Overview of Macmillan Cancer Support Charity
Charity can be undertaken as the voluntary practice of providing generous aid or showcasing a repository feeling and lending a helping hand to the vulnerable and the weak (Spade 2020). In the realm of charitable foundations, Macmillan Cancer Support is a notable name. It is one of the largest British charitable foundations; along with charitable services, it provides healthcare support to patients. This charitable foundation specialises in providing support to people who have cancer, with the presence of both monetary and information support. Douglas Macmillian founded this charitable organisation in 1911 to provide financial aid and healthcare support, especially for the citizens suffering from cancers (Macmillan.org.uk 2022). As of 2020, this charitable company generated a total revenue under the margin of 1.04 billion (Statista 2022). When looking at the inflow of funds for the company, the company conducts various annual fundraising events, helping this charitable company to witness a constant inflow of funds.
Furthermore, M&S (Marks & Spencer) being the prime partner of this charitable organisation, has helped the brand accumulate better funds since 2010. Moreover, with the digitalisation taking place by leaps and bounds, Macmillan also conducts fundraising activities on the social media platforms like Facebook and Instagram which consist of the most active user base. When looking at the case scenario, CLIC Sargent stands as one of the major competitors for Macmillan performing its activities on a similar platform. Currently, CLIC Sargent is also known as Young Lives vs Cancer and has been providing its services for 17 years in this field of helping the vulnerable and weak to fight cancer and leukaemia.
When introspective towards the section of the social media activities conducted by Macmillian Cancer Support, it can be witnessed that the brand projects to conduct more “unity marketing” strategy in terms of advertisements, helping the company to witness better effective results and meet the business objectives (marketingweek.com 2022). The charity has also unveiled a refreshed identity, designed to connect with supporters more effectively. The new branding strategy will enhance awareness of Macmillan’s wide range of support programmes and help it remain relevant to everyone it serves by replacing the old ‘Life with Cancer’ campaign. Furthermore, in terms of making its advertisement effective, Macmillian has promulgated on conducting marketing that raises human interest and can mould the general audience towards contributing towards fundraising. Whereas, when looking at CLIC Sargent’s case, the company has devised a new strategy of “better, faster, stronger” as a tag for becoming more financially efficient during such atrocious times to witness financial stability (Civilsociety.co.uk 2022). Hence, it can be stated that in terms of gaining better financial stability and gaining fundraisers, both the company applies to conduct promotional activities on the digital platform to witness better results.
According to the opinion of Thabit and Rauf (2018), marketing mix plays an extremely important role in terms of helping in aligning business with the current services wanted by customers. Since the principal channel between a business and its clients, the marketing department is critical to the success of that organisation. Many tactics exist in marketing, but they all serve the same goal: to boost consumer satisfaction by promoting its products or services. As a result, the marketing mix can construct both long-term and short-term strategic plans. The marketing mix is the most significant idea in marketing, according to one definition. Price, Place, Product, and Promotion (the four Ps) are marketing’s operational components. The culmination of taking necessary strategic measures can help witness a better success rate for any business organisation. However, when introspective towards the scenario of the digital marketing mix, it can be defined as an adaptation of all these 4 mixes; however, the entire gathering and conduction of business takes place on the digital platform. As mentioned earlier, digital is a new age; therefore, taking the business on the digital platform provides better lucrative opportunities for any business organisation (Spade 2020).
Social Media Fundraising Strategies of Macmillan Cancer Support
Furthermore, due to the Covid, 19 pandemic transformation the business module in the digital platform holds greater success criteria for Macmillian. Also, to witness a better competitive advantage over its rival organisation, undertaking the following steps can help this charity organisation gain easy accessibility to funds to continue doing the special services. The four mixes can be seen as follows:
Product mix: The product mix is one of the most crucial elements of the marketing mix, and it is used by organisations to optimally allocate their resources toward the products offered to the consumers. As stated by Kant (2020), the primary operations of Macmillan Cancer Support (MCS) are to provide financial and medical assistance to the patients undergoing the treatment of cancer. Thus, it can be analysed that the service-oriented product mix of MCS is the key product mix, the knowledge about which is spread out to the public through digital marketing. As discussed earlier, digital marketing allows organisations to share knowledge about the products with many potential consumers through social media platforms like Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter (Islam 2018). The social presence of the communities in the metaverse acts as an opportunity for the businesses to acquire customers and grow in the long run.
Price mix: Pricing is another most important element that determines the scale of customer acquisition by the businesses over a predetermined time frame. Pricing for a non-governmental or “not for profit” organisation is as important as that for a “for-profit” organisation (Do and Vu 2020). The primary motive of the pricing adopted by the NGOs, or the Charitable organisations is to encourage growth and aid the maximum number of individuals possible. The operations of the Charitable organisation are fuelled by social causes that need change. Thus, it can be analysed that the price mix of the charitable organisations is another essential component that is spread through the metaverse, allowing more and more numbers of affected individuals to gain knowledge (bin Abdul Lasi and Salim 2020). Social media campaigns can be considered an important part of MCS’s operations since the digital marketing and advertising strategy allows the organisations to address their target market.
Place mix: Place can be undertaken as an important aspect when interlinked with the segment of providing easy accessibility of the product and services to the customers. Since, the happening of the Covid 19 pandemic, has resulted in the shifting of most of the business activities on the online market domain (Shariq 2018). Therefore, when promulgated with the Macmillian that provides monetary and other forms of service aids to the vulnerable suffering from cancer, can consider updating their online platforms as in website, digital platforms like Facebook, Instagram where this charitable company already has its presence (Katsikeas, Leonidou and Zeriti 2019). Moreover, in terms of conducting fundraising programs and providing services to the customers, revamping the social media platforms can provide beneficial outcomes for this charitable organisation. The presence of a dedicated executive on social platforms like email, websites and other online platforms can converge in the creation of convenience and accessibility for customers and donors.
Comparison with CLIC Sargent Charity
Promotion mix: Promotion, the last of the 4Ps of the marketing mix, plays a major role for the firms in building their value proposition and brand equity. As stated by Kumar et al. (2018), the promotion allows a brand to determine its market image or the image it wants its target market to perceive them as. Macmillan Cancer Support primarily aims to improve the lives of individuals affected with Cancer. Therefore, the promotion mix adopted by the organisation is positioned over social media to reach as many affected individuals as possible. The social media campaigns designed by MCS include promoting fundraising events like the World’s Biggest Coffee Morning (Dushnitsky Piva and Rossi?Lamastra 2022). Macmillan Cancer Support also aims in engaging with the affected individuals and their families through online campaigns, conducting promotional activities through internet ads, interactive ads, awareness campaigns and introducing digital influences that can help in adding and conducting fundraising for a social cause.
It can be stated that improvisation is extremely important in terms of marketing. In the area of products, the company should focus more on developing the range to capture a larger market space. Along with the existing products and services, the company should also develop a range of services in collaboration with social media influencers. Collaborative actions can positively prove beneficial for the company in its present condition (Dizdarevic, Evanschitzky and Backhaus 2020). Social media influencers have a great reach to the people and the company can benefit from the large pool of customers by collaborating.
In the area of pricing, the company should focus more on diversification. By diversifying the pricing, the company can reach the latent pool of customers. Since the company does business in medical assistance, price diversification can be a positive action for their benefit. The company is already very well present on the social media platforms; by making use of the customer choice data, the company can develop diversified price ranges that will help them in gaining a larger customer pool (Syapsan 2019). The donation and fundraising campaign should possess flexibility, where any individual can donate any amount of money without facing any form of hindrances.
In terms of place, the company can tap into the potential offered by tailor-made advertising. By using digital media analytics, the company can successfully acquire a larger customer base. By using business analytics tools, the company can also gain more positive insight into customer choices. Online reputation management campaigns can be also helpful for maintaining the stellar online presence the company has. Maintaining an innovative website and revamped online accounts can help provide better cause outcomes.
For promotion, the company can utilise both online and offline platforms alike. Apart from the use of social media and other electronic methods of marketing, the company can also make use of brand placements through different channels. SEO is also another significantly important recommendation for the company. By using SEO, the company can reach a higher number of customers in need of their services and products (Agafonova, Yakhneeva and Mukhametshina 2020). Since most of the audience base has shifted to the digital market base, applying a strategic measure in terms of using AI-powered software and other advanced analytical tools can help in providing better results and witnessing the attention of a larger audience base.
Importance of Marketing Mix in Business Alignment
Thus, it can be analysed that with the following the necessary strategic means, the company would be able to provide better business output as a whole. Being witnessing a strong competitive scenario from other popular companies that provide their services in the same field of expertise, Macmillan Cancer Support with implying strategic means as revamping its entire digital market presence can result in providing a fruitful outcome.
Conclusion
Intuitive research was conducted on the allocated topic that focused on discussing the selected organisation, as in Macmillan Cancer Support, which focused on discussing the various forms of intricate details that are interlinked with the organisation. Initially, the study presented a brief description of the organisation and the various functional areas. Furthermore, the study showcased the most competitive scenario this charity organisation interfaces within the UK margin, both in terms of popularity and fundraising. The study presented a concise digital marketing mix and the strategic improvisation that the organisation could adopt to experience beneficial outcomes. The report addressed the various technical details and the overall benefit of the incorporation of the right digital marketing tactics that the organisation can undertake to witness better market reach and influence more audience and public towards contributing to fundraising that can help the organisation to experience a better competitive advantage. The study also presented various recommendations that can gain fruitful outcomes for the company in terms of providing better relief facilities. Thus, it can be concluded the research addressed the various points with supporting evidence to help in presenting a coherent outcome.
References
Agafonova, A.N., Yakhneeva, I.V. and Mukhametshina, G.R., 2020, November. Human-Centric Marketing in the Digital Era. In Innovative Economic Symposium (pp. 10-17). Springer, Cham.
bin Abdul Lasi, M. and Salim, S.M., 2020. The relationship between e-marketing mix strategy and integrated marketing communication: a conceptual framework. Int J Eng Appl Sci, 5(6), pp.40-48.
Civilsociety.co.uk. 2022. CLIC Sargent unveils a new strategy to be ‘better, faster, stronger’. [online] Available at: <https://www.civilsociety.co.uk/news/clic-sargent-launches-new-strategy-built-around-tougher-economic-times.html> [Accessed 16 April 2022].
Dizdarevic, A., Evanschitzky, H. and Backhaus, C., 2020. Technological Diversification in Retail Agglomerations: Case Studies Alongside the Digital Marketing Mix. In Retail Futures. Emerald Publishing Limited.
Do, Q. and Vu, T., 2020. Understanding consumer satisfaction with railway transportation service: An application of 7Ps marketing mix. Management Science Letters, 10(6), pp.1341-1350.
Dushnitsky, G., Piva, E. and Rossi?Lamastra, C., 2022. Investigating the mix of strategic choices and performance of transaction platforms: Evidence from the crowdfunding setting. Strategic Management Journal, 43(3), pp.563-598.
Islam, K.J., 2018. Digital Marketing Mix.
Kant, S., 2020. Critical Appraisal of Prevailing Marketing Mix: Applies Particularly to the Digital Marketing Metaphor.
Katsikeas, C., Leonidou, L. and Zeriti, A., 2019. Revisiting international marketing strategy in a digital era: Opportunities, challenges, and research directions. International Marketing Review.
Kumar, A., Mangla, S.K., Luthra, S., Rana, N.P. and Dwivedi, Y.K., 2018. Predicting changing pattern: building model for consumer decision making in digital market. Journal of Enterprise Information Management.
Macmillan.org.uk. 2022. [online] Available at: <https://www.macmillan.org.uk/about-us/who-we-are/organisation-history.htm> [Accessed 18 April 2022].
marketingweek.com. 2022. [online] Available at: <https://www.marketingweek.com/macmillan-brand-strategy-refreshed-identity/> [Accessed 16 April 2022].
Shariq, M., 2018. Brand equity dimensions-a literature review. International Research Journal of Management and Commerce, 5(3), p.312.
Spade, D., 2020. Solidarity not charity: Mutual aid for mobilization and survival. Social Text, 38(1), pp.131-151.
Statista. 2022. Macmillan Publishers – revenue | Statista. [online] Available at: <https://www.statista.com/statistics/1288341/revenue-of-macmillan-publishers/#:~:text=In%202020%2C%20publishing%20company%20Macmillan,billion%20in%20the%20previous%20year> [Accessed 18 April 2022].
Syapsan, S., 2019. The effect of service quality, innovation towards competitive advantages and sustainable economic growth: Marketing mix strategy as mediating variable. Benchmarking: An International Journal, 26(4), pp.1336-1356.
Thabit, T. and Raewf, M., 2018. The evaluation of marketing mix elements: A case study. International Journal of Social Sciences & Educational Studies, 4(4).
Order an Essay Now & Get These Features For Free:
Turnitin Report
Formatting
Title Page
Citation
Outline
