of
Europe i.e. in Singapore which will be the base camp for numerous supply chain
experts to engage with customers
3. It was recognized as the best sea freight forwarder in India and the number
two in air freight
Strengths 4. More than 95,000 employees worldwide in over 130 countries

Here are the weaknesses of DB Schenker :

1.There is a big difference between the logistics, per se in Europe or the western
world and Asia, hence difficult adaptation
Weaknesses 2. Strong competition and liberalization of the railway market in Germany

Following are the Opportunities of DB Schenker :

1.It can go for local companies because local companies still do logistics,
warehousing and transportation by themselves
2.It can also focus on Bangladesh who is the second largest producer of textiles
after China, it has 4 million people in the textile industry
Opportunities 3.Engineering services

The threats of DB Schenker are as mentioned :

1.There are lots of problems in terms of documentation and customs
2.Infrastructure improvement is still a challenge
Threats 3. Competition from various international and domestic players

DB Schenker Competition

Below are the 3 main DB Schenker competitors :

1. DHL
2.Panalpina
Competitors 3. Kuehne & Nagel International AG

The brand guide table above concludes the DB Schenker SWOT analysis along with its marketing and brand
parameters. Similar analysis has also been done for the competitors of the company belonging to the same
category, sector or industry.
Schenker of Canada Limited: Marketing and Social Media for Logistics

DB Schenker supports industry and trade in the global exchange of goods: in land transport,
worldwide air and ocean freight, contract logistics and supply chain management.1 Globally they
employ over 66,000 employees at over 2000 locations. Their Canadian operations account for
over 1600 employees at over 40 locations. Roughly 3 years ago, DB Schenker started to utilize
social media as part of their marketing strategy.

Social media marketing refers to the process of gaining traffic or attention through social media
sites.2 DB Schenker is using Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, LinkedIn, and their blog, in order to
drive traffic and engage their customers.

“We have found that Twitter and our blog drive the most traffic. Since we are a B2B company, we
found that the biggest traffic drivers are industry updates. For example, what is happening with
airfreight, regulation changes, port strikes, Customs Canada updates and so on.” says Fabiana
Varela, Manager, Marketing and Communications.

Organizations looking for a competitive edge can use social media monitoring and analytics tools
to find, sort and analyze that data. Among other potential benefits, social media analytics offers
businesses the ability to identify patterns in customer sentiment and gauge their marketing
effectiveness.3 DB Schenker uses Google Analytics to monitor their blog. Realizing the
importance of staying relevant and up to date, they hired a third party company to monitor and
write the content for each of their platforms.

“Social media is a full time job. Our marketing team provides all of the content for our social media
posts, however we use a third party to write and monitor the sites.” says Fabiana Varela.

Social media binds together communities that once were geographically isolated, greatly
increasing the pace and intensity of collaboration. 4 DB Schenker in Canada was transporting the
Tyrannosaurus Rex named “Sue”. The exhibit “A T.Rex Named Sue” created a lot of traffic for the
various museums and in an attempt to connect with today’s crowdculture savvy customer, DB
Schenker posted about “Sue’s” journey. Unfortunately, this campaign was not as successful for
them as they had hoped, however their blog post does provide a great read!

Knowing who your audience is and what information they are looking for will help to engage your
customer base. Social media and content marketing have a symbiotic relationship. They work
together to enhance the content creation process and expand distribution, both on social media as
well as online and offline.5

DB Schenker is not only an industry leader for logistics, but they are paving the way for the
logistics industry and social media initiatives.
 DB Schenker
Industry: Contract Logistics
Headquarters: Essen, Germany
Other Locations: Canada || United States || Puerto Rico

Supply Chain Transformation

Overview
DB Schenker Logistics is one of the world’s largest providers of freight forwarding and logistics
services. They are part of the DB Schenker global network with over 2,000 locations on all major
continents in 130 countries. Their supply chain services integrate and manage the entire global value
chain between suppliers, manufacturers, brand owners and customers.

Business Challenge
DB Schenker wanted to offer WMS solutions with a faster time-to-market. Their ambitious plan
included rapid rollouts in a complex global landscape of several hundred warehouses spanning
multiple regions. To meet their business objectives, they needed a low-cost system that included
standard WMS solutions for small and simple processes to enable quick on-boarding. The system also
needed the flexibility to support multiple verticals, value-added services and scalability. They also
required support for multiple languages across countries.

Softeon Solution
DB Schenker chose Softeon WMS Cloud as a highly cost-effective solution and an ideal platform for a
variety of warehouse and logistics requirements. The WMS was deployed on a private cloud
infrastructure managed by DB Schenker. The flexible configuration of Softeon WMS provided DB
Schenker with the template-driven solution they needed for rapid on-boarding. The underlying
component technology accommodates the variety of industries they serve and add-on services they
provide. In addition, the solution supported their global needs for multiple languages across countries
with localization features in their day-to-day operations including handling unit, units of measure,
currency, date formats, etc.

Results
The WMS is currently used in EMEA and North America. An on-demand WMS solution gives regional
branches the ability to scale and lowers their IT costs.

 Increased market responsiveness

 Ability to quickly onboard new 3PL customers

 Reduced client on-boarding time with flexible configuration wizard

 Increased warehouse and logistics efficiencies

 Support for multiple languages with minimal training

“With the launch of this IT service, a WMS implementation has less time-to-market than the procurement of a
scanner. For small and
mid-size businesses with basic requirements, we are now able to configure the WMS in days to match our
customer’s requirements.”
-Michael Brandes, Senior VP Logistics Engineering, Corporate Contract Logistics, DB Schenker Logistics