Marketing Management: Aldi's Marketing TOWS and Objectives

This article discusses the marketing management strategies of Aldi, including TOWS analysis and marketing audits. It also outlines the marketing objectives for Aldi's campaign and the marketing mix plan to achieve those objectives.

Marketing
Management

Contents
INTRODUCTION...........................................................................................................................1
MAIN BODY..................................................................................................................................1
Marketing TOWS in context to Aldi and explanation of marketing audits in doing so..............1
Three Marketing objectives for marketing campaign of “Expressing Ourselves”......................4
Marketing mix plan which is to be undertaken for achieving objectives over the period of 12
months..........................................................................................................................................6
Proposals related to the ways Aldi could improve customer service levels as part of the
marketing campaign.....................................................................................................................9
CONCLUSION..............................................................................................................................10
REFERENCES..............................................................................................................................12

INTRODUCTION
Marketing management is described as organisational discipline that emphases towards
convenient implementation of all marketing methods and orientation within company along with
management of all activities of marketing (Area, 2017). With effective marketing management,
companies launch their new offerings, increasing production for current products, develop modes
of transportation with communication, and reduce costs related with sales and distribution. To
understand marketing management, Aldi is selected which is German family owned supermarket
chain that executes practices in retail industry. It was established by Karl along with Theo
Albrecht in 1913 at Germany. Its major commodities are household essentials addition to
grocery. The managers of the company have planned to run an intensive campaign with the name
of “Expressing Ourselves” that will start on May 01, 2020 and will last till April 30, 2021. The
report covers essential tasks including marketing TOWS for the entity, objectives of marketing
that are set for the campaign and marketing mix plan which is proposed to be undertaken for
attaining objectives. At last, it provides proposal on the ways the company can improve their
customer service level as part of campaign.
MAIN BODY
Marketing TOWS in context to Aldi and explanation of marketing audits in doing so.
In marketing, TOWS analysis is used as strategic planning tool which adds real values to
company and assist in taking the planning further. It looks for matching internal organisational
factors that are strength and weaknesses to external environment factors that are opportunities
and threats for determining relevant strategic options which can be pursued by entity (Bagozzi
and Et. Al., 2018). Along with this, it the analysis enables in matching enterprise internal
strengths with external opportunities for developing strategies which has huge success potentials.
However, marketing audit is all about thoroughly reviewing plans, mission, aims, strategies,
techniques and existing practices of marketing hat are executed by company. By using marketing
audit, managers of Aldi analyses, evaluates, interprets and control internal and external
marketing environment for ascertaining areas that have problems and opportunities so that plan
of action is recommended promptly to increase marketing performance.
Aldi’s internal strength:
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 It has wide product portfolio that have uniqueness and innovation characteristics addition
to also have huge social media presence.
 Aldi have low cost structure which assists to produce and offer products at low cost
together with selling at reasonable prices that customers can afford in present context.
Aldi’s internal weakness:
 The supermarket chain has huge employee turnover due to more pressure from
administrators to gain targets in competitive environment.
 Aldi generally thrives on low level of profits and heavily depends on volume of sales. To
attain sales, it often gets indulge in unethical practices and treats suppliers in bad manner
which is its one of weakness.
 It mostly prefers shopping locations that are surrounded by low addition to medium
income groups (Baker and Saren, 2016). It rarely searches highly income groups and
have poor penetration in higher income segment.
External opportunities:
 Aldi can open discount stores in higher income segment and improve online presence to
make sales so to generate huge margins of income.
 In the international market, population is increasing rapidly that provides opportunities
to the supermarket chain for enhancing the customer base by targeting potential people.
 The entity can upgrade existing technologies for automating the operations so that
manual workings are reduced and workings are performed on time.
External threats:
 Development and innovation by rivals of Aldi creates threats for it as majority of
customers are attracted by them.
 Changes in taste, choices and preferences in rapid manner are also threat for the firm as it
leads in changing customer demand for organisational offerings (Deepak and Jeyakumar,
2019).
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 Increasing market competition creates pressure of the entity to reduce product price
which adds threat for it as it increases chances of loosing market shares addition to profits
also.
TOWS analysis and explanation of market audits in doing so:
The tool that managers of Aldi opt for generating, distinguishing and selecting strategies
for future id TOWS analysis. It involves four aspects that play essential function in marketing
audit. For TOWS Analysis of the organisation, marketing audit is performed to gain information
that will assist in preparing marketing audit plan through focusing on distinct areas. The
discussion of strategies is underneath in context to the organisation:
Figure 1: TOWS Analysis, 2020
(Source: TOWS Analysis, 2020)
Strength/ Opportunity: Herein, organisational managers utilises their strength to exploit
market opportunities through executing marketing audit in proper manner. It is also said as
“Maxi-Maxi Strategy” wherein Aldi possesses high success potentials. The managers combine
their strength that is low cost structure with the opportunity to target potential customers because
of increasing population. To determine strength-opportunity strategy, organisational people
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adopts environmental marketing audit for grabbing opportunities through utilising internal
strengths (Folinas and Fotiadis, 2017).
Weakness/ Opportunity: Herein, organisational marketers search alternatives for
dealing and overcoming weaknesses through grabbing opportunities promptly. It is also known
as Mini-Maxi strategy in which weaknesses are mitigated and opportunities are exploited at
maximum level. By using the strategy, Aldi managers grabs opportunities for bring automation
in various operations by adopting updates technologies with the aim to reduce weaker points of
marketing field to exact market research for satisfying maximum choices of customers in
demanded time. To analyse weakness-opportunity strategy, Aldi marketers adopts marketing
audit to focus towards overcoming weakness and grab opportunities within market.
Strength/ Threat: In this, all the strengths of business are utilised for reducing threats. It
is Maxi-Mini strategy in which organisational strengths are used to reduce threats (Frost and
Strauss, 2016). Marketing team of Aldi emphasis majorly towards product portfolio along with
facilitate new offerings rapidly with the purpose to attract customers easily and enhancing their
loyalty that will further assist in dominating rivals competition through avoiding competing
threats and strengthen market shares and volume of sales.
Weakness/ Threat: Mini-Mini strategy is another name of it and is least appealing
strategy as it assist to use weakness over the threats. Herein, Aldi marketers emphasis to provide
training sessions for reducing staff turnover ratio and educate them in various field such as
information technology and so on to avoid threat related to technological development. For
competing with rivals, the firm majorly focuses on improving knowledge of manpower that
motivates them to develop unique technologies and build leading position or image in market
(Gibson and Parkman, 2018).
Three Marketing objectives for marketing campaign of “Expressing Ourselves”.
As per the findings, it is said that Aldi company has diverse strengths through which it
operates in the market. Along with this, it also has various weaknesses which restrict it to
achieve set determinations. Its some of the strengths are strong distribution network through
which it reaches potential market in order to maximise satisfaction for organisational offerings
on time. Addition to this, the firm has low cost structure that assist to deliver products t
reasonable prices with higher quality that builds high customer values. As it is discounted store
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that provides variants of products at discount values that helps in making unique brand position
which attracts wide customers from distinct locations. In contrary, various weaknesses are also
associated with the firm that are high employee abseentism, huge expenses in training an
development, limited technological investments and low profit level. With considering of these
findings, managers of Aldi have set following marketing objectives for its marketing campaign
that is “Expressing Ourselves” for 12 months period:
 To reduce workforce abseentism by 35% in 7 months through increasing training sessions
and development programs that will help employees to acquire talents, competence and
skills which will result in retention of manpower with the firm.
 To improve profit level by 20% in 3 months by increasing product quality, reducing
unnecessary activities and promoting campaign by using various platforms.
 To increase production by 20% in upcoming 6 months through adopting advanced
technologies in the process of production and service offering that will lead in increasing
satisfaction among customers for the quality of commodities and delivering complete
information on time.
Aldi company has strong market image for offering commodities in discounted rates. With
this, it can target large market sections and can increase profits level by 20% in the particular
time duration. Further, it can be justified that organisational objectives have specificity,
measurability, achievability, realistic along with are time bound. All the above mentioned
objectives are set by management team of Aldi in order to build effective base of customers by
using promotional platforms that can increase awareness about products as well as help in
sustainable sales and profits by effective marketing campaign. Along with this, the entity posses
strong financial portfolio that can help in providing effective training to employees that will
boost confidence of people and motivate them to retain with work and this will reduce
abseentism by 35% in upcoming timings. The organisational administrators have planned to run
marketing campaign from May 01, 2020 to April 30, 2021 and for this, potential talents that have
knowledge of diverse field such as marketing, administration, technology and other are hired to
make the campaign successful and accomplishing all the objectives effectively and promptly.
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Marketing mix plan which is to be undertaken for achieving objectives over the period of 12
months.
Marketing mix plan is imperative tool for building and executing marketing strategy in
effective mode (Grewal, 2018). Marketing mix is mentioned to various elements of
organisational offering in dynamic and competing market. In other terms, it is micture of
ingredients that are used by company for attaining objectives through promoting or marketing its
valuables effectually to specific customer group. In case with Aldi, marketing team uses the tool
for understanding customer demands and deciding on what to offer along with the ways success
of business are plan. Marketing mix plan involves various elements that are product, place,
process, price, people, promotion and physical evidence that assist in making absolute effective
marketing strategy and their implementation helps in achieving objectives that are determined by
managers. Marketing mix plan for Aldi to achieve objectives over the duration of 12 months is as
follows:
Marketing
mix plan
elements
Meaning In context to Aldi
Product Product refers to tangible commodities
together with intangible services which
organisations offer to make sales and
profits. All products follows systematic
product life cycle. Along with this, it is
essential to plan the stages as well as
unique challenges (Johansen, 2016).
Aldi sells wide products under its
private label brand. It has stock of
approx 1350 products with variants of
names including baby products, fresh
meats, fresh meats, produces such as
seasonal commodities, vegetables,
organic and local produces, wines,
beer and home goods.
Price Price is the actual and exact amount
that is expected by user to pay for
attaining product. It describes
worthiness of commodities and it
linked with perceived values. It is
Consumer market is competitive that
involves customers with greater
choices. Aldi is well popularise of
discounting pricing strategy in which
better and superior qualities are
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generally affected by value chain costs,
competitors pricing, distribution plans
and mark-ups.
offered at reasonable rates that are
affordable by targeted customers
which are lower middle class, middle
class and other sections of society.
Place Place or placement is the physical
location from which customers are
offered products. Distribution plays
essential factor in placement. With
effective placement strategy,
organisational managers assess suitable
channels for products (Lidstone and
MacLennan, 2017). Common place
mix involves wholesale addition to
retail channels, physical store of
company and e-commerce websites.
Aldi is supermarket chain which is
spread over wide parts of globe. It
posses approx 10000 stores and
outlets in nearby 20 nations in which
customers either shop online or visits
nearest outlets or stores. Along with
this, customers have wide options
such as collect plus option related to
delivery addition to order collection
from particular collection points in 3-
7 days of placing orders.
Promotion Promotion is a communication aspect
within entire marketing function. It
involves special offers, advertising,
public relations, sales promotions and
many for to enhance awareness about
information and existence of particular
commodity (Mensah, 2017).
Aldi is multinational brand that uses
wide communication or promotion
methods including social media
platforms and other sources. For the
marketing campaign of “Expressing
Ourselves” managers can use
promotion methods including sales
promotion, social media platforms,
relationship marketing and newspaper
articles.
Physical
evidence
Physical evidence is material elements
that reassure customers. Moreover,
physical contexts addition to
paraphernalia which comes with
The retail stores and bodily outlets
are few physical evidence of Aldi.
Moreover, payment bills, bags,
standardisation, global pricing
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product is physical evidence. together with simple business process
are its physical evidences that attracts
maximum population towards it.
People People are human elements which are
involved in production to delivery
aspects and possess qualities along with
skills for ensuring success.
Organisation people are consultants,
service providers, marketers and so on
(Möller and Halinen, 2018).
People of Aldi posses lower customer
service against rivals. It is because its
manpower do not get involved in
production aspects as all are divided
in different sections of stores as per
specialisation and work interest in
thoughtful ways. In addition, by
providing job training and paying
higher, it may reduces abseentism of
employees and retaining them for
further duration.
Process Process in the sequence of set of
activities which are involved in
production to delivery of products that
creates significant affect on customer
experience and satisfaction level with
business lifetime value. Some
processes comprises of website user
experience, method of delivery, time of
delivery, in-store time to wait,
customer support communication and
aftercare.
Aldi has sheer layout process that
makes product findings easy and
helps customers to choose
commodities as per their interest and
requirements which reduces
employees to assist population. Along
with this, the organisation keeps
limited quantity of huge quality and
nominal price that prevents confusion
and this time to select commodities.
With this, it increases its customer
number and profit margins also.
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Proposals related to the ways Aldi could improve customer service levels as part of the
marketing campaign.
Proposals for the ways Aldi managers can improve customer service level as part of
“Express Ourselves” Marketing Campaign.
Customer service level is defined as the percentage of events wherein order is delivered
according to the promises. Moreover, it involves set of regulations addition to strategies which
are put forth for evaluating system performances. Aldi is supermarket chain that planned to run
an intensive marketing campaign by the name of “Expressing Ourselves” between the duration
of May 01, 2020 to April 30, 2021. Following are the some ways through which customer
service level that are part of the campaign can be improved by the company:
Level 1: Unacceptable: Unacceptable consumer service level is related to bad services at all
levels. These are generally unacceptable at any level (Pasquier and Villeneuve, 2017). To
improve this consumer service level, marketers will adopt e-mail marketing strategy in which
they will prepare questionnaire and send it to the potential customers that are part of the
campaign and as per the respondance effective changes will be made that will result in
improving such customer service level. In addition to it, seeking customer feedbacks will assist
marketers about gains addition to painful points and through this, Aldi can build trustworthy
relations that will assist in eliminating negative reviews and gaining positive outcomes in
consumer service levels.
Level 2: Basic: basic consumer service level is all about commodity as well as minimum
standards. At basic level of customer service, companies conduct limited necessities that are
required for completion of working (Reid and Sanders, 2019). In case with Aldi, it can improve
this level through understanding basic requirements of customers within its marketing campaign.
Moreover, by adopting relationship marketing strategy, managers can make relations with
potential clients and can understand their choices and accordingly works to improve them. In this
marketing campaign, the major focus will be on the customers that have basic needs of
organisational commodities that are groceries, home essentials and so on. By providing these at
reasonable rate, basic level of consumer services could be improved by the entity in this
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campaign.
Level 3: Good: The customer service level wherein customers identify organisational services as
satisfactory (Seran, Pellegrin-Boucher and Gurau, 2016). In order to improve it, managers of
Aldi can leverage multi-channel services wherein they create memorable experiences for
customers by offering them high quality commodities through multi channels. By improving
quality within products and making some modification in their processing system, customers can
achieve huge satisfaction from the services that will lead in improvisation in the service level of
campaign. Along with this, motivation customer service tem to perform with potentials to
provide services in the manner that changes perception of customers from satisfactory to
satisfied can also improve the strategy which is huge part of Expressing Ourselves.
Level 4: World Class: Customer service level that is considered as big jump from good to it is
generally beyond satisfactory (Van Den Berg and Braun, 2017). In this level, customers have
huge favourability for the products and they feel that the entity is great. In association to Aldi,
managers for improving the service level can create value for the customers that compare the
entity with other ones. Moreover, through differentiation strategy, managers can offer the
services or products in the marketing campaign that are totally different and unique from other
entities will also result in improving the service level.
Level 5: Trademark: Customer service level wherein other organisations are compared to the
entity (Welford, 2016). According to customers, the business concern is industrial benchmark for
providing great services. Minimum improvements are required by Aldi to improve this customer
service level in context to the marketing campaign. By using CRM platform, this level can be
improved by the entity as it ensures working of all personnel on same criteria that will establish
standards for high customer services.
CONCLUSION
The above business report concludes that marketing management is related to chalking out
definite programme after proper analysis and forecasting of situations in market along with
ultimate implementation to attain determined business objectives. It facilitates functions, events
and activities that are part of promoting, selling and distributing enterprise commodities and
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services. TOWS analysis enables firms to match strengths and opportunities for developing
strategies that leads in potential success. Marketing mix plan is one of effective technique that
assists companies to offer products as per situations and the ways for planning successful product
offering. There are various ways in which different customer service level can be improved by
companies that are part of their marketing campaigns.
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REFERENCES
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Online:
TOWS Analysis. 2020. [Online]. Available through: <https://tradebrains.in/tows-matrix/>
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