Coles Marketing and Consumer Behavior: Strategy and Recommendations

This report provides a comprehensive analysis of Coles Supermarket's marketing strategies and consumer behavior within the Australian market. It begins with an executive summary outlining the report's objectives, which include identifying current marketing practices, pinpointing issues, and sugg...Read More

Running head: MARKETING AND CONSUMER BEHAVIOR
MARKETING AND CONSUMER BEHAVIOR
Name of the student
Name of the university
Author note

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MARKETING AND CONSUMER BEHAVIOR
Executive Summary
The context of the report: The report is aimed at identifying the marketing operations that are
currently undertaken by Coles and the manner in which the same might be improved through
induction of innovative strategies.
The purpose of the report: The purpose of undertaking the research is to delineate the different
issues that are faced by Cole and the manner in which they might be resolved with a basic idea of
customer behavior in Australia.
The major findings: The report aimed at identifying the different possible steps that might be
undertaken by Coles after reviewing the customer behavior. The concerned organization faced
issues relating to the utilization of outdated marketing operational strategies and lack of
community engagement in the marketing initiatives. On the other hand, the lack of green
marketing mechanisms has affected the capabilities of the concerned organization in adhering to
the trends. The lack of suitable understanding of the customer behavior has also affected the
capabilities of the organization to attract the attention of the venture.
The conclusions: Therefore, the research concluded with a suitable identification of the issues
that are being faced by the concerned organization and the manner in which it might be mitigated
through the exposition of different recommended activities.
The main recommendations: Coles might take steps to develop innovative marketing practices
which will contribute to the unique selling proposition (USP) of the venture. On the other hand,
the organization might also take steps to develop community engagement programs for
maintaining the efficiency of the marketing operations.

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Table of Contents
Introduction......................................................................................................................................3
Background of the company............................................................................................................4
Marketing strategy...........................................................................................................................5
Issues in the marketing strategy.......................................................................................................7
Recommendations to the CMO.......................................................................................................8
Professional reflection...................................................................................................................10
Reference.......................................................................................................................................11

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Introduction
The marketing activities of an organization are commenced with the view of developing a
stronger base of customers in the different economies. Integrated marketing operations of an
organization assist the same in achieving the competitive advantage of the same while operating
in different markets. The purpose of undertaking the case evaluation is to identify the different
marketing mechanism that are currently implemented in the business model of Coles and the
issues that are faced by the same (Zarkada-Fraser & Fraser, 2015). It will also assist in
identifying the consumer behavior that is being faced by the concerned organization.
The implementation of the motivation- need theory by Maslow and the Hawkins Stern
Impulse buying theory will assist in enhancing the study through identification of the needs of
the customers. Therefore, the theories relating to consumer behavior and consumption attitudes
will be discussed as a part of the research. The delineation of the different theories relating to
customer behavior and marketing will assist in developing a coherent understanding of the
different issues that might be encountered by Coles.
The research will aim at the current marketing strategy and the issues that are being faced
by Coles. After the identification of the marketing issues, the research will enumerate a list of
recommended activities for the CMO of the venture and thereby reflect on the professionalism of
the approaches.

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Background of the company
 Analysis of the website: The website design of Coles has been created with a customer
centric approach with better user experience through segregation and organizing the
offerings in the different sections (Coles,2019). On the other hand, the website provides
suitable information on the product offerings of the venture. It has helped the
organization in developing trust and confidence among the target customers.
 Analysis of the industry and competitive environment: The supermarkets and grocery
industry in Australia is experiencing an annual growth by 2.1% which has assisted in the
development of different companies in the market (Pulker, Scott & Pollard, 2018). The
growing number of organizations in the Australian markets has assisted in enhancing the
market competition. On the other hand, the revenue that is generated through the active
functioning the industry is noted to be around $103 billion (Papadas, Avlonitis &
Carrigan, 2017). The rate of competition in the market is based on the active
involvement of 1966 businesses (Kanashiro Makiya & Fraisse, 2015).
 Identify the target audience: The target market of the concerned organization is Middle
class and premium Australian households from the age of 14 to 60 years. The longer
range of target audience is dependent on the variety of product offerings of the venture.
 Emerging consumer trends: The emerging customer trends in the Australian markets is
portrayed as the increased dependency of the people on the organic and quality products.
Klindzic, Knezevic and Maric (2016) opined that the Australians are ready to pay a good
price for a quality product. .therefore, the organizations \has taken steps to develop a
suitable range of products that are of enhanced quality and lower prices which will assist
the same in drawing the attention of the customers.

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Marketing strategy
Product
As far as the products of Coles Supermarket is concerned, it can be stated that there are
range of products that the organisation is offering to the customers. Mostly the products are
foods, groceries, liquor, general merchandise, financial services and fuel. There are different
business segments that Coles uses in terms of the Coles Supermarket, Coles Online, Coles
Liquor and Spirit hotels. Therefore, it can be argued that diverse range of products and services
are a key characteristic of Coles Supermarket (Coles,2019). In this regard, there are different
types of products like baby products, bakery, dairy, fresh fruits and vegetables and gift cards are
also offered by Coles Supermarket. For providing fuels Coles maintains an exclusive contract
with Shell and offers fuel at the Coles express convenience stores (O’Keeffe, Gilmour &
Simpson, 2016). Moreover, a wide variety of local and imported wine, beer and spirits are also
sell by Coles. Therefore, it can be argued that organisation intends to maximise the market
capitalisation by offering various range of products.
Price
It can be asserted that pricing is one of the crucial strategy that Coles Supermarket
practices in order to attract and maximise the customers as far as possible (Coles,2019). The
competition in the Australian market is so high that compels the company to set its pricing
strategy unique and attractive (Pressey, Gilchrist & Lenney, 2014). As a cost leader, Coles tries
to offer quality products at lower prices. Lowering the price is always identified as a core
strategy that Coles follows in order to participate in the competition with arch rival company
Woolworths. It is a significant facet that Coles Supermarket has practiced whereas the lifestyle

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of the Australians is high in terms of cost of living. It is supposed to be a competitive advantage
for Coles Supermarket to strengthen its business in Australia.
Place
There are more than 2000 stores and outlets Coles have in Australia (Finne & Grönroos,
2017). The distribution strategy of the organisation is robust and entitled to provide service to
millions of its existing users. Due to a strategic and effective store network with an objective to
increase its sales growth to 2-3% encourages Coles Supermarket to opt for unique locations
where the organisation can get strategic advantages (Homburg, Jozić & Kuehnl, 2017). The
company offers product in both the offline and online mode. In the offline mode the retail outlets
are established in the high density population areas. On the other hand, the online services offers
online facilitates to the customers in order to purchase products and place order any time. This
online delivery practices helps the organisation to increase the sales growth more than 25%
(Finne & Grönroos, 2017).
Promotion
For the marketing and promotion, Coles Supermarket primarily focused on its low
pricing strategy with the taglines like “Cheap Groceries”. Moreover, an interactive campaign for
the valued customers is also under pipeline. There are different promotional schemes that Coles
Supermarket practices in the form of customer loyalty bonus, discounts on specific products
(Rozdolskaya & Ledovskaya, 2015). The flybys loyalty and reward program of Coles is very
effective to retain the loyal customers. As a result of that it becomes an important aspect for the
organisation to facilitate effective promotional strategies for maintaining a good marketing
exposure.

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Issues in the marketing strategy
Coles Supermarket encountered a huge number of marketing issues that created hindrance to
the market expansion of the venture. The issues are as follows,
 Coles Supermarket is alleged with lack of engaging the local communities in
promotion. It is important for the giant business concerns like Coles Supermarket to
establish an effective sustainability practice with the help of engaging the local
communities in business practices (Coles,2019). From the research of Möller and
Parvinen (2015) the engagement of the local communities in business promotion can be
identified as a strategic measure for the business organisations because it helps the
organization to develop a good image. The local acceptability of the brand will lead to
maximise the local loyal customers. Therefore, Coles Supermarket should also focus on
this matter.
 It can be stated that one of the core promotional strategies of Coles Supermarket is
based on its low pricing strategy (Coles,2019). This is not a new strategy in Australia and
due to huge completion in the Australian retailing market, business rivals like
Woolworths is also followed the same promotional strategy. As a result of that the unique
value of Coles Supermarket’s has been curb down drastically. However, the
organisation does not create any new measure in the promotional strategies. Lack of new
promotional strategies creates a big issue for Coles Supermarket to expand its market
further in Australia.
 It is important for every business organisations to value its stakeholders. It can be a useful
tool for marketing and promotion. There is ample scope for Coles Supermarket to
establish a marketing and promotional strategy with the help of the stakeholders’ value.

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As a result of that absence of value measures further obstruct the process of establishing
effective marketing strategy for Coles Supermarket. From the research of O’Keeffe,
Gilmour and Simpson (2016) it can be stated that the value measure is contributed a lot
to plan a better marketing strategy. As a result of that the confidence of the stakeholders
will also be developed that can bring a strategic advantage for the organisation. However,
in case of Coles Supermarket lack of emphasis on the value measure jeopardize the
organisational practice extensively.
 The organisation clearly failed to identify the change in customer behavior in Australian
market (Coles,2019). It can be proved by the use of low pricing strategy despite the
marketing initiative did not create any new target customer. In addition to this, the new
retail giants like Aldi starts to focus on unique and sustainable marketing strategies in the
form of green marketing. It seems an effective marketing strategy for Aldi because the
Australian people and customers are highly concerned about the environmental factors in
recent times. Aldi used this trend and designed its marketing and promotional strategy.
 Lack of unique marketing and product offering damages the market capitalisation of
Coles Supermarket effectively. This Australian retail giant is facing huge loss of
customer trusts and the impact is also reflected on the negative revenue earning.
Recommendations to the CMO
The recommended activities that might be undertaken by the CMO of Coles are:
 Engaging local communities in the promotions: The concerned organization must take
steps to engage the local communities. The engagement of the communities in the
marketing procedures will assist the venture in strengthening the presence of the same in
the different markets. Then maximized rate of engagement of the community

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stakeholders in the different processes would assist the concerned venture in facilitating
the positive word of mouth promotions for enhancing the sales volume.
 Induction of innovative models in the promotional strategy: The induction of the
innovative marketing models in the organizational framework would assist Coles in
ensuring the uniqueness while drawing the attention of the target customers. The
innovative marketing models will be assisting the venture in developing the capabilities
of the same in continuing with the distinguished propositions while attracting the
attention of the customers through addressing their preferences.
 Designing marketing strategy based on the value measure: Coles might take steps to
develop marketing strategies based on the value measures relating to the interests of the
customers, the suppliers and the like. The induction of different strategies for addressing
the preferences and interests of the stakeholders will assist the venture in developing the
potentials of the same while expanding in the Australian markets.
 Market assessment in the Australian scenario: The concerned organization might take
steps to conduct suitable market assessment in the Australian scenario with the purpose
of suitable evaluation of customer behavior. The identification of customer behavior will
be assisting the concerned organization in developing the resource and potentials of the
venture. On the other hand, the assessment of the customer buying behavior will
strengthen the R&D operations of Coles while developing the propositions and
positioning the same for the target audience.
 Inducing green marketing techniques in the marketing mechanisms of the
organization: The induction of the green marketing techniques in the organizational
value chain processes will assist Coles in enhancing the potentials of the venture in

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developing the potentials of the same in maintaining the efficiency of the processes in
adherence to the different expectations of the customers.
Professional reflection
The Marketing assessment of Coles assisted me in developing a clear conception on the
different activities that might be commenced by the organizations. The assessment of the case
study assisted me in identifying the most common issues that might be faced by the
organizations while developing the marketing operations of the same. On the other hand, during
the case study assessment I realized that the innovativeness in the marketing operations of a
venture assist the same in improving the market orientation and customer engagement in the
different processes. Therefore, the future organizations must take steps to develop innovative
marketing models in order to gain the competitive benefits while operating in intense
competitive markets.

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Reference
Coles (2019). [online] shop.coles.com.au. Available at:
https://shop.coles.com.au/a/a-national/everything/browse [Accessed 25 May 2019].
Finne, Å., & Grönroos, C. (2017). Communication-in-use: customer-integrated marketing
communication. European Journal of Marketing, 51(3), 445-463.
Homburg, C., Jozić, D., & Kuehnl, C. (2017). Customer experience management: toward
implementing an evolving marketing concept. Journal of the Academy of Marketing
Science, 45(3), 377-401.
Kanashiro Makiya, I., & Fraisse, C. W. (2015). Sustainability initiatives driving supply chain:
Climate governance on beef production system. Journal of technology management &
innovation, 10(1), 215-224.
Klindzic, M., Knezevic, B., & Maric, I. (2016). Stakeholder analysis of social
supermarkets. Business Excellence, 10(1), 151.
Möller, K., & Parvinen, P. (2015). An impact-oriented implementation approach in business
marketing research: Introduction to the Special Issue on “Implementing Strategies and
Theories of B2B Marketing and Sales Management”. Industrial Marketing
Management, 45, 3-11.
O’Keeffe, J. M., Gilmour, D., & Simpson, E. (2016). A network approach to overcoming barriers
to market engagement for SMEs in energy efficiency initiatives such as the Green
Deal. Energy Policy, 97, 582-590.

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Papadas, K. K., Avlonitis, G. J., & Carrigan, M. (2017). Green marketing orientation:
Conceptualization, scale development and validation. Journal of Business Research, 80,
236-246.
Pressey, A. D., Gilchrist, A. J., & Lenney, P. (2014). Sales and marketing resistance to key
account management implementation: An ethnographic investigation. Industrial
Marketing Management, 43(7), 1157-1171.
Pulker, C. E., Scott, J. A., & Pollard, C. M. (2018). Ultra-processed family foods in Australia:
nutrition claims, health claims and marketing techniques. Public health nutrition, 21(1),
38-48.
Rozdolskaya, I. V., & Ledovskaya, M. E. (2015). Customer-oriented marketing imperatives of
innovation in the field of organization management working on the internal consulting
principles. Mediterranean Journal of Social Sciences, 6(2), 74.
Zarkada-Fraser, A., & Fraser, C. (2015). Integrating social and economic orientated marketing:
A study of retail management. In Proceedings of the 2000 Academy of Marketing Science
(AMS) Annual Conference (pp. 219-223). Springer, Cham.