Marks and Spencer Marketing Strategy: STP Analysis and Recommendations

This report provides a comprehensive marketing analysis of Marks and Spencer, a multinational British retailer. It begins with a situational analysis, detailing the company's history, product range, target market, and competitive landscape. The report then applies the STP (Segmentation, Targeting, and Positioning) model to evaluate Marks and Spencer's marketing strategies, exploring geographic and demographic segmentation, targeting approaches based on product life cycle and competitive factors, and positioning strategies focused on brand image and product portfolio. Furthermore, the report discusses individual and group factors influencing consumer behavior, such as age, culture, and environmental concerns. It also touches upon consumer behavior theories like the theory of reasoned action and motivation need theory. The report concludes with recommendations for Marks and Spencer based on the analysis.

Assessment 1

Table of Contents
INTRODUCTION ..........................................................................................................................3
MAIN BODY...................................................................................................................................3
Situational analysis :...................................................................................................................3
Segmentation :.............................................................................................................................4
Theory : ......................................................................................................................................6
Recommendation :......................................................................................................................7
CONCLUSION ...............................................................................................................................8
REFERENCES................................................................................................................................9

INTRODUCTION
Marketing is an essential business process that is about increasing the brand awareness of
a company or its product in the market and making consumers know about the benefits it can
provide to them if they will use it (Prabha, 2018). Marketing executive is a job position in a
company in which the corresponding employee has the task of identifying marketing practices
that can help the company and using the chosen marketing techniques for the company. The
following report file is based on marketing and importance of identifying the needs of customers
of the market. For this, it has divided into several parts. The chosen company for the company is
Marks and Spencer. It is a multinational company that deals in the retailing sector. The file starts
from the situational analysis of the company which includes the name, size, product range,
competitors, consumers base of the company and many other related elements. Then it moves to
the segmentation part in which STP model is used to analyse the marketing factors of the
company. Lastly there is one group factor and one individual factor that affects the behaviour of
customers.
MAIN BODY
Situational analysis :
Marks and Spencer is a public limited company that was founded in the year 1884 by two
friends – Michael Marks and Thomas Spencer. The name of the company was based on the last
name of its founders. Currently it is a large scale multinational British company that has its
headquarters in Paddington, London, United Kingdom. The company has a large product line
including clothing, beauty, food and home related products (Grzegorczyk, 2022). It currently has
959 of its stores only across UK out of which 615 are food products based stores. Total number
of its stores all across the world are around 1463. It also has a joint venture with a delivering
company Ocado for delivering food online. It is a big employment providing company with over
78,000 individuals employed with the company. The target market of the business entity are the
common people of the society that are generally from the middle income age group. Through the
variety and not much high prices, it created a large market that it can target. Even though it is
considered as a luxury brand. The company collects high amount of revenue and in the year
1998 it was the first British retailer to make a profit of 1 billion Euros before tax. But the sales

kept on slowly declining after that for a few years. The revenue generated by the company in
2022 was 10.885 billion Euros with 309 million Euros net income. The brand has rapidly
focused on increasing its presence on a global basis and diversifying in new different economies.
It is listed in the stock exchange of London with also being a constituent in the FTSE 250 index
and also being in the FTSE 100 index till the year of 2019. The retail industry has presence of a
lot of retailing giants and also different local stores that affect the industry heavily. Being a giant,
the main competition that Marks and Spencer faces is from some other retailing giants such as –
John Lewis and Primark stores.
Segmentation :
A company faces competition from other types of companies that deal in the similar
industry or market. These competition is for attracting the base of customers of the market
towards the company. Larger the competition more chances of the customer base of a company
to get affected by the other competing firms. Competition is a very important element that highly
effects the growth and revenue generation of a company (Banerji, 2018). Every business entity
needs to analyse factors that can help it in achieving a competitive advantage from other
companies. Customers are the element for which a business entity operates. Every type of
business entities are dependent on their customers and vice versa. But due to high competition in
the market, there are a lot of choices for the customers to choose from the available options. For
attracting the targeted base of customers and maintaining the present consumer base, a company
needs to effectively serve its customers and provide them better satisfaction value than other
related companies are providing. Companies try to find effective ways to serve their customers in
a best way and use different related models for the same. STP, full formed as segmentation,
targeting and positioning is a strategic model used in finding the best consumer base for a
company from the available market and effectively targeting them (KUMAR and CHHABRA,
2022). It is one of the most commonly used marketing models. Through three of its elements it
helps in selecting the best segment, targeting the best base of customers and using strategies that
can help in targeting them effectively. STP model of Marks and Spencer is discussed in the
following :
 Segmentation – It is the process of identifying the niche markets that are available to a
company and choosing the best one for it. Different types of segmentation are –

demographics, geographic, behavioural, lifestyle, psychographic and many more. Some
of the segmentation ways that the company can use are mentioned in the following :
◦ Geographic – This is the way of building niche markets based on the geographic
areas that can be different countries, states or cities. This can prove as a good strategy
for Marks and Spencer and people of different countries or areas have difference in
their buying patterns (Hartmann, Apaolaza and D’Souza, 2018). The company can
serve the customers in different ways by analysing the needs of people through their
geographic locations.
◦ Demographic – This is also a most commonly used type of segmentation in which
the segments are formed according to the demographical factors such as gender,
income, age, religion, occupation and life cycle of the customers. This segment can
be beneficial for Marks and Spencer, through this it can make products by focusing
on different age group, gender and other related products and it will help it to deeply
target the different groups.
 Targeting – After the process of identifying and choosing best market segments
according to the company, the step of targeting the chosen segment comes. This involves
the planning and making strategies for effectively targeting the chosen customer base.
The targeting of the consumers can be based on different aspects. The targeting aspects
that can be beneficial and used by Marks and Spencer are – product life cycle, financial
resources, regulatory and other entry barriers, competition in the market and companies
technical capabilities (Kadekova & Holienčinova 2018). It should also consider to
practice the targeting process by considering the vision, mission, ethic and values of the
market especially their target customers. It should analyse some new types of targeting
methods that are not currently used by the competing firms.
 Positioning – It is the process to effectively position and place the company product or
services in market so that they can be viewed or get in interaction of the consumers that
are consuming a similar type of product or service. If Marks and Spencer effectively
target its product, it can create a distinct image that provides a specific identity of the
brand. Different factors that it needs to consider while positioning its product are – the
margins it puts, image that it has in the marketplace, ability of imitation and replication,
portfolio of products and marketing resources present with the company (Kumagai,

2020). If Marks and Spencer has a good corporate image in the market, it can charge
higher amount of prices than the other companies are charging for any similar type of
products due to the good brand image in the market which has loyal consumer base and is
also a status symbol for the users. The positioning of the products need to be consistent as
if the customers do not find the particular products / services they will shift to another
similar type of product / services. If Marks and Spencer service any new type of products,
it should confirm that they can fit in the present delivery chain of the brand.
Theory :
Customer is the element for which a business operates. Every type of business entities are
dependent on their customers and thus need to try their best to earn a high number of customers
market share and serve them efficiently (Srivastava and Singh, 2021). Generally customers have
a lot of choices in the market from which it chooses the best company for buying its essentials or
other commodities. This choice is based on the buying patterns of the customers. The factors
which effect the buying pattern of the customers are divided into two types – one is individual
and other is group. The individual factors are one that affect the buying behaviour of a customers
through elements based on the personal reasons of a particular individual and do not get
influenced through the demands of other people. Some examples of individual factors that can
affect Marks and Spencer are – age, gender and occupation (Gulia and Marwah, 2022). One key
individual factors that highly affect the corresponding company is age. The age affects the
consumer buying pattern as customers want a business entity to focus on their particular age
criteria and provide them products or services accordingly. For example the clothing products of
a young 20 years boy will be different from than of an old 60 years old man not only in size but
also in the type of clothes. Whereas group influencing factors are the one that affect the buying
behaviour of the consumers on a group / whole basis. In this, a company needs to consider the
demands on a larger aspects and not on focusing the individual demands of the customers but on
a larger basis (Sharma, 2021). Different types of group consumer buying influencing factors that
can impact on Marks and Spencer are – culture, demographics and environmental factors as
problems faced from these factors directly affects the demand of people on a group basis / large
amount of people. Culture is a very important group influencing factor that can affect Marks and
Spencer and its working. Every person of the world wants that their culture should be respected

by other people and firms. A company especially a company operating on a large scale is under
supervision of the society and when it follows any activity that harm the culture of group of
people it can affect the goodwill of the company or also any legal issues (Gilal, Zhang, Gilal &
Gilal, 2019). Marks and Spencer needs to consider the culture that is followed in its premises or
in relation of the company. Different types of consumer behaviour theory that can have influence
on Marks and Spencer are :
 Theory of reasoned action – This theory states that customers behaviour in a way that
can help in getting a particular outcome or result. Rational decision making is considered
as a chief element that drives customers for making purchases. This concept of consumer
behaviour leans on the significance of specificity over obtuseness. In simple words, a
consumer may only take specific actions when given a reason to believe there will be a
specific desired result.
 Motivation need theory - Marketers with a strong understanding of motivation-need
consumer behaviour theory can effectively craft campaigns and advertisements around an
artificial need that they control within the consumer (Rangar and et. al., . 2020). A
common modern example comes in the form of luxury carmakers that emphasize the
safety and security features within their vehicles over the aesthetic, convincing
consumers that spending their money on an expensive luxury car is acceptable because it
fulfil the need to provide physiological safety for oneself and family.
Recommendation :
According to the above file, there are several recommendations for Marks and Spencer
which have potential of helping the company to achieve further growth. It can use demographics
and lifestyle segmentation types to divide the consumer market into different types and choosing
the one it that it can effectively serve. It should also effectively target the customers and position
its products in the market in a way to bring out the best desired results. Consumers are the most
important element for which a company operates. Marks and Spencer needs to efficiently serve
its customers to assure its long term growth and build a loyal customer base. The buying
behaviour of the consumers gets affected through many different types of factors. There are also
various consumer behavioural theories that provide the buying behaviour of the customers and
help a company to analyse ways to serve its customers in a best way. Marks and Spencer can use

theory of reasoned action and motivation need theory to understand the buying behaviour of its
customers that can have impact on their sales and also relationship with the customers.
CONCLUSION
From the above report it has been concluded that marketing is a very important element
of the business process that must considered by the business entities of the market as it can help
in raising the brand awareness, strong presence in the market and making the consumers know
about the new products / services that the company launches. Segmentation, targeting and
positioning are three factors that together form the STP model. It helps in effectively forming
and identifying the niche markets / group of consumers a company should target, way in which
they can be effectively targeted and lastly the ways to position the products or services of the
company in a way that can help in increasing its sales. There are different types of individual and
group factors that affect the behaviour of the consumers such as – age, income, marketing,
environment and technological.

REFERENCES
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