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My Marketing Portfolio Submission
This was one of my first Macquarie University Assignments
In this extract I had to research the specific topics of Marketing concepts! For example: Market Research, PESTEL Analysis, SWOT Analysis etc.
My Responses
| SWOT Analysis | PESTEL Analysis |
| After conducting a situational analysis, businesses will have to prioritise and handle certain external and/or internal factors to enter or sustain competitive advantage and contest in the market. SWOT analysis, is an analytical process that identifies strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, and threats to which is then used to determine actions in the marketing mix (Colgate, n.d) . Mc Donald’s is a highly established global fast-food company that owns about 34,108 independent franchises and restaurants in 120 countries (Mc Donalds Corporations, 2017) . McDonalds has utilized SWOT analysis to assist the businesses marketing mix as it faces challenges throughout the year. According to Roberta Greenspan, 2018 Mc Donald’s strengths includes a robust and trustful global brand image, allowing Mc Donald’s to easily introduce new products which reduces risks of product failures and promotional advertisement. Early 2018, Mc Donald’s had easily released a Hazelnut-filled pie in Japan and used social media to promote the new product (Figure 2 Appendix) and instantly, the new product became very popular in Japan (Barr, 2018) . One major threat outlined by Bhasin’s, 2018 SWOT analysis is the rise of health-conscious consumers which further implicated into a weakness as Mc Donald’s brand and products doesn’t embody the image of healthy consumption. After uncovering this threat and weakness, Mc Donald’s made alterations to their marketing mix such as the adjustment to their happy meals further illustrating how companies use SWOT analysis to guide decisions in the marketing mix. In further depth, Mc Donald’s U.S division removed cheeseburgers from happy meals and removed sugar components of drinks they provide so that calories attained will be reduced for the sake of consumer health attitudes (Barr, 2018) . As a suggestion to Mc Donald’s, the company should indulge in healthier opportunities such as investing in more children parks campaigns to encourage children to be more active and counter the shifts in consumer attitudes. | PESTEL is a theoretical framework that outlines the possible external factors new businesses and/or products are subjected to in pursuit of satisfying the market. PESTEL consists of 6 factors which respectively are political, economic, sociocultural, technological, environmental, and legislative and each factor can either assist, diminish, or have no effect on new products. In February 2018, DJI had developed and released a new product known as the Mavic Air Drone. The Mavic drone is a light foldable drone for explorers, creators, and even commercial users that contains the latest drone technology in the world such as hand gesture controls and auto piloting with sensors (Calore, 2018) . PESTEL factors were in effect where some factors hindered, and some assisted the new products entry into the market. For example, the drone has been implemented with the latest technological developments in the context of drones such as the quality and functionality of its camera, size and the auto driving with sensors (DJI, 2018) . With its features being current, it gives more value and luxury to buyers and thus assisting its entry into the market. Economically, businesses such as farms have been utilising drones to gain competitive advantage, increasing the demand for drones and helping the Mavic Air drone enter the market (Divya, 2017) . On the other hand, environmental factors have had no effect on the drone as natural disasters have not occurred during its release. However, there are factors that have a negative effect in the drone’s entry to the market. Sociocultural factors such as individual’s attitudes towards commercial drones have now shifted due to privacy/spying concerns (Channel 9, n.d) and further implicated to governments to create new legislations and laws such as restrictions of fly zones (Australian Government, 2018) and further hindering the drone to enter the market. It is recommended DJI require a license to operate their drones to prevent misuse of their products. |
Appendix references:
Figure 2
Mc Donald’s, Chocolate and Hazelnut-Filled Pie advertisement, Source: (Barr, 2018)
Reflection:
In comparison to the first blog, this submission and/or communication portfolio was more, in terms of writing and communication, disappointing. But it was my first ever attempt to do Harvard referencing and ACBE100 has refined and helped me properly find effective resources and how to properly do in-text citations.
Thinking back and looking at the response now, I realise that my sources and my citing was very wrong. For example in some of the in-text citations such as (Channel 9, n.d). If I had done ACBE100 first instead of this subject, I would’ve definitely had known to find more reliable sources with actual dates. Additionally, back when I was writing this extract, I thought you could only have one source at the end of the sentence, let alone, I didn’t know how to put more than one in-text citations until ACBE100!
But overall, I have learnt my lessons and hope to improve on my writing in the future!
Nicolas Allen Hernandez - Academic Communication 