Assignment No 1

John Jeffrey Organic Farming Business

 Table of Contents
EXECUTIVE SUMMARY........................................................................................................1

1. INTRODUCTION..............................................................................................................1

2. QUESTIONS......................................................................................................................2

2.1. STRATEGIC MARKETING AND ITS BENEFITS TO JOHN................................2

2.2. SWOT ANALYSIS FOR JOHN.................................................................................3

2.3. PORTER’S GENERIC STRATEGIES FOR JOHN...................................................4

2.4. MARKETING STRATEGIES WITH ADVANTAGES & DISADVANTAGES.....5

2.5. STRATEGIES & PRICING DECISION IN HOME COUNTRY PERFORMING

PESTLE ANALYSIS.............................................................................................................6

2.6. PROS & CONS RELATED TO ORGANIC PRODUCTS SELLING IN

EMERGING MARKETS.......................................................................................................9

3. CONCLUSION...................................................................................................................9

3.1. RECOMMENDATIONS..........................................................................................10

REFERENCES.........................................................................................................................10
 EXECUTIVE SUMMARY
John Jeffery was a full time lawyer who quitted his job in order to focus on farming
vegetables organically as he had been growing vegetables for family usage since 20 years in
his backyard. He was quite confident that he can do great in this business and will get great
profit. After leasing land for farming there had been 18 months and his business is still
stagnating while being bit profitable in first year as he was not having an appropriate
marketing strategy and just focused on using leaflets placed in mail boxes of people close to
his farm.

Effective marketing of an organic business needs an appropriate marketing mix which can
help in getting more and more customers while capitalizing customer service and quality of
products being provided to them in comparison to all others products being sold in market.
John hasn’t used internet or digital marketing to sell his products even though it is trending to
great extent in UK where people are purchasing goods online. There is great potential for
organic products to be sold online and there is increasing popularity among customers due to
increasing concerned linked with health.

1. INTRODUCTION
Within previous years the importance of organic food market has increased so has the overall
market with increasing number of sales of organic products as people are more focused on
fitness nowadays and they have made exercise and healthy food an essential part of their life
in order to stay fit. Within current highly changing market the focus of people is shifting
towards more and more organic products and with changing time their demand is increasing.
Even though at start the population which is looking for organic food was limited but with
changing need and time when customers realized the benefits of organic food and got
motivated mostly through positive word of mouth they eventually turned towards organic
food. The trend of organic food is increasing to great extent as the benefits of organic food
are to great extent including good for health while including no pesticides, tastier than non-
organic products and far much greater in taste as compared to non-organic products. All the
organic vegetables are available in UK where either the sellers sell them online which
involves home supply as when customers want any certain vegetable they place an order and
get highly fresh and good in condition vegetables at their doorstep rather than going and
searching in supermarkets. Another available option of purchasing fresh vegetables is farmer

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market specifically on Saturday or Sunday where the farmers come with their products and
sell at good prices as compared to prices offered by supermarkets.

The concept of selling organic food is very good has John is having unique products with
superior value being provided to end customer who is actually consuming those products. But
the marketing strategy of John is not up to mark as he is focused on using a marketing hit and
trail strategy which is basically linked with building recognition within minds of consumers
at local level. He went for sending leaflets to people at their houses in order to get response
from them whereas the response was not as much expected as only 4% of total people
responded. Another weakness of John is that he never follows up the restaurant owners in
order to complete repeated transactions. His client based hasn’t increased to great extent as
the idea of strategic planning hasn’t hit him and he isn’t aware of reasons of not increasing
customer base.

2. gQUESTIONS
2.1. STRATEGIC MARKETING AND ITS BENEFITS TO JOHN
In order to be more effective within strategic marketing the first need is to gather enough of
information related to marketing strategies and the processes of strategic marketing in order
to create awareness regarding importance of marketing and strategic marketing. Strategic
marketing is basically a marketing process based on certain strategies which helps in
improving the consumer base by focusing on right consumer market segment and assuring
that great quality and quantity of products and services will be provided to them on the right
time and place while considering their changing needs and demand (Carvalho et al., 2016).
The marketing efforts of John in the case of hit and test strategy are limited to just the field in
which he is manufacturing or growing the vegetables as he isn’t focused on selling his goods
to the restaurants on repeated version which for once purchased from him. There is no clear
direction with which the certain products should be grown in order to have a sustainable
supply of goods in order to meet the output goals and achieve a certain productivity level.

There is need for Johnson to understand the market and customers while evaluating what type
of products they usually purchase and what type of products they are demanding in order to
start growing all of those products which will be helpful in increasing his sales and attracting
more customers. Going for door to door selling or through mails cannot bring big results
when it comes to selling vegetables or organic products even though it reduces the investment
amount but when it doesn’t brings high profit margins it is eventually of no use (Armstrong et

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al., 2018). Whereas restaurants can provide great profit margin to John as they will be
purchasing goods on regular basis whereas they require great amount of investment as well in
order to grow organic food as per the requirement of restaurants. Likewise when it comes to
restaurants he can go for producing such products which are having high demand and are
normally short when demand is high whereas within remaining time of season he can focus
on small segment markets which will retain his productivity. Thus producing products while
considering the demand months will improve the productivity of John and reduce his cost per
unit being based on strategy mix.

Advertising techniques includes different organizational incentives along with key brand
information in order to target the specified customers (Armstrong et al., 2018). John needs to
develop a marketing strategy in order to reach his specified consumer base easily and
effectively by conducting proper marketing research. Along with that John can go for using
digital media strategy where he can provide customers about his organic products through
digital media which is highly being used by people nowadays. Digital media helps in creating
awareness regarding products bring less expensive while attracting customers to great extent
and has chances of greater outcomes as compared to those of selling goods using door to door
technique or through mails as they were not effective in case of John.

2.2. SWOT ANALYSIS FOR JOHN

SWOT basically refers to strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, and threats of a specified
person or company.

Strengths
As per current case study there are number
of organic plants which are produced by
John being best in quality while having
great marketing potential in comparison to
all other organic products which are being
sold in UK markets as organic products are
great in trend there people go for purchasing
organic plants in comparison to all other in-
organic ones available in market as they are
fresh and healthy for them to be used and
kept in home.
Along with that the another biggest strength
of John is that he is having a high quality of
technical experience of 20 years when it
comes to soil and its types along with the
variation within different organic
commodities while considering how to
Weaknesses
One of the biggest weakness of John is lack
of awareness regarding marketing strategies
and concepts which can be used in order to
boost sales. Due to lack of marketing
information he didn’t even focused on
understanding the consumer behavior while
conducting a complete research on business.
No company can develop a great consumer
base and improve their customer satisfaction
when proper research and development is
not conducted and company doesn’t adopts
a proper marketing plan.
There is no business investment within
digital or social media marketing due to
which the business is lacking behind.

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 plant, grow, and harvest them.
Opportunities
John is having great information regarding
organic vegetables and has an art of
growing them in a certain way which
produces great and healthy products. Within
same time the organic food industry is
increasing day by day which is a great
opportunity for John.
Along with that when John receives account
of good health evidence from British
government which can help in getting great
market access.
Threats
Biggest threat to John is lack of customer
response as when he has distributed his
posters to local customers there is no
positive response from them which is one of
biggest threat to his future sales.
As there is no positive response from
customers thus increasing investment in
business while taking loans will be a biggest
threat to John.

2.3. PORTER’S GENERIC STRATEGIES FOR JOHN

When it comes to Porter’s generic strategies the best one for John is standardized marketing
priority approach which focuses on making a business much more competitive by considering
a certain regional market, a specific product line, or a specific segment of a market. Here
differentiation strategy, focus strategy, and cost leadership approach can be appropriately
used which will eventually help in getting attention of that specified market and meeting their
need but here the focus is primarily on a small target market.

a. Focus Strategy

The focus strategy pays attention towards increasing consumer profitability by focusing on
specified market (Omsa et al., 2017). When a company focuses on a specific product or
market it produces such products which are highly desired by that market eventually leading
to increase in overall productivity of company.

b. Cost Leadership Strategy

Cost leadership strategy focuses on having a certain product pricing strategy which is
competitive with all other businesses in market thus helping in getting attention of mass
marketing (Omsa et al., 2017). John can go for low cost strategy as that will help in focusing
on a certain specific segment from all of those and can serve that specific segment within
better way thus meeting all of their needs and demands rather than going for meeting
demands of all types of customers thus failing in the end.

c. Product Differentiation Strategy

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Product differentiation strategy involves differentiating your products from others in market
to gain consumer attention (Omsa et al., 2017). There are number of risks concerned with
different actions taken by a company as the costs required for a specific focused business is
much higher as compared to that of costs required for a less focused business and
differentiation becomes quite less beneficial as there are number of competitors within
market and they eventually start focusing on that specific segment that a focused business is
targeting. Whereas whole target business approach meets the goals in a better way while
being focused on costs or differentiation strategy.

Both of these strategies can be very helpful for John as he is having superior and unique
organic vegetables quality and can offer competitive prices to get access to mass market in
UK.

2.4. MARKETING STRATEGIES WITH ADVANTAGES &

DISADVANTAGES
i. Partnership or Joint Venture

One option available to John is to go for partnership or a sort of joint venture with certain
leading supermarkets being local and well-known in the area (Deepak & Jeyakumar, 2019).
The inflow of customers within the supermarkets is to great extent higher as compared to
other places and adopting such a strategy can be very helpful and useful for John in selling
fresh and healthy organic vegetables. The disadvantage of partnership is that the partner can
sometimes be resistant in selling the products what John wants to sell or can in future demand
a high prices for keeping organic products of John in supermarket when the sale of products
start increasing to great extent.

ii. Product Awareness

Another strategy can be creating awareness among the customers through marketing the
products where John can inform them about the benefits of organic products while informing
them about proteins and other healthy items in those products along with fresh taste of
products (Deepak & Jeyakumar, 2019). This strategy can be beneficial in creating great
organic product value but there is need of great research work to be done and great time is
required in order to contact the customers and create awareness among them by informing
them about organic products.

iii. Social Media Marketing

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John’s key principle is not getting engage in aggressive marketing due to which there is very
little information available about John’s products in market. In order to get access to
customer market to great extent and have a wide consumer base there is need to integrate
strategic marketing within business model of its organic vegetables (Deepak & Jeyakumar,
2019). Great market potential can be gathered using digital and social media marketing which
is emerging need of time and customers are more focused on sellers which are providing
them products right at their homes rather than purchasing online. The need of digital and
social media marketing is increasing day by day as the way of treatment towards these
marketing strategies is changing day by day. Here direct link is generated among customers
and sellers which can help in gaining highly loyal customer base along with great other
benefits.

2.5. STRATEGIES & PRICING DECISION IN HOME COUNTRY

PERFORMING PESTLE ANALYSIS
John is a person who is highly ambitious while having a great business idea which he
implemented but was not so much successful as per his planning but is still into his business.
In the first step he should have conducted proper market research which he didn’t. Now there
is need to understand that within his business what is he doing right and what is being done
wrong in order to solve the issues.

If John goes for starting providing its products within my home country the appropriate
strategies will be as follows:

a. Branded Marketing

Marketing of products while using a specific brand name helps in increasing the awareness
regarding products and services to customers while informing them about value of products
being sold (Vijayan, 2019). The marketing process focuses on creating awareness regarding
customers using organic products and promoting the prices of different products within
advertisements. John should go for having a brand name specified with organic products
which will get customer attention. Along with that competing with market will become easy
using brand name for selling organic products.

b. Finding Wholesale Markets

John should focus on searching a reliable markets where there are wholesaler ready to
purchase products from him in premises when it is harvested. John can go for involving

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grocers, wholesaler, retailer, and other buyers in order to sell them organic products to great
extent. When a contract is developed with buyer it can bring great benefits to business in long
run (Vijayan, 2019). This is very beneficial strategy as it helps in achieving economy of scale
while simply selling products and advertise products of company easily.

c. A Company Website

One of biggest venture for John is internet marketing of its organic farm products with its
user name. A website can help in developing better communication with customers while
having complete business control being in best interest where customers can easily navigate
the website and gather information about availability of products and services (Bernal-Jurado
et al., 2017). The advertising work will inform customers with updated information regarding
availability of organic products with farm along with information related to images and all
additional information.

d. Low Pricing Strategy

When it comes to selling of goods and services a better low pricing strategy can be highly
effective for John while working within my home country as here people prefer purchasing
great products which are being offered at lower prices in comparison to what is being offered
by others.

e. Differentiation Strategy

This strategy can be very effective when it comes to providing customers with unique
products as per their needs and demands while considering the customer segments as there
are number of companies doing businesses while being based on market segmentation and
are very successful.

As per the above mentioned strategies the PESTLE analysis for my home country is as
follows:

i. Political:

Political factors involves all the factors including policies of government and other things
involves which eventually influences the overall working of a business (Bernal-Jurado et al.,
2017). As Bahrain is having an autocratic political system or a kingdom-ship where there is a
king ruling the whole country and political environment is having great influence on different
factors including governmental policies, changes within interest of political people involved

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and changes within their decisions which eventually influences the overall business
environment and it’s working.

ii. Economic

There are number of economic factors including inflation, demand, and supply of products,
taxation process, and interest rates which influences the overall purchasing decision of
people. Increase in inflation rate or taxes brings increase in product’s prices which eventually
reduces number of customers (Bernal-Jurado et al., 2017). As the economic conditions of
Bahrain is quite stable thus industrial licensing and liberalization of foreign capital can be
very helpful in improving overall economic conditions within which business can work and
improve eventually. John can do business within Bahrain being successful to great extent.

iii. Social

Within every country there are number of norms and values which are followed by customers
and eventually influences the way of doing a business within the market (Bernal-Jurado et al.,
2017). It involves any vogue influence on business market as there are number of social
factors including the education of people, gender, culture, work attitudes, and income
distribution etc. which overall influences the business conditions. The success and failure of a
business depends on such changing factors which eventually can bring changes in buying
behaviors of customers thus effecting the productivity of customers in the end.

iv. Technological

Advancement within technology reveals how better a company markets its products and
services among the customers (Bernal-Jurado et al., 2017). One of strongest is Bahrain when
it comes to IT and technology as Bahrain has advanced itself to great extent in technological
terms and this advanced technology can be very helpful for John while selling organic foods
to customers online as there are majority of people in Bahrain who prefer purchasing online
rather than going to markets due to their high busy life schedule.

v. Legal & Environmental Factors

Environmental factors includes the number of factors which influence the overall running of
a farming business (Bernal-Jurado et al., 2017). There are number of legal changes within
Bahrain including increases in minimum wages, recycling, saying no to plastic and much
more which directly influences the businesses and can effect John’s business in Bahrain.

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There are number of environmental problems occurring due to urbanization leading to health
problems and in such conditions growing and selling of healthy and hygienic organic
vegetables can have great business market.

2.6. PROS & CONS RELATED TO ORGANIC PRODUCTS SELLING IN

EMERGING MARKETS
The advantages of organic product businesses when they enter the emerging market includes
(Gabriel, 2019):

1. The benefit of high demand for its organic products as they gain great popularity in
emerging markets in short time.
2. Establishing and building of business becomes easy due to which competition with
other businesses is eliminated.
3. Organic product business get attached with all other sellers selling same products due
to which marketing becomes easy.
4. As there are number of benefits in entering emerging markets thus organic products
business becomes prestigious.

The disadvantages of organic product businesses when they enter the emerging market
includes (Gabriel, 2019):

1. Uncertainty among emerging markets can bring bankruptcy when sales of company
are very less.
2. Lack of information may lead to failure of business.
3. Number of political risks are concerned with doing business in emerging markets
especially changing marketing or selling laws.
4. Poor corporate governance of emerging markets can lead to main businesses taking
control over all the available customer market.

3. CONCLUSION
John organic farming business is stagnating as he lacked effective marketing knowledge and
strategies which could help in boosting his business as he relied on leaflets which he placed
within mail boxes of people living close to his farm and focused on increase customer base
by this way which eventually turned out to be useless as there was response of 4% customers
only. Internet marketing can a useful marketing strategy which can help John in increasing
his number of customers and business along with his profit turnover as it helps in reaching

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great number of customers within short span of time. An operating website of organic
farming business will help in enabling consumers to gather better information about organic
farming business, reputation, and image of business in market, quality of products being
provided, and how much quantity is usually available.

Along with that a website can help customers in getting appropriate information about items
and locations to which they can be delivered which makes purchasing of products easy.
Along with that website helps people in gathering information regarding their customers and
preferences of customers eventually helping in keeping all the required organic products
which are high in demand rather than keeping such products which are not being sold to great
extent or a limited stock of them is being purchased. This also helps in creating quick and less
costly awareness among customers and attracting them to great extent.

3.1. RECOMMENDATIONS
The innovations which John can do in his business can include weeding technique, pest
control methods, and information technology. Within weeding technique John can go for
removing weeds from his farms using small machines in order to ensure mechanical removal
of weeds without use of any sort of chemical. Within pest control John can go for using such
pest controlling methods which can improve quality of vegetables. Within terms of
information technology there are various ways to contact the existing and new consumer base
and bring increase in sales where one is internet marketing.

REFERENCES
Armstrong, G. M., Kotler, P., Harker, M. J., and Brennan, R. (2018). Marketing: an
introduction. Pearson UK.

Bernal‐Jurado, E., Mozas‐Moral, A., Fernández‐Uclés, D., & Medina‐Viruel, M. J. (2017).

Explanatory factors for efficiency in the use of social networking sites—the case of organic
food products. Psychology & Marketing, 34(12), 1119-1126.

Deepak, R. K. A., & Jeyakumar, S. (2019). Marketing management. Educreation Publishing.

Gabriel, C. A. (2019). Renewable energy enterprises in emerging markets: strategic and

operational challenges. Routledge.

Omsa, S., Abdullah, I. H., & Jamali, H. (2017). Five competitive forces model and the
implementation of Porter’s generic strategies to gain firm performances.

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Vijayan, G. (2019). Organic Food Certification and Marketing Strategies. Agrihortico.

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