Professor Wade
Oct. 2, 2012
BUS 130-300
Essay #2
1. SWOT analysis is a marketing strategy used to find a company’s strengths and opportunities for a manager to take full advantage of them. The other two words are in the acronym are weaknesses and threats which the manager will try to work around or improve. This is needed for a company to make a marketing strategy and to become better than the competition. For example, if two companies both sold movies and they were pretty much the same in everything they do, people would go to either. But if one of those companies did a SWOT analysis and found that they can make finding these movies in the store a lot easier, then maybe they can attract more customers to their store. This would be seizing more opportunities and adding to their strengths. (pg. 49)
2. Clustering techniques is a way to find a pattern in the way costumers buy. Instead of using the manager’s best judgment, a computer group’s customers based on their similarities in segmenting dimensions to make a homogenous segments. This is needed for better marketing strategies. The clustering of a certain homogenous group can be studied and figured out why the computer clustered them together. For example, this can be because of culture or certain demographics that lead to a certain reaction to a product. CRM or consumer relationship management is a good way to improve marketing as well. They can also find out what the customer buys and what he or she needs. This is done by a computer database that keeps track of what the customer buys. So it sees segmenting information and can keep track of customer purchasing. This will enable a company to react to this by doing such things as sending reminders that he or she is due for something or send out coupons for the value minded consumers. This is all based upon what they regularly purchase and need. CRM is important because it gives a company the ability to advertise in a cost-effective way
Cited: Perreault, William D., Joseph P. Cannon, and E. Jerome McCarthy. Essentials of Marketing: A Marketing Strategy Planning Approach 12e. New York: McGraw-Hill/Irwin, 2010. Print.