Research Objectives

Discuss about the Strategic Integrated Marketing Challenges.

Marketing is the industry through which every organization and industry promotes its businesses and products, services in the target market. This is performed to enhance the demand for the products and the services introduced by the business organizations in the target market. In modern terms, to conduct the functionalities of the marketing department, there are numerous sources are available. While in the traditional period of time, only a few were available. Yet they were effective but today’s marketing techniques have the strength to change the consumer’s preferences using effective modern techniques of advertisement and promotion. Under this report, research will be directed towards the role of technology in regards to the marketing. In addition to this, technology’s components and their functionalities are capable enough to enhance the performance of the organization. With the help of technology, organizations across the globe can increase their product’s demand, growth rate, etc. Furthermore, technology helps the organization to attain their desired gaols and the objectives, as well as technology, has the strength to enhance the effectiveness of the promotional and advertisement campaigns. And with the modern technologies of promotion and advertisement, organizations could spread the awareness in regards to their products across the globe. However, there are a number of benefits available in relation to the technology in marketing while, numerous disadvantages also exist with the same. The main component of technology is internet and it has the adequate strength to gain huge positive results for the organization.  Apart from this, organization could also use social media platforms; email marketing techniques, etc. to gain the consumers and to enhance the demand for the particular item or service across the global market. 

The major aim of this research proposal is to analyse the numerous aspects of the topic of research i.e. “Impact of Technology in marketing”. Furthermore, various other questions will also be covered under this research proposal in order to determine the appropriate and adequate factors available in regards to the research topic.  This research topic will be conducted with the view to analysing the functionalities of leading companies of Australia which includes Wesfarmers, Woolworths Limited and Amcor Limited (Hansen & Owen, 2016).

All these companies are involved in the production and distribution of products and services of various categories. Wesfarmers Limited is involved in the functionalities such as retail, manufacturing, and distribution of chemicals and fertilizers, coal mining, and safety products (Thorson & Moore, 2013). Woolworths Limited is also involved in various functionalities such as production and distribution of liquor products, hotel industry, retail market, etc. Along with these two companies, Amcor Limited is also known as the top manufacturer of flexible and non-flexible packaging. These are distributed across the globe and they are serving various manufacturing industries in order to provide appropriate packaging materials (Kumar, 2016).

Literature Review

All these companies stand in the top ten companies in Australia in terms of revenue and the biggest factor behind the success of the organization and the rapid increase in the demand for their products is the involvement of the technology in the marketing techniques (Arnold & Boggs, 2015).

• To determine the benefits of the technology in terms of marketing;
• To determine the disadvantages of the technology;
• Major components of the technology which has directed the various industries towards the success and the growth.

Research Question: This research paper will conclude the various aspects of the research. Certain aspects which will be critically evaluated and discussed under this research paper in relation to the “Impact of Technology in marketing” are:

• What are the different benefits/advantages of technology in marketing?
• What are the different disadvantages of impact of technology in the marketing?
• What are the unique features or components of technology which could direct the industries towards the success and the growth?

As per Beach (2014), there are numerous aspects are available in relation to the impact of the technology in the marketing i.e. promotion and advertisement functionalities. With the implementation of the unique and advanced methodology of promotional and advertisement techniques, various industries have attained adequate growth and the success (Xia, et. al., 2010). Across the globe, various big companies, as well as small and medium level companies, have adopted the method of technology for promoting their new products and the services in the global market with the view to attain the organizational goals and the objectives. Marketing functionalities have the adequate strength to provide more than sufficient growth and positive response as expected by the management of the organizations. With the help of technology in the marketing functionalities, organizations are able to spread the awareness in relation to their newly launched products, services or the newly launched business organization in the domestic or in the global market audience. Promoting the newly launched products and the services in order to increase the demand for the product is the most appropriate way to enhance the sales of the organization. This will lead to the enhancement of the growth as well as success factor of the organization (Richards & Schmidt, 2014).

Choice of the selection of the technology for performing marketing functionalities is a big task as to which technology more preference should be given and to which not is a bit difficult and complicated task (Sharma, 2015). Organizations need to perform adequate research in order to analyse the best and suitable technique for them. Technology’s revolution has been done since a very long time but in 1990, when technology was first introduced to perform advertisement and promotional activities, various challenges and issues occurred. Globalisation is one of those technologies which were introduced to enhance the effectiveness of the organization’s activities. But it also leads to various challenges in relation to the marketing activities (Northcott & Ma’amora Taulapapa, 2012). With the above discussion, it could be concluded that the technology has a great impact on enhancing the effectiveness of the marketing activities to promote and to spread awareness in relation to the newly launched business outlets, products, and the services across the globe.  It could easily understand that the technology has huge advantages while disadvantages in relation to the technology in marketing also exist (Belch, et. al., 2014).

The basic advantage of technology in marketing includes that the customers could avail the adequate information in regards to the newly launched products, services, as well as of new business outlets without putting much efforts. With the help of same technique, marketing activities have been treated as the most crucial functionality in the business organization’s activities. The basic component of the marketing activities is promotion and advertisement of newly launched products in the domestic, international or in the target market. Effective elements of the marketing activities are social media platforms, internet sources, email marketing, display shows, sponsorship of events, sports tournaments, etc. These all techniques are the result of invention done in the name of technology. Technology could be implemented in any industry and from recent years, technology has created an effective place in the organizational workplace irrelevance to their nature of the organization. Customers can gain adequate knowledge in relevance with the companies’ techniques used to promote their new products and services. With the help of technology, advertisement could be made so effective which could make consumers realise the importance of the certain products and the services. Making effective advertisements and the promotional campaigns help the organization to enhance its presence in the competitive business environment (Blakeman, 2014).

For instance, Amcor Limited is promoting its new type of packaging which specially designed to reduce the impact of the packaging from the environment. Apart from the importance of the packaging, the promotional campaign also defines the raw materials used in the production of the packaging which would not create a negative impact on the environmental conditions. Technology has also played an important role in enhancing the effectiveness of the marketing techniques and providing more options to the organization for promotion purpose. Before introduction of the technology in the marketing department, few methods were available such as newspaper advertisement, magazine advertisement, pamphlets, etc. which are known as the traditional methods of advertisement and promotion or print medium of advertisement (Entrepreneur, 2017). With the implementation of the technology, marketing team of every organization has got the two mediums through which they could promote and spread awareness amongst the public in regards to the products and the services of the organization i.e. traditional methods or print medium of advertisement and digital medium of advertisement. Other advantages of introducing technology in the marketing functionalities include that they have the capability to cover large part of the audience in terms of spreading awareness in regards to the products and the services as well as it is bit cheap for the organizations too. Cost of the production will also be decreased as with the help of technology, various other factors could be improved which could remove the extra cost incurred for the production of goods, etc. (Edsa, 2017).

Apart from these benefits, the primary advantage is the attainment of the trust from the consumers towards the organization and towards its products (Peter, 2015). Technology will be proven successful only when the true picture of the products and the services will be shown through the digital mediums of the promotion. As well as these mediums are updated regularly in order to make the consumer’s experience better and to enhance the consumer’s trust over the technological equipment used for promoting the products and the services (Garvey, 2014).

Methodology is the crucial part of the research paper. This helps to analyse and evaluate the impact of various sections included in the research paper in regards to the “Impact of the Technology in marketing”.  Under the methodology section, theoretical perceptive, design of the research, data collection methods, collecting samples and the techniques used to collect the samples, analysis and the presentation of the data in relevance with the research topic, reliability and validity, ethical considerations, timeline of the research, etc. will be covered for evaluating the effectiveness of the research conducted.

Theoretical perceptive of the research paper defines the possibility of conducting research. Under this research paper, theoretical perceptive in regards to the “Impact of the Technology in marketing” is being conducted. Apart from the impact of the technology, advantages and the disadvantages of the technology in regards with the same is also being covered with this research paper. As using technology to perform and to enhance the effectiveness of the marketing activities is marked as legal, hence; research on this topic could be carried without any issue (Ginsburg, et. al., 2017).

The research paper has been designed in the context of the topic of this research. The research topic will be mixed with the methods of conducting research in order to gain the adequate information in regards to the impact of technology in the marketing functionalities. To analyse the effectiveness of this research, various sources such as consumers, visitors, investors, employees as well as the management of the organizations. Designing of the research is done to enhance the effectiveness of the methods used to analyse the importance of the research topic (Grunig, 2013).

Method of data collection has a unique importance in terms of evaluating the effectiveness of the research paper. Under this step, various sources and the ways will be analysed from which the information will be collected for reaching to the appropriate result (Percy, 2014). For collecting the data for analysing the effectiveness of the research paper, two sources are available i.e. primary and secondary sources of data. Whereas primary sources are first-hand evidence of the information and these types of data are collected from the eyewitness of the incident, conducting surveys, etc. while secondary data sources are the sources which are collected by someone and those data are used to fulfil certain purpose. For instance, government conduct census surveys to determine the population count and it is known as primary source of data whereas companies use these data for determining the appropriate target audience for their newly launched product and the services (Hatziargyriou, 2014).

Under this method of collecting response, samples and other methods are distributed amongst a large number of consumers, visitors, employees, and to other stakeholders of the organization so as to collect the large number of responses. This is conducted in order to obtain the adequate and the effective results for which the research was executed. Collecting response from small number of audience, may lead to the negative results but in the scenario of large number of collection of sample, appropriate results will be attained for sure. Questionnaires, survey forms, feedback forms, etc. could be used. Response rate will be determined through the total number of responses asked and the total number of responses obtained. In order to analyse and obtain effective results, sample size would be 100 (Jensen, 2013).

Presentation of the data should be done in an appropriate manner as through this technique, better understanding in relation to the data collected and for which the research was conducted, the purpose would be determined. The collected data could be displayed under tables, charts, graphs, etc. (Kasper & Kellerman, 2014).

The data collected from the primary or secondary resources should be valid enough so that consumers and other stakeholders of the organization could rely upon the figures. These resources should be valid and the appropriate reference should also be given to the data collected from the secondary resources in order to maintain the transparency. The referencing for the secondary sources of data is crucial in order to build the strong relationship with the investors as investors invest their capital on the basis of history of the company, current condition of the company as well as through the figures. To attain the mark and to reduce the chances of any kind of modification in the data collected, referencing is must. With this procedure, organization will be able to make all types of stakeholders rely upon the facts and figures displayed to them (Knowthis, 2017).

Apart from this, valid data will be useful for attaining the mark of getting adequate results. The data which will be provided to stakeholders should be provided in the format which could be modified. And this security should also be kept within the organization so that without authorisation, no one will be able to make wrong use of the data and the chances of modification in the data would also be reduced. For this, organization could use the password protection which is an important factor generated with the help of technology. If any unauthorised person would try to reach to the data, his details will be captured in the system and appropriate actions will be taken or before modifying the data, written permit should be taken in order to avoid glitches in the future (Kraidy, 2017).

Ethical considerations define the rules and the regulations in relation to the completion of the project in an effective manner. All the considerations i.e. legal, political, environmental, social, etc. should be considered before performing the functionalities of the organization. avoiding and non-fulfilment of the ethical consideration may lead to the disturbance in the organizational performances. Hence, these should be considered adequate for attaining the expected and positive results in relation to the particular project (Lawrie, 2014).

Arnold, E. C., & Boggs, K. U. (2015). Interpersonal Relationships-E-Book: Professional Communication Skills for Nurses. Elsevier Health Sciences.

Beach, L. R. (2014). Decision making in the workplace: A unified perspective. Psychology Press.

Belch, G. E., Belch, M. A., Kerr, G. F., & Powell, I. (2014). Advertising: An integrated marketing communication perspective. McGraw-Hill Education.

Blakeman, R. (2014). Integrated marketing communication: creative strategy from idea to implementation. Rowman & Littlefield.

Edsa. (2017). Advantages of direct selling, Retrieved from:. https://www.edsa.ee/en/direct-selling/advantages-of-direct-selling/.

Entrepreneur. (2017). Unique selling proposition(USP). Retrieved from: https://www.entrepreneur.com/encyclopedia/unique-selling-proposition-usp.

Garvey, W. D. (2014). Communication: the essence of science: facilitating information exchange among librarians, scientists, engineers and students. Elsevier.

Ginsburg, K. R., Kinsman, S. B., & American Academy of Pediatrics. (2017). Reaching Teens Strength-Based Communication Strategies To Build Resilience and Support Healthy Adolescent Development.

Grunig, J. E. (Ed.). (2013). Excellence in public relations and communication management. Routledge.

Hansen, E. L., & Owen, R. M. (2016). Evolving Technologies To Drive Competitive Advantage in Hospitality Industry. Retrieved 01 31, 2016, from https://www.hotel-online.com/Trends/Andersen/tech.html

Hatziargyriou, N. (Ed.). (2014). Microgrids: architectures and control. Wiley/IEEE Press.

Jensen, K. B. (Ed.). (2013). A handbook of media and communication research: Qualitative and quantitative methodologies. Routledge.

Kasper, G., & Kellerman, E. (2014). Communication strategies: Psycholinguistic and sociolinguistic perspectives. Routledge.

Knowthis. (2017), Advantages of personal selling, Retrieved from: https://www.knowthis.com/personal-selling/advantages-of-personal-selling.

Kraidy, M. (2017). Hybridity, or the cultural logic of globalization. Temple University Press.

Kumar, R. (2011). Research Methodology, 3rd Ed. Sage London.

Lawrie, A. (2014). An exploration of perceptions of verbal and non-verbal communication strategies on intercultural group interactions and how they impact on learning and teaching in higher education. Internationalisation and the Student Experience, 14.

Northcott, D., & Ma’amora Taulapapa, T. (2012). Using the balanced scorecard to manage performance in public sector organizations: Issues and challenges. International Journal of Public Sector Management, 25(3), 166-191.

Percy, L. (2014). Strategic integrated marketing communications. Routledge.

Peter, P. C. (2015). MKTG 472 Advanced Integrated Marketing Communications.

Richards, J. C., & Schmidt, R. W. (2014). Language and communication. Routledge.

Sharma, R. (2015). IMC: A Tool for Building Competitive Advantage. International Journal of Core Engineering and Management, 2(2), 75-88.

Thorson, E., & Moore, J. (Eds.). (2013). Integrated communication: Synergy of persuasive voices. Psychology Press.

Xia, J. C., Evans, F. H., Spilsbury, K., Ciesielski, V., Arrowsmith, C., & Wright, G. (2010). Market segments based on the dominant movement patterns of tourists. Tourism management, 31(4), 464-469.