BE562-7-SP Marketing & Innovation Coursework 2 Brief | UoE

Marketing Strategy Plan 

For this coursework, you should assume the role of the director of marketing and sales. You are asked to develop a marketing strategy plan that is focused on your business’s innovative strengths and ultimately results in sustainable competitive advantage (SCA). Your report should have 3000 words, including in-text citations and excluding references (and appendices if any). Please note, due to access to reliable business sources and although not necessary, it is recommended to choose a business that has a strong presence in the UK market.    

Guidelines:  

You are asked to develop a marketing strategy for your chosen business. Please familiarize yourself with the steps below before deciding on a business company. Your marketing strategy plan should include the following:  

Executive Summary: This section should provide an overview of the whole report, which it is a brief for an executive to make decisions. This executive summary is a summary of the whole report, written in a concise way to allow the executive to get their head around the background of the report, the analysis that has been conducted and the recommendations. [roughly 150 words]

Introduction: This section should provide an introduction to the report. [roughly 200 words]

Situational/Market Analysis: A presentation of the UK market (or your home country market) and your chosen business company. You need to study the UK market (your home country market) where your chosen business company is available and present an overview of the industry, including key competitors of the business company, their market position, etc. Using reliable business sources is helpful to show your understanding of the business company. [roughly 500 words]  

Market Segmentation, Targeting and Positioning: A presentation of different target markets, which are served by your business company. You need to categorise your target market into different groups and present each group using facts and figures from reliable business sources. Successful businesses classify their market into smaller clusters or sub-target markets and serve them separately based on their different needs and wants. This part requires detailed market research and an in-depth understanding of the different sub-target markets of your business. Using reliable business sources is helpful to show your understanding of the different sub-target markets. [roughly 500 words]  

Innovation in Marketing: A presentation of your company’s key innovation activities that result in sustainable competitive advantage (SCA).  You need to present and explain how your business company benefits from its innovation drivers (i.e., product innovation, service innovation, and/or business model innovation) to achieve market success, maintain its market position, and ultimately lead to SCA. As a key source of SCA, you can focus on more than one innovation driver (i.e., product, service, and business model innovation). Alternatively, you may select a particular source of innovation (a choice from product innovation, service innovation, or business model innovation). It is recommended to use reliable business and academic sources to show your understanding of the company’s innovation drivers for achieving SCA (roughly 750 words).  

Strategic Marketing: A presentation of a trade-off for managing resources. A key part of any marketing strategy plan is the proper allocation of resources to different activities, which will ultimately result in achieving SCA. Please note, this section is NOT a conclusion or summary of your report. You need to recommend one or more than one strategy to your business company for managing its limited resources. Managing resources optimally is critical, as marketing resources provide the primary action levers for businesses to achieve SCA. There are various ways to present and justify your resource management. For example, you can justify your allocation of resources to different drivers of innovation, different channels of your business, different target markets, etc. You can limit your resources for one particular driver of innovation and allocate more to a different one. You can cut the budget on one particular target market, as presented in part 2, and increase the budget for another target market. Moreover, bear in mind that whatever decision, with regards to managing resources, you make, you need to justify your choices with personal evaluation and use reliable business resources, wherever possible (roughly 750 words). 

Conclusion: Based on your research and analysis, suggest recommendations for the executive managers at your selected company to further help their strategic marketing by identifying the recommended marketing strategy based on assessing various identified innovation opportunities (product innovation, service innovation and/or business model innovation). (roughly 150 words) 
 
Notes and recommendations on the assignment:  

• Try to justify your points, decisions, and arguments using reliable business sources. In some parts, such as part 3, using reliable academic references will also be helpful. 
• Your coursework should be developed as a marketing strategy plan rather than a descriptive essay. While writing different sections, use facts, figures, and tables from reliable business resources. 
• It is important that you be able to defend and justify your arguments and decisions made throughout your marketing strategy plan. Wherever possible, use reliable resources to support your points. 

Module Learning Outcomes

On successful completion of the module, students will be able to:

• Analyse the historical emergence of marketing, and locate marketing within a wider social, economic and political context.
• Demonstrate an understanding of key principles, practices, theories and concepts that constitute contemporary marketing practice.
• Critically evaluate the role of marketing in contemporary society.
• Critically evaluate the importance of innovation activities in marketing firms and within different sectors.