Customer satisfaction is the measure of how satisfied and happy the customer is with the product or service. To measure customer satisfaction, most companies conduct telephone and Internet surveys with their customers. The questions are a series of multiple choice and open ended questions. A few examples of questions that could be included on a survey are- "On a scale of 1 to 10 how satisfied are you with the product or service?" "What is one thing that you would improve about the product or service?" An MBA marketing project could be to come up with a short customer satisfaction questionnaire of five to 10 questions, with a combination of open ended and multiple choice questions.
Branding is the process of creating an identity for your product or service. This can involve creating a slogan, logo and image. Examples of branding are the golden arches associated with McDonald's or the red and white logo associated with Coca Cola. Branding is an important part of marketing as it helps identify a company instantly with the goal being to create a positive emotional association. Have your MBA students come up with a company brand. Develop a slogan, determine the market demographic and design a logo.
PR or public relations is managing the publicity of the activities surrounding a business, product or service. It also involves planning and executing a program that promotes the business and brings public understanding and awareness. This can be done by sponsoring events where you offer free samples, information and where your brand is displayed prominently. For example, the sponsorship of a music festival or charitable event, which generally brings press coverage and results in free publicity. Managing the relationship and your company's image with the press is what PR is all about. As an MBA marketing student you can draw up a detailed plan to implement a PR strategy. This can include an event you would like to sponsor, the target demographics and what you hope to gain from it.
Advertisement and promotion is one of the main elements of marketing that involves communication between the company and its customers. The main objective is to make the public more aware of your brand and your product. The ultimate goal is to create trust betwen your company's brand and the consumer. This can be done through advertising on television, radio, newspapers, magazines and online. Most advertising strategies will include a combination of using these types of media. For a student project you can come up with an advertising strategy for your company. Include the demographics you are targeting, the goal (such as sales or branding), the ad costs and the methods you intend to use.
Positioning is a concept in marketing that defines how the marketers create an impression in the minds of consumers with regard to a certain product. Segmentation, on the other hand, involves determining the actual potential customers of the company, analyzing the company's competitors and choosing attractive segments to compete in. These two processes are necessary to determine the customer and his expected buying process. Students can draw up a report on the relationship of positioning and segmentation for their market place.
Knowing customer demographics is important to understanding who is purchasing your product and how much he is spending. For instance, if you can find out that the largest part of your customer base consists of women 18 to 25 with an income of $25,000 to $50,000, it makes it much easier for you to target your advertising to this group, rather than wasting money on middle-aged men, who are not likely to purchase your product. For a project you can draw up a marketing survey that you can put on your company website. You should find out the age, income and amount of products they purchase from your company each month.