Wal-Mart Marketing Crisis, Essay Example

The “Made in USA” branding of most of Wal-Mart’s products is a local marketing scheme that focuses on the local market as opposed to the overseas market. Wal-Mart has adopted this marketing tactic in a bid to increase home market sales for its products by gaining local support for locally produced goods and services (Edelson, 2013). It is evident that the Wal-Marts marketing tactics are target the American market as opposed to eternal markets owing to the fact that it is still one of the top three consumer markets in the world.

It appears that management did lose its way and forgot the concepts and tenets that made the company successful. The company was initially grounded in values of American exceptionalism, where the company focused production and sale of its commodities within the US market. However, the need for reduction of operation costs lead the retailer to source its products from overseas markets that incur minimal operational and labor costs. However, sourcing products has left little support for local markets and opened up markets for imported products.

The company appears to have adopted a skewed marketing strategy as the company seeks to address the public perception crisis it currently faces. The company is in desperate need for the application of holistic marketing, where all members of the company’s staff, from the CEO to the lowest paid employee works towards a singular goal, add value to the organization. Holistic marketing would help Wal-Mart consider all aspects of their operations, and how it relates to their customer by considering all input from all employees both directly and indirectly responsible for marketing their commodities within the United States. Furthermore, a dwindling foreign market necessitates the application of marketing programs, activities and process that take into consideration the interdependencies and breadth that exists between the different elements at work.

In order for the marketing department to be successful, management responsible has to consider a number of marketing management tasks. The execution of these tasks determines the success of a marketing campaign. A successful marketing team develops marketing strategies and plans. Wal-Mart failed to develop marketing strategies and plans and focused on increasing profits through mitigation of costs by outsourcing its products from external markets (Kotler, 2014). Another important marketing function is capturing marketing insight. Wal-Mart fails to develop and assert its unique marketing insight that would have helped it connect with its customer. Wal-Mart focused on pricing as opposed to connecting with the customer to build a long-lasting relationship of customer loyalty.

Building a strong brand is essential in staying ahead of the competition in the 21^st century (Kotler, 2014). Wal-Mart failed to considerably build a strong brand by adopting specific marketing and production policies that would have favored its largest market, the US market. By sourcing most of its product from external markets, the company failed to connect with its most important clients, customers from the US market. By failing to do this, the company also directly failed to deliver and communicate value to the customer. This disconnect with the customer left the organization without a proper general long-term growth and development plan to help guide the marketing department.

In conclusion, There is a vivid relationship between Wal-Mart’s symptoms and how well management performed its tasks as far as marketing is concerned a general underperformance in the execution of these functions has undermined the company’s marketing efforts. There is need for the development of clear marketing functions, goals and objectives to help the company with its marketing crisis.

References

Brennan, J., Illinggworth, M., & Marbach, G. (2012). Wal-Mart Crisis Underscores Need For Strong Corporate Governance. PR News, 68(18), 1.

Edelson, S. (2013). Wal-Mart Vows $50B In Made In U.S. Goods. WWD: Women’s Wear Daily, 2015(11), 1. Retrieved March 13, 2015, from http://cdn3.yoox.biz/brioni/wp-content/uploads/2013/09/WWD-US-16.01.13.pdf

Kotler, P. (2014). Marketing Management. Upper Saddle River: Prentice Hall.