In this study, Unilever has selected to conduct an analysis of its internal and external factors. Unilever is known for selling consumer goods to numerous companies all around the world. Unilever was officially established in 1930 and it has gained high popularity over the years by selling high-quality consumer goods to its customers (Unilever, 2024). Over the years, Unilever has developed its number of brands by collaborating with different companies and creating its own brands. On that basis, a huge quality product range is sold by Unilever which includes personal care products, homecare products, nutrition products, ice cream and so on. Demand for personal care products such as such as soap, handwash and deodorants are the highest for Unilever along with home care products, for example, detergent, room freshener and so on (Unilever, 2024). The huge number of brands shown in the below figure has helped the organisation to expand its range of products all around the world. In this respect, the overall income of Unilever has developed continuously over the years.

Figure 1: Brands of Unilever

(Source:  Unilever, 2024)

The target market of Unilever has been identified by considering a suitable market segmentation. The market segmentations considered by Unilever are behavioural segmentation and demographic segmentation. In order to select the target market of Unilever, income and age are taken into consideration (Pham, 2020). The management of Unilever has evaluated income range of customers and presented various brand’s products based on their income range. On that basis, the organisation can be able to continue to provide suitable range of products and services to different customers. Similarly, based on age of customers, different products such as beauty and personal care products are offered to them. Therefore, based on different ages of customers, the company presented a suitable range of products to them. Along with that, it has been identified that organisations have evaluated the behavioural patterns of customers to determine their purchase behaviour (Sokol and Holý, 2021.). On that basis, main target audience of Unilever is health-conscious people who care for their personal hygiene and health. On that basis, beauty and health products of different ranges have been sold to them.

TH50144E – Digital Marketing and Consumer Behaviour Assignment Sample 2024

Figure 2: Market statistics of Unilever

(Source: Unilever, 2022)

Unilever has a higher market position in different countries all around the world. In respect to the above figure, it is seen that operating margin on geographical area was 19.9 billion EUR in Asia and Africa, 17.7 billion EUR in North and South America and 16.1 billion EUR in Europe (Unilever, 2022). In regards to these figures, it is clear that Unilever has the leading position in the industry and it has expanded its financial capacity all around the world based on the massive range of products and services sold over the years. The above figure has helped to show that the highest operating margin of 19.6 billion EUR is seen for personal care products of Unilever (Unilever, 2022). In respect to personal care products, the company has managed to gather attention of numerous customers all around the world which has helped to expand its financial performance and gather high amount of profit. Along with that, second highest operating margin of 18.7 billion EUR is seen for beauty and wellbeing products which is also extremely high for Unilever (Unilever, 2022). On that basis, the organisation can be able to generate a higher amount of profit from these two products and collect a massive amount of profit. Similarly, competitive advantage can be gathered by Unilever by expanding its market position in the industry which is highly beneficial,

Figure 3: Leading consumer household and personal care product seller

(Source: Statista, 2023)

Based on above graph, it is seen that Unilever has the second leading position in selling personal care and household products. Therefore, the main competitors regarding hose hold and personal care products are P&G, Loreal Group, Rajesh Exports and so on (Statista, 2023). In addition to that, Nestle, Estee Lauder, GSK, PepsiCo and so on are also main competitors of Unilever regarding other consumer goods. The graph has shown that Unilever has the second leading position regarding household and personal care products and it is highly competitive with P&G in the market. P&G also sells a high range of products to its consumers which creates direct competition and consumers of Unilever can seek P&G products as alternative to Unilever. Except for P&G, high competition with Nestle and Estee Lauder has been seen which is also not beneficial for the business (Iglesias et al. 2023). In respect to the massive competition, the overall profitability of the business can mitigate.

Figure 4: Leading consumer household and personal care product seller

(Source: Statista, 2023)

In order to gain competitive advantage over the years, the organisation has focused on adopting advanced technologies and new business ideas in the business to develop product and service quality. This has increased company revenue in 2022 to 60,073 million EUR (Statista, 2023). For example, AI technologies introduced by Unilever can consider adequate recommendations for customers using chatbots. Therefore, customer behaviour patterns and requirements can be easily understood by Unilever which improves overall quality of products and services at a constant rate. In addition to that, this business has considered an efficient CSR strategy and contributed 40 million EUR in community development which has increased social benefits and developed potential number of customers (Unilever, 2023).

and

●       Discuss the goals that they want to achieve by being present on each of them.

Present the company’s digital channels and platforms

Unilever, being a leading fast-moving consumer goods organisation has implemented digital marketing operations for attracting the customers to the business. It has induced online advertisement for introducing its new products in the market (Unilever, 2024). With the assistance of social media, this organisation has induced different marketing options for ensuring the digital marketing operations accurately. TikTok and Instagram are the potential platforms used by this organisation in maintaining the marketing operations accurately (Unilever, 2024). Additionally, organisation with the inclusion of the digital market has involved sustainability awareness among the customers. From a survey of consumers of Unilever, it has been observed that 83% of them have suggested that TikTok and Instagram has been a good place for gathering advice related to living with proper sustainability (Unilever, 2023). However, 48% of the customers have said they get sustainability information from TV documentaries. Additionally, this organisation with nine influencers of social media has introduced a Behavioural Insights Team (BIT) that is promoting sustainability with the products of Unilever in the social media (Unilever, 2023). This has been an opportunity for Unilever to promote its product across the world. Thus, social media is playing a crucial role in maintaining present digital operations in the company. Apparently, this organisation has involved YouTube platform for maintaining advertisements, which is providing opportunities in maintaining the maximising the ROI (Return of investment) accurately.

Unilever also promotes its newly induced products through the inclusion of Facebook, which is another pertinent digital channel for promoting the products. Unilever has 3.9 million followers in Facebook, which has assisted the organisation to manage its digital marketing operations accurately (Facebook, 2024). Beside this, it has been found that CleanTok, which is a fast-growing community in TikTok, has been used by this organisation for launching its first opera for attracting its customers (Facebook, 2024). This has assisted in creating awareness regarding the usage of cleaning products. The partnership of the organisation with TikTok has provided opportunity for the company in maintaining its consumer growth. Additionally, for targeting Generation Z the organisation has implemented influencer marketing in online platforms for collaborating with the different brands of the organisation. 93% of consumers from Generation Z are getting influenced from the content creators, which is providing a chance for the organisation to promote its brands successfully (Unilever, 2023). For attracting the existing customers, email marketing has been used by this organisation by sending the offers and discounts on the brand as per availability. This has assisted in maintaining a proper involvement of the marketing operations appropriately for maintaining business operations accurately.

Goals Unilever want to achieve by being present on each of them

There is a radical change in marketing operations in Unilever from the traditional marketing techniques with the online marketing operations (Unilever, 2023). These changes have assisted in ensuring growth of the organisation as it involves programmatic competitive advantage in the organisation. This organisation, with its digital marketing operations, aims to equip 10 million young people with marketing essential skills by 2030 (Unilever, 2024). This goal will help in providing youth education, which can provide opportunity in improving employment in the organisation. This goal also involved flexible employment options to the workforce, which will be met by 2030. This goal will be helpful in maintaining the business options so that business developments can be managed properly.

Figure 5: Change in Unilever

(Source: Unilever, 2023)

Moreover, the involvement of the sustainability developments goals (SDGs) is involved for maintaining the business opportunities with a target of US$12 trillion in a year and providing 380 million of new jobs by 2030 (Unilever, 2024). This has assisted in maintaining the business operations accurately and maintaining the long-term sustainability operations appropriately. Organisation also had goals to spend more €2 billion annually by 2025 (Unilever, 2024). The availability of suppliers in 22 key markets will assist in managing the social change in organisation. Empowering the employees can be an opportunity for including the digital transformation process in the organisation and maintaining business developments accurately. Maintaining the above-mentioned goals will help in ensuring the opportunities so that business development can be managed properly. These goals will also assist society in maintaining the business operations properly so that long-term benefits can be provided to the shareholders of the organisations.

Task 3

●       Discuss the company’s digital actions and plans in response to them.

With reference to the operational context of Unilever, different contemporary trends can be highlighted in relation to consumer behaviour. The most preferred consumer trend within the FMCG industry indicates lucrative preference of sustainability measures. The consumer market within the FMCG sector is also observed to enhance their attention to signify the social and responsible practices of respective organisations. The emergence of the Covid-19 pandemic has also played a supportive role to create awareness among the consumers regarding the preference of environment friendly habits. For example, around 20% of the shoppers across the FMCG industry indicated the preference of environmentally friendly practices (Babbage, 2024). Unilever is facing similar consequences where potential consumers are largely referring to the concept of green credentials as an integral part of benefiting the environment.

Along with this, the contemporary trend of digitisation can also be highlighted within the behavioural pattern of customers (Fusko et al. 2020). This aspect has also provided extrinsic influence to the operational strategy of Unilever across the worldwide markets. The digital channels and mediums have also emerged as the most important and new age distribution channels with increasing appetite for growth. Explicit usage of the social media channels and platforms can also be highlighted for this purpose, which are largely driving the focus of the FMCG corporate entities towards digital marketing to comply with the ongoing consumer trend. For instance, an estimated USD 130.5 billion spending is likely to take place across social media for advertisements through mobile by the end of 2027 (Sprout Social, 2023). With reference to this understanding, Unilever has also been attentive to consider the rising print of digitisation across the wider consumer market as a substantial parameter of improving their profitability and performance with effective mitigation of market demands and consumer requirements.

In order to provide quick response in alignment with the contemporary trends of customer behaviour, Unilever has been extremely attentive to signify the digital actions within their operations and business activities. For this purpose, Unilever has been focusing on the deployment of artificial intelligence (AI) oriented solutions and mechanisms as an integral part of empowering a resilient supply chain (Unilever, 2023). This is also playing a leading role to improve overall operation efficiency within Unilever with the optimisation of overall manufacturing and design processes under the lights of virtual simulations, data driven decision making approach, automatic workflow and others. Along with this, active implications of AI solutions and Big Data analytics can also be considered from the perspective of Unilever in terms of optimising their existing food portfolio and accelerating towards the consequences of new product development. This is also adding a greater value to their sustainability concerns and measures. An emerging AI lab is also formulated by Unilever in order to boost up active implications of technology advancement and innovation within their operations (Unilever, 2023). Moreover, the management of Unilever has also been attentive to consider the increasing trend of social media preference among the consumers. Due to this reason, the social media platforms are also largely preferred by Unilever as an integral part of reaching their target audience. Active implications of social media influencers are also playing a leading role for Unilever by providing a positive influence over the purchasing decision of consumers. Along with this, Unilever has also considered the creation of partnerships with the leading behavioural science institutions across the globe in terms of researching the role of social media content to encourage consumers and people regarding the preference of sustainable choices (Unilever, 2023) This digital planning is effectively disclosing the perceptual focus of Unilever management to consider digitisation at the core of their business operations while putting a strong emphasis on complying with the consumer trends and behavioural attributes. The organisation is also planning to launch another 29 e-commerce hubs by prioritising the digital commands channels growth (Babcock, 2023). As per the reports of 2022, Unilever experienced 23% growth across their digital commerce channels while ensuring around 9% underlying sales growth (Babcock, 2023). This evidence is denoting the positive implications of considering both sustainable and digitisation trends, which are also benefiting Unilever with improved financial performance.

Task 4

●       type of the campaign.

●       campaign’s goal

●       reasons for its success or failure

Type of the campaign

The selected market campaign for Unilever is Dove’s market campaign which is a famous brand of Unilever (Unilever, 2023). In order to promote the skincare and personal care products of Dove, responsible market campaign has been considered by Unilever. Dove’s Campaign was considered by introducing Real Beauty Challenge in which consumers were involved in evaluating the quality of Dove products and how they can help to improve their skin (Unilever, 2023). Based on this demonstration of product quality directly to customers, Unilever was able to influence numerous customers to purchase the products of Dove which has improved financial performance of the business.

Campaign’s goal  

The campaign of “Dove real beauty” has been aimed to attract the women customers in the organisation for maintaining the business opportunities in the organisation (Unilever, 2024). The main motivation for this campaign was to involve real examples of women having different ages, ethnicities and styles that are using Dove. This captain has induced the goal of involving diversity, which has assisted in promoting equality among women across the world. The campaign has pledged to portray the women as they are in real-life. The campaign has assisted in building body confidence and self-esteem among women. It has been observed that 8girls among 10 girls globally do not feel good about their looks (Unilever, 2017). Thus, this campaign has aimed to resolve this issue and motivate women to be confident and use the product for enhancing their beauty.

This campaign was launched in 2004 with the aim to feature real-women for the first time in the organisation or attracting the customers. This has been helpful for maintaining diversity across the world, which has been beneficial for maintaining the broader market for this product (Unilever, 2017). The campaign has committed people to develop the beauty of women with the product. Thus, the goal of this campaign has assisted in improving the revenue of the organisation in maintaining the business opportunities accurately. The campaign has also targeted to improve the brand value of the product and has achieved 6470 million US dollars in 2023 with the help of this campaign (Petruzzi, 2023). This has assisted in maintaining the business opportunities and sustainability features of the product in the organisation. Thus, this campaign’s goals have been met by the organisation accurately.

Reasons for its success or failure

The Dove real beauty campaign initiated by Unilever was able to obtain distinct success with reference to the achievement of increasing financial performance with rising attention of the consumers across the world. The prime reason behind the success of this campaign indicated its substantial focus on making consumers and people informed regarding the benefits of the products and innovations afforded by Unilever with Dove (Unilever, 2023). Along with this, the management of Unilever had also focused on challenging the current stereotypes about beauty through this campaign, which initially recognised the influence of marketing and advertising on consumers (Unilever, 2023). The success of the real beauty campaign can also be understood by considering the financial performance of Dove, which helps you empower the revenue by around 10% within a single year (Strixus, 2023).

Apart from that, the campaign had also played a significant role by analysing real sentiments of women about beauty. The promotion of self-esteem as well as the new standard of beauty had also been beneficial from the perspective of Unilever to empower the accountability of Dove products across the globe (Unilever, 2023). Potential consumers had also paid extreme attention to the campaign behind which the improvement of people’s self-esteem can be largely intercepted. Along with this, the campaign had also been helpful to connect with the consumers with reference to their appearance as well as self-confidence. This aspect has maintained a transverse relationship to identify increasing consumer attention and preference of dove products. This aspect initially added a greater value to empower the financial standings of Unilever. For example, universe ensured around 5.2% sales growth during the third quarter of 2023 (Unilever, 2023). Behind this increasing sales growth, adequate contribution of this campaign can be considered, which has been helpful to empower the corporate revenue of Unilever to a large extent.