Top Marketing Planning

Task 1

1.1: Important theories and the changing perspectives of the marketing planning activity and evaluate the ability of British Airways to plan the future marketing activity

Theories used in the marketing planning activity

Marketing planning activity is totally a customer-oriented activity. The organisations have to collect some information about the customers of the industry to prepare an effective marketing plan. The major information about the customers should be collected by the organisations are as follows: The test, preferences and demand of the customers, geography and demography structure of the economy, purchasing power of the customers etc. Based on such information the organisations have to use some theories to prepare an efficient and effective marketing plan. The theories are as follows:

Marketing mix: The theory of marketing mix used in the marketing plan is totally based on the test, preference and psychology of the customers. The marketing mix is basically a mix of four P’s these are pricing, people, place and product. The organisations have to do well research about the test, preferences and requirements of the customers. As opined by Toledo et al. (2014, p.50), the product and services should be designed by the organisations according to the requirements of the customers. The ability of meeting the requirements of the customers create a value of the products and services in the market. The organisations have to collect some information about the geographical features of the market to select a suitable market place for the products. The products should have the ability to meet the geographical requirements of the customers. The price of the products should be set by the organisations according to the purchasing power of the customers. The organisations have to prepare the promotional strategies to launch the product and services in the market according to the cultural preferences of the customers.

Product life cycle: The organisations have to prepare the marketing plan according to the phase of life cycle of a particular products and services. Basically there are four phases included in the product life cycle. The first one is Introduction, in the introduction phase the organisations try to build a market for the products by promoting the product and providing important information about the product to the customers. In growth phase of the product organisations tries to increase the supply of the products in the market and including some new features in the product to improve the quality. In the maturity phase, the organisations try to create some differentiation with the similar products in the industry to survive in the competitive market. The organisations use different promotional strategies to build the differentiation. The price of the products should be lower to make an opportunity to build new customers of the product. In the decline phase of the product life cycle the organisations lose the demand for the products among the customers. In this situation the organisations try to shut down the production of the products.

Alignment: The organisations must build an alignment among the benefits of the product with the requirements of the product to customers. The organisations also try to build a communication with the customers to provide important information to the customers and get the feedback from the customers about the products and services. The company also try to know about the new requirements of the customers and request them to provide some idea and opinion to improve the quality of the products (French, 2017, p.27).

Changes in the perspective of the marketing planning

According to the traditional marketing planning activities the organisations only pay their attentions to product, price, place, people and promotions to prepare the marketing plan for the new products. However, Due to the changes in the perspectives of the marketing planning the organisations include some new factors in the preparation of the marketing planning activities. The factors are as follows;

Features of the products: The organisations have to consider the features of the products to prepare the marketing plan for the product. The features should be prepared according to the requirements of the customers.

Innovativeness: The organisations have to include some creative features in the products to increase the innovativeness of the product.

Build a brand: The organisations also try to build a brand for the products in the market by using some unique promotional strategies.

Global network: The organisations also try to build a global network to prepare a global market for the products by promoting the products globally.

Strength and Weaknesses: The organizations also consider the strength and weakness of the products to survive in the industry for a long time. The organisations try to use their strength as much as possible and resolve the weakness the products by creating some effective solutions.

High prices: The organisations have to collect important information about the purchasing power of the targeting customers. The company can build some differentiation in the market to justify the high prices of the products. The company also try to build some competitive advantages to reduce the production cost for setting a low price for the products.

Potentiality of the market: The organisations also try to know the potentiality of the market and the customers. The organisation can build a broad segment of the products and services according to the future potentiality of the market.

Competitors: Organisations can try to know some important information about the competitors. According to Goretzki et al. (2013, p.50), organisation should be aware about the marketing and production strategies used by the competitors to increase the market share.

Availability of the products: Organisations also manage the distributors and the supply channels of the products in an efficient manner to ensure the availability of the products in the market.

Quality of the products: Organisations try to include new features in the products continuously to increase the ability of meeting requirements of the customers and improve the quality of the products. Organisations have to increase the quality of the products to build loyalty among the customers towards the product.

Evaluation of the ability of British airways to plan the future marketing activity

As the British Airways is an old player in the airlines industry therefore, the organisation have a greater knowledge about the demand and requirements of the customers. The Company also has a strong base of loyal customers in the industry. For this reason, the airlines company know about the expectations of the customers towards the services provided by the Company. The Company also have some qualified employees in the marketing management department for preparing the marketing plan. The marketing manager use the marketing mix, life cycle, alignment theories in an efficient manner to produce an effective marketing plan (Shank and Lyberger, 2014, p.36). The managers also use the different factors such as Features of the products, Innovativeness, Build a brand, Global network, Strength and Weaknesses to design the services provided by the British airways to the customers. The good quality of the services also increases the loyalty among the customers towards the British Airways.

1.2: Techniques used in the organisational auditing and external factors that affect the marketing planning activity

Evaluation of the organisational auditing and external factors that influence the marketing planning activity of the British Airways

Techniques of the organisational auditing

Organisations use the organisational auditing process to know some information about the activities done by the organisations. As stated by Shaw (2016, p.27), the auditing sources provide different information about the activity such as strength and weakness of the activity, the problem faced by the employees to complete the activities, new process can be applied by the organisation to do the business activity. These information help the organizations to improve the efficiency of the activities by creating the solutions of the problems faced by the employees to complete the activities and use the strength of the activities to resolve the weaknesses. The organisations use different techniques for the organisational auditing. The activities are as follows:

• SWOT analysis
• Market research
• PEST analysis
• Competitive analysis
• Internal marketing environment analysis
• External marketing environment analysis

External factors that influence the marketing planning activity

There are different environmental factors that influence the marketing planning activities of the organisations. The external factors are as follows;

Political: Organisations have to consider some legislations produce by the government while preparing the marketing plan. This kinds of legislation provide some restrictions to the organisations in the preparation of the marketing plan.

Economical: The organisation has to consider the employment rate, purchasing power and per capita income of the targeting customers while preparing the marketing plan for the products (Kaynak and Kucukemiroglu, 2015, p.177).

Social: The structure of the society and the culture of the customers also influence the marketing plan of the organisation.

Technological: The development of the new technologies also influences the marketing plan of the organisations.

Techniques use in the British Airways for organisational auditing

British Airways use the following techniques for the organisational auditing:

Inquiry: British airways use some communication process to know the problems faced by the employees to complete the operations and the organizations try to create some solution to solve the problems.

Examination: The Company also take the exam of the employees to know the skills and knowledge that require for completing the job in an efficient manner.

Observation: The Company also observe the process followed by the employees to complete the job. The company also can prepare the organisational charts and flowcharts to provide an appropriate process to the employees to complete the job (Mahzan and Lymer, 2014, p.330).

SWOT analysis: The Company also acquire some knowledge about the strength and weakness of the Company. The company try to increase the strength of them to reduce the weakness. The company analyze the future potentiality of different regional market to improve to know about opportunity of the Company in the market. The company analyze the future threats of the organisations from the new competitors or the new decision of the government that change the scenario of the market.

Competitive analysis: British Airways always analysis the competitors in the market to get different information such as market share achieved by the competitors, the competitive advantages acquired by the competitors and the marketing strategies followed by them to increase the market share. This information help the company to create an effective marketing plan.

Market research: The market research technique help the company to acquire different information about the customers such as test, preferences, habits, requirements, purchasing power etc (Jayawardhena et al. 2016, p.779). These information help the company to design the products and services with effective features.

Internal and marketing environment analysis: Internal marketing environment analysis help the company to acquire the information about the resources and budgets of the company to prepare a marketing plan. The marketing managers of the British Airlines Company also forecast the performance of the marketing plan by analysis the internal marketing environment. The external marketing environment analysis help the company to acquire important information about the economy such as such as employment rate, per capita income, requirement of the customer, purchasing power, cultural structure of the customers etc.

External factors that influence the marketing planning activity of the BA

There are different external factors that influence the marketing plan of the British Airways. The incident of BREXIT had a great impact on the marketing plan of the British Airways. Some other external factors influence the marketing plan of the British Airways. The external factors are as follows:
Political: There are different resolutions and legislations has to consider by the BA to prepare the marketing plan such as Consumer protection from unfair trading regulations and the business protection from the misleading marketing regulations 2008. These regulations and legislations provide some restrictions the Company to prepare the marketing plan without any illegal, misleading and untruthful content.

Economical: During the economic recession in 2009 and the incident of Brexit in the 2016 had a great impact on the on the British Airlines Company. The Company had to prepare a new marketing plan to increase the demand of the airlines services.

Social: The changes in the society are the only one consistent factor of the society. Therefore, the dynamism of the society influences the company to change the marketing plan with the changes in the society.

Technological: The continuous development in the technology is influencing the Company to use the new technologies and marketing strategies in the marketing plan to increase the demand of the customers.

Task 2

2.1: Barriers of marketing planning activity and the process followed by the BA to overcome those barriers

There are different kinds of barriers faced by the organisation to prepare the marketing plan. However, British Airlines face the following barriers mostly:

As opined by Grünig and Kühn (2015, p.80), a confusion can be rise between the tactics and strategies followed by the organisation to prepare the marketing plan. The Company has to clear the confusion between the tactics and strategies to prepare an efficient marketing plan.

The isolation of the marketing functions from the marketing plan always create a barrier for the company. The company has to consider the different marketing functions to prepare the marketing plan.

The confusion between the marketing function and marketing concept also create some barriers for the British Airlines Company. The company has to provide an appropriate description of the marketing functions and marketing concept to clear the confusion.

• The different views and perspectives towards the marketing plan of the different persons associate with the company can create some barriers in the organisation. The company has to consider the views and perspectives of the associate person to omit the organisational barriers from the marketing plan activities (Carrington et al. 2014, p.2760).
• The weak analysis of the company also creates some barriers in the marketing plan. The weak analysis of different factors of the marketing plan reduces the effectiveness of the marketing plan. The company has to increase the depth of analysis to reduce the barriers from the marketing plan.
• Lack of knowledge and skill also create some barriers in the marketing plan. The Company has to recruit some qualified marketing managers marketing department to reduce the barriers of knowledge and skills.
• The confusion between the process of the marketing plan and the outcomes of the marketing plan also create some barriers in marketing plan. The company has to clear the confusion between the process and outcome to reduce the barriers.
• The failure of the objectives of the marketing plan also create barrier for the company. Therefore, the company has to prepare a proper plan to reduce the barriers of the marketing plan.