Marketing Assignment: Role of Advertising to Operate Business Objectives

Question

Task: You are required to produce a short report on marketing assignment that seeks to develop your understanding and awareness of marketing and its component elements in use of the marketing mix to operate and manage key business objectives. By completing these tasks, you would be demonstrating your knowledge of marketing within a business context and some of the challenges or issues faced by businesses.

Answer

1. Marketing Mix
Marketing includes the set of activities that a company undertakes for the promotion of its product or service to the consumers. Marketing activities generally consist of advertisement, sell and delivery of products to the customers. Marketing activities ensure the identification of the target customer and drawing their attention to the product or service so that the selling of the product or service is enhanced.

The Marketing Mix or the 7Ps of marketing is a utility used by marketers in order to determine product offering and create customer value (Wu and Li, 2018).

• Product: The product must be well-suited to the consumer demands and needs and it must fulfill the customers’ expectations and must function properly.
• Place: The product or service must be available readily at appropriate places where the target market consumers generally shop.
• Promotion: The product or service must be promoted to the target customers via different promotional channels such as advertisement, Sales Promotion, personal selling, etc. (Išorait?, 2016)
• Price: The price of the product or service must be optimum and not too high as customers demand value for money on the products.
• People: The correct marketing of the products requires the right marketing professionals on whom the company relies for engaging the customers.
• Physical Environment: The customers receive the product or service in certain physical environments where the product is provided, which must be encouraging the customer to obtain the product.
• Processes: The processes associated with the delivery of the product or service ensures that the standard of service is maintained.

2. SWOT Analysis
Marketing can be used by a business to remain competitive in the market. Marketing is an ever evolving concept and it is adjusting and adapting to the utility of technology in businesses. The proper marketing analysis of any product allows the company to gain insight into the demands and expectations of the customers and the companies can make products that fit the demands of the customers. Marketing ensures the company to gain information regarding the company’s internal and environment that has an influence on the company’s productivity. SWOT analysis can be used for this purpose (Gürel and Tat, 2017).

• Strengths: This internal factor evaluates the power of the firm that makes the firm attractive to the target audience. The firm can use its strengths to develop products or services and place it in the market among the competing brands to gain competitive advantage.
• Weaknesses: This internal factor shows the shortcomings of the company that can be detrimental to the business. The firm must work on these issues to ensure that it is able to fulfill its objectives.
• Opportunities: This is an external factor that provides insight into the possibilities for the business to grow. The firm must take full advantage when these opportunities arise that can positively drive the business towards success.
• Threats: This external factor shows the possible hindrances or risks that may make it difficult for the firm to fulfill its business objectives. The firm must identify these threats fast and work towards finding effective solutions to them.

Figure 1: SWOT analysis
(Source:Tsatsoula, 2018)

3. Ansoff’s Matrix
The Ansoff Matrix, also known as product/market expansion grid, is an utility that is often used by companies for analyzing and planning their strategies for growth. The four parts of the matrix are:

• Market Penetration: This strategy focuses on increasing market sales of existing products.
• Product Development: This strategy deals with the designing and introduction of new products.
• Market Development: This strategy is concerned with entry of the firm in new markets.
• Diversification: This strategy focuses on the firm’s entry into a new market with new products.

Figure 2: Ansoff Matrix
(Source: Tsatsoula, 2018)

The Ansoff Matrix helps business decision-makers in business management by providing four alternate strategies for the development of the business organization. It is a strategic planning tool that helps in the analysis of strategic options for the business of the firm along with considering the risk associated with each alternative (Tsatsoula, 2018). The first strategy of the matrix is market penetration entails the lowest possible risk. This strategy can be applied by the firm in case of growing markets, by gaining competitive advantage over other firms. The second strategy is the product development strategy where the firm develops new products for the existing market. This strategy is riskier than the previous strategy. The third strategy is the market development strategy where a firm enters a new market with the existing products. This strategy entails a high degree of risk. The fourth strategy is the diversification in which the firm enters new markets with new products. This is the riskiest strategy among all the strategies of the matrix.

4. Digital Marketing
Digital marketing refers to the utilization of digital platforms for the marketing activities of a business organization. It encompasses a number of components such as social media marketing, search engine optimization, email marketing, mobile marketing, content marketing, etc. (Chaffey, 2019) Digital marketing entails certain advantages that can help the business to grow and prosper; they are listed below:

• Targeting specific audience: Digital marketing allows the firm to target only the specific potential consumers for their marketing endeavors and this helps the firms in increasing its consumer base manifold. This can result in the increase in profitability of the business organization.
• Expansion over large areas: Digital marketing tools help the business organizations to expand their business for geographical expansion without any hurdles. The tools provide a flexible pathway for business expansion.
• Cost effective: Digital marketing tools are cost effective and help the firm to minimize its cost expenditure for marketing purpose along with increasing the reach of the organization. Digital marketing tools have better Cost Per Lead (CPL) compared to other channels (Kannan, 2017).
• Higher revenue: Digital marketing tools allow the business organization to expand the business over large areas with minimum possible expense, and generate higher revenue as compared to traditional marketing methods.
• Measurable analytics: Digital marketing allows the firm to identify customer behavior and buying patterns by providing information about the sales of the product or service. This can help the firm to choose the target market appropriately and design the product according to their needs.

Conclusion
On completion, it can be concluded that it is of paramount importance for an organization to decide their product and place it at an affordable price through effective promotion. Besides this, the other aspects of 7Ps should also be considered to make the product a success. SWOT analysis plays a crucial role in making the company aware of its strengths that can be used to eliminate the threats and opportunities to be capitalized to overcome the weaknesses. With the use of Ansoff’s matrix company can decide their way of growth and digital marketing will help in reaching a wider segment of customers and enhance the overall productivity.

References
Chaffey, D., 2019. Digital marketing. Pearson UK.

Gürel, E. and Tat, M., 2017. SWOT analysis: a theoretical review. Journal of International Social Research, 10(51).

Išorait?, M., 2016.Marketing mix theoretical aspects. International journal of research granthaalayah, 4(6), pp.25-37.

Kannan, P.K., 2017. Digital marketing: A framework, review and research agenda. International Journal of Research in Marketing, 34(1), pp.22-45.

Tsatsoula, E., 2018. Application of Ansoff's Matrix-Methodology: Marketing Growth Strategies For Products.

Wu, Y.L. and Li, E.Y., 2018. Marketing mix, customer value, and customer loyalty in social commerce. Internet Research.