Progressively write this assignment in your Wiki, which is within your online group in ‘My Groups’ area in Blackboard. Notes: (1) Word submissions are NOT acceptable. (2) If you are in a group, ensure that EACH student contributes substantively directly to the wiki content. It is NOT acceptable for students to write outside of the wiki and hand notes to another group member to write-up in the wiki.

Requirements

Study the relevant Study Guide (SG) topics (as indicated in the brief) before/while writing the assignment.

Work and write collaboratively within your assigned group.

Set-out your work using the headings below – one wiki page per heading. All headings should appear as links on your Ass2 wiki page, which is (in turn) linked to your group wiki home page:

Aim to undertake a ‘client-based’ approach – real or imagined. Make any necessary assumptions about the organisation behind the market offering (e.g. strategy, size, structure, culture) to ensure that you can proceed to planning the commercialisation step, of which your marketing plan is an important part.

Undertake appropriate desk research, e.g. using SCU Library databases, such as Proquest for article searches, and reference correctly.

Opportunity for 5% BONUS (1.75 additional points): Evaluate (preferably in your group) your final assignment using the Ass2 rubric provided. Each group member needs to submit a properly completed rubric online to the ‘Assignment’ area in the Blackboard by the Ass2 due date to be awarded the bonus.

1.      The new/improved sustainable market offering (Topic 3, especially SG Activities 3.10 and 3.11)

1.1 Apply CPS

Apply each of the five pre-implementation CPS steps to identify a sustainability-oriented consumer or marketing problem and start working toward a potential new or improved sustainable offering to address the problem. Week 3 Tutorials will support you with CPS required for developing your initial sustainable marketing offering concept. We recommend you complete your first wiki draft of this part by Week 5.

As per Titus (2000), the five pre-implementation CPS steps for concept development are:

1. Problem identification:
2. Problem delineation:

iii. Information gathering:

1. Idea generation:
2. Idea evaluation and refinement:

1.2 Profile the sustainable market offering, e.g. in terms of:

• Nature– what combination of product, service and/or experience (Topic 1)
• Type – industrial or consumer good (Topic 1, preview Topic 5)
• Value provided (utility created) to customer/end-user to address their unmet needs; discern between core, actual and augmented levels of offering (if applicable) (Topic 1,3; preview Topic 8)
• Sustainability benefits – economic, social, environmental (Topic 3)
• Existing brand perceptions (if applicable) (Topic 3; preview Topic 8)
• Information needs to be filled and an outline of the marketing research (secondary, primary) required to do so (Topic 4).

2. Situation analysis of the selected sustainable market offering

This section of the report elaborates on those parts of Section 1 that relate to the final chosen market offering positioned on sustainability. It comprises three parts and draws on various Study Guide topics:

2.1 Environmental analysis (draw on Topic 2)

An assessment of current external macro- and micro environmental factors pertinent to the future of the sustainable offering:

• Main issues and trends within political/legal, economic, socio-cultural, technological and ecological (PESTE) macro environment
• Competition: main direct and indirect competitors (e.g. in terms of their size, goals, market share, product quality, marketing strategies and other characteristics that are needed to understand their intentions and behaviour). Focus on their key competitive advantages and weaknesses. How are they positioned?
• Suppliers and intermediaries: main issues and trends
• SWOT analysis:
  • Describe the sustainable offering’s internal strengths (things it does well) and weaknesses (things it does not do well).
  • Describe the opportunities and threats in the external environment that would influence the prospects of the offering.
  • Assess how strengths might be matched to opportunities to produce leverage.
  • Assess the problems that result when environmental threats attack weaknesses in the offering.
  • Anticipate how internal weaknesses or limitations may prevent the offering from taking advantage of opportunities.
  • Anticipate how strengths might be used to used reduce the vulnerability to threats.
• Information needs to be filled and an outline of the marketing research (secondary, primary) required to do so (draw on Topic 4).

2.2 Market and customer analysis (draw on Topics 4 and 5)

• Consumer or business market
• Market type: potential (interested customers), available (interested with income and access to offering), qualified (available and suitable on other criteria, such as age) and target (qualified and to be served) and penetrated (current buyers)
• Customer need
• Market growth, market share (if applicable)
• Influences on consumers (e.g. cultural, social, personal) or business customers (e.g. size, industry, growth, resources, supplier relationships)
• Information needs to be filled and an outline of the marketing research (secondary, primary) required to do so.

3. References

On a separate wiki page, provide a List of References to which you have referred in the body of your wiki. As a minimum we expect you to refer to your textbook. Please note the referencing expectations stated in the Unit Information Guide.

Marking criteria

1. Creativity: Demonstrated commitment to achieving an imaginative and creative response by attending to each of the five steps to the creative problem-solving process (CPS) (10% each; 50% total)
2. Intellectual rigour: Critical thinking and analysis of situations:
3. Synthesis of creative problem-solving outcomes into a meaningful product profile (10%)
4. Environmental analysis (15%)
5. Market and customer analysis (15%).
6. Written communication: Effective organisation, so that the group wiki is easily understood, coherent, consistent and visually appealing. Visuals and embedded links need to be relevant and explained in the text. Spelling and grammar. Use of visuals. (10%).