Article: http://blogs.wsj.com/digits/2013/11/14/twitter-extends-ad-platform-for-small-businesses/

In the article above, Twitter has been reported to have expanded advertising on its platform beyond large companies but also to small businesses in the UK and Canada. While this was done so as to increase Twitter’s international revenue, this has also opened up doors of change in the marketing world, where small businesses now have a bigger chance in promoting their name and the utilization of social media. While this is good news for the previously neglected “small fry”, we must keep in mind the “balance of social media”. As mentioned in a second article, there is need for businesses to “rethink their social media strategies” beyond that of recognizing the “growing importance” of social media, in avoidance of “privacy concerns and media clutter”. As we have learnt in class, I believe there is a need for integration of market research in that companies need to identify when they might be crossing the line with overly aggressive marketing tactics that might have adverse effects on consumers that will backfire on their intended results; as explained in the article, “at the end of the day, social media is only valuable if it’s aligned to the company strategy”.

MC Hammer: Role of Social Media in Marketing

In relation to Abhilasha Gnawali’s blog post about organizational structure, I believe there is much functionality to the differing variations between the two main types of organizational structures as pictured below: 

In an attempt to increase profit, electronics and engineering company, Siemens, has been reported to “revamping” its organizational structure, so as to “make the company more agile and competitive”. Siemens aims to take its vertically structure corporation and transform it to a flatter, more decentralized model where a whole layer of its cluster system is eliminated to “make Siemens more streamlined and closer to [their] markets”.

Based on what we have learnt in class, this would mean more direct communication between the executives of the company and their workers where there is now less difficulty in information flow. While to a certain extent this strategy would be able to help the management team of Siemens, I believe this move is more resultant of the pressure on the new CEO to meet profit targets. After all, the company remains to be a multi-national corporation where its operations in its various regions are difficult to monitor without a structured hierarchical approach within the corporation, making it impossible for the company to fully integrate itself to the flat, unstructured model of the two organizational structures.

Article: http://online.wsj.com/news/articles/SB10001424052702304410204579141330057795494

Article: http://blogs.wsj.com/digits/2013/11/13/snapchat-spurned-3-billion-acquisition-offer-from-facebook/

Not long after Snapchat was a topic of discussion in class, came the news that Snapchat had turned down Facebook’s two acquisition offers. In conjunction with Twitter’s recent IPO of $25 billion, it appears peculiar to me that Snapchat, a company with no actual generation of revenue was already valued at $3 billion by Facebook. While some may argue that this value will only grow, along with it’s doubled number of users at 350 million within 3 months, one has to take a step back when looking at the $800 million raised from investors. There are many other similar phone applications such as Pinterest that have yet to generate revenue but is valued at $3.8 million and has generated $250 million from investors.

However, this is disputed by a second article, which brings out an important and neglected point – while technological advancements have certainly been a focal point of this generation, youth might not be particularly reliable for the prediction of technological trends – more often than not, we give in to the coming and passing of “fads”. This makes one wary of the projected worth of Snapchat despite the countless articles analyzing Snapchat’s point of difference and probable value propositions, as well as afterthoughts as to whether or not it was the right choice for the company to have passed up on Facebook’s offers of acquisition.

Article: http://www.businessweek.com/articles/2013-03-26/college-startups-the-new-masters-degree

With an ever booming number of business school undergraduates comes a correlated boom in the number of students taking their own shot at entrepreneurial start-ups. As entrepreneurs gets increasingly younger, so does the amount of risk they are willing to take. Yet, as we have discussed in class, “75% of start-ups fail” but start-ups remain to be important “pivots” where an enormous portion of start-ups mainly focus on accomplishing as much trial and errors with the amount of funding they have rather than pushing for success.

“Many an undergraduate business student wants to be the next Mark Zuckerberg,”  as said in the article, though many start-ups definitely require a pinch of realism in that many remain unaware that “only half of all new businesses survive for five years, and only a third make it to the 10-year mark”. With that being said however, the article also mentions that the barriers to entry for start-ups are at an all-time low in terms of cost and convenience thanks to technology and the influence of social media in this day and age.

Even though it is slightly conflicting, I would certainly have to agree with the article’s title, that starting your own business would give one an unparalleled opportunity to learn in comparison to that of what could be taught under the curriculum of business degrees.

Related article: http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-24912717