Marketing Mix Elements and Strategic Decisions in Holland and Barrett

This report analyses the marketing mix elements in Holland and Barrett's UK operations and illustrates about strategic decision and relevant taught theories in marketing efforts. It also evaluates the effectiveness of their marketing efforts through AIDA model and push and pull strategy. The report concludes with references.

Project

Table of Contents
INTRODUCTION ..........................................................................................................................4
MAIN BODY...................................................................................................................................4
Marketing mix elements in its UK operations............................................................................4
Overview of Company ....................................................................................................................4
Illustrate about strategic decision and relevant taught theories in marketing efforts..................7
Does/ can evaluate the effectiveness of marketing efforts........................................................11
REFERENCES..............................................................................................................................13

INTRODUCTION
Marketing refers to set of activities, processes, set of institutions, communicating,
creating, exchange offerings and delivering that have value for customers, partners, clients and
society at large. Marketing is important because it helps in promoting the business and mission
of an organisation. Its the role of marketing to reach out to prospects, investors and customers
while creating an image which represents the company in positive light(Barnes., 2016). In the
present report, Holland and Barrett is taken into consideration. It is an international world's
leading health and wellness retailers and also largest in Europe continent. It was established in
the year of 1870 and that is headquartered in England, UK. The present report covers analysis
about marketing mix elements in UK operations and also about strategic decisions and taught
theories in its marketing efforts. In addition to this, the present report covers analysis about
effectiveness of marketing efforts.
MAIN BODY
Marketing mix elements in its UK operations
Overview of Company
Holland and Barrett is a big retail company and it is a chain of healthy food shops with
around 1300 hundred stores in over 16 countries. The company was established in 1870 and is
headquartered in United Kingdom. The main motive of this organization is to serve best quality
products to consumer especially food based products. In this organization wide range of products
are available with affordable prices(Brennan and Kalsi., 2015).The other important role of this
organization is to check the quality of products before arranging items in their store. Because if
damaged items are arranged in display, then organization received negative feedback from
customers. And this is not good for company. But this company get high profit and revenue from
two products, first one is grocery items and other one is cloths. The other branches of this
organization are established in Netherlands, Belgium, China, Hong Kong, Saudi Arabia and so
on.

Marketing Mix -
It refers to focus on multiple areas as part of comprehensive marketing plan. It also helps
to develop the product from all areas which is very important to maintain product quality and
reputation of organization in market. (Buchan and et.al., 2019).The organization chosen for
using marketing mix method are Holland and Barrett. The areas which is consider by
organization for marketing plan are product, price, place and promotion. These areas are also
known as four P's of marketing which are described below -
 Product – It refers to manufacture or serve good quality product according to customer
need and wants. For preparing a proper solution for them as a product organization must
need to understand consumers properly. Main products of this organization are based on
natural, healthy and dietary supplements food products. Their items are available in
online mode also. In context to Holland and Barrett, they must provide proper training to
staff members regarding their product. It includes new food recipes, explanations of
different supplements, eating food in proper ways, all these are helpful to improve
customer health. These suggestions are provided by employees to consumer according to
their wants, needs and diet through offline and online mode.
 Price – It refers to fix the particular price of particular product which was decided by
both government and organization. In this stage it is necessary for organization that they
must fix average or affordable price for consumers. It also helped consumers for full their
basic needs easily such as purchasing grocery and food items. In this method company
facilitate customers to earn points through various schemes such as discount, by using
voucher and card also (Busse and et.al., 2017). It also helped to increase company's
profit. In context to Holland and Barrett, management must initiate proper pricing
strategies which is more affordable for consumers. And this method also helped to attract
them towards our product.
 Place – It refers to selection of area or place where products are easily distributed due to
some factors. Those factors includes culture and tradition, consumer habits, lifestyle and
so on. In short proper understanding of that particular area is important by organization
for distribute the product easily. The other main motive is to serve their healthy products
to all categories of people nationally because their items totally based on health concept.
In context to Holland and Barrett, management ensure that firstly target lower class

families where density is highly populated. Because in this class needs and wants are
always high and organization easily attract these type of people . And this helped to
increase the productivity in distribution process.
Promotion – It refers to increase the popularity of product between people through various
promotional activities. It advertising, sales promotion, direct selling and so on. It is also very
important for consumers because without promotional activities they did not get any information
regarding company and product(Calabi and Klein., 2017). Recently organization used very
effective promotion strategy with help of technology. The name of that strategy is Health Hub
Blog and in this method their employees share various useful information which is useful for
consumers. In context to Holland and Barrett, management must organize new promotional
activities which helps to increase productivity of organization.
Promotional mix: It is defined as combination of various marketing strategies that is used by an
organisation to communicate about its product and services along with benefits. In relation
to Holland & Barrett, it make use of advertising, sales promotion and direct marketing as an
effective element for promoting its brand.
Advertising – It refers to marketing communication activity between the manufacturer and user.
In advertisement messages are in a paid form by an organization and then these messages
send to consumers effectively. E.g. advertising in hoardings, digital and video advertising
through various actors and blogs. Advertising also helps to increase characteristics of
organization such as what type of atmosphere, ambience, structure are maintain in retail
store. Because without these elements customer not feel happy for buy the product. In
advertising most import thing is information which is provided company to consumer is
correct or not(Diehl and et.al., 2016). Because regarding product correct details of product
is very necessary for purchasing right product by consumers. If consumer received wrong
product then definitely customer comment negative word of mouth. And this leads to
reducing purchasing power of consumers, reduction in cost and so on. In context to
Holland and Barrett, management must ensure that information of product is right or not
before doing ad in form blogs, magazines, articles and so on.

Sales Promotion - It is a marketing strategy where business organization use short term
planning which is used to increase interest in consumers mind(Höglund and Falkenström.,
2018). Maintaining good behaviour with customers are the most important step for
employees sales promotion. Because without good behaviour employees didn't easily sell
their product which leads to reducing the profit. In this stage employees have more
responsibility to increase the sale of product with new creativity and unique ideas.
Employees are also responsible to influence consumer for buying particular product with
help of suggesting product special features. Before launching items in sales promotion
activity, they must confirm that functioning are totally different from others competitors
product. In this stage flexible targets are also important for employees because without
flexibility employees are not able to increase sales. In context to Holland and Barrett,
management must prepare favourable policies which helped to motivate employees. It
includes increment, bonus and so on.
Illustrate about strategic decision and relevant taught theories in marketing efforts.
Strategic marketing decisions are the decision which are taken as part of iterative process
of strategy development. In order to ensure a sustainable competitive advantage, a company
makes these decisions in response to the changing marketing environment dimensions. Strategic
marketing decisions are helpful in terms of developing products and services that provides an
organisation with higher profits(Lorenz., 2016). It is also helpful in terms of formulating the
plan of action and align about long and short term goals. From management perspective,
strategic decision making is different from daily choices which is taken on every day. In context
to Holland and Barrett, it is one of the leading chain of food and health shops on an international
level. In order to analyse competitive advantage, there are some marketing theories which needs
to be implemented:
AIDA Model:
AIDA model is a model which identifies about cognitive stages through which an
individual goes through during the process of buying for a product or service. This model stands
for attention, interest, desire and action. This model is also commonly used in digital marketing
where it uses public campaign and sales strategies as well.

Awareness: Under this head, it is about creating brand awareness and affiliation with products
and services. It is about use of those strategies which make buyers aware about products and
services (Matchaya and et.al., 2019). This head also covers discussion about use of platforms
and tools and the kind of message which company wants to deliver. With respect to Holland and
Barrett company, the marketing team needs to make sure that products and services should be
promoted in such a manner that it attracts the attention of customers on large scale.
 Interest:Once the consumer is aware that products and services exist then business have
to work on increasing interest level of potential customers. It is a very difficult step in
terms of creating interest if the products and services are not interesting(Mohammed and
et.al., 2015). For creating interest on large scale, it is necessary that advertising
information should be segregated into appropriate manner and also easy to understand
with interesting subheadings and illustrations. With respect to Holland and Barrett,
marketing team need to use simple language which customers can understand about their
Illustration : AIDA Model
Source : Essential marketing models http://BIT.LYSMARTMODELS

products and services. It needs to be implemented some innovative and creative factor for
purpose of increasing interest of customers.
 Desire: When consumer feel interested for products and services then next goal is to
make sure that consumers desire for it and move their mindset into different
manner(Needham., 2016). It is important that customers realise that why there is need to
promote products and services. With respect to Holland and Barrett, they have to
manufacture their healthy food on the basis of mapping customers desires through market
survey in products and services. For attaining competitive advantage, it would help in
terms of measuring out positive and negative preferences.
Advantages and disadvantages of AIDA model:
Advantages: It majorly focuses on four elements which are Awareness, Desire, Interest and
Action. This model is helpful in terms of maximising success of marketing efforts. This model is
supportive in terms of sorting the current marketing activities in each category to seee that
whether they are covering all the bases.
Disadvantages: The negative factor of AIDA model is that process of purchase decision is not
considered any more after it ends when a customer makes a purchase. There are some purchase
effects which remain unaffected such as dissatisfaction, customer ratings and recommendations.
Push and pull strategy in marketing
Push and pull strategy plays a very important role in marketing where push strategy is
that where pushing the brand in front of audiences. Pull marketing strategy is that where strategy
needs to be implemented which naturally draws consumer interest in brands and products.
 Push marketing is a kind of promotional strategy where businesses take their products
and services to the consumers. Push is that term which stems the idea which marketers
are attempting to push their products to consumers (Pelkmans., 2016). There are some
common tactics which are used by sales team which includes selling merchandise
directly to customers through showrooms and negotiate it with retailers to sell their
products for them.
 Pull marketing approach is totally opposite approach of push marketing. The target of
pull marketing is that customers come to you. The term pull marketing means where
marketers are attempting to pull customers in.

There are some common sales tactics which are used in pull marketing which includes mass-
media promotions, advertising sales promotions and word of mouth referrals(Phillips., 2018).
From perspective of business, pull marketing attempts to create loyalty of brand and keep
customers coming back. Businesses generally uses pull marketing when customers have
knowledge what they are looking for and which problems they need to solve. They need to pull
themselves towards solution as opposed to solution offered by the competitors.
Advantages and disadvantages of push and pull strategy
 Advantages of push strategy: The main advantage of push strategy is that it enables the
long-term planning, readily available stock, allows for more planning and control,
economies of scale. This type of strategy is commonly used to increase and gain product
exposure.
 Disadvantages of push strategy: The main disadvantage of push strategy is that it
requires an active sales team which is able to work with distributors and retailers. It has
poor negotiating power with distributors and retailers. When product is new into the
market then it is difficult to forecast demand into appropriate manner. One of the
disadvantage is that marketing efforts on initial level are likely to be expensive as they
are more focused on securing one time purchase than on building customer relationship
and loyalty.
 Advantages of pull strategy: This kind of marketing is considered as cost-effective
marketing because customers already know about the product they want to buy. For
promoting product, there is no requirement of creating advertisement on large scale.
Through pull marketing it is easier to build better customer engagement and also have the
ability to recognise customers profile (Tieman., 2017). Products can be sold on large
scale by targeting the advertisement to specific customer.
 Disadvantages of pull strategy: The major disadvantage of pull strategy is that it is
difficult to reach out to broad customers because when target market is already available
then products might not be appealing for those who are outside the group.

Does/ can evaluate the effectiveness of marketing efforts
Yes, it can be evaluated the effectiveness of marketing efforts. The effectiveness of
marketing efforts can be evaluated into positive manner with support of AIDA model and push
and pull strategy. AIDA model and push and pull strategy is supportive in terms of mitigating
the challenges and opportunities which exist in competitive market. AIDA model is helpful in
terms of determining the ways they should craft and also distribute marketing messages to their
target audience at every stage of buyer's journey(Raza and et.al., 2019).This model is considered
as hierarchy of effects model. It means that customer has to pass themselves from every stage to
complete its desired action. It can be applied into strategic manner within the marketing efforts
as communication model rather than decision-making model.
This model also guides companies at which period of time communication should be
done in every stage. Consumers generally uses different kinds of platforms, engage themselves at
different touch points and also require different information throughout the stages from different
sources. The main focus is on five parameters of this model where these parameters contribute
their role in terms of doing marketing. With support of push and pull strategy, it is easier to react
into efficient manner on changing customer demands. These strategies is also helpful in terms of
creating economies of scale within the existing operations. Push and pull strategy can be
implemented into successful manner by establishing foundation of sound systems and processes.
There are some examples of push and pull strategies which is helpful in terms of understanding
market efforts into positive manner. Display ads, billboards and direct marketing are some of the
examples of push marketing strategy. These examples is helpful in terms of building brand
image and promotion of company as well. Social media marketing, search engine optimisation
and blogs are the latest method of marketing under pull marketing strategy. These examples are
helpful in terms of attracting customers on large scale and promotion can be done into smarter
manner for getting popular within a limited period of time.
With perspective of Holland and Barrett company, these two models are helpful in terms
of increasing sales and productivity in market. To focus on promotional strategy, it is necessary
for Holland and Barrett company to analyse their products into appropriate manner. Brand
positioning is also helpful in this competitive market for achieving competitive advantage into
effective manner.

For getting popular among customers, Holland and Barrett company uses google strategy
which is 'see think-do. This process starts with brand awareness and then pushes people towards
purchase of products into positive manner. Their sales approach is based on target audience,
storyline and creativity. Their major focus is towards social media marketing where it comes
under pull strategy. These marketing efforts are helpful for the company in terms of their positive
growth and development. In this manner, marketing efforts can be evaluated of Holland and
Barrett company into positive manner.
CONCLUSION
The above stated report concludes that principles of marketing plays a very important
role in this business world. It has been concluded that marketing mix elements are very important
because it helps in terms of sustaining the company into long period of time. Marketing mix
support in terms of analysing each element into effective manner and also supportive in terms of
understanding market into positive way. It has been determined that strategic marketing
decisions are very necessary in terms of building a strong brand image and there are certain
models which are helpful in terms of understanding the market efforts. AIDA model and push
and pull strategies are helpful in terms of understanding the market efforts into positive manner.
The effectiveness of marketing efforts can be evaluated into positive manner and this can be
justified through support of AIDA model and push and pull strategies. These two models are
helpful in terms of understanding customers into deeper manner and also supportive in terms of
growth of an organisation into positive manner.

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