Public Communications and Marketing

The presentation about the E & J Gallo Winery was made by Jennifer Burroughs and Laurence Kuhlmann, who are employees of the company. They presented their company to the students of San Jose University in order to acquaint the audience with the winery and scout potential candidates for the organization.

The first part of the presentation made by Laurence Kuhlmann gives insight into what E & J Gallo Winery is, how they operate, what they value and what their objectives are. The company is vertically integrated so that they could manufacture the best products. Their headquarters include a research facility and a glass production department. E & J Gallo Winery purchased its first Northwest wine acquisition – Columbia Winery – in 2011, so the company changed its status from a pacific-established company to a nationwide one. The winery also widened its product range. They used to be a company with the main focus on producing the grape-based beverages, but they included stronger liquor, such as vodka and cognac as well.

The presentation mentioned how environmentally conscious E & J Gallo Winery is: they use recycled glass, and they minimized the use of fertilizers and synthetic chemicals. Lastly, Laurence focused on the importance of employees within the organization. The winery provides its staff with leadership training oriented at fast career improvement, support programs and various team-building activities in order to increase their level of happiness and job satisfaction.

The second part was presented by Jennifer Burroughs, who spoke about the company’s marketing strategy. She talked about the shopper marketing concept, which is a proportional combination of retail, consumer and shopper’s interests. Shopper marketing was designed to guide the shopper to the right product, which was basically made for him, and to provide him with solutions for the most comfortable shopping experience. Jennifer emphasized that winery is a complex category, because the products vary drastically and the number of brands is impossible to calculate. As a result, it can be the reason for the consumer’s confusion as they visit the supermarket. The company can position their product based on one or several important distinctive properties. However, the positioning on the basis of too many features can result in consumer’s confusion or cause mistrust. Once the company has determined the desired position, it should take decisive steps to bring this position to the minds of the target customers and persuade them to accept it.

E & J Gallo Winery conducts surveys, which are aimed at helping the shopper to find a solution for the wine shopping. The winery developed a way to distinguish wines according to the occasion or the reason for the purchase. For example, the wine you would buy to drink at dinner differs from the wine you would buy to bring to the dinner party or a celebration.

Another approach to a pleasant shopping experience is to place all ingredients for the most popular cocktails on the same shelf so that the shopper did not walk around the whole supermarket looking for necessary things. E & J Gallo Winery incorporated the iBeacons application for their customers, because, according to conducted surveys, their consumers prefer to locate what they are looking for fast with the help of their phones. One of the most interesting marketing strategies invented by the winery involves sport teams. With their support E & J Gallo Winery links the most popular beverage in a certain community to the local team, for example, 49ers and vodka, which drastically improved sales and advertisement.

E & J Gallo Winery determined that a large portion of their consumers consists of the Hispanic population, who prefer sweeter products and have trouble with the shopping. The marketing team took a bilingual orientation and made the advertisement aimed at providing the information to the Spanish-speaking community about the most suitable products for them. As a consequence, the winery integrated the “scratch and smell” concept at the stores, because the shoppers stated that they would like to smell or try a product before buying it. Such strategy helps to increase the chances of purchasing the beverages.

In conclusion, E & J Gallo Winery incorporated a shopper-oriented marketing strategy, which is being executed with the help of numerous surveys and constant comfortable improvements directly at the retail place.

Target

The presentation on one of the largest discount retail stores in the country – Target – was made by Meredith Klausner, Group Vice President. Their key concept involves the process of business analytics and data-driven decisions.

In the beginning, Meredith shared Target’s history with the audience, explaining to them how the store appeared and how they always implemented the discount position first. Over the years, the range of products changed drastically. It was caused by the fact that the team of managers always observed and determined the Target’s buying audience, or guests, how they prefer to call them, and their needs. The store’s main ideas involve the process of constant innovation along with the maintaining the highest level of value and their main approach “Expect more. Pay less.”

The main idea of the presentation was that Target is oriented at guests, who are digitally connected and require products, which will support their technological lifestyle. The presenter explained how a few years ago the company considered its target audience to be stay-at-home mothers, who are willing to buy everything at one place, which offers competitive prices and comfortable shopping experience. They realized that nowadays their guests are the millennial families with both parents working and looking for ways to improve and make their lives easier.

The managers at Target understand that most of the American population are digitally involved and use the Internet to improve their household. With the help of surveys, Target determined what technology integration is necessary to attract Internet-savvy guests. They incorporated the iBeacon application, which helps to coordinate their guests between the aisles at the store.

Meredith Klausner pointed out that Target’s biggest competitors today are not Wal-Mart or K-Mart, but Amazon Prime and other online delivery companies. So they changed their delivery strategy to fit the customer’s expectations of speed and value. Target is working with such online delivery programs as Google Express and Instacart, which help gain the best at home shopping experience. The most important aspect of Target, which enables it to compete with Amazon Prime, is that Target offers much more appealing prices for its customers in addition to comfortable and fast delivery options.

The biggest marketing advantage presented by Target is Open House at San Francisco. Open House is a simulation of a guest’s home, in which everything is digitally connected and can be operated with the help of a phone. Meredith explained that modern consumers want everything at their houses to be happening instantly and controlled remotely. At the Open House, even the door knobs can be technologically customized. The Open House concept is an extremely innovative approach to the marketing and is definitely shaping American consumer’s expectations of a digitally advanced home.

Sherwin Williams

Sherwin Williams is a building material selling company mostly known for its quality paints. The presentation was made by Ivan Tailor and Andrea Long, Regional Directors in the Bay Area.

Firstly, presenters spoke about the foundation of the company and that it was and is the biggest paint manufacturer in the United States, which establishes high quality products and the ability to achieve the customer satisfaction. Nowadays, Sherwin-Williams is a transnational corporation with a multi-billion turnover. The company owns 34 factories and 3,000 branded stores. They abide by the highest ethical standards of doing business, which is a guarantor of trust – the most crucial component of a successful business – for them, their customers and partners. Then the presenters acquainted the audience with the possible career paths in their business analytics department and told about the advantages of working for the Sherwin Williams.

The second part of presentation focused on how exactly Sherwin Williams is incorporating innovative technology in their business strategy to make their customers experience more pleasant. They created an application, which tracks all the data throughout the country about consumer’s preferences and local stores so that the corporate teams could analyze it and shape the marketing strategy. The online system has a survey, and every customer is invited to complete it. Nowadays surveys are the easiest, fastest and most actual way to receive buyer information. Sherwin Williams has developed surveys to fit both their retail and corporate customers because the company is designed to fit everyone’s needs and interests. In addition, the consumers are given the ability to rate stores and products online. The rating system can help the company analyze the work of staff members in certain stores, understand what its team is doing differently and use it in their strategy. The results and feedbacks are instantly transferred with the help of the Internet, which saves time and accumulates productivity. That is what data-based decisions mean.

The ratings designed by the Sherwin Williams team are quite intricate. They is not just a scale from 1-10, there are many different factors, such as likelihood to recommend, sales associate experience and store experience, which also have several aspects that are being rated. Comments and additional information are very much appreciated. In case of a negative feedback or an occurrence of a miscommunication, Sherwin Williams team members contact a customer via email and do all possible to understand what the problem was and fix the situation so that to return the customer.

In conclusion, Sherwin Williams uses surveys as the primary source of information regarding their products and customer satisfaction. They develop their entire marketing strategy based on that information and fix problems with the help of the comments and recommendations of their valued customers.

Macy’s

Macy’s presentation was made by the regional manager, who started his speech from the information on the changes in the industry and consumer’s behavior. He did not give an overview of the company, because he wanted to focus more on how the company is adapting to fit customer’s constantly changing expectations.

The audience was asked about how many of them used shop online 10 years ago and now. Everyone responded similarly and it was obvious that almost no one would shop online some years ago when there were no smartphones. On the contrary, everyone prefers to do it nowadays to save time and sometimes because the experience of shopping online is often more pleasant and comfortable than actually going to the store. Macy’s directed most of its resources to improve the website and advance the logistics of its network. The strategy of the company is based on the engagement of its associates, which results in the satisfaction of the customers.

Macy’s developed an application, which contains every product offered by the store. The presenter explained that the quality of our lives depends on our pockets, so the company decided to make its products as accessible as possible for the smartphone users.

In order to withstand the competition, Macy’s is accelerating the fulfillment and improving the process of delivery. Its biggest competitor is Amazon, so it is important to provide the customers with a fast and safe delivery options.

All of the mentioned features do not mean that in-store experience is outdated, and the company stopped working on its improvement. Macy’s is transforming its in-store technology to help navigate the customers and even give them fashion advice with the help of a virtual experience.

Next feature that Macy’s is improving is the coupons and special offers. Due to the fact that most of the shopping is done online, there are many discounts and chances to find very appealing prices. The reason for that is that online shops do not have to use their money to open a store and pay the salespeople. As a result, the attraction of online shopping is not only the time-saving factor but also a budget-friendly feature. That is why Macy’s is trying to keep the customers aware of special offers or upcoming sales and that they are able to participate in them.

One of the interesting things is that the Macy’s is interested in giving credit to their stores. For example, if the customer cannot find a certain product or appropriate size and color, he/she can ask the salesperson for help. In his turn, the sales assistant will find the product online and arrange it to be shipped to customer’s house. In that case, the credit of a sale still goes to the store and not the online application.

Macy’s offers same day delivery, which is not be done by the other companies. Unfortunately, it is not available throughout the entire United States, but most of the west and east regions along with some parts of the south have implemented such strategy.

Macy’s is oriented at making the shopping experience positive, that is why they have incorporated Pinterest on their website. As a result, when the customers are browsing and see something they like, they receive a link to a Macy’s website and receive an entertaining shopping experience.

From a marketing point of view, Macy’s are doing everything correct to fit the modern consumer’s expectations and are directing their resources into the right places. The best way to attract new customers is not the physical advertisement, but the cooperation with the social platforms, which Macy’s is taking advantage of actively.

Based on the Macy’s strategies the following phases of data-based marketing planning must be outlined:

1. Phase of motivation and research initiatives, which identify and analyze marketing problems;
2. Search phase, in which alternative marketing activities are defined, justified in an objective form, and where a list of the necessary market data is compiled;
3. The optimization phase of selecting the most favorable marketing activities through the adoption of alternative marketing opportunities and analysis of the estimated results;
4. The implementation phase, which involves the transfer of selected marketing activities;
5. The phase of control, which is performed by the help of monitoring the marketing activities implementation and their effectiveness.

Ross Stores & dd’s Discount

The presentation was made by DelMark Matthews, District Manager IT, Dan O’Keefe, District Manager IT and Cory McCann, District Manager. First they explained to the audience what business analytics is. According to them, it means to coordinate a strategy based on the results of the previous performance of the company and the incorporation of it in the future business planning. For them, as expressed by the presenter, it is an opportunity to determine what works best for the company, what they should keep doing, and also understand what does not work, what obstacles company faces and how to avoid them in the future. After explaining what business analytics is, presenters offered insight into the data-based decisions, which help businesses to gain access to a more relevant and accurate information. Such information is then leveraged into the optimization of the inside environment of the stores. Data analysis can be gathered with the help of customer surveys, focus groups or business intelligence software, which helps evaluate the responses and customer’s approaches to the answering. Presenters used the recommendations outlined by Forbes to make an efficient data-based decision, which involves the setting of a primary objective, creating an execution plan, collecting the data, conduction of the surveys and the development of recommendations.

The next part of the presentation revealed the important questions connected to the data-driven analysis. Ross Stores distinguishes its customers by the level of their influence. It is important because they have to adjust their marketing strategy to fit the expectations of their target audience. Obviously, other consumers also matter, but the different groups display different behaviors and have other preferences, for example, men and women. They demand specifically constructed approaches developed to fit their expectations. Consequently, the company must establish what brands to focus on, what type of promotions does each audience respond to the best and how the marketing decisions made by the company influenced the consumer’s behavior.

In their practice, marketing managers of Ross Stores are faced with an infinite number of distressed markets and other situations that require resolution. Such situations are characterized by a certain set of variables (volume and structure of demand and supply of goods in the market, the price level, conditions and market size, competition, etc.). They are all interrelated in a certain way that allows the company members to consider a marketing problem situation as a kind of economic system, while applying such principles of a system analysis as subordination of local and global goals of system as a whole.

The main result of the Ross Store’s strategic planning is the distribution of its capacity (manpower, material and financial resources) among major activities and strategic business units, for examples stores.

Marketing strategy of the enterprise is a logical structure that defines the ways to achieve long-term goals, such as winning certain market share, obtaining a certain amount of profit, the victory in the competition, etc. The marketing strategy of Ross Stores shows where, when and how it will deal with the company’s opportunities.

The internal environment of the company’s marketing includes its organizational structure, the individual units, the relationship between them, control systems, information systems planning, etc.

The next part of presentation was focused on displaying the results of the proper data-based decision-making incorporation at the company. The presenters showed that sales increased by 15% and many Ross Store and Discount stores locations were added throughout the entire country.

Lastly, before discussing the recruitment, presenters outlined the possibilities of the growth for the company. It was evident that California, Texas and Florida areas are the most prospective markets for them. Ross Stores is planning to cover the markets with the help of the concepts outlined in the presentation.

In the modern business, marketing decision-making can be an important competitive advantage. Businesses can outperform their competitors with the help of making better and faster decisions and more effective implementation of the data-based analysis.

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