Cheryl Yip in her blog “The value of creating value” mentions the indispensability of relationships between a company and its customers and stakeholders.

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Samsung’s reputation in the market is not at its best. Reports suggest that Galaxy Note 7 phones caught fire and exploded due to leaky and faulty lithium batteries. The situation even worsened when passengers having the Note phones were asked to deboard their flights due to safety issues. There has been an upheaval in the financial market as share prices of Samsung have hit rock bottom. Even though the company offered  $100 to the affected customers, it is not of much use as the damage has already been done. This incident has led to the decrease in trust in consumers as they now fear purchasing Samsung phones in the anticipation that they might burn and explode again suddenly.

Having understood the impact or the consequences this will have on the customer segment , Samsung’s COO Tim Baxter has made a public apology expressing his deep concern for this unprecedented issue.

As learnt in class, it is very important for a company to maintain its relationship and loyalty with its customers.In my view , if it cannot create and maintain(which is even more crucial) trust among people , it will lose its business. Why do we see Apple at a commanding position in the market or Blackberry losing dominance in the phone industry? The answer to this is that both the companies are viewed differently because of the relationship standards they maintain with their customers. In my opinion , the underlying idea is to give it all when it comes to catering consumers. There should not be any room for discrepancy or complacency when it comes to meeting requirements of the customers.

In her blog post , Cheryl discusses the key determinants which help companies achieve goals quickly. They are value propositions , customer relationships and customer segments. I second this and would like to add that if Samsung had known that such incidents would seriously impact their customer segments, they would have taken extra care and precaution even with the minutest details of their product. The customers due to this negligence have surely been affected. In my view , even if public relations of Samsung does its level best to reassure public about the safety measures it adopts, it will be tremendously difficult to capture the former market position.  According to me, Samsung will have to work extra hours to establish trust back in people.

Citations

• N.p., n.d. Web. <http://www.wsj.com/articles/samsungs-reputation-takes-a-hit-as-incidents-mount-1476136987>.
• N.p., n.d. Web. <http://hosted2.ap.org/APDEFAULT/f70471f764144b2fab526d39972d37b3/Article_2016-10-11-US-TEC–Samsung-Smartphone%20Dependency/id-d5e6497b50834b7eb7901c79f174dcef>.
• N.p., n.d. Web. <http://www.inc.com/john-brandon/why-the-samsung-galaxy-note-7-exploding-battery-problem-is-deeply-troubling.html>

Ciel Chen’s blog “Online presence of businesses” depicts the advantages of doing business online and a study by Aberdeen Group that says that businesses which operate online have a larger financial turnover than those who do not.

                                                      source:www.adweek.com/files/imagecache/node-detail/news_article/dove-speak-beautiful-hed-2016.png

From showcasing the benefits of Dove soap bars in a conventional style to helping women rediscover their inner beauty and confidence, Dove has indeed come a long way. There have been massive changes in advertisements which show what exactly Dove is all about. “Ideas and opinions about body image are now fluidly shared every second through social feeds, and sometimes we do not fully realize the resounding impact of the words in even one post,” Jennifer Bremner, Dove’s Director of Marketing, said. “We can positively change the way future generations express themselves online.”

Dove along with Twitter has launched #speakbeautiful, a campaign which encourages women to step up and tweet about beauty in a positive way. This came as a response to various negative comments in relation to body shaming and women’s image.

As learnt in class, I believe the value proposition of the company through this campaign is to bring a revolution in the mindset of people to respect women and to not judge any woman on the basis of body and skin colour. The key activity of Dove in relation to this is to campaign as much as possible to make women more confident.

In his blog post, Ciel mentions that online presence of a business helps the business to grow which I agree with.It helps in creating a positive brand image, resulting in developing trust in consumers and increasing sales. In my opinion, Dove has been able to successfully foster the change . Firstly , they do not talk about anti aging processes and themes unlike other brands. This has instilled a sense of belongingness in women with the brand. Secondly , they emphasize on “real beauty” i.e. “inner beauty”. You never see Dove directly campaigning to use their products but they bring out through ads what people think and expect which creates consumer confidence leading to purchasing of their products. I believe that a great marketing strategy involves not directly mentioning the name and quality of the product but carrying it out in a way that connects people.

Had Dove not started this campaign, I think that they would not have enjoyed the current market position as they do now. Thus , the brand scores a perfect ten by leveraging social media.

Citations

• N.p., n.d. Web. <https://www.google.co.in/search?q=dove+speak+beautiful&biw=1366&bih=657&source=lnms&tbm=isch&sa=X&sqi=2&ved=0ahUKEwiKy92Qpt7PAhUDS2MKHR5wAuYQ_AUIBygC#tbm=isch&q=dove+speak+beautiful+twitter&imgrc=FrysZjWlfrXwyM%3A>.
• N.p., n.d. Web. <http://www.adweek.com/news/technology/dove-and-twitter-built-tool-measure-how-positive-or-negative-your-tweets-are-170165>.
• N.p., n.d. Web. <http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2015/02/19/speakbeautiful-dove-social-media_n_6713960.html>.