Marketing Essentials Report: Analyzing McDonald's Marketing Strategies

This report provides a comprehensive analysis of McDonald's marketing strategies, exploring the role of marketing and its interrelation with other functional units within the organization. It examines the key roles and responsibilities of the marketing function, considering the wider organizational context. The report delves into the application of the marketing mix to the marketing planning process, comparing McDonald's approach with that of ASDA to achieve business objectives. Furthermore, it produces and evaluates a basic marketing plan for McDonald's, including an overview of the company, an external and internal environment analysis. The report highlights the significance of effective interrelationships between different functional departments and emphasizes the importance of marketing in driving business success. The report also includes an overview of the marketing budget, strategies, timing and evaluation of marketing activities.

MARKETING ESSENTIALS

Table of Contents
Introduction......................................................................................................................................4
LO1 Explain the role of marketing and how it interrelates with other functional units of an
organisation......................................................................................................................................5
P1 Explain the key roles and responsibilities of the marketing function for the chosen
organisation......................................................................................................................................5
P2 Explain how roles and responsibilities of marketing relate to the wider organisational context
for the chosen scenario....................................................................................................................7
Task 2:...........................................................................................................................................11
P3 Compare how the chosen organisation applies the marketing mix to the marketing planning
process to achieve business objectives..........................................................................................11
Task 3:...........................................................................................................................................16
P4 Produce and evaluate a basic marketing plan for the chosen organisation..............................16
1. Company Overview:..............................................................................................................16
2. External environment analysis:..............................................................................................16
4. Internal environment analysis:...............................................................................................19
Conclusion:....................................................................................................................................25
References......................................................................................................................................26

Introduction
As an organisation, the name Mc Donalds need no introduction. It is one of the most famous and
named fast food joints in the world. Initially it started only as a Hamburger joint, but later on,
they started selling French fries, cold drinks, ice cream and increased their menu. They are
located all over the world as of now. Mc Donalds was established in 1940 as a fast food
restaurant which sold hamburgers by Richard and Maurice McDonald.Currently, Mc Donalds is
the fourth largest employer concerning the number of employees. In the current business quarter
it employees about 1.9 Million employees approximately all over the world. And has branches
around the globe (Mcdonalds.com, 2018). The union of all these resources gives a huge brand
name to the company and helps in the marketing.

LO1 Explain the role of marketing and how it interrelates with other
functional units of an organisation.
P1 Explain the key roles and responsibilities of the marketing function for the
chosen organisation.
Introduction to the concept of marketing, including current and future trends
Marketing is basically a strategy to promote a brand name in various ways in a particular
segment and sometimes globally as well. Over the years marketing has seen multiple deviations.
Previously marketing was limited to only News Papers and TeleVision. In the old people used to
discuss about a certain product if they liked it and even criticize some products as well
(Sheth,and Sisodia, 2015). This discussion itself is advertising. Building a rapport and good
name for an organization so it can grow smoothly and increase its profits is the sole purpose of
marketing. In the modern world, marketing has taken various turns and can be divided into
multiple categories and subcategories.
An overview of the different marketing processes
As discussed above marketing could be of various types, to major classifications can be Online
and Offline marketing. Offline marketing may include the distribution of fliers, the discussion
between people regarding the positive points of a product and service. And the shortcomings as
well. There could be free advertising as well. Let's take a practical example to understand what

free advertising is. Let's assume there is a consumer who liked the product or service of a certain
organisation or did not like it; the customer will go ahead and tell that to hi s family and friends.
Going further the group of people he has introduced the brand to will go ahead and discuss that
with their friends which in result will create a Domino effect (Tomczak et al., 2018). Then there
are intangible resources as well. The amount of intangible resources a company owns which
includes its huge brand name, the reputation all over the world and the frequent partnerships and
collaboration also is a result of marketing and can be used for marketing as well.
Role and responsibilities of a marketing manager in the context of the organisation
Taking the example of Mc Donalds, one can study as to how they have used marketing to grow
and prosper as a business. Mc Donalds has spread all over the world with its different branches
and had marketing managers around the globe. The job profile of a marketing manager can cover
a huge area of scope. As the branches are spread all over the world, the marketing techniques
used by the managers are also very different. As the concept of marketing depends hugely on the
culture and generally speaking the demographics of an area.
The job profile of a manager includes tasks such as "Market Research", which implies that a
marketing manager is supposed to keep an eye on the competition. What is the competition doing
now what are the price differences in the market concerning the service they are providing. What
is the development graph of other competitors compared to the manager's organisation etc.?
One of the major job roles also includes the development and implementation of various
marketing strategy. After doing research as to what is the status of the market and what
competition is doing, a manager is supposed to invent and analyse new marketing strategies to
withhold the reputation in the market (Bai and Chang, 2015). A very good example can be

Wendy’s; Wendy’s is another fast food joint and directly competes with Mc Donalds in terms of
business. The profit graph of Wendy's was slowly depreciating. But the organisation made
correct use of social media and established their name once again in the market. The twitter
handler of Wendy's started roasting other profiles and business and started making memes.
Meme culture is the new trend in modern society; a meme is a visual representation of a funny
statement that goes viral. And Wendy's marketing managers correctly used the ongoing trend for
their own use and developed a new type of marketing strategy. Wendy was all over the internet,
and that boosted the sales of the organization, and that is the result of proper marketing
Now it’s important that a marketing manager does not only invent a marketing plan but
implement it properly as well. The basic steps to invent and apply marketing strategies are,
identifying the business activities that are going on in the organisation and what steps can be
taken to improve them or replace them if necessary (Mishra and Modi, 2016). The second step is
to find out the target areas as to where the business could prosper more and applying the
marketing strategy there. The third step is to analyse and evaluate the marketing plan devised by
the manager if it's working or not. What are the shortcomings of the plan and what strong points
does the plan have which is working? The fourth point is to be open to changes; a manager
should be open to change their marketing plan if it's not working. That's the main point, by trial
and error method a good marketing plan can be converted to a perfect marketing plan.

P2 Explain how roles and responsibilities of marketing relate to the wider
organisational context for the chosen scenario.
An explanation of how marketing influences and interrelates with other functional
departments of the organisation
Marketing is directly related to each and every department of an organization, and if marketing is
not done properly then the brand name will not prosper, partnerships will not take place.
Marketing directly influences the profit of a company and profit is directly linked to the number
of branches, number of employees an organisation is able to hire and keep. Because good salary
is important. It is a huge domino effect, and the first piece is marketing.
The value and importance of the marketing role in the context of the organisation
The marketing roles directly hinder and affect the various branches of an organisation. Be it
production, be it the partnership. In easy words marketing is the visual representation of an
organisation which creates the first impression in the eye of a consumer as well as a potential
partner.
Conclusions that emphasise the significance of having effective interrelationships between
different functional departments
As discussed above, marketing is the first piece in the huge domino effect between production
and profit of any organisation. Each and every organisation is directly or indirectly related to
marketing. If all the departments are interlinked, then the marketing managers will be able to

know all the sides and little details of the dept and will be able to devise new marketing
strategies effectively and vice versa.
6 Identifying goals and objectives-
Mc Donalds should be going ahead and sorting out their objectives as to what is their aim and
what points do they lack in and what needs to be changed and kept. The clear vision helps any
organisation to work efficiently towards their goal and eventually success (Mcdonalds.com,
2018). Not only Mc Donalds but in general it will help in the betterment of any organisation.
7 Description of Product and services
As an organisation, Mc Donalds offers various products and services which include various food
items such as hamburgers, fries, dessert, cold drinks. Moreover, the organisation has partnered
with various other companies which add to the already large catalogue of the company
(Armstrong et al., 2015).
8 Marketing Budget
A proper marketing budget should be devised as to what needs to be improved and what needs
to implemented newly. For now, Mc Donalds can estimate their marketing budget to £60,000.
Now the budget has two aspects to it first one is the cost of maintenance and the second one is
labour and promotion cost. The maintenance can be kept to about £20,000, and £40,000 can be
used as the labour and promotion cost.
9 Strategies

Developing proper marketing plans and implementing them should be one of the primary aims of
the company. The advertising management should work towards developing new strategies and
using the social media in a much proper way.
10 Timing
A proper time limit should be fixed so that a plan can be applied and a lookout should be kept as
to how the plans are working and are there any improvements necessary. Or the plan needs to be
replaced as a whole. Every plan has advantages and shortcomings, and that can only be figured
out if there is ample amount of time. Time management is important as it gives the opportunity
to devise and apply new strategies all the time
11 Evaluations
After developing, implementing and studying the plans properly in the end, evaluating as to how
the plan has worked till now and how will it work in the long run when compared to the
competition. Study of the validity and stability of the particular marketing plan needs to be done
(Sheth, and Sisodia, 2015). This is the final stage and by carrying out this steps one will be able
to find the final shortcomings and will be able to decide if anything is supposed be eliminated or
added to make the plan more efficient,

Task 2:
P3 Compare the ways in which the chosen organisation applies the marketing
mix to the marketing planning process to achieve business objectives.
In order to gain the proper business marketing is essential for the Mc.Donalds. The concept of
the marketing mix plays a vital role in the marketing activity of all the organisation as well as
McDonald's. Marketing mix involves seven elements which precipitated the complete
understanding of the marketing to attain the highest degree of growth for the McDonalds. Seven
elements of the marketing mix include place, people, price, product, promotion, physical
evidence, and process (Armstrong et al., 2015). In this section of the project compare of the
marketing mix utilisation of two organisations will be described for understanding the critical
importance of the marketing mix and its utilisation in the marketing context. Two companies that
have been chosen for this section is the McDonalds and ASDA: one is retail industry, and
another is from the food sector. Marketing mix tool enables the companies to describe all the
direction of the marketing in very significant manner. Descriptions are as follows:

Figure1: Marketing mix
Source: (Armstrong et al., 2015).
Price:
Price is one of the important elements of the marketing mix which reflects the value paid by the
customer to buy a product. Fixing proper price by considering the market value and competitor
analysis and many more factors are playing the major role. If the price is high, then sales of the
company will slow down and can lose the customer base, but if the price is affordable and also,
quality product service can enhance the business. McDonald's is able to fix their price by
considering the market and competitor's price. McDonald's also follows the low-profit high
selling policy which is beneficial for them to maintain the price in the affordable range and this
is the reason that their sales got increased 2.5% and able to achieve the 22.82billiuon revenue in