...competition and acquisitions and mergers in the market, lead both academicians and practitioners to concentrate on the consumers’ purchase decisions in portable PC industry. The NDP group’s report published by PC World state that in May 2003, U.S. retailers made more money selling laptop/notebook computers than they did selling desktops. It was the first time that laptops have outsold desktops in the U.S. This research seeks to develop a better understanding of the factors influencing consumers’ laptop purchases. What makes this study distinctive from other sectoral studies is that, this research also seeks the differences among three consumer groups (stayers, satisfied switchers, and dissatisfied switchers) of a company with respect to the factors influencing consumers’ laptop purchases. It is found that core technical features, post purchase services, price and payment conditions, peripheral specifications, physical appearanc The rapid developments in IT sector accompanied by increased competition and acquisitions and mergers in the market, lead both academicians and practitioners to concentrate on the consumers’ purchase decisions in portable PC industry. The NDP group’s report published by PC World state that in May 2003, U.S. retailers made more money selling laptop/notebook computers than they did selling desktops. It was the first time that laptops have outsold desktops in the U.S. This research seeks to develop a better understanding of the factors influencing consumers’ laptop...
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...not happen overnight. Sales relationships can be built by reaching out to customers, offering rewards and incentives to come back to the company to purchase more products, and offering the type of customer service that customers love to receive. This paper will discuss sales relationships and compare and contrast the cost of customer retention verses customer acquisition. Business-to-Business Retention and Acquisition Business to business sales can be astronomical. An example of a business to business transaction is a small company selling a large amount of product to the Wal-Mart Corporation for Wal-Mart to market in all of the organizations stores. Wal-Mart strives in selling the merchandise for a low price but wanting to make a profit in bulk. The benefit about Wal-Mart is that the company can be very beneficial to other patent holders because of how fast Wal-Mart can sell an item once the item enters the company’s doors. Another company that should be explored is Sam’s Club (which is owned by Wal-Mart). Sam’s club on the other hand allows consumers to purchase in bulk for his or her small business. The point that needs to be brought up is that at least half of the profit that Sam’s Club brings in the doors is from small business accounts. Sam’s Club offers bulk refills to candy machines and the ability to even purchase a vendor or candy machine. But, that is just beginning of Sam’s Club sales. “Year to date, Sam’s Club estimates it has identified more than $233 million...
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...CHAPTER 1 Understanding Consumer Behavior TRUE/FALSE 1. GOOGLE CONDUCTS RESEARCH ON JAPAN’S CONSUMERS BECAUSE THEIR HEAVY USE OF CELL PHONES TO ACCESS THE INTERNET. Ans: T Page: 2 AACSB: Technology 2. Consumer behavior involves more than buying and using goods and services. Ans: T Page: 3 AACSB: Analytic 3. The average U.S. household spends $127 per day on goods and services. Ans: T Page: 5 AACSB: Analytic 4. Online shopping is growing by more than 30 percent every year. Ans: F Page: 8 AACSB: Technology 5. The primary reason, according to your text, that people prefer to shop online is that there is a wide selection. Ans: F Page: 10 AACSB: Technology 6. The four domains of consumer behavior are (1) psychological, (2) the process of making decisions, (3) the consumer’s family upbringing, and (4) consumer behavior outcomes. Ans: F Page: 11 AACSB: Analytic 7. In consumer behavior, recognizing a problem occurs when consumers realize they have an unfilled need. Ans: T Page: 12 AACSB: Analytic 8. Culture refers only to the typical or expected behaviors or norms of religious groups. Ans: F Page: 13 AACSB: Analytic 9. Jack is an avid gamer and meets John, who plays similar video games. Jack would consider John as a part of his reference group. Ans: T Page: 14 AACSB: Analytic 10. One reason marketers study consumer behavior is because it helps them to create new products. Ans: T Page: 16 AACSB: Analytic ...
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...WANTING IS BETTER THAN HAVING The article that I have chosen for the research implication paper is “When Wanting is 2 Better than Having: Materialism, Transformation Expectations, and Product-Evoked Emotions in the Purchase Process.” (Richins, 2013) The focus of the article is the accuracy and claim that purchasing brings an individual happiness. I found this article to be of interest not only because it focuses on the ‘People’ aspect of the Modern Marketing Management Four Ps (Kotler & Keller, 2012), but it an interesting insight of consumer behavior from a psychological point of view. This article examines the emotions evoked before, during and after purchasing a product and introduces the concept of hedonic elevation. Hedonic elevation is simply the concept of relating to something with either a pleasant, or an unpleasant, sensation. Lastly, this article focuses on product-evoked emotions between high and low-materialism consumers through the performance of three separate studies, using five different hypotheses. The main emotions that are studied throughout article are joy, excitement, contentment, optimism and peacefulness. Materialism has three main components: a measure of personal success based on what one has acquired in life, that concept that acquisitions and happiness are interdependent, and the simple process of frequently acquiring possessions. This article is the first of its kind to study how various feelings, associated with purchasing a product, may change throughout...
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...Quaker Oats The Company PepsiCo is the second largest beverage company in the world. They are internationally known for mostly their snacks and beverages. Being almost one hundred years in the business, they were incorporated in 1919. PepsiCo sells, distributes and markets a large range of these products to more than two hundred territories and countries. They are the top seller of many famous brand names such as Doritos, Lay’s, Pepsi, as well as Gatorade which came about by an acquisition of Quaker Oats in 2011. While the acquisition of Quaker Oats was not only for their beverage products but their food as well, we will be focusing on the beverage industry. The Industry The beverage industry overall does not have a huge threat of new entrants. The capital requirements to enter into this industry are very large in order to compete with the distribution levels and production lines that the biggest companies have already mastered. Not only are these factors present but the cost to purchase the materials such as machinery and modes of transportation are immense. Also the economy of scales that companies like PepsiCo have established in terms of marketing, purchasing and R&D, leave little from for new businesses to compete effectively. Furthermore the fact that to be successful in this industry means in many cases you need to be internationally sold is a huge barrier to entry since government regulation and distribution may be impossible for a smaller company to wrap...
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...content: 1187 Introduction In early May 2014, Apple disclosed its intention to buy Beats for US$3 billion and announced the deal completion in early August 2014, welcoming Beats to the Apple family. Apple’s rationale for buying Beats is best summed up by Tim Cook - “Music is such an important part of all of our lives and holds a special place within our hearts at Apple, that’s why we have kept investing in music and are bringing together these extraordinary teams so we can continue to create the most innovative music products and services in the world.” iTunes moved music purchases from CDs to the online platform in 2000. For the first time in 2013, iTunes music sales declined, this downward trend has continued. The fall has been largely attributable to the rising popularity of online streaming music platforms such as Pandora and Spotify. A similar amount of money to buy one track on iTunes can purchase a one month subscription to millions of tracks on Spotify. Beats has a music streaming platform similar to Pandora and Spotify. By merging with Beats, Apple will be able to tap into the music streaming business. However, some analysts doubt whether Apple needs Beats to achieve this, questioning why Apple doesn’t attempt to develop a similar or better streaming platform internally. Speculation has it that Apple is buying the talent of Jimmy Iovine and Dr. Dre to help them grow their entertainment sector as a whole. Regardless of whether Apple is interested in Beat’s streaming...
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...Susan Kroeger MT459 Consumer Behavior Unit 8 Kaplan University September 24, 2013 Consumers follow many steps in their quest to select, secure, use and dispose of products and services that satisfy their needs. Marketers can satisfy consumer needs only to the extent that they understand the consumers. The five factors that influence consumers are: problem recognition, information search, alternative evaluation, purchase decision and post purchase behavior, also known as the what, where, when and how consumers will buy. These five factors can also be described as: physiological factors, socio-cultural factors, personal factors, psychological factors and rational factors. For example, the physiological factors relate to physical protection and commodity, among others. The socio-cultural ones comprise family, friends, work, the social groups with which the consumer identifies with and that influences the purchasing behavior. Family and friends play a role in the influence on a consumer, as he or she will try to follow the tendencies of the group. Consumers coming from different cultures have different preferences respective to brands and products. The purchase decision is also influenced by personal factors, namely age, consumer's life cycle stage, occupation, economical level, way of life and personality. The financial capacity is a factor that influences the purchasing process, the higher it is, the higher the acquisition power. In other words, demographic factors...
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...contain items on sale or any special deals going on and, in addition, the colors of the site will correlate with the coins themselves. The site will be designed in such a manner in which the loading speed will average one to one and a half seconds. Studies have shown that the presentation and ease of maneuverability within a site is critical, and the deciding factor whether or not the consumer likes the site is made within the first few second of visiting. Acquisition. The procurement of merchandise for the site will be done through E-Bay, Craig’s List, and Wholesale distributors. The acquisition will be completed in bulk in order to seize a better price per coin. The coins themselves will have to be certified PCGS or NGC, which are the two main respected coin grading service providers. By utilizing auction sites, a better price can be achieved in the acquisition process. Once the merchandise is acquired, a catalog can be created to give the potential client options of the products available. Shopping. In order for the consumer to be at ease while shopping and have the ability to track purchases, the site will be enabled with a...
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... Keller Graduate School of Management FIN 561 Mergers & Acquisitions (Online) Professor Gene Smith September 19, 2015 Table of Contents Table of Contents…………………………………………………………………………………………………………………...i Executive Summary…………………………………………………..……………………………………………………………1 Overview of Pharmaceutical Industry…………………….…………………………………………………………......2 S.W.O.T Analysis..……………………..................................................................................................3-5 Impact on Marketing and Sales…………………………………………….………………………………………………..5-6 Marketing and Sales Considerations……………………………………………………………………………….........6-7 Operational Considerations………………………………………..…………………………………………….……………7-8 Financial Considerations………………………………………………………………………………………………………...8-9 Recommendations………………………………………………………………………………………………………………..9-11 References……………………………………………………………….…………………………………………………………….12 i. Executive Summary Merck & Co. is one of the world’s leading pharmaceutical companies, is seeking to acquire Medco Containment Services, a leading managed prescription drug benefit company, for $6 billion dollars. After the merger, Merck & Co. will seek to strengthen their position in healthcare industry, by not only selling prescription drugs used by millions of consumers, but also having a larger say in how the medicines are used by consumers. 1. Overview of Pharmaceutical...
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...the internet and the company was very successful, the recognition on the brand was low. In the past Cisco’s marketing campaigns targeted corporations and IT decision makers but in 2003 they entered the consumer market. The acquisition of Linksys allowed Cisco to offer several home entertainment solutions along with home and small office network gear. Because they now have consumer products, the also needed a different marketing approach. In 2006 the company launched a rebranding campaign, the tagline “The Human Network” was intended to ‘humanize’ the technology company by branding them as a company that connects people through technology and not just a company that builds network equipment. This marketing strategy was highly successful, increasing revenues by 41% from 2006 to 2008. In 2008 their revenue hit $39.5 billion and was ranked the 18th largest global brand. With this said, it was a viable plan for Cisco to reach out to consumers at that time but it is well known in business that most companies fail once they step away from its core competencies. Although going from larger company routers to home routers with the acquisition on Linksys was not a far cry, Cisco fouled when they tried to go even further with the purchase of the Flip Camera company. “The Flip acquisition was always kind of a mystery, since those pocket-size camcorders didn't really fit into anything else the company did. While they were a very hot commodity for a couple of years, it has become apparent...
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...majority decide to buy iPhones, when other smartphones supplied contain better features even at lower prices? This insight brief seeks to explain some of the reasons why the majority decides to buy iPhones. By pointing out some of the biases usually incurred in consumers’ decision-making process, this might help consumers to identify and be aware of the biases they make through this process. Especially, the biases occurred in the state of information search. Thereby, hopefully, this insight brief might encourage better decision making. The internet contains limitless access to information. This fact makes the consumers capable of finding websites comparing technological devices, such as smartphones, easily and effortless. Therefore, consumers should be able to make the best decision regarding their purchase of smartphones. In spite of this, consumers do not always make the best decisions. Often consumers choose to purchase iPhones mainly because of some biases occurred when processing and acquiring information. According to the traditional model of consumer decision making, consumers reach the state of information search after they have recognized a problem (Kardes et.al. 2011). In the state of information search consumers often choose a cluster of brands to consider, called a consideration set. The consideration set is often evoked from memory, i.e. internal search, instead of through external information search, because information derived from memory is often less demanding...
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...| Merck-Medco | Analysis of an Acquisition | | | | | Merck-Medco Acquisition Analysis Executive Summary: Recommendation It is recommended that Merck tender a cash bid of $6.6 Billion dollars to acquire Medco Containment Services Inc. Marketing & Sales Considerations Medco currently maintains relationships with employers, plan sponsors, and managed care organizations and services over 33 Million individuals. The information collected on physician prescription practices, and patient records and refill tendencies will allow Merck to target their sales and marketing efforts to more effectively reach target markets. In addition, the data collected will be used to identify competitor drug deficiencies and pricing. Operational Considerations A combined Merck/Medco company would result in the control of the entire drug manufacturing and selling process. Merck would have the ability to manufacture drugs specific to each patients needs with collected information being used to research and develop new drugs for sale. Due to the vertical nature of this acquisition Merck will continue to be run independently of Medco so that each division can focus on executing on their strengths within the industry. Overlapping operations, such as marketing and sales, will be consolidated at an estimated after acquisition savings of $1 Billion. Financial Considerations As mentioned, it is recommended that the tendered bid be comprised of all cash. While this will...
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...licenses, and service businesses owned by Nokia. Microsoft made this move in line with their partnership promise made in February 2011 as well the increasing popularity of Nokia’s Smartphones. This acquisition, unified branding, increased synergies, and faster innovation will allow Microsoft to grow its profits and share in small devices. On the other, this transaction will allow Nokia to gain better sales, a strengthened financial standing, and a solid foundation for forthcoming investments. The transaction, under the agreement made between the two companies, will cost Microsoft a total of $7 billion. Microsoft hopes to draw cash from its foreign resources to fund this transaction, which forecasts purport will close in 2014’s first quarter. However, shareholders from Nokia’s side, regulations, and other conditions may affect the transaction closure dates. Although Microsoft will bring Nokia, its design, manufacturing rights, and distribution privileges into its fold, it will not submerge all aspects of Nokia. More specifically, this transaction involves Nokia’s Smartphones and devices unit. This unit includes the Lumia Smartphones, a brand that operates on Microsoft’s windows eight operating systems, as well as the Nokia’s Asha phones. Microsoft will benefit from the acquisition significantly particularly in the Smartphones and devices market. The benefits that the company receives from Nokia present equal importance as the resources it offers. The action made by these two...
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...licenses, and service businesses owned by Nokia. Microsoft made this move in line with their partnership promise made in February 2011 as well the increasing popularity of Nokia’s Smartphones. This acquisition, unified branding, increased synergies, and faster innovation will allow Microsoft to grow its profits and share in small devices. On the other, this transaction will allow Nokia to gain better sales, a strengthened financial standing, and a solid foundation for forthcoming investments. The transaction, under the agreement made between the two companies, will cost Microsoft a total of $7 billion. Microsoft hopes to draw cash from its foreign resources to fund this transaction, which forecasts purport will close in 2014’s first quarter. However, shareholders from Nokia’s side, regulations, and other conditions may affect the transaction closure dates. Although Microsoft will bring Nokia, its design, manufacturing rights, and distribution privileges into its fold, it will not submerge all aspects of Nokia. More specifically, this transaction involves Nokia’s Smartphones and devices unit. This unit includes the Lumia Smartphones, a brand that operates on Microsoft’s windows eight operating systems, as well as the Nokia’s Asha phones. Microsoft will benefit from the acquisition significantly particularly in the Smartphones and devices market. The benefits that the company receives from Nokia present equal importance as the resources it offers. The action made by these two...
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...their initial purchase amount, to be found in page 1 and 2. We found out that there are significant differences in their lifetime value and hence we came out with the following suggestions to help guide future marketing plans so as to generate higher profits for the company. During our calculations of the lifetime value of customers in both categories, it is important to note that we made the following assumptions and calculations (if not stated in our excel formulas): • In the acquisition year (year 0), customers only made 1 purchase. • Total numbers of orders are obtained by multiplying frequency by number of orders in exhibit 1 and 2. • As stated in the case, gross profit margin is 42% of sales which does not include the cost of sending the catalogs (total variable costs). Hence, we took 42% of our total revenue and minus the total variable cost to obtain our gross profit. • CLV is accumulative starting from year 0. The main goal of estimating the lifetime value of customers in this case is to predict how valuable the customers are. Given the Customer Lifetime Values that we found for the two groups of customers, we can assert that the amount of the initial purchase is relevant enough to predict future customers' behaviors and purchases. The average price per order for customers falling under the category of initial purchases below $50 remained under $50 in every of the following 5 years. We can deduce exactly the same result for consumers whom first purchase was above...
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