Discuss about the Marketing Management for Contemporary Business Environment.
Marketing becomes a key function in the contemporary business environment as it allows firms to create good relations with the customers and to develop competitive advantage. Marketing functions provides a systematic framework to the firms for introducing and promoting their product or services. It plays critical role in establishing communication between customers and firms that increase market presence and consequently sales (Kumar et al., 2011). In this report, the importance of marketing process in creating competitive advantage for the real world organizations will be analyzed. The way organizations have used marketing function to gain competitive advantage will also be discussed in this report. Targeting, segmentation, market intelligence, marketing mix some core concepts of marketing are also applied to analyze the marketing strategies of firm. Burberry, UK based global luxury brand and Coca-Cola, US based global beverage firm are selected as case organizations. This report will analyze marketing strategies of these companies.
Coca-Cola is one of the valuable brands in the world. Segmentation includes in marketing process of Coca-Cola. This firm segments market mainly on the basis of demographical variables including age, family and income. For example: In advertisements, it mainly addressees young customer base. Similarly, it also offers product in different flavors and packaging to make it fit for the consumers with different affordability level. Segmentation helps Coca-Cola to differentiate its offerings from the competitors and to attract large consumer base, which provides competitive advantage. Through segmentation, it satisfies needs of different niche markets (Anders, 2011). Target market of Coca-Cola is quite wide that allows it to capture significant beverage market and to achieve competitive advantage. Benefits and uses are communicated by Coca-Cola to position among customers’ thoughts. For example: bold taste and zero calories are used to position Coca-Cola Zero to communicate with the dieters (McDaniel et al., 2016). Marketing mix includes in the marketing process that allows this firm to combine price, place, product and promotion elements effectively for satisfying and communicating needs of target market and to develop unique image (Lee and Carter, 2012).
Burberry becomes a recognizable brand in the global fashion industry due to its innovative marketing practices. Segmentation, targeting, positioning and marketing mix are the major elements of marketing process at Burberry (Donnellan, 2013). Demographic and behavioral segmentation is used by this firm to target stylish and wealthy young men and women, who have sense of fashion. By determining and analyzing needs of target market, it develops a marketing mix to communicate with customers (Lorange and Rembiszewski, 2016). Marketing mix of this firm develop a unique image and to position it as iconic and innovative brand in global fashion industry. For example: digital media is used by Burberry in innovative manner that creates image of digital fashion brand. This allows firms to differentiae offering from the competitors, which provides source of competitive advantage (Phan et al., 2011). It combines traditional British fashion with the digital network that helps to become highly admired brand.
Coca-Cola is the market leader in the global non-alcoholic beverage industry by capturing approximately 42% market share (NASDAQ, 2014). It makes this firm world’s largest non-alcoholic beverage company. It is operating from over 125 years. The marketing practices and strategies of this firm allow it to make effective presence in more than 200 countries (Coca-Cola, 2016). This firm has won several awards for marketing and advertising campaigns worldwide. “Share a Coke”, “Open happiness” and “Can Change the world” are some successful market campaign of Coca-Cola (Hepburn, 2016). The value of Coca-Cola brand is $73,102m and it becomes world’s third valuable global brand (Interbrand, 2016). Due to successful marketing, Pepsi holds second position in the market, despite of calming better product from Coca-Cola (Lee et al., 2015). The sales of this firm are also consistent in last five years. It depicts success of marketing practices in terms of increasing and maintaining consumer base. This firm offers more than 500 brands worldwide through the world’s largest distribution network. It develops an effective market presence (The Coca-Cola Company, 2016). It delivers consistent marketing massage to the customers by focusing on values of sharing happiness, joy and positivity. This creates unique image and reputation that develops strong relationship with the customers (Lee et al., 2015). Due to marketing practices, it successfully attracts and maintains large consumer base in global beverage industry.
The Burberry brand is valued at $5,873m in 2015. In this year, the brand value of this firm grew by 5% (Interbrand, 2016). The marketing practices of this firm create an image of innovative fashion brand with unique design and craftsmanship. It has used social media and other tools of digital marketing to connect with the target customers. This firm mainly targets young males and females and due to this it uses social media to maintain relations with the customers. The sales of this firm in 2015 grew by 9% that indicates success of marketing practices in terms of maintaining and enhancing consumer base (Annual Report, 2016). This brand has strong presence in social media. For example: it has around more than 3m twitter followers, which is quite high from the number of Coca-Cola followers (Roland, 2014). It has 40m followers in social media and this marketing practice provides competitive advantages to this firm in terms of increasing awareness and engagement of customers (Milnes, 2016). This firm maintains consistency in marketing communication through logos, signature product heritage and craftsmanship. This helps to develop relationship and increase customer loyalty, which provides competitive advantage (Clark, 2014).
Coca-Cola has executed an effective market strategy by exploiting different customer segments overtime. Initially, it offers one beverage for the entire soft drink consumers. Through market segmentation strategy, it has determined diverse consumer preferences and offered more than a dozen products. This has played critical role in developing products as per the changing needs of the different market segments. Currently, it addresses different customers’ needs for flavors, calorie and caffeine. The market segmentation strategy has helped this firm to understand changing customers’ needs and to make informed changes in offerings (Lamb, 2012). By offerings wide product range, it has developed and maintained dominate position in the global soft drink industry. Similarly, segmentation strategy of this firm has helped to consider geographical differences of customers and to invent products as per their needs that vary on the basis of culture, climate and income. For example: package size and level of sweetness in Coca-Cola product range varies in accordance to the local taste (Sun, 2009). Market segmentation strategy is executed by Coca-Cola effectively to determine the needs and preference of customers for the soft drinks and to develop product offerings accordingly (Lamb et al., 2011). By applying Ansoff matrix successfully, it has executed market strategy successfully. It has employed market penetration, product development, market development strategy and diversification strategies. By offering soft drinks in different flavors, it has penetrated US market and expanded in the different markets of the world (Hill and Jones, 2011). It has also used diversification strategy by offering health drinks to the customers.
The marketing function of Burberry provides competitive advantage in terms of creating unique image that develops strong relationship between target customers and offerings. Burberry has executed market strategy by applying porter’s generic strategy successfully. This model indicates three strategies to outperform in an industry such as cost leadership, differentiation and focus. The market strategy of the firm has successfully applied focus differentiation strategy by using digital media in highly innovative manner (Henry, 2011). In this strategy, it employs target market strategy by selecting a niche segment of millennial that forms 60 percent of world population. It has offered stylish collections as per the needs and preference of millennial, while developing heritage of firm. In order to reach and engage customers, social media strategy has executed by Burberry in an effective manner. It determined tech-savvy attitudes of the target market and thus extensively used social media. Through social media, it has established effective communication between target market and offerings. It became the first firm in the fashion industry to use social media for communicating with the customers (Pride et al., 2014). This has helped Burberry to create value as digitalized fashion brand and to create distinct image.
Conclusion
It can be concluded from the above discussion that Coca-Cola and Burberry has created competitive advantage by creating unique image among the customers. Marketing strategies and processes of these firms have helped them to communicate with the customers effectively and to engage them. Market segmentation and Ansoff matrix have effectively applied by Coco-Cola to understand needs and preferences of customer and to tailor offerings accordingly. Burberry has employed focus differentiation strategy successfully to target needs of niche segment of the luxury fashion market. Through this, it has created an image as most digitalized brand and attracted target customers. The marketing activities of these firms have helped to differentiate their offerings from the competitors, which caused the development of competitive advantage.
References
Anders, J. (2011) Coca-Cola’s Marketing Strategy: An Analysis of Price, Product and Communication. Germany: GRIN.
Annual Report (2016) Burberry. [Online]. Available at: https://www.burberryplc.com/documents/ar-15-16/burberry_annual_report_2015-16.pdf (Accessed: 1st December, 2016).
Clark, J. (2014) Fashion Merchandising: Principles and Practice. USA: Palgrave Macmillan.
Donnellan, J. (2013) Merchandise buying and management. A&C Black.
Hepburn, M. (2016) The Share a Coke story. [Online]. Available at: https://www.coca-cola.co.uk/stories/share-a-coke (Accessed: 1st December, 2016).
Hill, C.W. and Jones, G.R. (2011) Essentials of strategic management. USA: Cengage Learning.
Interbrand (2016) Coca-Cola. [Online]. Available at: https://interbrand.com/best-brands/best-global-brands/2016/ranking/cocacola/ (Accessed: 1st December, 2016).
Interbrand (2016) Ranking. [Online]. Available at: https://interbrand.com/best-brands/best-global-brands/2015/ranking/ (Accessed: 1st December, 2016).
Kumar, V., Jones, E., Venkatesan, R. and Leone, R.P. (2011) Is market orientation a source of sustainable competitive advantage or simply the cost of competing?. Journal of marketing, 75(1), pp.16-30.
Lamb, C.W. (2012) Marketing. USA: Cengage Learning.
Lamb, C.W., Hair, J.F. and McDaniel, C. (2011) Essentials of marketing. Cengage Learning.
Lee, A., Yao, J., Mizerski, R. and Lambert, C. (2015) The strategy of global branding and brand equity. UK: Routledge.
Lee, K. and Carter, S. (2012) Global marketing management. UK: Oxford University Press.
Lorange, P. and Rembiszewski, J. (2016) From Great to Gone: Why FMCG Companies are Losing the Race for Customers. UK: Routledge.
McDaniel, C., Lamb, C.W. and Hair, J.F. (2016) Marketing essentials. Australia: South-Western.
Milnes, H. (2016) Burberry wants to monetize its 40 million social followers. [Online]. Available at: https://digiday.com/brands/burberry-wants-monetize-40m-social-followers/ (Accessed: 1st December, 2016).
Morning Star (2016) Coca-Cola Co KO. [Online]. Available at: https://financials.morningstar.com/income-statement/is.html?t=KO (Accessed: 1st December, 2016).
NASDAQ (2016) Coke Vs. Pepsi: By The Numbers. [Online]. Available at: https://www.nasdaq.com/article/coke-vs-pepsi-by-the-numbers-cm337909 (Accessed: 1st December, 2016).
Phan, M., Thomas, R. and Heine, K. (2011) Social media and luxury brand management: The case of Burberry. Journal of Global Fashion Marketing, 2(4), pp.213-222.
Pride, W.M., Hughes, R.J. and Kapoor, J.R. (2014) Foundations of business. Cengage Learning.
Roland, D. (2014) Burberry has more Twitter followers than Coca-Cola. [Online]. Available at: https://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/newsbysector/retailandconsumer/11112035/Burberry-has-more-Twitter-followers-than-Coca-Cola.html (Accessed: 1st December, 2016).
Sun, S. (2009) An analysis on the conditions and methods of market segmentation. International journal of business and management, 4(2), p.63.
The Coca-Cola Company (2016) The Coca-Cola Company to Present at Consumer Analyst Group of New York Conference. [Online]. Available at: https://www.coca-colacompany.com/press-center/press-releases/the-coca-cola-company-to-present-at-consumer-analyst-group-of-new-york-conference-2016 (Accessed: 1st December, 2016).
The Coca-Cola Company (2016)Who We Are. [Online]. Available at: https://www.coca-colacompany.com/press-center/press-releases/the-coca-cola-company-to-present-at-consumer-analyst-group-of-new-york-conference-2016 (Accessed: 1st December, 2016).
The Coca-Cola Compnay Henry, A. (2011) Understanding Strategic Management. USA: OUP Oxford.
Essay Writing Service Features
Our Experience
No matter how complex your assignment is, we can find the right professional for your specific task. Contact Essay is an essay writing company that hires only the smartest minds to help you with your projects. Our expertise allows us to provide students with high-quality academic writing, editing & proofreading services.
Free Features
Free revision policy
$10Free bibliography & reference
$8Free title page
$8Free formatting
$8How Our Essay Writing Service Works
First, you will need to complete an order form. It's not difficult but, in case there is anything you find not to be clear, you may always call us so that we can guide you through it. On the order form, you will need to include some basic information concerning your order: subject, topic, number of pages, etc. We also encourage our clients to upload any relevant information or sources that will help.
Complete the order form
Once we have all the information and instructions that we need, we select the most suitable writer for your assignment. While everything seems to be clear, the writer, who has complete knowledge of the subject, may need clarification from you. It is at that point that you would receive a call or email from us.
Writer’s assignment
As soon as the writer has finished, it will be delivered both to the website and to your email address so that you will not miss it. If your deadline is close at hand, we will place a call to you to make sure that you receive the paper on time.
Completing the order and download