Component 1: Marketing – New technology — Eduqas A-Level Business
Test yourself on Component 1: Marketing – New technology with EDUQAS A-Level practice questions.
7 days Premium · Then free forever · No card, no charge
Component 1: Marketing – New technology explained
Digital media put paid search, display, email and influencer content within reach of firms that could never afford television, and because they are bought by click or impression the spend is measurable in a way press advertising never was.
Read the full explanation
Social platforms add conversation, user generated content and communities, which builds reach cheaply while handing part of the message to the audience. Online retailing removes the shop from the transaction, widens the range far beyond shelf space and lets prices change by the hour. Mobile commerce moves the same activity onto phones, adding location based offers, app loyalty schemes and one tap payment. Behind all of it sits the real change, which is customer data allowing targeting, personalisation and testing one version of an offer against another.
Explain the impacts of new technology on existing businesses such as high street retailers
For an established store based retailer, online competition attacks the cost structure rather than the product. Rent, business rates, heating and shop floor wages are largely fixed, so when footfall falls the break-even level of sales stays where it was and losses arrive quickly, while a rival serves the same customers from a single warehouse. Price transparency and showrooming let shoppers inspect in store and buy elsewhere, squeezing margin on the very lines that used to pay for the space. The usual response is omni-channel trading through click and collect, in store returns for online orders, and using shops as local fulfilment points so the floor space earns its keep. That needs capital, systems and retraining, and it changes what a store is for; Debenhams and Argos are the standard illustrations of failure and of adaptation.
Evaluate the impact of new technology on the marketing activities of businesses and its stakeholders
Judging this properly means weighing measurable gains against costs that never appear on an advertising invoice. Precise targeting lowers the cost of acquiring a customer and lets a small firm compete for attention, but it rests on data carrying legal duties under data protection law and on platforms whose rules, algorithms and prices the business does not control. Reach bought today can vanish when a platform changes its ranking, and one complaint can travel further than any campaign. Stakeholders move in different directions: customers gain choice, personalisation and sometimes lower prices while giving up privacy, store employees lose hours as roles shift to analytics and fulfilment, suppliers face more price transparency, and shareholders see margin move either way depending on execution.
Your focus
- Explain how new technology is used in marketing, including the role of digital media, social media, e-tailing and m-commerce
- Explain the impacts of new technology on existing businesses such as high street retailers
- Evaluate the impact of new technology on the marketing activities of businesses and its stakeholders
Component 1: Marketing – New technology exam tips
Marking Points
- Define the terms precisely, since electronic retailing is retail conducted online while mobile commerce is a transaction completed on a handheld device, and the two overlap rather than being identical.
- Explain the mechanism rather than the label, for example that targeting by search term or browsing history cuts wasted coverage and therefore lowers the cost of acquiring a customer.
- Use measurability as a point of analysis, naming conversion rate, cost per click, or customer acquisition cost weighed against customer lifetime value.
- Apply the technology to the case business and its segment, since an app with push notifications suits frequent repeat purchase while a search campaign suits an occasional high value purchase.
- Anchor the impact in cost behaviour: high fixed costs with falling volume raise fixed cost per unit and push output towards or below the break-even point.
- Distinguish threats from opportunities for the same firm, including data capture, cheaper secondary locations and the use of existing stores as fulfilment hubs.
- Name the investment required and where the money comes from, since systems, retraining and delivery capacity need finance and will affect gearing and cash flow.
- Show awareness of pace, because consumer technology changes demand far faster than a property portfolio tied into long leases can be changed.
- Set a criterion before judging, such as return on marketing spend, customer retention or risk to brand reputation, then apply that same criterion throughout.
- Treat stakeholders as having conflicting interests, naming the direction and rough size of each effect instead of saying that everyone is affected.
- Recognise dependency risk, since rising auction prices, algorithm changes and platform commission are costs that grow after the switch has been made.
- Close with the condition that decides it, usually whether the target segment is genuinely reachable online and whether the firm has the data skills to use what it collects.
Examiner Tips
- 💡Explain questions here carry a because chain worth two or three marks, so take one technology and follow it through to sales volume, cost or brand strength.
- 💡Keep one current illustration ready, such as a retailer using app data to target offers, and hold it to a clause so it supports the argument rather than filling the page.
- 💡Watch for questions that ask about marketing activities specifically, where operations and human resource effects will not be credited.
- 💡Analyse questions want a chain of reasoning: the technology change, then the effect on costs or revenue, then the effect on profit or competitiveness for the named business.
- 💡If the case gives sales figures across several years, calculate the percentage change and quote it, because an applied number lifts the whole answer.
- 💡Do not spend the answer on the technology itself; the marks are for the impact on the existing business and how it responds.
- 💡The longest question in this topic is normally an evaluate, so plan two developed arguments plus a supported judgement rather than four thin points.
- 💡Use stakeholder conflict as the route into judgement, since what benefits shareholders through lower costs may harm employees, and saying so explicitly earns the evaluation marks.
- 💡Quote one figure from the case, such as the share of sales made online, so the judgement rests on evidence and not on assertion.
Common Mistakes
- Writing that digital marketing is cheap without qualification, when auction based advertising prices rise as rivals bid and skilled staff or agencies cost real money.
- Describing social media only as free advertising, ignoring moderation, response times and the speed with which one complaint spreads.
- Listing technologies with no link to a marketing objective such as awareness, trial, retention or average basket size.
- Claiming the high street is finished, when several chains have grown store numbers by using them for collection and returns.
- Ignoring the costs online retailing carries of its own, particularly delivery, returns processing in clothing, and paid search to be found at all.
- Treating every retailer alike, when a convenience or service based business is far less exposed than a standard electronics chain.
- Balancing the answer with one advantage and one disadvantage of equal weight, which is description with a conclusion bolted on rather than evaluation.
- Forgetting customers who are not online, which matters when the case business serves older, rural or low income markets.
- Treating data collection as costless, when compliance, security and the damage caused by a breach are genuine liabilities.