Discuss your company’s POSITION in the MARKET place relative to competitors.

MKT501 – Strategic Marketing
Module 1 – SLP
Introduction to and Fundamentals of Strategic Marketing.

Over the session you will conduct an analysis an organization of your choosing. Your paper will provide your assessment of whether your chosen organization and where your chosen organization has a competitive advantage. This requires you to describe and analyze the marketing situation of your chosen organization; what markets your chosen organization currently or potentially serves; against whom your chosen organization competes; and how your chosen organization competes with its competitors for those markets. Note that it is not sufficient to simply describe what your chosen organization does. You must apply the analytical frameworks taught in the course to analyze your selected organization and make recommendations for improvement. In order to do this effectively you must have access to relevant information. So your choice of an organization should be made with this in mind.
In each module you will complete a section of the marketing analysis, building on the sections previously completed in prior modules. Excluding your title page, each of the parts of your SLP is to be approximately four pages. Thus, the entire analysis when completed should be about twenty pages long.
Before Completing SLP1:
1. Click to see an outline of the entire project.
2. Examine the following example:
Khera (2008). Sample marketing plan: AMT. MoreBusiness.com. Khera Communications, Inc. Available on October 28, 2009 at
http://www.morebusiness.com/templates_worksheets/bplans/printpre.brc
3. Look at the primary resources on writing a marketing plan that are listed on the Background1.
SLP1
For Module 01, for the company you choose to audit, in 2-3 pages for Tasks 1-4 in the following list of Sections, you will identify its primary products/services that are of interest to you, its core business, its markets, its competitors, the major variables at work in the industry within which the company is classed. And as Task 5 in the following series of Sections, you will describe the general situation for the product you are examining in 2-3 pages.
In summary, the total paper for SLP1, excluding the title page and reference page should be approximately 4-5 pages and, of those 4-5 pages, Section 5 should be 2-3 pages. In other words, about half of your SLP1 should address the issues outlined in Section 5.
Excluding your title page and references, using the sections as subtitles in your paper; please address the following:
1) NAME the ORGANIZATION or Company you have chosen to examine, and give its address and other background information in a 1-2 paragraph summary.
2) Give the organization’s MISSION STATEMENT.
If there is no mission statement, analyze information about the company and write a mission statement that includes what it does, whom it serves, and how it serves them (i.e., what value it provides, or what values underlie the organization). This should take a paragraph
3) Create an initial list or table of the major PRODUCTS (GOODS, or SERVICES) that the company produces and/or sells, with an explanation of each. The initial listing of products (goods and/or services) should take about half a page.
You will present more detail regarding what the company sells and to whom it sells what it sells in SLP02 #7-9.
4) Create a list of COMPETITORS for the business (if it is small) or for a product category (if the company is quite large). This should take about half a page.
5) Discuss your company’s POSITION in the MARKET place relative to competitors. In doing so, explain your company’s strategies or COMPETITIVE ADVANTAGES. As stated above, this should take 2-3 pages.
Submit your approximately 4-5 page (excluding title page and references) paper to Coursenet.

Expectations
Please remember: All SLP contributions relating to a discussion of competitive advantage must be specific in that key competitors must be individually identified and described with reference to the questions posed. General observations regarding your firm’s having competitive advantage (or not) over the competition are not up to the standard expected in MBA assignments!
Note that your SLP is front-end loaded. This means that your SLP01 will take a bit more time than SLPs02-05 because your description of the target market(s) your organization serves and the competition your organization faces establish the foundation to which you will add to your answers to the sections in SLPs02-05, and because you need to give careful consideration to your choice of organization.
Note that this assignment does NOT require you to prepare a detailed essay.
Instead use section headings for each of the topics you address in your paper followed by a discussion of that topic. In addressing the questions, as is illustrated in the outline for the total paper, use the CAPITALIZED and BOLD words in the sections above as headings.
Note that each of the centered sections listed in this outline for SLP1-5 of your paper correspond to the modules in which you are to address the outlined aspects of your paper.
INTRODUCTION (centered, bold, all caps)
NAME OF ORGANIZATION (subheadings at left margin)
MISSION STATEMENT
PRODUCTS, GOODS OR SERVICES
COMPETITORS
POSITION IN THE MARKET
COMPETITIVE ADVANTAGES

Choosing the Organization
Over the session, in your SLP, since you will be examining one organization or company, it is suggested that you choose a company:
That "markets" a product or service and
For which you have access to information that will assist in analyzing its Mission, Objectives, Competitors, Product, Price, Place, and Promotion.
The following caveats apply:
If you choose a small company, you may need to write a mission statement and create much of the information for the paper. If you work at that company, you may have access to important information, but you may need to organize it on behalf of that company.
If you choose a very large company, limit your analysis to one product line or category.
Choose a military unit ONLY if it is a unit that has competitors, markets itself, and has pricing, product, promotional strategies and issues in the traditional sense, (for example the PX, the officers club, or the athletic club). For many military entities, marketing may not be a part of its routine operations therefore it is recommended that you select an alternative organization.
Lastly, and only if you absolutely can’t find an organization’s marketing activities that can be described, discuss your situation with your instructor,
Good choices for the SLP include companies of products and services you regularly use (you could look at cars, toothbrushes, laundry soap, computers, clothing lines, etc.), or companies that you’ve worked for in the past.
For detailed advice on choosing an organization for your SLP see:
Flaschner, A (2007). Finding an entity to audit. TUI University. Available on 2010 July 1 at
http://sites.google.com/site/zaydeealan0/tui-unviersity/selecting-entity-to-audit
For detailed instructions of finding information about companies, products, and/or countries.
Flaschner, A (2007) Hints on searching for information on brands, product lines, companies, industries, and/or countries. TUI University. Available on 2010 July 1 at
http://sites.google.com/site/zaydeealan0/tui-unviersity/searchingbrandproductcountryinformation
.
References
As an academically-oriented paper, you are expected to use references and to properly cite those references. If in your SLP you refer to information obtained from talking with an owner/manager, you should cite what that manager told you.
Examples
Below are examples of Marketing Plans created by previous students and are provided with their permission:
Kunishima, K. (undated). A Farmer’s Market. TUI University.
Fan, K. K. (undated). Compuware, Inc. TUI University.
McIntyre, A. G. (undated). LKJ Construction. TUI University.
Cosing, C. (undated). Playland Pres