group project

Group Course Project (100 Total Points)

Practice Marketing Simulation

After the first week of class students will be assigned to a team for the remainder of the course. Teams will then work together on the parameters and decisions of the Practice Marketing simulation for the remainder of the course. Practice Marketing is a computer simulation game where teams have the opportunity to apply the concepts learned in the class, as well as analyze the business, and make marketing decisions in a real-time scenario. More importantly, students will have the ability to immediately see the impact of their decisions on the success of the business in the marketplace.

Teams of 3-4 people will take on the role of the senior marketing team for a new company that makes backpacks. A total of five teams will be created from the class to compete against each other as well as a control team run by the computer simulation. Each team will have ability to see the decisions and results for each of their competitors for target market selection, product development, pricing strategy, distribution strategy, and promotional strategies and elements. Teams will input their decisions online prior to the decision deadline posted on course homepage. After decisions are input, the computer will tabulate the results of your decisions and provide a host of market data that will include sales, profits, advertising, product specs, etc. for each of the teams. After analyzing the results, teams will then make appropriate adjustments for the next round of decisions. At the end of the game, a winner will be determined based on the computer-generated results. We will discuss the results, learning, issues, etc. as part of your final presentation.

During the final week of class, each team will make a formal presentation. These presentations will be as your final opportunity to convince the instructor of your approach and what you learned from the simulation experience. Presentation should be about 15 minutes in length, and should cover the following elements at a minimum:

· Target audience overview / description / rationale for selection

· Product characteristics / rationale / fit with target audience

· Pricing strategy / rationale

· Distribution strategy / rationale

· Promotional strategy / key elements

· Key changes made from the initial decisions to the final approach / rationale

· Key learnings from the exercise

PROJECT REQUIREMENT

In this course we will be using Practice Marketing, an online marketing simulation

This will be used in the course project which will be done in groups. You will need the access code that came packaged with the book or you may purchase the access to the simulation online. The URL to register for the simulation is: