Role of Marketing Functions - IKEA

The report is based on the case study of IKEA, which was founded in Sweden and now has become the world's largest furniture retailer. It also sells kitchen appliances and home accessories. It is an online business company who sells the entire product online andis always aware about new technologies. It presented all roles and responsibilities of marketing functions and helps to take a company on further level of growth and development.

It also focuses on how these responsibilities will help to make an organization wider and maximizes its sales. The company also conducts many programs and events to let people know about their brands and products. The report compares different ways of marketing mix that is 7 P's to achieve overall business objectives. It also throws light on the main functions of IKEA and how it will enhance the performance level of company. The report also shows that IKEA differs from others because of its planning and innovations. It will also present a basic marketing plan other than IKEA.

TASK 1

P1. Roles and responsibilities of marketing functions in the context of IKEA

Marketing functions play a vital role in an organization's mission. It helps to promote all the material of a business and increase the volume of sales. Marketing functions manages the brand according to the need of users it means what customers need and how they interact with a company. IKEA is a company who sells all its products online and it includes furniture, kitchen appliances and home accessories. It is now the world's largest furniture retailer company. In IKEA, it also conducts campaign management for marketing initiatives. It also promotes materials and also keeps them up to date as to increase the sales volume. IKEA first identifies products and services to focus more on selling cycle and then produce those products according to the needs of customers and communicates and promotes them (Responsibility of Marketing Departments.2018). IKEA is an online company which sells its product online; this marketing function helps to keep website content up to date , so that people can quickly searches about the business and new additions

Marketing department of IKEA monitors and manages the social media, it also carefully watch what being posted on social sites about a company online (Armstrong and et.al. 2015). The main role of marketing function in IKEA is to produce internal communication which means that the employees who work should know their values and goals, aims, objectives so that they work with more interest. It is often more responsible for employee communication through newsletter and internet.

When a conference is held, the members who work in marketing department acts as a spokesperson or guides on behalf of IKEA and they know how to responds to media. Research also plays a vital role in marketing functions, as it help to define target markets and opportunities to understand the needs of market and customers, then they apply in a company whether they fulfill them or not (Martensen and Mouritsen, 2015). In IKEA company, to select a company and then manage them to produce marketing material to support a market. These include agencies, print vendors, web providers etc. It is job of the marketing department to reach customers, investors and community to let them know about products and planning because they are only help in creating an image which represents a company in positive and negative term.

Next are responsibilities of marketing functions for growing more revenue, increase market share and contribute to IKEA's growth and development. A company without marketing department cannot earn and increase its sales. There are many key responsibilities of a company which should be handled especially by the marketing department.

In a company, there are various types of marketing department i.e. advertising, publications etc. Each person is liable to its responsibilities and completes it on time. To establish marketing strategies, it is necessary to come close to customers in order to find their needs. IKEA also creates surveys and keep information to sales team and customer support which helps to redirect the marketing strategies in future. They also establish channels and social networks to understand the needs of user better. It is important to know the position of a company and about its rivals that is why IKEA always keep its eye on selling that which product sold more and also identify its mistakes in order to overcome from it.

There are many people who work with an objective of a company and their contribution towards company makes it stronger and sustain on its own position. IKEA always surprised customers by their innovations and attract more customers. The marketing department of a company works on new promotions, programs and should improve more to convert the message and actions of customers.

IKEA is a company which started its business with limited people but now there are around 150 people engaged, and are always trying to achieve the targeted goals and objectives. It does not matter that other departments are complete their responibity or not, if marketing department will fail then the entire system fails. That is why marketing functions have their importance in every small and big organizations. Marketing department should know the behaviour of user and customer's feeling and having more contact with them help to improve in sales process and maximizes the profit. IKEA also plan for next year activities and this marketing department is able to plan the next year's budget to perform well. As these activities are one time investment of time, money and efforts.

Every action of IKEA is checked whether they meet the target objective or not. IKEA also makes strategic plans to increase its sales and to do so it draft a document in every month to know the actual position of a company, also takes important actions to know strengths, competition and target markets.

P2. Different key roles and responsibilities of marketing related to IKEA

Roles and responsibilities are generate to increase the scope in an organization. In IKEA, rules are made to follow and the employees who work there are keep follow rules i as they are not so tough but it help them to complete the need and target of a company. The role of each department is unique and has its own importance and also helps to sustain in growing world.

These roles and responsibilities may affect the performance of IKEA such as:

Strategy: being a senior manager of IKEA, the main responsibility for setting marketing strategy with overall company strategy and objectives. It may help in maximizing profit and increase the volume of sales and share in specific market sector. For example, to enter a new sector and opens new channel then marketing team consults with management before planning. These strategies help to widen the organization and by taking right decision on time will help to attract customers and increase its sell power. Strategic planning will help to plan for future also as this may affect the upcoming activities which may influence the performance of IKEA.

Marketing Research: it is a key responsibility of IKEA. As research helps to identify opportunities and understand customer's needs and priorities (Pike, 2015). Through marketing research, the manager can know strengths and weaknesses of a company so they can take legal action in order to widen business and let it towards more profit. Through research process, company can beat its weaker rivals and add more customers in their business to increase the volume of sales. The manager of IKEA can read out all industry reports, survey, market data on websites or by contacting more customers and get to know the market and customer's need and adopt many new technologies to their business in order to gain more profit and take business into further level of success.

Product Development: the department works with internal and external product development team to develop new product and replace or improve existing one. This department of IKEA determine the sales of existing product and identify the gap range in terms of price and helps to reduce those gaps, this will help to add more new products on the store and creates new brand image in front of customers (Akbar, Omar and Wadood, 2017). As marketing team provides information related to new product and this product development department help to improve their product and add new innovations according to needs of customers. Then marketing department sets prices and then launch a product into market and collect reviews from users.

Communications: IKEA plans different campaigns and develop communications material to promote products and services to customers. Remaining budget will help to plan on advertisement campaigns, develop e- mail marketing programs, promotions on website; these all plans are done to ensure the safety related to product and gain trust of customers. IKEA is a trustworthy company and all these programs are done to develop positive image among people. It also writes press notice related to launching on new product, company brochures, and product data sheet and customers newsletter (Uksumenko, Kuzmicheva and Vorozhbit, 2017). Overall it completes all communications level for launching new product. It also designs the promotional material and if the department may have skills they may appoint advertising agencies or firms to produce work. For Better communication with employees will help in fast running of product and maximize sales volume.

Sales Support: there is a link between sales and marketing departments function, if coordination is good it will help to improve the sales performance and boost up the growth. Marketing department provide sales team running advertisement such as coupon or telephone number and also encourages visitors to fill full details in the website in return for a free newsletter or special report (Pappas, 2017). This idea will definitely help in selling and adding new innovations in their product according to customer’s feedback. Marketing function of IKEA also prepares presentation for promotion of new products to customers in order to let them know about new offers and stocks.

Events: organizing events is also key marketing function of IKEA. It organizes exhibitions, seminars, sales conferences and many more in order to attract more customers. These events are done to promote their products on wide variety of area and to get success in marketing field. Through events, a company may know the actual needs as they directly interact with customers (Holbrook, 2018). Through displays, and presentation, marketing department of a company easily knows the basic requirement and if the events are successful then the owner of IKEA can identify the sale of product in future. These events are done to get people aware related to the product and keep them close to users who continuously buy their product which are home appliances, kitchen appliances and furniture.

TASK 2

P.3. Presenting different ways in IKEA using marketing mix (7P's) to achieve business objectives

As IKEA is online retailer company and it provides services to all types of people that is why it uses 7 P's of marketing that is product, price, place, people, physical evidence, promotion, and process. These seven factors are interlinked to each other and help in growth of a firm and achieve its target while other company is only based on product firm so they may use 4 P's only. IKEA uses all seven factors and it affect the performance of a business.

Product: there are 9500 products and IKEA launches 2500 new more product in a year. These product are design in house with well contracted designers. It promotes the idea of innovative designs will other firm did not. The product can be examine by its five dimension design: form, quality, functions, sustainability and its low price (Service marketing mix.2018). These five features are not given by any other company that is why IKEA is differ from all other.

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