Month: April 2010

In a recent few years, Blockbuster only saw contradicting results to its company name in the financial statement. The failure led from increasing debt but declining assets with resulted in a much higher debt to assets ratio than previous years. The report of fourth quarter and fiscal-year 2009 financial results show: revenue dropping $0.23 billion in a year; gross profit decreasing 118.5 million in a year; operating loss increasing $50.9 million compared to the full year 2008; a net loss increasing by 184.1 million compared to the full year of 2008. This highlights some of the results of failure in finance of Blockbuster.  The charts below (Quarterly Data: left, Annual Data: right) based on the balance sheet of financial statement indicates that Blockbuster has been increasing in its debt but decreasing in its assets continuously since 2008 and throughout 2009. This resulted in an increase in debt to assets ratio which is significant sign of financial downfall to the company. We should keep an eye on Blockbusters’ 2010 financial statement to see how and in what areas they made a “blockbusting” recovery to its finance.

According to the a Board Member of the Canadian Marketing Association and an executive for the National Advertising Benevolent Society of Quebec, Mitch Joel, there are four key factors of trend that will change marketing forever; touch, analytics, one-line and location-aware.

As a commerce student having an interest of going into marketing, these four factors seem significant for me to familiarize.

From phones to mp3 to navigation system or any types of device, it is notable that technology is focused on simple and quick to use methods.  This brings the trend of touch screens (example). Personally, I prefer typing and clicking than touching. I would usually get frustrated at either the sensitivity or the inconsistency of the device. The conception of being on one-line which is the linkage between all different devices (example) is the drift of today’s technology. The combination with the trend of touch to one-line would make a hit in marketing.

Analytics is another trend that companies should concentrate their motives into collecting detailed data.

Lastly, the ability that allows people to publish, receive and follow information which brings a location-aware is the concept that is popular among social networks these days.

Whether I prefer the use of it or not, the world’s marketing is changing based on these four trends, and Mitch Joel is suggesting that these will be fixed into a creation of new and successful business models. Therefore, we all should not necessary follow but familiarize and consider these trends.

Work Cited:

For Current Trends That Will Change Marketing Forever by Mitch Joel (Web) (http://www.twistimage.com/blog/)

After calculating my carbon footprint, I was not too surprised with the result of low carbon emission. This is because of the fact that I am currently living in a temporary student residence determines and gives me a huge advantage in footprint calculation. The residence does a good job of reducing the electricity/utility costs. I can reduce emissions in my shelter by doing little things such as taking shorter showers or using less of warm water. However, I can’t do much to change the items (heater, window, showerhead) as it is all for the public use or the school residences’ property. For the “daily commute” part of the footprint, since I live at my school and my classes very nearby, this allows me to walk which creates no carbon emission.

I was a little surprised with the result the calculation gave me with my food consumption. I didn’t know that food can determine the amount of carbon emission. In order to reduce my emission in the food area, I can change my diet so that I consume more organic and vegetable-based food. I have a desire to follow this plan because this would benefit my personal health anyways; as well it would reduce emissions to do good to my community and even the world.

I noticed that I am not aware of many of the activities or items that determine the amount of emissions as many of my answers were “I don’t know”.

After the crisis that led from the recall, Toyota needs a recovery plan based on their brand. Their biggest loss from this incident is the trust and reputation of their brand. Toyota used to be known and had success with their quality of the vehicles. However, when this advantageous gap started narrowing, the company focused instead on the appeals (styling and performance) which caused the engineering and management resources to decline. This was the fault that led to the failure resulted in the incident. In order to regain their reputation, Toyota needs to put the customer’s voice at the center in planning based on their behavior. They need to satisfy and meet the decision making qualities of the customers: motivation, perception, attitude formation, integration, and learning.  In purchasing Toyota cars, the behaviors which represent their voice of the customers clearly show that these decision making qualities are triggered and made due to the qualities of Toyota vehicles. Toyota needs to respect and focus their recovery plan based on these voices of the customers. This will help the company to regain their trust from the customers as well as their brand reputation.

Toyota takes action in their first step of this recovery plan by launching new quality checks.

Work Cited:

Learning the Hard Way by Finbarr O’Neill (Web)  http://www.nytimes.com/2010/03/25/opinion/25iht-edoneill.html