Marketing Process & Planning for Desklib Online Library

This report discusses marketing process and planning in the context of 21st century, roles of marketing functions, extended marketing mix for ASDA, and marketing plan for new luxurious range of own brand food products. It includes recommendations and situational analysis. The report is relevant for marketing students and professionals. Course code and college/university are not mentioned.

Marketing Process &
Planning

TABLE OF CONTENT
INTRODUCTION...........................................................................................................................3
PART 1............................................................................................................................................3
Marketing in 21st Century...........................................................................................................3
Role of Marketing Functions.......................................................................................................4
Marketing Functions Work and Interaction with Different Departments....................................4
Explaining Extended Marketing Mix For ASDA........................................................................5
Evaluating How ASDA's Marketing Mix Contributes to The Success of The Venture..............6
Recommendations........................................................................................................................7
PART 2............................................................................................................................................7
Strategic Marketing Plan Link with Organization's Objectives...................................................7
SMART Marketing Objectives....................................................................................................8
Marketing Research.....................................................................................................................8
Situational Analysis.....................................................................................................................8
Marketing Mix of New Product Line.........................................................................................10
Marketing Budget......................................................................................................................11
Tactical Actions.........................................................................................................................12
Control and Monitoring Measures.............................................................................................12
Media Plan.................................................................................................................................13
CONCLUSION..............................................................................................................................14
REFERENCES..............................................................................................................................15

INTRODUCTION
Marketing is a process undertaken by companies to promote sales and buying of products
and services provided by them. Marketing can be used for different purpose of company, like,
building brand image, boost sales, and introducing new produce. Process of marketing includes,
analysing, planning, organizing, implementing, controlling and follow-up. Marketing plan is a
strategy to achieve the set goals and objective of an organization in the target market. It also
helps determine the specific goal and understand the current market and its trends. It undertakes
the planning of PR campaign and outreach over a period. Market research and innovational
promotional supports a successful marketing plan.
In this following report, marketing would be discussed in the context of 21st century and
roles of marketing functions, marketing mix and its impact would be described as a Junior
Marketing analyst of ASDA. Furthermore, marketing plan for new “Luxurious” range of own
brand food products would be formulated.
PART 1
Marketing in 21st Century
Traditionally, marketing has revolved around television, cinema, radio and print media
but as the digital world has been evolved to the rise of social media. Television and cinema were
new to the markets of 80s and 90s when the advertisement breaks carried the company's
marketing campaigns with the print industry. Those mediums for marketing are still existing and
actively used by the organizations for different goals and purpose. In 21st century marketing has
evolved and involved the traditional and modern mediums used for marketing (Jovanov, 2017).
The rise of digitalization has gifted social media to the industry. Social media not only
replaced the meaning of entertainment but also for marketing medium. Social media and digital
platforms like different mobile application, software and blogging has been rising and used by
individuals as well as companies to increase their reach and engagement with the potential
customers (Lahtinen, Dietrich, and Rundle-Thiele, 2020). Communication is an integral part of
marketing without which they can not generate good network, with social media they can easily

create a better social network with their audience. It has enabled the companies to directly
interact with customers which creates better consumer-business relationship, this has also
allowed them to resolve issues on personal level and give better services to them.
Traditional media is no less of a good marketing medium but with active social media
and digital platform use the marketing strategy has enhanced. Hence, marketing in 21st century is
a mixture of both traditional and modern mediums to increase and promote buying and selling of
a company's products and service with many other objectives.
Role of Marketing Functions
There are seven main marketing functions and their roles:
 Promotions: The main marketing function is to promote the brand and the products or
services. As for ASDA, the main role of promotions would increase their product sales
and build brand reputation in the market for profit making.
 Selling: Although the main gaol is to achieve more and more sales but only pitching the
idea of buying the products can create wrong impression (Salili, Gharecheh, and HAJI,
2019). Firm balances what they pitch to their audience that will make their sales of rise
but their vision also creates a balance.
 Product or Service Management: Creating and introducing products that fill the gap
between consumer needs is the main role of products and service management. For
example, venture has adjusted for the need of online retailing to fill consumer needs and
increase product sales.
 Marketing Information Management: For better marketing a company needs
information of marketing. ASDA has many competitors in the UK market and the
research help them to determine marketing strategy (Salehi, and et.al, 2019).
 Pricing: Marketing research also inform about market prices of the similar products
which help them to set appropriate prices. As the company has competitors with similar
products, they set the prices that will be perceived for the value given by products.
 Financing: Marketing helps them generate more profit and those finances are managed
by marketing through expansion in different markets.

Marketing Functions Work and Interaction with Different Departments
 Operations Management/Production: Marketing functions are involved in market
research which will help to determine the production and designing of new products in
company like ASDA. Marketing information management and product management can
help them to manufacture products with quality and design that market demands. With
coordination between functions of marketing and the department of operations
management the volumes of order availability in market could meet timely (Naujoks,
2020).
 Finance Department: Finance management is very important for an organization and
the need for them to work closely with marketing department will help them know if
there are enough finance to carry out promotional activities as well as to know if there is
enough budget to meet the needs of distribution and research.
 Human Resource Management: Marketing function will determine the need of skills in
the department and according to that the Human Resource Department can recruit the
appropriate candidate to fill in that position. Human resource department will need to
work closely with them to ensure that staffing levels are place to create a competent and
ambitious team, production targets are meeting the goals.
Explaining Extended Marketing Mix For ASDA
Marketing mix is generally consists of four Ps, product, price, place, promotions. These
marketing mix are now extended to seven, three added Ps being, people, process, physical
evidence. The extended marketing mix are discussed below:
 Product: Products are tangible or intangible item offered by an organization to the
market (Eti, 2020.). ASDA is leading retailer offering range of different products from
groceries to clothing and mobiles.
 Price: Price affects the sales of a product and decided according to cost of production,
market average price and value of product. Firm offers range of products at reasonable
prices.
 Place: Place is company's distribution channels to reach market as well as the physical
location which can affect the sales and profit of company. ASDA is a rapidly growing
supermarket chain, specially after collaborating with Walmart.

 Promotions: Through promotions a company communicates with the consumers and
increase the sales and reach the organizational goals (Wu, and Li, 2018). For example,
Company set a goal to create brand reputation through commercials.
 People: This element of marketing mix refers to the personnel that represents and work
for the company, the employees, workers, CEO and all the staff that will interact with the
consumers. There are more than a hundred thousand people that work for ASDA.
 Process: Process involves the stages of marketing like planning, implementing,
controlling and tracking. This helps to create blueprint. ASDA has their own process by
which they operate.
 Physical Evidence: Theses are all the tangible commodities that the customers see,
furniture, equipments to product packaging and interior designing. Physical evidence of
supermarket includes its stores, website, logos, broacher and products.
Evaluating How ASDA's Marketing Mix Contributes to The Success of The Venture
Marketing mix helps an organization to determine marketing decisions which helps in
developing its strengths and rectify its weaknesses. The company offers range of products to its
customers from fresh and frozen food to groceries, clothings, leisure, home and entertainment
goods. They also provide financial services like Credit cards, travel money and insurance,
personal loans which helps them target a large market and gain more profit. The main strategy of
ASDA is to provide products that are affordable to their customers compare to the rest of the
competitors. They also provide price guarantee which further helps them gain customer trust (Al-
Fadly, 2020).
There are two distribution channels that are used by the supermarket; offline and online, with
hundreds of stores in the UK and their online website and platforms. The online retailing is
booming it helps them attract more customers. The company believes in going all out with their
promotions to boost their sales and gain profit. They use different mediums for advertisements
and use sponsorship as another way of promotion. They also provide funding to British athletes
for support.
ASDA provides both on and off-the-job training to its more than a hundred thousand
employees and pay extra wage for working overtime. This helps them create a better employee-
company relationship. They have set of activities that is performed to achieve goals. They

receive their products from suppliers and those are then organized on shelves for the customers.
Customers pick those products and use self-service machines for payments. Which builds trust
and ensure customer loyalty. Lastly, physical evidence are their logos, brochures, websites, its
own stores, product packaging and everything that is tangible and seen by the customers. This
build brand image and make company more accessible for the consumers.
Recommendations
There are many strategies used by ASDA as seen in the marketing mix. Here are some
recommendations that can be used by them:
 ASDA has main strategy of marketing to target the potential customers and that is to
provide products in low prices. Although the strategy does work, they should focus more
on the quality which will further help retain the customers.
 Distribution channels are well-developed into two main division, online and offline.
Online retailing is rising rapidly so, the company should increase their focus on that
division and expand their market to even larger audience.
 The presence of company in other countries specially in Asian market is non-existent.
Expansion of physical location will bring even more opportunities for marketing and
profit generation of the brand.
 Also, as social media promotions are in trend, the company should focus on that and
create even larger audience for the brand.
PART 2
Executive Summary:
ASDA's new luxurious rage of own brand food products launched to be Vegan food
products, aiming for superior taste, value and organic quality (Tatum, 2020). ASDA is aiming to
exceed customer's expectations in terms of both quality and prices by providing organic and
sustainable food products.
Strategic Marketing Plan Link with Organization's Objectives
The organization aims for a mission to be “Britain's best-value retailer exceeding
customer needs always”, and vision to respect for the individuals and strive for excellence. With
new brand food product line they would be providing luxurious quality of vegan products which

will be organic and sustainable supporting the world's mission to contribute to control
environment change and respect not only the individual but nature's needs (Freire, and Rudkin,
2019).
SMART Marketing Objectives
ASDA forms clear marketing objectives to achieve with the new line of brands. With the
new luxury food brand line they want to achieve these SMART objectives:
 Specific: To gain 70% of the market for vegan food industry by 4 years in UK.
 Measurable: Increase profit by 50% within 3 years.
 Attainable: To be leader among the competitors in vegan food industry.
 Relevant: To increase customer awareness about the vegan food industry.
 Time-Bound: Expand new brand to the stores in other countries within three months and
increase sales of it by 25% every six months.
Marketing Research
Marketing research will help the brand to get information about customers' needs that are
growing for vegan food lines, with that competitor's offered products would also be able assess
and more effective plans would be able to established. By marketing research ASDA will
discover the target market and where other competitor's have lacked so the company can fill the
gap in, additionally, the condition of distribution channels will also be able to assess
(Donndelinger, and Ferguson, 2017,). So, in result the luxury brand vegan food line would be
launched effectively.
Situational Analysis
Market analysis of new brand based on different analytical tools:
SWOT Analysis-
 Strengths: New luxurious vegan product line's biggest strength is its value for money
and the quality of organic and sustainability.
 Weaknesses: In a market like UK where most the people practice meat diets, company
can have difficult time in marketing as they lack experience.

 Opportunities: The growing surge of sustainable, organic products and vegan lifestyle
has brought many opportunities for the brand line and retaining and expansion would be
easier.
 Threat: Growing competition and a portion of audience being orthodox to vegan
alternatives are the biggest threat to the food line.
PESTLE Analysis-
 Political: The political stability in the UK market is in favour of new product launch.
 Economical: UK is one the biggest economy and increasing wages increases the expense
power of consumers which will help in selling of product.
 Social: The demands for vegan food has raised due to lifestyle changes of the youth, but
UK's older population is rising which can be a con for the product line.
 Technological: The product line would be heavily distributing from online distribution
channels as more conventional market has been created through technology.
 Legal: The company should be aware about every law and legislation regarding food and
beverage sector.
 Environmental: Environment has facing many negative impact and the vegan food line
will help to restore the damage.
5C Analysis-
 Company: The company will have sustainable competitive advantage as the product line
is organic and vegan, also they are one the market leaders which will rise the chances of
retention in the market.
 Collaborators: Company's supply chain reaches to Walmart which has good reputation
and will help them in reaching the audience.
 Customers: The company can aim to target potential customers according to
segmentation like Total available market, serviceable available market and serviceable
obtainable market.
 Competitors: The market of ASDA is highly competitive but the vegan food product
line is rather new with limited competitors.

 Context: Through PESTLE analysis it was found that the industries operating in UK has
advantages of political stability and economic growth, environment need of sustainable
product will also add values to the product line.
Market Segmentation-
Market segmentation helps to define better understanding of target audience and potential
consumers. The market is segmented into four segments.
 Demographic Segmentation: This market is segmented on the basis of sex, age, marital
status, occupation, income, race, nationality, religion, family size and education level.
Market of vegan food products is more acceptable and demanded by younger generation,
Millennials and adult Generation Z (Salehi, and et.al, 2020).
 Behavioural Segmentation: The market is segmented on the basis different behaviours
like online shopping habits, usage rate, loyalty, actions taken on a website and benefits
sought. It will tell the company how audience react and interact with the company.
 Geographic Segmentation: Based on location the consumer behaviour changes and their
demand also changes which make their classification different from each other. Changes
have to be made in product according to that.
 Psychographic Segmentation: These are similar to demographic segmentation, heavily
based on mental and emotional characteristics of consumers, how their lifestyle changes
and other factors affecting their needs.
Product Value-proposition-
The luxurious vegan food product brand line would not only give value as a substitute but
also for its quality. The company is aiming to make product and packaging of the product
sustainable. Products will be made with the aim of quality taste rather than just a substitute of
meat products. As the environment is suffering from all the plastic wastage and different
pollution the campaign would be making general awareness about the need of organic and
sustainable products, and also with criteria of tasty, and value for money.

Marketing Mix of New Product Line
 Product: The tangible vegan food product line is targeted to be valued for quality and the
range of different choices in the line will be its USP (Heide, and Altintzoglou, 2018).
 Price: As the luxurious food product line is working towards quality the prices will be
taken according to the value it provides with consideration of competitor's price.
 Place: The distribution channels of the company is divided into two, online and offline
which will also be applied for this product line (Trinh, Anesbury, and Driesener, 2017).
Physical location would be aim to be expanded rapidly.
 Promotions: The promotion of product line would be given more emphasis on social
media platforms and digital ways, targeting the youth. Other mediums like
advertisements on radio and television would also be done.
 People: The people that are involved in the company as staff and owners would be
actively participating in the marketing process of the latest product line.
 Process: The process of marketing that are, market research, planning, implementing,
controlling and tracking would be given special attention to keeping the vision and
mission alive.
 Physical Evidence: Everything that can be seen by the customers are physical evidence.
The logo and product packaging will be focusing on the sustainability to reach the
audience with better understanding of purpose.
Marketing Budget
Outline of money that a business intended to spend on the marketing related projects is
called marketing budget. Every company needs budget to carry out operations and make budget
plans to spend it effectively. ASDA's outlined marketing budget planned is given below:
Resources Cost £
Online and Social Media Advertisement 1000
Marketing Research 500
Print Advertisement 100
Radio 150
Sales Training 100

Catalogues & Brochures 55
Conventions 75
Video Advertisements 2100
Total 4080
Tactical Actions
The company has to survive and retain the new product line's position in the market for
which they need to take some measures. In order to make the new vegan food product line
successful, the following tactics would be used by them:
 Social Media Promotions: In the era of digitalization and technological advancement
the social media usage for entertainment purpose as well as promotional purpose has
raised, and as the target consumers of the product line is youth the best way to promote
and retain the product line in the market would be social media (Nistor, 2019).
 Constant Market Research: The competition in the food and beverages business is
increasing every day, so it is important for up-gradation in the products and services in a
company. Constant market research will help the product line to know the constant
changing demands of consumers and would be able to fulfil the needs.
 Customer Feedback and Follow Up: For any product the last straw is always customer
feedback. It will be the final review that will ensure the sustainability. Through customer
feedback and quick follow-ups, the new product line will try to meet customer
expectations and even exceed it.
Control and Monitoring Measures
After implementing every marketing plan, it is important to monitor and control to ensure
achievements of objectives. To measure it, there are metrics such as:
 Return on Marketing Investment: It is marketing metrics used to measure effectiveness
of online marketing campaign. To examine result on the basis of set objectives this
measure is used. It could be classified as a subcategory of return on investment.

 Customer Lifetime Value: This measure can be by company to know the total value
they can expect to earn of a given customer relationship throughout the lifetime. It can
show customer's success operations' impact on company revenue.
 Net Promoter Score: This metric directly relies on customer data's voice and customer
feedback. This score is based on responses of customers on NPS that consists on set of
questions based on one, that is “the likeliness they will recommend the company/product
to their acquaintances.”
Media Plan
The following is the media plan and budget that will support the launch and retention of
vegan food product line:-
Media Budget-
For brand promotions in different media a specific plan for budget management is done below:
Resources Cost £
Owned Media 250
Social Media 500
Video Advertisement 850
Marketing Platforms 200
Creative/Graphic Designer 200
Total 2000
Recommendations For Selected Multi-media Activities-
The brand is focusing on social media promotions the most as the target audience is
youth, and they are most active on those platforms. The strategy used by the company is great for
their profit making, but they can target older generation too by creating general awareness about
the product (Majid, and et.al, 2019). They should also invest in media that reached older
generation as UK has seen rise in older population in past years, so they can target a larger
market.
Digital, Offline and Social Media Channels For Communication-

There are many new surging digital and social media channels that can help them target
the market. The digital and social media platforms like Instagram, Facebook, twitter, Tik-Tok
and YouTube are some to be named. Offline media like television, print and radio are some well-
known traditional media platforms.
Justifying Multi-media Plan Based on Qualitative and Quantitative Criteria-
According to the discussed plan of multi-media promotions, social media was found to be
most effective. The audience that is being targeted by the supermarket consume the digital social
media platforms most and through that effective brand recognition among them could be
established. These platforms will also be helpful to get feedbacks directly through the customers
which will further help the brand to grow in the market.
CONCLUSION
In conclusion of this report, according to 21st century marketing, it is a mixture of both
traditional and modern ways of promotions and planning to achieve set goals. The roles of
marketing functions were discussed and with effort of each function's success of organization
goals is possible. ASDA's marketing mix and its impact of organizational success was also
discussed. It was recommended them to focus on quality too and increase the usage of online
distribution channel, additionally, expansion of market to other countries was also suggested to
them.
For ASDA's launch of new 'Luxurious' range of vegan food product line a marketing plan
was made. Through social media and digital platforms the company will target its potential
customers who are the Youth. The marketing budget and media budget was also made and
strategical analysis made a complete report of plan.

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