Marketing & Management: A Study on Metro Bank

This report analyzes the marketing environment of Metro Bank, discussing the importance of customer needs, wants and demands, technological and economic factors, competitor analysis, and the bank's marketing mix. The report highlights key findings and offers insights into the subject.

Running head: MARKETING & MANAGEMENT
Assignment 1
Marketing & Management
Student’s name:
Name of the university:
Author’s note:

1MARKETING & MANAGEMENT
Table of Contents
Overview of Metro Bank.................................................................................................................2
Outlining the purpose of the report..................................................................................................2
Task 1: Needs, wants and demands.................................................................................................3
a. Explaining the importance of customers’ needs, wants and demands.....................................3
b. Discussing the needs, wants and demands of customers that Metro Bank offer.....................3
Task 2: Marketing environment.......................................................................................................4
a. Explaining the relevance of a situation analysis......................................................................4
b. Identifying and discussing one technological and one economic factor that can impact Metro
Bank.............................................................................................................................................5
c. Outlining the importance of competitor analysis in marketing................................................6
d. Identifying three key competitors of Metro Bank....................................................................6
e. Discussing the findings of the competitor analysis, highlighting key areas for Metro Bank. .7
Task 3: Marketing mix.....................................................................................................................8
a. Using the7p’s of Marketing identify and describe Metro Bank’s current marketing mix.......8
Summaries the reports key findings..............................................................................................10
Reference List................................................................................................................................11

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Overview of Metro Bank
Metro Bank Plc is a retail bank operating in the UK and it was the first new high street
bank to launch in the country over 100 years. It was founded by Vernon Hill in the year 2010 and
it is worth noting that, the bank is listed on London Stock Exchange and is an integral part of
FTSE 250 index. The institution aims to open between 200 and 250 stores in the entire Greater
London within 10 years of starting up. However, at the present time, the organisation has near
about 55 stores in the United Kingdom (Metrobankonline.co.uk 2017). The product range of the
bank includes consumer bank, credit cards and corporate banking and based on the entire
banking operation, the net income of the institution as per the statistics of 2017 is around £ 10.8
million and the annual revenue can be shown in the figure of £ 293 million (as per 2017
statistics). As per the Daily Telegraph, the bank had increased its account holders by more than
50% in the first half of 2013 and the total customer accounts had reached to 200,000 (including
near about 15,000 business accounts).
Outlining the purpose of the report
The aim of the study is to develop a marketing plan by recognizing the needs,
requirements and demands of the potential customers. For this reason, the purpose of the report
is to analyze the marketing environment by identifying and discussing the impact of
technological and economic factors upon the Metro Bank's business operations. This particular
study will further discuss the importance of competitor's analysis for developing a significant
marketing strategy which is essential to stay competitive in the market. Further, the report will
highlight the marketing mix by considering 7P’s for the Metro Bank as it is worth mentioning
that, marketing mix helps an organisation to develop potential marketing plan and strategy.

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Task 1: Needs, wants and demands
a. Explaining the importance of customers’ needs, wants and demands
An organisation tries to understand the needs, wants and demands of the customers in
order to be successful in the market. As stated by Bowen and Chen McCain (2015), the
customers’ needs are the states of deprivation. The needs can be physical products such as food,
clothing, safety and shelter. The needs of the customers can be explained as the basic desires of
the customers. The customers struggle sometimes in order to articulate the needs and the
customers’ needs can change quickly with the time. Social needs of the customers can be
belonging and affection.
Customers’ wants can be defined as the desired by the customers those are not required
for them to survive. Therefore, customers’ wants are the opposite of the needs of the customers
as needs can be essential of the customers. Customers want that the organisation can become
integral in order to know the wants of the customers.
Moreover, according to Kurtz and Boone (2013), if the customers are able to purchase the
needs and wants, it means the customers have their demands for the needs and wants. Customers'
demands must be met by the organisation and the organisations can the expectations of the
customers or exceeding those.
b. Discussing the needs, wants and demands of customers that Metro Bank offer
Customers need the banking process to be understood in the proper way as the customers
need to perfectly share the data with the bank so that the customers can enjoy the benefits of
digital banking (Adamati and Hellwig 2014). Customers need great value from the Metro Bank
from the financial products and services like share, credit card and debit card. The customers

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need digital banking service in their mobile app or on the desktop. High-value financial products
and services can attract the tech-savvy generation of banking customers.
Customers want banking process to be easy and customers want to access the service and
products to be seamless and simple. Basic banking tasks must be unified and simple and
customers want multiple options to do the banking. The customers want the banking to be done
through physical stores, through mobile, through tablets or any digital medium. Metro Bank
keeps open its service on 7days in a week and customers can open a bank account on the very
first visit.
Customers demand that banking institutions must understand the needs of financial help,
loans and mortgage that can help the customers to demand in future. Finally, the customers of
Metro Bank demand the great value of services and products on the nearby stores that open from
8 am to 8 pm on weekdays. Metro Bank provides same rates and charges for each service
without small print.
Task 2: Marketing environment
a. Explaining the relevance of a situation analysis
Each profit organisation aims to gain business growth in terms of financial profitability
and thus, companies try to develop such products or services that can meet the customer’s trends
and preferences. According to the viewpoint of (Babin and Zikmund 2015), an organisation
needs to understand own strengths and weakness so that, it becomes possible for the company to
develop such products that are profitable for the company. Hence, the situational analysis is
required to meet all the requirements and the understanding. Situational analysis refers to the

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process and methods that the management utilise in order to analyse the internal as well as an
external environment for gaining in-depth knowledge regarding firm's capability.
b. Identifying and discussing one technological and one economic factor that can impact
Metro Bank
Technological factor:
In the retail banking sector, technology leverages its own importance in bringing
competitive advantage. Customers are sharing their own personal details and store money in their
accounts by performing online banking. Thus, it is important for the Metro Bank to focus on the
cyber-security. As opined by (Bell and Hindmoor 2015), the number of cyber-crimes is
increasing day-by-day and thus, it is essential for the banking sector to utilise the information
technology at its fullest so that it becomes possible for them to provide an improved and secure
services to the customers. Metro Bank spends significantly on the maintenance of the
technological infrastructure and Metro Bank provides customers with apps and common features
to use on Smartphone. This technological innovation and development will be blessing for Metro
Bank to increase customer base.
Economical factor:
The introduction of Brexit has a significant impact on the economic condition of the
population. The market is facing a high rate of inflation. According to Dibb (2017), the price of
commodities are enhancing day-by-day and thus, the people are facing an economic downturn at
the present time-frame. In this relation, it can be shown that the current GDP growth rate in the
United Kingdom is near about 0.4% while the rate of inflation is around 3%. Thus, it can be

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stated that the people are showing less interest in saving their money and thus, in this time of
economic downturn, the banking industry is affected negatively.
c. Outlining the importance of competitor analysis in marketing
Competitor analysis allows an organisational entity to view the pricing strategy and the
offerings of the competitors through comparison. According to the viewpoint of Belch et al.
(2014), competitive analysis is just one of the first steps in an organisation’s planning and
researches but it a fundamental component in establishing an effective marketing plan. A prime
objective of the competitor analysis is to be able to understand competitor’s response towards the
market and to the competitive changes as well. Thus, competitive analysis facilitates counter
response strategies and scenario planning for minimising the risk and assisting with the
implementation of own plans and strategies. With the help of competitor analysis, the concerned
organisation Metro Bank becomes able to understand what the major competitors are in the
domestic market and what their marketing strategies are.
d. Identifying three key competitors of Metro Bank
Barclays HSBC Holdings Lloyd Banks
Number of branches
in the UK
Barclays has near
about 1464 stores in
the entire United
Kingdom
This particular bank
has near more than
940 branches
It is one of the major
competitors of Metro
Bank and it has
around 1219 stores in
the UK.
USP Barclays has an
experience of more
than 300 year
All banking needs
convenient credit
cards, home loans and
Door-to-door banking

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business account
across the globe
Revenues Around £3.54 billion
(as per the statistics of
2017)
Near about £ 51.445
billion (as per the
statistics of 2017)
£ 17.5 billion
Customer base (All
across the globe)
More than 48 million 38 million Around 30 million
Market value £ 43.6 billion More than £ 120
billion
£ 53.0 billion
Number of employees Total number of
employees is near
about 119,300
Around 220,000 More than 45,000
Table 1: Competitors’ analysis of Metro Bank
(Source: Self-developed)
e. Discussing the findings of the competitor analysis, highlighting key areas for Metro Bank
Based on the above competitors’ analysis table, it can be marked that, all the three banks
have strong market value in comparison to the concerned organisation Metro Bank. Further, it is
worth noting that, the Barclays has a strong customer base of near about 48 million customers
where the concerned organisation Metro Bank has near about 1 million customers in the UK
(Singh 2016). Further, both the banks named Lloyd and HSBC holdings to have a huge number
of branches in the entire UK whereas the Metro has only 55 stores in the UK (Glynos et al.
2015). However, the company aims to open 250 stores by the year 2020 and this will be one of
the strongest parts of the concerned organisation. Further, it can be mentioned that the annual

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revenue of all the three banks are high and thus, it becomes possible for the banks to hold a
significant percentage of market share in the market of UK (Wallnöfer and Hacklin 2017). Apart
from this, the above-held marked table shows that each of the three banks has a number of
employees. Barclays and Lloyd have large customers segment and Metro Bank can utilise extra
features of banking, finance, financial planning, insurance and tax in order to increase the
customer base.
Task 3: Marketing mix
a. Using the7p’s of Marketing identify and describe Metro Bank’s current marketing mix
Marketing mix elements Attributes
Product The banks deal with a range of products such as credit cards,
cooperate banking, safe deposit boxes, financial planning
services, account switching facility, consumer banking and
online banking opportunity. In addition to this, the bank pays
significant attention to the kids. It encourages kids to save
money and thus, the bank counts the coins of the children by
using Magic Money Machines (Metrobankonline.co.uk 2017).

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Price The banking sector is the United Kingdom is very competitive
and being a retail banking institution, it is essential to consider
significant pricing strategy to stay competitive in the sector.
According to the viewpoint of Luxton et al. (2015), the
aforementioned Metro Bank charges a little amount from the
customers for providing banking facilities (such as credit and
debit card facility). In case of online banking, the institution
charges a very little amount and thus, it attracts most of the
people in the region.
Place The company provides unparalleled levels of service to the
customers. The company has near about 55 stores and all the
stores are open 7 days a week from 8 am to 8 pm. Thus,
customers can visit the stores when they feel free and
convenient. Further, the company aims to open 150 more
stores within 2020. Further, it can be stated that the company
offers a 24*7 London-based contact centre.
Promotions Metro Bank takes help of social media sites such as Facebook,
YouTube and Twitter for the purpose of promotion. Further,
the company has good PR team that leverage various
promotional programs to reach to the target customers.
People The aim of the company is to provide an improving banking
service to the customers and thus, the company hires skilled
and well-trained staffs (Kim et al. 2015). Further, the
company provides a number of training programs to the

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employees through knowledge management system to
improve the efficiency of the staffs across the bank. At
present, Metro Bank has more than 2,800 employees.
Process The Metro bank offers simple and convenient banking process
to the customers. Therefore, customers get the facility to open
a bank on a very first day. Further, the employees
communicate with the customers in local language for making
sense.
Physical evidence It includes various tangible (such as Billboards, Signage and
dress code of the bank staffs) and intangible assets (such as
financial reports) as the physical evidence. Physical evidence
refers to the layout of the place like the placement of the
customer service executive desks, location of the cheque
deposit centre. The stores of Metro Bank are convenient.
Table 2: Marketing Mix of Metro Bank
(Source: Created by self)
Summaries the reports key findings
In the ever-awaiting conclusion part, it can be concluded that understanding of the
position of competitors and the impact of macro environmental factors upon the business is
required to develop for having business growth and competitive advantage in the domestic and
international market. From the above-held discussion, it has been understood that Metro Bank is
performing in some customer-centric way for reaching to the target customers within selected

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time-frame. Metro bank provides highly secure banking services to the customers and thus, it
becomes possible for the banking sector to open near about 50 stores within the very short time.
However, it is essential for the banking sector to understand the position of the competitors in the
market and how they are performing in the home market to meet the needs and requirements of
the customers. For this reason, the study has provided a significant competitor analysis for
gaining an in-depth understanding of current market share of the rivals. Further, the study has
delivered 7 Ps as per the performance of Metro Bank by marketing mix tool. With the help of
this, the company becomes able to develop a significant marketing plan for establishing the
brand in the market efficiently.

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Reference List
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what to do about it. Princeton University Press.
Babin, B.J. and Zikmund, W.G., 2015. Exploring marketing research. London: Cengage
Learning.
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communication perspective. New York: McGraw-Hill Education.
Bell, S. and Hindmoor, A., 2015. Taming the city? Ideas, structural power and the evolution of
British banking policy amidst the great financial meltdown. New Political Economy, 20(3),
pp.454-474.
Blythe J., 2013 Principles & Practices of Marketing. London: Sage.
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Contemporary Hospitality Management, 27(3), pp.415-430.
Cornwell, T.B., 2014. Sponsorship in marketing: Effective communication through sports, arts
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Dibb, S., 2017. Changing Times for Social Marketing Segmentation. In Segmentation in Social
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Egan, J., 2015. Marketing communications. London: Cengage Learning.

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Glynos, J., Klimecki, R. and Willmott, H., 2015. Logics in policy and practice: A critical nodal
analysis of the UK banking reform process. Critical Policy Studies, 9(4), pp.393-415.
Kim, K., Hayes, J.L., Avant, J.A. and Reid, L.N., 2014. Trends in advertising research: A
longitudinal analysis of leading advertising, marketing, and communication journals, 1980 to
2010. Journal of advertising, 43(3), pp.296-316.
Kurtz D, and Boone L. 2013, Principles of Contemporary Marketing. International Edition 14th
Edition.
Luxton, S., Reid, M. and Mavondo, F., 2015. Integrated marketing communication capability
and brand performance. Journal of Advertising, 44(1), pp.37-46.
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https://www.metrobankonline.co.uk/about-us/ [Accessed 19 Mar. 2018].
Singh, D., 2016. Banking regulation of UK and US financial markets. Abingdon: Routledge.
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