Marketing Management for JD Sports: Current Marketing Mix, Recommendations, and Digital Marketing Strategies

This report discusses the marketing management of JD Sports, including its current marketing mix, strengths, and areas for improvement. It also provides recommendations for changes and improvements in the marketing mix, as well as the use of digital marketing strategies such as M marketing and E marketing to increase the company's success in the market.

Marketing Management

Contents
SUMMARY ....................................................................................................................................3
INTRODUCTION...........................................................................................................................1
MAIN BODY ..................................................................................................................................1
Description of organisation and background information of the product and services ..............1
Identify the strengths and the areas for improvement in the current marketing mix of the
organisation .................................................................................................................................2
The recommendation for the company to make changes and improvement in its marketing mix
and the justification for the changes. ..........................................................................................4
Evaluate how the organisation can use appropriate digital marketing strategies and its
contribution in the success of business........................................................................................5
CONCLUSION ...............................................................................................................................7
REFERENCES................................................................................................................................8

SUMMARY
The following report highlights the description and background of JD Sports and define
the full information about its product line such as about its sports product such as shoes, cloths
and sports equipment. Further it define the current marketing mix which is 4Ps such as their
price, product, place and marketing strategies of the company to offers their product to the
potential users. Moreover, the report covers the recommendation to make changes and transform
their current marketing mix to improve the efficiency and profitability of the company. At last it
shows the use of digital marketing strategies such as M marketing and E marketing which the
marketers can use to get maximum profit and customer base for the future growth of the
company.

INTRODUCTION
Marketing management refers to the organisational field that focuses on the practical
implication of marketing techniques, orientation and methods in the internal organisation or
business. It also related to the management of the marketing activities, functions and resources
which are required to perform the marketing methods to promote the product and services in the
market. It is the process of managing the marketing elements, setting the objectives of the
company, organising the strategies into steps as well as taking decisions to executing these steps
to get the maximum profits by satisfied the consumer expectations(Chernev, 2019). To explain
this concept the selected company is JD Sports which was founded in 1981 by John Wardle and
David Makin. It is multinational British company which deals in sports products such as sports
wear, foot wear. Equipments and accessories.
The report covers knowledge of key theories, models and concepts in marketing to guide
and executive marketing strategies. Further, it defines the complexity of competitive
environment and its impacts on marketing strategies in organisation. It defines the marketing
strategies to identify internal and external challenges and adopt the changes. At last, it covers
problems solving and creative skills to provide suggestions and recommendations to business.
MAIN BODY
Description of organisation and background information of the product and services
Marketing management is the set of activities to find out various resources and activities
which are essential for conducting marketing practices. The main motive of marketing
management is to attract new customers, satisfy the needs of consumers, earn maximum
profitability and market share as well as creating a good public reputation. In JD Sports, the
marketing manager make various strategy to achieve the motive of marketing management. JD
Sports is the British retail company situated in Bury, Greater Manchester in England. It is the
biggest supplier of sports products such as footwear, equipment and clothing as well as sponsor
multiple teams, association and players of football (Cornwell and Kwon, 2020). The company
has around 38,000 employees across 2,400 stores located in 18 countries which has great brand
value in all the nation. The main vision of company is to earn maximum profit and grow their
higher market share to become the most trusted and profitable company in the world. The
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mission is to offer large variety of quality sports products to enhance the experience and
satisfaction of the target customers. Also, it has large number of stakeholders that are highly
interested in the operations of business such as suppliers, investors, management, workforce and
potential customers.
Initially they start with one line of products such as sports wear and offer them in UK market
only. After gaining success in this, then they introduce another lines of products like foot wear
and accessories as well as expand their business in many countries. Further, they also sponsor
many teams and formed association to promote their products to large number of customers in
global market.
Identify the strengths and the areas for improvement in the current marketing mix of the
organisation
Marketing mix refers to the set of tactics, activities and actions which a company used to
promote their products and brands in the market. It is the business marketing tools that the
marketing manager uses to achieve its marketing goals in target market. It includes multiple
areas as 4Ps such as price, product, place and promotion that are the most important part of
marketing plan in an organisation (Deepak and Jeyakumar, 2019). In JD Sports, the marketing
manager use marketing mix to make effective marketing plan to promote their sports product in
global market efficiently. The managers use strategic combination of the price, product,
promotion and place element in their current marketing mix. It helps the company to increase
their current position in the competitive market as well as achieve the business goals and
growth. To 4Ps of marketing mix in reference to JD Sports are as follows-
Products-It includes the product and services of the company which they offers in the
market to meet the expectation and needs of customers. In JD Sports, they offers variety of
products related to sports such as footwear, clothing and equipment in the world to meet the
desires of people. The marketers make various strategy to conduct research about their product
response as well as collect huge data and information related to their product to make them
differentiate from the competitors. Further, they collect data about the customer response, liking,
trends and preferences related to their product so they can make improvement in the current
quality and durability of product. They produce their product in such a way that the customer use
it form any where as well as they are so comfortable and convenient to carry. The customer feel
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comfortable and relax after wearing and utilising the sports product as well as it makes them
easy to perform their practices well.
Price- Price refers to the value, worth and monetary aspect of the product. The marketer
makes various research and calculation for fixing the economical price which are beneficial for
both customers and company. Price is not only associated with monetary aspects of product, it
also related with the customers willingness to make efforts and spend time to buy the product.
All these factors are most important for marketers to decide the price of their product. The
marketer manager of JD Sports make most effective price strategy by collecting market data and
calculating carefully the cost of their products as well as current market price of substitute
products (Dixit, 2020). Further, they creates balancing between them and pricing their product.
To generate revenue for the sports products the marketers make effective pricing plan Because it
also affect their profit, demand, supply, and expenditure spend on promotional activities. The
marketers of JD Sports set the price of their products which the customers are ready to pay that
is not too high or low.
Place – It refers to the market place as well as target market that the company decided to
sell their product and services. It is directly related to the selection of target market where the
customer are easily reach as well as most convenient place for customer. It refers to the selling
the right product at the right time, at the right place in the right price for the potential customers.
The marketers of JD Sports make effective strategy to choose right market and platform to offer
their services to attract the large number of customers. They offer their product on online
platform as well as by opening stores in main market in many countries for the convenience of
customers(Şengün, 2018).
Promotion – It refers to the advertisement and promotional activities of marketers to
promote their product and services in the target market to increase the customer base and sales of
the company. Nowadays, there are various sources available for company such as digital
platform as well as traditional approaches to promote the product and services as well as reach
to the target audience quickly. The marketing manager of JD Sports make effective marketing
strategy by identify various communication channels and promotional activities of their
competitors. They use direct marketing, advertising, sales promotions and digital marketing to
promote their sports products in the target market to attract large number of consumers. They
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also make innovative and attractive tag line to divert the mind of customers towards their
products which enhances their profitability and sales.
The strengths of the JD Sports is that they operate their business at large scale as well as they
offer high standard quality product which provide great comfort to the customer as they perform
their practices smoothly. Also, JD Sports operates their business both online and offline by
operating many retail stores and branches in main market of many nations which leads to
increase in their brand value or sales. Whereas, there is also some weaknesses and areas for
improvement that marketers need to develop to increase the sales and profit of company. Such as
the marketers of JD Sports need to use effective communication channels like social media
platform and emails to convey their massage and promote their product and services to reach the
maximum customer for earning maximum loyal customer base and market share. They must
make changes in their current promotion element of marketing mix as they can advance or fast
promotional sources to advertise their product innovative (Grant, 2019). Moreover, they also
make changes in their pricing strategy by comparing the price of competitors as well as offering
the product at reasonable price that all the section of society can afford to buy it. They cut down
their production cost by reducing wastage and time to set the price lower as compare to before to
make more economical for all type of customers.
The recommendation for the company to make changes and improvement in its marketing mix
and the justification for the changes.
The current marketing mix of JD Sports includes four elements that is product, price,
place and promotion which are most essential for company to get maximum profit and market
share. Effective marketing mix can foster the profitability and brand value of the company as
well as ineffective marketing mix also hinder and create the problems for company which leads
to decline in their profit, customer base and sales. In JD Sports, the marketers makes various
plans to make effective strategies related their product designs, pricing, place and promotional
activities.
The marketers of JD Sports can use various resources to modify their promotional strategies and
choose most effective communication channels for advertise their products in the world. They
can also collaborate with many marketing agencies, bloggers, influencers and celebrities to make
attractive and innovative promotion (Grewal, 2018). The company sponsors many team, players
of football so they can place their advertisement holdings and distribute pamphlets in the stadium
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so the public know more about the products and their durability. By printing business cards,
developing online websites and blog, press release and using emails as communication tools they
can conduct best promotional activities to promote their product. They also use sale promotions
and providing practical demo to the users about the quality, uses and durability of products to
the youth.
For effective pricing as well as set the most economical price to offer the product ad
services to the customers, the marketers of JD Sports have to modified their pricing strategies or
policies to set best price for the offering. Also, they produce best quality product and provide
them to the customers at best price to build trust and loyal customer base. They can sale their
products at higher price by maintaining quality of product as well as creating trust or best
customer relation. The marketers use best strategies for the customer relationship management to
sell their product at higher price as compare to their competitors to increase profitability and
sales. Also, marketers must conduct deep research about the market conditions, income level of
customers as well as pricing policies of competitors then calculate all the data accurately to
balance their cost and revenue for the fixing most effective price of the products.
Justification for the changes
It is beneficial for the JD Sports to modified and make changes in their current marketing
mix to increase the profitability and productivity of the company. By making changes in their
promotional and pricing policies they can enhance their sales, customer base and market share.
All these changes helps and allows the marketers of JD Sports to promote their products easily as
well as by using many communication channels they can increase the impact of their
advertisement on customers. It also provides competitive advantages to them to compete with
their competitors efficiency (Hüttner, 2018). By conducting analytical research about market
and customers trends they can fix best price for their products which are beneficial and
economical for all types of customer as they easily afford all the sports product of the JD Sports.
All these changes foster the productivity, sales, revenue, profitability and brand value of the
company.
Evaluate how the organisation can use appropriate digital marketing strategies and its
contribution in the success of business
The digital marketing strategies are most common and effective tool in recent times which helps
the company to promote the product and services to the large number of customers in global
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market. It includes two approaches such as E marketing and M marketing strategies which will
increase the sales of the company. The marketers of JD Sports can use appropriate digital
marketing strategies to make and convey their product massages as well as their tag lines to the
potential users (Misztal, 2019). The marketers use M marketing by collaborating and use of
social media platform to provide information and massage about their products to the
stakeholders.
M marketing refers to the mobile marketing such as through sending emails, creating
whatsapp group and posting photo, video and link by Instagram profile as well as developing
profile on LinkedIn. They also collaborate you tube Bloggers and social media influencers to
promote the product to the larger number of customers and their follows also get to know about
the products and services of JD Sports (Park, 2020). There are various strategies of mobile
marketing which the marketers can use to drive the traffic towards them. These are location
based marketing, responsive site design, social media advertisements, mobile friendly content,
voice search optimization and text message marketing. Also, they can use videos, GIFs, on site
and in app support, personalize campaigns as well as opt-in forms for using M marketing
strategies effectively.
E marketing is the set of activities of planning as well as executing the production,
pricing, promotion and distribution of goods and services by using computer systems. It is
related to the networked environment like the world wide web and internet to satisfy customer
demands and to facilitate exchanges. It is also know as online marketing and internet marketing
which is very common marketing tool among the large companies. The marketers of JD Sports
can effectively use this tools to reach out the maximum customers and spread awareness about
their brand to the potential users. They can develop online website by using world wide web to
share information related to product in the whole world as well as send direct Email to the loyal
customer base about the new product line (Parsons, and Lepkowska-White, 2018). Also they can
collect reviews, response and suggestions form website sign ups to make improvement in their
product and services. By using emails they can interact, connect and communicate more with the
customers.
The importance and benefits of this strategies to improve the profitability and efficiency of the
company
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M- marketing and E marketing has great and positive impact on the sales and brand value
of the JD Sports. These digital marketing strategies highly contribute in the success of the
company. By using these strategies the marketers can connect, interact and communicate better
with their customers which leads to increase in their customer base and market share. It also
build their credibility, strengthen their relationships with multiple stakeholders as well as boost
their sales by reaching maximum number of people in the world. It reduces the stress, time and
cost of the company and the marketers as they invest less time and cost to promote their product
digitally as compare to before traditional methods of promotion. Previously they used holdings,
pamphlets and door to door promotional approaches to sell their product in the market which
very time consuming, costly and complex (Rindfleisch and Malter 2019). By using these
strategies in their marketing mix they can promote their product and services without investing
extra cost as well as without going different market place. They can provide information about
their product by giving advertisement on online and social media platforms from any time and
any where at low cost which reduce their promotional cost as well as increase their profit margin.
By these they can promote their product, spread awareness about their services as well as boost
their sale in the global market efficiently.
CONCLUSION
As per above presented information, it is concluded that marketing management is most
important part of the company which increase and foster the market share and sales of the
company. The marketers can make effective marketing mix to promote and distribute their
product in target market as well as make changes timely as per the recent market and customer
trends. Also, they can use various data and research engine to calculate the cost and price of their
product. By using M marketing and E marketing digital tools they can easily communicate and
spread awareness about the product in the world to attract large number of customer and increase
profitability of the company.
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REFERENCES
Books and journal
Chernev, A., 2019. Strategic marketing management: Theory and practice. Cerebellum Press.
Cornwell, T.B. and Kwon, Y., 2020. Sponsorship-linked marketing: research surpluses and
shortages. Journal of the Academy of Marketing Science. 48(4). pp.607-629.
Deepak, R.K.A. and Jeyakumar, S., 2019. Marketing management. Educreation Publishing.
Dixit, S.K. ed., 2020. The Routledge handbook of tourism experience management and
marketing. Routledge.
Grant, D.B., 2019. Outsourcing integration and third party logistics services: an appreciation of
two ‘classic’articles in industrial marketing management. Industrial Marketing
Management. 79. pp.21-26.
Grewal, D., 2018. Retail marketing management: The 5 Es of retailing. Sage.
Hüttner, M., 2018. Marketing-Management: allgemein-sektoral-international. Walter de Gruyter
GmbH & Co KG.
Misztal, K., 2019. Marketing management in seaports. In Strategic Management in the Maritime
Sector (pp. 49-63). Routledge.
Park, S., 2020. Marketing management (Vol. 3). Seohee Academy.
Parsons, A.L. and Lepkowska-White, E., 2018. Social media marketing management: A
conceptual framework. Journal of Internet Commerce. 17(2). pp.81-95.
Rindfleisch, A. and Malter, A.J. eds., 2019. Marketing in a digital world. Emerald Group
Publishing.
Şengün, S., 2018. A Survey of Marketing Management for the Video Games Industry in Turkey.
In Marketing management in Turkey. Emerald Publishing Limited.
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