Marketing Management: Organizational Environment Analysis of Marks and Spencer

This report analyzes the organizational environment of Marks and Spencer, a British multinational retailer specializing in clothing, home products, and food products. The report includes a SWOT analysis, PESTLE analysis, and Porter's five forces model. It also evaluates the company's STP approach and marketing mix, and provides recommendations for the company. The report is relevant for marketing management courses.

Marketing Management

Contents
INTRODUCTION.................................................................................................................................3
MAIN BODY........................................................................................................................................3
Organizational environment by applying environmental analysis tools.............................................3
Analysing the STP approach of the company....................................................................................8
Marketing mix of company.............................................................................................................10
Recommendations to the company..................................................................................................11
CONCLUSION...................................................................................................................................11
REFERENCES....................................................................................................................................13

INTRODUCTION
Marketing management refers to the management which focuses on the organizational
discipline and used to have practical application on the marketing orientation, techniques and
methods which are used in the organization. The role of marketing management is to convert
the potential customers in to the actual and targeted customers. This project is based on the
Marks and Spencer which is the British multinational retailer having its headquartered in
London, England. The organization is specializing in selling clothing, home products and the
food products. The report will outline the organization environment by applying the various
environmental tools that are PESTLE analysis, SWOT analysis, Porter’s five forces model,
etc. which makes the company to know about its opportunities and threats. Further this report
will outline the STP approach which will evaluate the segmentation, targeting and positioning
of the organization. At last this report will outline the marketing mix of the company by
evaluating the 4 P’s and recommendations to the company.
MAIN BODY
Organizational environment by applying environmental analysis tools
Effectiveness of marketing strategy
The company used to choose its marketing strategy carefully as it makes the company
to have advertisement campaign by having the digital marketing and also having the store
strategy (Morgan and et.al., 2019). It basically uses the print media, TV ads, Mobile ads and
other social media platform in order to have good marketing of company.
SWOT analysis of company
Strengths: There are some of the strengths of the company which helps the
organization in order to earn the good amount of revenue. The organization is in the market
for the last 136 and by this it has the well experience in the business of retail in United
Kingdom. It is one of the recognized brands and used to provide the quality of products to
their customers in the competitive market. The organization used to sell its products offline
that means on stores and online also which increases the profits of company (Hajizadeh,
2019). The company used to sell the variety of products to its customers and used to have the
latest and updated technologies in order to have their production faster and increase
profitability.

Weaknesses: With having strength the organization has some weak points which used
to decreases the profits of the company. By seeing the record in 2019 it is observe that the
stores of the organization is declining the sales of the company. This is because of the low
supply chain system and non-availability of the products in the competitive market. As there
were great demands in the festive the and due to pandemic the company was not able to have
new products in the market (Wang and Wang, 2020). By this company has made the huge
loss in the offline market as all the makes were closed and there were no sales of products.
Opportunities: The organization has the lots of opportunity in order to come back and
to have the great increase in the profits. Marks and Spencer is the big multinational brand so
it can expand its market globally. The cited organization has opened its stores in the countries
like India, Russia, Brazil, Poland and Indonesia. By seeing this, the company has an
opportunity in order to expand its market in the various other countries where it can earn
good profits. The company is having the online market but the organization is not more
famous so it must enhance e-commerce stores. By having the retail market online the
company can earn more profit (SWOT analysis (strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and
threats analysis), 2022). As due to pandemic and busy schedule of the people so by this they
can purchase online products. This makes the company to have the lower cost in order to
expand its market online and makes the company to earn good revenue.
Threats: The Company is the biggest retail market in the United Kingdom and having
the lots of competition with the other brands. Some of its competitive brands are Amazon,
Tesco, ASDA, Sainsbury, Morrison, etc. The cited organization must change its strategy in
order to sell its products and have unique and different strategy from its competitors. As if the
company would not change its strategy than the market share of the company will be
decreasing on continuous basis (Ervural and et.al., 2018). In order to overcome with this
threat the company must adopt the new strategies in order to have better marketing in the
market.
PESTLE Analysis of the company
In the today’s economy it is very important for the company to examine the external
environment of the company which makes them know about the new factors that are affecting
and helping business (SWOT analysis (strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threats
analysis), 2022). By doing PESTLE analysis of the organization can do the external analysis

and make them know about the factors impacting business. The factors of PESTLE analysis
are as follows:
Political factors: The political factors include the tax policies, environmental
regulation, trade restrictions, trade tariffs, reforms and the political stability. These factors use
to determine that up to which extent the government used to influence the industry or the
organization (Achinas and et.al., 2019). Some trade barriers use to put hindrance on the
trading and ruin the business of the company. Marks and Spencer is the big brand and have
more than 1300 stores across the world which helps the company to have freely travelled of
their goods without any trade restrictions. The organization has the big support of the
government as the company has fair means of trade practices.
Economic factors: Economic factors are the factor which includes the economic
growth rates, interest rates, inflation rates, minimum wages rate, working hours,
unemployment rates, cost of living, etc. These factors used to determine the economy’s
performance that used to have direct impact on the company and affects the profitability of
the company (Christodoulou and Cullinane, 2019). The rise in the inflation can affect the
companies which are operating in many economies of world. In United Kingdom the fiscal
and monetary policies are properly managed by the government and have maintained in order
to low the rates of inflation. The fiscal policies and it crisis can decrease the demand of the
products of the cited organization. Because of this there were many job cuts and created a
problem of unemployment. The recession in the country has also affected the as company
was not able to give discounts at the time of eves.
Social factors: These factors include cultural norms, health consciousness, population,
age distribution, career attitudes, health and safety, etc. These stated factors sometimes help
the company in order to have good market analytics and to make strategy for their company.
In the past years the company want to raise its market by changing up with the trends in the
markets (Nandonde, 2019). As purchase of the customers are influences by the cultural,
social, personal and psychological changes in the competitive market. The company has
changes its clothing with having the good market analytics which helps the company to sold
more and have good profitability.
Technological factors: Technological factors are the factors which includes the
innovation and developments in the technologies. The up dated technologies and machine
learning helps the organization to have faster production of their products. The technological

factors include change in technology, evolution in infrastructure, government and
institutional research. The cited organization has announced the transformation in the
technology that will help the company in order to produce the products faster which can
reach to the diversified customers. This is created by the company in order to have and design
the faster growth that would have great result for the company. The organization is very
focused upon the simplification and consolidation of the supplier base. The cited organization
must understand about the role of the new and innovative technology in order to have the
successful operation.
Legal factors: Legal factors are refers to the factors which include the change in
legislation, access to material, resources, import or export, quotas and taxation. These factors
affect both the internal and external sides of the business. There are certain laws which have
an impact on the environment of the business in the country. The legislation that is laws and
policies roe used to change on the continuous basis. The organization used to have the
training sessions in order to have safety related to new laws and policies which can affect the
profitability of the business. As the company has not focused on the issues that were
happened in the market which makes the company to pay fine for almost 50000 pounds for
the each offence done by them.
Environmental factors: These factors are mainly concerned with the effect of the
surrounding’s environment and it also affects the ecological aspects. It includes the waste
disposal laws, environmental protection laws and other environmental laws. The elements of
the environment that are affecting the environment of the company is related to the change in
the climatic conditions. As climate changes on continuous basis and usually affects the
profitability of the company. The company used to establish its own Green Policy that the
used to call the ‘Plan A’ which makes the company to have positive impact on business.
Porter’s five forces of the company
Porter’s five forces analysis is basically the macro tool which used focus on the macro
tool of the business as it used to take the economy as a whole. By analysing this tool it makes
the company to know about is profitability and competitive power in the economy (Bruijl,
2018). Understanding this tool makes the company to have the good and better strategies and
helps the company to make the good decisions. The five forces that used to affect the
business activities of the organization are as follows:

1. Competitive rivalry: This force helps the company to examine the competition of
the company in the workplace. It basically used to consider the number of existing
competitors of the company in the market. Rivalry competition will be high it
there are just few organizations dealing in the same type of product or services in
the market (Baxter, 2019). As because of this the customers can easily switch to
the other brands where they get better products. The competitor’s rivalry of the
organization is high as there is threat of substitutes of the products and the
suppliers in the market can control this. The cited organization was used to face
the threat of competition as there were new entry of the organization dealing in the
same quality of products and services and bring the products with the same prices.
2. The bargaining powers of suppliers: This forces analysis makes the company to
know about the suppliers and its control over the prices in the market. It also
accesses the number of suppliers supplying their raw material and the other
resources available in the market (Kabeyi, 2018). The businesses are in the better
position when they used to have the more suppliers, as it makes easy for them to
purchase raw material at good rate. More than 90 % of the Marks and spencer
were the British. As M & S were directly from the UK suppliers who used to
purchase stock from the manufacture. The bargaining power of the supplier is
basically quite low of the company because the organization was used to purchase
the raw material from few suppliers only.
3. The bargaining power of customers: This force of the model used to examine the
bargaining power of the customers in the market and their effect on the pricing
and quality of the product. The customers have the power in order to bargain the
when they are lots of seller of the same products in the market. On the other hand
the buying of the customers are low when there is seller or small amount of the
sellers selling the same quality of products and have different in the quality of
products. As it is seen that the bargaining power of the buyers are always high. As
consumers used to seek the classical clothing and become price sensitive or
having brand image and become fashion sensitive. The organisation used to focus
on their customers which make tem to have targeted customers. The customers of
the UK are used to have premium prices in order to support British products and
they wanting the low prices products with high quality.
4. The Threats of new entrants in market: This force of the model use to consider
that how it is difficult or easy for the competitors in order to enter in the

competitive market. The easier for the other organization to enter the market, the
more risky for the entered market to survive with the new organizations. It is hard
for the cited company to have a new entrant in the market as in order to enter in
this market it require high capital and cost of entry and maintenance. The
organization has well experience in their work as it has been for long time. The
company has many distribution channels which provide them cost advantage and
knowledge in their field. The cost of new entrant is very low due to high capital
and confidence of the customers on the retailer’s products, this used to have
barriers to entry. The barriers to entry basically include the cost advantages,
access to inputs, economies of scale and the high brand identity.
5. The threat of substitutes of products or services: This force of the model used to
examine that how easy for the customers in order to asitch from one product to
another product. It basically used to examine the number of competitors and
mostly their prices and quality compared in order to compare with another
business. The threat of substitutes is done by the customers as they use to switch
from the product where they get same products at lower rate. It is seen that the
customers used to get same product but there is difference in the quality of the
products (Sukma, Lubis and Utami, 2019). Having substitution will decrease or
reduce the demand for the customers as customers switch to the alternatives. As
company is retailer in clothes the other companies used to copy the quality and
design of the products. The customers in the market are used to pay premium for
the brand or they can buy those similar products at the lower rate in the market.
Thus it shows that the threat of substitutes is high of the Marks and Spencer.
Analysing the STP approach of the company
STP approach is the acronym for the Segmentation, Targeting and Positioning that
used to examine the products or services and also used to examine that how the organization
communicate the benefits of their products to the customers. This approach used to focus on
the more valuable segments of the organization and also helps in developing the marketing
mix and positioning strategy for the particular segments. The more personalized and targeted
the marketing efforts of the company will be the more successful the company will be. While
evaluating the targeting and position strategy the organization must also evaluate their
potential customers and attract the customers by showing them detail about their products.
The STP approach of the company is as follows:

Segmentation: This process of segmentation describes about the distinctive and
common characterises between the people in the competitive market. It allows the
organization in order to develop the more relevant and engaging marketing campaigns (Shah,
Azhar and Bhutto, 2019). This makes the company to know and identify about the specific
desire of the people in the market. This makes the organization to have more focus on the
people and used to deliver the desire products of the individual or groups. The segmentation
of the market can be done on various factors that are demographics, geography,
psychographics, values, life stages and behaviours of the people. It is basically the subset of
the market that is made up of the people having one or more same traits that use to have
similar demand of products and services in the market. The products and services of the
organization are based on the price, quality, function, etc. The cited organization must focus
on this segmentation and used to divide its market into few segments. Marks and Spencer
used to divide its customers on few parameters.
Targeting: In this next step the organization will look on the segments and will
identify the best opportunities for their successful business. The organization must evaluate
the segment and target the customers by having the campaign in the market (Ing, Osman and
Tze-Yi, 2020). The stage of targeting is basically about the identifying the best opportunities
in order to use the customer data and the customers insights that the company used to gain
during the segmentation stage. By having this, the organization can have the customers
journey and will create the more relevant marketing campaigns.by having the ethical business
the organization is running the successful business throughout the world. But still they have
to maintain some market oriented target in order to have market stability in the organization.
By evaluating the opportunities and threat the company can make their budget and target the
accessible to them. If the decided target is not achievable than the organization must think of
an alternative target in order to be successful in the competitive market.
Positioning: After targeting, the organization should consider positioning that will
help the business in order to respond to the need and desire of the customers that can be
fulfilled by the product. By using the customer segmentation the organization can change the
product positioning. By having the targeted audience the company can have the best product
positioning of their products in the market. In order to make the clothing and food business
more successful the cited organization needs to plan more in order to take bets action. As th
company is used to sell the cloths and food they used to improve the quality of their food

products and p must provide fresh food products to the customers. By having proper
positioning the company can used to sell more products in the market.
Marketing mix of company
Marketing mix refers to the multiple areas that used to focus on the part of the
comprehensive planning of the business. These are basically the set of actions that the
company uses in order to promote its brand and product in the market. It includes the 4 P’s
that are: Price, Product, Promotion and Place. The below describes the 4 P’ s of the
organization which help them to lead in the market:
Price: Price is main element of the marketing mix which used to describe that on what
price the customers will buy the products. The marketers of the company must link the
products reality and with their perceived value which makes the customers to but that
product. In some business organization they used to have high costs of their products in order
to maintain the brand image of their company. The marketers of the company must recognize
and give the discounts whenever it is appropriate. By giving discounts it attracts the
customers to buy more products (Nikbin and et.al., 2021). But it may be drawback for the
company as people used to think that selling the products at the lower rate results to have low
quality of products. Marks and spencer used to sell brand cloths for men, women and kids at
the price between medium to higher as it used to sell category to the premium quality. The
company use to follow the dynamic pricing strategy and provides discounts to their
customers in order to finish the old stock and selling at the lower price.
Product: Product refers to the goods or services that the company offers to sell to their
customers. The company should sell that product that use to fulfil the demands of their
customers. In order to be successful in the market the company must understand the life cycle
of the product and must have good plans in order to deal with the every stage of the products.
As the cited organization is the popular and the top retail brand situated in the UK it has good
product portfolio in order to have market stability. The company used to offers products like
Blazers, cardigans, jeans, linen, skirts and in foot wears like boots, sandals, loafers, heels, etc.
The organization also used to sell the home and furniture section which basically includes the
home accessories, furniture of bedroom, living room, dining rooms etc. M & S also sells the
house brands rather than selling the international brand. The company used to provide
donation in the year 2021, to the needy people who has been impacted by the pandemic.

Place: The Company must make the best decision regarding the place of selling the
products. They must have their stores at the place which used to attract the customers in order
to go and have purchase of their products. The placement of the products in the stores is also
play the vital role in the selling the products of the company. However in some cases the
placement is related to having the best advertisements on the television or on the social media
platforms. The organization is the international brand which used to have more than 1000
stores which are operating in more than 50 countries. The company used to have its own
website on the social media where the customers can by the products and have the home
delivery of the products. M & S also used to provide the international delivery of the some
products in the other countries.
Promotion: Promotion used to include the advertising, having good public relation
and also to have food promotional strategy. The goal of the company in order to promote the
business is to know about their products to the customers and also to know about the prices of
the products. The marketers used to do placement and promotion together and make their
products reach to the customers. The company always chooses the best marketing strategy in
order to do advertisements of their products. It used to provide the common medium of
communication for all the customers in the market. The company used to have the season sale
which used to promote the products and by this the organization makes the loyal customers.
Recommendations to the company
1. It is recommended to the company that they must have and change their products
according to the changes in trends in the markets. These make the customers to
attract towards the organization as it will be having trending products.
2. It is also suggested to the company that it go for the style rather than going and
changing for the fashion. In order to be success the company must sell the styling
products of clothing to their customers.
3. It is recommended that the company should focus on the quality of the products
not on the price of the products. Y selling good quality it automatically attracts the
customers to buy that product.
CONCLUSION
From the above report it is concluded the organizational environment of the
organization by applying the various environmental tools that are PESTLE analysis which
used to make the company know about the political, economic, social, technological, legal ad

environmental factors. It also describes the SWOT analysis which evaluates the strengths,
weaknesses, opportunities and threats. The another external tool for analysing external
environment is Porter’s five forces model which includes the threat of new entry, substitutes
products, bargaining power of customers and suppliers. Further this report has evaluated the
STP approach which will evaluate the segmentation, targeting and positioning of the products
the organization. At last this project has evaluated the line the marketing mix of the company
by evaluating the 4 P’s and recommendations to the company.

REFERENCES
Books and journals
Achinas, S. and et.al., 2019. A PESTLE analysis of biofuels energy industry in
Europe. Sustainability. 11(21). p.5981.
Baxter, G., 2019. A strategic analysis of Cargolux Airlines International position in the global
air cargo supply chain using Porter’s Five Forces Model. Infrastructures. 4(1). p.6.
Bruijl, G. H. T., 2018. The relevance of Porter's five forces in today's innovative and
changing business environment. Available at SSRN 3192207.
Christodoulou, A. and Cullinane, K., 2019. Identifying the main opportunities and challenges
from the implementation of a port energy management system: A SWOT/PESTLE
analysis. Sustainability. 11(21). p.6046.
Ervural, B. C. and et.al., 2018. An ANP and fuzzy TOPSIS-based SWOT analysis for
Turkey’s energy planning. Renewable and Sustainable Energy Reviews. 82. pp.1538-
1550.
Hajizadeh, Y., 2019. Machine learning in oil and gas; a SWOT analysis approach. Journal of
Petroleum Science and Engineering. 176. pp.661-663.
Ing, P., Osman, Z. and Tze-Yin, L., 2020. Marketing Mix and STP Strategies: An
Exploratory Study into Grocery Retailers in Malaysia. Asian Journal of
Entrepreneurship. 1(4). pp.129-143.
Kabeyi, M. J. B., 2018. Michael porter’s five competitive forces and generetic strategies,
market segmentation strategy and case study of competition in global smartphone
manufacturing industry. IJAR. 4(10). pp.39-45.
Morgan, N. A. and et.al., 2019. Research in marketing strategy. Journal of the Academy of
Marketing Science. 47(1). pp.4-29.
Nandonde, F. A., 2019. A PESTLE analysis of international retailing in the East African
Community. Global Business and Organizational Excellence. 38(4). pp.54-61.
Nikbin, D. and et.al., 2021. Marketing mix strategies during and after COVID-19 pandemic
and recession: a systematic review. Asia-Pacific Journal of Business Administration.
Shah, S. A., Azhar, S.M. and Bhutto, N.A., 2019. Halal marketing: a marketing strategy
perspective. Journal of Islamic Marketing.
Sukma, D., Lubis, P. H. and Utami, S., 2019. Analysis of Marketing Strategy of Minyeuk
Pret Using STP, Ansoff Matrix, and Marketing Mix.
Wang, J. and Wang, Z., 2020. Strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threats (Swot)
analysis of china’s prevention and control strategy for the covid-19
epidemic. International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health. 17(7).
p.2235.
Online
SWOT analysis (strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threats analysis). 2022. [Online ].
Available through: <https://searchcio.techtarget.com/definition/SWOT-analysis-
strengths-weaknesses-opportunities-and-threats-analysis>

What is PESTLE Analysis? Everything you need to know about it. 2022. [Online ]. Available
through: <https://www.analyticssteps.com/blogs/what-pestle-analysis>