MKT6800 Digital Marketing Strategy Project: John Lewis Analysis

This project provides a comprehensive digital marketing strategy for John Lewis, a British department store chain. It begins with an introduction to the company and its online presence, followed by a micro and macro analysis, including PESTLE and SWOT analyses to assess the external and internal environments. The project then develops a digital business plan, outlining the company's objectives and goals, including increasing sales and brand awareness. The plan focuses on leveraging social media platforms like Facebook and LinkedIn, and search engines like Google and Yahoo. It sets SMART objectives, details implementation plans, and addresses budgeting and measurement of the campaign's success. Competitor analysis is also included to understand the market landscape and identify opportunities. The project aims to provide a realistic digital marketing campaign that can be presented to the Board of Directors, emphasizing the link between digital business and digital marketing strategy. The conclusion summarizes the key findings and recommendations for improving John Lewis's online marketing efforts.

Digital Marketing Strategy
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Table of Contents
Introduction......................................................................................................................................3
STEP 1 Micro and macro analysis..............................................................................................4
STEP 2 Digital Business with Digital Marketing Plan...............................................................6
STEP 3 SMART Objectives of Digital Marketing.....................................................................8
STEP 4 Plan for implementing objectives of Digital marketing.................................................9
STEP 5 Budgeting.......................................................................................................................9
STEP 6 Measuring digital marketing plan ...............................................................................10
CONCLUSION..............................................................................................................................10
REFERENCES..............................................................................................................................11
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Introduction
John Lewis is a British company which operates departmental stores, its banking and
financial services, supermarkets and other retail related activities. The company was founded in
1864 and have many stores in England, Scotland and Wales. John Spedan Lewis is the founder
of the company. The company also sells their products through online mechanism. John Lewis
focuses on mobile shopping, on Christmas day last year 75% of companies online traffic came
from mobile shopping (Minculete and Olar, 2018). It also uses click and collect services which
eliminate middlemen.
The Digital marketing brings a huge relief to the company and the buyers. The
organisation can target their customers and reach maximum population to establish their brand.
Digital Market process consider five steps that are Research, Create, Promote, Analyse and
optimise. These are the steps which company should implement for growing into the market.
Digital marketing strategy is a plan that allows organisations how organisations meet its
marketing objectives through various online modes like social media. Some examples are:
campaigns of social media, building loyalty of customers through emails and many more.
The main purposes of digital marketing strategies are: rising website traffic, increasing
awareness about brand, increasing revenue of organisations and many more.
STEP 1 Micro and macro analysis and marketing plan
Digital Marketing Plan-
Firms, organisations and businesses uses different methods and ways to attract customers
towards their products and services. While looking at position, threats and opportunities of John
Lewis, the marketing plan needs to be logical. The plan is to capture the segment of middle class
and group of mid-aged people as they are the people with aspirational lifestyle. This approach
would help in marketing, capturing and retaining large number of customers (Farrar, 2020). For
the growth of business now it has become necessary to include digital marketing strategy with
other methods of marketing. Digital marketing plans are made to meet pre-determined objectives
and goals. The objectives that are going to be achieved through digital marketing are:
 More sales- To have more communication with the target customers and to find a
solution for their problems and requirements.
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 Larger sales opportunities- Helps the sale by converting more interaction into
opportunities of sales.
 More deals- To help potential customer quickly to overcome their problems and to make
a buying decision.
For the predetermined goals and objectives standards of metrics and accountability are
necessary.
 Increasing more sales from 20 to 80 and new prospect from 15 to 30.
 Increasing sales pipeline from $10M TO $25M
 Increasing deals from 5 to 10 in a month and reduce the cycle of sales from 100 days to
70 days.
John Lewis would take help of digital marketing to achieve and fulfil the aims by
providing content on digital platforms. This content will benefit the company in many ways: to
increase awareness, to form engagement among customers, building relationship to increase
sales, to help in guiding process of decision making, to gain new customers (Mekonnen, 2018).
Social media is one of the best platforms available to companies and organisations to
advertise their products to leads and to the existing customers. By becoming continuously active
on platforms of social media marketers can expand their product and service's reach, bring more
traffic to their website, and make connections with more customers. The plan is to create more
posts related to the product or services and update them on company's social media profile. The
company would promote the different campaigns of marketing through the posts of social media
and would share other useful content. PESTLE analysis: everything you need to know (2016).
Available in: http://pestleanalysis. com.pecialisation then it becomes easier for the marketers to
put out the right and nice content to the targetted customers.
Online strategies used by John Lewis
John Lewis partnership said that as customers are increasingly shopping through online medium,
the company will also become digital first. The company also plans to expand into new areas to
sell products based on Waitrose Garden, farm and John lewis outdoor living. Wait rose's online
delivery capacity was grow to 2,50,000 orders per week. They even launched a series of virtual
classes across John lewis.
The arguments against digital marketing strategy is that the company will become more
dependable on technology. They even have the security and privacy issues. John Lewis also
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needs a maintenance cost due to constantly evolving environment. The company will face a
worldwide competition through globalisation.
PESTLE Analysis of John Lewis
Pestle Analysis is conducted to analyse and monitor the external factors which affects the
organisation performance. Pestle stands for political, economical, social, technological,
environmental and legal (De Pelsmacker and et. al., 2018). These are the macro environmental
factors which affects the organisation. Through Pestle analysis the company can understand the
market scenario and improve its performance.
Political-
UK Government is settling to decrease the corporation tax from 30% to 28% which
helps John Lewis to increase their profitability ratio in future. Competitors from other country
can enter the UK market without any limitations.
Economical-
Unpredictability in import and export duties, UK GDP depends on the consumers
spending and it is a most important factor of UK economic growth. The country is facing a
recession due to which the competition is rigid in retail sector, that may influence John lewis.
The prices of the product may drop down most of the time.
Social-
John lewis should focus on the youngsters as they are more brand conscious, the
company must introduce more brands and latest fashion products for the customers. The
company should follow the latest trends to grab the customers.
Technological-
John Lewis sells their product through online mechanism to reach more and more target
audience. Internet shopping is the latest trend which is used by every retail industry to increase
their sales approach.
Environmental-
The resources used in production; cotton and wool by the company are environment
friendly (Bush, 2017.). The company also adopt sustainable practices and ensure that the
lifestyle doesn't harm other peoples.
Legal-
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The organisation manufactured their innovative designs, it should be legally secured so
that it cannot be stolen by other competitors (Hanlon, 2019). If the firm is entering into new
market, they have their own regulatory policies which company has to evaluate before entering
such market.
Situation analysis: Swot analysis is a part of situation analysis tat will be explained as
below in tabular form. This is:
SWOT Analysis of John Lewis-
The SWOT Analysis of John Lewis analyses the strength, weakness, opportunities and
threats of the company (Moro Visconti, 2016.). SWOT Analysis enables the company to
compare the performance and business to its competitors.
Strengths Weakness
1. The company have strong online presence.
2. It also have a good brand image in the
industry.
1. The company offers products at higher price
as compare to supermarkets which limits the
target group.
2. The organisation is also lacking in effective
marketing strategy.
Opportunities Threats
1. Expand network and develop new product
for growth of the organisation.
2. The company focus on youngsters as they
are brand and image conscious, their target
group is increasing.
1. Due to Cultural Differences the company
may face failure in entering into new market.
2. New Legislation can create a negative
effects on the organisation.
Competitors Analysis
Competitors analysis is the process of identifying strength and weakness of other
competitors and comparing the company with the competitors. It shows that where the company
stands in front of our competitors. A company can analyse the website traffic that helps to collect
more information of the competitors. The SEO tactics can be used by the company to improve
ranking in search results. The organisation should also focuses on online ads of their competitors,
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it helps the company to sot opportunities that rivalry company is missing. The social media
presence and PR efforts should also be analysed by the organisation.
Competitor objective related to digital marketing
The competitors objective related to digital marketing are as follows-
 To Increase the sales.
 To Improve the conversion rate.
 To generate more leads.
Market Analysis
Market analysis provides a detailed information to the organisation that help them in
framing the right strategy to ensure digital marketing success. Market analysis helps to find
different ways to market the business more effectively. Through digital marketing the company
can reach to more audience as compared to traditional marketing. The company has to identify
their target audiences and also they should know in which digital area, the digital team should be
active.
Conclusion-
From the above mentioned information, it has been concluded that there are different examples
of situation analysis such as PESTLE analysis, Swot analysis, competitors analysis etc. All these
are effective for an organisation in improvement of its business performance.
STEP 2 Digital Business with Digital Marketing Plan
Facebook:
Facebook is the most common online platform used by adults in their daily lives, so it
provides an opportunity to businesses and brands to increase their visibility by implementation of
marketing strategies of Facebook (Bala and Verma, 2018). John lewis add following points in its
digital marketing plan for the use of Facebook.
 The first step would be setting objectives for Facebook. Objectives for John lewis are to
increase to awareness of brand, to improve sales and generation of lead and prospects.
 The plan clearly mentions out the targetted audience and the demographics of social
media define about users education, languages spoken and so on.
 The plan involves engagement through Facebook, as it helps in creating discussions and
conversations with different types of customers.
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 The plan involves the time of posting content on Facebook. It is a challenge for
organisations to know right time to post. Sunday is not the right time to post as it is least
engaged day in a week.
 Facebook ad strategy is also a effective way to build brand and advertise it with ads.
LinkedIn:
LinkedIn is a platform where millions of professionals are present. It is the place where
so many leads can be found for the business and brand (Katsikeas and et. al., 2019). Among
many social media sites LinkedIn has stand out as success. The following points would help in
using LinkedIn for digital marketing plan of John Lewis:
 John lewis has to convert its company page into a page of lead generation. It should
create interaction by a option of click through which take to updates of company.
 The digital marketing plan of John Lewis creates showcase pages in LinkedIn for the
promotion and expansion. These pages are best to attract the traffic of LinkedIn.
 LinkedIn has advanced search option which help in identifying the targetted customer.
There are option of filter is available to companies, so marketing strategy should use this
way in their planning.
 LinkedIn offers to create own group which provide more opportunities and interaction
with different kind of people.
Google:
Google is the place where every type of person is present, everyone is used to with the
service of google. John lewis puts all the information about its products and services in in the
google so that customer can have access to the information of the services this attract the
customers as it is very convenient. The plan involves the service of google ad for targetting the
potential customers and for the generation of leads and to convert them into prospect customer.
Yahoo:
To solely depend on google for the advertisement of John lewis product and services, to
attract customers then the digital marketing plan includes yahoo because it covers 30% of market
that is needed by the company. Yahoo has search ads, it is an effective advertising method
because it gives information about the searchers what they are looking for, these searchers click
on paid ads that means they have a intent to convert into customers (Bakhtieva, 2017).
Displaying ads to the people who have shown interest in product and services. It is the part of
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personalized advertising known as re marketing. Yahoo mail ads are showed on the platform of
e-mails. With a click user reaches to the product and services of brand.
STEP 3 SMART Objectives of Digital Marketing
While setting objectives it is important that they are achievable by the organisation.
Setting smart objectives is crucial for digital marketing campaign. Smart goals directly
contribute in achieving business goals (Taiminen and Karjaluoto, 2015). Each campaign and ads
should be in line with marketing objectives and relevant to target audience. The objectives must
be specific that focus the campaign and helps to achieve results. The Smart Digital Objectives
are as follows-
1. Increases Brand awareness by creating accounts on different social media sites like Facebook,
Twitter, Instagram etc.
2. Increase the lead generation by website.
3. Maintain the enquiries per week.
Importance of digital marketing
Digital Marketing helps to establish an online presence of the business which increses the
growth of the company. The importance of digital marketing are as follows-
1. Reach people through online-
Nowadays, every company have their presence on internet. The organisation also focus
on digital marketing as most of the people use social networking sites, they check social media
and also purchases the product online. The Online presence increases the sales of the company
and customers.
2. Compete with Larger corporations-
When organisation is in the market with their competitor it is hard to survive with them.
Each company have its own reputation in the market. Its an opportunity for the company to
compete with larger corporations. The organisation can reach intersted leads with the same
methods that the other big corporation uses (Bång and Hell, 2015). The methods which is used
by the corporation are SEO and Pay per click.
3. Target Audience-
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With Digital Marketing, the business have capability to reach their target audience. The
Organisation can reach the audience, who are interested in their products. The company can set
the parameters for the social media ad campaign which can be seen by the relevant people.
STEP 4 Plan for implementing objectives of Digital marketing
In order to achieve above mentioned objectives, implementation of digital marketing plan is
important for John Lewis to use the opportunities given by world of online to grow businesses
(Key and Czaplewski, 2017). Step 1 would be setting of goals, where generation of at least 2
leads from Facebook each day.
Step 2 would be getting clear and specific about the audience to be targetted.
Step 3 would be positioning in the market, special things about business over competitors.
Step 4 would be arranging financial resources and human resources towards the successful
implementation of digital marketing plan. To provide human resources to use the digital
marketing activities.
Step 5 would be measuring results it is done by making weekly reports, source from where
traffic is gathering, being in touch with the new contacts and so on.
Step 6 would be arranging time to review the marketing strategy that if that particular strategy
has started showing result or not. Double down the strategies that is working and removing
which is not.
STEP 5 Budgeting
Budgeting is a financial tool which is available to all the owners of business. It is a
financial plan that can be short term as well as long term to control the cash flows of an
organisation.
For marketers it is a complex job to identify the budget for digital marketing plan because
it needs various strategies as there are many channels that are available, so every channel needs
financial resource to get maximum benefit (Saura and et. al ., 2019). So the digital marketing
plan include while planning budget it is necessary to to clear about the goals for the upcoming
month and year. For growing website of business there should be more investment in content of
high quality and investment in good search engine optimisation. The marketers of John Lewis
have to be also clear about that what part of revenue and profit should be invested in digital
marketing strategy. 8-9% of total revenue of the business should be invested in marketing. By
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auditing the results of past through different channels, which channels helped in gathering traffic
should be invested in more.
STEP 6 Measuring and controlling digital marketing plan
The above mentioned marketing plan can be measured by statistics and analytical combinations.
Some of them are traffic, revenue and conversions (López García and et. al ., 2019). This digital
marketing plan increase the total visit sites, it would create traffic from different channels like
direct visitors and search. There would be more strategies for engagement with leads and
customers. The various social platforms available to company are: facebook, google, yahoo,
LinkedIn and so on. For the implementation and to take full advantages of social media there is
need of people with required skill. If people of the organisation have good knowledge about
industry and sBush, T., 2017. Visitors time on site shows the level of interest towards the brand.
Measurement of digital marketing plan is done by checking sales done through online websites
of John Lewis, online sales are tracked easily with the help of Google analytics. Company has to
just install small snippet code on their websites, then it would be able to look which campaign
helped them in getting more sales through online. John lewis get more sales with the help of
Facebook. The next way of measuring used by John Lewis is online to store sales, in this
customers after seeing the products online they like to visit stores especially local consumers. It
can be measured by collecting information of customers from website and matching with the
details of customers visited in stores. Company also gives codes for discounts in their websites
then they can match with the campaign of marketing. And the simple way available is just
directly asking from customers. The next method is generation of leads from web forms through
google analytics company is able to see outcomes got from campaigns. Any consumer who
finishes web forms can be used converted into a consumer. This is the simple way because leads
are generated after coming live on Facebook by company. These can be measured by simply
installing tracking program like google analytics with this company would be able to see which
campaign generated potential customers for business through live. It can also be measured by
potential customers spending their time on blogs and websites, for this analytics are used to track
how much time a person is spending and what all thing they are eyeing on or browsing.
Understanding measurement of digital marketing campaigns reduces stress of sales in company
because it clearly defines which campaign is making profits for a firm and which campaigns are
not creating profits and revenue.
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CONCLUSION
From the above information it has been concluded that digital marketing strategy is vital process
for increasing number of customers and growth of the business. SWOT and Pestle analysis of
John Lewis shows that how these factors affect the companies and company convert these factors
into their opportunities and strengths. It also shows how Facebook, google and yahoo help in
gaining more market share.
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