Marketing Essentials Report: Zara, Marketing Mix, and Business Plan

This report provides a detailed analysis of Zara's marketing strategies, examining the key roles and responsibilities of the marketing function within the organization. It explores the company's marketing mix, including product, price, place, promotion, people, process, and physical evidence, and compares it with that of C&A. The report also delves into how the marketing department interacts with other departments like HR, Finance, R&D and Production within Zara's organizational structure. Furthermore, it evaluates and produces a suitable marketing plan for Zara, including a budget, monitoring, and controlling mechanisms, offering insights into the company's approach to brand building, campaign strategies, market research, and overall business objectives. The report also includes references to relevant marketing theories and concepts.

MARKETING
ESSENTIALS
1

Table of Contents
INTRODUCTION...........................................................................................................................3
PART 1............................................................................................................................................3
P1 Explain the key roles and responsibilities of the marketing function....................................3
P2 Determine the roles and responsibilities of marketing department in context of wider
organizational operations............................................................................................................5
PART 2............................................................................................................................................7
P3 Comparison of marketing Mix strategy use by organisations to achieve its overall business
objectives.....................................................................................................................................7
PART 3..........................................................................................................................................10
P4 Evaluate and produce a suitable marketing plan for selected organisation.........................10
BUDGET...................................................................................................................................12
Monitoring and Controlling......................................................................................................13
CONCLUSION..............................................................................................................................13
REFERENCES..............................................................................................................................14
2

INTRODUCTION
Marketing is define as the process of which is been used by the marketers in the
organisation with the motive to carry the business operations in most effective manner and to
convey the message to its potential customers (Simkin and Dibb, 2013). Moreover it is a tool
which helps the business organisations to establish effective communication and to offer quality
products and services to its customers and satisfy them. In simple words it is defined as the
process of effective communication which take place between seller and the buyer with the
motive to satisfy them. The organisation chosen for this report is Zara. The company is dealing
in fashionable cloths and is one of the most popular brand which offers quality products at
affordable prices. The topics covered in the report are roles and responsibilities of marketing
functions, its marketing mix and the business plan which help them in accomplishing success.
PART 1
P1 Explain the key roles and responsibilities of the marketing function
Marketing plays quite significant role in the organisation as helps in accomplishing the
desire goals and objectives of the company. In context of the Zara, the marketing is playing
major role as with the use of effective marketing tools they are increasing the sales of the
company by attracting potential customers across the globe. The marketing department within
the business operation is responsible to focus on the activities of investors, customers and
various other communities and its roles and duties are describe as follow-
 Brand- With the help of marketing plan the main focus of the company is to formulate the
positive brand image of the company and to target the potential customers (Pike, 2015).
Activities related to branding are very important as it helps in formulating positive image
of the company as focus on engaging the customers. The actions taken by the marketing
department for formulating the positive image of the company helps in increasing the
sales and profit margins within the company.
 Focus on the marketing campaigns- Marketing plan within the business organisation
related to organising campaigns for the promotion activities helps in driving the attention
of the potential customers. As in this present scenario where everyone is using online
platforms so it become easy to attract the large number of potential customers by putting
visual and engaging content on the various popular social media platforms. The focus
3

whiling designing and formulating strategies for business campaigns is to produce right
material and also focus on establishing effective and right communication (Blythe, 2010).
 Producing marketing and promotional materials- Marketing department within the
business organisation is to focus and develop the effective plan which highlights the core
products and services. The marketing department is responsible to focus on the functions
of various other departments within the organisation with the motive to identify the weak
areas and take corrective steps accordingly. In this digital world where everything is
perform using various digital so it become easy to acquire the materials as mostly things
are perform using visual content.
 Market research- The marketing department within the business organisation is
responsible to focus on conducting effective market research as it is very important top
drive success in the marketplace. The research helps in identifying the present trend in
the marketplace and the various strategies been used by the other competitions. After
analysing the market situation it become easy for the marketing department to identify
the various fields where they have to make changes and able to formulate better strategies
which provides desire results.
 Effective communication process- The role of the marketing department within business
organisation helps in knowing the weak points within the operations of business by
establishing effective communication. The proper and effective communication helps in
accomplishment of the desire goals and objectives as employees within the organisation
feel free to put their viewpoints and provides suggestions at various level of production
with the motive to increase the production capacity of the business. The marketing
department within the business organisation is responsible to establish effective
communication as it helps in reducing the conflict situation and the misunderstanding
which take place due to miscommunication (Puddle, 2015).
 Analysing positioning of company in marketplace- Marketing department with the
company is responsible to identify and track its position in the marketplace so that it can
take corrective actions in order to improve its present situation and to make its brand the
most desirable and preferable in marketplace. Moreover it helps in tracking the
performance of the competitors in the market and provide the right direction to marketing
4

department which helps in meeting the needs and preferences of potential customers and
to make it its position more stronger (Lammenett, 2012).
P2 Determine the roles and responsibilities of marketing department in context of wider
organizational operations.
Marketing and HR department: As we all know that Zara is the most popular fashion
retail brand across the world. It has more than 7000+ stores globally. As all the functional
departments in Zara are interconnected to each other. The company is already a brand so has a
good reputation all over the world. For this, it continuously promotes its products and services. It
also depends upon its quality. Zara has a brand quality which attract the customers. The HR
department focuses on hiring those employers who pull their weight in achieving the sales of the
organisation while marketing creates brand message to employees. The HR department blog
about what all new trends are coming in the company. The marketing department advertise HR
policies that influence young customers to attract towards the companies product. Likewise,
Marketers focus on communicating the brand to customers, the HR focus on communicating the
brand to its employees. They also take care about employees salary data, that what benefits the
competitors are providing.
HR and finance department: These both departments are depends on each other. This is
because both these functional departments have common goals and depends on one another. HR
department mainly focuses on its employee well being, to create them a valuable worker. So that
it turns into happy and healthy workforce. Happy employees automatically benefits finance as it
creates more money for the organisation to grow. Likewise, for making a stable organisation it is
a duty of HR department to find a right employee for the right position with right key skills and
competencies. For this, it is highly dependent on the finance department. Because of proper
budget, training facilities or programs for workers. So Zara make sure that the finance
department should provide the proper budget to the HR department for employee engagement.
And also for providing them rewards or bonus (Rudden, 2016).
Finance and marketing department: For every organisation these both departments
should be strong. Because marketing department focuses on the expanding the customers
attraction and finance department focuses on achieving profits by marketing. So these
departments should have a close coordination between them. If one department fails to perform
5

its work then it effects the other department and also overall growth and profitability of the
company. Zara's sales department focuses on increasing revenue by selling customer preferences
clothes and their services (Durmaz, 2011). Marketing department focuses on developing
strategies to attract new customers. To develop, they need credit policies from finance
department that can meet customers demands and services. Similarly, the purpose of Finance
departments is to develop companies profitability. As credit policies benefits the marketing
department and it deals with the companies accounts receivables accounts and collectible debt.
Marketing and Research & Development department: work of both these departments
is to focus on customers needs and preferences, which helps the company in resulting more
productive and increasing their revenues. These both departments needs to work together. As
R&D departments creates a possibility while Marketing department creates it possible- that what
amount a customer is willing to pay for what product. On the other side, marketing and research
department cooperate to create a team to understand customers unmet needs. This helps the
teams making connections and communications with each other. Research development team
helps the marketers in knowing which type of designs customers want of which quality at what
price. They do their research through observations or asking questions or by sampling method.
This improves the companies product development, customer focus and competitive intelligence.
And also brings close to sales manager, marketers, product developers and research developers.
Finance and Production department: In Zara, both the departments play major role.
Because while production department make sure that company does not run out of stock, because
if there is no stock left then company does not meet its customers demand and satisfaction while
finance department ensures that company should always have enough resources and funds so that
it cannot go into trouble due to lack of capital. These both departments are interconnected with
each other. Production always require raw material, new machinery, workers, working area etc.
and these things needs money to start. Money comes under finance (Henríquez, 2018). So
finance is a major function which helps in production of every business, because it works as a
fuel for every organisation. And vice versa if production is not done properly, then it will not
create finance.
6

PART 2
P3 Comparison of marketing Mix strategy use by organisations to achieve its overall business
objectives.
Marketing mix refers to that policy or strategy of the company which helps the management to
take the company forward to desired goals and objectives. This strategy is also termed as 7p's of
marketing mix. Components of marketing mix are product, price, place, promotion, process,
physical evidence and people. These components are a combination of traditional and modern
marketing mix (Jones and Rowley 2011).
To develop an understanding of ways in which different companies are using this strategy, there
is a discussion regarding marketing mix of Zara and C&A.
Objective
Name of company Goal
Zara Organization is planning to hold top most
position in fashion industry and become
leading brand in clothing market.
C&A Company is aiming to provide customer
satisfaction through serving them with best
possible quality in whole market of clothing.
Product
Name of company Goal
Zara Management of the company is aiming to to
serve customers with best possible and latest
trends so that customers can align products
with the common notion about company, i.e.,
firm for latest fashion trends.
C&A There is no common notion about the serving
pattern of the company, as they believe to offer
only those products and services which are in
7

accordance of needs and wants of customers
(Piñeiro-Otero and Martínez-Rolán 2016).
Price
Name of company Goal
Zara The company is adopting the price penetration
strategy and is using the benefit of its
established brand value in the market. They are
fixing the prices of their products with the
information about class or affordability level of
customers.
C&A Company is adopting strategy of price
skimming in the process of offering their
products to its customers (Baker and Magnini,
2016).
Place
Name of company Goal
Zara Company is marking its presence in both
platforms. Online and offline platforms, both
are being exploited by the company in order to
generate profits.
C&A The company is mainly focusing on markets of
Belgium, Germany and UK. They have began
to give competition to Zara by opening stores
in different regions.
Promotion
Name of company Goal
8

Zara They are using mainly online platform to
advertise about their offerings in the market
(Eletxigerra, Barrutia and Echebarria, 2018).
C&A They are using local channels to promote their
products.
People
Name of company Goal
Zara They are recruiting best employees in order to
carry out their operations smoothly.
C&A They are not looking for already trained
employees. They believe in providing training
programs.
Physical evidence
Name of company Goal
Zara Famous for luxurious brands and latest fashion
items in the industry.
C&A Quality items are being offered to customers.
Process
Name of company Goal
Zara They are using delegative management style.
Decision and authority in decentralised all over
the company (Yee and Yazdanifard 2013).
C&A Centralized authority is there in the place.
9

PART 3
P4 Evaluate and produce a suitable marketing plan for selected organisation.
Marketing is a process of delivering marketing message to targeted audience. This
process helps the management of the company to plan and organise resource to execute
marketing process efficiently. This set a fix deadline to in terms of time period to execute and
reach desired objectives. Marketing plan is different for the teams in a organisation but every
separate team have same motive for completing the business common goal (jenyo Gabriel and
Soyoye Kolapo, 2015).
SMART OBJECTIVE
Objective is the end result which a team or organization wants to achieve with their
actions and initiatives taken by the company. This goal of the process helps the management to
develop a clear picture of the procedure and also provides guidelines to initiate actions
accordingly. For the given marketing plan, smart objective is defined as follows:
“To introducing household products for the new targeted customers in order to
increase the market share by 40% within a year”.
SWOT analysis
It is the technique of evaluating and analysing internal environmental factors of the
organization. This helps the management to identify strengths and weaknesses of the company so
that these can be aligned with the opportunities and threats and management can ensure
formulation of effective and efficient strategies. Before launching any new product, it is
important for the marketing department of Zara, that they analyse each and every impact,
whether positive or negative, so that, company is considering every important factor while
designing marketing plan. In this context, SWOT analysis of Zara has been give below:
Strengths: Established name of brand: To survive in the long term in the market, it is important that
company is having a strong brand value in the market. Zara is enjoying this position in
the market and hence, this strong point will ensure that Zara can easily introduce new
product as targeted market is already placing strong trust on the brand name.
 Highly skilled work: Zara's workers are well trained. They maintain their quality in order
to maintain the standard (Ivanov, 2019).
10

Weaknesses High range: The weakest point in company's strategy is that it is having premium price
range for its products. This makes product of the company unaffordable for medium class
people. New product that the company is coming up in front with is also having premium
range and, therefore, it may be difficult to establish and place the product successfully in
the market.
 Already established companies: In households sectors there are already lots of companies
established with good reputation.
Opportunities Online channels: there is an increased trend of digital shopping and bringing each and
every item over online platform. There is huge potential in online market as wide range
of population is connected over this stage. Zara can exploit this opportunity and can mark
its presence over this place also.
 Market segment:Through introduction of new products in the market, company can
attempt to increase market share. It is the universal fact, that higher the market share,
higher will be the profitability measure of the company.
Threats High competition: Households sectors are already selling by well known companies like,
Procter & Gamble, Unilever etc.
 Buyer's behaviour:Buyers behaviour is totally depends on their mood. Accepting or
rejecting a new product by the company is totally depends on customers.
PORTER'S GENERIC STRATEGIES
Porter's generic strategies has three different ways to create a competitive advantage:
 Cost leadership strategy: This strategy focuses on the minimisation of cost by providing
a same or similar type of product or services to the customers. The launch of new items at
low cost will save the company from the image of servicing to only elite class.
 Differentiation strategy: Differentiation strategy plays a very important role in an
organisation. As this makes any firm different from other firms in terms of quality or in
cost. This is a strategy where positioning comes into the play. By making this new
product, it differentiate Zara from other companies.
11

 Focus strategy: According to this theory, company focus on the narrow segments. This
will help the company to be specialized in one area and increase customer satisfaction.
By reading these strategies, the product comes in differentiate strategy category because
it helps the organisation in becoming different from its competitors and create competitive
advantage.
4 P's of marketing mix
The organisation is having a marketing mix which has 4 components and it defines the strategies
which the management is ensuring to market their presence in targeted market. In context of
Zara, marketing mix containing 4 P is described below:
 Product: Zara is holding top position in fashion industry and is dealing in fashion
apparels for men, women and teenagers. In this time, Zara is coming up in front with an
ultimate new product in the industry. Any fashion industry has never ever entered into
household items industry. Also Zara plage for reducing the waste and believes in
sustainable development.
 Price: There is a common notion in the market that Zara is offering a range of high
priced products only. Company is only focusing elite class of society. Zara is coming in
market with new range of products in households segment with affordable price range so
that it can break this image and notion. This whole process will help the company to
increase market share and profitability as well.
 Place: The company is marking their presence all over the globe and the main objective
of this marketing plan is to make the company offer its services all around the world.
Zara is famous for making its culture and tradition applicable to all levels.
 Promotion: Main promotion strategies are promoting new products online and on the
small outlets where people dost attracts easily. Zara always manufacturing new products
according to the customers need and demand. Commercial breaks and online aids are
helps a lot in promoting the products. By giving discounts and exciting prices or gifts and
cashback offers, Zara makes a bond with the customers and enlarge their market share.
BUDGET
PARTICULARS First Year
Second
Year Third Year
Fourth-
year Fifth Year
Opening capital 2000 0 1200 1700
12