Business Project Assignment #3

For this fourth business plan project assignment, I want you to do the following:

1. Choose two different online companies that would be direct or indirect competitors for your business and list their websites for me.

Student analysis should use the social marketing process figure in the chapter to organize their assessment and their recommendations for improvement. For each (including YOUR company-so 3 in total for each aspect), try to identify the following and answer the following questions:

a. Social marketing efforts the company has (or will) implemented

b. Mobile marketing efforts the company has (or will) implemented

c. Local marketing efforts the company has (or will) implemented (although identifying the local efforts may require some extra work)

d. Do they use social plug-ins on their websites?

e. An assessment of how effective the web presence of each firm is, as well as how effective the Facebook, Twitter, and Pinterest campaigns are.

i. Do they have a Facebook/Twitter/Pinterest page? If so, visit those pages to see how they are using them.

ii. How are the Facebook/Twitter/Pinterest pages different from the company’s website?

iii. Are there some tools they are not using?

iv. Examine the basics of these firms’ photography because the heart of much marketing is high-quality photography, including how consumers are using or wearing the products.

v. Examine how the firms organize their boards/pages.

· Are the boards a sensible introduction to the firms’ products?

vi. Assess how well each firm supports consumer engagement, and community building.

· Does one firm seem to have a “stronger” brand (in the sense of a larger, more lively community, and a wide variety of posts indicating engagement and conversation)?

f. Can you identify how the firms use mobile marketing? Use your smartphone or tablet to access their apps, if they have one, and websites.

g. Are their websites designed specifically for each platform?

h. In conclusion for this section, compare and critically contrast these firms, and make recommendations for how you, as a marketing manager, would improve their effectiveness.

2. Visit the same two websites of your choice from above and your own (real or imagined) and apply the social marketing process model to both.

a. Critically compare and contrast the effectiveness of these sites in terms of the dimensions of the social marketing process.

b. How well do these sites acquire:

i. Fans

ii. Generate engagement

iii. Amplify responses

iv. Create a community

v. Strengthen their brands?

vi. What recommendations can you make for these sites to improve their effectiveness?

For instance, one site may be much better on fan acquisition than it is on engagement. Many sites are strong on acquisition and engagement, but weak on community building. You should assess each site on each dimension. Finally, you should present a list of recommendations for improvement with a brief explanation on how it would help these firms.

3. Visit your personal Facebook profile page and examine the ads shown in the right margin.

a. What is being advertised and how do you believe it is relevant to your interests or online behavior?

b. Make a list of ads appearing in your News Feed and answer these questions:

i. Are these ads appropriately targeted to you in terms of your demographics (Profile), prior or current interests, visits to other websites, and past purchases?

ii. Surf the web, visiting at least two retail websites. In the next 24 hours, do you see advertising on Facebook related to your surfing behavior?

iii. You should be assessing why you are being shown these particular ads.

If you have a smartphone or tablet, you should visit your pages using these mobile devices and assess how the limitations of a smartphone screen are being managed by Facebook.