Opportunity identification and marketing strategy
In Modules 1 and 2, you have been introduced to some key elements of a business marketing plan, including the characteristics and uniqueness of business marketing, market opportunity identification, business marketing strategy, organizational buyer behaviours, and purchasing functions. In this assignment, you will integrate and apply these concepts. The assignment will also provide you with the opportunity to develop and apply research.
This assignment consists of writing a report introducing your chosen company and the product(s) that you intend to market. You will also examine the product-market of your chosen company and the opportunities you have identified, and begin developing a business marketing strategy. As part of your marketing strategy, you will research whether your chosen company currently markets its product(s) or service(s) outside of Canada, and evaluate your company’s prospects for increasing its global presence.
Please note that to prepare the environmental analysis that generally precedes the development of a corporate and marketing strategy, you may need to review concepts from your earlier courses. Two tools that managers frequently use for environmental and competitive analysis are SWOT and Porter’s Five Forces. Our textbook assumes that you are already familiar with these tools and does not discuss them in detail.
This first assignment will be used again later in Assignment 4, since the information from this assignment forms part of your business marketing plan.
This assignment is divided into three parts:
Part I: Introduction
Part II: Opportunity Identification and Marketing Strategy Development
Part III: Consumer Behaviour and Purchasing Process Analysis
This assignment is marked out of 100 and is worth 9 per cent of your final grade in the course.
Instructions
Write a 12- to 15-page double-spaced report, styled in APA format, as follows:
Part I: Introduction
Introduce your chosen company and its product line(s), and choose the product line(s) you will market. The company that you choose must earn at least 60% of its revenue from B2B (as opposed to Consumer) marketing.
Part II: Opportunity Identification and Marketing Strategy Development
(Note: You will use tools such as SWOT and Porter’s Five Forces to assess the competitive environment of your chosen company. You will also need to do research to collect information about your chosen company’s competitive environment, mission, vision, and current strategy.)
Research and present the mission and vision statements for your chosen company.
Develop B2B marketing objectives for your company.
Define your company’s product-market.
Conduct a situation (SWOT) analysis (both internal and external), including resource/competitive advantage analysis.
Analyze the competition of your chosen company. Consider using Porter’s Five Forces for this step.
Outline a B2B marketing strategy for your chosen company.
Part III: Consumer Behaviour and Purchasing Process Analysis
Research and analyze the purchasing process of your targeted business customers (including a typical purchasing process and people and functions involved).
Analyze typical behaviours of your targeted business customers.
References
You must reference all ideas or findings that are not original to you. References must be provided for both paraphrasing and quoting. Paraphrasing is taking the ideas or findings of another writer or researcher and putting them into your own words. Like quotations, paraphrased ideas must be acknowledged; otherwise, you appear to be claiming that the idea is your own. Quoting is using the exact words of a writer.
This course uses American Psychological Association (APA) citation style; the TRU Library provides excellent guides on how to write APA citations and references.
Criteria for Evaluating Assignment 1
Criteria
Value
Use of marketing terms and textbook concepts
30%
Organization and completeness
20%
Critical thinking and insight
20%
Logical conclusions
10%
Professional Presentation (tone, grammar, spelling, APA)
20%
