MKT501 Marketing Management

                                                              Source: (4 Ps of Marketing (Product Mix), 2018)

Product: Walmart’s core business is providing customers with retail services for which the company attracts its customers by enabling them with effective and convenient service. For example, sales personnel of the company are trained in such a manner that they assist shoppers with finding goods of their choice. Convenience in product selection is offered as Walmart stores comprises of wide array of products in almost all of its retail and online stores. Since customers experiences one-stop shopping experience with Walmart, they find shopping easy with it and thus product component in marketing mix of the company affects highly while defining customer experience and overall influence of store sales (Marcilla, 2014).

Price: Walmart uses pricing strategy which includes Everyday low Price i.e. EDLP pricing strategy. In fact, this low pricing technique are frequently observed in advertisements made by Walmart. The chief objective behind this pricing strategy is to support the generic business strategy of Walmart, that is cost leadership (Govindarajan & Gupta, 2017). Moreover, this strategy helps in generation of huge sales and thereby Walmart enjoys the benefit through economies of sales. Walmart charges less than 15% on some of its products as compared to its competitors. Therefore, this marketing mix in pricing contributes as main component for enabling successful competitiveness in retail service industry.

Place: In distribution strategy of Walmart, the company uses intensive distribution channel strategy. Under this strategy, Walmart offers same variety of products in all of its stores along with employee’s responsibilities towards stores management. In order to reach more customers, the company keeps on expanding its business by opening more retail stores and thus gets public attention by enabling convenient shopping experience in geographical terms. The company also use direct delivery systems in which vendors and suppliers of retail stores gets their goods delivered by the company’s supply chain network (Marcilla, 2014).

Promotion: Marketing communication or promotional mix of Walmart is composed of sales promotion, advertisements, public related service and personal selling. Company uses advertisers like newspapers and websites to promote their products special deals and discounts. Package deals and new products are sold personally by sales person of stores by persuading customers. Walmart’s online websites offers customers with gifts and cash on delivery facilities that enhances its online sales also. Walmart public relations are maintained effectively as it uses press releases to keep its stakeholders and investors informed about company policies and strategies. The company also sponsors many charity functions to remain in news and in front of customers eyes. Thus, it can be said that promotion in marketing mix of Walmart helps the company in establishing strong customer relationship along with improving its brand image (Marcilla, 2014).

Differences observed

Although Walmart is an international company, it uses different name in several countries. Even the pricing strategy of the company varies according to market. For example, in India and China, the price of products is placed lower as compared to US since India and China are economically weaker than US. Whereas low pricing strategy for UK has been kept to give tough competition to its competitors. Distribution channels of the company also differs in different countries. In India, the company owns best wholesale stores but in US, the number of retail stores are higher than China, India and UK (Thomas, 2017).

Conclusion

Walmart is one of the most attractive companies mentioned in Fortune 500 company’s list in service related industry. It employees’ large number of people while giving exclusive care to its customers like valuable assets. The standardised marketing mix policy of the company can be summarised as an excellent marketing strategy. The availability of variety of products, enhanced distribution channel, low pricing policy and effective methods of promotion contributes all the necessary factors required in successful internationalisation of the company.

References

Carpenter, M., Bauer, T., & Erdogan, B. (2012). Management Principles. Creative Commons.

4 Ps of Marketing (Product Mix). (2018). Retrieved from https://www.mbaskool.com/business-concepts/marketing-and-strategy-terms/6778-4-ps-of-marketing.html

Govindarajan, V., & Gupta, A. K. (2017). Taking Wal-Mart Global: Lessons From Retailing's Giant. Retrieved from https://www.strategy-business.com/article/13866?gko=e19cb

Marcilla, L. B. (2014). Business analysis for Wal-Mart, a grocery retail chain, and improvement proposals . Missouri.

Thomas, T. (2017). How Walmart pivoted its India strategy and succeeded. Retrieved from https://www.thehindubusinessline.com/companies/how-walmart-pivoted-its-india-strategy-and-succeeded/article9944164.ece

Walmart Inc. (2018). Walmart-About Us. Retrieved from https://corporate.walmart.com/our-story