Brand Positioning Strategies for ASDA Amid the Cost-of-Living Crisis Case Study

Brand Positioning Strategies for ASDA Amid the Cost-of-Living Crisis

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Introduction: Brand Positioning Strategies for ASDA Amid the Cost-of-Living Crisis

ASDA is one of the renowned company of United Kingdom in terms of supermarket that offer clothing, home and entertainment to their large variety of consumers. The company had 145000 workers that serve around 18 million customers every week through their living sores situated across the country. The industry had large super centres that provide foods, and offer range of services such as photo printing, dry cleaners and banks to attract the customers by enabling extra services that are beneficial. The industry had launched an online selling website platform to sell George through George.com and 560 stores serving 8 lakh consumers a week. Logistic service launched back in 2011 through the Grocery Click and Collect platform that raised 15 million orders a year. The organizational structure follows the hierarchy method that has multiple branches of the organization to ensure one goal and is achieve in small steps by the members of the organization. The ASDA has centralized distribution system that consists of eight depots and relies mainly on top down decision making.

Figure 1.1: Revenue growth of ASDA over the years

The above figure depicts the revenue growth rate of ASDA over the years. It shows that in the year 2022, ASDA made an increment in their revenue growth by 6.4% than the previous year (Statista.com, 2023). The revenue growth figure depicts that ASDA holds a dominating position in the market in terms of revenue generation. However, ASDA's sales growth figure plummeted in early 2020, due to the pandemic outbreak and the transformation of shopping behaviors among customers. 

Stakeholder Analysis

Types	Stakeholders	Action
Internal Stakeholders	Chairman	Recruitment and retention of members of ASDA as well as educate them with the company’s benefits and so must develop a proper vision to recruit and retain employees during the crisis time.
Executives	The role is overseeing the organization and coordinating all the functions and so they should formulate effective strategies to reduce the cost so that customer can easily buy, despite having low income.
Marketing Manager	Defining the target consumer and brand proposition and provide consumer about the product insights. During the crisis, the manager need to introduce low cost products that have additional benefits and boost the sale during the crisis
Employees	There are different roles of employees according to their designation such as checkouts, packaging, scanning and others. During the crisis, they must provide support to their consumer and convince them to buy their products at affordable prices and they must ensure the increment of the organization during the crisis time.
Customer Relations manager	Maintain good relations with customers and provide quality services at affordable prices to meet the needs of the customer. During the crisis time relationship manager need to adhere emotional attachment with the customer to sell maximum goods at low cost.
External Stakeholders	Customers	Lowering down the cost would increase the switching amount of consumers that boost the revenue of the organization in the crisis time
Government	The government role is to provide affordable product at correct price and by joining g with ASDA, it has the opportunity to meet the needs of customer household crisis.

Table 1: Stakeholder Analysis

The above table represents the roles of different stakeholders associated with ASDA to enhance their customer reputation as well as provide budget-friendly products. It shows that Chairman is assigned the role of drafting a vision for the organization to meet the rapidly changing requirements of customers. Executives have a major role to develop effective strategies in order to provide cost-friendly service to customers. Marketing managers are associated with the role of drafting brand positioning strategies that would enable customers to explore a new way of budget-friendly shopping in the post-pandemic time. The customer relationship manager has a major role to play to maintain good relations with customers and ensure their loyalty towards the brand. Government has a vital role to formulate policies and securing a healthy business environment and offer better opportunities for organizational growth. 

Problem Overview

The retail sector is one of the principal supporters of the UK's GDP boost and economy. ASDA is one of the biggest retail partnerships in the UK as well as in the world. It holds a dominating position in the market in terms of remuneration growth as well as customer prestige. Nevertheless, the pandemic has changed consumer shopping manners that adversely affected the company's income growth in the market.

Figure 1.2: The UK’s retail sector performance over the years

The above figure illustrates the performance of the retail industry in the UK over the years. It has shown constant growth from the year 2017 and become a major donor to the country's economy. In the year 2020, The UK's retail industry suffered a flop of around 58.3 billion GBP that reduces its potential (Statista.com, 2023). It has lessened due to the pandemic and the transforming of the manners of customers. ASDA needs to produce influential marketing techniques that would help to meet the rapidly changing demands of customers. It would help them to earn a good prestige among customers and pave way for new expansion prospects. The firm will able to develop more revenue by drafting proper branding strategies. The consumer price index has shown a continuous rise that peaked at 40 year high. In the year, it figured at around 9.0% had created difficulties for people to purchase their desired product (Asda.com, 2022). It has also transformed the shopping manners of consumers as well as developed obstacles for the company to generate revenue. ASDA's profit generation and customer service have been affected by the rising price in the UK. 

Figure 1.3: Decline in Household Income

The above figure reflects that in the post-pandemic period, household income has witnessed sharp decline that increased difficulties for consumers. It shows that old age people income those are aged 75 or above witnessed a decline of -2.0% that increased their difficulties to purchase products (Asda.com, 2022). It has also increased difficulties for ASDA to generate revenue and gain a reputation among customers. The organization needs to introduce effective brand positioning strategies to mitigate these risks.

Research Aim, objectives, questions

Aim

This research will be aimed to analyze the role of branding strategies to increase the switching cost of customers and maintain loyalty towards ASDA.

 Objectives

• To evaluate the role of brand positioning strategy in shaping the business performance of ASDA.

• To effectively analyze the changing shopping behavior of customers in the post-pandemic period.

• To develop strategies that would be helpful to increase switching costs among customers. 

Questions

• What is the role of brand positioning strategies to enhance the business performance of ASDA?

• What are the changes witnessed in customer shopping behavior after the pandemic?

• What strategies would help to higher the switching cost among customers?

Literature Review

Brand positioning strategies play a crucial role to increase the switching cost among customers and make them loyal towards the brand. ASDA needs to formulate proper positioning methods to enhance their reputation among customers as well as unveil further growth opportunities. As opined by Kanakaratne et al. (2020), customer loyalty is influenced by several factors that have also been related to the brand's performance in the market. The author added that customer-based positioning strategies are effective to maintain customer loyalty and pave way for organizations' robust growth. On the contrary, Veleva et al. (2020) have argued that customer-based positioning strategies often raised complexities to manage a diverse customer base. It may reduce customer loyalty and affect the brand's performance in the market. 

Figure 2.1: Attribution theory framework

As stated by Huang and Rust (2021), Price based positioning is also helpful to maintain customer loyalty towards the brand and enable the brand to achieve robust growth. The author added that this positioning strategy would be effective to estimate the budget of customers and offer a better experience. As opined by Antwi et al. (2021), the Attribution theory would be helpful to understand customer requirements and meet their demands. This theory will increase the switching cost and make customers loyal towards ASDA.

Methodology

This research would use the appropriate methods for data collection and data analysis. As opined by Dufour and Richard (2019), primary data collection would be helpful to get proper data and understand their perspective of the company. Influenced by the author the research will use the primary data collection method and get a brief highlight of the customer's perspective. It would help to avoid the manipulation of data and ensure its authenticity. Survey will be done to get the final outcome from the research and serve the large interests of people. 

The different question that need to ask to the participants in the field to make the secondary survey successful and infer best qualitative results are as follows.

Q1) What is your age?

• 15-25

• 25-45

• 45-65

• Above 65

Q2) What is your monthly income?

• Below 100 dollar

• 100-300 dollar

• 300-500 dollar

• Above 500 dollar

Q3) How you are affected with the living crisis?

• Strongly affected

• Mildly affected

• Weakly affected

Q4) Do you agree that covid pandemic has the adverse effect on your living style?

• Strongly disagree

• Disagree

• Neutral

• Agree

• Strongly agree

Q5) Does the crisis lowers your living standards?

• Strongly disagree

• Disagree

• Neutral

• Agree

• Strongly agree

Q6) Do you agree that ASDA provides services during the living crisis time?

• Strongly disagree

• Disagree

• Neutral

• Agree

• Strongly agree

Q7) Do you agree that ASDA is standing hard to mitigate the living crisis of the individual?

• Strongly disagree

• Disagree

• Neutral

• Agree

• Strongly agree

Q8) Do you agree that ASDA had lowers down the prices of the products?

• Strongly disagree

• Disagree

• Neutral

• Agree

• Strongly agree

Q9) How will you rate your marketing style on comparison before the pandemic in ASDA in a scale of 10?

• 1-3

• 3-5

• 5-7

• 7-10

Q10) Do you agree that ASDA need to improvise more in lowering on the cost of the products?

• Strongly disagree

• Disagree

• Neutral

• Agree

• Strongly agree

Q11) Do you agree that your living income has lowers down due to crisis?

• Strongly disagree

• Disagree

• Neutral

• Agree

• Strongly agree

Q12) Do you agree that ASDA strategies meet the needs of the consumers in during the crisis?

• Strongly disagree

• Disagree

• Neutral

• Agree

• Strongly agree

Project Timeline

Main Task	Week 1	Week 2 to 3	Week 4 to 7	Week 8 to 10	Week 11 to 12	Week 13
Topic selection
Impacts of the projects overview
Evaluation of the problem statement
Research finalization techniques
Extracting and analyzing the data of survey
Presentation of the draft formative
Final deadline

Table 2: Project Timeline

Ethical Considerations

The research would abide by the legal framework of The Patent Act, of 1977 that ensure its legal protection and avoid any kind of misconduct. The research's ethical consideration is secured by this regulatory framework.

References

Antwi, C.O., Ren, J., Owusu-Ansah, W., Mensah, H.K. and Aboagye, M.O., 2021. Airport self-service technologies, passenger self-concept, and behavior: An attributional view. Sustainability, 13(6), p.3134.https://www.mdpi.com/1032230

Asda.com (2022) .Asda Income.Available from https://corporate.asda.com/media-library/document/asda-income-tracker-may-2022/_proxyDocument?id=00000181-060f-dbf3-a5a5-be9fb2280000. Accessed on 16.03.2023

Dufour, I.F. and Richard, M.C., 2019. Theorizing from secondary qualitative data: A comparison of two data analysis methods. Cogent Education, 6(1), p.1690265.https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/2331186X.2019.1690265

Huang, M.H. and Rust, R.T., 2021. A strategic framework for artificial intelligence in marketing. Journal of the Academy of Marketing Science, 49, pp.30-50.https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s11747-020-00749-9

Kanakaratne, M.D.S., Bray, J. and Robson, J., 2020. The influence of national culture and industry structure on grocery retail customer loyalty. Journal of Retailing and Consumer Services, 54, p.102013.https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0969698918311317

Statista.com (2023) .Total monthly sales value of all retailing including automotive fuel in Great Britain from January 2017 to December 2022.Available from https://www.statista.com/statistics/287867/retail-sales-total-value-monthly-great-britain-gb/. Accessed on 03.04.2023

Statista.com (2023). Percentage change in sales at Asda in Great Britain compared to a year earlier from September 2014 to December 2022. Available from https://www.statista.com/statistics/386700/asda-sales-percentage-change-great-britain-uk/. Accessed on 04.03.2023

Veleva, S.S. and Tsvetanova, A.I., 2020, September. Characteristics of the digital marketing advantages and disadvantages. In IOP Conference Series: Materials Science and Engineering (Vol. 940, No. 1, p. 012065). IOP Publishing.https://iopscience.iop.org/article/10.1088/1757-899X/940/1/012065/meta