Part 1
Wal-Mart aids individuals all through the globe save money and spend a better life anywhere and anytime within retail outlets, online and via their phones (Wal-Mart, 2014). Each week, over 245 million consumers as well as members come to around 11,000 outlets under 71 different banners within 27 different nations as well as e-commerce sites within 10 nations (Wal-Mart, 2014). At present, Wal-Mart offers employment prospects to around 2.2 million people all across the globe. Ever since the time when foremost Wal-Mart outlet was opened during the year 1962 within Rogers, the company has been highly dedicated towards enhancing the lives of its consumers (Wal-Mart, 2014). The business of Wal-Mart is basically the outcome of visionary leadership of Sam Walton together with generations of officials concentrated on assisting consumers as well as societies to save money as well as live a better life. Further, it is quite clear from the below table that the company has shown increase in sales and profit levels since the period of last 5 years.
Part 2
The consumers’ expectations are mainly concerned with the high quality of the products, reasonable pricing of the products, the high accessibility to those products, and the customer services received. The real difference among retail products is relatively insignificant, and the consumers have access to many similar products from different manufacturers, and retailers. New communication facilities have made it even easier for customer to source the products they want, at a price they want. This means that, the amount of sales achievable would be very sensitive to any price changes. These factors accompanied by higher awareness and expectations from customers, increases the bargaining power of the buyers to a very high level (Grant , 2013).
Part 3
Being a part of the marketing department, I would make sure that tasks are performed in a well-timed manner and customers’ needs and wants are fully satisfied. At every point the customers’ would expect that they are provided with superior quality products and services that to at reasonable cost. The customers also desire proper accessibility of the offered products, and services. As a result, the main task is to retain and attract new customers by way of effective strategies and approaches.
Part 4
4P’s Marketing Mix
The conception of 4Ps marketing mix is time and again described as a well-liked marketing strategy that aids in getting hold of the seller needs by means of aiming the preferred product within the most suitable sector of the marketplace (Doyle, 2006). Moreover, it takes in 4Ps namely; Product, Price, Place (allocation) as well as Promotion. Wal-Mart is at present acknowledged as one of the highly renowned retail stores operating in the United Kingdom and the sections below will now specify the marketing mix for Wal-Mart with respect to 4P’s Marketing mix.
- Product
The foremost ‘P’ of the marketing mix is Product. Product simply indicates towards the goods and facilities which the companies provide to their clients (Kotler and Armstrong, 2004). In case of Wal-Mart, the company facilitates its customers with wide range of products such as huge variety of groceries, non-food items (such as health, beauty etc.), entertainment, magazines and many more. The company is the most vertically incorporated food vendors within Britain, possessing abattoirs, vegetable and fruit pack stores. The company is always on the continuous verge to provide its customers with high quality and latest products.
- Price
The second aspect of marketing mix is Price which implies the money value of a specific good or facility (Kotler and Armstrong, 2004). Price performs an essential part in consumer’s purchasing decision. Moreover, Wal-Mart completely recognizes the need for setting reasonable price for its offered products and services and tries hard to offer its customers with best quality products that too at a very reasonable price and also, at a price lower than its competitors. The company lays high attention at the time of deciding the cost of a specific good or service.
- Place
The third element i.e. Place means the distribution networks made use of in order to transfer a company’s goods from the producer or facility provider till the actual users (Kotler and Armstrong, 2004). Wal-Mart makes sure that all the products offered by it are available at the suitable place during the suitable time.
- Promotion
With the intention to make customers aware regarding the huge range of goods as well as their features, the organization could bring into play several promotional means (Kotler and Armstrong, 2004). Wal-Mart uses a number of techniques for promoting its products such as bill boards, television advertisements, broachers, symbol boards, radio, newspaper as well as product dummies, placards and product displays. In addition to this, adopting methods like face-to-face selling through employing experienced Distributers could surely perk the level of organization’s sales. Furthermore, Wal-Mart also puts forward for its customers several offers such as discount on goods etc on continuous basis.
Part 5
The Key Success Factors and Key Performance Indicators are well aligned with the current and desired Positioning. The key success factors for Wal-Mart include price to quality balance, quality leadership and employee motivation. These three factors have made the discount division store sector so become successful in the present day. Although, it’s quite interesting that these success factors could effortlessly make or break the sector- but currently, they are what actually make the company flourish. Moving ahead, the key performance indicators of Wal-Mart include comparable store sales; operating income growth higher as compared to sales growth; inventory growth lower than total sales growth and lastly, return on average assets.
Part 6
Wal-Mart runs retail outlets in several different formats across the globe and is highly dedicated towards saving individuals money in order to make sure that they could enjoy a better life. The company earns customers’ trust each day through making available a wide range of quality services and products that to at everyday low cost at the same time promoting a culture which offers rewards and involves integrity, mutual respect as well as diversity (Wal-Mart, 2014). Low price every day is the pricing philosophy of Wal-mart under as per which the company price products and services at a less cost daily so that the consumers trust that the prices wouldn’t alter under recurrent promotional practice. The fiscal year of the company finishes on January 31 for all the operations in the U.S., Puerto Rico and Canada. The fiscal year for all other practices ends on December 31 (Wal-Mart, 2014). As per the statistics, the company accounted for around $405.0 billion in the year ended January 31, 2010 (Wal-Mart, 2014). The operations of Wal-Mart take in three business sectors i.e. Wal-Mart U.S., Sam’s Club and lastly, International (Wal-Mart, 2014). The U.S. segment of Wal-Mart is the biggest sector of the business, resulting in around 63.8 percent of the net sales in 2010 and runs retail outlets in diverse formats within the US and online retail operations of Wal-Mart’s i.e. Wal-Mart.com.
Through modernization, the company is building a flawless experience to enable consumers to shop anywhere and anytime online, in stores and via mobile devices. Wal-Mart is presently bringing value and opportunities for consumers and societies worldwide. The company functions more than 11,000 retail divisions under 71 different banners within 27 distinct nations along with e-commerce sites within 10 nations. The company offers employment prospects to over 2.2 million associates worldwide and 1.3 million people within the U.S. unaccompanied (Wal-Mart, 2014). Moving ahead, Wal-Mart became a global corporation during the year 1991, and operates within 26 nations outside the US. With over 6,100 outlets globally, the company leverages its worldwide resources for meeting local requirements (Wal-Mart, 2014).
Value Chain Analysis of Wal-Mart
The Value Chain analysis is basically a systematic approach to discover the activities and tasks that make the entire system of an organization work (Hamel, 2002). The Value Chain describes the categories of activities within an organization which together help create a product or a service (Porter, 1980). The Value Chain comprises of different actors and non-actors, who are dependent upon each other. The main strategy lies in maintaining an effective supply chain network to minimize delay in distribution, reduce operational costs as well as offer top class services to the customers (Grant , 2013). Similarly, the goal of Value Chain at Wal-Mart is to offer best quality products and services to customers while keeping the costs low. Further, in order to attain competitive edge, some primary and some support activities form part of the value chain at Wal-Mart. For example, primary activities include logistics, operations, marketing & sales, service etc while support activities include firm infrastructure, human resource management, technology, procurement etc. To be more precise, the important components of value chain at Wal-Mart include:
- Suppliers/Vendors
The main suppliers and vendors of Wal-Mart include different brands selling their products through Wal-Mart. The company values its relationship with its global suppliers and constantly aims to procure best quality products at best cost. The group also follows procurement and best sourcing techniques such as vendor rationalization and others.
- Partners
Wal-Mart partners with various global brands involving different product categories ranging from food items to electronics and apparels.
Part 7
The company holds strong linkage among all its departments carrying out diverse operations of the company. Wal-Mart makes sure that all internal as well as external linkages are properly aligned. The internal linkages are chiefly focused upon employee-employee relationship; employee-manager relation and lastly, employees and company relationship. The internal linkages also involve relation between different departments. The company makes sure that there exists sound relationship between the employees and top management. The external linkages involve linkage between company and its suppliers, investors and customers. The company makes sure that all its customers, suppliers and investors remain satisfied with the company.
Part 8
Currently the group is setting and perusing a hybrid strategy in terms of the price and quality. The group has tried to position itself as a provider of high quality, premium products, with reasonable pricing. In terms of geographical expansion, the focus of the group is mainly in the US, UK and Europe. Following are some areas in which the actions can be taken.
- Geographical expansion
Currently the group is mostly concentrated in Europe, UK and US. There are some other regions which can potentially become very profitable. Firstly, the group can expand its operation in Asia, where there are some fast growing markets, and emerging economies, such as China and India. In addition, there are some high potential markets in the Middle East, with high population such as some of the Arabs countries. Therefore, instead of expanding in North America or Europe, where the market is highly concentrated, the group can focus on these markets instead.
- New product development
The group has successfully entered in to the premium products by offering some successful product ranges in recent years. One area that has yet to be approached by the group is the natural products. The increasing tendency in the society towards natural products provides an opportunity for the company to develop some natural cosmetic product ranges. However, considering the growing trend it might be a very profitable area to consider. In addition, these product ranges can also be successful in Asian market as it may appeal to their cultures values.
- The role of regional capabilities in product development
Currently, the company sells products which have been procured from several different suppliers worldwide. The company can also consider the possibility of using regional capabilities in developing new products under its own brands name.
The action plan would involve three key steps including:
Step 1: Identify tasks
Step 2: Analyze and delegate tasks
Step 3: Reconfirm the allotted tasks
The acquisition of resources needed for this research would involve considerable costs. The available resources would be allotted for different tasks part of the research in a logical manner. Resources would be allotted as per the importance of task.
References:
Doyle, P., 2006, Marketing Management and Strategy (4th Ed). Phil Stern: books.
Grant , R.M., 2013, Contemporary Strategy Analysis, 8th edition, Wiley.
Hamel, G., 2002, Leading the Revolution: How to Thrive in Turbulent Times by Making Innovation a Way of Life. New York: Plume Books
Kotler, P. and Armstrong, G., 2004, Principles of Marketing (10th Ed.). New Jersey: Pearson Education Inc
Porter, M. E, 1980, Competitive strategy: techniques for analyzing industries and competitors. New York: Free Press.
Wal-Mart, 2014, Our Story [Online] http://corporate.walmart.com/our-story/our-business/, Date Accessed: 04/10/2014
