Marketing Essentials: Amazon's Role and Responsibilities Report

This report provides a comprehensive analysis of Amazon's marketing strategies, focusing on its role and responsibilities within the organization. It explores the key functions of marketing, including social media management, brand awareness, market research, and strategy formulation. The report delves into the relationships between the marketing department and other departments such as production, finance, human resources, and research and development, highlighting the importance of these interconnections for overall business success. Furthermore, it compares the marketing mix elements of Amazon and eBay, and concludes with a proposed marketing plan designed to enhance Amazon's sales and achieve its business goals. The report emphasizes the importance of marketing in promoting brand awareness, understanding consumer needs, and adapting to market trends, ultimately contributing to a firm's growth and development in the competitive e-commerce landscape.

MARKETING ESSENTIALS

Table of Contents
INTRODUCTION...........................................................................................................................1
LO 1.................................................................................................................................................1
P1 Key roles and responsibilities of the marketing function..................................................1
P2 Role and responsibilities of marketing related to organisation.........................................2
LO 2.................................................................................................................................................6
P3 Marketing mix comparison..............................................................................................6
LO 3.................................................................................................................................................9
P4 Marketing plan for Amazon..............................................................................................9
CONCLUSION..............................................................................................................................13
REFERENCES..............................................................................................................................14

INTRODUCTION
Marketing is the technique to reach to mass audience and make people aware with
product and services offered by business unit. It is the process that helps in promoting brand and
attracting potential buyers (Blythe and Martin, 2019). Marketing is important part of business
for its growth and development. Effective marketing is key to success for a firm. Present study is
based on Amazon, which is a leading E-commerce firm that offers products and services across
the world. In the year 2018, company has generated 177.9 billion revenues. Current assignment
will discuss the role and responsibility of marketing in the organisation. Furthermore, it will
describe responsibility of marketing in wider organisational context. Study will compare
marketing mix element of Amazon with eBay. In addition, report will produce a marketing plan
so that sales of the firm can be increased and it can accomplish its goal significantly.
LO 1
P1 Key roles and responsibilities of the marketing function
Marketing is related to buying and selling of the product. It also includes market research,
distribution methods and also product development (Blythe and Martin, 2019).
Roles and responsibilities of the organization-
Monitoring and managing social media- it is a process of managing and analysing
product on the social media platform such a google, Facebook, YouTube and Instagram by
carefully watching the online post of the organization and also manages the online accounts of
the amazon. It saves time of the company by scheduling post earlier.. it also increases customer
support by creating more simple ways for customers to inquire through social media (Perkins and
et.al., 2017). Through social media, amazon can take care of brand's reputation by giving more
quickly response to queries of the customers also take feedback from the customer's experience.
It also encourages innovation by creating new opportunities as well collaboration over new
platforms for campaigns on social media.
Improve communication- Marketing is responsible for improving coordination between
employees and consumers. Through marketing firm can contact with consumers and can
understand their needs. Social networking sites are helpful in making direct contact with
potential buyers, people can share their views and can make the firm aware with their choice so
that enterprise can offer them products and services accordingly. Hence marketing plays the
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coordinator role which helps Amazon in raising satisfaction level of consumers to great extent.
(Piñeiro-Otero and Martínez-Rolán, 2016).
Brand awareness: Marketing plays the role of promoter; it supports in raising awareness
among people so that they get to know features of products provided by business unit. By this
way enterprise can gain attention of mass audience and can turn them into actual consumers
(Nirschl and Steinberg, 2018).
Conduct market research: Marketing plays the role of researcher, it conducts market
research in order to analyses current market situation so that firm can make its strategy
accordingly. This is beneficial tool which supports business unit in identifying its loop fall and
making changes in existing strategies accordingly. (Campbell, Martin and Fabos, 2018). Through
market research Amazon and pays perception and needs of buyers, strategies of competitors and
make its marketing plan so that it can gain competitive advantage (Pike, 2015).
Strategy formulation: marketing is considered as most important tool which helps the
organisation in estimating demands and set price accordingly. Through marketing firm can
analyses its position in the market and can frame strategy so that it can gain success in the
market. (Blythe and Martin, 2019). Amazon marketers frame amazing strategies so that product
can be promoted in the market and firm can improve its brand image.
Relationship builder: Marketing plays the role of relationship builder, through marketing
Amazon can make contact with buyers. Through social sites it takes suggestion of them and get
to know their views which help the firm in building strong bonding with potential buyers and
turning them into real consumers of business unit.
Awareness of brand values- brands represents the value of the products in the customer's
eyes in terms of dignity and trust of the organization. Every brand has its own value. (Perkins
and et.al., 2017).
P2 Role and responsibilities of marketing related to organisation
Relationship between various departments
Marketing department and production: There is strong relationship between marketing
department and production functional units. As marketing department plays an important role in
advertising and promoting business. It is a process of defining positioning, target, segment and
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unique selling of a product or product line. It is the role of marketing department to manage
branding, advertising, all promotional activities and labelling of a product (Perkins and et.al.,
2017). It is necessary for every company to get close to customers and listen to their needs. It is
the role of marketing department to listen to customers and provide them with product that
satisfy consumer’s needs. It can be done in 2 ways: Through marketing Amazon analyses needs
of buyers and design products accordingly. If there is no market research then firm will not be
able to analyses issues in its products and production department will not be able to provide high
quality products to consumers. On other hand production unit is responsible for producing goods
and services which help marketing team to sale the end product to end user and satisfying their
needs.
Marketing is responsible for generating content. Company's website is the first and
possibly the last place where people go in search of information about the company. Marketing
department of Amazon is responsible to update the website daily and makes sure that when
anyone searches for the similar type of business amazon should come quickly. Website should be
attractive so that people get attracted toward it and wish to look for the product they were
actually looking for.(Malhotra, 2015.) Through search engine optimization company can collect
information about the customer's nature i.e. what are they looking for, what product do they want
and in how much quantity do they purchase. By using this information amazon give coupons and
discounts to the customers which helps in retaining customers. Marketing team of Amazon get
updated information about new trends, digital tools and strategies that arise in market. Product
management tools should be used to project the success of company's products. It can be done by
using various tools like canny, Survey Monkey etc. to collect feedback from customers or other
analytical tools like google analytics to determine product success and web areas with lowest and
highest interactions. (Blakeman, 2015. ). All these things are used by Amazon in product
development so that it can offer wide range of products and can attract more consumers towards
the brand.
Marketing and finance department: Both these functional units are interrelated. Through
internal channels of company, marketing team of Amazon creates surveys and collect sales and
information from the customers within the company i.e. employees who help in redirecting
marketing strategies and enhance the product in the future. Through external channels of the
company, marketing team do researches about people needs and provide them with those
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products thus converting them into customers. Marketing team also use social media to better
understand the need of customers by looking at the insights which shows likes, dislike, sharing
and commenting done by people on various social media platforms.(Blythe and Martin, 2019)
Amazon uses past data to find out the needs of customer by collecting large amount of data
generated by the customers. It has the capability to analyse the data and from the insights of data
marketing team make strategies to provide products as per customers needs. Amazon recognises
the pattern of purchase of customer i.e. how customers look for the product, how they buy them,
how they use services and by doing this Amazon predicts what will customer do next thus
anticipate needs of customers. Once customers are satisfied with the product this will increase
the sale and generate profit. (Campbell, Martin and Fabos, 2018.) All these things help in
generating revenues which is beneficial for the finance unit because they get adequate fund to
allot for further business operations. On other hand finance department has to provide budget to
marketing team so that advertisement expenses can be done properly and entity can raise its
sales.
Marketing describes the consumer recognition of the product. It is a process that at how
much extent does customer recall a brand. Marketing department is responsible to build brand
image to make people aware of products, engage customers, prepare promotional activities and
do research about competitors product. Marketing team is responsible for not only marketing the
product but also managing and developing the product as per customer needs. Brand awareness
can repeat the purchase of a product by targeting audience and motivate them so that they feel
connected to the brand. Brand awareness influences the perception of customers which results in
brand loyalty. It also increases market share if company's product is first to enter in the market
which leaves a brand image in their mind and a barrier for competitors to enter in market.
(Rowley, 2016. )
Marketing and HR department: Both this functional departments are depended on each
other, if one department fails to perform its duties well then it may impact on overall working of
Amazon to great extent. Marketing is responsible for monitoring the progress of company and
evaluating the market condition. This helps business in making strategies accordingly. It is
important to study the competitors to know where our company stands. Amazon has many
competitors are Walmart, E-bay, Best buy, Costco and many others. It is essential to track
competitors marketing as well as their packaging, advertising, social media, promotion and
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website activities. Amazon uses google alert to get updates on what competitor is doing. It is free
to use, just sign in with google alert and insert competitors name to search about the activities
perform by them or any news, blogs or videos. Social networking sites are part of marketing
element that aids the firm in monitoring the working of other competitors and making changes in
the firm's strategies so that it can gain competitive advantage (Pike, 2015.) To monitor
competition company also connect with competitors on social media sites and see what company
is most liked by customers or company can become secret shopper and purchase the products of
competitors to identify their technique that Amazon is not using and also helps in finding out
price of similar products. Marketing plays the role of monitor, by monitoring websites of
competitors makes Amazon learn a lot such as company can track information about what they
are offering to customers and identify new trends. It main goal is to ensure that all marketing
elements are better than competitors. It is helpful in forecasting demand of manpower in the
coming future, by this way HR team can hire candidates accordingly so that demand and supply
can be balanced. If human resource department fails to perform its duties well such as hiring
unskilled people, poor training arrangement then Amazon employees will not be able to generate
sales which will affect productivity and profitability of company to great extent.
Marketing and research and development: Research and development unit can perform
well if there is marketing department. Marketing plays the role of innovator, it helps in analysing
new ideas that may help in raising satisfaction level of consumers and increasing profitability of
business unit. Customers always look for something new in the market and demand is increasing.
Marketing department should improve the products, new promotion ways and make new
products which attract people so that they do not go anywhere. By using marketing tool Amazon
has found the innovative idea of Amazon prime. Amazon has launched amazon prime in which
shipping is fast and free, this made people to come and order from amazon prime leaving other
company back. Company is also developing amazon air through which customers can get their
order in 30 minutes which can be a game changer. Amazon also introduced alexa (amazon voice
assistant) which can place orders, find music and can hear and answer voice commands from a
noisy room. Company has innovated its website by one-click purchase in which customer does
not have to fill multiple forms to place an order. (Shaw, 2016. )
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LO 2
P3 Marketing mix comparison
Marketing mix includes 7 p's of marketing which are product, place, price, promotion,
people, process and physical environment. Company always try to make best combination of 7
p's of marketing for achieving growth and gain more profit
Elements Amazon eBay
Product As the global leader, amazon
offers large number of product
to consumers. Where people
can buy millions of product at
same destination so it is easy
for them to choose products
according to their needs. Wide
range of products help to make
no. of costumers. And the
increase of selection of product
they started amazon prime
facility which help to gain
more no. of customer and they
giving them extra facilities for
that company adopt branding
and packaging strategies in
which it make packaging
simple and clear so that
consumers not get confused. It
offers retail goods, video
games, Amazon drive,
electronics items to consumers
across the world (Smith, 2016 )
Ebay provides warranty for its
product which attract customer
and help to make more profit.
eBay offers wide range of
products to consumers such as
video games, home appliances,
beauty items, retail items,
bicycles etc. All these things
are able to meet the needs of
wide range of consumers.
Place Place means the venue use for In venues of selling ebay is
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the business operations it
started with online selling
concept.
Company takes support of
direct and indirect distribution
strategy.. And it also decreases
the delivery time of the
product.
only dealing in online business
and there distribution channel
is only via online platform. In
online business ebay have been
ranked in top 13 global retail
brand (eBay Worldwide: A
Complete List of International
eBay Sites, 2019). In chosen
strategy firm get more targets
customers and that help to
achieve organisational goal
which is maximisation of
profit (Folinas and Fotiadis,
2017.)
Price Amazon adopts competitive
pricing strategy as primary
pricing strategy. It ensures
competitor's prices and
accordingly set its products
price. With this pricing
strategy, firm gets more
customer base and earn more
profit
Ebay adopt penetration pricing
strategy, this helps the firm in
attracting more buyers as
initially it offers low cost items
so that people take interest in
its products and service. In
addition, firm charge 4% of
selling price as the fees and a
annual subscription fees. With
this strategy firm gets more no.
of customer which help to
increase its market share and
company growth
Promotion In promotion strategies,
amazon primarily adopt
advertising strategy. It
In promotion strategies, ebay
mainly focus on sales
promotion. For that, enterprise
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promotes the brand through
TV advertisements and news
papers. This helps the entity in
reaching to mass audience and
making them aware with
features of company.
gives discount coupons to
customer, sale, and cashback
offers. It also adopts
advertisement strategies but
not on wide basis. E bay also
provide free gift on the
purchase of a fix amount and it
attracts customer for the
investment.
People It is a very fast growing
company and more than
100000 employees are working
in it which makes it a big
brand and firm provides job
security to there employees
and extra benefits like
incentive, medical facilities
and social security to their
workers. For retention of staff
members it provides them
hygienic and better working
environment (Chatzidakis,
McEachern and Warnaby,
2018.)
With more than 12600
employees, eBay have a large
no. of workers segment where
eBay mainly focus on their
employee satisfaction and
reduce employee turnover rate.
In order to meet this target it
recruits people at high salary
packages. This helps in hiring
talented people those who can
contribute well in
accomplishing goal of business
unit.
Process Amazon has its own website
where consumers can raise
their voice if they have any
quarry related to product of
service. Customer service
executives give immediate
ebay providing a quality online
shopping experience, for that it
implements strategy of
customer feedback. It applies
the suggestions given by
customer which helps to
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response to consumers which
makes them amazing
experience.. That shows that
buyers can reach to firm
smoothly and their problems
get resolved quickly.
making better experience of
shopping
Physical evidence Its first physical evidence is its
logo, website and its mobile
app. Website of firm is user
friendly which creates good
image in the eyes of users and
helps to gain more customer
base and organisational goal.
Packaging of its products is
very attractive. It has designed
its website in attractive manner
that catches attention of
potential buyers (Nirschl and
Steinberg, 2018).
LO 3
P4 Marketing plan for Amazon
Executive summary
Marketing plan gives an overview of business marketing activities. Marketing plan is a
process of how organisation develop and implement strategies to market their product and
services. It can be generated by doing marketing research and competitors analysis (Piñeiro-
Oteroand Martínez-Rolán., 2016).
Company background
Amazon is world's largest digital streaming and e-commerce company. It is an online
retailer, but was originally web service provider and electronic book reader. (Stern and Porr,
2017)
Mission: to become the leading e-commerce firm that provides wide range of products to
mass audience.
Marketing objective: To increase sales of its beauty products by 20% till the end of
2019.
SWOT analysis :
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STRENGTH
 Wide range of products
 Global presence
 Delivery network is fast and quick
WEAKNESS
 Failure of product
 Brick-and-mortar model is limited
OPPORTUNITIES
 Invest in brick-and-mortar stores
 Entering in new markets
THREATS
 Cybercrime
 Change in regulations
PESTLE analysis:
POLITICAL FACTOR UK government is stable so there is no fluctuation
in the rules and regulations thus company does not
need to change their strategies which reduce cost
(Nirschl and Steinberg, 2018). Due to political
stability, company can expand its business in
different countries. UK government has made anti-
cyber law to protect it from fraud, customers feel
secure and take more interest in purchasing products
which increase sales.
ECONOMIC FACTOR Employment rate is high in UK thus purchasing
power of people is also high. Due to busy schedule
people prefer to purchase online. It has a positive
impact on amazon. But inflation impacts negative
on purchase behaviour of buyers and they do not
spend much amount in buying such products in such
condition sales of the Amazon may get decreased.
SOCIAL FACTOR Online buying practices are increasing because
young generation prefer to shop online which
increases sale of company. But people have fear of
fraud which makes them negative towards the
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