Strategic Marketing Plan for Marriott Hotel's New Service

This report presents a strategic marketing plan developed for Marriott Hotel, London, aiming to achieve its business objectives. It begins with an introduction to marketing and the hospitality industry, highlighting the industry's growth and Marriott's position as a multinational company. The report includes an executive summary, company background, and the aim of the marketing plan. A PEST analysis examines the external business environment, considering political, economic, social, and technological factors impacting the hotel. The report also analyzes Marriott's strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, and threats (SWOT). The 7Ps of the marketing mix—product, price, place, promotion, people, process, and physical evidence—are discussed to build a strategic marketing plan. Segmentation, targeting, and positioning (STP) strategies are outlined, followed by a proposed budget. The report concludes by summarizing the importance of marketing in the hospitality industry and the interrelationship of organizational units. References to relevant academic sources are included.

HOSPITALITY MARKETING
ESSENTIALS

TABLE OF CONTENTS
 INTRODUCTION
 Developing marketing plan to meet organization’s marketing objectives
 CONCLUSION
 REFERENCES

INTRODUCTION
 Marketing is a set of activities and processes for creating, communicating and offering value to
customers based on the customer's needs and wants.
 Hospitality marketing is also marketing in the direction of increasing revenue of the hospitality
industry.
 It takes into account how different segments of the hospitality industry such as restaurants,
amusement parks, hotel, resorts use marketing techniques to promote its product ad services.
 Currently hospitality industry is moving at a fast pace, there are over 3.5 million people employed
in hospitality industry and expected to be 6 million by 2020 in UK.
 In this report, Marriott Hotel, London is taken, which is a multinational hospitality company with
broad hotel portfolio.

Developing marketing plan to meet
organization’s marketing objectives
EXECUTIVE SUMMARY
 This report represents developing strategic marketing plan which helps an organization in achieving its business
objectives after thorough analysis of different marketing processes.
COMPANY BACKGROUND
 Marriott International is an American multinational hospitality company having broad portfolio of hotels and
other facilities. It was founded by J. Willard Marriott. It is one of the largest hotel chain in the world. It has 30
brands in more than 130 countries and territories globally.
AIM
 The aim of this report is to prepare a new marketing plan to implement the new service in the hotel.

Cont..
PEST ANALYSIS
The PEST analysis is a tool that is used to analyse the external business environment of any industry which can
impact the whole industry. A detailed discussion of the same is stated below.
 Political: Hospitality industry is exposed to various political and legal factors. This includes terrorism,
military conflict, political instability etc. Major issue Marriott hotel is facing is the BREXIT which is a point
of concern as most of the employees in the UK are from European nations and complete hospitality industry
is highly reliant on these labours. The workforce in UK hospitality has more than 24% of workers from
outside the country.
 Economical: Even though Marriott is a financially strong brand but factors like currency fluctuations,
government policies on trade, travel and immigration etc. could have negative impact on the Marriott's hotel.

Cont..
 Social: It depends on the changing needs, preferences, lifestyle of the
customers. Marriott in order to retain its customers provides customer loyalty
program which provides additional benefits to its customers such as free hotel
stays and other offers and discounts. It also has its own website to through
which people can check and book the hotels.
 Technological: Marriott hotel needs to keep pace with the changing technology
to reduce operational costs and attract more customers. Also, there is a need to
have proper infrastructure which protects the customer's data.

Cont..
Strengths
 Top competition in competitive
landscape
 Starwood acquisition driving strategic
advantage
 Proactive and innovative
 Global presence
Weaknesses
 Majorly reliant on North American
market
 Lawsuit for blocking personal Wi-Fi of
customer
 Bad publicity when Marriott sent its
ships to rescue only its customers after
hurricane Irma
Opportunities
 Expanding to untouched market
 Increase in global travel
 Personalized attention to the customers
Threats
 Increasing competition
 Negative effect of Brexit

Cont..
7Ps of MARKETING MIX
Marketing mix is a framework which helps in building a strategic marketing plan to achieve business
objectives. A brief discussion of 7Ps is stated below.
 Product: Marriott has wide hotel portfolio that meets with different needs of the customers. It sells
highly differentiated products with various benefits offered to customers.
 Price: Marriott uses competitive pricing strategy which is mostly higher than its competitors
which is because it offers more features that it's competitor doesn't.
 Place: Marriott has a global presence which gives it an opportunity to attract more customers such
as corporate people. It has adopted multiple channel strategy to reduce overall cost.

Cont..
SEGMENTATION, TARGETING AND POSITIONING
 Segmentation: Marriott uses multi-stage segmentation catering to the needs
of distinct target markets using different types of hotel service.
 Targeting: It has targeted middle to upper class people, with unique
personality and lifestyle.
 Positioning: After identifying the target market, Marriott has developed
different positioning for different segments.
BUDGET
 The estimated budget for this plan is £3500.

CONCLUSION
 It can be summarized that marketing plays a huge role in hospitality
industry.
 There exist an interrelationship among the other organizational units
which is beneficial for an organization in achieving its objectives.
 Comparative analysis of marketing mix gives a clear picture of the
current position of the organization and in developing future
marketing plan.

REFERENCES
 Chernysheva, Y. G., et.al, 2017. Business analysis as an important component of ensuring enterprise’s
economic security.
 Ikechi, A., Chinenye, E. P. and Chiyem, O., 2017. Marketing Mix Concept: Blending the Variables to
Suit the Contemporary Marketers. International Academic Journal of Management and
Marketing. 9(1). pp.55-65.
 Nieves, J. and Diaz-Meneses, G., 2016. Antecedents and outcomes of marketing innovation: An
empirical analysis in the hotel industry. International Journal of Contemporary Hospitality
Management. 28(8). pp.1554-1576.
 Rather, R. A. and Sharma, J., 2017. Customer engagement for evaluating customer relationships in
hotel industry. European Journal of Tourism, Hospitality and Recreation. 8(1). pp.1-13.

Thank You