Weekly Post

Questions

This week our review materials had a lot to do with the message to consumers.  We did not have any class prompts this week so I'm going to go through my questions and then some Pharmasim assignment comments in this week's blog.

My first question related to communicating a message to consumers.  In a world where so many people have DV-Rs and the opportunity to fast forward through commercials it makes it more difficult to get people to pay attention.  We also talked about in class how people have more than just the television in front of them at all times.  There are so many times when commercials come on and I go straight to my phone or tablet to keep occupied.  So how do companies balance between conveying their message and getting the attention of the viewers to watch?  I've seen so many commercials that are funny and entertaining, but I have no idea what the commercial is trying to sell to me.  Or other commercials that are all about a product, but I'm too bored to watch.  I think companies that have something catchy, like a specific jingle or slogan, can provide an entertaining commercial and still have people remember what company the commercial represents.

Another note from the weekly material related to keeping promotions consistent across channels.  My question was whether this meant solely the message or whether it meant that the promotion offered should be all the same.  I get so many emails that have in-store only or online only sales - are these companies going against the consistent strategy?  I have to think that they are, because personally I can't stand when companies do this.  It seems that it's always the one I don't want that I get the sale for and it turns me off to purchasing something from them at all.  Banana Republic and Petco seem to be notorious for this in my inbox.

My last question was addressed in class.  Since we were talking about public relations, I automatically thought of Carnival Cruise Lines and their recent blunders.  I think at this point there is not much they could do to come back from the hits they have taken recently.  The stock is doing better than I would have imagined, but not going strong (see article: http://www.fool.com/investing/general/2013/05/09/carnival-stock-it-gets-worse.aspx ).  On the up side if you are willing to risk going on this line prices have dropped dramatically for them to try to fill up the ships.

Pharmasim

Also this week we began working on team Pharmasim sections.  It's been an interesting switch to this version as there are many more incidents and decisions to make as part of the team.  It has been nice though having input from a group and working together to make decisions that can be supported.  We have been off to a good start in this round with stock price steadily increasing.

We have put a reliance on the market update to give us a strategy which has worked out well.  That report got us to look into alligning our sales force which we did in the first round.  Then we have increased a little more since then due to channel increases.  We have also looked into cannibalization and some promotion information.  We have compared our promotions to other companies which lead us to some increases in the co-op and POP sections.  We started a website with Adworks which has been doing well. 

Next we will be looking launching a new product!