Stakeholders-Study One-Topic 6

Stakeholders

• What influences the way a stakeholder views a plan?
• Once you have an understanding of how and why a stakeholder has a particular viewpoint, what can you do to engage with them?

Stakeholder management is critical to the success of every project in every organisation I have ever worked with. By engaging the right people in the right way in your project, you can make a big difference to its success... and to your career.– Rachel Thompson, Mind Tools.

Stakeholder Analysis is the technique used to identify the key people who have to be won over. You then use Stakeholder Planning to build the support that helps you succeed.

The benefits of using a stakeholder-based approach are that:

• You can use the opinions of the most powerful stakeholders to shape your projects at an early stage. Not only does this make it more likely that they will support you, their input can also improve the quality of your project
• Gaining support from powerful stakeholders can help you to win more resources – this makes it more likely that your projects will be successful
• By communicating with stakeholders early and frequently, you can ensure that they fully understand what you are doing and understand the benefits of your project – this means they can support you actively when necessary
• You can anticipate what people's reaction to your project may be, and build into your plan the actions that will win people's support.

The first step in Stakeholder Analysis is to identify who your stakeholders are. The next step is to work out their power, influence and interest, so you know who you should focus on. The final step is to develop a good understanding of the most important stakeholders so that you know how they are likely to respond, and so that you can work out how to win their support

Key questions that can help you understand your stakeholders are:

• What financial or emotional interest do they have in the outcome of your work? Is it positive or negative?

• What motivates them most of all?

• What information do they want from you?

• How do they want to receive information from you? What is the best way of communicating your message to them?

• What is their current opinion of your work? Is it based on good information?

• Who influences their opinions generally, and who influences their opinion of you? Do some of these influences therefore become important stakeholders in their own right?

• If they are not likely to be positive, what will win them around to support your project?

• If you don't think you will be able to win them around, how will you manage their opposition?

• Who else might be influenced by their opinions? Do these people become stakeholders in their own right?

A very good way of answering these questions is to talk to your stakeholders directly – people are often quite open about their views, and asking people's opinions is often the first step in building a successful relationship with them.

Adaptable marketing teams-Study One-Topic 6

Adaptable Marketing Teams

The video highlights the need for marketing professionals to be adaptable to all the different types of marketing tools and channels available. How would this affect you personally as part of a marketing team?

"In conclusion...marketers have got to shift from specialised, inflexible marketers & agencies to teams with quick thinking & fast acting players". In other words as a marketer you need to be able to adapt your marketing plan and be a jack of all trades within marketing channels. How this would affect me personally as part of a marketing team? It would mean making it a priority to review the marketing plan on a regular bases. Keeping up to date with all marketing trends and applications. Adapting the plan where need be and researching as well as monitoring the response from marketing campaigns. I would also look into upskilling in all marketing channels that I was not confident in for example social media applications or web sites etc.  (How ever lucky for my generation I was born into the Internet and all things web related)

Customer service-Study One-Topic 6

Customer service

Reflect on any customer service experiences you have had, good or bad, and how they made you feel about the product or service afterwards. Can you pinpoint why you felt the way you did? What would make you change your opinion.

Sir Richard Branson's Customer Service Key Points:

• Be visible
• Express a passion
• Your companies employees are your greatest assets
• Hire for attitude
• Engage in social media with a genuine voice
• Have fun and don't take your self to seriously

Customer service experience: Purchasing a new car, the car sales team where enthusiastic and helpful and it did not feel forced. No question was to small to ask and they where very clear with the warranties & servicing plans as well as road side assistance. They kept us updated on vehicle delivery schedule, and even offered to pick us up so we could pick up the car. AAA+ service

 

The Boston Matrix-Study One-Topic 6

The Boston Matrix

• What is the Boston Matrix?

It is the growth market share matrix. the companies products are divided into four categories based on their market growth rate and their importance of the relative market share and dominance.

• What is meant by a dog, a star and a cash cow?

Dog-have a small share of a low growth market. They are businesses that offer specialised products in limited markets that are not likely to grow quickly. Dogs serve only a limited market and therefore the products or business may be taken off the market or sold.

Star-Products that have a dominant market share in a high growth markets.Stars generate large revenues but they also required large amounts of funding to keep up with production and promotion demands.

Cash Cow-Have a dominant market share in a low growth potential market. Competitors do not often enter the market. Is well established and has a high market share that a company can sustain with minimal funding. Companies usually milk Cash Cows to fund other products for growth.

• How can you use the Boston Matrix to identify changes needed to current business operations? 

You can determine a companies existing successful or unsuccessful products or SBU's. from this you will be able to determine what actions you will take. Weather you nurture a less successful product, or simply cut your loses. It is a great simple tool to use when preparing a marketing plan, however it really is a guide and not to be used as a final decision maker.

Marketing ROI-Study One-Topic 5

Marketing ROI

• How is ROI calculated?
• What are the two costs involved in ROI?
• What are two marketing goals that aren't about making a profit?
• What are the benefits of understanding your ROI?      

ROI is the money gained or lost on an investment, it is what you expect to get back on what you are spending. The benefits of understanding your ROI is so that you can make smart marketing choices that result in a positive out come. It will help you to make the decisions on what to spend your budgets on and you can be accountable for your marketing plans. 

Documenting and reporting a promotional activity or campaign allows you to assess the revenue generated compared to the associated costs and analyse the information to ensure the organisation is in a profitable situation.

The profit from investment-The investment costs/Investment costs.

The two market goals that are not about making a profit are 'Brand Awareness' & 'Purchase Intent'

Website landing pages-Study One-Topic 5

Website landing pages-I chose to write notes instead

How to ensure once someone has clicke don your web page they will turn into your customer. Landing page =Destination URL

A landing page is the page people see right after they click on your add. It could be your home page, a product spicific page, your contacts us form or other. It's what ever page you chose after you have created the add.

3 Tips To Remember:

1- Is the page featuring whtat you promised in the add?
2- Can people easily find what they are looking for on your site?
3- What do you want them to do on your site? Include a call to action. 'Buy Now' 'Learn More' Sign up'

EXAMPLE: Looking for Eye Liner and chose the Sephora add


Which took me to their Landing Page 

Changing your target audience-Study One-Topic 5

Changing your target audience

• Why does the consultant in this video suggest that sometimes it's a good idea to change your target audience?
• How can you change your target audience?
• If you did change your target audience, how would this affect the marketing mix?

It is a good idea to change your target audience when you are looking to leverage or grow your business to make more money or expand your products or services to a larger target market, if you can not do so with your current target market.  

You can do this by asking yourself what are your new goals? What is driving you to want to make a change? And how will you go about implementing these changes? Also is your current market able to fit into these new goals. If not then it is time to look at changing your target audience.You can start making changes by marketing in a different way, with a different message in different places. 

Ask yourself 3 questions,what can you upgrade? Your products & services,your message and target audience. If you can answer yes to all three then it's time to change you target audience. Implementing the above changes would mean that your current marketing mix will need an over haul and changes would have to be made to tie in with your new vision & goals. This will mean starting a new marketing plan from scratch or modifying your current one. At the end of the day you just simply need to research your new target market, decided on what new products and services you want to provided and where you want to place them in the new market.