Scenario You have applied for a post as marketing manager to an organisation of your choice.

As part of the selection procedure you have been asked to write a report on your understanding of the various elements of the marketing process and your evaluation of the costs and benefits of your chosen organisation adopting a marketing orientation. Task: Write a report to the Managing Director of your chosen organisation that includes the following: Introduction definitions of marketing with a summary of your understanding of the term Your understanding of the marketing process (1.1) What is meant by market orientation and a brief description of different orientations that could be adopted (1.2) An explanation of the costs and benefits to your chosen organisation of adopting a marketing approach supported by evidence. (1.2) An evaluation of the costs and benefits together with your recommendations. (1.2) Propose a new market positioning for one of the organizations existing products or services and recommend a targeting strategy (2.5, 2.3) Word count not to exceed 2000 Answer: Marketing is a process through which a product is introduced to customers so that the company can make profit. Marketing takes different forms and modes to get a target that of customer satisfaction and profit for the company. Various aspects should be considered when doing Marketing such as the means of advertising, the product, and the customer. Its very important to understand that successful Marketing is the one that understands the relationship between the customer, the product, and the company. Few years back, Marketing entailed a very selfish vision focusing on the product overlooking the customer. As time passed, Marketing has recognized the relationship between the consumer, product, and company as one unit, Experienced organizations have learned that it is not their opinion that matters most regarding whether their product is needed or not. The opinion that matters most is that of the customers. (McNamara, C. 1998)

I believe that the successful company is the company that puts the product, the customer and its vision of profit in one triangle. The definition of Marketing has become wider where any company should find a way to find unhappy customers and bring to market products that suit their desire. Marketing goes through several processes such as Situation Analysis, Marketing Strategy, Marketing Mix Decisions, and Implementation and Control. Situation Analysis involves finding the opportunities that satisfy unfilled customer needs. Also the company should recognize its capabilities and the environment where its working. When carrying out Situation Analysis, there are several elements should be studied including Product, Suppliers, Customers, Competitors, and Climate. At the Product level, the company should study its main product and other supporting products that address its customer needs the best. You may want to break this definition up into parts such as the core product and any secondary or supporting services or products that 1

also make up what you sell. It is important to observe this in terms of its different parts in order to be able to relate this back to core client needs (Margarit, A.2011) The second element in Situation Analysis is the Supplier. A company should verify the supplying chain all the time in order to maintain the supplying sources. Third, the Customers, by studying their social level and their needs and the market size. Furthermore, Competitors in the market should not be overlooked in any situation analysis because when a company knows its competitors, it can improve its product and serve customers in a better way. As for the Climate in Situation Analysis, it includes political, environmental, social, and technological (PEST) factors. Marketing Strategies cannot be a hard step when a company would like to achieve its targets of high sales and customer satisfaction. Marketing strategies are integrated and they involve integrated elements such as the selection of the market and product the company sells. Marketing Mix Decisions is one of the most important processes in marketing because it studies how the product, price, place, and promotion are mixed together to satisfy customers and achieve sales in the target markets. It's simple! You just need to create a product that a particularly group of people want, put it on sale some place that those same people visit regularly, and price it at a level which matches the value they feel they get out of it; and do all that at a time they want to buy. Then you've got it made! (The Marketing Mix and 4 Ps, 2011) Implementation and Control is the last process in Marketing where plans on paper should be translated into actions in the market to achieve the goals of customer satisfaction for long-live in the market and will bring profit for the company. Control means constant monitoring of the product as per the customer changing needs. At some point in the process, a company may make a decision to change a product or to redesign it when customers no longer prefer that product. Marketing Orientation focuses on collecting information and conducting surveys constantly about the product in the market, changing customer needs, competitors capabilities. After collecting the appropriate information, it is shared across the different departments in the company. Then all information put together in order to increase sales and create customer value. A company that is marketing-orientated has the commitment to valuing customers and the customers needs (Exforsys Inc. 2009) Asda is pushing on suppliers and hold meeting and negotiations asking them to reduce prices to enable Asda to wage price war against competitors. The supermarket has embarked on a round of "tough" negotiations with all major suppliers, including multinationals such as Unilever. The pricing terms of nearly all 30,000 products in its stores are under scrutiny with suppliers asked to offer better terms. (wood, 2009)

ASDA MARKETING
Asda is one of the biggest four supermarkets in the UK, owned by US supermarket giant Wal-Mart and. It is known for its Everyday Low Prices food grocery. In this paper, I would like to shed light on Marketing Processes, Market Orientation, and Explanation of Cost and Benefits adopted in ASDA. First, Asda is following the steps of US giant Wal-Mart in marketing because Asda is part of Wl-Mart. Asda has taken over the UK market and according to statistics Asda has become the UK residents favorite shopping destination. Asda has gone through a fierce competition with retail hypermarkets in the UK by the goods lowest price campaigns it launches all year round. Asdas merger with the Wal-Mart back in 1999 gave it a bright future and came after it understood the increasing competition in the UK market. So that, Asda had achieved a lot of benefits from that merge such as increasing sales and gaining the customers satisfaction. In 2010, 17% of UK grocery shoppers used Asda for their main shop, with 'special offers' the most cited reason for its popularity. (Marketing Strategy of ASDA. 2010) Customers have trusted Asda products and this trust has become greater after the huge chops in prices while getting the same quality products. Grocer Asda has launched a moneyback guarantee that is at least 10% cheaper than competitors', including the "price crunch" offer by rival Morrisons, which was launched to tie-in with the VAT increase on 4 January. (Owen, E.2011) Asda has adopted numerous marketing strategies including the 4 Ps strategy mentioned earlier. Asda has been successful in having a wide range of products that suit the UK market at affordable and competitive prices within outstanding promotion packages and campaigns. I would like to say that Asda is a perfect example on the 4Ps; it reads its costumers minds, maintains high level of quality, and participates in some social activities through Asda Charity for helping the poor.

It seems that Asda has a brilliant future and is working on market-oriented business. Asda in its future plans focuses on tracking customers. Asda will continue to track shopper behaviour as well as capture important customer feedback. (Trust, J.2009) Furthermore, the future vision that Asda adapts as per the price is more reductions and as for sustainability it contributes with the community environment-friendly campaigns and under 'health' ASDA stores launched blood donation vans and also raised money for Breast Cancer. Another aspect of Asda market-oriented business is the online marketing and the wide range of advertising in Asdas global websites. With marketing orientation, a business revolves its strategic decisions aroundthe wants and needs of the target market, including potential customers. Acompany that is marketing-orientated has the commitment to valuingcustomers and the customers needs. In fact, it can even contribute to the transformation of a companys business culture (Seminar, 1996)

There are several benefits for market-oriented Asda to include high demand on products, satisfied customers, and log existing business. I believe that Market orientation is very essential for the survival of a company when competition is very hot. When marketing orientation becomes part of a companys vision, the trust will grow between the customer and the product and eventually with the company leading to more sales and profits. To add, as long as Asda is contributing in the community service as mentioned earlier and is fully aware of its customers needs, its reputation will increase and the company will remain on the top and its slogan of getting more for less will never die.

If we would like to put all what we have talked about so far of marketing processes, strategies, and orientation, we would get to whats called Market Positioning. Market positioning is the manipulation of a brand or family of brands to create a positive perception in the eyes of the public. If a product is well positioned, it will have strong sales, and it may become the go-to brand for people who need that particular product. (Smith S. E. What Is Market Positioning?. Retrieved from http://www.wisegeek.com. Asda can change into market positioning by changing low price slogans and linking them with quality like High Quality for Less.