HND in Business: Unit 2 Marketing Essentials - Apple Inc. Case Study

This case study examines the marketing strategies of Apple Inc., a leading multinational company. It begins by exploring the role of marketing as a function of business, highlighting market planning, product and service management, advertising, pricing, and distribution. The study then delves into the structure of Apple's marketing department, emphasizing its hierarchical organization and the roles of key personnel, including the Senior Vice President of Worldwide Marketing and the Vice President of Marketing Communications. The marketing process is then overviewed, including mission, situation analysis, marketing strategy, marketing mix, implementation, and control. The importance of the market environment, both internal and external, is discussed, emphasizing its influence on business decisions. Finally, the case study analyzes the influence and relationship of the marketing function with other departments, such as production, finance, and human resources, demonstrating its crucial role in achieving organizational goals. The case study references the importance of adapting to a dynamic business environment and leveraging market trends for success.

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Contents
Introduction.................................................................................................................................................3
1.The Role of Marketing as a Function of Business.....................................................................................3
2.Structure of the Marketing Department in Apple Inc...............................................................................5
3. Marketing Process Overview and Importance of the Market Environment............................................6
4.Marketing Function Influence and Relation with Other Departments.....................................................7
Conclusion...................................................................................................................................................8
Bibliography................................................................................................................................................9

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Introduction
Marketing is among the crucial elements that contribute to the survival and growth of any
business organization- small, medium and large multinational organizations. Marketing is among
the most misunderstood management disciplines commonly being associated with shopping and
advertisements, but it goes far beyond these two elements. There several marketing concepts
such as positioning, targeting, differentiation and segmentation, the 4Ps of marketing as well as
marketing strategies. In the contemporary marketing environment adopting an efficient
marketing strategy enables an organization to establish and sustain a competitive advantage over
its competitors, (Schindehutte and Kuratko, 2015, pp. 293). This case study is about the Apple
Inc. marketing strategies concerning the marketing concepts and strategies we learnt in class.
Apple Inc. is a large multinational company among the top revenue earners globally. Steve Jobs
a co-founder of the company served as the CEO, and the success of the company is credited to
him. The head offices are located in the United States, but they have their products delivered
almost in every corner of the world.
1. The Role of Marketing as a Function of Business
Marketing is very crucial for the success of Apple Inc., and they have focused on this to
gain a competitive advantage over their competitors. In this section, we are going to concentrate
on the role of marketing as a function of business rather than marketing as a department in Apple
Inc. The role of marketing in the company includes market planning, risk management, pricing,
financing, promotion, distribution, and product service management among many more. Apple is
among the company with creative and flexible marketing strategies that have made the company
to grow from a small computer company to a leading electronics company producing iPhones,
iPods, ipads and other online services such as iTunes. Market planning is the process of

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identifying and understanding the target market of an organization. Apple is mostly targeting the
upper to the middle class and specifically for people searching for convenience and ease of use.
Market planning is the primary marketing process for the organization, and it is often grouped
under management. Having a market plan is vital for Apple Inc. since it helps them products
that meet customer needs. Product and service management deals with producing a product that
suits the consumer's needs. After the production of a product, its success relies on its ease in
reaching the target consumers. The company ensures that they have devised efficient and
effective distribution networks. Apple has stores in most strategic places in the world as well as
customers can directly order products by visiting the stores' websites.
Advertising and promotion is another vital marketing role in the organization. The
company uses advertising and promotion to raise public awareness on their product as well as
gather crucial customers' needs and wants, (Chong, Ch'ng, Liu and 2017) The company
advertises and promotes its products various media channels including commercials as well as
the trending digital marketing tool-social media marketing. The pricing is also among the
functions of marketing in the company since once the product has reached the customer, they
must have the purchasing power to acquire the product. The company being a producer of new
technology, it sets prices that are comfortable for the wealthy and middle-class customers while
considering the production costs as well as revenue targets. Pricing is closely related to selling
since Selling involves direct interaction with customers to gather information on their wants,
needs, and preference to design a product or service that satisfy their requirements. Apple has
designated customer service team that provides useful product and service information to their
customers as a way to ensure customer satisfaction.

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2.Structure of the Marketing Department in Apple Inc
The marketing department in Apple is hierarchical with the 55-year-old Phil Schiller
being the head of the worldwide marketing of the organization. The hierarchical organization
enables the efficient and effective flow of information across and along with the various levels of
the department. If we view the Apple Inc. organization structure, the marketing department
included, we can see a spoke-and-wheel hierarchy. Unlike the Steve Jobs era where he made all
the strategic management decisions, Tim Cook's leadership is slightly different. Cook's
leadership promotes delegation of duties with the vice presidents given the authority to make
crucial decisions in their departments. The marketing department does not work independently
as it collaborates with other departments such as the hardware teams and software teams. Apart
from the senior vice president in charge of the worldwide marketing operations, there are junior
vice presidents that that handle interdepartmental relations.
The senior marketing vice president in the market is responsible for overseeing the
marketing initiatives of the company. He is also responsible for establishing and maintaining a
good relationship between developers, executives, and designers. He has to ensure that all the
parties involved in the product products process work together harmoniously to realize a new
product at the least possible cost but also incorporates all the attributes desired by the customers.
The senior marketing vice president is the brain behind the innovations and creativity in the
company for new products as well as improvement of the existing technology. Below the senior
vice president heading the marketing department, we have the Vice president- Marketing
Communications. Tor Myhren is currently occupying the Vice president, Marketing

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Communications position. He is responsible for all crucial decisions in advertising, package
design, internet presence, pricing, and other market-related choices.
3. Marketing Process Overview and Importance of the Market
Environment
The marketing process is very crucial for the success of any product, and it involves
product planning and tracking the product production progress as well as get feedback from the
customers. For the past seven years, Apple Inc. has been the winner of the CMO Survey Award
for Marketing Excellence. The marketing process of the company includes the mission, situation
analysis, marketing strategy, marketing mix as well as implementation and control. The
marketing mission of the company is to ensure that they make innovative, high-quality products.
Situation analysis involves understanding the competition as the company is committed to
meeting customers' needs to maintain a competitive advantage over their competitors. Apple
always strives to be the first to the market place with new technology and the brand loyalty is
used as a strategy to push through new products to old customers, (Więcek-Janka et al., 2017).
The company offers a wide range of product and premium pricing is valued in the company with
strict distribution guidelines. The marketing process of the company also ensures that all their
products complement each other and work in the same ecosystem thus customers tend to stay
within the brand, (Brashear-Alejandro, Kang and Groza, 2016,pp.1195). This is very a good
marketing strategy that helps the company create and sustain loyal customers.
The market environment highly determines the activities and operation of business
organizations. The actions of any organization are affected by various factors both internal and
external. Although some factors can be controlled within the organizations, most of the external
factors cannot be controlled; thus the organization has to flexible to adapt very fast to the

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dynamic business environment. The internal environment in any organization includes materials,
shareholders, machines and many more, (West, Ford, and Ibrahim, 2015). The external
environment which is further classified into microenvironment and microenvironment includes
production, distribution, promotion, fluctuation in exchange rates, international policies among
many market-related factors.
The apple company is making decisions based on the external and internal factors
affecting its operations. Based on the internal environments such as materials and money, the
organization has to prioritize what product should be released in the market and how it will be
produced based on the available funds. The market environment is essential in carrying out the
marketing functions since it helps in planning, understanding customers, tapping trends, realizing
opportunities and threats as well as understand the operations of the competitors, (Dissanayake
and Amarasuriya, 2015). As much as the business environment is dynamic, having a good
understanding of the market environment enables the Apple Inc. company to predict future
trends and prepare in advance. The market environment is essential since it allows the company
to understand the customer needs and preferences through a comprehensive analysis of the
purchasing patterns. The market environment comes with the threat as well as opportunities and
understanding the environment enables the company to tap in the opportunities and minimize the
risks. For instance, the increasing trend in social media marketing has made Apple Inc. to put a
lot of focus on digital marketing, and this move is contributed to an increase in sales in the
organization.
4.Marketing Function Influence and Relation with Other Departments
The marketing department is responsible for marketing activities, but it must work hand
in hand with other departments. The marketing team has a huge influence on the daily operations

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of the organization since it ensures the company makes a lot of revenue and profits. The
marketing team in Apple ensures that the company continuous meets the customer wants to
ensure customer satisfaction, (Martin, and Murphy, 2017, pp.140). The marketing function is key
to the survival and growth of the company.
The marketing department is working closely with other departments to ensure the
collective organizational goals and objectives are met effectively and efficiently. The marketing
department is closely working with the production Department, The Finance Department, and the
HR Department. The marketing department must gather information on the customer needs and
preference then it reports this information to the production department which includes software
and hardware designers and developers, (Straker and Wrigley, 2016.pp. 231). The production
department has to communicate with the marketing team on new technologies to determine how
viable it will be in the market and the pricing. The marketing department requires competent
team members; thus it has to get assistance from the human resource department to recruit and
train employees. Apple has continuous training programs that ensure their employees have the
required skill set to carry out their duties. The marketing department requires money to carry out
all its functions; thus it relies on the help of the finance department to ensure that marketing is
cost-effective.
Conclusion
Business organizations are operating in a dynamic environment; thus proper marketing is
a crucial tool to endure the turbulence in the market. Apple Inc. is among the companies with the
established marketing strategies that ensure their survival and growth for a long time. The role of
marketing in the company includes market planning, risk management, pricing, financing,
promotion, distribution, and product service management among many more. The marketing

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department in the organization collaborates with another department to realize the organizational
goals and objectives.
Bibliography
Brashear-Alejandro, T., Kang, J. and Groza, M.D., 2016. Leveraging loyalty programs to build
customer–company identification. Journal of Business Research, 69(3), pp.1190-1198.
Chong, A.Y.L., Ch’ng, E., Liu, M.J. and Li, B., 2017. Predicting consumer product demands via
Big Data: the roles of online promotional marketing and online reviews. International Journal of
Production Research, 55(17), pp.5142-5156.
Dissanayake, D. M. R., & Amarasuriya, T. (2015). Role of brand identity in developing global
brands: A literature based review on case comparison between Apple iPhone vs Samsung
smartphone brands.
Martin, K.D. and Murphy, P.E., 2017. The role of data privacy in marketing. Journal of the
Academy of Marketing Science, 45(2), pp.135-155.
Schindehutte, M. and Kuratko, D.F., 2015. The Role of Marketing in Initiating Entrepreneurial
Activity in Established Companies. In Proceedings of the 2000 Academy of Marketing Science
(AMS) Annual Conference (pp. 291-295). Springer, Cham.
Straker, K. and Wrigley, C., 2016. 11. The role of emotion, experience and meaning: the
comparative case of Apple and Samsung. International perspectives on business innovation and
disruption in design, p.231.
West, D.C., Ford, J. and Ibrahim, E., 2015. Strategic marketing: creating competitive advantage.
Oxford University Press, USA.
Więcek-Janka, E., Papierz, M., Kornecka, M. and Nitka, M., 2017. Apple products: A discussion
of the product life cycle. In 4th International Conference on Management Science and
Management Innovation (Vol. 31, pp. 159-164).