Analysis of Brand Management Techniques at Marks and Spencer

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BRAND MANAGEMENT
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Table of Contents
Introduction......................................................................................................................................2
LO1 Demonstrate an understanding of how a brand is built and managed over time.....................3
LO2 Analyse how brands are organised in portfolios; how brand hierarchies are built and
managed...........................................................................................................................................5
LO3 Evaluate how brands are leveraged/extended over time domestically and internationally.....6
LO4 Evaluate techniques for measuring and managing brand value over time..............................9
Conclusion.....................................................................................................................................11
Reference List................................................................................................................................12
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Introduction
Sustainability is a major concern for all types of the organisation because market stability is very
essential for organisations to establish strong roots in the market. In the competitive environment
it is very significant for the organisations to adopt proper strategies otherwise the organisations
cannot sustain in the competitive environment. Market stability is vital for organisations because
this stability helps the organisations to earn a considerable amount of profit from business
activities. Thus, Brand Management is very important for organisations because this
management process will help the organisations to increase the product value in the mind of the
customers. Customers nowadays are very brand conscious thus; organisations must devise proper
strategies to initiate significant steps of branding. Brand equity is required for establishing proper
brand management. The aim of this report is to explore the case of Mark, Spencer's from the
point of view of a brand analyst. This study will identify a range of tools, and techniques that are
employed to maximise the brand value.
M& S current scenario
This study will show why branding is an essential tool for accelerating operations of an
organisation, here the organisation is M&S in the UK. As the scenario shows that according to an
article published in the Marketing Week in 2017, M& S is declining and this is because M&S
has closed almost 21 stores and is under the process of closing 100 stores by the year of 2022.
M& S is closing their stores because their market share has decreased and in 2017 their market
share was recorded lowest of all. Thus, a marketing and brand analyst asked to address the
following issues discussed below.
LO1 Demonstrate an understanding of how a brand is built and managed over time
P1 Explain the importance of branding as a marketing tool and why and how it has
emerged in business practice.
The brand is a term that is applicable to the products of an organisation. The companies to create
an image into the minds of the customers use this term brand. In the case study of M&S,
branding is very significant for undertaking and implementing marketing strategies, which will
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be effective in nature. Branding mainly improves the recognition of an organisation because it
creates an impression of the products of the customers into the mind of the customers. Branding
used by M&S is the logo of the organisation. The logo is very important significant since it
makes the organisation stand alone from others. A marketing tool used by M&S to create trust
and this is visible from the market share of the organisation in the UK market. This logo however
not is necessary for local organisations but for multinational ones; this logo plays a vital role.
Thus, logo and the quality of the products help to build trust among the customers. Employees of
an organisation are also responsible for increasing the productivity of an organisation and
maintaining the reputation of the brand in the market. The renowned brand name of the
organisation helps the employees to take extra initiative for the organisation and give more effort
to their work (Curran and Taheri, 2017).
M1 Evaluate how brands are managed successfully over time using application of
appropriate theories, models and concepts
By applying proper tools, organisations can manage their brand's value in the global and national
market. The brand value of M&S can be managed by implementing the brand equity model.
Brand equity model mainly developed from the viewpoint of the consumers and it shows the
product value of the brand. M&S has to implement two models of brand equity in their
operational activities and these models re Keller's brand equity model and Akers's brand model
(Heding, Knudtzen and Bjerre, 2015).
The Keller's model is applied for controlling and monitoring the consumer's perception, and
Akers's model applied for building five aspects of the organisation, and these aspects are quality,
loyalty, brand associations, prosperity and awareness. This Akers's model mainly will help M&S
to aid the customers to perceive the value of the product and the services effectively. By using
these models, M&S can increase their profit margin and build strong brand equity (Noviko and
Kalenskaya, 2015).
P2 Analyze the critical components of a successful brand strategy for building and
managing brand equity
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M&S uses several approaches to build and manage their brand equity. These approaches mainly
help the organisation to strategise their responsibilities towards the brand name. The core
elements of M&S for successful brand strategies are objectives, employee engagement,
positioning, clear communication, positioning, promise, and identity. M&S ‘main component is
employees of the organisation, and they are the ones who apply specific strategies for branding.
Objectives are mainly the goals of the organisation M&S, and the employees in the organisation
are well aware of their roles and this help the organisation to achieve its goals. The mission and
vision of M&S are to deliver premium products to its customers. Thus, a positive background of
the organisation helps to attract more customers (Cho, Fiore and Russell, 2015). Clear
communication within the organisation aids the organisation to perform cooperatively at the
international level.
M2 Apply appropriate and validated examples within an organisational context
Organisations nowadays to sustain in the competitive environment are adopting strategies of
brand management for establishing the growth of the brand. M&S has implemented brand
management strategies to manipulate customers. Their strategy has been developed considering
the fact of competition between them and other brands. M&S major competitors are Tesco, Aldi
and Sainsbury. M&S has influenced the customers by implementing suitable marketing
strategies, which mainly involved promotional activities that display the brand. The branding
management strategies used by M&S is a logical one since it has helped the organisation to grow
and become sustainable in the world market. However, the strategies used by the competitors of
M&S are more effective, since their pricing strategy is more viable than M&S, thus from this
perspective M&S fail to meet their costing price since low cost strategy is not viable in M&S.
Thus, M&S must devise other strategies to increase the brand value of the organisation.
LO2 Analyse how brands are organised in portfolios; how brand hierarchies are built and
managed
P3 Analyze different strategies of portfolio management, brand hierarchy and brand
equity management.
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Brand portfolio strategies help to create the scope of the brand, roles of the products, portfolio
roles, and portfolio structures and brand portfolio models. Brand portfolio management is mainly
related to effectiveness and coordination, and this management mainly helps the organisation to
avoid the evolution of confusion between the customers. In M&S, the organisation was initiating
investment in the production process and making the marketing strategies to develop brand
value. Investment and overall management process can be achieved to aid the brand portfolio.
M&S follows strategies to ensure its brand value in the market, and this is:
Branded house: This strategy is a one that is regarded as a cost-effective strategy, which helps to
sustain in the retail sector. This strategy mainly helps the organisation to build a clear brand
image. M&S has adopted this strategy in order to build a clear brand image. M&S has
implemented this strategy to focus on the brands and the sub-brands within the organisation. This
strategy also helps to be identified in the competitive market.
House of brands: While branding this kind of strategy mainly helps to promote sub-brands of the
parent company, and this helps to promote the parent brand, not the corporate brand. This
strategy involves high investment to facilitate the functioning of the brand elements within the
organisation.
Brand management hierarchy is mainly the brand name that is related to assets of the
organisation. The hierarchy can be categorised on three levels, and this is individual branding,
family branding and modified branding. Individual branding helps to provide products with
unique products. Thus branding ensures the customisation of products and this helps in the
marketing process. By applying branding strategies, M&S can create independency on the
quality of the product and loyalty of the brand.
M3 Critically analyse portfolio management, brand hierarchies and brand equity using
appropriate theories, models and framework
Portfolio management is a significant technique that helps in effective branding process and
strategic goals. From the perspective of M&S, structural alignments are related to particular
theories, which are incorporated with implementation. In the portfolio management, allocation of
resources is related to creative performance that will lead to the increase of sales of the products.
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In the brand hierarchy, AIDA model is applicable. This model is related to attention, interest,
desire and action, which results in positive relation towards the promotional strategies of M&S.
Brand equity shows the scale of the brand image. These scales are mainly the cognitive, sensory,
and effective dimensions. In the business process of M&S, CBBE (Customer-Based Brand
Equity) model is applied to push the customer equity towards the retail brand. This model mainly
helps to build positive brand equity that helps to attract more customers towards the purview of
the organisation.
LO3 Evaluate how brands are leveraged/extended over time domestically and
internationally
P4 Evaluate how brands are managed collaboratively and in partnership both at a
domestic and global level
Organisations which are internationally operating its operations must work collaboratively to
reduce the risks of loss since operations in a foreign market is subject to risks, and these risks
have the capability of initiating huge loss in the purview of the organisation. Thus, organisations
while operating in the international market consider the collaborative models to reduce the risks,
at the same time attract the customer, and build a stronghold in the global market. The
collaboration of business activities can thus collaborate both at the national and international
level (Todor, 2014). The case of M&S it is visible that customers are accepting the brand
extension of M&S, which resulted in more value of the brand. Brand extension is used to
develop a new product category. This category of new products can be related or not related to
existing products of the organisation, and this type of steps helps the organisation to launch new
products more smoothly. Thus, brand extension in M&S helps the brand from several ways and
the main types, which the brand uses, are:
Line extension: Here the parent brand is used to brand new products which are produced to target
a new group of customers thus line extension adds a different flavour to the same product which
became boring to the customers (Elliott et al., 2015).
Category extension: In this type parent, the brand is used to enter in the new line of the product
category (Tatoglu, Sahadev and Demirbag, 2018).
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Brand extensions mainly help to leverage brand equity by introducing logical new categories of
products. This extension helps to increase the awareness of the brand name. M&S uses the
strategies for establishing the category of products, and introduced products that are relevant to
the customer's authorization of the brand and introduce the same products but using a different
form.
M4. Critically evaluate the use of different techniques used to leverage and extend brands
In the above part, the brand strategies took by M&S is discussed but it is visible that there exists
a lack of understanding of the brand extension procedure. Some of the more effective procedures
used in brand extension and advantage procedures are discussed below.
Exploration of the different market: M&S has adopted a significant approach towards the
branding process, but the foreign market may result in a negative impact on the operational
activities of the organisation. In the market of Singapore, M&S as a brand is not performing well
and this is the main cause of the market failure. Thus, it is visible that the branding value has not
created a strong impact on the market. To extend the brand, the organisation has to explore the
market beforehand for reducing the loss (Cameron, 2016).
Essential products: In M&S, the idea of selling essential products is a productive one because
this step will show the importance of producing such items in the manufacturing bundle of the
organisation. Consumers always buy the essential products first then opt for luxury items. This
essential product-selling concept thus helps the organisation to attract the customers in its
purview and retain them in the long run.
Self-service: Organisations have to produce products that will increase the brand value of the
organisation. Product manufacturing thus should fulfil the desired quality and the supply the
product. Thus, incorporation of the third party organisation supports to be minimised for
reducing the terms of supply and volume of production. Thus, a large volume of money can be
saved.
Lower cost strategy: While launching a new brand, brand extension strategy is feasible because
the new product uses the name of a well-established brand. In this aspect, effective
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advertisements help to capture the market share, and the budget of advertisement for brand
extension is much lower than for new brands (Ritch, 2018).
From the techniques used by M&S, we can arrive at the strengths and weaknesses that the
organisation faces while operating its business activities and this is discussed below.
Strengths
High identification of the brand: M&S is a giant retailer of UK, and they are mainly known for
their premium quality of products. The organisation is serving million of the people from the past
deceased. Thus, the brand value of M&S is very high, and customers prefer to buy from M&S
only.
Wide ranges of products: M&S has a large variety of products in their purview, and this large
variety helps the organisation to choose the best products from a variety of choices. M&S have
carried out investment in research activities to address the needs of the customers, and this is the
reason organisation is popular among the consumers (Morgan, Tallontire and Foxon, 2017).
Popular designer brands: M&S has a variety of products, which really help the organisation to
become popular among consumers.
Weaknesses
Bad publicity about the store: M&S has a drawback in the market since bad publicity about the
organisation has reduced the sale of M&S products. Once bad publicity about the organisation
evolved, which was that the organisation has stock of old fashioned items and this publicity
negatively affected the sale of the organisation. Thus, the wrong assumption about the
organisation made the business low (Gill, 2016).
Manual working style increased the cost of production: M&S has a backdrop, which is the
organisation follows old traditional techniques, and they had not adopted the new techniques.
However, the competitors of M&S have introduced the modern technologies in their purview to
reduce the time and money of the production process of the organisation. Thus, the competitors
have focused on new technologies for increasing the efficiency of the work (Rauschnabel et al.,
2016). However, M&S is following the old techniques for which their productivity reduced
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overtime, and they are not utilising the technology effectively rather they are using the manual
methods of working which requires more time and as we all know that time is money, so this is
the reason the productivity of the organisation over time decreased.
LO4 Evaluate techniques for measuring and managing brand value over time
P5 Evaluate different types of techniques for measuring and managing brand value using
specific organisational examples
Nowadays organisations are using different kinds of technologies for measuring brand values
and these kinds of measuring techniques used to establish the business as per the perception of
the consumers. Competitiveness nowadays has increased in large volume for which organisations
use different techniques mainly to sustain in the market . Brands in today’s world are not
restricted to marketing perspectives but are inserted in the daily life of the consumers. Whenever
the term brand is mentioned, then the first thing that comes into the mind are name, symbols and
logo that identify goods and services of the organisation. Brand value primarily has three
functions, and these are engagement, reassurance, and navigation. Navigation occurs when brand
help customers to select from different choices of product; reassurance ensures that they
communicate the quality of the product and thus assure the consumers while purchasing it and
engagement is the associations that encourage recognition of the brand by consumers (Burmann
et al., 2017).
The main techniques that M&S use to manage the brand value are shown below:
Analysis of the industry: This technique mainly used by organisations for measuring the brand
value of the organisation. In the case of M&S, analysis of the industry is conducted by
considering the existing brands mainly the competitors of the organisation. Thus, this technique
helps the organisation to adopt proper competitive advantages (Liu, Ng and Lim, 2014).
Social media usage: In the market of retail marketing social media plays a significant role since it
helps to measure the brand value of the organisation. Nowadays customers are influenced by
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social media thus this medium of reaching to the customers help the organisation to share their
views on the organisation and give feedback on the activities of the organisation. This technique
mainly helps to strategise proper techniques of branding (Çifci et al., 2016).
Survey questionnaire: This measurement technique is the most effective one to understand the
brand value of the organisation. In M&S, the survey process is very effective, and it provides an
idea about the standing of the company with respect to the other competitors in the market. Thus
current customer demands can be analysed by this technique (Mete and Davies, 2017).
M5. Critically evaluate the application of techniques for measuring and managing brand
value concerning developing a strong and enduring brand.
Thus from the above, it is visible that techniques do help M&S to group their business and
introduce new techniques in their business process. The survey process helps the organisation to
know the standing of the organisation in the market this also helps to change their operations
according to the needs of the consumers (Perry, Wood and Fernie, 2015.). The social media
usage does help the organisation to impact the mind of the customers but it is linked with some
disadvantage also, and this disadvantage is if bad publicity of the organisation evolves in the
social media then it is spread within a second for which organisation may lose potential
customers and are subject to huge loss. Analysis of industry helps the organisation to get an idea
about the market and the probable strategies of the competitors thus this technique is a viable one
to increase the growth of the organisation.
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Conclusion
From the report, it is visible that brand management plays a vital role in the success of an
organisation. In the case of M&S, proper branding strategies are very important since the
organisation is experiencing loss in their purview thus to sustain in the market and increase the
profit margin M&S must adopt proper strategies to sustain in the long run. M&S have adopted
some valuable strategies, but it must devise the strategy bundle to ensure its stability in the
market.
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