Marketing Report: Your Destination's Marketing Strategy and Plan

This report provides a detailed analysis of the marketing strategies employed by Your Destination, a transportation service company. It begins with an introduction to marketing and its significance, followed by an examination of the roles and responsibilities of marketing officers and the functions they perform within the organization. The report then delves into the development of marketing strategies, including a comparison of the marketing mix of Your Destination and its competitor, National Express. The report further develops a comprehensive marketing plan for Your Destination, outlining key elements and strategies to achieve competitive advantages. The report covers topics like customer relationship management, employee management, identifying new business opportunities, setting marketing budgets, and brand development. It also discusses the interplay between marketing and other organizational functions, such as operations, human resources, and finance. The report concludes with a summary of the key findings and recommendations for Your Destination's marketing efforts.

Marketing Essential

Table of Contents
INTRODUCTION...........................................................................................................................1
LO1 MEMO.....................................................................................................................................1
P1 Roles and responsibilities of marketing officers and marketing functions............................1
P2 Roles and responsibilities of marketing officer in wider organisational context...................3
LO2 Marketing Strategy..................................................................................................................6
P3 Comparison of marketing mix of National Express and Your Destination............................6
LO3 Marketing Plan........................................................................................................................8
Marketing Plan of Your Destination............................................................................................8
CONCLUSION..............................................................................................................................11
REFRENCES.................................................................................................................................12

INTRODUCTION
The action or business of promoting and selling products or services, including market
research and advertising is referred as marketing. Marketing is very essential component of
business which help in growth and development of organization. This report will aim to cover
the essential component of marketing which includes roles and responsibilities of marketing
officers and marketing functions for “Your Destination”. The organization specialized with
private personal hire to industrial level transportation facility. The company is rapidly growing
and expanding its facilities. The only competitor of the organization is “National Express”. In
order to gain competitive advantages, marketing strategies will be formulated in this report with
the help of marketing mix. Further, marketing plan will be made in this assignment so that
competitive advantage can be gain by “Your Destination” efficiently and effectively.
LO1 MEMO
P1 Roles and responsibilities of marketing officers and marketing functions
To: Senior Management
From: Marketing Manager
Date: 5th November 2017
Re: Roles and responsibilities of marketing officers
Marketing officer plays various roles in an organisation. The roles and responsibilities assign to
them so that they can increase the productivity and profitability of the organisation effectively
and efficiently (Armstrong, Harker and Brennan, 2015). In this context, the roles and
responsibilities of marketing officer in Your Destination is provided below:
 Conducting Marketing Research: It is the essential role of marketing officer, i.e. to
conduct marketing research in effective and efficient manner. Marketing research
includes the overall survey and research of nearby markets. As Your Destination is a
rapidly growing organisation and management wants to expand its business activities in
Manchester, Newcastle, Glasgow and Aberdeen the marketing officer must conduct
marketing research in the areas in order to acquire information about the taste and
preference of customers.
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Developing the marketing strategy: Marketing strategy is very essential to be formulated and
implemented by the organisation in order to gain competitive advantage and increase
profitability of the organisation (Fine, 2017). Marketing officer role is to develop effective
marketing strategies so that the promotion of products and services produced by the organisation
can be effectively demonstrated to the customers. As Your Destination is rapidly growing
organisation, the roles and responsibility marketing officer will be assigned is to formulate
 Customer Relationship management: The marketing officer performs the function of
championing customer relationship management in the organization. The marketing
manager collects this information from the organization's customer database to help
create a customer satisfaction survey. Marketing officer then share this information with
other employees to ensure they offer excellent customer service to their clients in order to
build lasting relationships. As Your Destination is expanding its business operations, thus
the marketing officer needs to manage customer relationships effectively and efficiently.
Employee Management: Marketing officer needs to work in team in order to accomplish desired
goals and targets. They have to guide and influence their subordinates so that their commitment
and loyalty level increases effectively and efficiently. They are in charge of marketing
department and therefore are responsible for managing employees within their department (Ele
and Nkang, 2014). The marketing officer of Your Destination will be accountable and
responsible for setting targets and deadline for their team and their role is to influence them
effectively so that organisational goals and targets can be accomplish effectively and efficiently.
 Identifying New Business Opportunities: Marketing officers are responsible for
analysing new trends with an aim of identifying unexploited or new markets for
organisation products and services. Identifying new business opportunities will help in
growth and development of the organisation and management can improve their
productivity and profitability effectively and efficiently. As Your Destination is
continuously developing organisation, marketing officers must be responsible for
identifying new business opportunities so that potentials of organisation can be utilised
and productivity and profitability can be simultaneously increases.
Setting Budget for marketing: Setting budget for the marketing and promotional activities is
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essential role which is to be played by the marketing officer. Marketing of products and services
needs ample amount and cost (Csikszentmihalyi and Sawyer, 2014). Thus, it is the responsibility
of the marketing officer to allocate marketing activities according to their nature and impact.
Further, they have to set budget in effective and essential way, so that each and every activity
can be done perfectly.
 Brand development: Brand development is very essential in order to attract more and
more customers. The current social economy of United Kingdom indicates that customer
are more attracted towards those organisations who have effective goodwill and
reputation in the market. Your Destination is continuously and rapidly developing
organisation, thus it is the responsibility of marketing officers to develop the brand image
in effective and efficient manner. They have to formulate and implement effective
marketing tactics that leads to growth and development of the organisation.
Maintaining public relations: Maintaining public relations is very important. In many
environments, a marketing manager represents his employer in the media. He grants interviews
in an effort to promote new products, services or initiatives. He represents the firm at charitable
events and other happenings taking place throughout the community (Schmitz and Ganesan,
2014). Thus, in Your Destination, marketing officers will be responsible for maintaining public
relations effectively and efficiently so that the brand image can be improved and profitability can
be increase.
P2 Roles and responsibilities of marketing officer in wider organisational context
To: Senior Management
From: Marketing Manager
Date: 5th November 2017
Re: Roles and responsibilities of marketing officers in wider organisational context
Marketing officers and marketing functions plays vital roles in organisation. With other
organisational functions and departments, they work diligently so that organisation can grow
and blooms effectively and efficiently. In this context, the roles and responsibilities of the
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marketing functions and officers along with officers and functions of other department is
discussed below:
Marketing management and operations management
The role of operation management is to improve the quality of products and services offered by
the organisation. The role of marketing is to promote the goods and services produced by the
organisation so that profitability and productivity can be increased effectively and efficiently
(Foxall, 2014). The operations management and operations manager plays a crucial role in order
to improve the quality of services of Your Destination. Thus, marketing officers needs to
collaborate with operations management of the organisation so that goods and services can be
promoted effectively and efficiently. The marketing department and management will required to
work closely with the operations department to ensure that adequate research and development is
planned to satisfy current and future customer needs. It is the responsibility of the marketing
department to set deadlines so that the production of services can be made effectively and
efficiently. Further, operations managers along with marketing officers require to focus on the
quality of the products and services can leads to the success of the organisation. Moreover, it will
also guaranteed the future growth and development of Your Destination. As the management
wants to expand its business operations, thus marketing and operation department requires to
work collaboratively so that organisational goals and targets can be accomplished effectively and
efficiently.
Marketing management and Human resource management
Human resource management in the organisation is responsible for managing manpower
and allocates all the resources effectively and efficiently so that business can run smoothly. The
marketing department will need to work closely with the human resource management to ensure
that appropriate skills and staffing levels are in place to research and develop new products ideas
(Dawson, 2014). The role of human resource manager is to hire and select competent candidate
for marketing so that promotion of goods and services can be made efficiently. Further, they are
responsible for training and development of manpower so that their skills, knowledge and
competencies can be improved effectively and efficiently. The marketing officers of Your
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Destination are responsible to work abreast with human resource managers so that the quality of
manpower required for marketing can be hired efficiently. This will not only aid in growth and
development of the organisation but also improve the performance of employees. Marketing
officers are provided with sales team and they are recruited by human resource officers and
managers. Thus, this implies that marketing officers and human resource managers works
diligently so that organisational goals and targets can be accomplished efficiently and
effectively.
Marketing management and Finance department
The marketing department will need to work closely with the finance department to
ensure that there is an adequate budget to meet the needs for research, promotion and
distribution. Finance management in organisation are responsible for maintaining and allocating
budgets in the organisation. Marketing of goods and services requires ample amount of cost so
that promotion of goods and services can be done in effective and efficient manner. Thus,
marketing officers along with finance officers needs to work abreast so that organisation can
generate ample of amount of budget. As Your Destination wants to expand its operations in
Manchester, Newcastle, Glasgow, etc. thus finance department of the organisation requires to
focus on budget planning and controlling so that organisational goals and targets can be
accomplish effectively (Carim and Warwick, 2013). Marketing officers are required to design the
budget plan on the promotional activities they will conduct so that brief idea can be acquired and
budget can be planned accordingly. In order to develop robust budget plan, both marketing
officers and finance managers requires to work abreast. This will lead to the growth and
development of the organisation effectively and efficiently.
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LO2 Marketing Strategy
P3 Comparison of marketing mix of National Express and Your Destination
Figure 1: The Marketing Mix 4P’s and 7P’s Explained
(Source: The Marketing Mix, 2015)
Marketing mix is the organisation’s marketing strategy that help in allocating right type of
product at right price and at right place so that its benefit can be delivered to the desire users and
customers. It consists of 7Ps which are Product, Price, Place, Promotion, People, Physical
Evidence and Process (Posey, Bennett and Courtney, 2013
). In this context, the marketing mix strategy of National Express and Your Destination
will be compared in order to analyse the effectiveness of marketing strategies. The comparison
of marketing mix is provided below:
Product
Your Destination is specialised with personal hire to industrial level transportation facility. The
product strategy of the Your Destination is to provide effective transportation services to the
customers. The product strategy of National Express is to provide quality transportation services
at affordable prices. The marketing team and operation management of National Express
allocated their range of services according to their prices. Your Destination management fails to
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innovate specific product strategy (Seryasat, Karimian and Seryasat, 2014). In order to compete
with National Express, the management needs to formulate specific product strategy.
Price
The price of the product is basically the amount that a customer pays. The price strategy
of Your Destination is effective enough to attract more and more customers towards the
organisation. The aim of the organisation is to provide effective transportation services at fixed
price. Though many a times it leads to loss to the organisation. The price strategy of National
Express is volatile as they charge different price for different services. Thus, it implies that the
price strategy of Your Destination requires improvement so that competitive advantage can be
gain effectively and efficiently.
Place
Place in marketing mix refers to the area where organisation delivers their products and services.
From the analysis it was identified that the main location of Your Destination is within London
and Essex. From there the organisation provides their transportation services (Kubacki, Rundle-
Thiele and Parkinson, 2015). Further, the management of the organisation aim to expand their
business operations in Manchester, Newcastle, Glasgow and Aberdeen. National Express already
established their offices in this location, thus in order to compete with National Express, the
marketing management of Your Destination requires to formulate effective place strategy in
order gain competitive advantage.
Promotion
Promotion strategy in marketing mix refers to communication methods that helps in increasing
customer base. It can boost brand recognition and sales effectively and efficiently. From the
analysis it was identified that the promotional strategy implemented by the management of Your
Destination is efficient enough to attract more and more customers towards the organisation.
National Express promotional strategy is to concentrate more on digital marketing and
techniques (Novikova and Potapov, 2017). They invest more in mobile marketing and social
media marketing. This is not only cost effective but also aid in increase in customers effectively
and efficiently. Thus, in order to gain competitive advantage, management of Your Destination,
requires to implement specific promotional strategies.
People
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People includes the manpower employed in the organisation. The company’s employees are
important in marketing because they are the ones who deliver the service. It is important to hire
and train the right people to deliver superior service to the clients and customers. From the
analysis it was identified that the manpower of Your Destination is limited and less skilful as
compared to National Express. Thus, in order to gain competitive advantage, the human resource
management of Your Destination requires to improve their manpower skills (Hollensen, 2015). It
will not only aid in improving their performance but also leads to growth and development of the
organisation.
Physical Evidence
In service industries, there must be physical evidence that the service has been delivered. The
physical evidence provided by the management of Your Destination is the invoice and bill
receipt which indicates the registration number and location of the organisation effectively and
efficiently (Ele and Nkang, 2014). The physical evidence given by the National Express is same,
but in addition they also provides discount coupons to customer when they purchase next
services. Thus, it implies marketing management of Your Destination must formulate and
implement specific strategies so that completive advantage can be gain effectively and
efficiently.
Process
The systems and processes of the organization affect the execution of the service. Your
Destination process is not well tailored and have many drawbacks that blocks the success of the
organisation (Csikszentmihalyi and Sawyer, 2014). National Express process is well tailored and
structure thus aid them in becoming the market leader. In order to compete with National
Express, management of Your Destination must improve their process strategies.
LO3 Marketing Plan
Marketing Plan of Your Destination
The marketing plan of Your Destination is provided below:
Internal Analysis: Internal Analysis is done with the help of SWOT model.
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 Strengths: The strength of the organisation is effective brand image, goodwill, customer
base and efficient management. This helps the organisation to move towards the direction
of growth and development.
Weaknesses: Weaknesses includes, lack of skilled manpower and workforce, lack of market
experience and ineffective promotional strategies. These weaknesses acts as barricade for the
growth and development of the organisation (Wood, 2014).
 Opportunities: To increase and expand business in different areas, to improve the
performance of the management, to increase the brand goodwill and reputation by
improving quality of products and services.
 Threats: Competition with the market leader, frequent changes in taste and preferences of
customers, irregular governmental policies and legislations are the biggest threats which
impacts on the growth and development of the organisation.
External Analysis
External analysis of the organisation is the analysis of external environment and surroundings
that impacts on the performance of the company. The analysis will help in formulation of
marketing plan effectively and efficiently. The external analysis is done with the help of
PESTLE analysis which is provided below: Political Factor: Frequent changes and transformations in tax policies and norms impacts
on the business of Your Destination. The tax rates have been increases which impacts on
the price strategy of the organisation.
Economic Factor: Due to the influence of European Union, market in United Kingdom is
suffering from recession and inflation (Westwood, 2016). Consumers’ purchasing power become
little and they do not prefer to purchase more products and services. Thus, it impacts on the
business of Your Destination greatly. Social Factor: Taste and preferences of consumers are changing frequently. They want
unique and innovative services that aid in reducing their time and efforts and which are
also easily available and accessible. This impacts on the business of Your Destination
greatly.
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 Technological Factor: Technology growth impacts on the business of Your Destination
greatly. There are various portable navigations equipment available in market that will
aid in improvement of transportation services effectively and efficiently. Legal Factor: There are certain laws and legislation which are bound to be followed by
the management of Your Destination in order to commence their business activities.
These includes Consumer Rights act, employment rights act, etc. Environmental Factor: Your Destination needs to work in order to preserve and protect
the environment of the country (Elves, 2014). In order to reduce the carbon footprints,
organisation needs to formulate specific strategies and implement use of technology so
that carbon footprints can be reduced effectively and efficiently.
Segmentation, Targeting and Positioning
Figure 2: Segmentation, Targeting, Positioning
(Source: Segmentation, Targeting, Positioning, 2017)
Segmentation, targeting and positioning aid in formulation of marketing plan and it is
provided below:
 Segmentation: It defines the customer and aid in segregating them in effective and
efficient ways. The services of Your Destination is available for all types of
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