Question 1 Week 3: Tutorial 2

Business processes can ensure greater business profitability, and it is necessary for businesses to execute these processes on a daily basis. Inefficiencies in the organisation can be removed by considering the core processes. The four core business processes that ensure coordination and performance of each department has been outlined below with relevant examples-

Concept-to-product- In any business, the process of product development involves the development of a product from an idea or concept. Before releasing the product in the market, the market need should be considered, and thereafter, the design of the product should be conceptualised (Saarela, 2011). Example- Modern cars were invented because it is a practical solution that met the needs of people who wants to travel from one place to another quickly. The idea was to build a gas-powered horseless carriage.
Market-to-customer- Another business process that includes the identification of the attractiveness of a market and thereafter creating a value proposition in order to make it attractive to the customers. Meeting customer needs means capturing a value and translating the business strategy into a growth strategy. Example- Electronics market meets the need of customers who wants to purchase electronic products and services for personal consumption purposes.
Order-to-cash- It primarily involves receiving and fulfilment of customer requests as soon as they order a service or product. The term is abbreviated as O-T-C, and it mainly involves the processing of sales orders of customers. Example- ERP system such as the Oracle Netsuite or Oracle ERP receives as well as processes customer orders efficiently (Bradford, 2015).
Demand-to-supply- It mainly involves the identification of the customer demands for a particular service or product, and based on the demand, supply is ensured. Example- investors are always looking forward to buying opportunities, and therefore, the demand is high. PayPal considered this as an opportunity, and its stocks meet the criteria of long term investors.

Question 2 Week 4: Tutorial 3

Marketing is incomplete without qualitative research because it is necessary to test products and ideas in order to gain a more realistic view of the needs and requirements of customers. Customers are likely to react differently to different products, and without conducting research, it is not possible to have an in-depth understanding of the market needs. In the case of sales-based research; one of the dominant paradigms involves testing of theory using empirical research (Johnson, 2015). The marketers use methods such as unstructured questioning or observation methods in order to gain insights regarding the market and make future decisions. The “how” and “why” of markets can be understood. Marketers will be benefitted because they will understand their potential customer base and will conduct product testing or branding. Moreover, the established companies will be using surveys in order to understand the satisfaction level of customers regarding a particular service and product. Again, marketers need to understand the deeper motives of customers so that they can influence the customer’s purchasing decisions. Qualitative research does not generalise the results unlike quantitative research. The marketers would be benefitted because they can choose the right course of action based on empirical research. On the downside, qualitative market research might be disadvantageous because the results cannot be generalised and the analysis process is time-consuming. Moreover, the responses of the participants are subjective in nature and consequently the final results are one-sided or biased. The interpretations will be subjective and it reduces the quality of the research outcomes. Moreover, without a proper industry experience, the marketers will be unable to conduct proper research. Apart from being a time-consuming process, qualitative research also requires a huge budget and there is a need to consider a small sample size. Qualitative research also violates standard categories. Further research needs to be done.

Question 3 Week 5: Tutorial 4

In this fast-paced world, one of the fastest changes noticed by marketers is the changing customer behaviour. As per the latest trends, customers in 2020 are looking for better services and products. Quality over quantity has been prioritised by the customers. Moreover, it is no longer easy to retain their attention span. Marketers are supposed to cope with the constant changes and demands of customers. Earlier, brands shared their content on facebook because it is one of the most widely used social media sites. It was easy for big brands to build fan pages and attract as many customers as possible. Large number of consumers followed those fan pages. However, priorities of customers have now changed and they are unwilling to handle branded content. Nevertheless, consumers are still interested in following few brands. This has created excessive competition among large brands. Nowadays, consumers are smart and they are looking for honest brands. Moreover, consumers want quick responses within few hours after complaining on online platform. Research shows that on social media platforms, the type of response to consumer criticism matters. Consumers are more likely to behave positively after receiving a vulnerable response from companies (Xia, 2013). The response should be customised and quick. Most complaints are related to services and products. Satisfaction level of customers can be enhanced by corrective action, active transferring and thanking (Einwiller and Steilen, 2015). It is difficult to earn the attention of modern day customers. Communication is the key to earn customer trust. Technology is advancing at a faster rate and continuous supply and demand has been noticed. Supply chain is now getting elongated and the only solution for facing the upcoming challenges is to implement automation across the communication process (Todor, 2016).

Question 4 Week 5: Tutorial 4

One of the highly significant factors that shape the attitudes of customers and their buying behaviour is their family members. Before making any purchase decision, an individual might get influenced by wife, husband, parents, children, siblings and so on. Often decisions are collaborative and in case of grocery buying, most decisions are made by a single family member. Studies show that consumer behaviour is influenced by family members. They are regarded as the “primary reference group” and therefore, marketers have categorised family into two types. In modern societies, the husband-wife relationship tends to influence the buying behaviour of both. Usually, the wife is considered as the primary purchasing agent, particularly for clothing items, sundries, food and so on. Moreover, joint decision-making is prevalent as well. Both men and women are regarded as possible targets of marketers because both of them can influence each other’s decision-making process. Again, parents are the second category that influences the buying behaviour of their children. This is because parents shape the religious beliefs as well as lifestyle choices of their children. Upbringing of children is done by parents and therefore, they play an influential role in the life of their children. Parental influence matters because parents are similar to a role model. When parents talk positively about a particular service or product, the children are more likely to accept the product and say positive things about it. Hence, opinion of a father or a mother influences the opinion of the child. Certain companies continue to do business because of this phenomenon. Parents often encourage children to buy a certain type of product by showing willingness to pay more for the product (Wiese and Kruger, 2016). Similarly, parents might negatively influence their children by complaining about a product and switching to other products. Children often get influenced by ways in which their parents complain about a particular product to another buyer.

Question 5 Week 6: Tutorial 5

Tesla Inc. used a $0 marketing strategy in order to dominate a market. It was possible to implement such a limited budget marketing campaign because it focussed on “word of mouth” advertising as well as referrals. The company did not spend anything on Twitter, Instagram and Facebook as well as YouTube. Instead focus has been given on creating media interest. This in turn, met the advertising needs of the company and made Elon Musk as one of the renowned CEOs. Direct marketing strategy has not been adopted by Tesla. Rather, the company encourages its customers to sell the products. Hence, Tesla manages to develop a product which always has a unique positioning (Ingram, 2018).
Tesla’s customer base ranges from the young adults to the people in their 40s. Particularly, the company has targeted the most tech-savvy and luxury car buyers. One of the significant target markets of Tesla is the United States. Moreover, the company managed to gain popularity in the European and Chinese markets too. As of 2019, Dutch customers have contributed around 1.6 billion USD to the revenue of the company (statista.com, 2020). Moreover, Tesla has been aiming towards attaining a broader segment of customer base.
It can be anticipated that Tesla’s future is in its batteries instead of its cars. One of the largest battery factories, known as the Tesla’s Gigafactory shall be built soon and permission from BYD, a Chinese company shall be taken in order to fulfil Tesla’s purpose (Dans, 2020). The company is going to be in a joint venture with Panasonic and it will further expand the scope of the company. Tesla’s capacity has enhanced and it can become a household name soon. It has been understood that the future is bright for Tesla because it has some ambitious plans.

Reference List

Bradford, M., 2015. Modern ERP: select, implement, and use today’s advanced business systems. Lulu. com.

Dans, E. (2020). The Key For Tesla’s Future Is Batteries, Not Cars. [online] Forbes. Available at: https://www.forbes.com/sites/enriquedans/2018/12/07/the-key-for-teslas-future-is-batteries-not-cars/#a719ec940612 [Accessed 18 May 2020].

Einwiller, S.A. and Steilen, S., 2015. Handling complaints on social network sites–An analysis of complaints and complaint responses on Facebook and Twitter pages of large US companies. Public Relations Review, 41(2), pp.195-204.

Ingram, N., 2018. Tesla Motors: A Potentially Disruptive Force in a Mature Industry. International journal of management and applied research, 5(1), pp.8-21.

Johnson, J.S., 2015. Qualitative sales research: An exposition of grounded theory. Journal of Personal Selling & Sales Management, 35(3), pp.262-273.

Saarela, M. ed., 2011. Functional foods: Concept to product. Elsevier.

Todor, R.D., 2016. Blending traditional and digital marketing. Bulletin of the Transilvania University of Brasov. Economic Sciences. Series V, 9(1), p.51.

Topic: Tesla. (2020). www.statista.com. Retrieved 18 May 2020, from https://www.statista.com/topics/2086/tesla/

Wiese, M. and Kruger, L., 2016. Parental influence on consumer and purchase behaviour of Generation Y. Journal of Consumer Sciences, 44.

Xia, L., 2013. Effects of companies’ responses to consumer criticism in social media. International Journal of Electronic Commerce, 17(4), pp.73-100.

Management Marketing