Let me start by saying, I love marketing. Taking this course has made me realize how vast the subject of marketing is. Most people think it is just sales or advertising. Those people are SO wrong. Every level of a business involves some kind of marketing – Analyzing the market and understanding what customers need, designing a product to suit those needs, determining where and how to get the product to the customers, figuring out how to make the most money out of it, creating a brand and keeping customers interested. So there you go, it’s very, very important.

My team and I chose to do our project on RIM (Blackberry). We thought it would be interesting to analyze this company in view of all the negative criticism they’ve been dealing with and to find out if it really is a dead end for Blackberry. I found it quite effective that the project was divided into 3 parts rather than one huge business plan assignment. We were able to focus on each individual section of the business plan one at a time and understand it fully. We learned to examine and evaluate the various aspects of a company’s business environment. I think that is a valuable skill as every business needs to do this before making any major decisions. It also broadened our view on Blackberry’s prospects.

The STP analysis was also pretty interesting because we were able to identify where Blackberry was going wrong. In my opinion this was one of the easier parts of the project. My favourite yet the most challenging part of the project was the final video. How do you fit 3 assignments’ worth of information into 7 minutes? But we had to and we did. The time limit definitely taught us how to pick out the most important information and streamline it to portray the intended message. I would imagine this is the hardest part of the job for filmmakers too. Choosing the right footage and cutting things out is very stressful!  However, the video project was a great outlet to voice our ideas and findings in a creative way. I think this is also a vital skill to have as a marketer. Moreover, knowing that our video was going to be peer reviewed ensured that we chose an interesting approach. We reinvented a scene from the popular TV show Mad Men and we took it all the way. With the suits, the scotch, the dramatic music and a great dialogue, we had it all! Another great thing about the project was that we were assigned teams. It was a great way to meet new people in the class and to practice working with different types of people. I lucked out with my team. Everyone had great ideas and we had no trouble working with each other.

Overall, the project was a successful learning experience and I hope to see interesting assignments like this in more of my courses in the future!