UNIT 2 Marketing Essentials Assignment _ Pearson BTEC Level 5 (GC0304)
Table of Contents
Introduction.
P1: Explain the key roles and responsibilities of the marketing functions for Apple.
P2: Relationship of the roles and responsibilities of marketing with the wider organizational context of Apple
P3 Compare the ways in which different organizations apply the marketing mix to the marketing planning process to achieve business objectives.
P4 Produce and evaluate a basic marketing plan for an organization.
Conclusion.
References.
Introduction
Apple Inc. is an American technology organization was founded by Steve Jobs. Apple is recognized for its product innovativeness to achieve a competitive advantage since 1977. This was known as Apple Computers Inc. and they have started to sell consumer electronics and online services. After that, Computers have been removed from their brand name. With 132,000 skilled and experienced employees, Apple made $59.531 billion net income in 2017 (Annual Reports, 2017). Apple offers a number of brands to its customers including iPod, iPad, iPhone and Mac Computers.
In addition, this organization has been successful on the software side also and offers Mac OS X operating system and media software such as iTunes, iWork, iOS, and life. (Apple Annual reports, 2017). This assignment is categorized into four main parts. The first task explains the roles and responsibilities of the marketing functions of Apple. The second task describes the relation of roles and responsibilities of the marketing functions of Apple. The third task compares the approaches in that different organizations use the marketing mix to plan the marketing process to gain business objectives. Finally, the last task evaluates a basic marketing plan for a business organization.
P1: Explain the key roles and responsibility of the marketing functions for Apple
Firstly, marketing functions must be defined to demonstrate the roles and responsibilities of marketing. According to Gardner (2015), marketing functions mean a combination of marketing research, product development process, customer service, product promotion, sales and advertisement. In the telecommunication sector of the UK, Apple Inc. is an established technology organization. This company is serving the customer by offering several products and services with benefits.
The role of the marketing function for Apple:
Diagram: Seven marketing functions Source: Gardner (2015)
Promoting and brand image is the first marketing function role in Apple. Apple’s marketing department support this company to promote its brand image to their customers. In addition, the front-line workers are recruited to maintain the brand image of Apple by serving quality services to the customers. Moreover, the marketing department of Apple makes several promotional tools for promoting products to their customers and manages these promotional tools effectively. As a result, this company uses television advertisement, social media advertisement and other advertisement that is working effectively. For example, Apple reveals its innovative brand positioning starting with a major TV ad campaign in 2017 (Apple Annual Report, 2017).
Apple’s marketing department’s manager is doing many tasks to create adequate content for the SEO (search engine optimization) facility for the customer availability of its financial services online. Apple’s manager uses the internet to achieve this facility that means customers will catch Apple’s website first to search for anything for any products of this company. In addition, this company can maintain its social media sites for marketing functions. This will support the company to get positive or negative feedback from its customer and identifies new concepts about better customer service.
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The responsibility of the marketing functions of Apple:
Apple’s marketing function responsibility is a combination of several things. Firstly, Apple’s marketing strategy is usually taken by the senior management of this company with the help of junior managers (Hill and O’Sullivan, 2016). The junior managers and the front-line workers of Apple are involved directly with customers. Thus, they are capable to define the proper market condition of Apple Inc. In addition, Apple performed a number of marketing strategies including market penetration, marketing distribution, etc to conduct its marketing strategy. For example, Apple’s marketing strategy discloses that Apple is doing its business in the UK and US marketplaces for global reach. This company is streamlining its main business by maintaining the Non-Core task and ensuring the remaining inheritance with the development of its control surroundings.
Marketing research of Apple supports this company to identify the behavior of its customer, new opportunities for this company and the competitive position of this company. Apple’s marketing research is conducted by two main sections including primary research and other is secondary research (Keegan, Moriarty and Duncan, 2015). Apple conducts marketing research with help of the interviews of customers, notice the market position, manage industry report, evaluating social media services, etc. For example, Apple recently improves its young customers’ accounts in the UK through market research. Furthermore, Apple’s marketing department has concentrated on the development of new products and on the existing product. Thus, the marketing research of Apple supports this company effectively. On the other hand, a team of market research can demonstrate the changing demands of Apple by creating an interface with its customers. Additionally, the team of marketing research must notify the distinctive features for the product development department of Apple regarding introduce new products in the market.
The other responsibility of Apple’s marketing department is to communicate different messages with its customers. Communicating with the customers supports Apple to promote its products and services and also helps them to get feedback from its customers. It also helps the customers about existing products of this company (Comfort and Brieger, 2016). The marketing manager of Apple can conduct advertisement campaigns, digital marketing content and promotional content to establish its website for this company. Release of paper, catalog of products, newspaper, and advertisements can be also applied to maintain better communication with its customers. For example, interactions of Apple are planned in the UK to support the customers by content like ‘Take One Small Step to manage their money better every day’.
The front-line staffs act as Apple’s salesperson. These staffs are significant for financial service providers such as Apple. The location and number of Apple branches support this company to maximize its organizational service area. The coordination of the marketing department with the sales department supports this company to increase its sales of products as well as create maximum profit (Marketing Dawn, 2017). A number of events such as seminars, campaigns, conferences, exhibitions, free customer consultants, fairs, etc. can be conducted by this marketing team of Apple. Apple Inc. can distribute several promotional content such as banners, leaflets, catalog, product presentation, and handout in those events. Currently, the sponsorship concept becomes a very significant technique for the marketing department. Apple gets promotional activities for its services by associating in several big external events. For example, Apple promotes its previous National Indoor Arena……………