Introduction:

Organizations manufacture products to satisfy the needs of the consumers. The choice and need of the products vary from person to person. To meet different needs, business organizations manufacture products (Gordon, 2012). No arrangements for new products can be made if consumers cannot be informed about certain products. Hence the need for marketing derives. Marketing activities inform consumers about new products and services to ensure that such products have unique features (Lewis, 2013). The author has evaluated the marketing activities of McDonald’s in this report. The author has also analyzed the marketing objectives of this report. McDonald’s is a very popular name among fast food lovers from all over the world. This renowned fast-food shop was launched in 1940. There are a lot of food items prepared by this company for fast food lovers. McDonald’s is operating business by several marketing approaches, especially by franchising (Gordon, 2012). The management has done a tremendous job acquiring proper marketing strategies for which the company has achieved success than similar companies. There are effective distribution channels of McDonald’s by which the fast foods are distributed among the fast-food lovers. It is determined that McDonald’s is the most renowned fast-food company in the world. It has been possible by the skilled marketing representatives (DeFanti, 2015).

P1 Explain the key roles and responsibilities of the marketing function within a selected organization.

Marketing is the set of the systematic and pre-planned process, especially framed by a certain organization's administration. Every business organization has short term and long term plans. For deriving the long term plans, the management frames-up several new products and services. The marketing department addressed the consumers that new products have been manufactured for enhancing the facilities to the consumers. To get advantages from excessive competition, the marketing department has to carry a deal with great care. The needs are different for different groups of people (DeFanti, 2015). A product may be appreciated, whereas it can be rejected by others. To determine the consumers' choices, the duty of the marketing manager is to deploy marketing representatives so that the required information can be gathered. The marketing manager then improves the product quality or brings new products in the production line to satisfy the needs of the customers (Gordon, 2012).

In the present business world, competition is growing bigger and bigger. Small and medium industries are also giving tough competition to large companies. The fact is that the organizations are researching a lot to decrease the production cost so that the product quality can be enhanced at a lower price than the competitors (Gordon, 2012). No organization can easily operate a monopolistic business as the fact of immense competition in the market. So the consumers have to be ensured that the products and services are capable of meeting the demands.

An organization has several departments, and there are several managers from each department. The production manager has the responsibility to ensure that the required products have been manufactured. At the same time, other departments have to carry specific duties (DeFanti, 2015). But no plans can result positively if the marketing department fails. Whether it is a manufacturing organization or trade organization, the marketing department does several activities such as:

· Take the responsibility to spread the right information about the products and services of a certain organization.

· The marketing manager carries surveys and researches to address the production manager about the choices of the customers.

· Thus the required adjustments can be made (Gordon, 2012). The success of a certain project of the organization needs rightful ways of communication. Communication ensures the sharing of ideas and thoughts, which improves the performance and the quality of services.

· Marketing department branding the organization to the consumers and they ensure the value of products and services.

· The marketing department also makes a relationship with consumers to fulfill their demand. They provide after-sales service also.

P2 Discuss how roles and responsibilities of marketing relate to the wider organizational context.

The significance of marketing is becoming wider and wider these days. The competition does not remain the same as earlier. With the process of globalization, it has become very easy to get a lot of alternative products. As a result, the organizations are seemed to be very careful to set the standards and objectives. Marketing functions are linked with the deliberate process of sending and receiving information. Thus the necessity to have an experienced marketing team is required. In this regard, the organizational structure is needed to be well framed. McDonald’s has a strong organizational structure for which the decision-making process is very sudden and improved.

As like other organizations, McDonald’s, also has many departments. The marketing team of this company is skilled and trained. As a result, the promotional functions can be determined effectively. The marketing department of McDonald’s is continuously researching on the improvement of the distribution process to the consumers (DeFanti, 2015).

Marketing the department has to play different roles for the organization. The information gathered from the field is delivered to the management to set rules and standards for satisfying the customers' needs. Thus the goal can be achieved. The organizational structure should be equipped with modern technologies for establishing a great communication system. The transfer of ideas and thoughts improves the quality of the performance. The marketing manager has direct engagement and relationship with the consumers. So the feedback about the service of the organization can be derived practically by the marketing manager. Thus the success of the arranged functions shoulders largely to the marketing manager.

Marketing process: The marketing process is defined as the task arranged by the marketing manager to get the detailed information regarding the consumers' choice from the available alternatives. It includes the actions, strategies, controls, and so on. The marketing process is determined to serve the consumers according to the needs (Lewis, 2013).

M1 Analyse the roles and responsibilities of marketing in the context of the marketing environment

The manager of the organization analyses here macro environment of McDonald's by using PESTEL analysis. It helps the organization to find out the marketing environment of the organization.

Political factors: Political factors are one of McDonald's most important factors of the macro environment. Because they are running a business most of the country, they need to face different political forces from different countries. For example, the UK government has banned any fast food outlet near the school in London. They also banned the advertisement of fast food products by using any character of cartoons (DeFanti, 2015).

Economic factors: It is another important fact for the organization where the manager of the organization deals with inflation, the national income of a nation, GDP growth rate, and so on. In 2008, the recession of the UK influenced the business of McDonald's. But now, the BREXIT issue is a matter of concern for any business that actually coming from different nations to the UK (Gordon, 2012).

Social factors: Social factors indicate the age, education, culture, social norms, and values. Young people mostly like fast food in any country, and there are more than 50% of people are young in Britain. They are also fast food lovers. So it is a great opportunity for McDonald's.

Technological factor: Technological factor is also important for the organization where McDonald's uses updated technology. They are now selling their product by online order. But the equipment of the kitchen of McDonald's is backdated (Brooks and Simkin, 2012).

Environmental factor: Environmental issue is also important for the organization. The manager of the organization is concern about the environmental issue. They are the largest buyer of beef in the world who buys 350000 cattle in a year. It may cause the ecosystem of the world. The reason for global warming is using soya from Amazon. So McDonald is trying to stop using soya from amazon.

Legal factor: It is another important fact for any business that is running internationally. They need to maintain different laws of different nations regarding different issues. The minimum wage revolution should be concerned. The manager of McDonald's also respects the tax laws of various nations.

Figure 01: PESTEL analysis

Source: (DeFanti, 2015)

M2 Analyse the significance of interrelationships between marketing and other functional units of the organization.

The relation between marketing and another department: Marketing is an important issue for an organization. It has a great relationship with other departments. These are given below:

The relation between marketing and finance: The finance department is responsible for allocating money from different sources to capital for the organization. The marketing department helps them find suitable sources for capital. They also help them how much money the marketing department needs to advertise its product or promotional activities (Lewis, 2013).

The relation between marketing and human resource department: the HR department is responsible for recruiting the most talented and skilled employees for the organization. They also arrange different types of training programs for the employee's developing career (Brooks and Simkin, 2012). The marketing department helps the HR department by informing about various information regarding the source of labor. The marketing department manager tells the manager or HR department what type of training they need for their marketing people.

The relation between the accounting and marketing department: They have a great relationship because of marketing department helps the manager of accounting department prepares different types of budget. The marketing manager analyses the market and demand of consumer (Lewis, 2013). Based on this information the managerial accountant prepares sales budget, purchase budget, production budget and so on.

The relation between the marketing and purchase department: The manager of the marketing department informs the purchasing department about the market demand. It helps the purchase department to buy the product based on demand of production department and information of store department (Lewis, 2013).

D1 Critically analyses and evaluates the key elements of the marketing function and how they interrelate with other functional units of an organization.

Marketing department of an organization does several functions to help the other department to achieve organizational objectives. They mainly do:

1. Market research: Marketing department of McDonald analyzes the market and the demand of consumer. This information helps the accounting department to find out expected revenue, it also helps the sales and marketing department to make sales budget, helps production department to produce the number of product as per market demand.

2. Positioning: The manager of the marketing department sets the place of the organization from where they can run the business effectively. Positioning means setting the organization at specific place of market from where they can achieve economies of scale and market benefits. It helps the other department to understand their position.

3. Competitive analysis: The marketing manager analyze the market competition. It mainly helps the accounts department to set the price of the product according to average price of market.

4. Market strategy: The manager analyzes the strategy of other organization in same industry to know their strategy. Based on this strategy, the manager of the organization sets their own strategy.

5. Budget: Marketing manager helps to prepare sales budget, production budget and helps to other department to prepare some other required budget.

P3 Compare the ways in which different organizations apply the marketing mix to the marketing planning process to achieve business objectives.

Marketing Mix: The marketing mix refers to the actions taken by the marketing manager to attract the customers to buy the products from the related organization. There are certain elements of the marketing mix (Lewis, 2013). These are here:

Products: A company can attract consumers by the set of products. McDonald’s has a variety of fast food items by which the company takes the attention from the consumers. The quality of the products is good enough to satisfy the expectation of the consumers (Brooks and Simkin, 2012).

Price: The price of the products is very important element of the marketing mix. Consumers want to get products at the lowest price whereas the company wants to make highest profit. Thus the price of the products is needed to be strategic.

Place: The organization should be in the convenient place. McDonald’s is very careful about it.

Promotion: McDonald’s promotes fast-food items through newspaper, magazines, and online media, leaflet and so on.

People: The personnel have to be active and skilled. McDonald’s has about 36000 employees.

Process: The production and distribution process of the firm are advanced.

Physical evidence: There are several stores in several countries from where the consumers get the desired food items.

Comparison of marketing mix with KFC:

	McDonald's	KFC
Product	Fast food items like snacks, burgers, cold drinks and so on.	Burgers, fried chickens, crushers, and so on.
Price	McDonald’s follows price penetrating strategy.	KFC follows competitive pricing strategy.
Place	Several branches in many countries.	KFC also delivers foods by making franchising.
Promotion	Online media, website etc. are used to promote the products.	Advertisements through TV, newspaper, leaflet are used.
People	Above 36000 employees.	Various skilled employees.
Process	Production process is very improved.	The distribution process is very quick.
Physical Evidence	A lot of branches are available.	Several stores have been set to serve the consumers.

M3 evaluate different tactics applied by organizations to demonstrate how business objectives have been achieved.

Most of the organizations are using different five types of tactics to achieve organizational goals and objectives. These five tactics are:

1. Product: The main objective of McDonald's is increasing sales of the organization (Brooks and Simkin, 2012). But this objective will be achieved when the manager of the organization offers different types of products to the consumer.

2. Price: It is another strategy to attract the customer. McDonald's is using this strategy mostly to attract the consumer most. They offer their product at the cheapest rate in the market of the UK. They believe on their program “Happy menu price”.

3. Marketing strategy: It is another important strategy for McDonald to attract the consumer to provide more foods. They promote their products in different ways. They offer foods to the consumer and they supply this food very fast.

4. Operational strategy: The key to the success of McDonald's is its operational strategy. The organization uses this strategy to sell their product more and more. They mainly follow to provide their food on time to the consumer door or table.

5. Financial strategy: It is also good for the business. McDonald is a public ltd company and they are raising money from different sources.

D2 Design a strategic marketing plan that tactically applies the use of the 7Ps to achieve overall marketing objectives.

The manager of the organization is always trying to achieve the marketing objectives of the organization.

The key elements of the marketing function are interrelated with each other. In this regard, the SWOT analysis of McDonald's can be done to critically analyze the interrelation of the functional units.

Strength of McDonald:

· Cost leadership strategy

· Cheap price of product

· Strong brand value

· International business

· Good supply chain management

The weakness of McDonald:

· Low product diversification

· Vulnerability to western market declines

· Limited process flexibility

· Having hygienic issue

· Legal issues

Figure 02: SWOT analysis

Source: (Brooks and Simkin, 2012)

Threats of McDonald:

· National and international competitors

· Different types of law regarding a health issue

· Modern lifestyle trends

· GMO trends and regulations

· Tax barriers for an international company in a different nation

The opportunity of McDonald:

· Expansion of business in developing countries

· Development of business in the middle east

· Diversification of product

· Increasing more outlets

· Targeting more customer range

The author here uses Porter’s generic strategies to develop 7P’s of McDonald. It helps the organization to understand different types of strategies. These are:

1. Overall cost leadership strategy: McDonald is still using a cost leadership strategy. Because of they are offering their product at the lowest price to the market. So based on this strategy they fix the price of their product.

2. Product differentiation: McDonald's should use this strategy to offer different types of products to the market. Because they are running worldwide so they need to find out the most effective product as per the demand of the consumer.

3. Focus: Finally McDonald should focus on several strategies also to prepare 7P’s.

The author is planning a strategy for McDonald's by applying 7Ps to achieve overall marketing objectives.

7Ps	Description
Product	McDonald should offer different types of product to the consumer.
Price	They are still offering the product at the cheapest rate so they need to keep this pricing strategy.
Place	McDonald should enter in developing countries where they can expand the business.
Promotion	McDonald may use digital media to promote their product.
People	McDonald needs to recruit some skilled people for their marketing department.
Process	They are using different types of process for their organization.
Physical evidence	It means outlets, equipment, and furniture and so on.

P4 Produce and evaluate a basic marketing plan for an organization.

Marketing plan of McDonald’s: Like other successful business organizations, McDonald’s has also an effective marketing plan. It is a detailed written document prepared by the marketing manager to bring the framework for which the objective of the organization can be obtained (DeFanti, 2015). The functions of the business can be attributed to the issue of a proper marketing plan. It helps a marketing manager to guide, train, and monitor and controls the employees to accomplish the organizational goal.

Segmenting: The term segmenting is a buzzword for marketing activities. To improve the quality of the services, managers often segment the markets into several categories so that the functions can be arranged due to the needs of each group. The market is divided into several sub-sections by deriving some facts. In this regard, McDonald’s segments the market in such a manner so that the quality can be enhanced.

Figure 03: Types of Segmentation

Source: (Kotler, 2012)

McDonald is using geographic segmentation to produce and offer their product. For example, McDonald is the biggest buyer of cattle meat but they offer vegetarian burger at India, Because of Indian people avoid beef meet.

Targeting: Targeting refers to the term of focusing on the specific group of customers who have the possibility to make a purchase from the organization. The marketing manager of McDonald’s is very careful to focus on certain groups. It tends to bring the company in such a situation so that the organization can derive optimum value.

Figure 04: Types of targeting strategies

Source: (Chikweche and Fletcher, 2012)

McDonald is using differentiated marketing strategies to offer two or more segments by developing a marketing mix for each segment.

Positioning: Positioning is the process of deriving the market into such a place in where the organization can obtain the expected result.

Figure 05: Types of positioning strategies

Source: (Brooks and Simkin, 2012)

M4 Produce a detailed, coherent evidence-based marketing plan for an organization

A marketing plan is very essential for an organization. It helps an organization to achieve its goal. So the author of this report has made a marketing plan for McDonald's.

Segmentation: The author has chosen psychographic segmentation and behavioral segmentation.

Psychographic segmentation:

Lifestyle:

Experience: McDonald's offers a variety on the menu (burger, drinks, and deserts) and provides a place for socialization.

Innovators: McDonald's offers a variety of innovations such as new flavors in deserts.

Thinkers: McDonald's offers value products of high with sophisticated environments.

Behavioral segmentation:

Occasions: They should offer various offers to different programs such as valentine's day, mother day, and so on.

Benefits sought: They need to provide quality.

Targeting: McDonald should use a differentiated targeting strategy. Because they are running a business all over the world.

Positioning strategy: The positioning statement of McDonald's is “We are not a burger company serving people but are a people company selling burgers”. They are always trying to more nutritious their product.

Conclusion:

All the organizations recruit marketing manager to guide and control the marketing activities. The marketing manager holds the marketing objectives to promote the maximum sale of products to the consumers (DeFanti, 2015). Thus the products are filled with a lot of natures. The marketing team has to generate proper marketing plans for the organization so that the expected mission can be reached. In order to distribute the products, the marketing manager uses several distribution channels. McDonald’s has been selected by the author in this report to analyze marketing activities and objectives. The role of marketing to get success has been evaluated by the author.

References:

Howell, R., (2015). Market segmentation: the importance of age cohorts. The Neumann Business Review. pp.21-54

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Chikweche, T. & Fletcher, R. 2012, "Revisiting the marketing mix at the bottom of pyramid (BOP): from theoretical considerations to practical realities", Journal of Consumer Marketing, vol. 29, no. 7, pp. 507-520.

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Unit 2 Marketing Essentials, Assignment solution, BTEC-HND, UK