Market research involves field (primary) and desk (secondary) research:
- Primary research – this involves communicating directly with the consumer to find out what they exactly it is that they need.
- Lex Transfleet carry out questionnaires and they invite customers to their business to interview them and this is what helps them with their research to meet there customers needs better.
- Lex Transfleet can also give loyalty cards which records every item bought by the customer.
- Involves publish material for example reference books, statistics and marketing reports by specialist companies.
- This allows the marketing and sales department to find out information about consumers income and expenditure.
- Government publications also have information about spending, population changes, household information and family income.
Pricing
The price of the truck rental service needs to be fixed in Lex Transfleet and the reason for this is because Lex Transfleet wants to:
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Make profit – Lex Transfleet wants to cover the cost of it trucks so it does not make a loss in the business.
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Beating competition – Lex Transfleet will want other businesses to rent the trucks from them instead of competitors by keeping prices low and maximising sales which will attract more customers to come and buy trucks and other services from them.
- Providing a quality product or service – Lex Transfleet will need to make sure it is not undercharging for its services and products because customer will pay high prices for better products so this also means they will not have any loss in the profit. Lex Transfleet has also changed its name to RAC plc as it is branded and it will attract more customers.
Promoting the product
The Promotion Process involves the following which Lex Transfleet does:
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Advertising – informing the public or other businesses about Lex Transfleets products and services, e.g. they use the internet, newspapers.
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Branding – Lex Transfleet makes sure they create an image of the product or service in an attractive way Lex Transfleet has changed it name recently to ‘RAC’. Having a logo to and image to persuade customers to use them.
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Packaging – Lex Transfleet presents the product in an attractive way so the trucks have M.O.T and are safe and practical to use.
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Publicity – in the media which mean special promotions and sponsor which Lex Transfleet have on their website. Lex Transfleet have had good publicity in the news paper and press so get positive image. Give special offers to big companies who rent lots of trucks and for longer.
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They do have a website which they are on http://www.lvl.co.uk/vans/van_info/lex_transfleet.php giving promotion to subscribe to a van and light truck magazine.
Place
- Involves selling the product for example selling the vans and truck rental services all over the U.K and they have a website which can attract customers.
- Lex Transfleet sell truck rental services directly to the customer which is safe.
- Lex Transfleet will give customers a quote through their internet using online bookings or emailing them and over the phone.
- Lex Transfleet uses telesales for selling to the customer over the phone so they will need call centre staff.
- Direct mail which Lex Transfleet uses to send their brochures out the businesses.
- E-commerce Lex Transfleet sell their services over the internet through their website you have to email them first to get a quote
Lex Transfleet uses ICT in the marketing and sales function for: advertising and website, keeping customer’s profiles on the system, online marketing and also finding out research on their competitors by looking at the internet and other websites.
Human Resources Function
Purpose of the human resources function: Deals with hiring, firing and well being of the staff and all other functions for example sales and marketing, administration and finance ect. So it can run effectively.
In Lex Transfleet they will need to deal with:
- Recruitment of staff which means that Lex Transfleet will need to be advertising vacancies liaise with finance for costs and payment, how many people to recruit.
- Disciplining and dismissing staff in other functions to run smoothly and to reduce costs.
- Training and development and promoting of staff which will liaise with finance for cost of training and other functional areas to check who needs training for example in Lex Transfleet induction and health and safety or other courses are taken place for this and if someone is in the sales and marketing function they will need training to do the job properly.
- Maintaining good working conditions of the staff and Health and safety in Lex Transfleet.
- Looking after employee and the business relationship and liaising with other functional areas like sales and marketing to find out how well the staff in Lex Transfleet are doing and rewarding staff by giving pay rises and liaise with finance about budget to give pay rises.
- Dealing with employee organisation for example the trade unions.
The employees and the business have rights and responsibilities and Human Resources have to deal with this and make sure staff is aware of this in Lex Transfleet. Interest of employees protected by the trade union and by staff associations and also the rights of the employees protected by the employment laws liaise functional areas to make sure there is a safe working environment in Lex Transfleet. Everything is recorded so the employee will know if they have made any mistakes and need to improve or they have met their needs.
Operations and management function
Purpose of the management function: This function transforms the business resources into products and services for example operations which is the production of a goods or service.
Land machinery – Lex Transfleet needs to find land, offices, call centres, machinery or equipment required and need to get information from other functions to get the right amount.
Machinery equipment – Lex Transfleet has software, computers, photocopiers which the business needs.
People who work there and for the business - call centre staff, mangers, supervisors, operator’s consultants, accountants, specialists, solicitors.
Materials and stock used by the business – trucks that are brought, truck parts, stationary, computers, software.
Factors of production
- Land – the offices , buildings
- Labour- the people who work there
- Capital –the money invested into the business
- Enterprise –the input of the entrepreneur
The resources used by Lex Transfleet will have to be paid for. This results on costs for the business for example wages, rent, rates, materials, stock, electricity, phone bills all of these have to be dealt with the finance department.
When operations in Lex Transfleet are trying to produce a product or service it will have to look at its costs to manufacture that item or service and it will have to make sure that the sales department will cover the day to day costs and the greater the added value the greater the possible profit. So the more money they get from sales and they take away that from the running cost they get profit.
Efficiency and productivity
Efficiency means – making the most for the resources for example good productivity by the staff and also the number of sales made by staff in Lex Transfleet or the number of calls taken by the employee.
Some employees paid a bonus for selling more services and also to motivate them to make more sales for Lex Transfleet.
Quality assurance - quality assurance is very important as it means more returns to the businesses. Quality control of a service or product is very important for feedback to the marketing department.
- Operation check with sales as they monitor the calls and make sure the quality of service is very good. Sales liaise with Human Resources to give training to customers in Lex Transfleet.
- Operations liaise with Human resources to give training operation staff.
- Operations also monitor number of complaint and reasons for complaint to minimise this and improve services better by liaising with sales team to find out what their customer views are as they are in the front line and dealing with customers on a regular basis.
- Operations liaise with marketing to get information about customer demand, competitor information and lots more.
- Operations also check with sales function to check which items/services are selling more to make decision about producing more or less of these goods or services and then contacting the marketing function to either advertise more or less.
- Operations will liaise with finance to buy more or less to expand and liaise with Hr to get more staff.
Finance Function
Purpose of the finance function: To control inflow and outflow of money in the business and is also closely involved in the production of goods or services and links in with other functions of the business and senior management.
In Lex Transfleet the finance department looks like this the table below shows this as the finance director.
Finance director
Financial accounting
All transactions have to be recorded. Sales of the products and services from the sales department so they are auditable as they are recorded. Purchases made for stock or material from the operations department again so it’s recorded. Each type of expense for example electricity, bill rent, and wages are from the administration department. Wages is the information collected from the Human resources function so employees are paid on time and correct. Debtors are people who owe the business money for example the customers who have brought a product and still haven’t given the money for it. Creditors are people whom the business owes money for example if Lex Transfleet has brought something from somewhere e.g. a truck then they owe the money to the suppliers if they haven’t yet paid for it.
Accounting
ICT used to records all the transaction and special accounting software used to records wages.
Financial statement is produced for management and this shows profit and loss and also, helps management monitor the main aims and objectives of the business the information on financial statements are on computer databases and so computers prepare the accounts automatically
Finance produce 2 main accounts:
- Profit and loss shows sales figures form the sales functions, expenses from all functions and then can calculate the profit.
- The balance sheet shows how much the business owns and owes.
Costing and budgeting this is how the function works together:
- Operations tell the finance of the cost of raw material purchased, for example trucks, tyres, equipment purchased by Lex Transfleet.
- The cost of paying the wages for the employees working for Lex Transfleet which the human resources function will let them know about.
- Other expenses such as:
- Bills which are the costs from administrations function.
- Electricity, water, rates, stationary are also in the administrations function.
- Advertising , promoting the business – sales and marketing function and they communicate with administration function so the suppliers are paid on time.
The Finance function has to liaise with other functional areas to calculate the costs for making the product and service to ensure that there is a sufficient finance to cover the costs and also the business is making the most of efficient use of its resources.
Budgeting
Finance has to set budgets there are two kinds of budgets, a sales budget I used to forecast the income of the business from sales, and a production budget which is used to plan for the cost for producing the service for example cost for buying trucks and hiring people. Both Budgets will monitor the actual figures with forecasted and if the figures do not match for examples sales figures then they will liaise sales function to change their forecast or with marketing to advertise and promote the services better.
Raising finance are the Long term finance needs which are used for investing in premises, trucks, machinery, computers and lots more, and theirs short term needs which is like buying stock for example trucks, paying bills, and paying wages.
Finance has to raise money for the other functions such as marketing, sales, operation and administration to finance their expenditure so that the activities can takes place to meet Lex Transfleets aims and objectives.
Payroll
Works out pay and deduction of tax and national insurance of its employees and it gets it information from the Human Resources function and it is done by computers in Lex Transfleet as it is a large Plc and also uses computer payroll programmes as they are faster and very accurate., so the employees are happy as they will be being paid properly and accurately.
Administration Function
Purpose of the administration function: Administration is making sure that the right resources are in the right place at the right time.
The administration function makes the business run smoothly and makes sure that:
- Paper in the photocopiers
- Paper in the loo
- Premises are safe
- Telephone messages are passed on
Administration and communication:
Information and messages such as enquiries, orders, complaints from external sources. Callers with or without appointment will call in and different functions will communicate with each their for the day to day running of the business these methods include paper, documents, telephone, fact, internal email and meeting. If finance needs to meet with operation function to make decisions the administration function will arrange it for example if a customer wants a meeting with the sales team the administration function will arrange it.
The marketing function is done by:
Sales so that they get records of customers, finance so they get to process accounts and payroll.
Opening and distributing post when it arrives to all other functions and collecting and stamping the post going out at the end if the day from all other functions. Operating and telephone switchboard which means transferring these calls to the relevant people in other functions. Dealing with callers to premises and directing them to the relevant functions.
Designing and printing forms for all the different functions and also filling and database maintenance and making sure the premises are clean and secure:
- Cleaning can be outsourced in Lex Transfleet which means using external companies which come and carry this out so the place is clean and safe for employees and visitors.
