Blog Five: Half Way Point

          We are just about half way through the semester and all I can say is that marketing may be a great fit for me. Unlike Accounting, Finance, and Statistics, marketing gives me a great conceptual understanding of what makes a business successful. Although those other courses are the building blocks of keeping a company running, without marketing, who will know what your company is offering in the first place. Instead of just crunching numbers, marketing has helped me analyze the strategies that need to be made when making unique decisions that push a company ahead from the rest.
          In my earlier blog, I expressed how I felt about public speaking and how I have never been confident when it comes to sharing my ideas and knowledge in front of a large group of peers/individuals. Well, last class, I presented my final presentation of three to my class and I have never felt any better. Having two previous presentations in this course already, helped calm my nerves. For this presentation, I had to choose a Ted Talk that I wanted to discuss with the class. I decided to choose the Ted Talk, What It Takes To Be Great Leader?, by Roselinde Torres.
What helped boost my confidence was how I prepared for the presentation, repetition, repetition, repetition. Once I had it down, I could give the presentation in my sleep. I set my split my presentation into three sections, which are given below:
What Makes a Great Leader today:

•        According to Ms. Torres, many see this image of an all-knowing superhero whom stands, commands and protects their followers. (image from another time)
•       Another outdated method: Leadership development programs that are based on success models from a world that was, but not from a world that is, or that is coming.
•       Despite these programs, based on statistics from 4000 companies, over half reported they failed to have growing strong leaders.
•       Relying on traditional development practices will stunt your growth as a leader

 What Makes a Great 21^st Century Leader:

1.    Where are you looking to anticipate change? Whether business/life

•       Answer is on your calendar: Who are you spending time with, what topics are you focusing on, when are you traveling? Great leader don’t keep their heads down, they see around corners, shaping their future, not just reacting to it.

How this ties to marketing:

•     Marketing managers need to be alert and aware of the market they are entering, what is happening in the present time, and what is expected to happen in this market.
•       They need to meet consumer demands, time constraints, and always be on top of their competitive strategies.
•       They need to instill good uses of SWOT Analysis and product differentiation to beat their competitors
•      Overall, leaders in the marketing department need to be disciplined and use their resources constructively so they can stand out from other companies 

Once I had these three sections memorized, it came so easy to me. The day of the presentation, I dressed up in business attire, and felt comfortable leading up until it was time for me to get up in front of the class. The reason I dedicated this blog to this specific presentation is because I feel like I am really starting to overcome my fear of public speaking due to the significant amount of times we have had to present. Thank you for reading!

Blog Four: Becoming A Marketer

          As I introduced in my earlier blog, one of our main projects in BU 215 is to create a backpack on McGraw Hill Education's practice marketing simulator with a group of four other students, "Practice is a new line of 3D, multiplayer learning games from McGraw-Hill Education. Designed against course Learning Objectives and delivered on the web and on tablets, these games integrate into the core curriculum to provide hands on, experiential learning experiences"(MHPractice). Through this online simulator, we have the ability to create a company that meets a specific market for consumers looking to purchase new, top of the line backpack that fulfills their needs. We then are able to compare our results with the other teams in BU 215 (sales, cost of goods sold, revenue, expenses). With this information we are able to revise our strategy and advance in our market. It just so happens that my team is at the top of the charts compared to our peers, excelling in our industry.
          We had to create a strategic plan that would help us grow as a company. We chose to name our company, Acres of Vermont, which is a local company with the drive to supply superior backpacks to individuals that enjoy the outdoors. Outdoor enthusiasts want a bag that can withstand any weather, has a lot of capacity, and provides enough comfort to tackle any adventure. When creating our company we had these three goals in mind:

With these three goals in mind, we believe we can create a successful company that will provide and give our surrounding communities the backpack they are looking for. We want to start at a slow pace, building a foundation for our product and then expanding when we begin to get a satisfying customer base. In our strategic plan, I wrote about our target market and our strategy for building a successful company. I thought I would incorporate an excerpt of what I wrote for the target market of our company to convey how we will go about meeting our consumers needs: "At this point in time, Acres of Vermont’s primary focus is on consumers that love the outdoors. Vermont is known for their luscious green lands, captivating mountain ranges, and alluring bodies of water. Just recently, Vermont was named the first area in the country to use sustainable renewable energy with the use of twelve wind turbines strategically placed in different areas of the state. As a company, we seek consumers that carry the same initiative for a sustainable, clean environment with the hopes of bettering communities around them. Based on statistics from our initial marketing research for these target segments, our market size is about fourteen thousand with a growth rate of five percent per year. Last year, about thirteen percent of outdoor enthusiasts purchased backpacks that fit their needs for adventure. Our hope is to introduce a backpack that grabs the attention of these enthusiasts, while also luring them in with our determination for a greener planet. In hopes of satisfying our potential consumer’s needs, our main focus and concentration is placed on what our consumers what"(Acres of Vermont Strategic Plan). This is just one part of our strategic plan, which I will go into further detail in my next couple blogs. In my opinion, the target market of a company can either make or break you. Hope you enjoyed reading, have a great day!

Blog Three

Last week, we began to study chapter five in our textbook. I scored a one hundred on the chapter five quiz, which I am pretty happy about. Chapter five is all about understanding consumer behavior. In this blog, I will begin to discuss what the consumer decision process and experience is. This is a five step decision that many consumers take part in before buying products: Problem recognition->information search->alternative evaluation->purchase decision->post-purchase behavior.

• "Problem recognition, the initial step in the purchase decision, is perceiving a difference between a person's ideal and actual situations big enough to trigger a decision"(Kerin, p.110). This can do with your outfits going out of style, wanting a next generation phone, or realizing you are running out of your favorite cereal.
• "After recognizing a problem, a consumer begins to search for information, the next stage in the purchase decision process"(Kerin, p.110). There are many different types of ways to search for information. An internal search revolves around past products or past companies you have bought or bought from before. There are personal sources, which have to do with recommendations from families or friends. There are also public sources, which have to do with consumer based reviews and reports. Finally, there are marketer-dominated sources, which is typically all that goes into a company's advertising. 
• "Alternative Evaluation clarifies the problem for the consumer by suggesting criteria to use for the purchase, yielding brand names that might meet the criteria, and developing consumer value perceptions"(Kerin, p.111).
• Purchase decision has to do with who you are going to buy it from and when you are going to buy it. When taking into consideration who you are going to buy from, you may check the stores selling price, warranty options, return policies, etc. When picking when to buy the product you may want to see when there could be a sale/deal or if there are rebates on the product.
• The final stage, post-purchase behavior, has to do with the consumers thoughts on the product once they have purchased it. Typically, a consumer can either be satisfied or dissatisfied. "If customers are dissatisfied, marketers must determine whether the product was deficient or consumer expectations were too high"(Kerin, p.112). Often times, this affects post purchase behavior of similar products/companies, and whether or not they choose to buy from them again. Some consumers go through cognitive dissonance, which is post purchase anxiety/unsureness.

The reason I chose to go over these five steps in my blog is because every person on earth is a consumer at one point. These steps are essential to picking a product or item that will meet your expectations. Besides reviewing this section of chapter five, we have also begun a group project with the MHPractice backpack simulator. This can be purchased for around fifty dollars online and can be accessed right away. As a group, we are a backpack company and using this simulator, we are able to create a backpack and introduce it to specific markets that meet specific target market needs. Every step that is needed to start a successful business line in a company is incorporated in the simulation. Every quarter, we get financial and sales reports for our backpack in order to improve are product and are marketing techniques. We are starting the first simulation this week and writing a paper with our group, I will be sure to update you about it in my next blog.

Thanks for reading!

Blog Two

          Wow! This class has been getting interesting. After about a three weeks of class, I have begun to really enjoy marketing as a business subject. On Mondays, we usually begin the class by taking an online quiz revolving around the chapter that we are focusing on for that specific week. The quizzes themselves are not very difficult if you actually do the reading, in fact it gives you more motivation to read the textbook instead of just skimming through it. After we jump right into our Ad presentations and Ted Talks. Everyday one of my peers in the class is assigned to present a Ted Talk to the class. Typically they speak for around three minutes, discussing the Ted Talk and how it links to marketing, and then show a short clip from the actual video. After the Ted Talk, two students then give their Ad presentations. Students pick a television Ad, no matter the genre, and discuss how the Ad links to the four Ps of marketing, what the target market is, why it is important to us, and how it links to our class specifically. On a typical day, we usually review parts of the chapter through a powerpoint and then have an interactive group activity to convey what we have learned in the chapter, which we then present to the class as a group.
          I gave my first Ad presentation the second week of class. As I said in my first blog, public speaking has never been one of my specialities. I usually get very nervous, with the fear of messing up in front of my audience. I took the time to practice and memorize my lines beforehand and felt pretty comfortable with my presentation. I decided to do my Ad on a recent Heinz Ketchup commercial:

          Heinz Ketchup decided to promote their traditional glass bottle to the public in this 2013 SuperBowl commercial. The bottle is meant to help avoid the weird squirting noises, messy splatter, and watery drip that usually comes along with their squeeze bottle line.

Product: As stated before, the Heinz Ketchup glass bottle.

Price: Not stated in commercial, but typically ranges from one to four dollars.

Place: Can be bought at any grocery store, convenience store, or found at any restaurant.

Promotion: Promoting their class bottle in comparison to their plastic squeeze bottle.

Target Market: Families, restaurant owners, tailgaters, barbecuers, etc.

Why I chose this? Ketchup is one of the most prominent condiments in the world.

How it links to marketing: Uses market erosion trying to bring back the glass bottle.

In my next blog, I will discuss what topics we have gone over in the past couple weeks regarding our textbook. I will also begin to talk about the group project we are starting using the MHPractice backpack simulator game, which seems like it will be very interesting! These past couple weeks have really opened my mind to all the intricate details that go into making a company successful.

Thanks for reading! Have a good day.

Blog One

          When it comes to building a consumer based company, marketing is an important component to creating and maintaining a successful business. According to Kerin Eleventh Edition Marketing textbook, "marketing is the activity for creating, communicating, delivering, and exchanging offerings that benefit its customers, the organization, its stakeholders, and society at large." Since an early age, I have been involved in many marketing decisions, but mostly from the consumer side. Hopefully by taking this course, I will gain experience and knowledge when it comes to the selling side of marketing. The thing that makes marketing so valuable is that it effects, "all individuals, all organizations, all industries, and all countries"(Kerin, pg. 4).
          In our first two weeks of class, we were introduced to the basics of marketing and how it can make or break a company. First and foremost, as we learned in BU 113, we were reintroduced to the marketing mix, or in other words the four Ps of marketing:

1. Product: A good, service, or idea to satisfy the consumer's needs.
2. Price: What is exchanged for the product.
3. Promotion: A means of communication between the seller and buyer.
4. Place: A means of getting the product to the consumer.

These controllable factors are used by organizations and their marketing department to solve marketing problems within their business that will help benefit their consumers. Without these four marketing mix factors, a company will not be able to succeed when it comes to introducing their product to the public. If an effective marketing plan is built, a company can use it as a "road map" when they approach their different marketing activity strategies and issues. In class, we have gone over chapters one and two in the textbook, made small marketing plans in small groups, and have talked about what types of marketing we have seen/experienced in our every day lives. We have also just made groups and are about to start an online simulation building our own backpacks and logo. Hands on and interactive group projects have always been my favorite types of assignments in my prior business courses. I am very eager to get started on this project, it seems like it will be a great learning experience.
          So far, most of my business classes have been numerical based courses such as accounting, statistics, and economics. I am excited for this course because it introduces you to a whole new world of business that I have not yet touched base on other than BU 113. I am looking forward to enhancing my public speaking through the multiple presentations we have to do (ad presentations, ted talks, group presentations). I have always been anxious and uncomfortable presenting to large groups so with this amount of practice, I believe I will gain some helpful experience. My main goal this semester is to take away all I can from my business courses. Instead of just doing the work to complete it, I need to begin to retain more of the knowledge I'm gaining in these courses, seeing that these are my upper level business courses for my major. I am looking forward to keeping this blog and posting about my progress in this course, thanks for reading.