2- Digital Marketing

Assignment task

Adopting the role of a digital marketing consultant, you are required to submit to the owners of a case-study organization, recommendations of what elements of digital marketing would be most suitable to meet that organization’s online objectives.

Presented in the form of a consultant report, the recommendations should identify and critically analyse the fundamental issues related to digital marketing and show clear evidence of synthesis and evaluation of the subject in the recommendations given to the organization.

Assignment guidance

The underlying principle of this assignment is that the recommendations made in the report should be specific to the case-study organization, and not a generic description of the elements of digital marketing that are available to any organization.

In the appendix there is a case study which gives you details of a fictitious – though credible – organization. There is sufficient information within the case study for you to complete the task. However, you will have to conduct an extensive situational analysis considering such things as – but not limited to; how this kind of organization operates, the nature of the market in which it exists, the impact of competitors and how they operate and market themselves, customer expectations / behaviour and relevant aspects of the environment that might impact on that organization’s marketing and in particular its digital marketing.

Note that although this situational analysis has to be conducted in order to develop the report, the analysis MUST NOT make up part of the submitted report – that is; the report has no ‘situational analysis’ section/chapter.

The report must not change any of the stated circumstances or advise any changes to the stated business and/or marketing strategy, for example; names of the organization. As a digital marketer you must consider the online marketing for the existing business / product/ service as presented.

The report is addressed to the owner[s] of the organization and you are to write it as if you are a consultant engaged to research and present the information. The report will be written in a management/consultant report format that will be easily understood by the addressees. That is: it is not an academic paper and must use appropriate language and terminology.

Similarly, there is no need to tell the addressees anything about themselves and/or their business – they already know!

The recommendations must be based on the model of key objective[s]. Your proposed objectives must be identified and justified in the introduction of your report.

You do not need to include any costs in the report [the price of a website, for example] however, as any marketing should give a return on investment, the approximate cost of your recommendations must be appropriate to the case-study organization and its resources [financial, physical and human]. Note that the ‘appropriateness’ will be just one thing that will become apparent during an effective situational analysis.

As is the case for management and consultant reports, the philosophy for this report is to include only content that is relevant – but cover all relevant issues.

As the nature of this assignment is designed to be as close as possible to a ‘real-life’ exercise that you might encounter in a work situation, the report itself will not include any academic references. However, you must include a bibliography of all the literature you have used in studying the module and developing recommendations for the case-study organisation.

Assignment presentation specification

The word limit for the report is up to 3,300 words excluding the appendices.
 
The case study: Lou’s Shoes

Louise and Christopher Walker are the business owners of a business called Lou’s Shoes. They sell different types of Ladies, Men’s, and Children’s Fashion Footwear. Louise and Christopher do not manufacture the items they sell personally but carefully curate products from fashion brands and manufacturers of suitable items buying them on a wholesale basis. They only sell to retail customers and not to other businesses on a wholesale basis.

The company has been trading for 2 years and currently has an eBay shop online with 11,500 positive feedback running with a rating of 4.95 stars. The company hires a small warehousing facility in the Northeast of England where they store, pick, and pack customer orders and receive returns. They do not have any bricks and mortar stores. The warehouse also has staff facilities for the 2 members of staff they currently employ part time. They both work 20 hours a week – one staff member is responsible for listing products and dealing with customer service messages via eBay and the other works in the distribution of the products and receiving goods into the warehouse. The warehouse is well placed for delivery / courier services and close to main transport links. None of the staff member have experience or knowledge of digital marketing other than listing on eBay.

The company sells Shoes, Sandals, and Boots for women, men, and children in the most popular fast fashion styles. They have a special ranges for weddings to suit brides, bridesmaids, flower girls and also mother of the bride. They also sell matching evening handbags to match these styles and some of their evening sandals.

People who visit the eBay shop, love the products for sale in the shop. The company currently does not have any other official online presence although details of her products have been shared on online forums with pictures and details particularly in bridal forums and on Instagram and Facebook.

Louise and Christopher would like to consider the possibility of expanding their online presence and sales including potentially internationally but do not know where to start, or with which countries / territories. She has standard business knowledge of computers but no formal business or marketing qualifications and has tasked you as a consultant to help with the best way to use the internet in the growth of her business.