Please provide advise on format of assignment?

Brief History on Proctor & Gamble

Proctor and Gamble is a well-known American household company that manufactures and sells top brand household goods. According to Butler (2020), Proctor & Gamble started in the field of soap making during hard economic times before the Civil war. Since then this company has rapidly grown. In 1879 James is Gamble's son who had a chemistry background pioneered cheaper alternatives of higher-end soaps which led to the creation of many great brands that are well known like Ivory. Throughout the decades P&G ventures into manufacturing a lot more brands to the market that are efficient and affordable that the world has grown to love. (Butler, 2020)

MACRO ENVIRONMENTAL FORCES FOR P & G

Globalization has been a major impact on most large and small business organizations on a macro scale. Commonly five specific areas of impact would come to mind; (Pestal) Political, Environmental, Social, Technological, Economical and Legal. Some other factors would include growing trends like diversity and a growing number of educated people adopting white-collar jobs that make an impact on our socio-economic environment and purchasing decisions. The customer today is also adopting and demanding that customers be ethically and environmentally responsible in their dealings. Many companies are now focusing on "developing recyclable materials and tools that assist with biodegradable packaging," (Armstrong, 2020, p.76-78)

Political Factors- New trend appearing lately would have been customers becoming more involved in acts of injustice involving racism and other forms of discrimination including disability and inequality. Many marketers strongly believe that brand activism is crucial; this has been a wide range trend globally. This is where the customer expects their favorite brand to support what is right and lobbying against what is wrong. Political factors affecting P&G may range in four major categories; Impact on economy, Changes in regulation, Political stability, and Mitigation of risk, all of the following can harm products. Various factors regulate product price, packaging, taxes, employment laws, health & safety laws, consumer protection, and e-commerce & import restrictions. (Contributor, 2020) This would change the way P&G marketers communicate their products to the marketplace. There has been an increase in government intervention in the area of natural resource management. EPA would have been the result of this intervention establishing environmental policies that dictate how businesses manage. (Armstrong, 2020, p.101)

Environmental Factors-P&G marketing strategies would be impacted by environmental factors due to different countries having different environmental protection laws that would determine how products are made and disposed of responsibly. Changes in the natural environment would also impact P&G "physical environment and its natural resources that needed by marketers activities along with natural disasters like hurricanes, tornadoes, and flash flooding and forest fires." (Armstrong, 2020, p.90-91) Marketers should also be aware of growing trends like shortages in raw materials which impact product price and market availability. Another factor for P&G could be pollution. One of P&G's goals would be in reducing carbon emissions, prioritizing water conservation along transferring over to renewable electricity. Non-renewable materials such as oil and coal shortages would have a major impact on the way P&G markets and produce its products and services. P&G has also committed to reducing its packing to 13% through the use of its new Pure Cycle technologies.

Social Factors -P&G has always been guided by its ability to provide excellence in both products and services. P&G understands that giving back to its community is vitally important as advocating against pollution and discrimination. P&G recognizes that social factors deal with sociocultural conditions on a business opportunity, threats, and strengths. Social effects like the threat of declining population growth rates in various countries would have a significant impact on P&G's bottom line. Another socio-cultural impact would be the growing demand for healthcare products by customers. Another notable impact has been disability among Americans. American athlete Melisa Stockwell is partnering with P&G to take part in the 2021 Olympics in Tokyo. P&G has now shift marketing initiatives by supporting the Paralympics with a financial sum of $10,000 grant money to charitable organizations such as this one. (Rosvoglou, 2021, para.2-4)

Technological Factors-P&G has recognized that technology focus is paramount for a business to keep up with customer's demands in real-time. Technology has shape and directed organizations on the way forward. When looking at emerging technology like the internet, smartphone devices, social media platforms, Web analytics, and GPS it's very clear to see that businesses cannot operate without using technological software and devices. The very existence of marketing in the digital world has emerged due to new technological advancements, so when technology advances businesses are automatically impacted. P&G has been able to learn a lot about their consumer's behaviors and buying decisions through tools like web analytics. Another factor would be payment options like visa debit, and online banking, today we now have new online payment apps like Apple pay and Pay Pal. Communication platforms like Google Classroom, Google Teams, and Monday.com have revolutionized marketing strategies. Other impacting factors include; 1) Growth in the online market; 2) Business automation 3) Increasing fuel efficiency and 4) Growth of e-commerce channels.

Economic Factors-Marco factors like raising interest, unemployment, international trade regulations, inflation, and economic growth rates all will present P&G with negative implications with both brand and profit margins.

P&G Sustainable Competitive Advantages

Over the past 60 years, P&G has pride itself on providing excellent products and services within the consumer goods industry. To keep up its competitive generic market structure P&G has geared its focus towards product quality and value. Both areas support give way to support P&G's efforts to accomplish leadership within the consumer goods industry. P&G over the years has maintained its steady position by adopting the Porters Model. Under the Porters' Model, P&G would be guided through a five-step analysis that would benchmark P&G's current competitive edge. The Porters' model would measure its impact through five criteria; 1) Competitive Rivalry- High, 2) Threat of New Entrants-Moderate, 3) Bargaining Power of Suppliers-Low, 4) Bargaining Power of Buyers-Moderate and 5) Threat of Substitutes- Low.

Porter's analysis made it possible for P&G to recognize other competitors like Estee Lauder, Clorox, and Unilever. According to Gardus (2016), Jim Creamer from CNBC says "What do those three winners have in common? They're all run by executives who used to work at Procter & Gamble, all of them born elsewhere, all of them with tremendous command of multiple international markets." P&G's sustainable strategies for competitive advantage have also provided a platform for manager's decision-making on marketing, research, and development along with innovation. One of its main strategies would be built around differentiation as a competitive .advantage among its peers within the consumer household market. (Smithson, 2017)

Another yet notable strategy to gain sustainable competitive advantage would be to focus on affordable pricing. For instance, Pantene hair care products prices have been strategically set lower than that of their competitors like Unilever with Dove hair care products. Some P&G intensive growth strategies would include;

1) Market Penetration- their drive in this area concentrates on gaining a larger market share by way of increasing consumer awareness. P&G would use these marketing campaigns for low-performing products to boast consumers in this particular circle. This initiative was further intensified when P&G offered certain retailers a higher profit margin takes on certain low-performing products. These retailers would then have to display P&G products in more noticeable locations in the stores. (Smithson, 2017, para.5-8)

2) Product Development-This second stage of P&G's intensive strategic growth would be geared towards product design and development. This meant coming up with innovative product design and an improved process for production. Some of this process improvement in production plants meant discovering new technology like when the company Pure Cycle discovered how to recycle or restore polypropylene plastic to a new state. This has indeed been a challenge for P&G because they lead the way in recycling plastic, now it has created or revolutionized being 100% self-reliant on their plastic source. (Brands, 2021, para.4-7)

3) Market Development-P&G has realized for it to expand it would have to dive into or enter new markets segments. When entering into new markets, it would allow for P&G in creating new revenue streams. This would normally occur when P&G would have created a new innovative product line. (Smithson, 2017, para.5-8) P&G has now agreed to venture into selling its branding and marketing expertise in a project called "Project EMM" (Enterprise Marketing Management), has been set up in partnership with Worldwide Magnify, a Silicon Valley company, and aims to enable companies across the world to build brands "faster, more efficiently and more effectively".

4) Diversification-This involves P&G continued initiatives in acquiring other business operations. This would then create a structural impact on P&G operations. Diversification helps P&G maintain its competitive edge in its existing and new landscape.

5) P&G Segmentation,Targeting, and Positioning (STP)-P&G has segmented itself based on the following categories; 1) Fabric Care and Home Care, 2) Baby, Feminine, and Family Care, 3 Beauty, 4) Grooming and Health Care. (Morgan, 2015) P&G's target market would include other businesses (B2B) that are based on their geographic locations, type of industry, organization's size, and product end-use. If the target in this case the consumer; information would have to be presented to P&G like "consumer, present information on socioeconomic, demographic, and psychographic characteristics." Businesses that P&G has focused on were businesses like Wal-Mart, Kroger, Kaufland, and Amazon. Despite P&G's target being on a Global span all of the products it produces have their target market within their category of health care, family care, beauty, grooming, and baby. (Samigoetz, 2017, para.5-7)

Products that P&G produces like Tide pods are specific geared towards people on the go like college students and large families whose time is limited. Other brands like Huggies pull-ups would target toddlers and parents. P&G has realized that for it to maintain its market presents it must continue to expand its large variety of brands strategically due to the growing demand for consumer and healthcare products. (Samigoetz, 2017, para.9-17)

6) P&G Branding-P&G has branding strategies are quite simple, each product has its brand. For P&G to deliver excellence in their brands they must first be offered a diverse product line to fulfill the needs of different cultures. P&G products all display both logos and a declaration of trademark along with patent rights. (Samigoetz, 2017, para.12-18) P&G has continued to bring strong awareness to brands through its aggressive marketing strategies. One risk factor P&G may face would be brand dilution; this is especially the case when P&G is running a large amount of different brands under one company. Brand dilution occurs when a company runs to many categories under its brand. This then causes the brand to lose identity especially if those products flop in performance and marketing strategies.