Westfield as a Leading Shopping Centre in London - Essay Example

Westfield is a leading shopping Centre in London with more than 100 shopping malls. Its rapid growth is attributed to its development of firm-specific advantages (FSAs), which gave it a competitive edge in terms of selection of its properties, redevelopment, marketing and branding, their relationship with the retailers and in the financial sector. Its development was focused on responding to changes in consumer spending habits and venturing into other business practices such as doorstep delivery. Due to the increasing number of visitors, its customers are continuously increasing, and this has led them to adopt the technologically driven mode of operation. The management has adopted the digital marketing system in which customers can quickly and conveniently look at all goods available and decide on which ones to buy. The online service launched facilitates this by enabling customers to make their orders online and the goods delivered at their doorstep. This has boosted their sales specifically during the winter seasons in which people cannot move to the shopping centre. This, in as much as it boosts the sales, has had its challenge in the expenses incurred during the delivery of small purchases to remote areas. In a bid to control this, the management encourages large purchases by offering promotions such as price cuts on large purchases made.

This, however, has called for the employment of more staff members and training the existing employees on digital marketing. Westfield has also established a means of getting consumer feedback and desires by coming up with a social site of you-tube and Facebook. From a list of 1,450 applicants, they chose an insider whose job is mainly to promote talks about shopping, smart buys, modern trends in fashion and the available offers and lifestyle (Dick & Merrett 2007, 308-318). He also responds to the customer queries and gives them directions on where to find relevant goods. This has enabled Westfield to reach even a larger population since most people post their views on these sites. On these sites, customers offer advice to each other and Cowell; the insider is also able to carry out market research online.

In another social media venture, Westfield introduced the online styling program in which customers email their queries on their wardrobe dilemmas and are advised on the best places, to find the goods they need. This service is offered 24/7 and so does not limit the customers to a specific time for their queries. It also launched the mobile application service in which customers can locate the shopping malls from their phones, locate the retailers for queries, receive discounts on some goods and even find out their balance on the Westfield gift cards. Westfield is continuously venturing into digital and mobile technology, to adapt to changes in technological trends of the modern population. As estimated in 2004, the U.S had an average of 2 square meters of retail shops per capita, Australia had only 0.6, and the rest of the world was estimated at 0.3 square meters of retail shops per capita. This is clear evidence of the enormous global opportunities for dynamically competitive businesses such as the Westfield which started off just as a small entity in Australia and expanded to the U.S, selling them back the shopping centres just like selling ice to the Eskimos and becoming one of the best shopping centres in Europe.