reflections and learning summaries

                                          Week 4- sustainable marketing

In week 4 I got to learn about sustainable marketing strategy. Sustainable marketing has a focus on lowering the harm on the environment and ethically increasing the quality of life and well-being of consumers. (Lunde, 2018, p.98). I learned that businesses have a role in society and must form a relationship with the society. Consumers like me want firms to be ethical.  In recent years, many people have become aware of what they are putting their money into and make a conscious effort to support firms that are actively doing something to help the society in general. To market to this target market firms will need to show that they see people as humans and not just customers.

As the movement to be more ethical is on the rise firms that are not doing just are being held accountable for its actions.  One of the biggest examples is the backlash garnered by amazon recently as it has been reveled that it does not pay its workers the bare minimum wage. It was leaked that amazon’s worker were afraid to take toilet breaks throughout the day as it could reduce the productivity and could get them fired. Most of its warehouse workers worked in inhumane conditions. The company faced a lot of critic on twitter and it led to media backlash and the us government put pressure on the CEO Jeff benzo to take action against the claims.  This led to the minimum wage for its workers to be risen to 15 $ an hour. The move was only made after the company received political pressure and had to meet the new minimum wage requirements of some states. As social media activism as become popular many businesses are aware and careful about what they put out. Many businesses have come under fire for lack of diversity, unequal wage gap, number of women in key positions etc. in the digital age the information can be distributed easily, and customers only want to support the firms that resonate with their own morals and beliefs. If I were a social media manager for amazon an any other firm that comes under fire for any activates I would apologies for the company and hand out a statement that the firm is rectifying the mistake. Denying it will not help the brands image. The new best step is to keep the public updated about new changes that will be implemented.

                               Week 5 - segregation, targeting and positioning

In week 5’s lecture I learned about the segregation, targeting and positiong strategies. The STP process constitutes of 5 steps including market segmentation. Target segmentation consists of dividing the market into small groups based on what the firm can offer them and what are their needs. It is key to increasing sales and expanding business. The main 4 basis on what the target market is broken down into is geographic, demographic, behavioristic and psychographic. Some firms use global segmentation where its products are not bound by location and it can target the entire world. These products need to be careful about cultural appropriateness. Demographic segment has various other micro factors that come into play such as age, race, religion, education, job, money etc. psychographic segmentation involves segmentation people based on the type of lifestyle they choose, personality types and core values.

Facebooks target market at the time of its launch were college students who wanted to stay in contact with their friends. The age range was 18-30 and its targeted college students so education status mattered. It held on its target market for a while but then decided to analyze it and shifted its focus to a younger audience that is high school kids. High school teens got access to Facebook and so did everyone else. For a long time, Facebook was only used by young people. It was launched in us and gradually spread to other counties as it is a virtual product. Slowly Facebook became a hub for older generations, and it has phased out the younger generation. The age group 13-24 is the one that uses Facebook less frequently compared to other demographics. This means that Facebook needs to rethink its marketing strategies based on its current demographics.

                                       Week 6- branding strategies

In week 6 I learned about the impact branding strategies have on a products life cycle. Effective branding helps brands communicate with its customers and it all leads to how we perceive a brand. Branding consists of other offerings like brand logo, symbol, name and design. I learned that all these had a great impact on what the brand stands for and a great deal of effort is put into coming up with the right representative for the brand image.

As is the case with the McDonalds logo. A logo is the most recognizable part of a brand where its name isn’t mentioned. Effort is put into coming up with a symbol that will be widely recognizable and easily translated across languages. McDonalds has the most widely recognized logo in the all of history. It had a different logo that resembled a chef when it opened in 1940s. 20 years later it was changed to the symbol we have currently with arches.

From 1961 to 2010 the logo still underwent few minor changes and in 2010 the final simple M was established as its logo. McDonalds is a proof that having a simple memorable symbol can help people identify a brand. The company did not start with it but made different changes to perfect it. As it is the face of the company it should be simple, recognizable, memorable and easily translated through different countries and cultures. McDonalds met all these criteria for a good logo design. 

           Week 9- marketing communication and social media strategies.

In week 9 I was taught about marketing communication and social media strategies.

Since social media has become a major part of everyone’s life, brands have started using it to gain a more favorable position with their consumers using it. Brand deals, sales, new product launches and even complains are handled online through it. It helps them know what main issues its users are facing and to be on top of it.  many businesses like showpo have based their entire business around social media marketing. A lot of brands use instagram as a free advertising tool and generate sales. Wendys is an accuarte example of a business that uses social media to its advantge. It has taken advantage of any situation possible to promote itself on twitter and is very popular on twitter.  It is very quick with its replies on twitter and uses humor to enertain its followers.  Being fun and quirky on social media is something that a lot of brands work on to appear cool and appeal to the younger generations.