Best Group Ever!

Throughout this course I have had the privilege of working with 5 of the best group members I have ever had. It was great working these guys, but that does leave me a little concerned. Usually in every group there is at least one slacker and if you cant point them out, that usually means its you. However, I really hope everyone agrees with me in stating, there really was no slacker in the group. The work was divided evenly and everyone got to contribute in fields that best suited their abilities. Although there were no internal conflicts with three assignments as did fairly well in them and they were all completed way before the due dates, we did have some technical difficulty with the camera (the quality for some of the scenes were not filmed in the proper definition) but those were easily sorted out.

Some minor issues were our schedules did not all mesh up, as we all had other commitments (For example I play on the football team so our meetings could not be during my practices), these issues were easily manageable by segmenting the work evenly and having many short meetings and separate smaller group meetings.

One reason I think this group ran so smoothly is because it was a marketing class and we were all learning to market ourselves to each other. For example our group was really organized a trait that was strongly emphasized in class. Furthermore, principles learned in class such as reciprocity came up many times, for example if someone helped me in a part portion of the assignment I felt obligated to look over their work as well and contribute in any way I could. In addition it is clear that everyone in our group was generally interested in building a relationship with each other that could span past the class and mutually benefit ourselves, this is a theme that was regularly discussed in class. This could be seen as by the end of the semester we had all been sitting together in class, I regularly walked home with members of my team and even had lunch once or twice with some members. The benefits of these relations has already started to show, one of my team members leant me an expensive SD reader the other day, which I need for a project in another class, which is a clear sign of the trust we had built over a semester of working together and a few of my team members have already reaped the benefits of me working at the campus bar.

I had a great time working with my team and I feel as though I have built a lot of strong connections. I know I would recommend every one of my team members to any employer I know and help them any way I could in the professional world in which we are all entering in the near future, and I really hope they would do the same.

 Me on set just having a blast 🙂

http://www.convinceandconvert.com/social-image-of-the-week/coca-colas-new-corporate-website-aims-to-refresh-the-world-through-storytelling/

The above link is to a Blog that describes how Coca-cola’s has reinvented its corporate website, titling their website “Coca-Cola Journey, Featuring content themed around pop culture, social media, brand history, marketing campaigns, recipes, career advice, and more the website is a far cry from the traditional corporate website.

The blog further comments on how the new site is so incredibly responsive to the customer. This is a statement I couldn’t agree more with Coke clearly did its homework, “In response to consumer feedback and site data, Coca-Cola made more than 60 tweaks to the site, including adding in sections related to food and music.” Coke is clearly willing to male many changes to its public image to satisfy the needs of the consumer, they are clearly willing to go the extra mile to respond to the consumers changing demand.

As consumers can post their own experiences with coke directly on the site Coke has greatly decreased the knowledge gap between them and the consumer. Which is great as the new site has received an incredible amount of public support and public, illustrating how by listening to the consumer Coke has greatly improved its product.

However after reading this blog I visited Coke’s website myself and found it not to be as customer centric as this post lead me to believe. Although the site was visually appealing it was really confusing to navigate. This is shocking to me because as we discussed in class, usually the customer’s willing to go the extra mile to discuss a product are those who have something negative to say about it. With such few negative comments about the product, I am lead to believe coke is filtering out much of its customer stories.

Furthermore, as I had difficulty navigating the site, I am sure older loyal coke drinkers are having the same issue. As this large segment of consumers are likely unheard and coke thinks they have been able to capture the responses of a majority of pop consumers, it is possible that coke is actually creating a larger knowledge gap between them and their elder more loyal consumers.

All in all this was a very interesting post, but it does overlook a few mistakes in consumer research coke is making.

After reading Eric’s post on Marshall Mathers,

Marshall Mathers: In Response to an External Marketing Blog

I completely agree with his statement that Eminem is a marketing genius. Although, I do not personally listen to his music, every time Eminem comes out with a new CD I know about. While I was originally surprised to hear that he was the number one selling artist of the 2000s, the shock subdued when I researched his marketing strategy.

The Album foreshadowed in Eric’s work, “The Marshall Mathers LP 2” came out earlier this month and immediately went platinum. According to a Forbes marketing blog:

(http://www.forbes.com/sites/zackomalleygreenburg/2013/11/15/eminems-marshall-mathers-lp-2-anatomy-of-a-chart-topper/)

This success was due to “a mix of a loyal fan base, clever marketing and smart partnerships.” While both loyal fans and smart partnerships do play a roll in his success, the driving force behind his record sales, which lead to these fans and partners, is his incredible marketing strategies.

Eric’s post does a great job in pointing out how Eminem markets his music as a differential product in comparison to the conventional music of today. For example, his lyrics are very controversial in addition he is a white rapper, which is kind of rare in today’s musical world. In my opinion however the cleverest marketing ploy used by Eminem is his “retirement” ploy. Eminem continues to retire, than come out of retirement only to release a single record, which always hits number one in the music charts. In my opinion this marketing ploy resembles the scarcity principle of consumer purchasing behaviour.

As consumers may believe that every album Eminem releases after he comes out of retirement could possible be his last, as he could go into permanent retirement in the next time he decides to take a step away from music, consumers, especially his biggest fans, perceive that his next album could be his last, thus not only could this be their last chance to experience last songs, but the album could potentially sell out, so they should rush to the store and buy it now.

Through these marketing exploits Eminem was able to net 10 million dollars last year! So don’t be surprised if you find out he retires next year only to come out with a new record at the age of 50.