Marketing and Communication

This report proposes a communication plan for Metro Bank to enhance its personal banking service by 5% by February 2019 through targeting university students in South East London. It includes the description of the target audience, promotional mix theory, proposed promotion, chosen channel, key communication message, AIDA marketing theory, and feedback collection. The report is relevant to marketing and communication courses in universities.

Running head: MARKETING AND COMMUNICATION
Marketing and Communication
Name of the Student:
Name of the University:
Author Note:

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Table of Contents
1. Introduction............................................................................................................................2
2. Description of Target Audience.............................................................................................2
3. Explanation of Promotional Mix Theory...............................................................................2
4. Proposed Promotion for Metro bank for Achieving New Objective.....................................3
5. Chosen Channel Used and Justification.................................................................................3
6. Explanation of the Key Communication Message.................................................................4
7. AIDA Marketing Theory:......................................................................................................4
8. Collection of the Feedback....................................................................................................5

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1. Introduction
Communications plan represents a navigation tool that helps in defining the company
goals and the means undertaken for achieving them (Killian and McManus 2015). The
method adopted in communication planning helps the company in getting an idea about their
target audience. This kind of a plan clearly and succinctly put across messages about the
firm’s doings, the benchmarks and the evaluation process. The report aims at putting forward
a proposed communication plan for Metro Bank that will help in enhancing its personal
banking service by five percent by the February 2019 through targeting the university
students in South East London.
2. Description of Target Audience
The target audience of the Metro Bank represents the university students of South
East London approximately between the age group of 20 to 35 years (Vukotic et al 2015).
Students do not always remain in a position in paying for education. It is in these scenarios
where the education loan put forward by the bank holds an importance. Thus, they approach
different banks in acquiring the required loan amount for complementing their education.
3. Explanation of Promotional Mix Theory
The promotional mix theory refers to the combination of different components of the
promotional mix having due weight age (Moller 2013). This includes:
1. Advertising: Adoption of this mode of promotion will help in creating association
patterns for the Metro Bank that will have an emotional face that will act as an influence on
the purchasing behaviour.

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2. Sales promotion: Adoption of this promotional means will help in persuading
potential customers in opting for the service offered by the bank through non-media and
media communications. This method however gives a short-term boost to the sales.
5. Personal Selling: By adopting this method of promotion, Metro Bank is able to sell
product or service through face-to-face meeting with clients.
4. Proposed Promotion for Metro bank for Achieving New Objective
The proposed promotion method for Metro Bank to achieve the new objectives would
be advertising (metrobankonline.co.uk 2018).
Advantages include:
 Market expansion and increase in sales
 Easily introduces a new product into the market
 Enables a company to fight competition, enhance good skill and educates the
customers
 Ensures elimination of intermediaries and ensures portraying the quality of the
products
Disadvantages include:
 Advertising can sometime lead to undermining of social value thereby leading
to confusion for the buyers
 Increases the cost
 Advertising can sometimes encourage sale of inferior products
 Advertisements sometimes contain contents which has real bad taste

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5. Chosen Channel Used and Justification
The chosen channel for Metro Bank would be advertising on print medium like ‘The
Sun’ and on the popular social media platforms (Moriarty et al. 2014). This will help the
company in easily persuading and informing the clients and would be cost effective.
Advertisement will help the company in generating secure leads from the mediators and
convince readers to identify the outlets for enjoying the required service. The process of
advertising also leads to substantial stress on the mediators for creating options for the service
that helps in drawing the customer interest. Advertising also trains the salespersons regarding
service application and usage.
6. Explanation of the Key Communication Message
The communication message that Metro Bank wants to put across includes the plan of
the company to grow by five percent by the year 2019 through targeting the students of
University of South East London (Aaker and Biel 2013). The purpose of this message is to
inform and persuade its clients. The bank through its various advertisement mediums have
also put across the message that there is no prior appointment required for opening account
and the bank ensures quick and easy switching between existing accounts. In addition, the
bank also tries to portray that it has a 24X7 app for accessing and managing money with their
stores remaining open for close to 362 days in year.
7. AIDA Marketing Theory:
Attention: The logo of the Metro Bank in bright red color is sufficient for attracting
the attentions of its clients. The bank also adds a personal touch to all its advertisements for
grabbing customer attention.

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Interest: To retain the attentions of the customers the bank put forward the services
offered and how easily people can open an account with even worrying to fix an appointment
Desire: The bank through the mention of 24X7 and 362 days service helps in
developing favourable of the consumers towards the products offered.
Action: The client indulges in a purchase decision and engages opting for the service
offered by the bank.
8. Collection of the Feedback
To ensure effectiveness of the proposed promotion, the feedback of the customers is
collected via either the contact forms or emails from the customers. Email puts forward an
effective medium for collection of feedback from the customers. Metro Bank should
effectively respond to the customer feedback through creation of organized system of
feedback.

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References:
Aaker, D.A. and Biel, A.L., 2013. Brand equity & advertising: advertising's role in building
strong brands. Psychology Press.
Killian, G. and McManus, K., 2015. A marketing communications approach for the digital
era: Managerial guidelines for social media integration. Business Horizons, 58(5), pp.539-
549.
metrobankonline.co.uk (2018). [online] Available at: https://www.metrobankonline.co.uk/
[Accessed 25 Apr. 2018].
Möller, K., 2013. Theory map of business marketing: Relationships and networks
perspectives. Industrial Marketing Management, 42(3), pp.324-335.
Moriarty, S., Mitchell, N.D., Wells, W.D., Crawford, R., Brennan, L. and Spence-Stone, R.,
2014. Advertising: Principles and practice. Pearson Australia.
Vukotic, S., Anicic, J., Zakic, N. and Petrovic, Z., 2015. The role of marketing and brand in
banking. Journal of Process Management. New Technologies, 3(4), pp.76-83.