JuleStory

Now is the season of choosing your major.

Ever since I came to UBC, I always wanted to do International Relations because I was trilingual and wanted to work for multi-national non-profit organizations. Little did I know that I would apply for Marketing and International Business major, as I am continuously in awe of all the possibilities and impact marketing has on people’s everyday life.

A week ago, as I was working researching about product placement and STP of Axe, (male deodorant producer), I was trying to think of recommendations for Axe so they could be more profitable and sustainable. Our group researched on the various marketing channels and discussed in depth of how to utilize this channel so we can secure our target market and position ourselves ideally in the market.

The well-used channel for the 18-21 years old demographic is Facebook, Twitter, Linked In and blogs. As the target market ages shift from teens to working adults, newspapers, commercials and online newspaper become more prominent channels. Even if you do not study marketing, you would know of this. Nonetheless, the reason I want to study more about marketing is that I want to know How to get my product’s ads into those commercials, How to seal a negotiation with a television show company so they would use our product on their shows, How to acquire fresh news from the various communication channels that I can find.  As a marketer, I want to learn the applicable skills to get the name out there and be part of a person’s life. Although we might not be aware of this, but we are daily exposed to marketing, whether we are in school, coffee shop, or the gym. With marketing, we can make those normal places unique and more meaningful to others, including myself.

As late as it is, I recently found out about Tim Horton’s “Roll up the Rim” campaign. I was not aware of this interesting campaign until I saw one of my friends rolling up the rim and talking about winning prizes. This happened during our marketing meeting last week Thursday, and during the span of 30 mins, I personally experienced the AIDA Model. Breaking down this 30 mins, I would like to explain in details how the AIDA Model happened to me.

Awareness at 1:10pm : I became aware of the campaign when my friend started talking about how she won two extra coffees during this week. Tim Hortons to me was an aided recall — a brand that I recognized if their name was presented.

Interest at 1:17pm: I got interested in the campaign while looking at the cover of the Tim Horton’s middle size mocha cup, and learned about all the awesome prizes such as cars, laptops, coupons etc that consumers had a chance to win.

Desire at 1:30pm: After researching the possibilities of winning the prizes, all the sudden I felt an urge to get a Tim Hortons middle size coffee for myself after my marketing meeting

Action at 1:35pm: With only 15 mins left until my next class started, I rushed towards Timmys beside Sauder and lined up for my own lucky cup of coffee, in hopes that I might really win the CAR!!!

During this 30 mins period, it was amazing how Tim Hortons for me changed from aided recall to top- of- mind awareness, in which when people talked about “Roll up the Rim – winning cars by purchasing coffee”, automatically Tim Hortons’ name came up to me.

Despite I didn’t win any prizes, Tim Hortons sure was successful in promoting to UBC students like me.

12:00am.

I am desperate to hear news from Japan after the earthquake happened. Rather than Yahoo news, I choose to search on Facebook to obtain primary data. As I expected, the Facebook wall  that used to be full of “5 hours till midterm…” or “come to our Year End AGM!”posts, was now replaced by thousands of posts of tsunami updates and prayers for Japan. I hungrily search for posts from my Japanese friends, but I wasn’t able to find any.

At 12:30am, I found Kaveh’s “UBC Humanitarian Aid for Japan” group and was encouraged to do my part in helping Japan — by helping organize the BizzComm Expressions Charity Concert and 1000 paper cranes donation. Just like how I  found out about Kaveh’s group and Japan relief donation events, CTV and Global TV reporters also found out about us on Facebook. At first it was hard to picture news anchors surfing on Facebook and coming across to student-initiatives, I finally realized that the news industry also recognized the value of Facebook as a primary data.

What I had not expected was the scale of impact that news was to the community. Restaurants, non-profit groups soon looked into collaborative efforts to donate to relief in Japan. At that time, I realized how “real” Facebook was (how it wasn’t just purely primary data) and how social media could cause an immediate impact in uniting students from such a scattered demographic.

After Expressions Charity Concert, I linked the event on Facebook thanking all the people who helped raise $750 in merely two days. Within 5 mins after the post, I received a short but touching word from one of my best friends whom I had lost contact with. It wasn’t an email per say, but one word to express her thanks – a “like” on my Facebook status.

Today I came across a blog post from “Design Revivor“, which was a basic review of some special Macbook apps. Browsing through all the Mac applications, I realized that I have never used most of them before. I realized that I initially purchased by Macbook for the sole reason that the appealing design and the portability of the product.

Despite the fact that I have not maximized the Macbook service, I do not have post-purchase dissonance because I can see how Apple tries to maximize consumer satisfaction by closing their Gaps Model.

Knowledge Gap : A majority of Macbook advocates come from the design or musical industry demographic, as Macbook provides music and art development services and applications. On the other rim or the scale, for those like me who are not very technically focus, Macbook is easy to use, physically appealing, and it is a trend among college students to own the product.

Standard Gap : Apple’s perception of consumer expectations is for Macbook to be quick with adapting to new trends and updating their programs. Committed to increasing service quality, Apple closes this gap by providing easy to download updated programs and focusing on developing new programs that would make Macbook more accessible.

Delivery Gap : Store associates at Apple Stores will help explain to consumers in detail about all the tricks of how to utilize the Macbook. Online tutorials, peer reviews and transparency of the advantages and disadvantages of certain programs give consumers sufficient information about the product.

Communication Gap : Just like any other companies, Apple is slow in fixing their products, but their discount and customer loyalty programs offset their slowness in responding to repair requests. Student discounts in September, reliable warranty programs and online presence attracts their target market, which helps Apple close this gap.

On Feb 21^st, 2011 Apple announced that they are expected to release a cheaper version of the iPhone during 2011 to deal with growing smartphone competition. This topic was brought to the table during Comm 296 class today too, asking us whether we think Apple’s move was wise or not.

Despite my group mates who disapproved Apple’s actions to lower prices on iPhone, I advocated Apples’s new competitor orientated price.

Here are some reasons I believe Apple made the right decision to lower iPhone prices.

1.     Sales Orientation – Apple’s new strategy helps them increase sales volume due to the expected increase in consumer demand for the more affordable iPhone.

2.     Profit Orientation  – Observing the new emerging Smartphone and android market share, by lowering prices Apple is trying to regain its market share and try to boost revenue in the long term.

3.     Competitor Orientation – Apple’s decrease in prices in a way shows their confidence in competing in the relatively cheaper priced phone market. This shows Apple’s aggressiveness (not passiveness) to win the competition and regain its popularity in the phone market

4.     Customer Orientation – By lowering prices, Apple makes its brand accessible to a new segment of consumers who might have not wanted to purchase Iphone if Apple had not lowered its prices. Thus, Apple’s new strategy is helping reach out to a larger demographic, and ultimately they are increasing values for a larger consumer base.

Despite many loyal customers who complain about Apple’s weak strategy of lowering prices to accommodate to lower priced products, I admire Apple’s strategy because it shows that they are passionate to increase value to increasing numbers of potential consumers and they are confident that even if iPhone prices are lowered, the value of the product is untainted.

As I was working on the STP (“Segmentation,Targeting,Positioning”) group assignment this week, for some reason the urge to do a STP on the Sauder School of Business community crossed my mind. Although students in Sauder are already segmented from UBC students, I realized that there are so many other micro segment groups in our Sauder community.

First segment is the 1^st years who actively participate in CUS (Commerce Undergraduate Society) elections, getting involved in CUS clubs, and proactively attending networking conferences. They tend to be curious of many Sauder events, and they value their relationships with their Frosh leaders or executives of the clubs that they currently are part of.

Second segment is the 2^nd year club executives, who are currently seeking to get more involved in building professional relationships in hopes to get a summer internship or Co-op in 3^rd year. Rather than attending conferences, this segment is more interested in organizing major business conferences and external events to brush up their management skills and people skills.

Third segment is those newly elected and hired CUS Board of Directors and executive team. This is where I identify myself with at the moment. Experiencing 1^st year trying to adjust to the new life in college, and going through 2nd year organizing club networking and skill building events, this segment values their position that enables them to provide the services and support that the 1^st and 2^nd segment seeks for.

It is amazing how although I STP-ed the Sauder Community into more specific segments, it is safe to say that all Sauder students have one goal – to maximize their academic, social and professional experience in Sauder. However segmented Sauder is, it is this one goal that I believe, unites us and make us one Sauder family under the same roof.

As long as I could remember, my family has forever been advocates of the Sony brand. Founded in 1946, Sony Corporation grew from a radio repair shop into a more than $60 billion global organization. My family purchased Walkman players, MD players, MP3 players, PSP, Bravia TV, Sound System, and even SME (Sony Music Entertainment) labeled CDs – Sony has been part of my life ever since I was a child. What makes Sony so successful in attracting customers of all demographics? I would like to refer to Jennifer Chu’s blog and analyze Sony’s sustainable competitive advantage.

Customer excellence –Valuing the customer’s voices, Sony established its Customer Information Center in 1963 to respond to inquiries. Today, Sony has Customer Information Centers worldwide, at which they can provide prompt responses to customer needs, which helps Sony enhance the quality of its customer service.

Operational excellence –Sony employees’ culture is to live a Sony-centered life, which reflects on their motivation to increase the brand value. Consider this quote from Chairman Norio Ohga: “Every year a large number of new employees join the company, and I always say to them the most valuable asset is the four letters, S, O, N, Y. I tell them, make sure the basis of your actions is increasing the value of these four letters. When you consider doing something, you must consider whether your action will increase the value of Sony, or lower its value.”

Product excellence – Sony is the leader in product innovation, which includes: the world’s first tape recorder; the first all-transistor TV; the world’s first color video cassette recorder; the Walkman; the CD; the MD player; and PlayStation game system. Other innovations include: VAIO; digital network recorders that rewind and fast-forward “live” television; and Hi-Scan flat screen TVs that deliver near HDTV picture quality.

Every year, it seems that the number of Sauder events are increasing by ten-fold. You see CUS club booths everyday, with posters, swags, and people occupying the tables, promoting their club’s events. Whereas last year, booth-ing was enough to attract attention, this year Facebook promotion is more effective. Facebook promotion came to effect last August, when BizzComm, (which I am involved in), began promoting UBC Freshmen Reception to incoming freshmen using Facebook.
Our club utilized the Facebook friend account and became friends with students, which added a personal touch and created a presence on their Facebook walls. This promotion was successful, as we attracted more than 450 freshmen across Canada to come. The Facebook promotion soon became the new trend among Sauder clubs, but now, even this strategy is becoming obsolete. Although students use Facebook to gather information and to keep updated by “creeping” on each other’s walls, in reality people who clicked “attend” are not guaranteed to actually attend.

With only two months left of my presidency in BizzComm, I was very blessed to discover – from one girl on my team – a new marketing strategy that was even more effective than Facebook. To promote BizzComm’s signature event, Speakout Public Speaking Competition, she didn’t wait for people to come to our booth, or spam on people’s Facebook walls. Instead, she took a very personal approach and took the time to talk to each and every one of her friends about the event and “invited” them to come. It is easy for us to just  “sell” our event and leave, but she took the time to LISTEN to her friends. Thanks to her, I was reminded that although promoting through Facebook can be easy, but in the heart of it, everyone appreciates marketing that is relational, and on a personal level.

You might have heard of the Korean boy band TVXQ, also know as Dong Bang Shin Ki. TVXQ has the Guinness World Records for having the world’s largest official fan club, with more than 800,000 official members in South Korea, more than 200,000 in Japan and over 200,000 international fans.

In 2010, TVXQ released its compilation album which sold around 413,000 copies on the first week. This set the record for the highest first-week sales by a foreign group, which was last set by Bon Jovi in 1995 for 379,000 copies.

What factors made the young Korean boy band evolve into an international pop star in merely 5 years? Undoubtedly, that would be their dynamic dance performance and professional vocal skills. However, we also need to credit TVXQ’s marketing strategy that effectively targeted their audience in Korea and Japan. TVXQ’s Korean fans are mainly young girls in their teens, whereas their Japanese fans are in their working ages.  To target the teen fans, TVXQ performed more powerful dance tunes, whereas in Japan, they are known for their beautiful harmony in their ballads.

Due to the distinct media culture of Japan and Korea, TVXQ promoted themselves through different channels too. In Japan, TVXQ became well-known through many reality and game shows, which appealed to many families who surrounded the TV during dinner. On the other hand, in Korea TVXQ were constantly performing on national music shows, which helped them dominate the K-Pop charts.

Reflecting on TVXQ’s success story, I feel that marketing strategy is just like a wardrobe. Depending on what audience you are targeting, you choose the clothes that would the most appealing for the culture. The good thing is, this marketing wardrobe never gets full, for as long there are new ideas, the wardrobe would keep on filling up, with no limits.

A few days ago, while I was pondering about what to write for my first blog entry, I came across an article about online shopping in my Chinese textbook. Luckily, today in class we discussed the text in depth, focusing on the rapidly growing online shopping market in China. One particular store we focused on was Taobao, a Chinese website which facilitates business-to-consumer and consumer-to-consumer retail by providing a platform for businesses and individual. Sellers are able to post new and used goods for sale on the website, and buyers are able to bargain with the seller using instant messaging tools.

Conventionally, social trend helps businesses generate sales, such as the case for car companies making profits for “going green”. However, that’s not the case for Taobao. Taobao created the social trend of online shopping,; in 2009, one out of every three Chinese Internet users was shopping online. Consequently, online retail sales increased 117 percent annually between 2007 and 2009, of which close to 89% of sales increase was generated by Taobao.

Taobao was able to successfully capture loyal customers and attract new ones because they successfully implemented the 4Ps.

Product :Taobao currently hosts 800 million product listings, giving customers a variety of products to choose from. After purchase, customers post comments on the sellers’ page, which becomes valuable information for new customers who might inquire product size or texture.

Place: In order to achieve 100% customer satisfaction rate, sellers deliver products in less than 3 days.

For Promotion, Taobao now sells for itself. It has a largely customer oriented system; such as payment made after confirmation of product, and $0 return shipping fee. Moreover, the opportunity to connect with 370 million registered users in the Taobao community is what makes Taobao as successful as it is.