Marketing Essentials Report: Avon's Strategies and Mix Comparison

This report delves into the realm of marketing essentials, focusing specifically on the strategies employed by Avon. It begins by establishing the crucial role of marketing in business success, highlighting its evolution in the modern landscape and the importance of adapting to changing consumer needs. The report then explores Avon's marketing functions, including market identification, product development, and the creation of a sustainable competitive advantage. A significant portion of the report is dedicated to a comparative analysis of the 7Ps of the marketing mix between Avon and another company, evaluating their product strategies, pricing, distribution, promotion, personnel, and processes. Finally, the report concludes with a basic marketing plan, offering a comprehensive overview of the marketing essentials and their application in a real-world business context.

Marketing Essentials

Table of Contents
INTRODUCTION...........................................................................................................................1
TASK 1............................................................................................................................................1
Essay............................................................................................................................................1
TASK 2............................................................................................................................................4
P3. Comparison of various marketing mix between two companies...........................................4
TASK 3............................................................................................................................................7
P4. Marketing plan.......................................................................................................................7
CONCLUSION..............................................................................................................................10
REFERENCES..............................................................................................................................11

INTRODUCTION
Marketing is business term that defines management process through which goods and
services moves from business houses to consumers. Marketing creates relationship between
businesses and satisfied consumers. Marketing process is responsible for identifying, anticipating
and satisfying consumers requirements profitably. Marketing essentials are all those processes
and activities that are performed for effective marketing of business. This process of marketing
essential starts with identifying nature and scope of marketing and ends with distribution of
product. In this project report role of marketing and its functions in AVON is described.
Together with this elements of marketing mix to achieve organisational objective and a basic
marketing plan is included in this report (Berkowitz, 2016).
TASK 1
Essay
Marketing plays very important role in success of a business. Marketing is most
misunderstood process in modern and changing world. Because in modern world more focus is
provided on high technology process and importance of important four P's of marketing are not
provided much importance. Earlier marketing was restricted to informing a consumer about
existence of the product. In current working environment marketing starts with making various
strategies to implement various marketing plans. Morden organisations offers exciting and
insightful suggestions that completely changes marketing strategies. Introduction of new
channels and technologies have dramatically changed the environment in which business
operates. In modern organisation role of marketing has changed and is continuously changing
day by day. Organisations focus on integrating needs and wants of consumers and other
functions like production, research and development, finance and personal. With this new and
continuously changing environment its very difficult to make a business competitive and survive
in long run (Brassington and Pettitt, 2013). Organisation have understood that focusing on single
function is not sufficient to survive they need to cope up with the new changing environment.
AVON understands importance of marketing in modern organisations and consider
marketing function as heart of the organisation that brings oxygen and nutrients to business that
are necessary for its survival. Today, large and small, national or international, innovative or
traditional everyone is competing for same market. Modern organisations understands power of
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hostile approach to marketing that helps to create desirable demand, reputation and competition.
Hostile approach gives each part of business as single entity and gives a shared purpose to every
activity. Role of marketing is too diverted such as identifying new market, developing new
product, creating sustainable competitive advantage and creating utility of product introduced
(Functions of marketing, 2017).
Identifying new market is very important for a product which is offered in the market
that have high demand for consuming the introduced product. Before introducing a product in
the market, market study is done by marketing team to find suitable market for product. New
markets provides more opportunities to AVON as new consumer group will be added for
product. Developing new product requires to search for new market and targeted consumers to
whom product will be marketed. Before introduction of new product consumers insight is very
important so that product is designed and developed according to consumers preference.
Developing a perfect product for consumers make it stand out of the rest. Sustainable
competitive advantage helps marketing to evaluate changing environment and AVON will be
always ready to adopt these changes. When business organisations keeps on evolving their
products according to changing requirements of consumers that brings sustainable growth in
business (Brooks and Simkin, 2012). To always be in competition AVON needs to continuously
upgrade its products. Creating utility for new and existing products is done through marketing.
Utility of the product is the ability to satisfy its wants. Marketing creates form, time, place,
information and possession utility. To increase utility of a product AVON will make product
available on time to its consumers.
Marketing department have overall responsibility of increasing revenue, increasing
market share and contributing to companies growth and profitability. Marketing executives are
responsible for performing various functions of marketing such as advertising, publications or
events. Marketing function is responsible for forming strategy, market research,
communications, sales support and events of AVON. Marketing strategy needs to be in line with
overall organisations goals and objective of organisation. Marketing strategy may be to increase
share in a specific market sector which is done through increasing channels of distribution or
covering wider geographical area. Market research is the key responsibility of marketing
department. Research helps company to identify market opportunities and gain better
understanding about consumers requirements (Nguyen and Simkin, 2012). This helps business to
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be aware with its strengths and weaknesses and effective actions are taken to compete with
competitors. Communications material in marketing department develops that helps to promote
product goods by AVON. Based on the budget available company may plan to organise an event,
promotional contacts through companies website and press release or product publications. Sales
support encourage cooperation between marketing and sales department that leads to increases
in sales performation. Marketing department is responsible to more sales with high quality
advertising that leads to more sales. Marketing also prepares presentation for sales team and
supplies them with promotional material.
Existence of business depends on satisfying consumers needs and wants and this can not
be sole responsibility of marketing department. Marketing is the strategic that discipline all other
activities of business. To make organisation successful AVON needs to make all its department
to work effectively and efficiently (Caragher, 2016). Marketing department needs to work
closely with production department to ensure that adequate research and development is planned
to satisfy current and future consumers needs. Marketing helps to produce and design quality
products as per specification of consumers. Volume that is generated by marketing can be met
with scheduling delivery with production department. Marketing department set deadlines that
may stretch capabilities of production department. Marketing department also related with
functions performed by finance department. As funds required by marketing department to meet
research, promotions and distribution of products is prepared by finance department. Finance
department have brief of all organisation that ensures business operations. All departments work
with allocated budgets and to overspend marketing departments needs to communicate with
finance department. Marketing concentrate on increasing sales volume and finance department
focus on cash flows and covering cost. Human resource and marketing department ensures that
appropriate skills and staffing levels are in place to research and develop new ideas. This also
helps to meet new targets in production and also helps to create competent sales team. HRM
department will have many recruitment process and marketing department helps in balancing
theses programmes with other departments. Sales department is very much affected by its
marketing activities performed by marketing department. Various activities that boost sales are
introduced by marketing team and marketing also helps to predict sales in future to some extent
that leads to delivery on time of products by AVON (Mihart, 2012).
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TASK 2
P3. Comparison of various marketing mix between two companies
The 7Ps of marketing mix are the marketing tactics which are used to achieve the
objectives of the company. Moreover, it is also used to satisfy the target customers. Before,
launching a product an organization prepares a plan by using 7Ps of marketing mix (Desai,
2013).
Source: Marketing Mix, 2018
Elements Beauty Giant AVON
1. Product “Forever Young” is the product that
the company is planning to launch. It
deals in other brands of cosmetic. The
items it sells are cosmetic products of
other brands. It will use advance
technology with natural extracts. Also
the packaging will be very luxurious
to attract the customers. The range of
It produces and sells complex and
modern range of cosmetic products.
It uses make-up colours
diversification, packaging methods
and manufacturing technology. The
products that it sells are beauty,
household and personal care. It also
has an anti-ageing product called
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Illustration 1: Marketing Mix, 2018

products include eyeshadow, mascara,
eyeliner, foundation, moisturisers,
fragrance etc.
“Avon Nutraeffects Ageless Multi
Action Cream”.
2. Price The pricing strategy for “Forever
Young” would be very cost-effective.
Beauty Giant will keep the prices
economical which can be afforded by
all classes of people living in UK. The
prices will be very low in the initial
phase of launching. The price will be
changed as soon as the product is
famous in the market. The range will
be between £10- £12 (Papasolomou
and Melanthiou, 2012).
It has three approaches towards
pricing strategy: prices level, degree
of the price diversification and price
mobility. The prices are generally
moderate which may vary depending
on the product category, their
characteristics and the targeted
consumer category. Also the price
greatly depends on the quality and
position in the market. The anti
ageing cream price is between £12-
£16.
3. Place It will follow intense distribution of
the new product to grab a good market
share. It will implement direct
distribution strategy where the product
will be given to other shops, from
where the customers can buy “Forever
Young”. Also it will sell the product
online. This will increase the market
share of the product in the
international markets. The product
will be made available on all the 50
branches in UK.
It takes into consideration the
dimensions of distribution channels,
size of the distribution, degree of
company's participation, degree of
control, degree of elasticity and
transportation of goods. Further, it
applies strategies like direct
distribution, distribution through
personal device etc. (Marketing Mix,
2018).
4. Promotion To advertise their product, Beauty
Giant will use Magazines, Television,
Internet etc. Magazines will have
The promotion policy adopted by
Avon are image expansion strategy,
conducting ongoing promotional
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photos of models displaying “Forever
Young”. This will be an effective way
to attract the customers as make-up
addicts often turn to beauty or fashion
magazines. Advertising on television
will make it easy to display the
products to large number of people.
Also, it will be displayed on
billboards. The billboards will be
located at shopping centres and in the
locations where there is a large
amount of traffic. Along with this, it
will free samples by collaborating
with magazines and other shops in
order to make the people aware about
the product.
activities, offensive promotional
strategy, undifferentiated strategy,
organizing promotional activities
with specialized institutions' help.
Organizing promotional activities are
done to attract the customers.
Undifferentiated strategy enables it
to address all the potential customers
(Dibb and Simkin, 2013).
5. People Beauty Giant will employ more
employees in order to make the
product available throughout the UK.
The staff will be friendly, having
complete knowledge about the
product. The staff will competent to
answer the queries of the customers.
It has more number employees as
compared to Beauty Giant since it
deals in three categories: beauty,
household and personal care. The
employees have the knowledge about
the products sold under these
categories.
6. Process It will use natural extracts in Forever
Young and no animal derived
ingredients will be used (Pike, 2015).
AVON is a successful company and
preferred by many customers
because of the feedbacks and quality
of the products.
7. Physical
Evidence
The company will keep the packaging
very luxurious. The staff will be in
uniforms and a special section for this
All the items are available at the
stores as well as online.
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product will be established.
TASK 3
P4. Marketing plan
A marketing plan is important for a business for achieving the objectives. A plan is a
document that contain the details about the company's marketing objectives, plans and other
activities relating to marketing (Gamble and et. al., 2011). One of the main reasons for preparing
a marketing plan is to plan the promotional activities of the product to attract the customers so
that sales and profits will be increased. The marketing plan for Beauty Giant is mentioned below:
Executive summary: Beauty Giant is a small and medium sized company selling
cosmetic items in UK. It was established in the year 1990. It has 50 branches all over the UK. It
sells variety of men and women toiletries. The company has a strong standing in the market and
is planning to launch its own product to be sold under its own brand name. It has decided to
launch an anti-ageing product called “Forever Young”. It will be a unique and one of its kind
cream.
Vision: To set a standard in the cosmetic industry by providing quality products to the
consumers.
Mission: To be a market leader by providing quality products at economical price.
Objective: The main objective of Beauty Giant is to be on the top of the cosmetic
industry by launching new product Forever Young in coming two-year time and increase profit
by 15%.
SWOT Analysis
SWOT analysis is done as a part of strategic planning exercise. It is done to know the
strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threats. The decision will be taken on the basis of the
information gathered from the SWOT analysis (Hsu, 2011). This will help the company maintain
the standard of the product and grab the opportunities. Also, the company will be able to work on
weaknesses and reduce the threats. The SWOT analysis of Beauty Giant is given below:
Strengths
 Using natural extracts and providing
high quality will attract customers.
Weaknesses
 High competition since anti-ageing
segment is what other competitors are
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 Providing products at economical
prices will increase the sales.
 The company has effective and proper
distribution channels by which products
will be delivered without any delays.
looking for.
 It is a medium size company therefore
there will huge competitive pressure on
Beauty Giant.
Opportunities
 High opportunities in international
markets.
 The demand for herbal and natural
products has increased is ever
increasing.
Threats
 The make-up trends changes quickly.
 Fluctuations in foreign exchange rate of
UK.
STP process of Beauty Giant
Segmentation: Segmentation is a process of marketing mix which is done to identify
different groups of customers on the basis of demographics, pschychographic and geographic
segmentation. Beauty Giant uses demographics segmentation that targets consumers on the basis
of age, gender, religion, family size, income and education. As product is specifically for a
particular age group.
Targeting: In this the customers will be analysed who can be targeted. Beauty Giant
wants to target the people both men and women over the age of 30 for its new anti-ageing
product “Forever Young”. Targeting a particular age group helps to develop marketing plan that
have high influence on targeted consumers (Illing and Anders, 2016).
Positioning: It is done to provide a clear and distinctive place from all the competing
products in the minds of the target consumers. Beauty Giant holds a good market share in UK
therefore it will easy for them to position the product in the minds of target customers. Already
established image of company helps to introduce new product and achieving its sales target in
smooth form.
Marketing Strategies: The marketing strategies should be applied to achieve the
objectives. It will include the marketing policies and plans for the objectives. Beauty Giant may
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use relationship market strategy for increasing cust1545304692omer loyalty and interaction for
long-term engagement.
Budget: The budgets are prepared to allocate the available resources efficiently and
effectively. It is prepared to meet the financial demands of each department operating in an
organization so that resources are not wasted (Malhotra Birks and Wills, 2013). Beauty Giant
will prepare budgets for its new product “Forever Young” because many departments will be
there to carry out the activities smoothly. Proper allocation of funds among the departments such
as manufacturing, advertising, marketing etc. will be required.
Particulars 1st year 2nd year 3rd year
Initial
money 30000 10000 10000
Investment 10000 15000
Total 30000 20000 25000
Marketing
expenditures
Advertiseme
nt 7000 5200 5000
Sales
promotion 2200 2000 5000
Direct
marketing 6700 5000 2500
Total 15900 12200 12500
Available
balance 14100 7800 12500
Monitoring and evaluation process: It is a process which helps the company to improve
the performance by monitoring continuously and evaluating the results achieved with the
standard to assess the variance. This process keeps the track of the performance so that the
objectives can be achieved within the specified time. Beauty Giant has devoted staff team for this
process who assess the needs of the customers, their purchasing power and how willing they are
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