Principles and Practices of Marketing: A Sainsbury's Case Study Report

This report provides a detailed analysis of Sainsbury's marketing strategies, encompassing its current approaches, branding decisions, and the differences between national and international marketing strategies. The report examines Sainsbury's use of innovations, competitive pricing, customer loyalty programs like the Nectar scheme, and digital marketing tools. It delves into branding decisions implemented over the last three years, including brand positioning, brand name strategies, and brand sponsorship through campaigns. The report also assesses the impact of these decisions on Sainsbury's brand value and market presence. Furthermore, it discusses the evolution of Sainsbury's brand development, including investments in food services, cost-reduction strategies, and the introduction of new product ranges. The report highlights the importance of adapting to changing consumer behaviors and competitive landscapes to maintain and enhance brand value. This analysis offers valuable insights into the marketing principles and practices of a leading supermarket chain.

PRINCIPLES AND
PRACTICES OF
MARKETING

TABLE OF CONTENTS
INTRODUCTION...........................................................................................................................1
Background report...........................................................................................................................1
Present marketing strategies of Sainsbury..................................................................................1
1. Branding decisions implemented by Sainsbury in the last 3 years .............................................3
2. Difference between national and international marketing strategy ............................................6
CONCLUSION..............................................................................................................................10
REFERENCES .............................................................................................................................11

INTRODUCTION
Marketing strategy is defined as the organisational approach to address and convince
people so that they can make their purchasing decision in favour of organisation. These strategies
help business to achieve its marketing objectives in terms of profits and customers. For
sustaining the growth and development, it is necessary for the organisation to conduct an
effective market research and develop marketing plans with the help of highly professional
human resources. The marketing strategies are essential for organisations, because these plans
help organisation to develop a better understanding about the way for achieving their goals,
attracting customers, eliminating barriers as well as assist in identifying methods to achieve their
business targets (Baker, 2014).
The report will consider an example of Sainsbury which is among one of the largest
supermarket chains with its headquartering in UK. The report will highlight the marketing
strategies used by Sainsbury at present. The report will evaluate the impact of brand management
decisions implemented by organisation in the past few years. It will also analyse the variations in
national and international marketing strategies of Sainsbury. The report will provide a detailed
analysis of marketing principles and strategies of Sainsbury.
BACKGROUND REPORT
Present marketing strategies of Sainsbury
The creativity and regular monitoring of marketing strategies is one of the key factor in
success of Sainsbury. Along with the supermarket stores, an organisation also deals in food
services, gift cards, and fuel services and as an e-commerce provider. The organisation makes its
marketing plan for all components such as product, its distribution, price, innovations
considering requirements of customers as well as advertisement policies. For sustaining its
higher brand value and growth, currently the organisation is using following strategies and
policies for marketing:
 Sainsbury regularly introduces innovations and expansion in its product range. This
strategy of organisation is to cover all segments of the market. The organisation operates
in the format of supermarkets as well as local stores. Its product range is defined in a way
that it covers all segments of customers ranging from all age groups and product lines
from grocery to clothes and fuels. By keeping the view of environment friendly
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customer's organisation is providing organic foods, special products for vegans and low
fat food for those seeking healthy options. This strategy helps organisation to connect
with all types of customers (Chaffey, 2015).
 Organisation follows the competitive policy for price which allows its target audience to
value their money with excellent quality and low prices as compare to other alternative
options. For on time distribution and to allow people to avail its services all time, the
organisation is operating few of its stores for even 24 hours and most of its stores
operates till midnight: so that consumers can access and use services of Sainsbury
anytime. With online website it provides facility to order products online and to ensure
delivery at their home. These strategies are significantly helpful for organisation, as they
can attract more customers with remarkable presence of organisation at all locations and
during any hour of the day.
 Sainsbury is providing its human resources better training, so that they can easily
understand the sensitivity of customers purchasing behaviour. Such strategies enhance
the trust of customers and promote customers’ loyalty (Sainsbury’s overhauls Nectar
scheme to ‘genuinely reward loyalty’, 2018). The excellent designs of stores, baskets,
interior of stores are also attractive features which provides its customers great
experience of purchasing.
 To retain its customers so that they do not choose other options over Sainsbury,
organisation is presently conducting loyalty programs. Organisation is member of Nectar
loyalty scheme so that when its customers made regular purchases they are given rewards
in terms of their loyalty towards Sainsbury. Such loyalty programs are beneficial for both
organisation and customers. Many customers continue make purchases with Sainsbury so
that they can get attractive offers
 The organisation is using highly efficient promotional strategies. It is using digital
marketing tools such as social networking, website promotions as well as physical
promotional techniques such as attractive offers and discounts on festive seasons such as
new years and Christmas as well as during peak times when customers are more likely to
make purchases (Ekinci, 2018). For promotion Sainsbury strictly focus on the content and
presentation of its message so that it effectively creates an impression on public.
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1. BRANDING DECISIONS IMPLEMENTED BY SAINSBURY IN THE
LAST 3 YEARS
It is an important aspect for Sainsbury to create high brand value so that it becomes easy
for customers to recognise the Sainsbury brand and to prefer it over other brands. If people are
not able to identify the brand then, it indicates that organisation has failed to promote itself
within public. To maintain the brand value organisation needs to take branding decisions
precisely and with proper planning. The branding decisions involves following strategic
implementations:
Brand positioning decisions:
Sainsbury has made various strategies and decisions for strongly positioning its brand
among public. For making the brand very popular and well known to each and every individual,
organisation has expanded its product range to a great extent in the last 3 years. As a result,
organisation offers variety of products and services to its customers. For instance, organisation
provides bakery products and instant foods but for those customers who prefer nutrition rich
food, the organisation has started fat free food services for them. The participation of Sainsbury
in all product range like food services, clothing, fuel, online retail services and grocery services
in supermarkets as well as in local stores. The presence of organisation in such vast areas
naturally positioned its brand in front (Gillespie and Riddle, 2015).
Further, to create dominating impact on minds of people the organisation launched
Nectar scheme for loyalty of its customers in 2018. Under this scheme the organisation provides
rewards and benefits to the customers who are loyal to the Sainsbury brand. Such loyalty
programs encourage customers to regularly make purchase with Sainsbury only. From the past
few year's organisation is trying to make its presence available to the extent as much as possible
(Maarit Jalkala and Keränen, 2014). For example, in order to positioned brand strongly in UK
organisation has planned to open its stores during night as well. These approaches easily remind
customers about the brand when they require any product in which Sainsbury deals.
To make Sainsbury brand more efficient the organisation has been focusing on involving
digital technologies as its integral component. The organisation provides all facilities regarding
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making purchase or providing feedbacks about quality, to its customers on just a single click.
The adaption to the advance technologies represents organisation as innovative and customer
oriented. Thus, whenever customers have thought of quality services with benefits then people
can easily click the Sainsbury brand in their minds. Brand positioning decisions helps
organisation to easily position its brand among other competitive brands in the market (Melewar
and Alwi, 2015).
Brand name:
For maintaining the brand value Sainsbury must create a positive impression of its brand
name on customers. The target audience must have a pleasant feeling when they observe or hear
name of Sainsbury. Such impact is possible only when customers are highly impressed with the
services of organisation. In order to make brand name appealing the organisation strictly focus
on its human resources (Todor, 2014). To include the best force of skilled human resources, in
2018 the organisation planned to increase base payment rates of its employee. In order to attract
more customers in 2018 organisation planned to merge with Asda which is one of the toughest
competitor of Sainsbury in the supermarket sector.
With this merger, the groups which predominantly prefers Asda will be automatically
included in the Sainsbury brand. The merger of two biggest ventures has already created an
excitement among customers. This merger of organisation under its dual brand strategy has given
rise to the expectation among customers: with the name of Sainsbury brand that soon
organisation will flood market with successive discounts, attractive offers, profit margins and
extreme changes in purchasing behaviour of consumers. Such mergers have promoted Sainsbury
brand as well as enabled firm to create powerful and positive impression on its customers as well
as its competitors. This decision of organisation will also encourage other small retailers to
collaborate with Sainsbury brand for sustaining their existence.
It will also help organisation to develop its brand as huge entity. However, this merger
also brings challenges for organisation. Merger with great number of brands under single
Sainsbury brand will make it difficult for the organisation to maintain the distinct features of
every brand. Also, it will bring another challenge for Sainsbury to maintain the service quality as
per standards of organisation. The merging can also have negative impact on the performance of
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organisation, if Sainsbury fails to meet expectations of people due to over burden of brand name
(Wensley, 2016).
Brand sponsorship:
An organisation is one of the leading retailers and provides vast range of products under
Sainsbury brand. Thus, it becomes necessary for the organisation to ensure the great quality of
material from its suppliers because the quality will directly reflect the brand of organisation.
Organisation regularly make strategies to promote its brand products and to sponsor its own
brand value. For instance, to introduce creativity and more attractions in the clothing brand of
Sainsbury which is popularly known as “Sainsbury's Tu”, in 2017 organisation introduces new
brand positioning of its clothing brand. The aim of this campaign was to advertise “Sainsbury's
Tu” clothing brand among customers’.
In order to emotionally connect with customers in 2017, organisation also launched
“Sainsbury’s food dancing campaign” so that the food brand of organisation is welcomed and
accepted by its customers with emotional connectivity. Such campaigns are greatly effective in
improving the performance of organisation. Though such campaigns have not brought any major
change in brand policies but it will help organisation to remind customers regularly about the
presence and success of the organisation (West, Ford and Ibrahim, 2015). This approach of
organisation is necessary because it motivates customers to regularly maintain relation with
organisation due to driving forces such as innovation, quality and direct involvement of
consumers with such emotionally and participative promotional campaigns.
Development of brand:
In the last three years, the major branding decisions of organisation which have great
impact on growth of Sainsbury are related to development of organisation's brand. The ultimate
feature which contributes to the brand value is the support of customers which can be achieved t
through appropriate marketing strategies. In 2017, organisation has planned to invest good
amount in improving its food services. In the same year organisation shifts its strategy from 3-
year quality upgrade programs to completely focused planning vision on achieving sales targets
in food range. This strategy may not give effective results because the quality programs were
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improving entire Sainsbury brand but with the abolishment of that strategy the organisation is
now keeping its focus on selected brand range.
To increase the profit margins in 2016, organisation framed strategies for reducing
operational costs by adjusting and re-organisation of its human resources. It includes the changes
in nights shifts of its employees and other financial related activities. These cost based activities
will help organisation to utilize its resource in productive manner and will increase the profit
margin of organisation. To ensure the development of brand organisation regularly monitors its
competitive organisations.
In 2016, organisation launched more developed and improved range of food products by
replacement of its all former food range. This improvement action of Sainsbury greatly
influenced the performance of organisation. Such innovative actions encourage excitement
among customers to review and try the new products and services. The changing environment of
organisation assures the improvement in quality as well as increased interests of buyers.
However, with such changes organisation may suffer risk of failure. It may happen that the new
products range especially within food services may not be appreciated by the consumers.
Thus, before implementing such changes, Sainsbury must conduct proper research. The
regular monitoring of feedbacks and suggestions of customers can also be helpful for the
organisation to foster growth (Wensley, 2016). Another major step by Sainsbury to develop its
brand was taken in 2017, when organisation re-branded all of its products except clothing and
food services under brand name of “Sainsbury’s Home”. The introduction of all services under
single name allow consumers to easily identify the brand from the crowd of other brands. It also
increases the sales and makes organisation more trustworthy.
2. DIFFERENCE BETWEEN NATIONAL AND INTERNATIONAL
MARKETING STRATEGY
Marketing strategies are developed in order to understand the requirements of customers
and to identify the factors which could influence the business activities of organisation. Thus, the
marketing practices are greatly influenced by the number of factors such as nature of target
audience, social and cultural factors as well as technical factors. Sainsbury is recognised as the
leading organisation in its domestic location United Kingdom. But its competitors like Tesco and
Marks & Spencer is not only leading in UK but also across the various countries of world.
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Thus, in order to move forward in the race, the organisation need to make its presence in
international market as well. However, the marketing strategies are in a great variation in
domestic and international context. The marketing strategies of Sainsbury in national context of
UK may not provide same response and productivity in international market. Because the
priorities and preferences of customers all around the world may not be the same as the
consumers of UK (Five priorities for Sainsbury's in 2017, 2017). Thus, national and international
marketing strategies are characterised by following differences:
Differences
 Domestic marketing methods are executed within a single nation or geographical
boundary: on the other hand, in international marketing all marketing concepts ranging
from product specification to distribution and promotional activities are expanded across
the boundaries of home location of the organisation.
 Domestic marketing strategies are performed on small scale and within country so it
involves low operational cost and lesser restrictions from government. But as
international marketing is to be implemented in foreign countries a lot of legal
regulations are imposed on the organisation as per the law of foreign country. It also
involves increased share of investments because of variations in taxation and financial
systems in every country.
 International marketing involves great risks because the organisation requires detailed
analysis and knowledge of customer segments of foreign countries which is a tough nut
to crack for organisations. If Sainsbury fails to clearly understand the market trend of
other countries then, there are higher possibilities that organisation may fail due to strong
competition from the local competitors. Contrary to international marketing with
domestic marketing the Marks and Spencer organisation is familiar with the competitive
forces and preferences of the consumers thus, they have lower risks of failure (Todor,
2014).
 In domestic marketing technology usage of technical devices may be limited: but in case
of international marketing it is required for the organisation to effectively use the
advanced technology in order to integrate business activities across different corners of
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world (Sainsbury's unveils 'step change' in with new food campaign, 2017). Without use
of technology it is almost impossible for the organisation to operate internationally. The promotional methods used in marketing strategy also holds variations in domestic
and international contexts. For instance, it may happen that in UK social media
promotion is sufficient for Sainsbury to promote its products due to its well established
brand value. But the same social networking strategy may not give effective result to
organisation in countries in which direct interaction with consumers is required for
generating brand awareness.
International marketing strategy which can be used by Sainsbury
In order to achieve the same response and success in international market as achieved at
national economy of UK, Sainsbury must use following marketing strategies in foreign countries.
 The first step for international marketing is that Sainsbury must separate its activities and
approaches in national and international market. The major purpose for this separation is
that organisation is accepted by UK with open hearted thus it must not make pre
assumptions that it will get same responses from other countries and hence, it must frame
separate marketing plan for its international exposure.
 Sainsbury must ensure that its technical support provides excellent results and uses most
advanced features. In the absence of effective communication and information exchange
tools, it will become difficult for the organisation to coordinate and maintain its brand
value. The use of advanced technology will also make the marketing strategies effective
and productive.
 The most influencing and dominating strategy for marking success of organisation across
the national boundaries is the customization of its products and services according to the
requirements and culture of targeted country (Gillespie and Riddle, 2015). In attempt to
introducing product customization Sainsbury must first conduct proper market
researches. These findings will help organisation to develop and improve products
according to the latest trends of that market. It will also help organisation to develop a
clear perspective of competitive level.
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 To create significant impact in short span of time organisation can also merge or
collaborate with the most successful organisation of the foreign country. This will
automatically provide in build customer segment to Sainsbury. However, with this
approach it is very challenging for organisation to maintain or make an agreement with
other partners to follow the same standards and brand perceptions of organisation.
 To influence the international consumers, Sainsbury can also develop strong relationship
with the influencing personalities of foreign countries. This approach will help
organisation to build the roots of its brand. The interference of regional authorities will
not only escort organisation to identify scope and opportunities but will also guide to
understand regional preferences, cultural values and legal regulations.
 In developing countries where Sainsbury does not have tough competition, organisation
can easily influence its citizens by providing innovative products and services (Ekinci,
2018). The innovations and improved quality services will attract the consumers and will
naturally force them to accept the Sainsbury brand.
 The organisation can also use its vast success and reputation for influencing the
consumers of foreign countries. When organisation describe its achievements and its
immense popularity in United Kingdom then it also inspires and encourages consumers to
adopt a brand which is highly recommended by the developed country like UK.
 The effective pricing and quality strategies can attract other countries which observe the
Sainsbury as source of investment and employment generator. When Sainsbury starts
working in any region then, it will surely generate huge employment opportunities and
will also be beneficial as it will contribute to the economy of foreign nation. Thus,
organisation must aim at providing great opportunities to the human resources. This
strategy will make Sainsbury popular and recognisable among social groups in the
international market.
 The organisation must also have clear perspectives of monitoring. Since, international
marketing involves great risks organisation must regularly monitor that its prices and
product specification are as per requirement. There must not be any coordination gap as it
could affect the brand value of Sainsbury adversely.
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 The customers’ feedbacks and suggestions are the crucial elements for successful
marketing strategy. Sainsbury must follow the same elements in international marketing
as well. The organisation can interact with the customers through social media. But since,
most of the target customers may be unaware about the Sainsbury brand social media
marketing may not prove effective. Thus, at initial phase organisation must try to involve
in the local events such as cultural festivals and sports in the form of sponsors (Maarit
Jalkala and Keränen, 2014). This approach will allow organisation to get recognition by
consumers: they will start taking knowledge about the product and services of
organisation. Sainsbury can use advertisements in newspapers and banners to address
and promote its services in front of its target audience. For the opening of business, the
organisation can organise or host grand events which involves huge participation of
public by gaining their attention with huge discounts and offers
 Sainsbury must analyse the approaches of local competitors so that organisation can get
the idea about the promotional strategies in context with the regional characteristics of
the people. It will help organisation to frame better policies with its innovative and
quality services.
The effective implementation of these strategies will help Sainsbury to achieve the great
success in international market: it has achieved huge response in national market of United
Kingdom.
CONCLUSION
From the report, it can be concluded that implementation of marketing principles and
practices is essential for the business activities. The organisations must develop marketing plans
and strategies by facilitating complete analysis of customers, competitive and technical factors as
well as the organisational resources. The report has described the current marketing principles
and methods which are used by Sainsbury to establish the most successful organisation. The
report has explained various branding decisions implemented by organisation in past few years
in order to improve its brand value. It has explored the organisational decisions in empowering
brand position, brand name and its development.
The report has also described the various trends in national and international marketing
environment. It has analysed the implementation process of international marketing strategies by
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