Hyundeok Suhr's Blog

A company without a Facebook, Twitter, or Youtube account is hardly imaginable.

These three icons are very commonly seen in almost all websites.

We discussed how social media are used in businesses but did not talk about their possible drawbacks and characteristics.

I found a news article called “Why companies watch your every Facebook, Youtube, Twitter Move.” As the title indicates, it talks about why companies are watching internet users, impact of social media, and what companies should do with social media.

Personally, I trust people’s words when told in person rather than when informed through the internet by unknown people. This article says the otherwise. Information gets spread really quickly through the internet and it has a huge impact.

The writer of the article says,

“Consumers are spending their attention on social media,” he says, but firms don’t know how to repay them properly. “There’s no manual for that yet.”

Social media are dynamic, and today’s Twitter may be tomorrow’s forgotten website. “Don’t assume that what works today will work tomorrow,” says Tom Austin at Gartner. “Your model has to be continually adapted.”

Almost every company has those icons on their websites. When you actually follow or “like” their pages, there aren’t anything useful or interesting information going on. When they do have promotions, there are multiple steps involved and their credibility is very low since they are in a virtual context. It is true that it is easy to checkout what companies are about through the internet, but it is about time they moved it further so that they could make customers’ attention worth it.

Today in Business Fundamentals, we discussed about how businesses could use social media and information technology to earn money. When we were given time to discuss about it, I couldn’t come up with anything. After class, I have done some research on how social media are used. Wow, some companies are really creative in using them. I’m introducing what I found the most creative and interesting.

Kogi BBQ trucks travel around Los Angeles selling tacos and Korean fusion cuisine at cheap prices. If it travels, how do we know when and where to go? This is where social media are used. They tweet and put up their schedule on their website so that people know the time and venue. I found this really clever! The idea of mobile restaurant is unique and economic. It reduces the amount of fixed cost, so they don’t have to sell a large quantity of products to cover the fixed cost. Therefore, there is no need to fight for market share and there is less competition.

They serve Back to School Week – Dorm Food! I wish UBC had something like that.

(Pictures from http://kogibbq.com/2010/10/back-to-school-week-dorm-food/ )

My family is moving to a smaller place at the end of this month since both my sister and  I are living in UBC and my parents are leaving Canada in two years for good. We have had to sell or discard some of our funiture: bookshelves, beds, drawers, and desks. They are in too good conditions, so we’ve decided to sell them. We posted advertisements in craigslist.com and vanchosun.com.

Surprisingly, we got a lot of calls and email asking about the beds and bookshevles and they were sold the day we posted the advertisements. It was a bitter-sweet moment; we were glad that we had less things to carry to the new place, but we were kind of attached to the furniture we had used for almost a decade. We haven’t received any calls or email asking about the desks. We are thinking of donating them if they are not sold by the time we move.

The whole process of selling has been pretty interesting. We feel like doing a business. We carefully thought about words we used for the advertisements and how to attract people. We even have a promotion for the desks because they seem not very attractive to people; we are giving a chair for free if someone buys two desks. Also, we couldn’t just ignore other people trying to sell their belongings. They are our “competitiors.” We checked out their price offers and set our prices lower than theirs. Maybe that was why our furniture was sold quickly. We are thinking of lowering our price for the desks. This thought reminds me of the Lieber case we discussed in class although we don’t really have to think about various costs. All in all, I could experience some aspects of marketing.

I hope they get sold soon so that we don’t have to worry about having to carry them to a small apartment! At the same time, I’ll miss my desk.

Selling some books and a drawer! Contact me if you are interested!

In the first week of my dormitory life, I found out that I had already spent over $500 from my meal plan. I thought, ‘have I eaten that much food already?’ I talked to my friend about it and he told me that $500 was overhead charge.

Then a few days ago, I was having dinner with a friend at our residence dining hall.  Someone behind us dropped a plate and it broke with a clink. My friend, who doesn’t live in a residence, asked me if he had to pay for the broken plate. I actually didn’t know the answer to that. I looked up the residence contract and found the answer there. Each resident pays a non-refundable fee of $60 for equipment.

I wonder why the overhead charge is different for each meal plan; the bigger plan you get, the more you pay for overhead charge. I don’t understand this. It can be assumed that if you eat more, you use more china, cutlury, and so on. However, even if you get the minimum plan, you can always add more dollars and eat as much as someone who has the maximum meal plan, yet you pay less overhead charge. It is a fixed cost in my opinion; the sizes of the meal plans should not determine the cost of overhead charge.

Tennis matches are always fun to watch. They last really long and commercials in the middle of them interrupt the fun of the matches, so I end up not watching until the end. I always wonder where they get all the winners’ prizes, which are worth millions of dollars.  I read an article, which I linked to this article, called Economics of the U.S. Open. It shows where they get their revenue from and how their money is spent. Now I understand why there are so many commercials in between the matches and during the matches. However, I wonder what the effects of the commercials would be. Sponsorship deals are one half of the U.S. Open’s revenue, which means that they pay about $98 million. The fact that there are sponsorship deals every year indicates that sponsors make profits. I would think that they sell a enough number of units of products so that their fixed cost is covered and there is money left. They make so much money! I think they should lower the prices of the tickets. (I hope as a tennis fan.)

http://www.greenpeace.org/international/en/news/features/Nestle-needs-to-give-rainfores/

My friend linked me a video on Youtube about Nestle’s Kit Kat. I was expecting another advertisement that would make me drool. However, it made me want to close my eyes instead.

Nestle has been criticized by people around the globe because of its palm oil suppliers for its products. The palm oil suppliers have been destroying the rainforests in order to manufacture palm oil. It has taken away the habitats of orangutans and the lungs of our planet.

The main ethical issue in this case is that as a well-known company Nestle has not considered the environmental issues caused by its suppliers. The company has to be careful in choosing where its supplies are coming from especially when the main consumers of the products are young children, who have the right to inherit a healthy place to live. In order for Nestle to solve this ethical issue, it needs to contract with better suppliers that can help the company take corporate responsibilities in conserving the environment.