Week 4 Blog Post

Evaluating WNE Football's Marketing Strategy to Recruits

The task of evaluating our marketing strategy to our recruits is similar to the scenario briefly touched upon by Professor Spotts in his lecture, regarding the process of high school students deciding on a future school and depositing.  Obviously, the scenario is the same for us, but a lot more factors are involved.

What is unique about our marketing process is that we have direct contact and feedback with our potential customers.  While we do receive a handful of customers (players) that we have had no previous contact with, the majority of next-season's incoming freshmen were recruited by our staff, which entailed numerous emails, letters, post cards, phone calls, text messages, and personal visits to their school and at WNE.  During the recruiting process, we make sure to receive direct feedback from the recruits regarding our process and the processes of our competitors.  For example, we will ask which means of communication each recruit prefers and, usually towards the end of the process, which tactics worked best for them, and which had a negative effect on them.  We will even go as far to survey them as to what other schools are doing to successfully recruit.  For example, at the Division III level, it is impossible to really offer a student anything extra in terms of scholarship money.  Students have to make their decision based on a school's scholastic programs, football program, proximity to home, appearance, financial package, etc.  In surveying our recruits, we found that other schools were offering guaranteed roster spots for camp to those recruits who decided to commit early on in the process.  We decided to experiment with it, and found it to be less useful than we hoped for.

The only critique I can make with our marketing process to recruits is that we do not stay ahead of the curve in terms of what techniques our competitors are utilizing.  Much like the example above, we spend a lot of time surveying recruits as to what others are doing, and try to emulate the successful techniques.  I think it would be more beneficial to research more into what is appealing to the high school demographic now-a-days, and come up with a technique on our own that has not been utilized.  I believe we would benefit in our recruiting classes if we stayed ahead of our competitors in terms of our innovativeness when it comes to recruiting, instead of copying what is already being implemented.

I would be interested to investigate whether or not we could utilize hard numbers in some sort of regression analysis, cluster analysis, tabular analysis, etc.  I think it would be interesting to see a market report in terms of recruiting college football players, and to get specific demographics on where the best athletes come from and what types of characteristics they possess.  This could be an interesting new field of research to look into, because as far as I know it is not easily accessible.    

PHARMASIM

The two prices I selected to test the market were $4.89 and $5.38.  The baseline price in which it was compared to was $5.29.  My results were as follows:

$4.89 -  Awareness stayed the same (78.6%), unit market share rose (22% to 23.7%) and share of manufacturer's sales rose (22.4% to 22.7%).  Net contribution impact: -13.4 mil

$5.38 - Awareness stayed the same (78.6%), unit market share dropped (22% to 21.7%) and share of manufacturer's sales stayed the same (22.4%).  Net contribution impact: 3.4 mil

For the next test, I analyzed Bundle #4 ($4.89, drop alcohol) and Bundle #12 ($5.38, Allround original).  My results were as follows:

Bundle #4 ($4.89 drop alcohol) - Stock price rose to $49.39, sales 112.1 mil, market share 22.4% (36.3% for cold remedy market)

Bundle #12 ($5.38 Allround original) - Stock price dropped to $37.20, sales 115.2 mil, market share 21.4% (35% for cold remedy market)

In terms of testing just for price, I expected the market share and manufacturer's share to rise, but was not expecting the net contribution to drop, especially as much as it did when testing the unit price of $4.89.  Conversely,  when testing the price of $5.38, I expected the market share and manufacturer's sale to decrease, but only the market share did.  Due to these results, I did not expect the net contribution impact to be positive.

When analyzing the test for the Bundles, I expected #4's results to be better than #12's results, which they were in every category except sales.  This is interesting to see that when you raise the price, which is less favorable to customers, that sales rose higher than that of the lesser price, but then see a less favorable stock price due to this.  This surprises me.

Dilbert and the Mar.ke.tin.g Blog

This week I chose to look at David and Marty's blogs.  I like how David uses the Dilbert Comics to bring a sense of humor towards the subject of marketing, and does an impressive job of relating it to the current topic as well.  I definitely do not possess the humor he displays in his writing, so it is entertaining for me when viewing his blog.  All jokes, or comics, aside, he does a great job of engaging the reader and getting them to think deeper into his topics.  He does a thorough job explaining his findings, especially with the Pharmasim tasks and explaining his reasoning behind his findings, which is great to see another perspective into the assignments.   Marty is also very thorough with his explanations as well.  I also like how he develops all of his ideas, first by giving his initial impressions on a topic, and then proceeds to talk through how he learned more about a given subject, and then describes his new impressions with evidence to back it up.  Both are very engaged in the class discussions, and do a great job of carrying it into their blogs, as it makes them easy to read and very insightful.

My Process of Purchasing Cold Remedies

Unfortunately, I no longer live at home and have the luxury of rummaging through Mom's medicine cabinet whenever a cold takes over my body.  Being a starving graduate assistant coach, I usually consult whatever the school store has on display, since part of my stipend is points/meals, just as the students utilize.  In this case, I will usually choose whatever works best, since it is essentially free for me.  The selection at the WNE convenience store does not always have what you need though, so my process changes when searching for cold remedies at your traditional CVS, Walgreens, etc.  I usually search for a name brand remedy, and if the price is reasonable, I try and get  a reputable brand name item, such as Advil or Tylenol.  Depending on how steep the price is, or how light my wallet is at the moment, I then search for the generic brand, as they are essentially the same product, just without the brand name.  Finally, I'll look for a sale on any of the items.  To be honest, and fortunate, I do not take much medication or consult a doctor very often, and usually try to battle through whatever sickness I endure.  In the rare case where I am deathly ill, or feel the need to consume medicine, I'll call home to consult with Dr. Mom or Dr. Grandma first, then search for the strongest thing I can find.