E-Marketing Plan For Woolworths: Situation Analysis, Strategies, Action Essay.

Your introduction should include:

1. Initial consultation with stakeholders (in this case it may be your trainer and assessor who will act as the senior manager and your direct supervisor)
2. Mission, Vision and objectives of the organisation in regard to the product or service
   • The objectives need to be SMART (Specific, Measurable, Attainable, Relevant and Timely). When defining these objectives think about the following:
   • What the ‘Return on investment’ will be? This may include increased customer spend, greater brand awareness, an increase in visits and online registrations, etc. How you quantify and measure the success of your plan will depend on your business and marketing objectives. This will differ from business to business.
   • Define objectives for each part of the customer journey - Awareness, Acquisition and Conversion. Your plan needs to look at the whole customer journey.
   • Make sure that your objectives reflect exactly what you will be measured on (KPI’s).
3. Summary of strategies and tactics to be used - Once your objectives have been defined, you need to provide a top level summary of your Strategy – outlining how you are going to use digital marketing to meet them. The strategy should summarise the ‘bigger picture’ without yet going into the detail. It should explain the concept behind the tactics, providing a general overview of the techniques to be used.
4. A brief summary of the marketing environment for this product or service
5. Projected outcomes and ‘return on investment’. Details can be included in budget or costing section.

For developing e-marketing plan, the electronic marketing manager will consult with different stakeholders such as senior manager, direct supervisor, trainer and another assessor. Further, the mission of Woolworths is to deliver the convenience, quality, and value to their customers. The vision of this company is to bring the little good to everyone at every day and also working with a clear strategy to put our customers 1^st.  The company makes different objectives with respect to products and services such as to retain the customer and store-led environment and team, to generate sustainable revenue derive in food and evolving brink business to deliver added value and convenience to their customer (Woolworths group, 2017).  

This report presents the situation analysis of company by using the SWOT analysis and identifying different issues. It also demonstrates the e-Marketing Schedule through Gantt chart and develops the effective marketing strategies and action plan. It also exhibits the costing and budget, and different technical issues. Moreover, this report discusses the monitoring strategy and e-Marketing Evaluation methods.    

The electronic marketing manager will choose the Australian marketing environment to sell the products and services of Woolworths limited. This marketing environment has selected by the company due to political stability and higher demand of customers. This environment is also effective for the company due to the low inflation rate and higher income of people as it can increase the demand of customers towards the products and services. In Australia, a high number of individual uses technology and e-channels to buy the products and services as it could be beneficial for Woolworths to create the brand awareness through e-channels (Hollensen, 2015).

 This e-marketing plan would be beneficial to generate more revenues by increasing the demand of customers. It could be also beneficial to retain the existing customers and attract the potential customers towards the company. By implementing this plan, the company can get $5, 00,000 returns on investment.  

High capital is required to sacrifice a consumer

A large number of the consumer may believe to purchase the high amount of products and services even in a tough situation to make long-term satisfaction. For affording the costly item, these consumers have cut down the spending in other areas. Hence, Woolworths should focus on how the item will benefit to customers and convenience them as it is valuable to observe the sacrifice level of customers. It is analyzed that competitors use payment plan in which they do not charge any interest for certain duration (Hair and Lukas, 2014). This could be an effective way to make perceive the added value to customers.   

Limited Merchandise to manage the operation

Woolworths have inadequate merchandise to manage the operation. The company faces a challenge to make the positive image in the customer’s mind through e-marketing channels. For the e-marketing plan, graphic designer, professional marketers, online advertiser and print media maker is essential (Perreault et. al., 2013). The issue can be created to make advertisement of the brand such as offers and convenience.  

Issues Identified

Expensive Trendy Stores

Trends show the success of a retail store. In the current scenario, the customer wants to a healthy lifestyle as they focus on organic foods that could be costly for the company. Along with this, it is also analyzed that different people have a different requirement as per their choices. Further, trendy consumers want higher price tags products and services (Babin, and Zikmund, 2015). Hence, marketing of this higher-end product is a complex.   

Product strategies

Woolworths is a recognized Australian retailer. It facilitates a different kind of grocery products which is an essential element of marketing mix. For delivering the product through e-marketing channels, Woolworths will include the meat, vegetables, fruits, and packaged products. It will also sell the other products such as DVDs, magazines, and stationery items. Along with this, it will consider the wide choice of local and international brands. In this way, it cannot dissatisfy the customers due to brand choice (Armstrong, et. al., 2015). 

The products of Woolworths is approved and tested by Woolworth’s experts to maintain the quality of products and services. It will also contain diverse product range from jewelry, bedding, bags, furniture, housewares, to accessories and clothing. This wide category will enable the company to meet the customer’s need as compared to its competitors. The company will also use Australian e-Marketing Code of Practice such as it will eliminate the high amount of unsolicited commercial electronic messages that are received by the consumer (Mullin, et. al., 2014). 

Price strategies

Woolworths will focus on the similar or slightly higher price as compared to its competitors due to unique products and services. It will also deliver the premium brands in its food chain as it will make the competitive price in the retail industry. It will also facilitate the Woolworths shopping card that can be automatically traced the purchases and provides the applicable fuel discount as there will be no need to keep paper receipt (Sheth, and Sisodia, 2015). 

Promotion strategies

Promotion is a key component of the marketing mix for Woolworths. It makes continue innovation in this element. In this way, it will facilitate the loyalty scheme for its customers such as petrol pump discount. It has launched fresh food people campaign in 1987 that is also used in the current scenario. It will also use different e-channels to endorse their products such as Google ad words, emails, Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, SEO, SMO, websites and mobile applications (Menon, et. al., 2015).

These channels provide easy accessibility and high choice for customers as it could increase the customer loyalty. Through these channels, it facilitates a wide range of deals and sales offer for their shoppers. It also provides gift cards and discounts to reach the target market and get projected ROI.  Woolworths will also entail the Australian eMarketing Code of Practice in which it will implement best practices of the commercial electronic message in compliance (Lusch, and Vargo, 2014).

Distribution strategies

Woolworths deals in approximately 1000 stores in the Australia. There are over 950 supermarkets and other are convenience stores.  There is a certain store which deals at Safeway stores in Victoria, Melbourne. It will also sell their products and services through e-marketing channels. It will also focus on dealing with a mobile app. It will entail different private labels such as Woolworths Fresh, Woolworth’s gold, Woolworth Select, and Woolworth Home brand. It will also build different outlets in a different region of Australia (Strauss, 2016). 

E-Marketing Schedule

For delivering the product and services through e-marketing channels, Woolworths has projected the budget. It relies on initial investment outlay as well as pre-determined objectives. The entire endorsement budget related with e-marketing would be approximately $500,000 as it would be beneficial to attain the estimated Return on investment i.e. $5,000,000 within the 10 weeks.  

Website content & search-ability

It is analyzed that company may confront issues regarding delaying search engines due to lack of skill to understand and index the page and develop content for their websites. Therefore, the company should resolve the issue and link the websites with Google’s webmaster guidelines. It could be beneficial for the company to get growth, high ranking and engaging the more users towards their company (McDonald, and Wilson, 2016). 

Customer registration & logging security (for customers and staff)

The company can confront the issue to use the private or restricted email account for registration of its domain name and keep the detail of registration. Training to staff with respect to online safety is essential however the company has needed to generate awareness about computer rights and responsibilities. Along with this, it provides the network access usage. Another issue can be faced by the company in logging security hence it should make aware to their staff and customers to keep strong passwords and avoid the fraudulent emails (De Mooij, 2013). It can aware the staff and customers regarding reporting on suspicious online activity as it will make sure the effective IT security practices.

Coupon codes, rewards for old clients, discounts

Coupon codes are an effective way to transform the visitors into shoppers. It could help the company to reward the customers who have signed up for your newsletter and left the comment on the contact page. Coupon discount could be applied in any prepaid and monthly plan, prepaid passes, merchandise, registration fees and single-visit in Woolworths. Further, a coupon discount does not apply to invoice total as it applies only to the eligible item up to the limit of redemption (Scott, 2015). The company can also set the timeframe for redeeming the coupon. In case, customer redeems the coupon then the coupon will discount the original and manual adjusted price of an item.

Multimedia

Multimedia is a key technical issue that could be faced by Woolworths. There are different elements of multimedia like live casting, mobile marketing, photos, videos, podcasting and file sharing. By using the multimedia, Woolworths needs to make effective content regarding itself because it can increase the brand awareness in a unique manner. The ability to use multimedia technology enables the business to communicate with the customers, potential customers and their employees (Czinkota, and Ronkainen, 2013). There are different online communities are available with the intention of sharing and uploading the photos on webpage hence company can take advantages of these to expand their market and products.

Autoresponders

An autoresponder is a program of a computer that transfers the automatic response on sent e-mails. It could be simple or quite complex for Woolworths. This tool is exercised as e-mail marketing to immediately deliver the responses to targeted customers and then record of them at a current time interval. Autoresponders are entailed into electronic mailing list software which confirms the unsubscriptions, subscriptions, list activities and posts (Sheth, and Sisodia, 2015). 

Marketing Strategies and Action Plan

Order forms and feedback forms

Woolworths relied on the feedback, whether it comes from customers or own employees. The company can appreciate the customers to fill the feedback forms as it could be beneficial to collect reliable data about products and services. The company can also use it build an effective working environment. It may also increase the company’s efficiency and offer the valuable facilities. It can also use it for getting new ways to improve and appreciate the time (Mullin, et. al., 2014). The company will also respond to customer’s feedback and provide them contact detail to complain regarding products and services.

Access levels to online resources

Woolworths may confront the issue to access level to online resources as it is very costly. The company has limited human resources to choose and catalog free online resources. The factor which may affect the company is that most of the customer wants free content to discover the company’s reputation. Online resources are easier to use and provide a wide range of resources to customers. Online resources play a critical role to aid the customer to spend their less time on searching and reading the information about the company (Perreault Jr, et. al., 2013).    

Credit card transactions

Credit card transaction may create the issue for the company due to the threat of fraud. However, this card transaction provides consumer-friendly protection in term of paying the amount in exchange of products. Along with this, Credit Card Act of 2009 secures the consumer against uninformed increases in credit card amounts and specifies constant timing for billing. It also regulates the appropriate debiting of dealings and restricts the charge (Babin, and Zikmund, 2015).   

Website hosting & publishing

Web hosting is a service that is linked to internet hosting. The corporation offers the services and provides the server computer to accumulate the websites. Together with, web publishing is a process by which the content is published on the internet. Web publishing organizes the website through a web host. But, publishing from the home computer can create complexities as compared to another computer which needs 24*7 hours connectivity of the internet (Armstrong, et. al., 2015).

Technical staff (size, requirements)

Lack of technical staff can also create the complexities to manage the business and respond to the customers. In the local phase, 2 technicians will be requisite for organizing the whole set-up and uploading the posts. The technical coordinator should be aware of the size and requirement because it will not analyze effectively then it may block the business operation. For developing e-marketing, Woolworth will need large size of technical staff for the tour. This technician should be aware of the requirement of business as it could improve the performance (Mullin, et. al., 2014). 

Monitoring Strategy 

Marketing initiatives

There are certain marketing activities which require several attempts before implementing. Further, consistent disclosure may provide better result hence marketing executive should consider the marketing strategies which have implemented several times for 10 weeks. In this way, marketing executive can keep the record the marketing practices and track the different aspect of initiatives such as media used, responses generated, sales generated, cost, the timing of the promotion, and return on sales (Babin, and Zikmund, 2015). 

Costing and Budget

Feedback

Woolworths can take the feedback of customer to monitor the positive and negative aspect of e-marketing activities. By getting the feedback from the customer, the company can make necessary changes and then implement this plan.

Competitor Response

Woolworths will also measure the responses of competitors to measure the success or failure of e-marketing plan. In this way, the company can analyze that how much competitors have imitated and tried their best in against these e-marketing activities. Further, if competitors ignore these e-marketing activities of Woolworths and get negative responses then there may be a chance of occurring issue as these issues could be improved (Hair Jr and Lukas, 2014).

E-Marketing Evaluation methods

Woolworths can use different technique to assess the e-marketing performance metrics. It can evaluate the performance of e-marketing activities such as return on investment and revues.

Evaluating the Return on investment and Revenue

It is analyzed the return on investment is a key part of implementing e-marketing plan. For this, the company can check the whether the high amount of money was spent on a marketing plan. Along with this, it can measure the amount that will be spent on each e-marketing activities and also measure the overall performance.  For measuring the performance, it can break down the e-marketing activities to measure the exact expenses of each activity as it would be beneficial to get potential ROI (Hollensen, 2015). Woolworths can assess the key performance indicator and e-marketing activities which would be beneficial to decline to assess the potential revenue.

References 

Armstrong, G., Kotler, P., Harker, M., & Brennan, R. (2015). Marketing: an introduction. Australia: Pearson Education.

Babin, B. J., & Zikmund, W. G. (2015). Exploring marketing research. USA: Cengage Learning.

Czinkota, M. R., & Ronkainen, I. A. (2013). International marketing. USA: Cengage Learning.

De Mooij, M. (2013). Global marketing and advertising: Understanding cultural paradoxes. USA: Sage Publications.

Hair Jr, J. F., & Lukas, B. (2014). Marketing research (Vol. 2). UK: McGraw-Hill Education Australia.

Hollensen, S. (2015). Marketing management: A relationship approach. Australia: Pearson Education.

Lusch, R. F., & Vargo, S. L. (2014). The service-dominant logic of marketing: Dialog, debate, and directions. UK: Routledge.

McDonald, M., & Wilson, H. (2016). Marketing Plans: How to prepare them, how to profit from them. UK: John Wiley & Sons.

Menon, A., Bharadwaj, S. G., Adidam, P. T., & Edison, S. W. (2015). Effective Marketing Strategy-Making: Antecedents and Consequences. In Proceedings of the 1997 Academy of Marketing Science (AMS) Annual Conference (pp. 224-224). USA: Springer, Cham.

Mullin, B. J., Hardy, S., & Sutton, W. (2014). Sports Marketing 4th Edition. UK: Human Kinetics.

Perreault Jr, W., Cannon, J., & McCarthy, E. J. (2013). Basic marketing. UK: McGraw-Hill Higher Education.

Scott, D. M. (2015). The new rules of marketing and PR: How to use social media, online video, mobile applications, blogs, news releases, and viral marketing to reach buyers directly. UK: John Wiley & Sons.

Sheth, J. N., & Sisodia, R. S. (2015). Does marketing need reform?: Fresh perspectives on the future. UK: Routledge.

Strauss, J. (2016). E-marketing. UK: Routledge.

Woolworths group (2017). About us. Retrieved from: https://www.woolworthsgroup.com.au/page/about-us 

Woolworths group (2017). strategy and objectives. Retrieved from: https://www.woolworthsgroup.com.au/page/about-us/our-approach/strategy-and-objectives/.