Unit 4 Marketing Principle Assignment - British SME

Program	Diploma in Business (Marketing)
Unit Number and Title	Unit 4 Marketing Principle - British SME
QFC Level	Level 5

Introduction

The study depicts various elements of marketing process that British SME’s will adopt for effective marketing for the selected market and that is influenced by micro and macro factors. The case describes that why international marketing differs from domestic market. The unit 4 marketing principle assignment British SME evaluates that SME’s can develop products to gain the competitive advantage and distributor needs to arrange by British SME’s to provide convenience to the customers. The case describe the segmentation criteria that TESCO use for products in different markets and recognize the targeting strategies use by TESCO for the selected product. The study implicates the buyer behaviour affects the marketing activities in the organization and plan for marketing mix in two different segments  TESCO plc  caters for.

Task 1

AC 1.1 Various elements of the marketing process adopted by British SME’s

The British SME’s is an organization who is planning to internationalise their operations in an increasingly complex international environment. The elements of marketing process adopted by the British SME’s for increasing its business are as follows:

• Targeting customers: British SME’s can establish its business at an international level by targeting the needs and requirements of the customers (Jobber and Ellis-Chadwick, 2012). Customer satisfaction can be achieved at international level by providing the new and different products and services at a cheaper price but in a better quality. The organization should try the best possible way to fulfil the requirements of its targeted customers.
• Branding: Branding helps an organization to promote recognition. A strong and consistent branding of will help people to feel more at ease while purchasing the products and services of British SME’s organization.  Branding helps in building a strong and separate image of British SME’s in the market. This will helps in creating and developing the confidence of customers towards the organization. British SME’s uses various medium of advertisements and promotions for establishing its brand name in the market (Kotler.at.et.al, 2015).

                          Figure 1: Features of Branding

AC1.2 Evaluate the benefits and costs of a market orientation to British SME’s

The marketing orientation is the most common orientation which is used in  contemporary issues  marketing. The British SME’s uses this approach by focusing on leaning and discovering the needs of its customers and attempting to provide for them. The market orientation adopted by the British SME’s has the following benefits and costs:

Benefits:

• Building Customer Value: Using market orientation benefits the British SME’s organization to increase the loyalty to its brand and helps in developing the new and repeat customers (Ferrell.et.al, 2010). The needs and requirements of customers are fulfilled by providing the best quality in a cheaper price.
• Responding to Demand: This approach helps in eliminating the guessing and forecasting associated with attempting to predict product trends and consumer demands. It allows modernizing the product development team and lowering up the creation costs to eliminate products for which market need and consumer demand doesn’t exist.

Costs:

• Extensive and Expensive Research: For successful and efficient implementation of market orientation in British SME’s needs to invest in an extensive market research (Jones and Rowley, 2011). The research required a huge time and hiring of private marketing firm to oversee the project well. The type of expenses is required to determine the needs of customers in the international marketplace. 
• Increasing Value Increases Cost: The increasing value of customers leads to automatic increases in the cost of production of goods and services of British SME’s. This raise in production cost leads to no longer profitable to continue with the market-orientation approach.

                           Figure 2: Features of Market Orientation

AC2.1 Influence of macro and micro factors on marketing decision of British SME’s

The marketing decisions made by the top management authorities of British SME  ‘s in order to increase its brand name in the marketplace may have significant influence due to the following micro and macro environmental factors:

Micro Factors

• The customers: The marketing decisions are very much influenced by the customers who may be the B2B or B2C, local or international customers and their reason for buying the product or services (Alon and Eugene, 2012).
• The supplier: The suppliers can control the growth of the business when they are the only one or the largest supplier of their goods. Thus, the marketing decisions of the British SME’s may also be affected or influenced by its suppliers.
• The competition: The  marketing decision making  is also influenced by those market competitors who offer the similar products and services as British SME’s. Their decision may involve the price and product differentiation, etc factors.

Macro Factors

• Technological factors: The British SME’s should consider the technical changes in the market for its promotion and advertisement of its goods and services while taking the appropriate marketing decision (Wang and Pizam, 2011).
• Economic factors: The economic factors can affect or influence the organization’s production and the consumer’s decision making process. Thus, the British SME’s should consider the economic factors while taking the marketing decision (Mallen, 2013).

                                Figure 3: Macro and Micro Factors

AC.4.3 Differentiation between international marketing activities and domestic marketing activities

The domestic marketing activities more concentrates on local marketplace while the international marketing activities concentrates on making the different products for different countries (Terpstra.et.al, 2012). The following are the differentiation between the international marketing activities and domestic marketing activities:

Table 1: Differentiation between domestic marketing and international marketing

BASIS	DOMESTIC MARKETING	INTERNATIONAL MARKETING
Meaning	Domestic marketing means conducting marketing activities within the geographical boundaries of the nation.	International marketing means the marketing activities are extended over the geographical limits of the country.
Area served	Small	Large
Use of Technology	Limited use	Use of latest technologies
Political interference	Less	Comparatively high
Nature of Customers	Almost same	Variations in customer taste and preferences.
Product mix	Consumer satisfaction and increase in sale are considered while designing the product mix strategy.	On the basis of foreign market product mix is decided (Ghauri and Cateora, 2010).
Type of market	Homogenous market	Heterogeneous market
Credit risk involved	Minimum credit risk	High credit risk
Control on marketing activities	Easy control	Difficulty in controlling because of variety in factors.
Risk involved	Normal risk	Higher risk involved (Paliwoda and Thomas, 2013)

AC.3.1 Explain how products are developed by British SME’s to sustain competitive advantages

The several factors has to be considered deeply by the British SME’s for taking the competitive advantages from the development and launching of new product in the market. The customers are now attracting towards those products which are more unique and cost effective. The British SME’s should look forward for analyzing the needs and requirements of the customers before going to develop a new product in the international market (Wheelwright, 2010). The British SME’s should consider properly the economical and social factors of the targeted markets in order to identify the needs and requirements of the consumers over there and develop those products and services which has a higher demand in the market. To have competitive advantages, British SME’s should offer good quality products with affordable prices. This would help the organization in attracting more and more customers in the market. The customers should be provided with the improved and better quality products instead of bored products wrapped up in one big bang (Wei and Chang, 2011). This would also help in keeping the competitors guessing on what else is to come as a replacement foe of building a product. 

AC.3.2 Arrangement of distribution needs by British SME’s to provide customer convenience

Every organization is needed to develop such an effective distribution strategy so that the newly developed product is reached easily to its potential customers. The customer satisfaction is only received when the loyalty of customers is achieved to the organization. British SME’s is required to have a proper consideration of the recent marketing trends which helps in distributing the awareness about the newly launched product among the consumers and facilitate them to make a purchase of such product (Fuchs and Schreier, 2011).  To know the consumption of products in a specific reason can be viewed by analyzing the various stores of British SME’s. This analyze would be helpful in pre-planning the fast delivering of products and in convenient manner. For the managing the inventory at various stores can be managed by using th0e internet facility. British SME’s can offer various discount schemes and home delivery with a reasonable price in case of online or app based sales. This would help in delivering the best services to its customers and making a timely delivery of products to them (Davies, 2012).

AC.3.3 Setting the prices for products

The pricing method adopted by the British SME’s are used in order to set the prices of their products and services along with organizational and environmental characteristics that influences this methods. The new product is launched in the market with the objective to attract more customers in the market and also to get more competitive advantages. The price of a product is the addition of its labour cost, marketing and material cost, delivering charges and the addition of desired profit. While deciding the prices of products, the demand and prevailing market competition is also considered (Nakamura and Steinsson, 2011). The pricing will be higher in case when the demand of a product is in trend in order to earn more profits.

                                      Figure 4: Pricing Factors

The British SME’s can categories its products according to the prices such that the consumers according to their capability of expenditure can purchase their required product. British SME’s should undertake the knowledge about the goodwill of the organization and market conditions in order to form a attracting offers and discounts that can be associated with the pricing to achieve the targets of an organization. In order to establish the newly developed product in the market, British SME’s should sell these products with a less profit margins but once the product becomes a trend, the pricing can be raised at a bit higher in order to maintain the product outcomes and standard (Alvarez.et.al, 2010).

AC.3.4 Promotional activities in British SME’s

The promotional activities are conducted to spread the awareness about the product in consumers in order to achieve the desired sales target and profits. The organization should make use of social media sites and digital media to promote its newly developed products. The digital promotional activities should include the discount offers and online ads for promoting the products. British SME’s should also sponsor the various events in order to capture the demands of customers (Albuquerque.et.al, 2012). The British SME’s should also facilitate it customers by providing the mobile app and web facility which helps them to choose their desired product according to the set prices and quality. The promotional activities adopted by the British SME’s should maximize the sales and profits of the organization. The promotional activities should not result in bringing a much burden on the cost of organization (Basher, 2010). The organization can use uses television, newspaper and internet to promote and advertise its products in order to establish it in the market and conquer the marketplace successfully.

                                     Figure 5: Promotion methods

AC.3.5 Three additional marketing mix for British SME’s for marketing the services

The marketing mix is the set of actions used to promote the brand and product of an organization in the market. The service marketing mix is also known as an extended marketing mix. The service marketing mix consists of 7 P’s as compared to the 4P’s of a product mix which includes Product, Pricing, Promotions and Place (Lovelock, 2011). The British SME’s require considering the following additional 3 P’s for attaining the desired service marketing objectives:

1. People: People are the one of the element of service  marketing mix . People define a service. In service marketing, people can make or break an organization. Thus, British SME’s should involve into getting their employees trained in interpersonal skills and customer service in order to achieve customer satisfaction. This will help in leaving the good impression on customers.
2. Process: The service process the way in which the services are delivered to its potential or end user. British SME’s should adopt the effective and flexible process for providing satisfactory and better delivery of its product to the end users in order to enhance the customer relations with the organization (Yelkur, 2000).
3. Physical evidence: The last element in the service marketing is the physical evidence. To create a better customer experience tangible elements should also be delivered with the service. The physical evidence is used as a differentiator in service marketing. Thus, British SME’s should make some changes in its brochures, banners and its interior designs. The attractive graphics and glasses should be used in the outdoor to attract the customers.

                                Figure 6: 7P's of Service Marketing Mix

Task 2 

2.2 Segmentation criteria Tesco use for the products in different markets

Tesco is the multinational organization that operates business in different parts of the world. The management segmented the customers according the demographic factors by which organization can easily the target the customers. The main aim the business is to provide the product according to the need of the customers. Following demographic factors assist the organization to target the customers:

• Age: The organization target the young or school students for the sale of the technological products like mobile phones, play stations, video games, electronic gadgets etc. The management will target the age group of 10-30 this kind of youngsters have the craze of buying the electronic items and provide the attractive offers to increase the sale of products (Wedel and Kamakura, 2012).
• Income: Management will segment the customers according to their income level like lower income group, medium level group and high income group. With this segmentation business will evaluate the potential of the customers and arrange the products according to the need of the customer (Theysohn.et.al.2013). As per the case management is facing the crises through segmentation organization can increase the sales of the products and earn more revenue.

2.3 Targeting strategy for the electronic items in Tesco

The strategy that assists the management to identify the targeted customers and identify the ways to reach them is known as targeting strategy. Through this strategy customers can segment the customers and sale the product to them. For this sort of matter organization adopts various strategies. To overcome the problems mentioned in the given case the management will use the concentrate targeting strategy for identify the division like age groups and high income groups (Grant, 2016). The strategy of targeting will assist the organization to conduct the research to recognize the needs and wants of the customers in all the concerned market. The management will target the youngsters to buy the electronic gadgets and provide the products according to their needs. For instance management will provide the desired information to the customers and identify the potential customers and easily target them. The strategy is related with the serving segment and the individual product in order to serve better services (Slack, 2015). Tesco is the renowned brand of UK so concentrate targeting technique will help the organization to target more customers.

2.4 Buyer behaviour affects marketing activities of Tesco in various buying situations

Perception or response of the buyer plays vital role in the marketing activities by which management has to plan the activities according to behaviour of the buyer. To increase the sales organization designs the strategy to identify the behaviour of the buyer and encourage the target customer groups. While purchasing the electronic items customer’s behaviour is influenced by market trends and offers (Solomon, 2014). This kind of buyer behaviour affects the whole activities of the Tesco. For instance, to change the behaviour of the focused customer groups Tesco provides discounts and offers to the customers in order to change the mind of the customers and increase the sale of the organization. As per the case organization is facing the problem of low sales to overcome this problem management will adopt various attractive policies like buy one get one free, weekend off etc this all techniques help the organization to change the perception of the customer and motivate the customer to buy the product (Vivek.et.al.2012). Change in the economic conditions of the customers also affects the buying behaviour of the customers.

2.5 Positioning of the electronic products

Positioning strategy adopts by the organization to increase the brand value of the organization and to compete with the brand to capture the more market. Other than that positioning assist the management to boast the image of organization by delivering the benefits of the electronic products. Organization adopts the online selling portal of the business in which management sell the products through application and provide various offers to the customers. This facility attracts more customers towards the organization and it will create good brand image of the organization (Derry and Oddsen, 2013). Business floats various offers on the different occasion for example business launch new product in the store and want to promote the new product then management chose the festival on which management launch new product and provide discount to the first thousand customers. Brand positioning helps the organization to set the positive image in minds of the customers and to increase the sale of the store. As per the case business is facing the problem of low sales due to last two years so overcome this problem positioning helps the organization to create the good brand image and increase the sales (Royston and Cox, 2015).

4.1 Marketing mix for two different segments in Tesco

Marketing mix helps the organization to identify the recent position of the business in the market. Following are the points that depict the marketing mix for electronic products for two different segments:

• Products: The management will classify the products according to the income of the customer like management will add the additional features in the products by which customers will feel satisfied and visit the store again. This all features increase the sale of the product and depict the effectiveness of the store. The business will develop the product for different age group by which customer of the entire age group buy the products.
• Price: Price of the all the product must be kept economical and according to the quality of the product (Huang and Sarigöllü, 2014). For high income group the prices must be high because they chose the high quality and price product according to their status. For medium income group the price must be economical.
• Place: For selling the products management provide focus to own stores by which the management gains the trust of the customers. For business expansion business will open more stores for the suitability of the customers.
• Promotion: All kind kinds of advertisement have been covered under the promotion mix. This helps the organization to promote the product in the market and try to increase the sale of the electronic products of Tesco (Bahadir.et.al.2015). Advertisement has been done through TV, pamphlets, online website etc. As per the case organization needs promotion strategy to increase the sale of the product.

                                         Figure 7 Marketing Mix

4.2 Differences in marketing products and services to Tesco in contrast to consumers

Following are the ways in which marketing of products and services differentiate of B2B and B2C:

Marketing of the products and services in B2B

• B2B organizations are more concentrate on the facility and efficiency.
• Organizations need highly expertise and detailed material of the products and services for the B2B (Kotler.et.al.2015).
• Long chain of command is followed by the B2B marketers.

Marketing of products and services in B2C

• The customers in B2C are more focused on projects and entertainment. In this consumers are emotionally convinced like desire, safety, status etc.
• Under B2C customers needs to fulfil the needs after the payment.
• In this customers make the payment very fast there is no chance of loss or theft (Shani and Chalasani, 2013).

                                           Figure 8: B2B and B2C Marketing

Conclusion

From the above study it can be identified that marketing principles plays the vital role in the growth of the organization. The marketing planning will not be possible without marketing principles. The report allots the information about the elements of marketing and evaluates the concept of marketing for Tesco. Moreover, report depicts the strategies of marketing, segmentation and positioning of the electronic products in the organization and explains the distribution method. At last report explains the marketing mix of two different segments and analyzes the difference between domestic marketing and  international marketing process.