Strategic Management Planning for Marks and Spencer

STRATEGIC
MANAGEMENT
PLANNING

TABLE OF CONTENTS
INTRODUCTION...........................................................................................................................3
Environmental Analysis...............................................................................................................3
Corporate and Marketing Objectives...........................................................................................6
Marketing Strategy Selection......................................................................................................7
Market Targeting and Positioning...............................................................................................8
Assessment of 7P’s......................................................................................................................9
Implementation, Control and Evaluation...................................................................................10
CONCLUSION..............................................................................................................................10
REFERENCES..............................................................................................................................11

INTRODUCTION
Strategic Marketing Planning deals in developing various strategies which can help the
company to achieve the organisational objectives. The companies need to follow various steps
and systematic process including the setting goals and objectives, evaluating internal and
external business factors, product planning, implementing, tracking the progress and evaluating
the success (Boons and et.al., 2021). All these processes when combined together can help in
contributing towards the success of the business. Marks and Spencer is a British multinational
retailer headquartered in London, UK. This was established in 1884. The company deals in
clothing, food and various home products with its own label (Marks and Spencer, 2021). The
report will shed light on the environmental analysis of the company by making use of various
models. The corporate and marketing objectives of the company will also be highlighted in the
report. This will be followed by mentioning the strategies of the company by using the Ansoff
Matrix. Marketing segmentation, targeting and positioning of the company will be described.
Marketing mix of the company will also be discussed along with implementation, evaluating and
monitoring of the strategies.
Environmental Analysis
Brexit and COVID-19 impacted the retail industry in many ways. It is must to analyse the
current economic and environmental condition of retail industry so that the companies like
Marks and Spencer can develop and implement appropriate strategies for running the business
and maintaining profitability even at the time of pandemic and Brexit. This can be analysed that
the retail industry in UK contributes majorly in the economy of the country. This retail industry
in UK constitutes many large companies such as M&S, Asda, Lidl, Tesco, Sainsbury and many
more. This can be observed that the Brexit impacted the overall operations of these companies in
retail industry. This is because all these retail companies perform operations across various
countries in the world and also depends on the suppliers outside UK. There were complete
restrictions imposed on the supply chains especially when the raw materials are to be imported
from other countries and cities. This impacted the profitability of the retail companies like M&S
greatly because their companies need to improve their supply chains and also they need to
improve their channels and payments (Smith, 2018). In this, the companies invested lot of money
due to which they suffered financially. This can also be observed that as the impact of Brexit was
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decreasing, the pandemic of COVID-19 started and this completely destroyed so many
companies forcing them to fire the employees or shutting down their businesses. This is why, the
retail companies like M&S hit hard by Brexit and then by pandemic of COVID-19.
The environmental analysis helps in analysing the impact of macro-environmental or the external
factors which impacts the operations and profitability of the companies like M&S (PESTLE
analysis of M&S, 2020). The best tool which can be used for analysing the effect of macro-
environmental factors is the PESTLE model which helps in examining various external factors
like political, economic, social, technological, environmental and legal factors and its impacts on
the operations of the company. The PESTLE analysis of Marks and Spencer can be done as
below:
Political: These factors include taxes, restrictions from government and many more other
impositions. The decision of United Kingdom to leave the European Union is the most important
political factors which impacted the operations of Marks and Spencer. This was completely
unpredictable that where the company will stand after the Brexit especially in regards to trade
regulations and tariffs. The company though developed various strategies to solve this problem
of Brexit but the possible outcomes were less than ideal for the retailers of UK. The company
also faced the loss of numerous free trade policies with the European suppliers. This also
increased the cost for the end consumer greatly (Petetin, 2020). This is why the company strived
so hard to attract the customers and increase the customer base. This impacted the overall
profitability of the company. Also due to pandemic, there were restrictions on everything related
to mobility outside the homes. Due to this also, the customers’ behaviour changed and they start
preferring to order the materials online and getting them at the doorsteps. This is why; there were
many political restrictions for delivering products to the customers online which impacted the
overall operations of the company as well as growth and progress.
Economic: These factors decide the overall financial stability of the company. This is mainly
depended on the customers and their behaviour. This was also observed that when the products
of the company become non-trendy or not according to the demands of the customers, then the
products are not sold easily and the companies need to face the loss. At the time of Brexit, the
company Marks and Spencer faced financial loss because there were restrictions on trade and the
company needs to pay extra amount as compared to the real one for getting raw materials from
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