Minor 1: Identifying Target Markets

In chapter 6 of Marshall, you learned that effective segmentation, target marketing, and positioning favorably impact marketing management. Choose a local company, the one you work for, or you would like to work for in the future. From information available from LETU Library EBSCOHost databaseLinks to an external site., internally from the marketing department or online from the company’s website, develop a managerial report (not APA format) based on the current products and services offered by the company. Include appropriate diagrams, charts or tables that both explain the following concepts and offers your analysis.

1. Market Segmentation: Consider the various approaches to segmenting the market(s) of your client firm. What segmentation approaches (Marshall, pp. 161-177) do you recommend? Evaluate your proposed segments against the criteria for effective segmentation (Marshall, pp. 160-161).Why do you recommend these approaches over other available approaches? What does this evaluation lead you to conclude about the best market segments for the company?

2. Segment Analysis: Analyze each potential segment on your list using the three steps you learned in the chapter (Marshall, pp. 177-180): (1) assess each in terms of segment size and growth potential, segment competitive forces, and strategic fit of the segment; (2) for the short set that emerges, develop profiles of each potential target market, and then identify each of your final set as primary, secondary, tertiary, or abandoned; (3) select the target marketing approach for each of your primary targets.

3. Compelling Value: Identify the likely sources of differential advantage for these products or services (Marshall, p. 183). In other words, why are these more valuable to customers than competing products?

This project will be scored using the MBA Project Grading Rubric.

Minor 2: Services as Core Offerings

Due Sunday by 11:59pm
Points 100
Submitting an external tool

This minor project asks you to demonstrate your understanding of the service-profit chain as applied to a specific company. Marshall introduces this in chapter 9 by claiming the New Dominant Logic in marketing implies a shift from physical goods to intangible services. This project asks you to write up a case study that documents how a company, in addition to its products, uses its services as a core offering.

To start, identify a company, other than Netfix, that offers both products and services to their customers. Once you have a company in mind, refine your research by using the “Business Searching Interface” under the EBSCOHost Database in the LETU LibraryLinks to an external site.. Examine the “Company Profiles” report, and then visit the company website. Determine what percentage of sales and profits come from product sales versus service sales.

Then write up a generic marketing report that is 1,200 words or less and contains three sections:

· Background: How has the growth of services as core offerings shifted over time in this company?

· Value Chain: What is the value offering of this company, along with its continuum of product and service offerings?

· Service Quality: How is the company’s Service-Profit Chain used to create customer satisfaction and loyalty?

This project will be scored using the MBA Project Grading Rubric.