Marketing Mix and Business Objectives: A Case Study of Burberry

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MARKETING ESSENTIALS
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Contents
INTRODUCTION...........................................................................................................................................3
LO1 EXPLAIN THE ROLE OF MARKETING AND HOW IT INTERRELATES WITH OTHER FUNCTIONAL UNITS
OF AN ORGANIZATION................................................................................................................................5
P1 EXPLAIN THE KEY ROLES AND RESPONSIBILITIES OF THE MARKETING FUNCTION.............................5
P2 EXPLAIN HOW ROLES AND RESPONSIBILITIES OF MARKETING RELATE TO THE WIDER
ORGANIZATIONAL CONTEXT....................................................................................................................6
LO2 COMPARE WAYS IN WHICH ORGANIZATIONS USE ELEMENTS OF THE MARKETING MIX (7 Ps) TO
ACHIEVE OVERALL BUSINESS OBJECTIVES...................................................................................................9
P3 COMPARE THE WAYS IN WHICH DIFFERENT ORGANIZATIONS APPLY THE MARKETING MIX TO THE
MARKETING PLANNING PROCESS TO ACHIEVE BUSINESS OBJECTIVES...................................................9
LO3 DEVELOP AND EVALUATE A BASIC MARKETING PLAN........................................................................14
P4 PRODUCE AND EVALUATE A BASIC MARKETING PLAN FOR AN ORGANIZATION..............................14
CONCLUSION.............................................................................................................................................16
REFERENCE LIST.........................................................................................................................................17
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INTRODUCTION
Marketing means the activities of an organization for the purpose of selling its product
or services to its final customer by adopting several marketing practices such as
advertising, sales promotion, direct selling or through other means. The aim of
marketing is to maintain a relationship with the customers by offering them quality
goods or services at an affordable price (Baker, 2016). The marketing activities of any
company are concentrated to the customers. The traditional approach of marketing
starts with manufacturing the goods and selling them to the final customer. But in the
modern approach, the activities of marketing starts before manufacturing the product
and even ends after selling the product to the final customer. In the modern approach,
the customer is considered as a king of the market and all the activities of the marketing
revolved around the customer to make them satisfied. The marketing mix of the
company comprises of 4P’s that includes product, price, place and promotion. The
marketing essentials are an exchange or transaction to satisfy the needs or wants of
an individual or a group (Blythe and Martin, 2019).
American Marketing Association defines the term marketing as, “marketing is the set
of activities, institutions and processes for creating, communicating and delivering the
offerings that have some value for the customers, clients, and society at large.”
Burberry Ltd. is a British luxury fashion house and its headquarter is in London,
England. Burberry manufactures the apparel of kids, men and women and also deals in
accessories and fragrances. The company was started in the year 1856 by Thomas
Burberry and their main purpose is to manufacture the clothes to protect the people
from the British weather.
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LO1 EXPLAIN THE ROLE OF MARKETING AND HOW IT INTERRELATES
WITH OTHER FUNCTIONAL UNITS OF AN ORGANIZATION
P1 EXPLAIN THE KEY ROLES AND RESPONSIBILITIES OF THE MARKETING
FUNCTION.
The marketing function of the Burberry helps to define the roles and responsibilities of
the organization that helps to identify the products and the promotion to make it
successful in the target market. The main activities involved in the marketing function
are research, planning, designing, promoting, sales, customer service and many more.
The roles and responsibilities of the marketing function in the Burberry are as follows:
 Conducting marketing research
Before launching a product in the market, the marketer must conduct marketing
research to understand the nature and demand of the product in the target
market. The importance of marketing research is very crucial in the fashion
industry where the needs and wants of the customer continuously and frequently
changes with the trends (Hill, 2017).
 Defining and managing the brand
The marketing function of the Burberry creates awareness about the brand and
the value of the brand. Through defining and managing the brand, the company
explains the importance of their experience with the customers and partners
when they interact with the organization.
 The clear understanding of the target market and competitors
The most important responsibility of the marketing function is to identify the
nature and characteristics of the target market and their competitors. The
marketing department of the Burberry does complete research of the target
market before launching a new product in the market and also analyzes the
marketing strategies of their competitors to grab the opportunities and to prevent
from the threats (Chernev, 2018).
 A strategy to drive profitability and growth
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Marketing function acts as a strategy to increase its profitability and market
growth. With the help of marketing, the organization increases its customer base
by selling more units of output to the end user. Therefore, the increase in sales
increases the profitability and the growth of the market.
 Satisfy customer needs
It is essential to produce the goods and services that will satisfy the needs and
wants of the customers. The customers can be only attached to the company if it
provides the goods or services according to their needs. Marketer collects and
analyzes the information collected through internal channels and outside the
company to make the customer satisfied and delighted (Razak et al., 2016).
 Brings innovation
The marketing department continuously works on bringing new innovations in
their product and promotional activities to attract the prospects and to retain the
existing customers. Innovation is the key to maintain its position in the market as
well as industry. The organization should implement innovative ideas in every
small detail for improving its position.
Thus marketing function involves several roles and responsibilities, and these
responsibilities directly contribute to its growth. There is a close relationship between
the marketing function and other organizational function in the organization.
P2 EXPLAIN HOW ROLES AND RESPONSIBILITIES OF MARKETING RELATE TO
THE WIDER ORGANIZATIONAL CONTEXT.
The major roles and responsibilities of marketing in the organizational context can be
explained as follows:
 Conducting marketing research
Conducting marketing research as a marketing function helps in identifying and
evaluating the future needs and trends of the market as well as customers. The
fashion industry changes continuously and the customers also expect from the
Burberry that they should manufacture the goods according to the market trends.
 Defining and managing the brand
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It is only possible through the marketing to create awareness and generate
demand for the product and brand. The company uses several promotional tools
such as advertising, online marketing, personal selling, direct mailing, event
marketing, sponsorship to promote the company as well as the brand (Sharma
and Prasad, 2018).
 The clear understanding of the target market and competitors
The success of any product depends on the marketing strategy adopted by the
Burberry to attract the customers. The marketing manager recognizes the needs
and requirement of the target market before manufacturing a product and also
analyzes the competitor’s marketing strategy before launching a new product.
 A strategy to drive profitability and growth
The marketing strategy of Burberry helps the company to sell its product easily
and therefore it increases the profitability of the company in the long term.
Promotional activities are the best tool to increase profitability and market growth
(Ward, 2016).
 Satisfy customer needs
The marketing practices help in generating demand for the product. Thus the
quality of product and services of the Burberry gives complete satisfaction to the
customers.
 Brings innovation
The reason behind the survival of the company in the industry is that it
continuously brings innovation in its product/services and also in promotional
practices which attract the potential customers as well as allow the existing
customers to remain loyal to the brand.
Key elements of the marketing function and their interrelationship with other
functional units of organization
The functional units of the organization include strategy, research, planning and tactics.
Research helps in getting all the required information such as logistics, raw material,
finance and other resources which is necessary for designing the marketing plan. After
collecting the data, the information is used to develop the strategy to identify the
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strength and weakness which are taken into account while developing any marketing
strategy. The marketing department then develops the outline of the planning process
to convert the organizational objectives into success (Thompson, 2017). The fourth and
last function of the marketing is tactics i.e. to prepare and implement the short term and
long term plans for attracting the target customers.
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LO2 COMPARE WAYS IN WHICH ORGANIZATIONS USE ELEMENTS OF THE
MARKETING MIX (7 Ps) TO ACHIEVE OVERALL BUSINESS OBJECTIVES
P3 COMPARE THE WAYS IN WHICH DIFFERENT ORGANIZATIONS APPLY THE
MARKETING MIX TO THE MARKETING PLANNING PROCESS TO ACHIEVE
BUSINESS OBJECTIVES.
The importance of the marketing mix in marketing planning can be seen as it helped in
achieving the organizational objective. The company uses different marketing methods
to achieve organizational objectives. The marketing mix of Burberry includes 4P's to
achieve the organizational objectives are as follows:
Product
Burberry is a fashion leading brand. The product of the Burberry includes accessories,
fragrances and apparel of children, men and women. Accessories are used to attract
the customers at the entry level and its life cycle and shelf life are more as compared to
the other two products. While the average life of the apparel is four months and after
this duration, these go out of fashion (Sulaiman and Syahrivar, 2018).
The products are acting as a hero in achieving the organizational goal of Burberry. The
customer satisfaction, reputation of company, customer loyalty, brand image etc. all
depends on the product and its quality. Thus the quality of the product should meet the
customer needs and wants. The target customer of the Burberry belongs to the high-
income group and they are ready to spend on trendy and unique products.
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Price
Burberry charges premium prices of its product because its target customers lie in the
high-income group and thus they demand the luxury products. Burberry uses a mix of
low-cost range and selling it at the premium price in order to maximize its profit.
Therefore, through its premium price and quality products, there is no direct competitor
of the company. The differentiation strategies used by the Burberry are product design,
durability and durability. The pricing strategy of the company remains the same as if the
company changes its prices i.e. charges more or less will shift its customers to another
company. The company charges the price according to the demand and willingness of
the customer to pay (Abril and Rodriguez-Cánovas, 2016).
The company also analyzes the pricing strategy of the competitor to finalize the price of
its product. Thus the pricing strategies of the Burberry are designed to meet the long
term organizational objective and also to expand its customer base.
Place
The total number of stores of Burberry is more than 475 in approximately 50 countries.
These stores are located in a highly populated area which guarantees that the company
does not incur any loss while operating in these areas. As a result, the company
expected more profit from these populated cities. In these stores, the company makes
extensive use of digital technology and innovation to improve customer service. Also,
the company uses the digital platform to sell its product which constituents a large per
cent of traffic. Due to a large number of stores, the Burberry is able to serve similar
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customer satisfaction result to its customers. The distribution channel of the Burberry is
quick and efficient to fulfil the needs of every customer (Baker, 2016). The store layout
and design of the stores attract many potential customers that help in converting them
in loyal customers.
Place as an element of marketing mix contributes to the meeting the objective of the
company. The place of the retail store should be convenient for the customers with all
necessary facilities such as parking, drinks and beverages and others so that customers
prefer to visit the stores and also takes the action to purchase the product.
Promotion
Burberry immensely focuses on its promotional activities and is one of the important
elements of the marketing mix which has a major contribution in achieving the
organizational goal. The apparel industry demands a huge investment in promotional
activities. The company following promotional tools advertising, online marketing, event
marketing, and sponsorship. The media used in the advertising are the newspaper,
television, online platform, banners, and billboards to attract the masses. The focus of
the Burberry changes from the traditional media to modern media such as online
platform due to its significance in the current scenario. Investment in the online platform
or social media helped the company to easily reach the target market. The use of digital
technology has contributed to achieving the organizational goal of Burberry (Baker and
Saren, 2016).
The organizational objective of the Burberry can be achieved by adopting various
promotional techniques. The apparel industry demands huge investment in the
promotion. It is because the trends and fashion in the current scenario can be known to
the people through promotional activities of companies.
People
The employees of the Burberry work in a team to achieve the marketing goals. They are
provided with proper training of persuasive techniques to fulfil the customer request. In
order to fulfil the customer request, the employees of the Burberry work in the customer
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service department to contact with the customers related to any mistake in the product
or any guide or help to the customers. These people are trained in this field to provide
customer complete satisfaction with the product or service (Dileep and Mathew, 2017).
The people have a major contribution in achieving the organizational objective of
Burberry. The training and development activities of employees are developed so that
they help in achieving the organizational objective. For instance, providing training to
employees of the retailer because they are the ones who interact with the final customer
and they have the power to influence the customer in the whole purchasing process.
Process
Burberry distribution and logistics functions make sure that products should be always
available to the retail stores and also the company has the system that provides the
details about the inventory in the store. Burberry supplies the goods to its retailer
according to replenishment order. The main aim of this system in the retail stores that
the goods should be always available to the customers when they need it. The
computer systems are installed to receive the order through online media. Based on this
order, the relevant goods are shipped to the customers according to their order.
From the process of research and development after providing the after-sales service,
several people and several technologies helped the company in achieving the
organizational objectives. The company must ensure that all the process must be
carried out efficiently and effectively.
Physical evidence
The physical evidence used by the Burberry is the unique color packaging that is easily
identifiable in the retail store. The shelves are also provided by the company that also
has a distinct color and shape that makes it unique and customers easily identify by the
customers. The other physical evidence used by the company for its online platform is a
user-friendly website that allows the customer to visit the website and they are easy to
access and view the products in the high-quality images (Thieu et al., 2017).
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