Week 8 EOC: Creative Content

Develop marketing plan

How to get the word out

Video, press release, commercial, promotional material, etc.

***Do the mission statement also***

Week 7 EOC: The Pitch

For my "make a difference" idea, I chose to have small baby blankets made with the Las Vegas Motor Speedway logo printed on it with a small Laps for Charity children's charity logo in the bottom right hand corner of the blanket. They will be made out of soft, furry fabric called polyamide and they will come in pink and blue. Can be sold at every event at the Speedway and the proceeds will be donated accordingly and to the Laps for Charity guidelines.  "For example, when Swartz recently met with McDonald’s executives to pitch providing the fast-food giant with new uniforms, he didn’t bring along any designs, rather than trying to close the sale, Swartz left the McDonald’s executives with the charge of truly helping every community in which it does business". Pg. 532, Armstrong & Kotler (2011). Marketing: An Introduction, 10th Ed. Prentice Hall Publishing".This shopping product is for the people that come to Las Vegas and to the Speedway from all over the world with the intentions of getting something with a Las Vegas logo on it. Hundreds of thousands of people come to watch the races every year and buy souvenirs. Can have them made for about six dollars and could sell them for eighteen dollars with a twelve dollar profit to be donated to the children of Las Vegas. Made by the American people for the American future. It is Corporate Image Advertising for the Speedway in that every blanket sold will have the two logos to spread the word of the charity and the company name so that whenever the people that see those logos will be sure to check them out when they take their vacation to Las Vegas. "This broad mission leads to a hierarchy of objectives, including business objectives and marketing objectives". Pg. 532, Armstrong & Kotler (2011). Marketing: An Introduction, 10th Ed. Prentice Hall Publishing.

Week 6 EOC: Me x 3

One of my favorite canned soups is the soups that are made by Campbell. One of their marketing strategies was to join Kraft in a creation that would appeal to my generation and the soups are relatively cheap. It is one of the few canned dinners that actually tastes good and the great thing about Campbell soups is that you can use the soup as a basis for a bigger dinner. For instance, I use cream of mushroom soup as a basis for adding pork chops and pouring it over rice. I do throw in enhancements but it sure tastes good and is inexpensive to make while getting a fulfilling meal. But sometimes they think like that too.

“ And a recent joint advertisement by Kraft and Campbell features a tomato-soup-and-grilled-cheese-sandwich combo that “Warms hearts without stretching budgets.” (Pg.9)

                   A product that I have worn for a long time and for so long it is a brand that defines me is Nautica which is owned by the VF Corporation. 

"VF Corporation offers a closet full of over 30 premium lifestyle brands, each of which “taps into consumer aspirations to fashion, status, and well-being” in a well-defined segment."(Pg.188)

          Since I have become a father, I try to eat healtheir and now that my daughter is eating the same food as me, I now have changed the way I do my grocery shopping. I eat foods that are organically grown and for that I shop at Whole Foods market.

"Whole Foods thrives by catering to affluent customers who the Wal-Marts of the world can’t serve well, offering them “organic, natural, and gourmet foods, all swaddled in Earth Day politics.” (Pg188)

Week 5 EOC: Super Bowl Commercials

The Super Bowl commercial I chose was the commercial made by Ridley Scott for Apple computers and was in the nineteen eighty-four Super Bowl. The tagline for the commercial is "Apple, because nineteen eighty-four won't be like nineteen eighty-four". The commercial is almost black and white but has a bunch of people dressed almost like prisoners or drones if you will and they are marching into a huge concrete room with a movie theater style screen. They sit down with a hypnotized look on their face and an elderly man is speaking to them with subliminal like words. Next thing you know is a muscular mature woman running towards the screen with a sledge hammer in her hand with a long handle and there are guards that look like from the riot control section of the police chasing her. As she runs closer to the screen, she hurls the sledge hammer towards the screen which shatters it. The video fades out and then the slogan appears. The metaphors that Scott makes is that the world was living off of paperwork with all of the people doing the same thing and nothing new hasn't come around for a while and when she breaks the screen, that represents the end of "the same thing".“It’s not really about sales; it is about sharing of information". When the slogan appears, it is meaning that nineteen eighty-four won't be just another year like all its proceeding years because of the first personal computer to be introduced to the market and the inventors knew that it was going to change the world has we knew forever. The way it is filmed and how the mood is set in the commercial are very well done. The target market on this product was people in the age group between twenty-five and forty and business type people that go to work in a cubicle.“It’s not really about sales; it is about sharing of information".

What Generation Am I In and How Do I Fit In?

When it comes to what generation a person might be, the category that I fall under is labeled "Generation Millennial". The Millennial generation is anyone born in the eighties and are coming into adulthood at the turn of the century. Since I was born in eighty-one and I graduated from high school in ninety-nine, I figure this is where I call home, but the best part is how I fit statistically in this group. This group of people according to the Pew Research Center Publication is on the road to becoming the most educated generation in history. They also say that we are the most ethnically diversified generation and that seventy-five percent of us have a profile on a networking site. Also, the fact that millennial women are having children without being married. These are all true and I am a prime example of them and more. I am currently attending The Art Institute of Las Vegas and if you are reading this then it is obvious that I have a profile on a networking site along with having two extraordinary kids while I am not married but I am still with the mother of my children. I remember when the coolest thing to have was not the I-Phone but a cool colored pager. That's right, I said pager. Then the world was at a standstill in awe when Motorola came out with the first cell phone. It was big, gray and weighed about five pounds, but a person with one of those was really cool.  

Week 4 EOC: Business vs. Consumer Buying Behavior

The buying behavior of a business is very different from the buying behavior of the average consumer such as you and me. When a big company like General Electric stays in business for as long as they have, it is only making and selling light bulbs and refrigerators to help fund the bigger moneymakers like locomotives and jet engines. Since it takes many months to create something like a locomotive on paper as well as bringing that drawing to reality, it is a long term investment so they use the business under their umbrella that will make enough money to keep the business afloat until the company can sell the big ticket item and make a lot more money than they ever would selling light bulbs. But, in the end, every business whether they are selling to a business or to the average person, they all need each other in some way or fashion. The Intel Company only really makes processors but they advertise for personal computers. The consumer wants to buy a personal computer which has an Intel processor. The two have a business together which supports each other and if one company has a drop in sells than the other will have a drop in sells. When GE makes light bulbs, it would be futile to make a bulb that would only go in their products. But, there is also a lot of research that goes into making a product of any kind. A company needs to know who their customers are and what their needs are for such a product a company wishes to make. Other factors which will effect buying by a consumer that can't be predicted are things like natural disasters and tragedies like September 11th when nobody for awhile came out of their home to buy anything.

Making Money For Good

One company that stands out in this is Tide. In a relief situation like when the disaster hit New Orleans and surrounding areas some years back, Tide has made a huge covered trailer complete with power and washer machines and driers to clean the clothes of the victims of a disaster for free. I remember seeing on the news after the storm had passed that Tide truck in the background until the news finally reported that power had been restored. Another thing that Tide does is sell a shirt with the Tide logo on it for twenty dollars and the money raised selling those shirts goes to people that have been affected by a disaster. http://www.lhj.com/volunteering/companies-that-care-brands-that-give-back/. Kellogg Company also gives back to their community by sponsoring an organization called the World of Children and what they do is award an individual with one hundred thousand dollars that has helped children in the world. http://www.kelloggcompany.com/social.aspx?id=58. One more company that gives back to the community is Target which donates five percent of the their annual revenue to education and is on target so far with giving one billion dollars to education  by the year 2015.

Week 2 EOC: Boston Consulting Group-Video Games

When it comes to the video game market and the question of who is the star, in my opinion it would be the computer game market. “New console systems from Nintendo, Microsoft and Sony are expected to help the console segment regain some momentum in the 2014 to 2015 timeframe,” said DFC Intelligence analyst David Cole. “However, the steadiest area of growth is on the PC and mobile side.” The fact that computer games have been around a long time and they continue to evolve. The question mark in this is the  The cash cow in my eyes is the playstation consoles. EEDAR forecasts that DLC content will generate $875 million in revenues this year alone in North America, and that figure should rise to more than $1 billion next year. With the launch of the Wii U and the increasing installed bases of Xbox 360 and PS3, DLC revenues should total around $2 billion worldwide, EEDAR said. The dog in this case is the handheld systems. A Nintendo representative says "Ok, so the handheld gaming console isn’t dead just yet. But with Nintendo reporting their first-ever yearly loss to the tune of half a billion dollars amid struggling 3DS sales, it’s clear that Nintendo feels the specialized handheld gaming market may be on life support".

Good Customer Service Experience

Week1EOC: Great Costumer Service

The good experience that comes to mind first was at Sam’s Club on Eastern by the freeway. I had been up all night working a graveyard shift as a bartender and my day started with me getting ready to go to work only to find that my car would not start due to the battery. When I got off, same thing, would not start and had to have the day shift girl give me a jump. Since I didn’t make anything at work as far as tips go, I spent the drive back across town thinking of how I am going to come up with the money to buy a new battery. I remembered that I bought the battery that was now dead, at the Sam’s Club near where I lived and decided to take it in to see if the warranty was still good as I forgot when exactly I bought it and how long the warranty was good for. As I pull onto Serene, the guy in front of me is breaking and swerving and I could see that he kept looking in his rear-view mirror at me. I thought to myself “now what”. To make a long story short, the guy made me beat him up in the parking lot. Geez. After a horrible day, I didn’t expect anything less from Sam’s. I took my battery in and with no receipt, the gentleman was very polite, helpful, speedy and gave me a new battery for free. I am still flabbergasted that it “actually” worked out after such a trying day. It was the only thing that went right after a fourteen hour day.