Marketing Assignment #3

When I heard about a marketing project, I though that it would be a research paper and presentation, and I couldn’t even imagine that it might be completely different. I really like the way how we do our project. It was not a boring paper since all assignments were focus on various tasks and requirements, and they expanded and enhanced each other. In addition, the assignments were not only interesting, but quite challenging because we had to think critically, analyze company’s strategy and implement our diverse skills.

The assignment #3 was the most valuable since we should fully understand the marketing strategy of our company and suggest our ideas how we can improve it. To fulfill this task without a strong foundation built in 2 previous assignments is impossible.

I enjoyed to work with members of my team. I liked that everyone contributed an equal part in all our assignment.

https://blogs.ubc.ca/benlee/

I don’t agree with Ben’s thoughts regarding why BlackBerry has been losing it’s market share and profit since 2010 and that BlackBerry has made a mistake when it launched the new Porsche Design smartphone.

Firstly, the company has started to lose it’s market share not because Apple released iPhone ( in fact, it was released in 2007), but because it didn’t suggest new technologies to their customers while Samsung, Apple, LG and other android providers were creating new very powerful smartphones. Unfortunately, BlackBerry understood it’s problem only a year ago when it decided to produce smartphones with attractive designs and powerful hardware.

Secondly, BlackBerry has been successfully co-operating with Porsche Design since they launched the first luxurious phone. Even though BlackBarry is not a luxurious brand and it’s products are quite affordable, it makes a good profit on these phones. In fact, BlackBerry is only a provider of smartphones, Porsche Design sells them in there stores all around the world and on the Internet.

Therefore, BlackBerry has a good strategy that allows it to make profit without big risks, advertize it’s brand more efficiently and target a new segment of luxurious phones.

http://www.the-cma.org/about/blog/battle-of-the-smartphone-brands-an-apple-loyalist-throws-down-the-gauntlet

 I have been reading with interest Bryan Tenenhouse’s blog called “Battle of the Smartphone Brands: An Apple Loyalist Throws Down the Gauntlet” because it is a great example of customer loyalty. He claims so emotionally that Apple is the best company and he will never even try something else. In order to support his point of view Bryan uses results of a survey that shows Apple customer loyalty is higher than Android’s one. Moreover, the blogger uses some “dirty” techniques to emphasize that competitors of Apple are shitty.

 Apple – iPhone 5 – TV Ad – Music Every Day

Even though I disagree with his reflections, I would like to agree that Apple has a great marketing company. It has not been very innovative for past 2 – 3 years, but it’s sales always beat records. Definitely, the reason for that is tremendously good marketing. Marketers perfectly know customers and their needs. Because of a quite broad, but not deep line of products, they can focus straightly on the targeting market.

Nevertheless, I suppose that if Apple will not suggest something really innovative in next 1 or 2 years, it may lose a lot of customers since we are living in the advance technology world where everything changes so fast.