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Background

Amazon is a well-known online retail giant that provides products and services to customers and third-party sellers across the globe. It was established in 1995 by Jeff Bezos as an online book retailer (Bidkar, 2019). However, the company now sells various products and provides a platform for sellers. Amazons goal is to become the best place to purchase and find products and services online. Its strength is to provide quality products and services at a price lower than its competitors in the market. In addition, the company uses a focus strategy on customer experience. The company is also using social responsibility to foster a positive relationship with the community. For example, Amazon is donating to welfare programs to solve social problems like poverty. In marketing, the company is investing a lot of money in advertisement to communicate with its customers.

The Relationship Between the Marketing Plan and Strategic Objectives

Amazon uses focus strategy to target customers which in turn serves the market.

Table 1: The Impact of Marketing Techniques On Strategy and Marketing Plan

Organizational strategy	Marketing techniques	Evaluate how marketing techniques can support the strategy
Focus strategy	Content marketing	Content marketing is efficient in supporting the organizations focus strategy. The organizations focus is to increase the experience of its customers (Bonsu, 2019). The technique makes it possible to achieve this because it enables the organization to create an immersive environment for potential customers to discover how the products will solve their problems.
	Diversity marketing	Amazon uses diverse marketing to support its focus strategy because its target customers are from worldwide. This may include employing various strategies or promoting channels to appeal to groups based on social differences, ethnicities, races, gender, religion, and many more (Wayne, 2018).
	Relationship marketing	Relationship marketing is recognized as one of Amazons most effective techniques to support its focus strategy (Palmatier and Steinhoff, 2019). As a result, in order to build a relationship with the target audience or customers, the company employs the following methods. The Amazon call centers operators address their customers by name, thereby generating familiarity and noting the customers complaints or suggestions. Asking for and listening to consumers requests and feedback. Sending birthday and holiday greetings. They manage both good and bad reviews.
	Mass marketing	Mass marketing is a technique that supports the firms focused strategy. According to Sposit (2019), mass marketing is where an organization tries to appeal to as many individuals as possible. Amazon is one of the main TV spenders to appeal to everyone (Hammett, 2019). The technique is used to ensure that everyone.

Amazon uses content, diversity, relationship and mass marketing to make its marketing plan effective.

Table 2: The Impacts of Marketing Techniques On Marketing Plan

Marketing techniques and tools	The impacts on the Marketing Plan
Content marketing	Content marketing is among the most important steps required in creating a marketing plan. It is important because it helps the company build trust, develop relationships, improve conversions, and generate leads by answering consumers questions (Lou et al., 2019). For example, Amazon successfully creates content that engages and adds value to their audience and increases conversion with this technique. This is because the brands content outperformed expectations by providing valuable information to educate their leads. This assists customers in staying informed and making better purchasing decisions. Marketers can also track the results of their contents reach. Everything can be measured online, from brainstorming and researching to knowing who has read the content. As a result, content marketing is an essential strategy for any brand looking to connect with its audience and increase conversions.
Diversity marketing	Amazon company uses diversity marketing to reach out to new customers in various racial, ethnic, or social gatherings. A company must be associated with the global commercial center, as groups of onlookers in various nations occasionally react to a similar message (Wayne, 2018). Aside from that, Amazons customers come from various societies, each with its own set of experiences, desires, and communication strategies. Without a doubt, even within a culture, such differences will be between different subgroups, ethnicity, age, sexual orientation, religion, and many more. Diversity marketing entails recognizing that marketing must provide alternative strategies for bestowing on various social occasions (Turner, 2018). With that knowledge, a decent variety of publicists hope to develop a mix of various specific systems, and the firm must include this in its market planning.
Relationship marketing	Relationship marketing is an important part of strong customer relationship management, which builds long-term customer loyalty. Amazon wants to build long-term relationships with its customers instead of just focusing on short-term goals, like making a single deal or getting a customer (Palmatier and Steinhoff, 2019). This marketing technique helps Amazon build strong relationships with their customers by giving them information that considers their specific points of interest and needs. This way, they meet their goals and targets and make money. This is part of Amazons marketing plan, which helps the company stay ahead of its competitors. This marketing technique also helps Amazon to be successful because it makes it easy for them to do market research on their customers. This allows them to understand what their customers want and need.
Mass marketing	Mass marketing tries to get a marketing message out to everyone who wants to hear the message. Communication is less personal, as evidenced by common mass-marketing tactics such as national TV, radio, print ads, and national point-of-purchase displays (Sposit, 2019). It enables Amazon to reach many people and offer one universal product offer. By distributing these ads through as many channels as possible, the message is delivered in a single ad push, saving the company money. Due to mass marketing, the production of their product is less expensive when compared to companies that produce products for a smaller and more targeted audience.

Determine Marketing Methodologies and Approaches That Contribute to A Marketing Plan

There are several marketing methodologies that play an integral role in the development of a marketing plan. The methodologies include marketing research approach, societal research and selling approach.

Marketing Research Approach

Marketing research approach provide insights used in the development of marketing plan. The approach brings to the forefront the principle of having the upper hand and making unrivaled contributions (McDaniel Jr and Gates, 2018). In this manner, organizations invest in procedures that provide them with information about what the purchaser requires prior to developing a product. As a result, Amazon conducts market research to understand its customers needs and desires better. As the worlds most successful online retailer, Amazon uses its brand name to attract potential customers attention. Aside from that, to better meet the needs of their customers than their competitors, they offer competitive prices to their customers and run various marketing campaigns that aid in capturing their attention.

Societal Approach

The societal approach ensures that marketing plan covers aspects that directly benefits the society. In this approach, an organization is supposed to develop a marketing strategy that provides value to customers to maintain and improve both the customers and societys well-being better than competitors (Bala and Verma, 2018). For example, Amazon has been giving back to the community in various ways since its inception. The companys philanthropic involvement is divided into computer science and STEM education, hunger and homelessness assistance, and disaster relief. For example, as shown in the figure below, Amazon donates $10,000 to Tarrant area food bank to fight hunger (Local News Only, 2018). Therefore, the societal marking approach enables Amazon to foster a good relationship with the community.

Figure 1: Amazons Donation to Tarrant Area

Selling Approach

The selling approach enables marketing plan to address the needs of sellers. The selling approach is a concept that majors on the sellers needs and impacts a marketing plan. The approach affirms that purchasers should be influenced to purchase the items on offer through special promotions (Wall and Spinuzzi, 2018). The focal point of this concept is geared toward converting products into money for the organization. Because Amazons customers are from across the globe, it is making efforts to increase overall sales, which directly impacts the organizations marketing planning. The approachs main objective is to get the customers to what the company is selling. It pushes the products to customers and ensures that they purchase them. For example, its customers can visit the website and purchase any products. As a result, the selling approach promotes the sales of products to customers.

The Risk Associated with The Marketing Plan

The risks associated with the marketing plan are pricing, trends and regulations, target market, and promotion.

Table 3: The Assessment of Risks

Risks	Assessment of the risk
Pricing	If the price of the products is high, the company risk losing customers to its rivals in the market. On the other hand, a low price may demonstrate poor quality (Chernev, 2018).
Trends and regulation	The failure to understand the trends and regulations may put the organizations bottom line at risk.
Target market	Targeting the wrong customers in the market have a detrimental impact on sales. This could put the entire organization in peril.
Promotion	Promotion is one of the most expensive risks in the marketing plan. There is a possibility that some promotion strategies might fail to achieve the intended objective, which is to drive sales. This means the organization risks losing money.

The risks identified and assessed can be addressed using various strategies. To mitigate the impact of the risks, the company should consider the following plan.

Table 4: Contingency plan to address the risks

Risk	Contingency plan to address the risks
Pricing	To address this risk, the following can be done; Develop deeper insights into the pricing model that works. Use insights from customers to inform the choice of pricing model to use.
Trends and regulations	The following can be done; Perform regular research in the market to effectively understand the market.
Target market	Perform an extensive research to understand the target market before taking an action.
Promotion	Engage contemporary marketing professional to help in selecting the best promotional strategy.

A Strategic Marketing Plan

The Components of a Marketing Plan

The marketing plan consist of a marketing goals, market research, analysis of competitors and marketing plan strategies.

Market Research

Market research is the foundation of the marketing plan because the marketing strategies to be used relies on its accuracy. Performing market research is crucial, whether when it comes to running a business (McDaniel Jr and Gates, 2018). This helps determine consumer purchasing behaviors in the sector, market size, market growth or decline, and any current business trends. It also assists in determining business opportunities, create relevant promotions and business objectives. With a perfect information of the market, marketing managers and the team can come up with strategies to improve sales. Therefore, market research plays an integral role in the development of a marketing plan.

Competitors

A good understanding of competitors in the market is essential for developing a marketing plan. Amazons main competitors in the e-business sector are Wal-Mart, eBay, and Alibaba (Wu and Gereffi, 2018). Although Walmart is best known for its physical department stores and is the undisputed king of brick-and-mortar retail, Amazon is the undisputed king of the internet. As shown in the figure below, eBay is second to Amazon in terms of market share. Amazon leads with a market share of 56%, eBay has 29%, and Wal-Mart has 10% (Inci, 2022). Therefore, while analyzing the competition, the organization can exploit any competitors flaws in the market.

Market Plan Strategies

Marketing strategy is an important component of marketing plan because it shows how the organization delivers products to customers. The marketing strategies used by Amazon was found to be effective in achieving its goals (Jain, 2019). A marketing strategy is an important plan developed specifically for the purpose of achieving an organizations marketing objectives (Kotler et al., 2019). It lays out a strategy for achieving these marketing objectives. It is the foundation of a marketing strategy. It is the result of extensive market research. Therefore, a marketing strategy enables Amazon to focus its limited resources on the most lucrative opportunities in order to increase sales.

Marketing Goals

Marketing goals are like a guide to the marketing plan used by an organization. According to Chaffey and Smith (2017), a marketing plan provides detailed goals that a company wants to achieve through its marketing strategy and efforts. It includes making people aware of your brand, establishing thought leadership, getting marketing qualified leads, enhancing brand involvement, and increasing the quality and quantity of leads. For example, as shown in the figure below, Amazon wants to keep improving its brand, customer base, and e-commerce skills to become the worlds favorite online shopping site (Buckland, 2019). As a result, marketing goals are a crucial component of marketing because they provide the purpose of marketing.

Mitigation Strategies for High-Risk Components of the Plan

Some of the high-risk components of the plan that should be mitigated are marketing research, competition and market budget.

Marketing Research

Marketing research is one of the high-risk components of a marketing plan because it affects the reliability of the result. For example, the company may fail to take advantage of growing economy of Saudi Arabia. The increased business activities and added value of oil is likely to boast the economy of the country (Esmail, 2018). As a result, the failure to conduct market research has an adverse impact on an organizations performance. It makes the organization perform poorly in the market (McDaniel Jr and Gates, 2018). The risk can be reduced by comparing the result of research conducted by RTi Research and Edelman Intelligence on Saudi Arabia. Therefore, the organization should ensure that marketing is performed effectively in the market by a reliable team.

Competition

Competition is a possible risk because the operations of a competitor in the market can adversely affect the operations of Amazon. The competitors can use prices of products to make the market unfavorable to Amazon. To mitigate this risk, if a rival lowers the prices of their products, the marketing and finance managers have a room to devise a new pricing policy to address the issue without incurring a loss to the company. The organization should use the information obtained from market research to make effective pricing decision (McDaniel Jr and Gates, 2018). Thus, to overcome the impact of competitors in the market, the organization should focus on maximizing its strengths.

Market Plan Strategy

The market plan strategy should achieve marking goals such as Amazon maintain its position as a market leader in e-business. This is a techniques used to achieve the marking goals of Amazon. The success of the organization and marketing department depends on the effectiveness of the strategy (Nwabueze and Mileski, 2018). However, it becomes an issue when the market plan strategy fails to achieve the intended purpose. This risk can be mitigated by making sure that only appropriate strategies are adopted. As a result, marketing managers should strive to ensure that marketing plan strategy are effectively developed.

A Marketing Plan

The marketing plan determines the marketing goals, target market, price, competitors, and how the company will measure its effort.

Marketing Goals

Amazons success is attributed to its singular focus and mission. The founder of the company, Jeff Bezos, has maintained that the companys mission statement is what drives him when he makes decisions as a leader (Bidkar, 2019). This means that Amazons success as the worlds top online retailer is due to their constant focus on this mission and how they carry it out every day, making them the best. The companys mission statement is to serve consumers through online and physical stores and focus on selection, price, and convenience (Rashid, 2022). The statement provides direction to everyone in the organization to achieve its objectives. For example, Amazon has focused its operations on adding value to customers. Therefore, one of the goals of Amazon is to ensure that the needs of customers are considered.

Amazon wants to be the best place to buy, find, and learn about any product or service. The firm intends to keep improving and expanding its brand, customer base, and expertise in online shopping to become the worlds favorite place to shop online (Bidkar, 2019). Amazon has used many different ways to reach this goal. Tests in Seattle, Washington, have been going on for five years, and now Amazon Fresh has been added to cities like Los Angeles and San Francisco. In addition, the company has teamed up with local businesses to offer the same easy home delivery on a wide range of ready-to-eat foods. Thus, the main purpose of Amazon is to provide a conducive platform for its customers.

Marketing Research

SWOT analysis is one of the tools used to understand the internal and external environment of a business.

Table 5: Amazons SWOT Analysis

Strengths	Opportunities
Amazon has a strong brand image and a good place in the market. It has firmly established itself as the most important online shopping site in the United States, its main competitor being Alibaba. The company provides high-quality products: Amazon sells high-quality products directly from reputable manufacturers (West, 2019). It offers excellent customer service: the company provides faster delivery options, making it convenient for its customers to receive products on time. Provide low-cost products and services to achieve a competitive advantage (Alshmrani, 2021).	Amazon has the opportunity to improve technological measures and organizational policies to lower fake sales. The organization can improve competitiveness against big box retailers and engage customers with the brand by expanding physical stores. The more e-commerce organizations the company buys, the more market share it will have and the less competition there will be.
Weaknesses	Threats
In recent years, the company has been involved in a number of lawsuits regarding patent infringement, product liability, environmental, antitrust, and many more. Limited physical store presence; Amazon owns only a few physical stores. This can make it difficult to entice customers to buy items not available in online stores. Unfavorable working conditions to ensure that customers get the order on time.	Cyber-attack is the main threat to Amazons effective performance in the market. The company is a huge target of identity theft and hacking. In addition, Amazon holds customers crucial data like home addresses and credit card numbers. Amazon faces rivalry from local online retailers who are more quick and agile than their strategies and operations (Alshmrani, 2021).

Amazon will use the information from SWOT to improve its operations and achieve a competitive advantage. Firstly, the company should maximize its strengths and use the existing opportunities. For instance, it should use its strong brand image to attract more customers to the market (Alshmrani, 2021). They should also consider expanding their stores to attract customers who prefer shopping through physical stores. Secondly, the company should eliminate the weaknesses and threats they experience in the market. For example, they should address issues of unfavorable working environment because it adversely impacts its reputation. They should also assure customers that their personal information such as card numbers to purchase products is safe. As a result, acting on the information from SWOT analysis is integral in achieving the marketing goal.

Marketing strategy

Executive Summary: this market plan is consistent with Amazons strategic goal of increasing the current market share from 50% to 60% in two years.

Aim: by implementing this market plan, Amazon intends to tap into market segments like Saudi Arabia and incoming markets.

Marketing Objectives: increase the number of customers served from 300 to 400 in the first year, followed by an additional 400 in the second year to reach 440 million.

Strategy: maintain focused strategy to ensure that customer needs are met.

The key points of marketing action plan

The online sales visits on Amazon websites should be used to determine its performance.

Online sales	Frequency of Sales online per week	Frequency of marketing Manager Visit per week
Part A sales revenue of Amazon and above.	5 times	1 time
Part B sales revenue	3 times	10 times
Part C Revenue	1 time	8 times

Understand competitors

Competition is the rivalry between organizations operating in the same industry to attain revenue, profit, and market share growth. For Amazon to do well in the market, they should try to learn more about their competitors, like their strengths and weaknesses. The best way to stay competitive in the market is to know their competitors and stay updated on their products and services. This is important for any business to remain relevant in the market. For example, Alibaba is one of the competitors in the e-business sector (Erne, 2019). The competitor integrates new technologies through mobile applications to reach out to more customers. To counter rivals impact in the market, Amazon should increase its customer experience. Therefore, Amazon understands the intense competition in e-commerce.

Competitor analysis plays an integral role in marketing plan. It provides vital information about competitors in the market.

Table 6: Competitors Analysis

Competitor	Strategy	Description of strategy	Target market	Number of active customers	Revenue	Global market share
Alibaba	Focused and differentiation strategy	A focused strategy is used to identify specific needs of a market, while a differentiation strategy involves providing customers with something unique.	Everyone and any business can buy their products in the market.	1.24 billion	$109 billion (Macro Trends, 2022)	9%
eBay	Intensive growth strategy	The strategy is where an organization majors on market penetration.	People in the age bracket of 25 to 34 years old and have an income of $100,000.	182 million	$10 billion	19%
Walmart	Intensive growth strategy	The strategy is where an organization focuses more on market penetration.	Consumers who want to save money on essential and non-essential products.	265 million	$152 billion	10%

Marketing mix is an important aspect in marketing plan as it provides information on the product, price, promotion and place.

Table 7: Amazons Marketing Mix

Marketing mix	Recommendations
Product	As a start, Amazon only sold books, but now it sells a lot of different things under a lot of different categories. The company sells a lot of clothes, shoes, jewelry, kitchen and home appliances, books, electronics, and sports. If a customer wants to buy something on Amazon, there are a lot of different things that customers can buy there. However, they should continue to add the line of products they are selling to their customers. This gives Amazon a big advantage over some of its competitors.
Pricing	There are a lot of different ways that a company can set prices. For example, Amazon usually prices things competitively. It looks at its competitors prices to figure out how much it should charge. However, they should pay attention to keeping prices low and giving customers a lot of choices. The other pricing models that Amazon often uses are psychological pricing and promotional pricing, which are both types of pricing (Hillen and Fedoseeva, 2021). Based on this, the organization will consider integrating various pricing techniques to achieve a competitive advantage.
Place	Amazon is the worlds biggest online store. It is a well-known brand that has stores all over the world. People can purchase things from amazon through official e-commerce websites and the amazon app. Products from Amazon can be shipped to more than 100 nations and regions worldwide. The company should ensure that more physical stores are established across the globe to reach more customers.
Promotion	Amazon speaks to its customers using different tools and methods. For example, it runs advertising campaigns on TV, newspapers, social media, and billboards. There are also a lot of Amazon affiliate websites that it uses to spread information about itself. In addition, Amazon has sales and discounts all the time. It also uses public relations activities to help people think of it as a good company. However, the company should focus more on social media marketing through Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, and others due to the increase in the number of users.

Target Market

Amazon wants to sell to individuals who have internet access and money to pay for things, like a credit card, debit card, and more. The company does not just work with people in the US it has expanded its reach to include people who shop online across the globe. Research indicates that people over the age of 40 are more likely to use the companys Prime service than people under 40 years of age. Because younger people do not have as much money as older people, they do not have as much power to buy things. In addition, younger people may be busy at work, while older people are more relaxed and have more time to do other things. As a result, people who are older like to use Amazon Prime more than young people like to use it more.

Market segmentation helps an organization to understand the target market.

Figure 8: Amazons Market Segmentation

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Marketing segment	Criteria used	Target
Demographic	Gender	Male and female
	Age	14-60 years
	Income	Low, middle, and rich
	Job	Students, employees, employers