For many years now, I am not used to working on Saturdays ! It gets into your mindset and your body assumes that Saturdays are days when you can relax - but we are here in HBS and that is not true. Saturday classes start at 8:30 AM and goes on till noon.
And to quote Prof. Quelch, if it is Saturday it has to be Marketing ! Our first session was the first of three cases dealing with “corporate brand management”. We discussed the Volkswagen (VW) story in the US. The focus was on the competitive positioning of the New Beetle in the US market along with the management of the entire VW product line.
Interestingly, in almost all the marketing cases, the Prof shows the ads which were used both in the print and digital media - so that you can relate to the discussion. And as mentioned earlier, all the class rooms are well equipped.
After seeing the ads, there was a discussion on when do you use people in the ads. When your product is not differentiated enough and when you know who your target audience is, then you use people in the ads. May be it is Marketing 101, but it was new to me. In product marketing, the ads play a very important role after purchase as well - as they reinforce the purchase decision in the mind of the customer; customers, post purchase also look for who else has bought the same product - you see this often in cars !
To recap, some of the thoughts on customers:
Acquire and retain the RIGHT customers
Segment customers according to their sophistication, willingness to pay and life-time profit potential; and adjust the marketing budget accordingly.
Customer metrics :
Acquisition (churn)
Satisfaction (delight)
Loyalty (Inertia)
Retention (age)
Be wary of the statement, "every one owns the customer", which can easily become, "no one owns the customer".
The second session was on Walmart - which is a remarkable company if you study in detail. Our Living Group is fortunate to have Gail with us, as she is the Sr.VP of Merchandising in Walmart. If you apply the 5 forces of Industry to Walmart, it will look like this:
Threat of Entry
Huge IT investment (Walmart is supposed to have invested over $1b in IT systems)
Large economies required to compete successfully
Supplier bargaining - which basically was eliminated by Walmart !
Technology - big first mover advantage
IT platform
Data warehouse
Scanner
RFID, etc
Rivalry
Fierce price competition
Availability of goods
Speed, friendliness, service
Location convenience
Different scale of shops
Threat of substitute
Online stores
Super markets
Direct buy from factories
Customer bargaining
Lowest price at other location
Distance to store
Availability
It is amazing that Walmart does not pay suppliers till the product is scanned at the checkout counter - which means even larger players like P&G have to carry the inventory cost.
Some other related points, which were interesting:
Key part of competitive strategy is to decide what you will not do, so that you will do a better job of what you decide to do
Make a virtue of saving a $ by every employee every single day; and remember Walmart employs over 200,000 people worldwide !
CEO of Walmart said that we need to grow because employees need opportunities, which comes from growth
Prof. Rivkin summarized the session by stating that firms with a competitive advantage:
Drives a wider wedge between the willingness to pay and the cost it incurs, than competitors, for the targeted products/services and customers;
Embodies its advantage in a set of activities that is across the value chain and reinforce each other (internal consistency)
Copes well with the five forces in its industry (external consistency)
offers a distinctive value proposition to its customers
Next week I am the leader of our Living Group - so I had a meeting along with other leaders and Prof. Tushman. It was a feedback session from all of us. There was discussion on the amount of reading material every day and the difficulty especially for non-native English speaking participants, more time for reflection after the class, more time for interaction within the class, and the pace with which the class itself is conducted. While Prof. Tushman accepted all these feedback and said that he will talk to his teaching staff, it is only fair for us to understand making major changes mid-way may not be possible. But surely it can be done for the future programs. Prof. Tushman emphasized the need to spend adequate time on the personal case - which can be very useful for our respective organizations.
Today evening, we went on a Boston harbour cruise - almost 120 participants signed up for this, which meant we had to go in three buses. It was a well organized one, as usual. Great weather, lots of drinks, heavy appetizers - good clean fun.
Before I sign off, I should acknowledge the dedication, attention to detail, punctuality and helping nature of the Exec Education staff here - they are just fantastic. They are led by Kathryn Venne. The team consists of Susan Collins, Denise Flynn and Anna Porter. On behalf of all AMPers, my sincere thanks to this fabulous team of four.
Sunday was a leisurely day - had a conference call at 7 am, after which went for my long run - managed to do 12 km today. Weather was great. Dinner was at a Korean Restaurant. Many must be wondering what a vegetarian eats in a Korean place - firstly Tae Hyung was with us, so he helped in ordering the right things and secondly, they did have a lot of veggie food, including sticky rice - enjoyed it.
Before I end , here are some pictures from the Harbour Cruise. And two video clips as well. I hope it is interesting - would love to hear some comments on the blog. More later ........
No comments:
Post a Comment