Role of Marketing Functions and Comparison of Marketing Mix: Avon vs L'Oréal

This article discusses the role of marketing functions and compares the marketing mix of Avon and L'Oréal to achieve business objectives. It also highlights the responsibilities of marketing related to other organizational departments.

MARKETING ESSENTIALS
1

TABLE OF CONTENTS
INTRODUCTION...........................................................................................................................3
LO 1.................................................................................................................................................3
P1 The role of marketing functions ............................................................................................3
P2 Roles and responsibilities of marketing related with other organizational ............................5
LO2..................................................................................................................................................7
P3 Compare the ways in which different organisations apply the marketing mix to the
marketing planning process to achieve business objectives........................................................7
P4 Produce and evaluate a basic marketing plan for an organisation........................................13
CONCLUSION..............................................................................................................................16
REFERENCES..............................................................................................................................17
2

INTRODUCTION
Aspect of marketing is to promote the business products by satisfying the needs of
customers. Marketing mix is the combination of factors that a company control in order to
influence its consumers to purchase the product. This concept include factors such as Place,
Promotion, People, Product, Price, Physical Evidence and Process that help the company to push
its article in the market. Avon is a leading brand which was established in the year 1886. It
offers make-up items for face, nails, eyes etc. The brand ever since it's foundation gained
tremendous amount of attention due to its products and is remarkable trust attained amongst its
users. Recently it is planning to market its new products Forever young (RAJESH, 2016).
Report will explain responsibilities of marketing function. It will highlight relationship
between marketing and other functional units. Furthermore, marketing mix elements of Avon
will be compare will Lo real. At last report will prepare marketing plan for the product forever
young.
LO 1
P1 The role of marketing functions
Role of marketing are explained as below:
Gathering and analysing market information -
Marketing function has responsibility to conduct market research, this helps in gaining
necessary information about consumers and their needs. Avon focuses on withdrawing
information from the market like the current requirement of the targeted consumers, required
quality and quantity, setting up of pricing policies considering the available substitute product in
the market analysing techniques are used to withdraw the following information. Considering
these factors Avon is currently focusing on herbal products in the rural sectors and the product
promoting is done in social gatherings by advertising their articles to local committees. Several
campaigning events are organized in their locality to promote the product and to gain
information about consumers and market conditions (Lovelock and Patterson, 2015). These help
them control or enforce the activities such as production, marketing, advertising, etc. according
to market conditions and maintain a healthy competition in the market.
Marketing Planning
Marketing plays the role of planner, it makes suitable plan through which product can be
launched in market and can gain attention of potential buyers. They are planning their market at
3

focused places like Avon - Forever Young hair colour gained tremendous amount of attention in
North Zone so they focused on market penetration sales in that particular area and then following
remaining zones for market expansion so Forever Young is focused on using their energy at the
right place and right market. They also motivated on take overs in certain areas over their local
brand to promote and generate sales for them (Kerin and Hartley, 2015).
Designing and development of product -
Forever Young focused on quality of the products mostly rather than any other factor as the
other things doesn't matter much to its consumers as the company refuses to compromise on the
quality and promise to deliver the best of its product compared to the ones available in the
market. Avon products are designed in attractive packages and the containers are eco friendly as
well so they create a good impression on the users and provides a USP to the marketing team for
the sale or promotion of the product (Shaw, 2016). the function of marketer in this stage is to
develop a attractive product design as according to the needs and wants of the customers.
Grading and Standardizing -
The brand tend to focus on the grading of their cosmetic products to differentiate them from
one another in terms of shape, size, quality, etc. as well as maintaining a specific quality in order
to maintain the standards of the company as well as it's products. This practice helped Avon-
Forever Young to organize their product in well defined manner and segmented their articles by
its unique abilities. Marketing department supposed to ensure the grading system and also ensure
the systematic way of promotional activities.
Packaging and Labelling -
Avon consider packaging and labelling as the pillars of it's marketing factor for Forever
Young. As many times a customer's first perception of the product without consuming depends
upon its design and looks. Forever Young prefer simple and eco friendly methods of product
packaging and even managed to gain enough attention on the attractiveness of the articles. They
also add the benefits of the products and it's proper usage technique on the label to provide
feasibility to its consumer's (Chaffey and Ellis-Chadwick, 2019). The marketing team of Avon -
Forever Young ensures that their product out stand in the market and symbolize a unique identity
amongst the available and tries to be a trend setter in the market; the marketing team claims the
best use of resources in the packaging of the product. Also, marketing department is responsible
to create or settled the product according to the business design.
Branding -
4

The branding of Avon is marked upon several defined standards as they prefer celebrity
endorsement, unique name and image for the promotion of the product so thus create
convenience for the marketing team as having a well established brand name and image when it
comes to the promotion and delivering sales results for Forever Young product.
Pricing and Promotion -
The marketing department of Avon perform several types of surveys, analyse the market and
forecast the sales figure of their product Forever Young helps in setting up of the price of the
product depending upon the requirement in the market and availability of finished goods as well
as the resources. The company then after analysing the demand and supply in the market by the
marketing team set the pricing and promotional strategies (Kannan, 2017).
Corporate Communications -
Combination of tactics promoting organization's communication channels such as calls,
massaging, conferences etc. These channels makes the communication within an organization
easy/ effective and also created a bridge between the company and consumers. The Avon helped
to maintain relationship with consumers and stakeholders through this channel.
Customer Relation -
Avon believes in customer relation building to keep the consumers satisfied through any
end such as interacting with them at various time period, keep them updated with their upcoming
new products and schemes, assisting them in any such related matters as well as prioritizing their
opinion by hearing them at intervals and also maintaining maximum transparency making them
feel valued by the brand. The marketing department helps to gain feedback of the product served
and thus maintain better customer relationship with the consumers and maximising sales in the
future (Van Den Berg and Braun, 2017). this is the foremost function of marketing is to ensure
the customer relation by listening the customer needs and wants and also make the system more
realistic and influencing.
P2 Roles and responsibilities of marketing related with other organizational
Avon believes that though marketing department plays a vital role in forming company's
sales but it is not solely responsible for the company's development. The department is
considered to be more than just generating sales as all the activities of the company is based on
the objective that - "The whole point of business is considered from customer's point of view".
Before the product reach the customer it go through different department first within the
organization -
5

Marketing with Operation / Production management -
The production department is so closely related to marketing department as it study the
need and requirement in the market (Voorhees and et.al., 2016). Avon marketing department
analyse the product requirement as well as the standard quality of their product for the desired
markets thus help control over or under production and help maintaining balance between
demand and supply. Firm’s production department study the market supply with the data
provided by the marketing team regarding the trend and quantity demand in the market as well as
their word is considered of how much sales they can maximise through their extra efforts.
Marketing with Finance department -
Avon align its activities with finance department to ensure that the implementation of
their plan is never facing deficiency of funding as well as allocation of budgets for advertising,
ensure that the company has enough cash flow to cover unexpected costs and expenses because
the deficiency of financial resources will lead the cosmetic brand out of the market away from its
competitors (Ashley and Tuten, 2015). They also set the amount of credit to be rotated in the
market as well as set several policies to recover and manage market fund rotation as they need
funds at a certain period for their expansion. The marketing department is also taught financial
methods adopted in the organization for better co-ordination within the departments.
Marketing with Human Resource department -
The appropriate skills required for proper staffing of the employees in different
departments specially marketing department is based on the screening process the department
has set standard for. The HR department in Avon is responsible for hiring such a staff to
maintain the area distribution of the employees. Sometime the company face deficit in the
employee staff to achieve their objective whereas at time excess of staff is allocated to achieve a
small task that increases the manpower cost of the company so the Human Resource Department
is responsible to control the staff count or employee balance (Feng, Morgan and Rego, 2015).
Forever Young promotes area based sales and hire people based on the geographic parameters
and even match the compatible skills of the employees like language known, culture, heredity,
beliefs etc. to eliminate confusion, disputes, misunderstanding amongst the individual. The
Human resource department in company also help the marketing department in providing time to
time training to be updated as well as allot people for promoting digital marketing factor to
expand their reach in the market.
6

Marketing with Quality department -
Avon quality department focuses on the quality check of the products so that the effective
and right quality of product reach the market. The marketing department generates the sales and
brings out the feedback if a particular product needs betterment and development to raise the
demand or user count. The quality of product varies from place to place as some region require
quality product and are willing to spend any particular amount on the beauty products whereas in
East region people are considering replacements product from rival company's as it involves low
cost so the department ensure that the quality of product is not compromised in order to generate
sales in the market (Gneezy, 2017). The Avon managed to set a team to ensure the quality of
products at different levels to ensure that the right quality of goods are gone through the process
and the quality of the final finished goods are not compromised. The sale is generated them
ensuring the best product is circulated in the market and the individuals are not using duplicates
or some copy product.
Marketing with Research and Development department -
The Research and Development team co-exist by mutual co-ordination of their functions
and activities in the market. The two factors cannot work independently as the research and
development requires to get information about the buyers, their current needs and preferences,
environmental challenges and opportunities as well as the trends in the market. The research and
development provide base for the launching of the new products in the market as well as
eliminating the ones that are old and are out of the trend. The requirement of the individuals
based on their age, culture, mentality, social belongingness are several of the factors considered
as the base for marketing of the products for Forever Young in the market. The program involves
experts in both the fields to evaluate the market conditions (Hartsfield, Johansen and Knight,
2017).
LO2
P3 Compare the ways in which different organisations apply the marketing mix to the marketing
planning process to achieve business objectives
The marketing mix includes 4 P's which are Product, Price Place, Promotion and three
extended P's which includes People, Process and Physical evidence which will help the cosmetic
firms to get the best return in order to achieve the business goals effectively and efficiently.
Generally the 4 P's defines the:
7

 Product:- What products and services the firm offers
 Price:- How much money customer pay for the product or service
 Place:- It refers to the location where product will be accessible to the customers
 Promotion:- It defines the strategy from which the customers get awareness regarding the
product
Further the marketing mix extended three more P's like people, process and physical evidence.
This makes the concept of 7 P's that is defined as:
 People:- It refers to the persons who supply the products
 Physical evidence:- It defines how the product of the company is perceived by the
customers (Analysis of marketing mix on cosmetics products, 2019)
 Process:- It refers to the procedure of how the product is supplied to the customers
Below table will show the comparison between the two cosmetics company that is Avon and
L'Oréal. It will also explain how both the company is applying the 7 P's of Marketing Mix:
Avon Business Objectives
Avon is the one of the leading direct sellers of beauty product services. Globally Avon
awarded as the fifth biggest beauty company. Objective of the company is to strengthen the
direct sales core, to enter new markets to increase the range of its products to increases its
revenue margins to cut on costs by 400 million dollars and finally to enhance the organizations
services.
Role of Key mixes in realising business objectives and planning process to address needs of
customer segments
In order to presenting the new business concept and new arrivals business always make
about the new strategies and goals to deliver the best source ideas. Such as marketing mix,
Marketing mix are the best elements which enable to provide customers about the brief history
through which they can easily generate the new business leads. So through marketing essentials
it will become easier for the company to analyse the new source and development areas.
MARKETING MIX( 7 P's ) Avon company L'Oréal company
Product Avon is the cosmetics
company of UK which
provides the herbal products
which are handmade cosmetic
L'oreal S.A is French company
and it is the world's largest
company which deals in
cosmetics like hair care, make
8

items like lipsticks, liners,
creams Etc (Lidstone and
MacLennan, 2017). and also
provides toiletries like herbal
soaps, shampoos, perfumes,
towels for men as well as
women It has 1,380sqm store
that is situated in Liverpool,
street, UK (RAJESH, 2016).
It has separate perfume library
that sells variety of perfumes.
The company has its stores
across UK, Germany and Italy.
It follows eco-friendly strategy
for the products and the
products are totally chemical
free and 100% natural that
does not affect the skin and
suitable for all skin types and
it also gives the treatment
facilities like massage in order
to relieve tensions, aches in
respect to muscles and it also
have musicians that have come
from different cultures,
The company take the recycled
materials in order to use the
products to produce fresh
products as well as to use in
packaging also.
up as well as skin care and
many more.
It produces all the products
related to beauty as well as
cosmetics there are divisions
like L'oreal Luxe – Diesel.
Clarisonic, Consumer
products- L'oreal Paris,
Garnier.
It follows the product strategy
regarding the quality it sells
high quality and innovated
products as well as services to
make the product stand
differently from the
competitors and makes the
products as per the needs and
requirements of the customers.
It includes products like
eyeliner, mascara, lipsticks,
nail polish, haircolors of
different shades, shampoos,
serums etc. these products
have different sizes as well as
price range is also different at
the same time the products are
tested as per the international
standards without harming
animals (Kannan, 2017).
9

Price Avon follows the skimming
strategy in which the company
charges high prices as it has
spent lot of money in research
and development in order to
produce the 100% natural and
herbal products (Jarach, 2017).
Avon sells the products in
order to generate the profit at
maximum level so that the
company can recover the costs
that the company has spent in
research and development to
make the product chemical
free and to give the customers
best experience with chemical
free products for natural and
healthy skin (Voorhees and
et.al., 2016).
The L'oreal company follows
the competitive price strategy
that is value based price
scheming for its products and
L'oreal fix the price of the
products as compared to other
competitors worldwide by
increasing and keeping its
stock units.
Place Avon uses the direct channel
for distribution in which it
sells its products to different
geographical regions in order
to directly acquire the
customers.
The company has its retail
stores in Italy, Germany and in
UK as well and many
countries.
L'oreal follows the indirect and
direct both distribution strategy
and have large distribution
channels in order to enable
strong presence in the market
and it has acquired various
companies worldwide in order
to increase its brand existence
(Ashley and Tuten, 2015).
The company has grown and
presently it has stores in
10

It has around 50 branches in
UK. The manufacturer of
Avon manages the stores by
itself (Kotler and et.al., 2015).
That helps the company in
building the customer base.
around 130 countries and 5
continents.
Each and every products are
accessible at salons, cosmetic
and departmental shops as well
as on retail outlets.
Promotion Avon promote its product
through social media as well as
online sales because now a
days the potential consumers
does the shopping online.
It promotes its product on the
E-commerce site in which the
description of the Avon
product are given like various
products, its price and the
images and the address as well
as contact details in order to
attract the customers to by the
product (Feng, Morgan and
Rego, 2015).
It also promotes the product
through social media like it
gives advertisements on
Facebook, YouTube with the
interesting content and
attractive images of the
products in order to draw the
attention of the consumers and
to attain the objectives of the
L'oreal is the global brand and
its promotion is made in
various countries.
The company follows the TV
advertising strategies and also
uses the brand ambassadors as
known models like Aishwarya
Rai, Naomi Watts etc. on
televisions as well as digital
advertisements in order to
promote the product over
worldwide.
It also follows word of mouth
as the promoting strategy and
also has the corporate social
responsibility like project care
in order to provide the social
welfare such as child education
and dealings with UNESCO in
order to assist young woman
for fulfilling their dreams
11

Avon
People People here defines the
employees of the organization
that are employed in order to
give the quality products or
services to the customers.
Avon have friendly
environment that makes every
employee happy and to work
together at the same time it
also have trained employees
that makes the customers well
aware about the product and
satisfy the customers in the
best way (Fine, 2017).
It organizes the training
programmes for the staffs that
attract more customers.
Loreal have the well skilled,
knowledgeable as well as
trained staff because the
company have spend money in
order to train and educate the
employees (Gneezy, 2017).
This makes the customers to
acquire knowledge about the
product and to increase the
experience as well as to satisfy
the needs and liking of the
customers.
L'oreal company also provides
the reward systems for the
employees and that increases
the motivation which helps to
attain the objectives and
increase the brand value.
Physical Evidence Physical evidence refers to the
environment where the product
or services are carried as well
as customers interact
The layout of the Avon
infrastructure, its services as
well as its products are very
attractive that is perceived by
the customers (Analysis of
marketing mix on cosmetics
products, 2019).
The physical evidence of
L'oreal like its display and
design as well as packaging of
the product is very attractive
and extreme at every store
whether it is own or
departmental store situated in
world wide. It has a strong
tagline 'Because we're worth it'
and have a powerful message
in order to attract the
12

customers.
It has very catchy colour and
logo of the product that
encourages the customers to
buy the products
Process Consumers can make contact
with customer care executive
through its website which
helps them in finding quick
solution for their complains
Company takes time to solve
complains of consumers
(Hitomi, 2017).
P4 Produce and evaluate a basic marketing plan for an organisation.
Marketing plan is the process through which enterprise can market its products and can
make people aware with its new product or service.
Executive summary
Avon is making the marketing plan for commercializing its new product that is anti-
ageing product which is named as 'Forever Young' to draw the customers by stimulating them
to purchase the product.
Company Information
Avon is a well-known cosmetic company of UK which sells the cosmetics items and
toiletries like soaps, creams, shampoos for men as well as women from various declared brands
worldwide and not manufacture the products by own (RAJESH, 2016).
Objective
The objective of Avon company is to increase the sales of Forever young product by 25%
till the end of 2019 and to become the leader of the market and want make the product Forever
young as ultimate choice in respect to consumers.
To enhance consumer experience by 20% till the end of year.
To increase profitability of organization by 20% in upcoming 6 months.
SWOT analysis
13

The SWOT analysis will include the (Strengths, Weaknesses) that are internal factors and
(Opportunities, Threats) are the external factors for the Avon company. This analysis will be
done to identify the competitors and understanding how it runs and
Strengths
 It is the leading cosmetic company of UK which provides 100% natural herbal cosmetic
and toiletries products
 Avon has its brand presence all over UK
 High brand value and provides the products at discounted prices
 It has low turnover because of the friendly environment of the employees
 company values their stakeholders and has maintained a good level of relationship with
them.
Weaknesses
 Avon is totally dependent on the various declared brands and it do not produce the
products on their own.
 Insufficiency in respect to bureaucracy
 lack of proper market planning
 company is facing a lot of competition from online dealers as it is a more convenient
method for people.
Opportunities
 It has the possibility to expand its products internationally
 Marketing Avon on advertisement will help to attract the customers worldwide
 It can increase its Toiletries products in order to compete with other competitors of the
market.
 Avon has the opportunity and wide scope to enter into online markets and sell their
products through Amazon and Flip kart
Threats
 Threat of other competitors such as Revlon, L'oreal Paris, Bobbie brown Etc.
 Employee shortage can be another threat for the Avon
 Increase in labour cost can affect the margins as well as increase functional cost.
PEST analysis
14

It is the tool for analysing the external factors for analysing Avon company that are:-
 Political factors: This is the very important factor which includes strict guidelines by
the government. For launching the 'Forever young' product the Avon company should
ensure the product safety for the consumers. Because these are skin contact products so
the company should follow the product safety act as well as the guidelines of the
government (Van Den Berg and Braun, 2017). Avon serves in more than 60 countries so
it is important for them to keep an eye on the instability of political factors.
 Economic factors: If thee is high inflation then enterprise will not be able to spend
money in marketing in such condition it might get fail to accomplish its objective. Due to
the high amount of corporate tax in other countries company is not able to expand their
operations.
 Social factors : Avon will have to consider taste, views, believes of the consumers and
accordingly it has to design its market plan so that it does not hurt feeling of any culture.
By considering this element it would be able to gain attention of mass audience. It is
necessary for the company to segment their market so that they can target people from
above the level of middle class. The marketing campaigns that the company conducts
must not be against the culture and religion of the people.
 Technological factors : Firm will take support of advance technology which will be
better in making healthy coordination with consumers and resolving their complain soon.
Company needs to look after its cost of production so that they can increase the margin of
profit.
Marketing strategies
 Product : Avon will provide warranty on its forever young product and its packaging will
be good that will gain attention of potential buyers.
 Price: It will implement penetration pricing for attracting consumers, by this way sales
target of the firm can be meet.
 Place: It will distribute its products online and through retail stores as well.
 Promotion: Avon will use social media and promotional campaign to promote its forever
young product in the market.
STP (Segmentation, Targeting and Positioning)
15

Avon will take assistance of demographic segmentation strategy, enterprise will target its
consumers on the bases of their gender, as it will target female candidates more, by this way
sales target of business can be met.
Differentiated targeting will be used, that strategy will give best result to Avon and it will
be able to gain attention of potential buyers.
Cost positioning will be used to maintain its positon, it will offer affordable items to
consumers (Voorhees and et.al., 2016).
Budget
The entire budget of this marketing plan will be 850 Pound.
Cost Amount
Salaries to staff 400
Rent 150
Advertisement cost 250
Utility bills 50
Total cost 850 Pound
Monitoring and controlling
Avon will use test marketing method in order to monitor the success of marketing plan
for its forever young product. It will review its annual report time to time to measure sales
growth of its anti-agent product. Both these strategies will help in gaining success in the market
and meeting the sales objective of Avon (Chaffey and Ellis-Chadwick, 2019).
KPI: This can be used as technique of monitoring and controlling the functions of organization.
In this past performance of firm will be measured on basis of employees performing in present.
Benchmarking: In this company will be engaged in setting up a benchmark on which they need
to reach out.
CONCLUSION
From the above study it can be articulated that marketing has strong relationship with
other departments .study also explained the strong relationship between the departments which
also associate with the marketing. Report also explained the different roles and function of the
marketing department to ensure the business performance. Effective marketing mix strategies
help the firm in gaining attention of buyers and raising sales for its products. It is essential to
16

know more about competitors and set its strategies accordingly so that enterprise can gain
competitive advantage in the market.
17

REFERENCES
Books and Journals
Ashley, C. and Tuten, T., 2015. Creative strategies in social media marketing: An exploratory
study of branded social content and consumer engagement. Psychology &
Marketing. 32(1). pp.15-27.
Chaffey, D. and Ellis-Chadwick, F., 2019. Digital marketing. Pearson UK.
Feng, H., Morgan, N.A. and Rego, L.L., 2015. Marketing department power and firm
performance. Journal of Marketing. 79(5). pp.1-20.
Gneezy, A., 2017. Field experimentation in marketing research. Journal of Marketing
Research. 54(1). pp.140-143.
Goldberg, M. E., Fishbein, M. and Middlestadt, S. E., 2018. Social marketing: Theoretical and
practical perspectives. Psychology Press.
Hartsfield, S., Johansen, D. and Knight, G., 2017. Entrepreneurial orientation, strategy, and
marketing capabilities in the performance of born global firms. International Business:
Research, Teaching, and Practice. 2(1). pp.12-38.
Kannan, P. K., 2017. Digital marketing: A framework, review and research agenda. International
Journal of Research in Marketing. 34(1). pp.22-45.
Kerin, R. and Hartley, S., 2015. Marketing: the core. McGraw-Hill.
Lovelock, C. and Patterson, P., 2015. Services marketing. Pearson Australia.
RAJESH, M. R., 2016. Impact of social media marketing on online purchases of conusmers in
selected cities of india with respect to fast moving consumer goods-personal products.
Shaw, S., 2016. Airline marketing and management. Routledge.
Van Den Berg, L. and Braun, E., 2017. Sports and city marketing in European cities. Routledge.
Voorhees, C. M. and et.al., 2016. Discriminant validity testing in marketing: an analysis, causes
for concern, and proposed remedies. Journal of the Academy of Marketing Science. 44(1).
pp.119-134.
Lidstone, J. and MacLennan, J., 2017. Marketing planning for the pharmaceutical industry.
Routledge.
Jarach, D., 2017. Airport marketing: Strategies to cope with the new millennium environment.
Routledge.
Kotler, P. and et.al., 2015. Marketing. Pearson Higher Education AU.
Fine, S. H., 2017. Marketing the public sector: Promoting the causes of public and nonprofit
agencies. Routledge.
Hitomi, K., 2017. Manufacturing systems engineering: A unified approach to manufacturing
technology, production management and industrial economics. Routledge.
Online
Analysis of marketing mix on cosmetics products. 2019. [Online]. Available through <
https://www.upet.ro/annals/economics/pdf/2011/part4/Palade.pdf>.
18