Analysis of Barclays Bank: Macro Environment and Strategies

This report provides a comprehensive analysis of Barclays Bank, a leading UK bank. It begins with an overview of the company's background and its operations, followed by a PESTLE analysis to examine the macro-environmental factors influencing the bank. The report then delves into market competitiveness, employing Porter's Five Forces to assess the bank's strategic position and includes an analysis of the marketing mix and supply chain management. Furthermore, the report evaluates Barclays Bank's brand value and concludes with recommendations. The report covers various aspects of the bank's operations, including political, economic, social, technological, legal, and environmental factors, along with its market position and marketing strategies.

REPORT

Table of Contents
INTRODUCTION...........................................................................................................................1
MAIN BODY...................................................................................................................................1
1. COMPANY’S BACKGROUND FOR BARCLAYS BANK.....................................................1
2. ORGANISATIONAL AUDIT OR MACRO ENVIRONMENTAL ANALYSIS FOR
BARCLAYS BANK........................................................................................................................1
3. MARKET COMPETITIVENESS ANALYSIS AND POSITIONING OF THE
ORGANISATION...........................................................................................................................3
5. SUPPLY CHAIN MANAGEMENT AND MARKETING MIX................................................4
6. BRAND VALUE FOR BARCLAYS BANK..............................................................................6
7.RECOMMENDATIONS FOR BARCLAYS BANK..................................................................6
Conclusion.......................................................................................................................................7
REFERENCES................................................................................................................................8

INTRODUCTION
In the recent years, UK business has been disturbed by many threats and fluctuations of
business environment. Around 52% of the UK business was affected in 2016 due to poor
exporting and bad consumer spending values. This report is focused on Barclays Bank which is
one of the largest and leading banks of UK. This bank is authorized by the Prudential Regulation
Authority(Bai, Krishnamurthy and Weymuller, 2018). The report will outline macro
environment of bank as well as market competitiveness along with supply chain management
and marketing mix to develop an in-depth understanding over business nature of company.
MAIN BODY
1. COMPANY’S BACKGROUND FOR BARCLAYS BANK
Barclays Bank is one of the largest banks of United Kingdom located in London. It was
established on July 20th 1986. Global financial services are being provided to the holding
companies. This bank offers retail services like credit cards, wholesale retailing , investment
banking, wealth and investment management. This company operates in two divisions i.e.
Barclays UK and Barclays international. Barclays UK deals with retail banking operations,
customer credit cards business, UK wealth management and corporate banking while, on the
other hand, Barclays international comprises with corporate banking franchise, investment bank
and international cards business. This bank is incorporated with lending practice that is
monitored and enforced with the help of Lending Standards Boards. The number of employees
earlier were more than that in present era. This bank had about 139.60 k employees in 2013
while in 2017, only 79.90 employees were working. The ultimate goal of bank is to support
stakeholders by becoming commercially successful by generating sustainable returns(Osman,
2018).
2. ORGANISATIONAL AUDIT OR MACRO ENVIRONMENTAL
ANALYSIS FOR BARCLAYS BANK
PESTLE Analysis is used to describe macro environmental factors of Barclays Bank
which are as follows:
Political factors: These factors play an important role to understand the Barclays Bank's
long term profitability in different countries' and market. Foreign money exchange is one of the
big businesses of this bank in different parts of world and these operations are affected by the
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political factors of certain countries. The stability of banking industry is greatly affected by the
political and government rules. There are many operations of different companies that are
supported by Barclays bank. These operations get affected by risk of military invasion, pricing
regulations, tax rates, wage legislation, industrial safety regulations and anti-trust laws related to
foreign exchange money centre Bank and many more.
Economic factors: Economic factors of different places affect the inflammation rate,
investment value, interest fluctuation and foreign exchange policies of Barclays Bank. Economic
systems and their stability as well as government intervention in free market are the major
factors that affect the economic factors of concerning sectors. Apart from this, employment rate
of people, skill level of workforce, labour costs, market inflammation rates and many other
factors are involved that affect Barclays Bank’s economic conditions(McMillen and .et.al.,
Barclays Bank PLC, 2017).
Social factors: This is one of the considering factors for the establishment of bank at a
particular place. Observation of social places play an important role in determining the liquidity
of Bank. Barclays Bank had shut down about more than 160 branches in rural areas because
there were no publicity of bank fluidity among people due to weak economy conditions .People
of rural areas were not showing any interest in investing money with bank and due to this,
liquidity flow was stopped.
Mental thoughts of a social community that they don, have money to deposit into bank effect the
work force quality of certain services related with banking sectors
Technological factors: Bank sector is now fully dependent on technological
methodology of working. Every bank is connected to each other with the help of technology.
Process like money transfer, ATM processing system, online banking and different bank
operations are connected with technological services. Barclays bank is also using these services
but due to lack of maintenance of these services, reputation of bank went down. In 2000, this
bank was not able to give appropriate technological services to their customers due to bad
services of account login. In 2010, bank users were not able to access the balance enquiry and
update information of account. These are few technological factors that affect the reputation of
Barclays Bank.
Legal factors: Bank processing is affected by different laws and regulations of a country.
Single bank license is not used everywhere to operate different branches of bank at different
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places. Legal factors included different documentation, licensing, operational and handling
processes related to bank. The concerning laws that are undertaken in this sector are Anti-Trust
foreign money centre, intellectual property, customer protection and e-commerce, employment,
health and safety and data protection laws(Burkett, 2018).
Environmental factors: Different markets have different norms and environmental
factors that affect the profitability standards of a bank. Even within country, states have different
environmental issues that are being considered during the operations of bank activities.
Marketing of a place is altered by weather, climate and attitudes of people towards green or
ecological products as well as waste management system in the financial sector.
3. MARKET COMPETITIVENESS ANALYSIS AND POSITIONING OF
THE ORGANISATION
Barclays, being a 325 years old financing institution, is involved in several operations
like investment banking, wealth management and credit cards service to users. Porter’s five
forces analysis is a strategic management tool that is used to analyse the different market
competitive factors that affect the profitability of Barclays Bank. These five forces are utilised to
understand different market strategies and with the help of this, profitability enhancement
programs are developed. Different analysis are involved in Porter Five Forces analysis like:
Threat of new entrants: New entrance of other banks organisations effect the market of
Barclays bank by lowering their price rate, reducing costs and place new options of products and
services. These challenges are managed by innovating new products and services by Barclays
bank. New economics of scale to lower the fixed cost per unit is maintained by bank . Apart from
this, more money on new research a development programs have been invested.
Bargaining power of suppliers: There are numerous suppliers in foreign money centre
bank that buys raw material with bargaining strategies. Dominant nature of powerful suppliers
always try to negotiate the value of services and try to make it lower than the market value. The
bargaining of suppliers lower the profitability of Barclays Bank. These challenges were solved
by creating a large base of customers and by building efficient chain with multiple suppliers.
Products are designed in new way by using different materials so that if the price of raw
materials get raised then the products can be shifted to another place(Kushwaha and Agrawal,
2015).
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Bargaining power of buyers: Bank users and other concerning industries and companies
are bank buyers. Customers always demand for the best offers in minimum prices as possible.
Rate of interest that is imposed by Barclays Bank is demanded to be lowered. This bargaining is
maintained by making a large base of customers. New products and services are also being
launched to maintain the demand of bargain because customers do not get more chance to
bargain on new launched services.
Threat of substitute products: It is created when a new product of a service is provided
to similar customers and this causes suffering of profitability of bank. There are many other
banks that are providing better services than Barclays in order to attract customers. This can be
maintained by creating oriented services and products. Bank has to understand the core need of
customers instead of focusing on their buying pattern. Switching cost can also be used to
maintain the profitability of bank.
Rivalry among existing customers: During intense competition among competitors, the
overall profitability of bank is decreased. Price is lowered down by organisation to hold the
market place. Other strategies are also applied to compete with this issue. Differentiation in
products and services are made to show uniqueness. Partnership with competitors is done to
increase the market size.
Along with this, STEP analysis is used to understand the positioning of Barclays bank.
Financial market is segmented based on demographic and psycho graphic values like age,
income and occupation, etc. Big companies and stakeholders are targeted on the basis of their
needs and requirements. The positioning of Barclays Bank is defined on the basis of services and
products that are provided by it(Brun, Durif and Ricard, 2014).
5. SUPPLY CHAIN MANAGEMENT AND MARKETING MIX
Marketing mix analyse and explain the marketing strategies of Barclays Bank. Following
parameters like product, price, place and promotions are used to describe the organisational
value.
Product: Barclays is one of the most leading international financial institution and bank.
A number of banking services are being provided with the help of marketing mix.
Different services like personal banking, Mortgage insurance, individual saving, loans and
investments for the different purposes. International banking services are given that allows the
offshore banking transfer facilities through multi currency accounts. Purchasing offers and
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credit card rewards along with different wealth management and fiduciary services. Services are
also provided to small and medium business with the help of corporate and business banking.
Price : Pricing strategies of Barclays are depended upon the competition of market,
regulatory bodies and demand of services. Various payment flexibility is offered by this bank
like there are 25% of discount on its mobile broad band scheme, monthly fee waiver and
discounted rates on various loans. Barclays Bank has also decided to cut down its annual
expenses i.e. 25% reduction in operating costs to manage its expanses. Now trend of bank
shopping has been started with the use of credit and shopping cards. Various offers are provided
by bank to shop the products lower than the market price. Different offers are given by bank
management on domestic products, clothings, households and many more.
Place : This bank is trying to expand its foreign business over many years. This has been
expanded in about more than 50 countries with a total number of 4750 branches set up. The first
online banking services were started by this bank to manage the online resources. This bank has
more than about 4.5 million online bankers in UK. This show that UK is a root place for
Barclays Bank. This is also offering mobile banking so that their customers can access their
account from anywhere
Promotions: This is bank is focusing on 360 branding and marketing with different
promotional activities. The main aim behind this is to pursue the clients to use its products and
services. There are many measures that are used by this bank to promote their services.
Press release, posters and touchers are released by bank management to make reach all the
informations, plans and offers to their customers(Levy and Hino, 2016.).
Promotions are also facilitated by using Newspapers, Magazines, and Billboards along
with sending the direct mail to personal websites.
Social media is one of the trending way of promotions through which lots of people can be
targeted in all over the world. One of the another way of promotion is sponsorship. Various
programmes are sponsored to increase its brand and service value.
Barclays bank has been sponsoring the Football Premiership League for last many years. Dubai
Tennis Championship 2008 was also sponsored by this bank. From 2010 to 2015 this bank had
hosted the sponsorship of cycling event. These all strategies are applied by organisation to attract
the concentration of users towards their services and products
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6. BRAND VALUE FOR BARCLAYS BANK
The way of working with its values and behaviours are the most concerning aspects of
this bank across the world. There is no doubt that this organisation is providing good facilities to
fulfil the demand of their customers. The brand value of this bank can be seen with the help of
working process in regard with working relationships of colleagues with other Barclays
colleagues, customers clients business partners, suppliers and competitors. A long chain of
suppliers for the service of this bank show the brand value for it. This bank has created its own
customer base even after falling down in 2000 decades. The customers service were fulfilled
with the trending demand of market to manage the users accounts. The main of this bank is to
provide customer satisfaction in accordance with the banking sector(Gu, 2016.).
The brand value is measured by the satisfaction of banks' employees and customers
satisfaction. Theses all are fulfilled by this organisation with the accordance of professional code
of conduct and ethical values. The broad value of its principle is being explored across the world.
Many big sponsors have been hired by this bank to facilitate different services in sports.
All rule and regulations are followed to maintain its brand value with respect to customers
satisfaction. This bank deal with private, government services along with the contract based
service. Wealth management and wholesale retailing and industrial corporate are the major keys
for its brand value in market. This is one of the 25 the biggest brand among 30 top banks in UK.
This bank is becoming more responsible with the concern of users service(Our Purpose and
Values, 2018).
7.RECOMMENDATIONS FOR BARCLAYS BANK
This bank is one of the oldest bank that had started the online banking to make easy
access of money transfers and transactions. But still it needs few recommendations for
enhancement of bank services. As it is being said that this bank is providing mobile banking but
it is not supported to all mobile operating systems. Apple pays mobile banking is only option in
this bank but it is also necessary to launch Android supporting mobile banking facilities for
customers. It would be good easy to use its service if it recommends the IOS app supporting
mobile banking service to customers(Booth, 2017).
As per the survey the customer care facilities are not as good as it should be so it is
important to improve the customer care service. Joint account facilities are also demanded in
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banking sectors by lots of customers and this facility is not available with this bank. So it is also
a considering point for this bank that it should launch such type of account service for their
customers. In last few years Barclays bank had been participated in different sponsorship event
but recently its involvement is not seen any more. So this process of promotions should be
continued to enhance the economy of bank. Rural areas must be covered by the banking services
of Barclays's Bank so that they can also gain the benefits of banking services. This bank should
also cooperate with the educational and , medical societies to gain more popularity . Hospitality
industry is one of the biggest growing sector in UK, this bank should take a step towards this
sector(Bank Recommendations - Sick of Barclays,2018.).
Conclusion
It is concluded here that Barclays bank is one of the oldest bank that are providing its
services in more than 50 countries. This is dealing with retail banking, wealth management,
credit cards services, wholesale banking and many more services. There are other factors and
marketing strategies have been explained to enhance the service quality of Barclays bank. Along
with this the brand value and recommendations for Barclays bank have also been discussed in
this consent.
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REFERENCES
Books and Journals
Bai, J., Krishnamurthy, A. and Weymuller, C. H., 2018. Measuring liquidity mismatch in the
banking sector. The Journal of Finance, 73(1), pp.51-93.
Booth, A., 2017. Technological Change and Gender in the Labour Policies of British Retail
Banks, 1945–1970. In Managing the Modern Workplace (pp. 119-142). Routledge.
Brun, I., Durif, F. and Ricard, L., 2014. E-relationship marketing: a cognitive mapping
introspection in the banking sector. European Journal of Marketing, 48(3/4), pp.572-594.
Burkett, J., 2018. ‘Don’t Bank on Apartheid’: The National Union of Students and the Boycott
Barclays Campaign. In Students in Twentieth-Century Britain and Ireland (pp. 225-245).
Palgrave Macmillan, Cham.
Gu, K., 2016. Cloud Migration of Barclays’ EPAS Platform(Doctoral dissertation,
WORCESTER POLYTECHNIC INSTITUTE).
Kushwaha, G. S. and Agrawal, S. R., 2015. An Indian customer surrounding 7P׳ s of service
marketing. Journal of Retailing and consumer services, 22, pp.85-95.
Levy, S. and Hino, H., 2016. Emotional brand attachment: a factor in customer-bank
relationships. International Journal of Bank Marketing, 34(2), pp.136-150.
McMillen, G. C., and .et.al., Barclays Bank PLC, 2017. Method and system for account
management and electronic wallet access on a mobile device. U.S. Patent 9,607,293.
Osman, I., 2018. The Role of Service Quality in the Marketing of Financial Services in Ghana:
the Case of Barclays Bank in Tamale (Doctoral dissertation).
Online
Bank Recommendations - Sick of Barclays. 2018. [Online]. Available through:
<https://www.reddit.com/r/UKPersonalFinance/comments/7jzt9z/banking_bank_recom
mendations_sick_of_barclays>
Our Purpose and Values. 2018. [Online]. Available through: <https://www.home.barclays/about-
barclays/barclays-values.html#integrity>.
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