Weekly class blog for class on 3/28/2012

           I had a hard time rapping my head around this week’s chapter, it could have been due to all the other work I had in my other classes. Anyway, this week we studied chapter 14 it was on "Integrated Marketing Communications." The chapter was mainly about one of the 4 p's, Promotion (Communication by marketers that informs, persuades and reminds potential buyers of a product in order to influence an opinion or elicit a response).

The four elements used in promotion are: Advertising, Public relations, sales promotion, and personal selling.

There are also some different kinds of Advertising Media.  Some listed in the PPT both traditional and new advertising medias, such as: Television, radio, newspaper, magazines, books, direct mail, billboards, transit cards, internet, banner ads, viral marketing, e-mail, and interactive video.  This is an interesting the thing how the advertising has changed over just the last few years with more and more advertising using the internet and e-mail.  It will be interesting to watch and see how it changes more over my lifespan.

I really like this graphic and how it demonstrates the promotional mix.  It accurately shows how the mix and mingle together.

      

                Much of this chapter was review for me from one class or another, either my business communications or my managerial accounting (Maybe that is why I had a hard time getting into it this week).  This chapter also talked about the Communication process, which I covered last year in my communications class.  This chapter talked about “pull” and “push” strategies again, which I also covered in my Managerial accounting class last year. 

                Even though this chapter was partly review, the main thing I think will come in handy in my future is the different kinds of advertising and promoting you can have your any business.  Your case this week “Wicked” talked about different types of promotion, and showed some great examples.

Marketing class 3/21/2012

This week we where able to study chapter 12 in our book on “Marketing channels and soppy chain management.”

We learned about the marketing channel functions which are: specialization and division of labor, overcoming discrepancies, and providing contact efficiency.

We also learned about different discrepancies and how to overcome them.  There are discrepancy of quantity, discrepancy of assortment, temporal discrepancy, and spatial discrepancy.

I love this graphic, it shows how providing contact efficiency works. (Except change circuit city since they went out of business a few years ago.)

We learned about channel intermediaries

We defined supply chain management which is: “A management system that coordinates and integrates all of the activities performed by supply chain members into a seamless process, from the source to the point of consumption, resulting in enhanced customer and economic value.”

The responsibilities of supply chain managers are:

·         Channel strategy decisions

·         Sourcing and procurement of raw materials

·         Production schedules

·         Order processing

·         Inventory management

·         Finished goods/supplies transportation and storage

·         Customer service coordination

·         Supply chain information flow management

·         Partner relationships

This is a graphic of the supply chain process. (I have covered this in a few of my other classes too.)

We also learned about Levels of distribution intensity. The intensity levels are mainly designated by the number of intermediaries they have.  For instance intensive level has many intermediaries; the selective level has several intermediaries, and last is the exclusive level with only one intermediary.

I think this chapter with learning about the place of the product will come in very handy since if the product isn’t in the right place at the right time then the product has a potential loss of sales.

(all slides and information taken from "MKTG" Lamb, Hair, McDaniel)

Marketing class 3-7-2012

Blog for class on 3-7-2012
We covered chapter 10 this last week after taking the midterm. Chapter 10 talks about

Developing and marketing products. We first defined a new product as: A product new to the world, the market, the producer, the seller, or some combination of these. Then we discussed the categories of new products that are: 1- New-to-the-world, 2- New PRODUCT LINES, 3- Product Line Additions, 4- Improvements of Revisions, 5- Prepositioned Products, and 6- Lower-priced Products.

We also discussed the new product development process, and how at you do all of the steps it works like a cone and funnels it down to the new product. According to the book only 4.3 percent of all new products succeed.

Then we talked about why products fail

·         No discernible benefits

·         Poor match between features and customer desires

·         Overestimation of market size

·         Incorrect positioning

·         Price too high or too low

·         Inadequate distribution

·         Poor promotion

·         Inferior product

So there are many reasons why your new product might be one of the 95.5% that fail.

We defined Diffusion as The process by which the adoption of an innovation spreads.

The different categories of Adaptors are: 1- Innovators, 2- Early Adopters, 3- Early Majority, 4-Late Majority, and 5-Laggards.  This categorizes how fast people adopt new products such as a new Ipad.

We also learned about a products life cycle and how it is similar to the biological life cycle such that the product is born, matures, and dies. Just like animals, plants, and people.  Below is a graph showing both the diffusion and life cycle of a product.

I think this is the most important part of this weeks lesson.  To understand how the diffusion curve and the product life cycle curve coincide.  This will come in handy in any type of product situation.

For marketing class 3/1/2012

We didn't have class tonight; instead we had to take our midterm exam. I tried to study and properly prepare for the exam. I got an 84% (B) on the exam. Not too bad, if I do say so myself. Next week we are going to talk about chapter 10 which is "developing and managing products."