Request For Writer Infoceo

This is a case study and I will be sending the case shortly.

Please answer the following questions from the case.

750 Words
1.Identify two of the main costs and two of the main benefits associated with the Buyer-centric, seller-centric and independent B2B models discussed in the case. Which faces the most sever challenges? Why? (Note: Exhibit 4 is useful, but it is Hinrichs opinion, not absolute truth - you should evaluate the chart critically). (worth 15 points)

750 Words
2.Global Sources mission statement is found on page 4 of the case. Identify three major strengths that can allow Global Sources to accomplish this mission. Given the factors you identified, how strong is the company positioned to attract investors? Support your position. (worth 15 points)

750 Words
3.Identify the critical success factors for any company competing in an online B2B marketplace. Briefly describe each with an explanation of why or how each is critical to a company in this industry. There are more than the five listed in the case. For example, Liquidity & Profitability are two dimensions of one factor: financial strength. Limit your list to no more than eight factors. Prepare a Competitive Profile Matrix (CPM)* using Global Sources, Alibaba and VerticalNet. What is your conclusion about Global Sources competitive position?(worth 10 points)


1200 Words
4.Hinrichs basically faces three options: remain independent, buy a competitor or form an alliance. Identify the trade-offs involved with each option, keeping in mind the material provided in Chapters 3-5 of the text, then recommend and support a course of action. (worth 20 points)

1200 Words
5.If business functions in a pluralistic society, the various players, or interest groups, must be identified, and they are referred to as stakeholders. Once the stakeholders are identified, a businesss economic and social responsibilities to each can be determined. List Global Sources most important stakeholders and say why they are important. (Worth 25%)

Just for Reference
*Competitive Profile Matrix (CPM): A CPM identifies a firms major competitors and its particular strengths and weaknesses in as compared to an industrys critical success factors.
For a description go to: http://www.soopertutorials.com/business/strategic-management/478-how-to-develop-internal-factor-evaluation-matrix-ife-matrix.html and

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Competitor_analysis

There are faxes for this order.

Take 2 business web sites of the same industry.
Compare them base on the issues of:
1. Ebusiness models
2. Channel utilities/conflicts
3. Security
4. Payment
5. Trust

-Use theoretical concepts.
-The report must also contain screen captures of the pages from the website discussed.

Assignment & Student Guidance Sheet


Programme: MBA

Module: Strategy, Business Information and Analysis
Assessment Session: February ??" April 2010
Credits accrued for satisfactory completion of this module: 15
Weighting of this assignment for obtaining module credits: 100%


Assignment Question:


1. Choose an industry with which you are familiar. Carry out a strategic assessment of it.

(some questions that you might wish to consider are; what are the industry trends; what are the principal strategic groups; what threats and opportunities confront firms in the industry; where is the industry on its life cycle? There are many other issues that you might also wish to think about). (50%)

2. What insights does the resource based view of Strategy add to an understanding of competitive advantage that the design school model leaves out? (50%)




Further Guidance for the Student:

1) You should allocate no more than 2,000 words to each question (ie 4,000 words in total).

2) You should identify key theories drawn from the Module and your wider reading and apply them in the context of each question.

3) You should fully reference your answers.

4) For question 1 you might wish to use frameworks such as PESTLE / SWOT / 5 Forces / Competitor Analysis etc etc.





Word Limit: 4,000 words. There is no lower limit however students may not exceed 10% of the stated word limit.
Assessment Criteria:
In addition to the criteria outlined above and in the Programme Handbook, students are expected to demonstrate:

an ability to use the concepts introduced in the Module

a critical approach to the questions by examining and evaluating the underlying assumptions of theories, models, or conceptual frameworks that they use.





Submission Instructions:

Please visit the Online Submission facility on Blackboard for further information on registering to submit online and guidance on submitting your assignment electronically. Please note you need to register your intent to submit at least 3 days before submitting your work.
Only one file in the specified format can be submitted.
An electronic AGC Form should be included as the front sheet of your submission.
Please insert the assignment question to your submission.
Retain your electronic submission receipt.

If you are not able to submit your work electronically please contact your Resource Partner or the School of Management for assistance.


There are faxes for this order.

Personal Application Paper (FedEx)

**** Please see the (upload file) for a clear description ****

*** Pretending you are working in FedEx when writing the paper. ***

*** FedEx (http://www.fedex.com/us/) ***

The paper should demonstrate an understanding of the industry and the competitive position of the organization (FedEx) within it. Please eliminate possible duplications, provide transitions between the sections, and make appropriate suggestions or recommendations how business strategies applied to your organization (in this paper, FedEx).

**** This paper requires a lot of academic research and analyzing. Please cite reference Using APA citation format. Prefer to use a lot academic sources such as LexisNexis sources****

The following are the characteristics of the Paper.

? The paper integrates that material with prior knowledge of your organization/industry.
? The paper goes beyond merely describing concepts and strategies the organization; it demonstrates critical thinking and analysis of those concepts and strategies, and it brings in the research relevant to student?s industry.
? The paper offers suggestions for further enhancement of the company?s strategies (required for A-level work).
? The paper connects concepts and applications of each particular week with previously learned material. (required for A-level work).
? The paper is clearly and grammatically written and well organized (required for A-level work).

Paper Rubric

? ? Paper demonstrates exceptional understanding of the material.
? ? Presented material is always integrated with prior knowledge of the organization/industry and material about the sections.
? ? The paper always goes beyond the simple description of organizational strategies. It critically evaluates and analyses them.
? ? The concepts, strategies and theories presented are integrated and always build on prior learning.
? ? For each major section, suggestions for further enhancement of company?s strategies are presented.
? Graduate level writing is reflected throughout the paper, including accurate spelling, punctuation, grammar, and sentence structure.




Sections of the paper

**** Your organization will be FedEx. Please pretending you are working in FedEx when writing the paper. ****

***nEach section should be about one page (300 words), however, it can be adjusted depend on the material of each section. ***

Part 1: Marketing Foundations
Write a description of the marketing function of FedEx
Some questions that may guide you in this part:
What is the company?s orientation towards the marketplace?
Who are your customers?
Does your company pay attention to or measure customer satisfaction?

Part 2: Strategic Innovation and its role in marketing
Assess the role marketing plays in an organization?s strategic planning
Assess the new product (for FedEx should be its service) development process in the context of an organization?s strategic objectives.
Analyze the concept and theories of innovation and its implications for business development.


Part 3: Strategic Marketing Planning ((with the SWOT, this part maybe little bigger than the others)
Discuss the Strategic Marketing Planning in your organization.
Some questions that may guide you in your posting:
What are the competencies of your organization.
Please talk about the companies SWOT (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SWOT_analysis)
How does your organization?s vision and mission shape its strategy?
How the marketing plan guide the organization to a leading position in the market.

Part 4: Understanding Markets and Buyers
Discuss how your organization conducts its Marketing Research and organizes its Marketing Information system.
Some questions that may guide you in your posting:
How do socio-cultural, psychological and situational factors impact your customers? purchasing decisions?
Analyze consumer needs and behavior and how they affect an organization?s ability to deliver superior value to customers.
Analyze the use of marketing information systems and innovative technologies in the organization.

Part 5: Positioning and Competitive Advantage
Discuss your organization?s primary customer segments and their differences.
Some questions that may guide you in your posting:
What positioning strategy does your organization use with those segments?
How does your organization utilize its competitive advantage?

Part 6 ? Product, Service and Branding Decisions
Discuss various product levels in your organization.
Some questions that may guide you in your posting:
What is your product mix, how important is packaging, services and warranties?

Part 7: Pricing Decisions
Discuss pricing strategy of your organization.
analyze various aspects of the marketing mix - product, place, and price- and innovative strategies to develop and sustain the organization?s market position.

Part 8 Distribution Decisions
Discuss your organization?s channel design.
Some questions that may guide you in your posting:
Does your company utilize Integrated Logistics Systems?
Discuss how the company benefits by using more than one channel of distribution. (retailer stores, phone sales, catalog sales, on-line)
Explain how the distribution system does or could operate as either a vertical (VMS) or horizontal (HMS) marketing system

Part 9: Integrated Marketing Communications Decisions
Discuss your organization?s marketing communication strategy.
Does your organization have an Integrated Approach to all its communications?
What promotional tools are utilized?
How are the organization?s advertising, sales promotion, event marketing, and Direct marketing to promote its product and service?

Part 10: Suggestion and Recommendations
Make appropriate Suggestion and Recommendation on the company business strategies in the coming future.

Review the paper. Please eliminate possible duplications and provide transitions between the sections.

Prepare a startup business plan for an entrepreneurial idea of your own selection (but submit your concept for my approval by the end of week one). Your business plan should be in APA format and approximately 15 - 20 pages in length, not counting the Cover Page and References Page (please use at least 5 scholarly references to research your paper).

At some point my wife and I plan on retiring in the rural area of Thailand. We already have some land and a house there. Thailand is a huge producer of rubber. I do not want to own a rubber plantation for several reasons; I am not a farmer, it takes too long for a rubber tree to mature and then it only produces for seven years and rubber trees deplete the nutrients of the soil after so many years. However, I feel if I had a solid business idea and the funds to back it up I could form a company similar to a co-op but not. I could then purchase the sap from the farmers, treat the sap so that it can be stored for longevity and then finally sell it when the market is right. I do not know of any present middle-men (competitors) that do this. A SWOT analysis should be done. The farmers presently have to sell the sap because they cannot process it for long term storage and they need the present funds to feed their family. The co-op concept would be for those that can afford it, only receive a percentage payment for the sap and once we go to market they would receive a larger remaining amount. Otherwise they could choose the full payment up front at the regular market rate. One of the points that will have to be researched is how to do this without actually turning it into a co-op since Thailand has some very strict co-op laws. Also the Thai Treaty of Amity: US-Thai Amity Treaty offers unique business advantages to Americans that it does not offer to other expats. Land will also have to be purchased for processing and storing the sap.

Areas to be covered:
I. Executive Summary
A. Business Opportunity and Vision
B. The Market and Projections
C. The Competitive Advantages
D. The Management Team
E. The Offering
II. The Company, Industry, and Product(s) and/or Service(s)
A. The Company
B. The Industry
C. The Product(s)
D. The Service(s)
E. The Growth Plan
III. Market Analysis
A. Market Size and Trends
B. Target Customers
C. Competition
IV. Marketing and Sales Plan
A. Marketing Strategy
B. Pricing
C. Sales Plan
D. Advertising and Promotion
E. Channels of Distribution
F. Operations Plan
V. Operating Plan
A. Product Development
B. Manufacturing Plan
C. Maintenance and Support
VI. Management Team
THE TEAM WILL CONSIST OF 4 AMERICAN/THAI COUPLES. CREATE THE FRAMEWORK FOR THE MANAGEMENT TEAM AND I WILL ADD THE INDIVIDUALS AND THE SKILL SETS THAT THEY BRING TO THE TEAM.
VII. Funds Required and Uses
A. Financial Required
B. Amounts, Timing, and Terms
C. Use of Funds ??" Capital Expenditures, Working Capital
Appendixes
Financial Data Assumptions
Exhibits and Appendixes

I did this preliminary workup for a plantation prior to moving to the middle-man idea. Dont know how much the figures have changed in the last 4 years.

It takes 6 ??" 8 years before you can harvest latex
1 Rai can hold approx 100 trees
6 trees can produce 1 kilo of latex a day
2 days of harvest and 1 day of rest
Harvest 10 mo a year
Trees produce for approx 14 years then ground is no longer good for Rubber Trees and needs to be rotated
At the end of the life cycle a rubber tree can be sold for wood
1 rubber tree seedling costs about 15 baht

http://www.afet.or.th/v081/english/data/quote.php

Sheets 60 baht/kilo
Raw 30 baht/kilo

How much will 1 Rai produce, in a month, based on these calculations and todays market for latex?

1 Rai = 100 trees / 6 trees = 16.66 kilo a day
20 producing days in a month x 16.66 kilo = 333.2 kilo
333.2 kilo converted to rubber sheets at 60 baht/kilo = 19,992 baht/month income
income goes to farmer to cover his fees and expenses = 9,996 baht
9,996 baht = 285.6 USD

How many Rai needed if want income of 120K USD annually.

$285.60 / 1 Rai x 10 mo = $2,856 annually
$120,000 / $2,856 = 42.01 Rai

If there are any additional questions for clarification then please have the writer email me at [email protected]. This business plan will need to have less than 20% of outside sources in Turnitins originality report. This is the text being used for the course Kaplan, J. & Warren, A. (2009). Patterns of Entrepreneurship Management, 3rd Edition. New Jersey: Wiley

My paper will provide a marketing profile of the Austin, Texas-based Dell Computer Corporation. This whole paper needs to be about their consumer pc market. It should focus on Dell's product, pricing, distribution, and promotion strategies. It should also include Dell's product portfolio strategy, its target market strategy, its market penetration strategy, and its market penetration strategy. Their key competitors (Hewlett-Packard, Sun Microsystems, and IBM) also need to be discussed (Remember, the whole theme of this paper will be concerning the Consumer PC market). Dell's direct-to-consumer distribution model and its lean manufacturing model need to be discussed in 1 and a half to 2 pages tops. Relating to Dell's promotion strategies, I need you to also address specific advertising campaigns, including the well known "Steven" (e.g. 'Hey, Dude, you're getting a Dell' campaign) which helped Dell vastly expand its share int he consumer market.

Deliverables:
1. Read the Case Study.

2. Engage in relevant research.

3. Answer the questions at the end of the case.

4. You may work together during the research phase, however all suggestions,
analysis, and recommendations must be original and done by yourself.

5. Your report should be between 6-8 pages, double-spaced, and in PDF format.

Case Study Questions:!
1. What are the specifics of this industry that may present barriers to entry?!

2. Assuming that there is no significant debt to worry about, what kind of pricing strategy would you use for this kind of company?!

3. Should there be different strategies in place for New Smyrna Beach and Key Largo? If so, what should these strategies consist of? How are these locations different from each other? How are they similar? !

4. Understanding that it is not likely possible to conduct a sufficient IFEM in this amount of time, you are tasked to ONLY conduct an EFEM. What is the EFEM score for these markets? Conduct and EFEM for both New Smyrna Beach & Key Largo
(one for each location). Explain the scores for each.!

5. One of the key elements in a SITUATIONAL ANALYSIS is ?knowing where you?ve been?. Since this is a new company, there should be much more attention spent on ?where you are? and ?where you would like to be?. Take a look at these last two elements and explain your thoughts, and recommendations. !

6. What other suggestions do you have for Sand Dollar Charters?

Sand Dollar Charters

?Sand Dollar Charters is the number one Boat Rental Company in New Smyrna
Beach. We offer our customers a boat rental to fit all their needs. Whether it is a Offshore Boat Rental, Bay Boat Rental, Flats Boat Rental, or Deck Boat Rental, Sand Dollar Charters boat rental has you covered.?

- http://volusiaboatrentals.com

About The Company
Do you want to rent a boat while visiting Daytona Beach, Ormond Beach, or New Smyrna Beach? Whether your on vacation or live here, why limit yourself to having only one type of boat? We are one of Florida's best Boat Rental Companies. Some days you are in the mood to relax with family and friends at a sandbar and other days you are in the mood to be fishing with the guys? Ever try to go wake boarding or waterskiing on a motor yacht, or even scuba diving or snorkeling from a
fishing boat?!

The point is there are different types of boats for different purposes and at Sandollar Charters we offer a wide variety of boat rentals. We are located in New Smyrna Beach which is just south of Daytona Beach and on the coast outside Orlando. We have everything from rigged out fishing boats to inlet sleepers.!

And don?t forget, when you arrive at Sandollar Charters, your boat is always ready to go. When you return, just throw us the keys and we?ll take care of the rest.!

Which Boat is Best?

A company that chooses this type of business has some difficult decisions to make. Here are the three major options Sand Dollar Charters offers.

Pontoon Boat: A pontoon is more of a pleasure boat. Slow moving, easy to control, and it fits a lot of people. You can relax for a nice day on the water while you fish,
have lunch, or just lounge around.

Offshore Fishing Boat: Want to catch the big fish? You will need to get out beyond the breakers! An offshore fishing boat will allow you to go many miles away out into the ocean. Sturdy, safe, and plenty of room, we also offer the service of a captain if you need it.

Inshore Fishing Boat: An inshore fishing boat will allow you to move around at higher speeds than a pontoon boat, while still being able to enjoy the comfort and convenience of staying close to home.

While it is certainly ideal for a company to offer different kinds of boats to its customers, which is biggest ?bang for your buck?? How does a new company
decide how many to purchase? How does a company decide WHICH boats to purchase?

Some additional company details

! FLEET INFO!
New Smyrna beach - 6 boats!
Key largo location - 4 boats, 3 wave runners and 2 motorcycles. ! !

HOW LONG IN BUSINESS!
New Smyrna beach --- been in biz for one year!
Key Largo ---------- been in biz for 2 months? just got down there! !

RATE INFO!
300 dollars for full day -- 200 dollars for half day the customer is responsible for gas. We take care of oil which is minimal and they can take boat on trailer to their location free of charge if they have a vehicle to tow with. we will drop off at location for customers. If location is 30 miles or further we will charge a 100 dollar fee. ! !

RENTAL LENGTH!
Day Rental is from 8 am to dark which separates us from our competition. All other companies make the customer have boat in around 4pm, so the additional time on water seems to be a value to customer. We do have a half day rental and it?s 4 hours which we stick to. We tell them ?hey you can pay 200 for 4 hours or 300 for 10 hours? to try and get them! into a full day.! !

RENTAL BEFORE 8!
We will accommodate any time frame. When customer wants boat, we let them have it, So if the customer picks up at 6 am on a full day rental, the value is really good. 6 am to dark. ! !

DOUBLE BOOKED!
Not really any issues on this. On busy weekends we have had to turn a few people down because of no boats available, but not often! !

PRICE STRUCTURE!
Only difference is 285 for full day in the keys and the half day rate in the same. Wave runners in keys are 65 dollars a hour. Motorcycle rentals are 155 for the day. ! !

DOCK INFO!
We do not own docks.! !
New Smyrna location -- currently we have a agreement with a location where we keep all boats in the water we pay them 30 percent. this includes water slips for all boats, they handle all customers when they come to location as far as having customer fill out contracts, walking customers to boats and going over operation of boats and safety and they take all payments. In addition to that we keep all boat related info in store front location.! !

Key Largo - Very different situation. Since we just got down there and are testing waters,! we currently rent a parking lot where we keep all boats, wave runners and motorcycles, so they would either call us or see our location or driving down the road and stop in.

Boats run $300 a day plus gas
After you become a regular customer (one rental a month)
we can rent at $200 a month
Or you can join our "Boat Club" which allows Member to have 52 rentals per year at $3500 ($1000 deposit)
Member can use rental days in either location Key Largo New Smyrna Beach
Inquire by email or phone for more details 305-202-1894 Don / 386-957-3913 Joel
Pontoons / Center consoles - New Smyrna Beach
Center consoles - Inshore / Off Shore - Key Largo
Wave Runners - Key Largo
(List is subject to change)
All rentals DO NOT include FUEL FEES
& Require a 24 HR notice please

Apollo Hospitals ? First world health care at emerging market prices. Define the competitive advantage of establishing an 1) insurance system and 2) investing in super specialty hospitals in India.
Support your position by providing three models of Strategy
? Five Forces
? Resource Based Models
? Cultural Characteristics that will support model
When explaining and defining the strategic opportunities, the firm should pursue, be sure to include an economic analysis of your position. Specifically, the following questions should be addressed:
Explain the factors affecting Apollo?s pricing decisions:
? Categorize the major costs tied to your strategy as either fixed of variable and explain how this contributes to your pricing strategy if at all.
? Would you anticipate a competitive, monopolistic, oligopolistic, or monopolistically competitive market structure for your product or service?
o How does this impact your overall strategic choices if at all?
o How does this impact your pricing strategy?
? Are the goods and services provided to the customers inelastic or elastic? How does this impact your pricing strategy if at all?
? When discussing pricing strategies, actual numbers are not necessary. Please discuss, however, whether prices would be higher, lower or similar to current substitutes and/or past prices that have been used. Also, plase be sure to also include a discussion of how the potential customers will pay for the god and services (e.g., out of pocket, government health program and/or private insurance program).
? Will an insurance system and investing in super specialty hospitals in India subject to any market failures such as positive/negative externalities, monopolies, asymmetric information, etc.? If so, would you expect the Indian government or other government entities to become involved? Would you perceive this involvement to help or hinder your success?

Course Project


Name of organization: Walmart

This document must be typed in paragraph form, using the questions as a guide in structuring the content. While it is not a requirement that each of these questions be specifically addressed, they should serve as a guide in creating the content of the project. Use whichever questions you care to by selecting the ones that seem most applicable to your organization. At least ten of the fourteen subtopics listed below must be addressed to some extent. Each topic addressed should have its own title and section. It should be very clear to the reader which topic you are addressing.

The project has no specific length requirements. However, it seems highly unlikely that a project of less than ten pages would be worthy of a grade higher than C. Each of your sections should be of sufficient length. While they do not need to be of equal length, one overly-long section will not compensate for another that is very short.

Subtopics (Please include your selections from this list in the order presented here.)

Environmental analysis
Industry information
Competitor analysis
Corporate mission
Corporate analysis and appraisal
General marketing strategy
Marketing research techniques employed
Market strategy
Market segmentation strategy
Positioning strategy
Product analysis and strategy
Pricing strategy
Promotion strategy
Distribution strategy

Environmental Analysis

Discuss the environment in which your organization operates?

What major environmental forces affect or will affect you?

Which aspects of the social-cultural environment most affect your organization?

How will you conduct environmental scanning?

Industry Information

Discuss the nature of your industry.

What is the current climate in your industry?

How would you describe the future of your industry?

What entry or exit barriers exist in your industry?

Explain the impact of factors in Porters Five Forces model on your organization.

Competitor Analysis

Briefly analyze an important competitor in terms of strategies, objectives, strengths and weaknesses.

Discuss the various classes of your competitors, mentioning names.

Discuss the intensity, or degree, of the competition you face.

Corporate Mission

How would you define your organizations mission?

Discuss your value orientation.

Corporate Analysis and Appraisal

Explain how you would go about conducting a corporate appraisal.

What would you list in an analysis of your organizations strengths and weaknesses?

How do you measure past performance?

Discuss how you do or could conduct a gap analysis.

How will you measure strategic performance?

Relate the concept of the experience curve to your organization.

Discuss the organization of your organizations marketing function.

Discuss your marketing functions relations with other areas of the organization.

Discuss your strategy for building a company-wide marketing orientation.

How will you evaluate and control your total marketing effort?

Select several key items of importance that you would want to examine in a marketing audit.

General Marketing Strategy

Discuss several important strategic planning initiatives facing your organization.

Discuss your growth strategy.

What goals are important to you at the present time?

What strategic alliances make sense for you now or in the future?

How will you seek to acquire a competitive advantage?

Explain your value marketing strategy.

Analyze/discuss your corporate strategic direction.

How have you organized for strategic effectiveness?

Discuss your product/market objectives.

Discuss your system for implementing marketing strategy.

Marketing Research Techniques Employed

How do you monitor industry trends?

How do you monitor consumer needs and behavior?

How will you determine industry sales and market shares?

Discuss your competitive intelligence system.

Market Strategy

Discuss your use of a market-scope strategy.

Discuss your use of a market-geography strategy.

Discuss your use of a market-entry strategy.

Discuss your use of a market-commitment strategy.

Discuss your use of a market-dilution strategy.

Market Segmentation Strategy

Using one product or your entire organization, discusses your level of market segmentation.

Positioning Strategy

Discuss your product positioning strategy.

Discuss your product re-positioning strategy, if relevant.

Product Analysis and Strategy

How will you define market boundaries?

Discuss your use of a product overlap strategy.

Discuss your use of a product scope strategy.

Discuss your use of a product design strategy.

Discuss your use of a product elimination strategy.

Explain the marketing strategy you do or would employ, based on the life cycle stage of a product/service.

Discuss your new product strategy.

Explain your diversification strategy.

Discuss your product portfolio (use the product portfolio matrix approach).

How does or might your organization use line or brand extensions?

Pricing Strategy

What will be your immediate pricing strategy?

What factors determine your organizations degree of price sensitivity?

Discuss your various products elasticity of demand.

Which pricing strategy will you select?

What methods might you employ in adapting your price?

Discuss your use of a price-flexibility strategy.

Discuss your use of a product line-pricing strategy.

Discuss your use of a bundling-pricing strategy.

How would you respond to a competitors price change?

Promotion Strategy

Discuss your promotion mix strategy.

Explain the factors that do or will influence your promotional strategy.

Discuss your advertising copy strategy.

How will you measure the results of your advertising effort?

How will you set media timing, and decide on the geographical allocation of your advertising?

What purposes are hopefully served by your sales promotion efforts?

Which consumer promotion and/or trade promotion tools do you use?

Discuss your personal selling strategy.

Discuss your sales force structure.

Discuss your sales force size and method of compensation.

What factors are considered when recruiting and selecting sales representatives?

Discuss your efforts at training and supervising sales representatives.

How do you motivate your sales representatives?

How do you evaluate your sales representatives?

Distribution Strategy

Discuss your channel-structure strategy.

Discuss your distribution scope strategy.

Discuss your use of a multiple-channel distribution strategy.

Discuss your use of a channel-modification strategy.

How will you determine the number of intermediaries to use, and the responsibilities of channel members?

How might product life cycle stage influence your decision to modify channel arrangements?

Do or could you use multiple channels of distribution?

Discuss possible examples of channel conflict, their causes, and how you will manage them.

What legal or ethical issues might arise regarding your channel relations?

1. Action Strategy

Assume that you plan to start a healthcare related business in your hometown. What products/services would you choose? Use either BCG Matrix, General Electronic Model, or MAC Model to conduct your analysis. List your reference(s) in APA format.

2. Pricing Strategies

In line with the demographic trend, Advantage Home Health decides to offer adult daycare services. How might Advantage Home Health formulate a prestige pricing strategy and a price bundling strategy targeted to customers who do not have an insurance plan? List your reference(s) in APA format.

Instructions: Please answer the questions individually, by each task, each question & sub-question. Like Task 2, have to answer in each question into Task 2 (d) (i), Task 2 (d) (ii)...etc. I also have uploaded a draft assignment for your reference, not a must to do it in the draft assignment as parts of it were not up to standard and not achieve the basic criteria, refer to the feedback i have uploaded as well. All reference will be shown in "Assignment brief", another notes were uploaded as well.

Introduction:

Bestwish Limited (?Bestwish?) is a publicly owned company that offers extensive range of quality greetings cards, gift dressing and plush merchandise, more than 50,000 stock keeping units. The production of different categories of products ranges from 2 to 15 processes. The products for direct sales are standardised but the company also produces specified design from customers on contract basis. The control of costs is complicated because of the varying production processes, large number of stock keeping units, and reliance on indirect costs.

The company has just closed its accounts for the year of 2010. Now, the Finance Director is working for reviewing the 2010 results and finalising the 2011 budget for a series of meeting in the coming weeks.


Task 1

Write a FORMAL REPORT in the capacity of the Finance Director to the Audit Committee of the Board to analyse the 2010 financial information at Exhibit I, II, III, and IV to assess the financial viability of Bestwish. Your analysis should fully utilise the information in the FOUR Exhibits and include a comparison with the 2009 results.


Task 2

The Finance Director will have a detailed financial review meeting with the Chief Executive Officer of Bestwish. Write a MEMO in the name of the Finance Director to the Chief Executive Officer to cover the following issues:

(a) Use ratios to improve the quality of financial information of the review. You need to cover liquidity, profitability and efficiency of Bestwish with at least two ratios in each category.

(b) Make recommendations on the strategic (rather than operational) business portfolio of Bestwish based on the financial information at Exhibit I and II.

Task 3

Bestwish has a Birthday Card Division. The Finance Director feels disappointed on the profitability and production effectiveness of the Division. The Division is using a marginal costing system for costing and pricing.

One of the 2010 budget assumptions was to acquire new machines to increase production capacity and to improve product quality. However, the Plant Facilities Manager abandoned the acquisition plan during 2010. It resulted in a lower depreciation (grouped under fixed production overhead) for the year. The Plant Facilities Manager, in turn, increased the production capacity by cutting the regular maintenance hours of machines.

Further, there were several major machine breakdown incidents happened during the year. Some of the orders could not be served or delivered on time so that compensation (grouped under variable selling overhead) had to be made to the customers. The breakdown also led to additional spending on repairs (grouped under variable production overhead).

The Division is running a responsibility accounting system. The Plant Facilities Manager has to account for the fixed production overhead. The Marketing Manager is responsible for the sales and all selling overheads. The Production Manager is accountable for the remaining items in Exhibit V.

The Finance Director calls for a meeting with the Division Controller, who is the head of the Division, to review specifically the performance of the Division. The Division Controller has limited costing knowledge and he seeks for help from the Division?s Management Accountant.

In capacity of the Division?s Management Accountant, write a MEMO to the Division Controller to address the following issues:

(a) Compare actual expenditure and income to the master budget of the Division according to Exhibit V. You should flex the master budget to the actual activity level and then calculate all sales, material, labour and overhead variances by assuming no opening and closing inventories. You should also discuss the responsibility for the variances found.

(b) Evaluate budgetary monitoring processes of the Division by recognising specifically the generic limitations of budget variances and how this might be different for types of budgets, for example fixed versus flexible.

(c) The Division Controller is puzzling whether the marginal costing system fits for cost and pricing management of the Division. Explain the importance of costs in the pricing strategy of the Division in light of the nature, similarities, and differences of the absorption and marginal costing.

(d) The Division Controller would like to improve the costing system of the Division. Design a costing system for use in the Division. You should justify your recommended design from the aspects of
(i) Classification of cost objects, i.e. function, product/service
(ii) Decision support, i.e. cost behavior and opportunity cost
(iii) Recording and analysing costs, i.e. job costing, batch costing, process costing, contract costing, standard costing; variance calculations, variance analysis and management by exception
Note: You have to consider specifically the scenario of Bestwish.

(e) The Division Controller has heard that Activity-based costing would greatly enhance cost accuracy, pricing, budgeting of the Division. You have identified two birthday card models (BC12 and BC38) and collected their relevant costing and operation data in Exhibit VI as a basis for evaluating the potential merits and limitations for the use of activity-based costing in the Division.

(f) Propose improvements to the costing and pricing systems used by the Division. You should consider the appropriateness of structuring the accountability of the managers in the Division, e.g. cost centre, profit centre, or investment centre.

(g) The Division Controller submitted 2011 divisional budget in November 2010. However, the Finance Director feels skeptical on the reliability of the budget due to unsatisfactory performance of the Division in 2010. The Division Controller requests you to prepare a more reliable 2011 budget for the Division.

(1) You believe that time series and causal analysis are two possible bases to estimate the 2011 sales. For the causal analysis, the Marketing Manager suggests the sales volume are likely explained by the selling overheads. You have collected the sales volume and selling overheads information of the Division for the last 10 years as shown in Exhibit VII. Based on the last submitted budget, the 2011 selling overheads are set to be $45,000. Apply forecasting techniques to make sales volume decisions for the Division.


(2) Select with justifications appropriate budgetary targets for the 2011 income statement of the Division. You have to duly consider the appropriateness of the 2010 budget cost assumptions in light of the 2010 actual result.

(3) Participate in the creation of a master budgeted income statement for the Division and explain your assumptions clearly.


Task 4

At the beginning of 2010, Bestwish invested $16 million to automate all the production facilities of the company in order to improve the printing technology of the products. The time horizon for the automation project was 5 years. The investment was entitled to a tax depreciation allowance of $3 million per year, starting from 2011. The scrap value of the facilities was expected to be $1 million.

The investment was expected to be able to increase the 2010 sales by 2% on top of the 2009 one and realise a compounding 1% sales growth annually thereafter.

Bestwish pays tax one year in arrears (i.e. 2010 tax will be paid in 2011) and the corporate tax rate is assumed to be 30%. The after-tax weighted average cost of capital of Bestwish is assumed to be 10%.

The Finance Director would like to perform a post-audit appraisal review on the appropriateness of the strategic automation investment decision made at the beginning of 2010 in FORMAL REPORT format for submission to the Audit Committee of the Board with the recently released 2010 financial statements at Exhibit I. You may assume that the 1% sales growth assumption is still valid.


Task 5

The Production Director is now suggesting undergoing two mutually exclusive investments to reduce the production costs of Bestwish. The first investment is to undertaking a value engineering study by investing $5 million immediately. The investment will not be entitled to any tax deduction. A five-year saving on the production cost, $2 million annually, is expected.

The second investment alternative is to invest $3.8 million immediately to acquire new machine to support a Total Quality Management programme. The machine is entitled to an annual depreciation tax allowance of $700,000. The scrap value of the machine at the end of the project can be assumed to be $300,000. The Total Quality Management programme is expected to achieve a five-year cost saving on defects of $1.4 million per year.

Bestwish pays tax one year in arrears (i.e. 2010 tax will be paid in 2011) and the corporate tax rate is assumed to be 30%. The after-tax weighted average cost of capital of Bestwish is assumed to be 10%.

Prepare a FORMAL REPORT to the Finance Director in the capacity of the Production Director for the following issues:

(a) Apply financial appraisal methods to analyse the above two investment projects using accounting rate of return, payback period, net present value, and internal rate of return.

(b) Explaining the merits, limitations, and difficulties of cost control through the processes standard costing (currently undertaking by Bestwish), value engineering, and total quality management. Recommend which process that could be more effectively manage cost reduction in Bestwish.

(c) Make a justified final strategic investment decision for the Production Director using above financial and qualitative information. Performa sensitivity analysis on your recommended project to identify the most sensitive factor to the net present value.

(d) Assess the sources of funds available to Bestwish for the recommended project

Please follow the instructions below to completion:
The below paper needs further research and should follow the below five steps to completion.

ONLY Acceptable References:
Acceptable references include peer-reviewed journals and conference proceedings as well
as published theses and dissertations. Genuine textbooks are acceptable as scientific
sources. ACM/IEEE publications with the word transactions in their title are normally
acceptable.
RFCs, ISO standards, ACM and IEEE standards, and ECM standards may be cited for the areas they discuss.

Overall, the research MUST detail the following:

Research Paper:

I. Problem Statement:
Document that details the problem you wish to address. MUST include acceptable references (see above) that justify your assertion that this is indeed a problem that is recognized in the field.


II. Project Proposal:
Draft the project proposal that clearly describes the research project that you will be conducting. The proposal should include a brief:

i. description of the problem being investigated
ii. the solution/approach that will be applied to addressing the problem
iii. and the expected results of their project.

III. Final Report:

1. Introduction
Provide the necessary background and discuss the relevant literature to
motivate the research problem that your paper addresses.

2. The Problem
Discuss the problem in detail and formulate it a manner that makes it
tractable.

3. The Method
Describe the method used to address the problem. Justify the approach that
you have adopted.

4. Results
Present the significant results of your study and relate it to the existing literature.

5. Conclusion
Summarize and highlight the significant contributions of your work. Identify
potential limitations of the study and suggest areas of research that can
address these limitations.

A. An additional 18 pages is required to be added to the existing document below
B. An additional 25 references is required.
C. Therefore, there should be 25 pages and 40 references in total when completed


PROJECT PROPOSAL: INFORMATION SECURITY IN CLOUD COMPUTING PLATFORMS

Problem Statement
Cloud computing manipulates and alters our way of understanding of how current computing systems are aligned. The economics of cloud computing are re-ordering the enterprise software industry globally, bringing greater value at a lower price to companies needing to stay in step with customers (Ambust, et al., 2009). The continued growth of cloud computing is also driving more digital content and information into data centers and the cloud than has ever been the case in the past, completely redefining the development methodologies of applications as well (Rajkumar, Yeo, Venugopal, 2008). Information and data are banished to a hypothetical land of bits and bytes that really exist nowhere but the cloud. All digital information in cloud computing relinquishes its presence on specific sets of computer, hard drives, and other storage components (Durkee, 2010). Cloud computing changes the locality of digital information which can be universally distributed to any geographic location. As a result, the command and control of this data is significantly diffused. This technological diffusement gives rise to new problems as well, including the need for managing security more effectively than has been the case in the past with enterprise applications (Kaufman, 2009). The most impactful concern dealing with cloud computing services is the customers' concerns dealing with the potential limitations that this trend leans towards including confidentiality of data and the need for greater fidelity of data platforms and their underlying technologies (Lin, Fu, Zhu, Dasmalchi, 2009).
In order to understand these limitations it is important to investigate the finer points and details that give cloud computing its definition. Many differing expectations and opinions must be explored to fully grasp the relative perspectives that arise from this idea. The thesis of this exploration deals with the legal, technical and economic viewpoints of cloud computing (RN Calheiros, et al., 2010). Specifically, this problem requires an identification process that potential customers should propose to cloud computing service providers before agreeing to their specific terms of contracts. This area specifically is focused on the area of Service Level Agreements (SLA) and their relative value for enterprise customers including their potential to re-order the economics of enterprise cloud computing in the enterprise (Balachandra, et al., 2010). The continual evolution of cloud computing from a technology standpoint continues to show significant potential for reduction of Total Cost of Ownership (TCO) while also reducing the incremental costs of aligning a specific application to the needs of a segment or larger audience of enterprise computing users (Ambust, et al., 2009). The lowered costs that cloud computing platforms are enabling and accelerating today are being further strengthened by how quickly applications on these platforms can be aligned to the specific, very precise needs of customers. Also what unified all of these strategies together is the continual reliance on Service Level Agreements (SLAs) and their role in stabilizing the nascent yet very fast moving aspects of cloud computing in the enterprise. The goal of this pursuit addresses the problems that might arise related to the capabilities and performance of software applications that are executed in cloud computing scenarios. The argument focuses upon previous research and personal experimentation in designated cloud computing scenarios. Ultimately, the goal is to distinguish the specific contributions affecting performance and, simultaneously provide some possible recommendations or solutions or to potential cloud users that might affect performance problems that are all initially defined through SLA benchmarks and continually monitored through real-time analytics of service performance including reliability and security metrics of performance (McQueen, M. (2008).

Problem Description
As was defined in the problem description, the legal, technical and economic viewpoints of cloud computing form the foundation of this thesis, with specific focus on the issues that enterprise customers are facing in the context of extended service agreements including Service Level Agreements (SLAs). The cloud computing industry has however found that SLAs are often not enforceable with cloud computing services providers, as many of them do not allow for their contracts to be binding from a legal standpoint (Rajkumar, Yeo, Venugopal, 2008). This is because the performance of their back-end systems defy a purely scientific level of management; there is no clear cause-and-effect of how to manage a highly integrated and complex cloud computing architecture with the same level of precision as a desktop operating system for example (Balachandra, et al., 2010). Even the most well-known enterprise software companies who have cloud computing applications running on the Software as a Service (SaaS) platform are not offering legally binding SLA contracts, and this includes Salesforce.com (Stolfo, et al, 2012). For these very large, rapidly growing cloud computing and SaaS-based enterprise software companies, SLAs are more for marketing and less for actually managing the overall performance levels of the applications they deliver (Stolfo, et al, 2012). In many instances the SLA commitments made are not enforceable legally and are meant to be offered as miles per gallon (MPG) ratings for new cars; as in each buyers and companys mileage may vary (Durkee, 2010).
In addition to the lack of enforceability of SLAs often cloud computing and SaaS-based enterprise software companies rely extensively on maintenance fees and annual maintenance contracts to generate the case they need to operate on a daily basis. The reliance on maintenance fees within enterprise software is commonplace and often doesnt lead to greater innovaton in new product development, instead making the enterprise software companies even more complacent over time due to the lack of urgency of generating revenue (Leavitt, 2009). For the typical enterprise software customer, this is often the case. They pay often up to 22% of the purchase price of their applications on a yearly basis, only to be given periodic, small updates that only incrementally deliver value (Rajkumar, Yeo, Venugopal, 2008). Cloud computing vendors including Salesforce.com, and others have created a strong business model by concentrating their efforts on selling against the maintenance fee model of on-premise software vendors, promising to deliver a continual stream of new product updates in exchange for the maintenance fees they charge, which ironically are in the same range as their on-premise counterparts (Balachandra, et al., 2010). The cloud computing enterprise software vendors also claim that their maintenance fees are also delivering more value because they refresh their entire application suite online every 30 days or less; which is significantly faster than any on-premise application can (Kaufman, 2009). Even with all these commitments to deliver a continual stream of new product and feature updates seamlessly over the Web via their cloud platforms, many cloud computing software companies still are not keeping the majority of commitments to their customers. Also, the SLAs they promise are not legally binding given the complexity of wording and lack of accountability and traceability of results (Pronto, JP (2008).
These factors taken together leave the enterprise software buyer with little protection from cloud computing-based software vendors from delivering on their commitments to increased levels of application performance and greater availability of enterprise-grade applications over the Internet. Today the economics of cloud computing are compensating for the lack of accountability of long-term performance (Stoddard, M. (2005). Yet from a legal, technical, and economic standpoint, the broader implications of cloud computing growth are at stake with how these enterprise software vendors choose to manage the distance and dichotomy of their promises and what they deliver. The SLA as a legal instrument needs to continually improve and gain a strong legal precedent to ensure it will be able to protect customers over time and ensure they get the value they are promised. This extends to their reliance on security, scalability of the cloud computing platforms as well, in addition to the development of more effective accounting and performance monitoring systems as well. Salesforce.com has been a leader in this area, as the value proposition of moving CRM systems off of on-premise; highly expensive to maintain systems to cloud computing has been a very profitable selling strategy. The creation of trust of salesforce.com is an example of how cloud computing vendors are working to create a more effective approach to quantifying and verifying their performance over time.

Solution or Approach to Solving the Problem
What is needed to alleviate the obfuscation and confusion that enterprise software vendors are propagating on this issue is an independent entity such as a standards organization to benchmark the SLAs of enterprise cloud computing vendors and report the results publically. This index needs to also take into account customer satisfaction levels and show how cloud computing, when properly implemented, can lead to significant gains in enterprise performance from a profitability and workflow perspective as well (OBryan, 2006). The indexing of corporate performance also needs to include a TCO (total cost of ownership) component to evaluate the real value of cloud computing in the enterprise.

Expected Results of the Project
By creating an index of cloud computing performance and defining its attributes from a TCO standpoint, the industry will have a truer measure of the real value of cloud-based applications. This approach to defining a performance-based taxonomy will also allow for a more effective comparison within industries as well. All of these factors taken together will provide enterprise computing buyers with more effective foundations of arguing for more thorough measures of application performance. The net result will be much greater visibility into how cloud computing is actually changing the global economics of the enterprise computing industry.
























References
Ambust, M. et al. (2009). Above the Clouds: A Berkeley View of Cloud Computing. UC Berkeley Reliable Adaptive Distributed Labratory, 10 Feb 2009. Retrieved from http://x- integrate.de/x-in- cms.nsf/id/DE_Von_Regenmachern_und_Wolkenbruechen_-_Impact_2009_Nachlese/$file/abovetheclouds.pdf

Balachandra, R. et al. (2010). Cloud Security Issues. 2009 IEEE International Conference on Services Computing. Retrieved from http://xml.csie.ntnu.edu.tw/JSPWiki/attach/Supergud/Cloud%20Security%20Issues.pdf

Durkee, D. (2010). Why Cloud Computing Will Never Be Free. Communications of the ACM, May,2010,53, 5. Retrieved from http://www.san.uri.br/~ober/arquivos/orientacoes/artigos_referencia/communications201 005.pdf

Kaufman, L. (2009). Data Security in the World of Cloud Computing. IEEE Security & Privacy, July/Aug 2009. Retrieved from http://xml.csie.ntnu.edu.tw/JSPWiki/attach/supergud/Data%20Security%20in%20the%20 World%20of%20Cloud%20Computing.pdf

King, R. (2009). Cloud computing: Small companies take flight. Business Week. http://
www.businessweek.com/technology/content/aug2008/tc2008083 619516.htm

Leavitt, N. (2009). Is Cloud Computing Really Ready for Prime Time? Computer, 42(1), 15-20. Retrieved from https://www.hh.se/download/18.70cf2e49129168da0158000123279/8+Is+Cloud+Compu ting+Ready.pdf

Lin, G., Fu, D., Zhu, J., & Dasmalchi, G. (2009). Cloud computing: IT as a service. IT Professional, 11(2), 10,13.

McQueen, M. (2008) System Security Through Ideal Driven Technical Metrics. Idaho national laboratory. Jan. 2008. Retrieved from: http://www.inl.gov/technicalpublications/Documents/3881671.pdf

(OBryan, 2006). Critical elements of information security program success. Retrieved from http://www.isaca.org/Journal/Past-Issues/2006/Volume-3/Pages/Critical-Elements-of-Information-Security-Program-Success1.aspx

Pronto, JP (2008) Developing Metrics for Effective Information Security Governance. Getronics. Retrieved from: http://www.interop.com/newyork/2008/presentations/conference/rc10-pironti.pdf

Rajkumar, B. Yeo, C., Venugopal, S. (2008). High Perfomance Computing and Commuications. HPCC 08, 10th International Conference on Computing. Retrieved from http://ieeexplore.ieee.org/xpl/login.jsp?tp=&arnumber=4637675&url=http%3A% F%2Fi eeexplore.ieee.org%2Fxpls%2Fabs_all.jsp%3Farnumber%3D4637675

RN Calheiros, R. Ranjan, A. Beloglazov, C. Rose, and R. Buyya. Cloudsim (2010) a toolkit for modeling and simulation of cloud computing environments and evaluation of resource provisioning algorithms. Software: Practice and Experience, Wiley Press, New York, USA, 2010

Stoddard, M. (2005) Process Control System Security Metrics ??" State of Practice. I3P. Retrieved from: http://stuweb.ee.mtu.edu/~ssmoily/section_4.pdf

Stolfo, S. et al. (2012). Fog Computing: Mitigating Insider Data Theft Attacks in the Cloud. Security and Privacy, 2012 IEEE Symposiom, p 125-128, 2012. Retrieved from http://ieeexplore.ieee.org/xpl/login.jsp?tp=&arnumber=6227695&url=http%3A%2F%2Fi eeexplore.ieee.org%2Fxpls%2Fabs_all.jsp%3Farnumber%3D6227695

the paper has to be on any MICROECONOMICS topic that interst you. CHoose any
one from the following:

1. History of a Specific Tariff
2. E-commerce For a Specific Firm
3. Business Cycle Theory Impact on Microeconomics
4. Supply and Demand in a Specific Market
5. Compare the Economies of Two Countries with Regard to Pricing Structures
6. NAFTAs Impact On a Specific Industry in the U.S., Canada, and Mexico
7. Federal Government Tax Policies Impact on
Businesses
8. Federal Government Spending Policies Impact on Businesses
9. Agricultural Subsidies for a Specific Good
10. The Minimum Wage and Its Impact on a Specific Business
11. Labor Unions Impact on a Specific Business
12. Oil Pricing on the World Market
13. Pharmaceuticals Impact on the Economy
14. How a Specific Price Index Works
15. Monopoly Power in a Specific Industry
16. Oligopoly Pricing for a Specific Industry
17. Monopolistic Competition in a Specific Industry
18. Pick a Specific Perfectly Competitive Market and Discuss Its History
19. History of an Oligopolistic Firm
20. History of a Monopoly
21. Is Utility Theory Relevant?
22. Price Supports in a Specific Industry
23. Rent Control in a Specific City/Area
24. Discuss the Relevance of Indifference curve Analysis
25. Antitrust Action Against a Particular Company
I'd prefer topic 5 of the list. Aagain, the paper must be an MIcroeconomics paper.
******
Question: is this site secure, by security i mean is it posible for any other
software to track the transaction between the customer and you?
please send the paper on time.

Thanx!

The report that Im required to create is a work term report for a technical report course. Here is an excerpt (below) from my courses engineering report guidelines so that you can get the idea of how my report is structured. My topic will be entitled Comparison of Database Management Systems. MySQL will be the primary one to compare against with the other two or three database systems such as Postgre SQL, Oracle, MSSQL, and/or DB2. Not all mentioned DBs have to be included but two or three will be sufficient as long as the report is expanded up to approximate 3000 words (or 10 to 14 pages). The report will be focus on analysis and comparison of DBs. It will be dealt with their histories, features, and installation, pricing and licensing, applications in the target organizations and advantages and disadvantages of each. Such comparison, it can be included performance, reliability, scalability, security, cost, downtime, query ability, backup and replication, limits, usability testing, and so on. Not all criteria have to be included, depending on what your findings are then you would know what good criteria to include. I would like the report to have some technical diagrams or tables to point out the essential of comparison. I would consider myself as a consultant engaged by a client and doing a case study (invented, not real) on which DB is superior. I would consider MySQL as superior. If after you compile the report and realize that MySQL might not be superior, you can email me and we may switch to the other winning DB.

The report format is as following (in order):

- Table of Contents
- List of Table and Figures
- Summary
- Glossary (optional)
- Introduction
- Discussion
- Conclusions
- Recommendations
- References
- Appendices (optional)

Ill take care of the title page and letter of transmittal.

As for number of sources, I would say 3 or 4, but probably mostly from the web such as Wikipedia.com. Citing some sources from journals or articles would be nice.

I would like to have the report be delivered as a Word doc file in the email.

Thanks very much for your service.


Heres the excerpt from the guideline:

=====
The reports are expected to have a significant analysis component which addresses engineering issues, and demonstrates 'engineering thought process'. A report which is purely descriptive and qualitative without a quantitative analytical component (e.g. a user manual or an overview) may expect to receive a very low or possibly even a failing grade. Some examples of analysis include:

a discussion of why a certain machine component would be made of a certain material - ease of manufacturing, costs/profit, FEA, stress analysis, etc.
a discussion of why a circuit would be designed using one type of chip over another - considerations of cost/profit, manufacturing process, reliability, component availability, size, expansion, heat dissipation, etc.
a discussion of why a computer network would use a certain component, say a type of router - cost, ease of use, data transmission considerations, reliability, etc.
an analysis of some software - why use a certain language, portability, memory usage, speed - e.g. the program uses 8% less memory and runs 25% faster if written in a certain fashion.

Do not simply write a descriptive report about some technology that interests you, such as 'voice over IP'. If you do want to use this for a topic, then your strategy would be to describe the technology in your introduction/background; then in the discussion you could set up a case study (real or invented) which allows you to do some analysis. For example, in this case you could consider yourself a 'consultant' engaged by a 'client' who wishes to consider the implementation of 'voice over IP' in their corporate structure - as the consultant, you can analyze whether or not this is a good prospect, given conditions which you can draw from a real case, or create them. This analysis should form the main part of the report.
=====

PART ONE

While many simulations focus on just one general area of management (e.g. supply chain management or leadership), I have selected one that integrates several areas. In particular, you will be looking at income statements and sales reports. You will be making decisions about production, pricing, and investment.

Your first step is to come up with a strategy for how you will make these decisions. I don't want you to run the simulation yet! We will be following the following sequence:

The simulation itself is short, so we will have the opportunity to repeat the above sequence three times.

1. Access the simulation site http://www.forio.com/pdasim.htm We will be using the PDA Sim

2. Read the introduction, and study the Financials and the Market Information. Review the Decisions you will be asked to make.

3. Describe the strategy that you will use and defend why you think that strategy will work. You may append supporting materials, such as data tables and references.

It is necessary to make specific recommendations as to any pricing changes or allocations to R&D. (Drop the price of model X? By how much?) Your recommendations must make sense given your analysis of the market and chosen strategy.

PART II

Review your strategy from last module and enter your decisions into the simulation. Run it through all the way through, and do not deviate from your strategy.

Give your final score on the simulation. How does that compare to market potential?

Evaluate the effectiveness of your strategy.

Outline your proposed changes in strategy for the next run and justify them.

Remember that the key here is ANALYSIS. What assumptions did you make when you planed your strategy? Did these assumptions prove to be right, or was there something else you didn't think about that influenced your results? How will taking those factors into account affect your strategy in this upcoming run?

Again, you need to crunch some numbers to determine how successful you were, where the greatest sources of profit are, and what changes make sense. Make sure you proposed changes in strategy are firmly based in this analysis and sound business principles.

PART III

Run the PDA Sim again, this time making any changes you proposed in the Module Two SLP. Then, explain

How you did on this round (Better or worse? What was your score?).

Why do you think you did better (or worse)?

What changes in strategy will you make for the final round?

Again, ground your analysis in business principles and support your arguments and recommendations with data. I am less concerned with the actual performance on this simulation as I am with your ability to explain it and devise a logical strategy to deal with it.

PART IV

For the third and final run of this simulation, enter your decisions taking into account the changes in strategy you proposed in Module Three and discuss

1. Your company's performance in this run.

2. How it compares to the last run.

3. Why you think you did better or worse.

By this time you know the drill! Ground your analysis in solid business theory and principles, and support your conclusions with data.

PART V

Now that you have run this simulation three times, I would like for you to evaluate the experience. First, I would like you to focus on the actual process you went through as you ran the simulation. Specifically, I'd like you to consider the following questions:

1. What did you learn from this exercise?

2. How did your strategies and decisions change?

3. What was the business theory, model, or analytical tools were most useful to you in determining your approach to the decisions you made?

Secondly, I'd like some feedback on this simulation. Did you find it interesting? Would you recommend continuing its use in future terms? Would you like to recommend any way the simulation exercise could be improved?

Assignment 5: Marketing Strategies

In this final assignment, you will compile the previous four (4) assignments, as well as adding the marketing strategies.

After the instructions I have added the additional papers pervious written to be reviewed

Write an 2 page paper in which you the additional information:

1.Write an executive summary of your marketing plan.
2.Provide the company?s mission statement and company introduction.
3.Provide the company?s branding, pricing, and distribution plan.
4.Provide the IMC and customer satisfaction plan.
5.Provide the following information about the marketing strategies:
a. Discuss the company?s competitors, and its strengths and weaknesses.
b. Determine the differentiation strategy in relation to the closest competitor.
c. Explain whether the company?s intention is to be a leader or follower within the industry.
d. Assess the macro-environmental issues (legal, technological, social, and economic) trends with which the company must operate.
e. Identify the most significant trend to impact the business and discuss how the company intends to minimize or capitalize on this trend.

6. Support your marketing plan with at least ten (10) reference sources that discuss the nature of the assignment.

A Company, its Market, and its Product

The fictitious company, the American Snack Chip Manufacturing Corporation (ASCMCO), was started in 2012 in the basement of a house in Queens, NY. The company began with two women who wanted to create a better snack chip and who were focused on using the commercial grade equipment they had inherited from their uncle when his snack business closed down. The mission statement of the company is to make the best snack chips and potato chips in the United States, and then begin expanding to other countries so that the whole world can enjoy the chips the company offers. To that end, the company has decided to move into a foreign market, which will be Japan. China exports so much to the United States and many snack companies have already moved into that market, so Japan was decided upon since it seemed as though it might be a more logical choice. One of the best ways to determine a country to move into with a new product is to do research into what is already in that country and what people from that country may want that they do not have (Kotler & Keller, 2012).
Since the fictitious company makes more than just potato chips, there is a strong chance that it can provide different kinds of chips and different kinds of flavors that will please the Japanese palate. The marketing plan involves extensive research, because the company must know what kinds of foods make good chips and which of those foods the Japanese palate would enjoy before it can move into the market. Additionally, marketing plans will also involve getting the attention of the target market before the product appears on the shelves, so there is already anticipation for the new items. The academic and focus value of a snack during the day is also a part of the marketing (Taylor, & Kanarek, 2006). When a target market is anticipating something new, the likelihood of a large percentage of that market making a purchase is high - and that can help a new product get going in a new market.
A SWOT analysis of the company and market shows the following: Strengths - company is established in the US, people in Japan like snack foods, people in Japan like US products and like to try new things, Japanese people value academic and things that help them learn. Weaknesses - company is not well-known in Japan, there are always snack products there, marketing to a new country is expensive. Opportunities - company can move into a large, strong market, company can play up the value of snacking for academic purposes. Threats - other companies that already sell snacks to Japan, the desire for other types of snacks that the company does not provide, companies that have a lot more money to use on marketing their products to Japan.
The market position for the product is that the product is a fun and enjoyable snack food to take with a person just about anywhere, and that it can produce a benefit to learning. Because there are chips they are not messy like some snack foods. They can be eaten at home, on the go, and at work, and that makes them very versatile. Versatility is important in a society that is increasingly fast-paced and busy, and when a snack can be versatile there is a better chance of it performing well (Mahoney, Taylor, & Kanarek, 2006). Additionally, snack foods that provide versatility are those to which people will keep coming back when there are parties are other get-togethers, and that can result in larger purchases that will help to build the strength of the brand. That is coupled with the value of having a snack in the afternoon and how it can improve learning (Mahoney, Taylor, & Kanarek, 2006). A better understanding of the value of a snack will help that snack sell, and a company that is careful about getting into a new market will do it wisely and successfully.

The brand is our promise to the customer, communicating to them what they can expect when they purchase the product (Williams, 2012). In order to develop a branding strategy there are seven elements that need to be considered. These are that the brand must be tied to the business model, be consistent, connect emotionally with the customer, reward and cultivate loyalty, the strategy must be measurable, it must position away from competitors, and it should be flexible (Sorenson, 2012). The latter is important because as a new company, we need to be able to make adjustments if the initial branding strategy does not work out. The American Snacks brand is a clear statement of intent in the Japanese market, and one of the benefits of this approach is that such a brand will also resonate in the American market. The packaging and promotion will reflect American origins of the product to all consumers. Domestically, the brand will be associated with classic products, and internationally, America's historic expertise in snack foods will be conjured up for the consumer, perhaps even with American celebrity endorsements, which are popular in Japan.
The optimum pricing strategy is that the company should price competitive to the marketplace, only slightly higher. Major snack food brands combine healthy markups with broad distribution, so such a pricing approach still leaves room for a small company to be profitable. Pricing in such a way that the market views us as an everyday product is important for selling high volumes. Additionally, when American Snacks moves into the premium market, such as Whole Foods and those type of stores, we will be pricing below the health food snacks and chips. Thus, we can capture more of the market. The slight premium pricing strategy will also be adopted in the Japanese market, where it will help to cover the extra costs of shipping to Japan. This pricing strategy supports the branding strategy because the brand is going to be a key point of differentiation. In the US, the classic-ness of the brand is emphasized by pricing within range of mainstream snack products; in Japan the pricing supports the uniqueness of the product, while maintaining consistency in pricing between the two markets.
The distribution channels for these markets involve numerous wholesales. In general, a wholesalers will cover a limited geographical area, which means that American Snack will require individual distribution arrangements for each territory. The company will self-distribute in the New York City area, using trucks emblazoned with the company logo. This will serve as additional marketing when these trucks drive around town. In Japan, the objective will be to find a singular wholesaler who can cover the entire country.
In this case, a pull strategy is required. American Snacks intends to compel customer with our value proposition of quality and good price. We want to create a relationship with the customer where they relate to the different flavors that are being offered and want to buy more because we have given them something unique. The distribution strategy is necessary because that is how the business works ? we must work within the existing distribution strategies. It is important to have an experienced distribution because they will be able to get us shelf space in the stores. Competition for prime real estate on the shelves is intense, but an experienced distributor can help us to gain good positioning.
By achieving good distribution initially throughout the Northeastern US and Tokyo, we will be able to reach our target customers, by having our snack products in the stores in which our customers shop. At that point, it is up to the stylish packaging, compelling flavors and the reputation that the brand builds to win customers and keep them coming back.

A Company, its Market, and its Product

The fictitious company, the American Snack Chip Manufacturing Corporation (ASCMCO), was started in 2012 in the basement of a house in Queens, NY. The company began with two women who wanted to create a better snack chip and who were focused on using the commercial grade equipment they had inherited from their uncle when his snack business closed down. The mission statement of the company is to make the best snack chips and potato chips in the United States, and then begin expanding to other countries so that the whole world can enjoy the chips the company offers. To that end, the company has decided to move into a foreign market, which will be Japan. China exports so much to the United States and many snack companies have already moved into that market, so Japan was decided upon since it seemed as though it might be a more logical choice. One of the best ways to determine a country to move into with a new product is to do research into what is already in that country and what people from that country may want that they do not have (Kotler & Keller, 2012).
Since the fictitious company makes more than just potato chips, there is a strong chance that it can provide different kinds of chips and different kinds of flavors that will please the Japanese palate. The marketing plan involves extensive research, because the company must know what kinds of foods make good chips and which of those foods the Japanese palate would enjoy before it can move into the market. Additionally, marketing plans will also involve getting the attention of the target market before the product appears on the shelves, so there is already anticipation for the new items. The academic and focus value of a snack during the day is also a part of the marketing (Taylor, & Kanarek, 2006). When a target market is anticipating something new, the likelihood of a large percentage of that market making a purchase is high - and that can help a new product get going in a new market.
A SWOT analysis of the company and market shows the following: Strengths - company is established in the US, people in Japan like snack foods, people in Japan like US products and like to try new things, Japanese people value academic and things that help them learn. Weaknesses - company is not well-known in Japan, there are always snack products there, marketing to a new country is expensive. Opportunities - company can move into a large, strong market, company can play up the value of snacking for academic purposes. Threats - other companies that already sell snacks to Japan, the desire for other types of snacks that the company does not provide, companies that have a lot more money to use on marketing their products to Japan.
The market position for the product is that the product is a fun and enjoyable snack food to take with a person just about anywhere, and that it can produce a benefit to learning. Because there are chips they are not messy like some snack foods. They can be eaten at home, on the go, and at work, and that makes them very versatile. Versatility is important in a society that is increasingly fast-paced and busy, and when a snack can be versatile there is a better chance of it performing well (Mahoney, Taylor, & Kanarek, 2006). Additionally, snack foods that provide versatility are those to which people will keep coming back when there are parties are other get-togethers, and that can result in larger purchases that will help to build the strength of the brand. That is coupled with the value of having a snack in the afternoon and how it can improve learning (Mahoney, Taylor, & Kanarek, 2006). A better understanding of the value of a snack will help that snack sell, and a company that is careful about getting into a new market will do it wisely and successfully.
References
Kotler, P. & Keller, L.K. (2012). Marketing management (14ed). NY: Pearson Education Limited.

Mahoney, C.R., Taylor, H.A., & Kanarek, R.B. (2006). Effect of an afternoon confectionery snack on cognitive processes critical to learning. NY: Tufts University.


Works Cited:

Sorenson, L. (2012). 7 components that comprise a comprehensive brand strategy. HubSpot. Retrieved November 17, 2012 from http://blog.hubspot.com/blog/tabid/6307/bid/31739/7-Components-That-Comprise-a-Comprehensive-Brand-Strategy.aspx

Williams, J. (2012) The basics of branding. Entrepreneur. Retrieved November 17, 2012 from http://www.entrepreneur.com/article/77408

Prepare an "effective marketing plan" which should included critical analysis and evaluation for the following :-
1. Strategic Situation Summary
2. Marketing Target and Objectives
3. Positioning Statement
4. Product Strategy
5. Price Strategy
6. Distribution Strategy
7. Promotion Strategy
8. Market Research
9. Co-ordination with other business function
10. Sales forecasts and budgets

Also please included graph, source model examples 4Ps, segmentation model etc; to be illustrate to complete the marketing plan.

SLP3 ASSIGNMENT:
Run the PDA simulation using your revised strategy that you developed in SLP2. Review and analyze the results and develop a revised strategy. Make a case for this new strategy using analysis and relevant theories.
SLP3 Expectations: The expectations are the same as for SLP1 and SLP2. The revised strategy consists of the Prices, R&D Allocation %, and any product discontinuations for the X5, X6, and X7 PDAs for each of the four years: 2006, 2007, 2008, and 2009. You must present a rational justification for this strategy. In other words, you must Make a Case for your proposed strategy using financial analysis and relevant theories. The Recommended Learning Path provides the optimal process for completing this assignment. Include any references that you use regarding data analysis and theories. Turn in the 4 to 6 page paper at the end of this module.
Recommended Learning Path:
1. Access the simulation site Click here.
2. Using the Revised Strategy from SLP2 RUN THE SIMULATION for ALL FOUR YEARS. After each year:
a. Review the results of the Net Profit for that year and the information from the Advisor
b. Review the financial results for that year. Note the Sales, the Revenue, Costs, and Net profit. Record and/or copy and paste this data into Excel for analysis (see below for how to get compatible spreadsheet software.)
c. Review the marketing results for that year - Note the Market Saturation (record and/or copy and paste this data, too.)
3. After the final year (2009), note the Final Score. Make sure you also review and record the financial and marketing data for the final year.
4. Begin to develop a new strategy to use in SLP4.
a. Use the Strategy Matrix to show you new strategy for prices, R&D Allocations and if you will quit selling any product.
b. Use analysis of the Financial Data from this run - Use CVP (Cost-Volume-Profit) analysis. Will Breakeven Analysis be useful?
c. Consider looking at the Market Saturation each year. This is a key peice of data.
d. Use product development theory and pricing theory.
e. Justify your new prices and justify your R&D allocations - point to your financial analysis and theories to Make a Case for your strategic decisions.
5. a. Show the results of the Default Run - the final Score and the Net Profit of each product year by year. Show any other summary data you think is appropriate about the results of the Default Run. Charts and graphs are very useful here.
b. Make your Proposal for your new strategy - show your Strategy Matrix - see the Download of the Word doc with a blank Matrix Table included.
c. Backup your new strategy with Evidence. Show the key analysis data. Discuss how the analysis was used to develop the strategy. Discuss the theories that were used.
--Consider discussing the R&D strategy first,
--then discuss the pricing strategy,
--then discuss Discontinuation strategy.
d. When showing data, you can use tables, charts and graphs.
e. If you are using any references such as those that you have found about CVP analysis and Other Theories, make sure you include them.
BACKGROUND INFORMATION:
The strategy for the second simulation derived on the basis of two main principles. The first is that the X7 has the highest potential upside, so sales should be encouraged by lowering the price. The second is that the X5 is going to be on the downslide by the time this years R&D investment kicks in, so that investment is best put to other uses. The strategy used is as follows:
Year by Year Decisions: Pricing & R&D Allocations
2006 2007 2008 2009
X5 Price $250 Price $250 Price $250 Price n/a
R&D % 0 R&D % 0 R&D % 0 R&D % 0
Discontinue?N Discontinue? N Discontinue? N Discontinue? Y
X6 Price $450 Price $450 Price $450 Price $450
R&D % 33 R&D % 33 R&D % 33 R&D % 0
Discontinue? N Discontinue? N Discontinue? N Discontinue? N
X7 Price $150 Price $150 Price $150 Price $150
R&D % 67 R&D % 67 R&D % 67 R&D % 100
Discontinue? N Discontinue? N Discontinue? N Discontinue? N

The results of the strategy are: a net income of $1.812 billion. This strategy was significantly more successful than the default strategy, which yielded a profit of $1.165 billion. The difference was $647 million, the improvement 55.5%. The majority of the success, however, came from the X7 strategy. This yielded sales improvements of $619 million from $174 million to $794 million. The strategy to increase the price of the X6 to increase profit was only marginally successful. Profit over the four years only improved $12 million. The X5 improved but only because it was discontinued for the final year. As a result of having its R&D stripped, it earned $3.45 million this time out. Given that the X7 was the beneficiary of this R&D money and that product earned $619 million more, I would argue that is a good use of opportunity cost.
The strategy for the X5 will remain basically the same. Lowering the price might squeeze an extra couple of units out of this product, but it finished at 98% saturation so there is little upside to making such a move. The focus of the SLP 3 run will be in other areas. The X6 strategy was barely effective. While the premium price deterred some customers, the higher margins accounted for that. Sales could be improved by adding to the R&D, but if that comes at the expense of sales in the X7, it would not be worth it. For the X6, pricing strategy is key. The X6 price increase came at a cost of 1 million customers over the default scenario. If price elasticity is in a straight line, that is 20,000 customers for every $1 of price increase. The contribution margin on the X6 is 62.5%. So for every $1 in revenue, contribution increases 37.5 cents, so you lose $7500 in contribution for every $1 you increase the price but you gain. This hints that price elasticity of demand is relatively low for this product, perhaps lower than previously believed. Increases in price will result in reduced sales figures but can be expected to bring in more profit as well. It is not expected, however, that elasticity is perfectly linear. It is worth testing the upper bound here, to see how high a price can be supported by the market.
With the X7, the most important number is the final market saturation figure of 37%. There is room for growth here. The cost of goods sold is $65. Thus, $65 is the lower bound on pricing for the X7. We just need to find the point that maximizes profit ??" this may not be saturation. We knocked $50 off the price and grew the sales by 5.388 million, so roughly 107,760 new customers for every dollar off. This can be used to find what should be the optimal price (if elasticity is linear, which it probably is not). Peak revenue is at around $105-106; peak contribution at $138-137 (see Appendix A), which gives us another million or so units. So the price will be set there for the X7.
The strategy for the SLP 3, therefore, will be as follows:
Year by Year Decisions: Pricing & R&D Allocations
2006 2007 2008 2009
X5 Price $250 Price $250 Price $250 Price n/a
R&D % 1 R&D % 1 R&D % 0 R&D % 0
Discontinue?N Discontinue? N Discontinue? N Discontinue? Y
X6 Price $450 Price $450 Price $460 Price $460
R&D % 32 R&D % 32 R&D % 0 R&D % 0
Discontinue? N Discontinue? N Discontinue? N Discontinue? N
X7 Price $137 Price $137 Price $137 Price $137
R&D % 67 R&D % 67 R&D % 100 R&D % 100
Discontinue? N Discontinue? N Discontinue? N Discontinue? N
The default run was easy to beat. The X5 lost a lot of money in the final year and the X7 had very little market saturation. It is believed that the optimal price point for the X7 is actually lower than where I set it, so that will be pursued. Any lower than $137 is believed to reduce total profit for the product. The X5 is a stable product and any gains there will be in the single millions. There is room for improvement in the performance of the X6, however. Raising the price in the latter years is believed to be the best course of action. However, if elasticity proves to not be linear, then an estimate of lasticity will be taken from the two runs and used in the subsequent run in order to find the optimal price point.
Appendix A: Contribution for X7 estimates
Price Decrease Estimated Sales Revenue VC Total Contribution
200 1,004,000 200,800,000 65260000 135,540,000
199 1 1111760 221,240,240 72264400 148,975,840
198 2 1219520 241,464,960 79268800 162,196,160
197 3 1327280 261,474,160 86273200 175,200,960
196 4 1435040 281,267,840 93277600 187,990,240
195 5 1542800 300,846,000 100282000 200,564,000
194 6 1650560 320,208,640 107286400 212,922,240
193 7 1758320 339,355,760 114290800 225,064,960
192 8 1866080 358,287,360 121295200 236,992,160
191 9 1973840 377,003,440 128299600 248,703,840
190 10 2081600 395,504,000 135304000 260,200,000
189 11 2189360 413,789,040 142308400 271,480,640
188 12 2297120 431,858,560 149312800 282,545,760
187 13 2404880 449,712,560 156317200 293,395,360
186 14 2512640 467,351,040 163321600 304,029,440
185 15 2620400 484,774,000 170326000 314,448,000
184 16 2728160 501,981,440 177330400 324,651,040
183 17 2835920 518,973,360 184334800 334,638,560
182 18 2943680 535,749,760 191339200 344,410,560
181 19 3051440 552,310,640 198343600 353,967,040
180 20 3159200 568,656,000 205348000 363,308,000
179 21 3266960 584,785,840 212352400 372,433,440
178 22 3374720 600,700,160 219356800 381,343,360
177 23 3482480 616,398,960 226361200 390,037,760
176 24 3590240 631,882,240 233365600 398,516,640
175 25 3698000 647,150,000 240370000 406,780,000
174 26 3805760 662,202,240 247374400 414,827,840
173 27 3913520 677,038,960 254378800 422,660,160
172 28 4021280 691,660,160 261383200 430,276,960
171 29 4129040 706,065,840 268387600 437,678,240
170 30 4236800 720,256,000 275392000 444,864,000
169 31 4344560 734,230,640 282396400 451,834,240
168 32 4452320 747,989,760 289400800 458,588,960
167 33 4560080 761,533,360 296405200 465,128,160
166 34 4667840 774,861,440 303409600 471,451,840
165 35 4775600 787,974,000 310414000 477,560,000
164 36 4883360 800,871,040 317418400 483,452,640
163 37 4991120 813,552,560 324422800 489,129,760
162 38 5098880 826,018,560 331427200 494,591,360
161 39 5206640 838,269,040 338431600 499,837,440
160 40 5314400 850,304,000 345436000 504,868,000
159 41 5422160 862,123,440 352440400 509,683,040
158 42 5529920 873,727,360 359444800 514,282,560
157 43 5637680 885,115,760 366449200 518,666,560
156 44 5745440 896,288,640 373453600 522,835,040
155 45 5853200 907,246,000 380458000 526,788,000
154 46 5960960 917,987,840 387462400 530,525,440
153 47 6068720 928,514,160 394466800 534,047,360
152 48 6176480 938,824,960 401471200 537,353,760
151 49 6284240 948,920,240 408475600 540,444,640
150 50 6392000 958,800,000 415480000 543,320,000
149 51 6499760 968,464,240 422484400 545,979,840
148 52 6607520 977,912,960 429488800 548,424,160
147 53 6715280 987,146,160 436493200 550,652,960
146 54 6823040 996,163,840 443497600 552,666,240
145 55 6930800 1,004,966,000 450502000 554,464,000
144 56 7038560 1,013,552,640 457506400 556,046,240
143 57 7146320 1,021,923,760 464510800 557,412,960
142 58 7254080 1,030,079,360 471515200 558,564,160
141 59 7361840 1,038,019,440 478519600 559,499,840
140 60 7469600 1,045,744,000 485524000 560,220,000
139 61 7577360 1,053,253,040 492528400 560,724,640
138 62 7685120 1,060,546,560 499532800 561,013,760
137 63 7792880 1,067,624,560 506537200 561,087,360
136 64 7900640 1,074,487,040 513541600 560,945,440
135 65 8008400 1,081,134,000 520546000 560,588,000
134 66 8116160 1,087,565,440 527550400 560,015,040
133 67 8223920 1,093,781,360 534554800 559,226,560
132 68 8331680 1,099,781,760 541559200 558,222,560
131 69 8439440 1,105,566,640 548563600 557,003,040
130 70 8547200 1,111,136,000 555568000 555,568,000
129 71 8654960 1,116,489,840 562572400 553,917,440
128 72 8762720 1,121,628,160 569576800 552,051,360
127 73 8870480 1,126,550,960 576581200 549,969,760
126 74 8978240 1,131,258,240 583585600 547,672,640
125 75 9086000 1,135,750,000 590590000 545,160,000
124 76 9193760 1,140,026,240 597594400 542,431,840
123 77 9301520 1,144,086,960 604598800 539,488,160
122 78 9409280 1,147,932,160 611603200 536,328,960
121 79 9517040 1,151,561,840 618607600 532,954,240
120 80 9624800 1,154,976,000 625612000 529,364,000
119 81 9732560 1,158,174,640 632616400 525,558,240
118 82 9840320 1,161,157,760 639620800 521,536,960
117 83 9948080 1,163,925,360 646625200 517,300,160
116 84 10055840 1,166,477,440 653629600 512,847,840
115 85 10163600 1,168,814,000 660634000 508,180,000
114 86 10271360 1,170,935,040 667638400 503,296,640
113 87 10379120 1,172,840,560 674642800 498,197,760
112 88 10486880 1,174,530,560 681647200 492,883,360
111 89 10594640 1,176,005,040 688651600 487,353,440
110 90 10702400 1,177,264,000 695656000 481,608,000
109 91 10810160 1,178,307,440 702660400 475,647,040
108 92 10917920 1,179,135,360 709664800 469,470,560
107 93 11025680 1,179,747,760 716669200 463,078,560
106 94 11133440 1,180,144,640 723673600 456,471,040
105 95 11241200 1,180,326,000 730678000 449,648,000
104 96 11348960 1,180,291,840 737682400 442,609,440
103 97 11456720 1,180,042,160 744686800 435,355,360
102 98 11564480 1,179,576,960 751691200 427,885,760
101 99 11672240 1,178,896,240 758695600 420,200,640
100 100 11780000 1,178,000,000 765700000 412,300,000
99 101 11887760 1,176,888,240 772704400 404,183,840
98 102 11995520 1,175,560,960 779708800 395,852,160
97 103 12103280 1,174,018,160 786713200 387,304,960
96 104 12211040 1,172,259,840 793717600 378,542,240
95 105 12318800 1,170,286,000 800722000 369,564,000
94 106 12426560 1,168,096,640 807726400 360,370,240
93 107 12534320 1,165,691,760 814730800 350,960,960
92 108 12642080 1,163,071,360 821735200 341,336,160
91 109 12749840 1,160,235,440 828739600 331,495,840
90 110 12857600 1,157,184,000 835744000 321,440,000
89 111 12965360 1,153,917,040 842748400 311,168,640
88 112 13073120 1,150,434,560 849752800 300,681,760
87 113 13180880 1,146,736,560 856757200 289,979,360
86 114 13288640 1,142,823,040 863761600 279,061,440
85 115 13396400 1,138,694,000 870766000 267,928,000
84 116 13504160 1,134,349,440 877770400 256,579,040
83 117 13611920 1,129,789,360 884774800 245,014,560
82 118 13719680 1,125,013,760 891779200 233,234,560
81 119 13827440 1,120,022,640 898783600 221,239,040
80 120 13935200 1,114,816,000 905788000 209,028,000
79 121 14042960 1,109,393,840 912792400 196,601,440
78 122 14150720 1,103,756,160 919796800 183,959,360
77 123 14258480 1,097,902,960 926801200 171,101,760
76 124 14366240 1,091,834,240 933805600 158,028,640
75 125 14474000 1,085,550,000 940810000 144,740,000
74 126 14581760 1,079,050,240 947814400 131,235,840
73 127 14689520 1,072,334,960 954818800 117,516,160
72 128 14797280 1,065,404,160 961823200 103,580,960
71 129 14905040 1,058,257,840 968827600 89,430,240
70 130 15012800 1,050,896,000 975832000 75,064,000
69 131 15120560 1,043,318,640 982836400 60,482,240
68 132 15228320 1,035,525,760 989840800 45,684,960

Assignment research paper
Minimum complete 10 pages
1/2" to 3/4" margin, regular type
cover sheet to include name, paper title, and date
table of content should be the detailed outline with page numbers (minimum 2 pages)
paper should be briefly footnoted
Conclusion/analysis- more than a summary or review. It's a critique and or an evaluation
Must have a bibliography minimum 10 sources
Bibliography should have various sources like books, journals, corporate website, and government material

Research paper requirements: Minimum 10 complete pages, 2 page detailed outline, paper should have footnotes (don't place websites in the foot notes; put them in the bibliography) Introduction should be in the appendix, and bibliography should be at the end of the paper.

I would like this paper to be about the market strategy of Shanghai Disney Resort. As mentioned earlier I need a two page outline with the paper. I began the outline already. Here is what I have so far (below).

I. Introduction
a. Brief history of Shanghai Disney Resort
II. Background
III. Product Strategy
IV. Pricing Strategy
V. Distribution Strategy
VI. Promotion Strategy
VII. Overall Plan
VIII. Failed Market Strategy
IX. Successful Market Strategy
X. Conclusion

I have not started writing the paper yet. As you write this paper, please focus on the marketing strategies of Shanghai Disney Resort because this is what my instructor wants me to focus on.

Below is a sample outline another student submitted that my instructor gave me. This is how the outline should look.
I. Introduction
a. Brief History of Coke
II. Background
a. Pepsi's gain market share
i. Pepsi's challenge
ii. Supermarket sales
III. Product
a. Marketing research (Project Kansas)
i. New Coke
1. Sweeter flavor preferred over Pepsi and Coke in taste tests
2. Surveys seemed promising
ii. Millions of dollars spent on this research
iii. Failed to factor in brand loyalty
1. 80/20 rule
IV. Price
a. Traditionally based on competitive forces
i. Price of new Coke to the customer was same as Old Coke
b. Price of "Old Coke" skyrocketed if it could be found
V. Distribution
a. New product was distributed the same way the old product was
i. Supermarkets
ii. Franchisee agreements
b. bottlers
VI. Promotion
a. New Coke Introduction
i. Big marketing pushes in New York
ii. Sales increased over previous formula
iii. Criticism
1. Pepsi took advantage
2. boycotts of products
3. Bad publicity
VII. Reversal
a. Occurred 3 months after its introduction
b. The old formula returned as Coca Cola Classic
i. Instead of using sugar can though high fructose corn syrup was substituted
ii. By the years end Coke Classic out sold both Pepsi and New Coke
VIII. Conclusion
a. Bad advertising is better than no advertising at all
b. Analysis

below is a sample of my writing style. please write the paper similar to my writing style.

General Motors was once considered the Great American Company, but now they are clinging to attributes that made its logo. General Motors now realizes that they drove the company into ruins that began more than twenty years ago. As customer preferences changed, competition tightened, and technology was making big leaps, General Motors always found themselves a lap or two behind their competitors. ?General Motors has been losing market share in the U.S. since the 1960?s, destroying capital for years, and returning no share price appreciation to investors? (Taylor III, 2008 p. 6). Over the years the company has tried to reform itself any number of times, but it has been doomed by what once made it successful: doing things the GM way. If you were to ask Rick Wagoner why GM is not like Toyota, he would tell you, ?We?re playing our own game-taking advantage of our own unique heritage and strengths? (Taylor III, 2008 p. 6).
Over the years General Motors and the United Auto Workers (UAW) Union have fought each other over union contracts for the employees of GM. The UAW has had employees go on strike many times in order to get the best wages with no cap on cost of living adjustments, health care benefits, and full retirement after thirty years regardless of age. The strike in 1970 lasted 67 days, and 400,000 employees walked off the job. This strike was described by a Historian as a ?titanic clash between two massive permanent entities? (Taylor III, 2008 p. 7). The union won this clash, because GM?s high fixed costs made the company vulnerable to a production shutdown. The UAW no longer has the power to help the employees as it did in the past. With General Motors reorganizing under Chapter 11 of the U.S. Bankruptcy Code, the company now has the upper hand, and the UAW has no choice but to work with GM to make the best for survival of the company and their employee?s jobs and benefits.
General Motors has found itself in financial trouble because of the UAW fighting to get the best wages and benefits for the union employees of the company. With General Motors' inability to keep up with consumer demands and needs, the company has let their competitors get ahead of them by not producing more fuel efficient vehicles until the last few years. All of these are problems that General Motors is working on to try and improve the company, and get it back on its feet by downsizing the company and focusing on restructuring the way the company operates.
On June 1, 2009, General Motors filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection in New York. President Obama hailed GM?s plan to emerge from its current woes as ?credible? and ?full of promise? (Whoriskey, 2009 p. 2). Along with the Chapter 11 bankruptcy, General Motors was given an additional $30 billion to aid the company through the bankruptcy process, bringing the total amount to $50 billion given to them from the U.S. government. The President also sought to reassure Americans who were skeptical about the plan?s provisions to transfer a 60 percent ownership stake in the company to the U.S. government in return for the additional investment.
The President said that ?We are acting as reluctant shareholders, because that is the only way to help GM succeed. What we are not doing?what I have no interest in doing?is running GM.? ?The federal government will refrain from exercising its rights as a shareholder in all but the most fundamental decisions,? vowed the President. He also promised that a board?not the government?would call the shots and make the decisions about how to turn this company around. Obama also said, ?our goal is to get GM back on its feet, take a hands-off approach and get out quickly? (Whoriskey, 2009 p. 2).
The Obama administration had been pushing the bankruptcy as the most practical way to restructure General Motors. ?Officials said their hope is that GM would emerge from the process smaller, with fewer workers and brands, less debt, but also more viable? (Peter, 2009 p. 3). Working together, the Auto Task Force, GM, and its stakeholders have created a practical, feasible plan that will give this ionic American company a chance to rise again. Under the new plan, a larger share of GM vehicles will be built in the United States, including most of all the fuel-efficient cars.
President Obama said, ?the deal is tough but fair and does not give special treatment to any of GM?s stakeholders. He also reminded potential car-buyers that GM warranties will be safe and government backed during the restructuring? (Whoriskey, 2009 p. 3). GM and the Auto Task Force could not have had better timing for the restructuring, thanks to Toyota and all of the problems they had bringing down consumer trust on quality of the Toyota vehicles. ?I will not pretend the hard times are over, he said in comments directed at GM employees. More jobs will be lost. More plants will close. More dealerships will shut their doors, and so will many parts suppliers. But I want you to know that what you are doing is making a sacrifice for the next generation?so that your children and all of our children can grow up in an America that still makes things, that builds cars, that still strives for a better future.? He expressed confidence that the ?new GM? will be able to ?out-compete automakers around the world,? and become an integral part of America?s economic future once again (Whoriskey, 2009 p. 3).
Many of the GM workers are looking for honesty and good ethics from the company, and also from the government as the restructuring process continues. The employees should be informed of how the company is progressing and if there are problem areas that need to be changed. The employees should be asked for their input, since this would help to motivate the employees and there is a good chance they would have innovative ideas for solutions to problems. Ethics are a very touchy subject with GM and its workforce at the present time. ?Ethics refers to the study of moral principles or values that determine whether actions are right or wrong and outcomes are good or bad. People rely on their ethical values to determine the right thing to do? (McShane p.52). Unlike Enron, GM has not done anything unethical. Although closing plants, laying employees off, and replacing them with new hires could be considered to be unethical to some of the existing employees. We personally feel that it would be in the best interest for GM to supplement ethical codes by providing some type of ethics training for all employees to help them get through the reconstructive phase successfully.
The Auto Task Force and GM intend to revamp its structural costs and try to lower its break-even point down to U.S. industry volumes of 10 million vehicles by the fourth quarter of 2011. This is substantially lower than the 16 million vehicles of the boom-era. In order for this to happen, GM is going to need to focus on their employees very closely, and management is going to need to know how to settle problems that they are already facing. They will need to come up with ideas on how to keep their employees motivated, so that they are meeting their capabilities to their maximum competencies. It will be very important for GM management to make certain that employees understand what their role perceptions are.
Employees? behavior and performance also depend on how much the situation supports or interferes with their task goals. ?Situational factors include conditions beyond the employee?s immediate control that constrains or facilitates behavior and performance. Some situational characteristics such as a consumer preference or economic conditions originate from the external environment and can be beyond the employee?s or the organization?s control? (McShane p. 37).

The Marketing Plan should demonstrate:
1. Present a clear description of digital formats relevant to the audience.
2. Research and evaluate digital service providers, suppliers, and distributors.
3. Make strategic recommendations appropriate to the publishing company.


Details of assignment:

CASE: Parent Press is a small publishing company with 4 people of staff, and a growing list of print titles on parenthood, child care & early education, child psychology, and related subject areas. They publish around 30 new titles each year, and have a backlist of 300 titles.
?

Their product range can be summarised as:
1. 50% - trade / consumer market (accessible parenting, child care and child psychology titles).
2. ?25% - professional market (handbooks and industry guidelines for practising child carers,
nursery staff, primary-school teachers and child psychologists).
??3. 25% - academic market (monographs and supplementary texts on early education and child
psychology).

?Parent Press was founded 15 years ago, as a mail order business, and as a result 60% of sales are
made direct to an extensive customer database of individuals, professional bodies, societies, social
services, libraries and academic institutions. They have a website with e-commerce functionality,
which they use to sell physical books online. Marston Book Services distribute their print titles UK
and worldwide.

Parent Press have wanted to make a move into digital publishing for a while now but no-one within
their busy team has the time to investigate the market, digital formats, platforms, conversion
suppliers, or distribution channels. The Managing Director Lucy Fielding is determined to switch to a
simultaneous print and ebook publishing workflow over the next 12 months.

You are a freelance consultant. You have been asked to brief Lucy Fielding, Managing Director, of
Parent Press on ebook technology and draft a digital conversion strategy for the business. This
should include a roadmap of the steps the company needs to take in order to implement the changes
you suggest.

They have requested:
1. Practical advice on publishing ebooks.
Which digital formats and platforms to convert to... pdf, ePub, Kindle, etc..
List of recommended suppliers, lead times and costs per book?
What quality assurance measures need to be put in place?
2. Strategic advice on deciding which backlist titles to convert
Which criteria should they use to prioritise the conversion of their backlist?
Should they have a trial and error strategy?
3. Guidance on where and how to sell the ebooks
Can they sell the ebooks on their own website, if so how?
What should their ebook pricing policy be?
Which e-retailers should they use, what are their discounts, Terms & Conditions?
Can you recommend any new distribution channels?
4. Advice on updating their author contracts and royalty rates
What clauses should their contracts include?
What royalty rate is fair?


PLEASE NOTE:
In this scenario you will recommend which digital formats are best suited to a range of printed products. You must also identify the digital distribution channels appropriate to reaching the target markets. Your client will need your advice on the workflow required to implement this conversion process and help to identify suitable suppliers. This scenario draws upon learning from the module on production workflow, digital formats and suppliers. It will also require you to independently research and investigate the digital publishing options available to publishers and evaluate their suitability for the client.
1. Present a clear description of digital formats relevant to the audience.
2. Research and evaluate digital service providers, suppliers, and distributors.
3. Make strategic recommendations appropriate to the publishing company.

The objective for this case is to complete an external analysis for Smuckers, using the Porter 5-Forces Model and a PEST Analysis. Ulimately, this analysis will lead to some conclusions about opportunities and threats facing the company. (SWOT analysis)

For some background information on SWOT analysis, please review the following:

SWOT analysis: Lesson. (2009). http://marketingteacher.com/Lessons/lesson_swot.htm

Zahorsky, D. (2009). A business owners secret weapon: SWOT analysis. Small Business Information. Web site: http://sbinformation.about.com/cs/bestpractices/a/swot.htm

So you will want to limit your analysis to the identification and evaluation of one or two key items in each element of the two models, as described in the background readings for this module.

Step One: Determine the scope of your analysis (entire company, selected business division?) and find the appropriate NAICS code.

Step Two: Using the sources you identified in the SLP, collect some data to support an industry analysis of each of the 5 Forces in Porter's Model.

Step Three: Using the sources you identified in the SLP, collect some data to support an analysis of each of the 4 elements in the PEST analysis. When considering economic data, use the most current data you can find.

Step Four: In a 4-5 page paper, write up the results of your external analysis, leading to conclusions about the opportunities and threats facing Smuckers as revealed by your research. The data you report from the 5 Forces and PEST analysis must be properly cited through intext citations and a reference list, or footnotes.

Case Expectations:

Consider the Case as a formal business report that you are developing for the Board of Directors and CEO as Smuckers' company consultant. This is a professional document.

Executive summary
Introduction
Main Body
Conclusion

BACKGROUND READING

SWOT Analysis

SWOT stands for: Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities, and Threats. The first two relate to an analysis of the internal organization (module 3), and the latter two to analysis of the external environment (module 2).

The purpose of an external analysis is to scan the outside environment for factors which might open up new opportunities for the business - or present threats to survival. Then company managers and executives can formulate plans to take advantage of the opportunities and ward off or respond to potential threats.



In this class, we will be using two different models that approach the external environment from two different perspectives:

1. Industry environment - Porter's Five Forces Model

2. Macroenvironment - PEST Analysis

Industry-level Environment

Porter's Model of Five Forces is one of the most versatile frameworks to analyze the industry external environment. Employed by a variety of academics and business practitioners for over 3 decades, the Five Forces Model has proved its usefulness in a variety of arenas. The Porter model helps the user get a handle on the competitive and market characteristics of a specific industry. The factors covered by the Five Forces Model are:

Threat of new entrants
Bargaining power of suppliers
Bargaining power of customers
Availability of substitutes
Degree of rivalry among competitors

Macro-level Environment
While the Porter analysis looks at the conditions in a specific industry, thePEST analysis looks at factors that affect the greater business environment. The factors addressed by this model include:

Political (including regulatory)
Economic
Socio-cultural
Technical

REQUIRED MATERIALS:

Comeford, R., & Callaghan, D. Environmental, industry, and internal analysis. Retrieved from University of Rhode Island. Web site: http://www.cba.uri.edu/Faculty/Comerford/Text/Chapter2.html

Connelley, D. (2005). Strategy for the External Environment. Power Point Presentation.

Key forces in the external environment. (2009). Retrieved from The International Development Research Centre. Web site: http://www.idrc.ca/en/ev-28364-201-1-DO_TOPIC.html

PEST analysis (2009). Retrieved from Value Based Management. Web site: http://www.valuebasedmanagement.net/methods_PEST_analysis.html

Porters Five Forces: A model for industry analysis. (2007). Retrieved from QuickMBA. Web site: http://www.quickmba.com/strategy/porter.shtml

I need a business plan for a sophomore level college class. The business plan is for starting a Solar Panel Installation and Service company. You can name the company whatever you like. It needs to be a partnership. Partner 1 Paul is a certified solar panel installer with 5 years of experience. Partner 2 Marcin soon will have a degree in business administration. Partners will invest $20k of their own money. Companys office needs to be located in central Connecticut. For example, this place in Glastonbury: http://www.cityfeet.com/Commercial/ForLease/331-New-London-Turnpike-Glastonbury-CT-06033-16225395L2465503L0.aspx
But if you think that this place is not good feel free to find something else.
Please use the following format for the business plan: (with my notes and suggestions)

1. Introductory Page
a. Name and address of business
b. Nature of business
c. Statement of financing needed (I was thinking something in the $50-100k range but use whatever you come up with)
d. Statement of confidentiality of report
2. Executive Summary ??" 2-3 pages summarizing the complete business plan
3. Industry Analysis
a. Future outlook and trends (go green trend)
b. Analysis of competitors (mention few competitors from Connecticut)
c. Market segmentation
d. Industry and market forecasts (expect the market to boom in 2-3 years)
4. Description of Venture
a. Products (find a couple of producers of solar panels who will be the suppliers)
b. Service (sales, installation and service of solar panels)
c. Size of business
d. Office equipment and personnel (Need to buy basic office equipment, need to buy a pick up truck, need to buy tools, I was thinking to hire only one more person for front desk/ customer service)
e. Background of entrepreneurs (As mentioned before Paul Smith (25 y.o.) is a certified solar panel installer with 5 years of experience. Marcin Bakula (23 y.o) will soon have a college degree in business administration. Took classes on how to run a company, work experience include sales/customer service at retail stores. Feel free to add more stuff.
5. Operations Plan
a. Description of companys operation
b. Flow of orders for goods and/or services
c. Technology utilization
6. Marketing Plan
a. Pricing (you can see what other companies charge for products and use similar data. Use competitive labor prices)
b. Distribution
c. Promotion
d. Product forecasts
e. Controls
7. Organizational Plan
a. Form of ownership (partnership)
b. Identification of partners (write about strengths of partners)
c. Roles and responsibilities of members of organization ( Paul and Marcin will perform the work, the hired person will run the office, take orders etc.)
8. Assessment of Risk
a. Evaluate weakness(es) of business
b. New technologies
c. Contingency plans (discuss strategies of exiting the market if the company dont succeed)
9. Financial Plan for the first 3 years (first year on month to month basis. After that on quarterly bases)
a. Assumptions (sales forecast, lots of sales during the summer, little during winter) (expense forecast)
b. Pro forma income statement (include sales, gross profit, operating expenses: salaries, rent, utilities, advertising, sales expenses, insurance, payroll taxes, depreciation, office expenses)
c. Cash flow projections
d. Pro forma balance sheet
e. Break-even analysis
f. Sources and applications of funds, end of First Year
10. Appendix (contains backup material)
a. Market research data
b. Leases or contracts
c. Price lists from suppliers

Length and Format: The paper should be 10-15 pages in length, double-spaced, and follow generally accepted APA guidelines for college papers. It should contain an abstract, bibliography, and references should be properly noted. Please deliver file as a Word document

Evaluation: The paper is evaluated on whether your economic analysis and/or conclusions have been thought out, logically developed, clearly presented, and supported with your own analysis and/or that of others. In other words, apply textbook theory to a true managerial situation, real or theoretical.

Topics to be discussed should include, but are not limited to: supply/demand, pricing and competition, market structure (market concentration, vertical/horizontal integration, monopoly/oligopoly/monopolistic competition, etc.) and government regulation. Charts and or graphs are to be used in explaining concepts and wherever appropriate.

The paper topic and general outline are as follows (outline is flexible as long as it uses concepts from micro/managerial economics to discuss the topic).:

The Economics of the Pharmaceutical Industry


The pharmaceutical industry is one of the most volatile global industries. The industry is steeped in research, generating new products and formulations to improve the lives of people around the world. As these companies seek to increase their profit margins, they also struggle with controlling costs associated with bringing new drugs to market. Pharmaceutical companies often engage in a variety of financial endeavors in an effort to maximize their profit margins and improve their economic stance, including mergers and acquisitions. These restructures can result in market monopolies of different therapeutic areas. They also contend with pricing issues and the competitiveness of lower priced generic substitutes. However, pharmaceutical companies are not the only players; government regulation, insurance reimbursement, and health care providers have a significant role in the economic success or failure of this industry.


Research Paper Outline


I. Overview of the Pharmaceutical Industry
II. Industry Structure
a. Market Concentration
b. Vertical Integration
III. Impact of Government Regulation
IV. Role of Patents
V. Pricing
a. Branded Drugs
b. Generic Intrusion
c. Health Insurance Plans
VI. Conclusion

There are faxes for this order.

Report for SERVICE MARKETING
Each student will record in a journal (template provided) at least 5 different personal encounters with a range of service providers which occurred within the previous three months. These encounters will form the basis of a report analysing service delivery issues. The template will be provided by your lecturer..

The purpose of this assignment is for the student to understand and evaluate the service encounter from one?s own perspective as a customer and to analyse the recorded situations utilising relevant course concepts and theories. The focus of the assignment is on analysis of the encounters using appropriate models and concepts ? the description of the encounters should be included as attachments to the report.

The purpose of the report is to analyse the student?s service encounters using the concepts and frameworks which are being learned in the course. Students should use the report to demonstrate that they understand the link between services marketing theory and practice. The report should be 2,500 words in length. Additional instructions for this assignment will be provided by the local lecturer.

Create the 4P (price, production, place, promotion) marketing plan for Monster.com based on the information provided in the attached case.


Product: Demonstrate a clear integration of target market wants and product benefits
Price: Use a strategic pricing process to justify and recommend a price supported with facts
Place/Distribution: Choose and clearly justify a distribution method
Promotion: Chose an appropriate promotion mix give the target audience and any other marketing mix elements. Identify synergies and/or advantages resulting from the choice