Business Marketing Audit (Situational Analysis) for Masafi brand of Juice from Masafi Company LLC

 

The main body of the report excluding title page, executive summary, table of contents, introduction, conclusion, tables, figures, list of references, and appendices must not exceed 2,500 words (+/-10%). Use only Times New Roman font; 12-points font-size; 1.5 points line-spacing; and 2.5 cm margin on all sides of the pages

ASSIGNMENT BRIEF AND REQUIREMENTS:

Assume that you are the new Marketing Manager of a ‘real-world’ company that operates in UAE region, providing a key product or service that has been customized, adapted, or localized specifically to suit the MENA/UAE market; or which is specifically produced locally in the UAE for the Arab market only. You have been asked to familiarize yourself with the corporate objectives of the organization, and contribute towards the marketing strategy to achieve those corporate objectives for a specific product of the company. The focus of this assignment is on the steps preceding the formulation of marketing strategies (The Marketing Plan) – namely Situational Analyses and Marketing Audit.

NOTE: The aim of the report is not to persuade the reader on how great the organization you chose is. Rather, it is to show how you can very critically evaluate the organization’s market situation and market performance; and then suggest strategies for going forward.

Task 1:

Analyze the context and environments in which your organization operates. Quantify and explain the implications of the trends identified. The environment refers to the macro-environmental forces impacting on the industry, namely, political, legal, economic, social and technological dimensions (PESTLE Analysis). Contexts normally associated with macro-environment analysis include a company looking at industry trends; a business looking at product trends driven by consumer preference; evaluation of a brand’s market position relative to industry changes; a geographically defined business such as the subsidiary office of an overseas company; a company needing to identify opportunities for entering a market or country; and a business seeking to identify opportunities and threats in acquiring another company. To quantify the trends that are identified, use importance weights for each environmental dimension and rank the issues that are identified. Ranking/weighing increases the usefulness of the information, as it prioritizes and attaches importance to different bits of information. Use positive/negative scales to rank salient trends to help managers better understand a trend’s estimated impact. Rate each macro environmental force/dimension using weights of 0.0 to 1.0, with the sum of the weights for the dimensions adding up to 1.0. Derive a statistic for each dimension by multiplying the rank of each trend by the weight of each macro-environmental dimension and summing the products for each dimension.

Task 2:

Provide a brief overview of the organization in terms of what it markets; analyze its mission statement; and how its history has shaped the organization’s development of core competencies. Review the organization’s performance in the last few years from both financial and marketing perspectives. Then, identify and evaluate the organization’s present marketing goals and objectives.

Task 3:

Using the Pyramid of Corporate Social Responsibility, examine the social responsibility and marketing ethics issues that are relevant for the company and the chosen product. How effectively has the company addressed the issues? What could they be doing better?

Task 4:

Define the core target profile the organization’s key target market for the specific product you chose. What are their needs and benefits sought? Identify the major competitors and their characteristics in terms of size, growth, market share, profitability and marketing capabilities. What factors have contributed to their success or decline? What are their major strengths and weaknesses? What is the organisation’s competitive strategy within the market? Are they a market leader, follower, or niche? Discuss the implications of their position.

Task 5:

Identify the critical success factors within the market. What things must be done exceptionally well in order to succeed in the industry? What factors could cause organizations in the industry to under perform? What is the organisation’s position with respect to the critical success factors? Conduct a SWOT analysis and explain the key points. Then, assess whether the organisation has the strengths to capitalize on the opportunities. Are there threats which the organisation needs to address? Does the organisation need to turn any weaknesses into strengths? How realistic are the organisation’s marketing objectives, given the anticipated environment, including the actions of competitors and the organisation’s core competencies? Evaluate the organisation’s existing value proposition. What relevant marketing issues face the organisation?

Task 6:

How does the company want the specific chosen product, and its associated brand, to be perceived by its target market as compared to its major competitors? How does the target market perceive the selected company’s product and its associated brand with respect to competition? How strong, favorable, and unique are the brand associations? Present and explain both a positioning map and a perceptual map to show the position where the company wants the product to be perceived, and also where the product actually stands in the market compared to competition. Include a positioning statement. Lecturer’s Expectations on Research to Address the Assignment Questions: Complete this assignment using material from the textbooks, journal articles, lectures, case studies, your experience in organisation(s)/markets, and other sources such as newspapers, magazines, and websites. You may conduct informal observation or discussions with friends and relatives who know about the company and product chosen. However, no formal primary data collection research is necessary for this class work. You must acknowledge all sources of any information and ideas which are not your own as in-work citations and in a list of references at the end of your report. Please place tables, charts, graphs, pictures, histograms, and matrices in the appendix section.

Your report MUST include of the following:

1) Executive Summary

2) Table of contents (on a separate page of the report). Include a table of contents with headings, sub-headings and page numbers.

3) Introduction (1/2 page); the introduction should introduce all aspects of the report questions and preview the content of the report. Specifically, the introduction should include: (a) general lead-in information about the report topic including why you chose this company and product for your assignment, by way of providing rational (e.g., market share, profit, new product, most advertised product) and other reasons for your selection of the product; (b) a statement of the main aim(s) and objective(s); (c) method(s) of approach; (d) indications of the scope and limitations of the report; (e) a preview of material presented in the body of the report.

4) Analysis (main body of the report) – containing subtitles and subsections of the main analyses of the 6 tasks above (page 7); detailed discussions of your findings and inferences; and then your recommendations.

5) Conclusion (1/2 page); conclusions are quite often read by managers before the main text of the report and hence should summaries the main points clearly.

MARKING CRITERIA

The marks you obtain will depend on the extent to which:

1. You are able to demonstrate your understanding of relevant concepts and your ability to apply the concepts in your recommended solutions to the problems posed.

2. You are able to constructively critique the company’s marketing situation.

3. The opinions you express are clear and supported by concise, creative, and logical arguments grounded upon sound theory).

4. The report is easy to read and understand, with a layout that allows the reader to easily grasp the sense, direction, and objectives of the work.

5. The report is evidently based on research, broadly and skillfully made from varied sources (Journal articles, industry publications, magazines, websites, newspapers, informal interviews, etc.).

6. Harvard referencing style is used accurately and consistently in within-work citations and in presenting your list of references at the end of the report.

7. The report is visually striking and appealing, as a well-designed package