Marketing is a fast moving subject and it is all around you. There are hundreds of examples of good practice. So it is not a question of having to read text books alone. Perhaps there is too much information ? To be able to gain the most from your course it is essential to structure your time and focus on covering the syllabus.

If you look at the ‘Magic Formula’ in the Exam section, use that as the foundation for your work. Many students spend all of their time cramming facts into the short term memory. When they leave the exam very little it retained.

From the start, take the key concept e.g. market segmentation. Understand what it is, why it is used. Then to bring it to life take a case study and apply it. You might have a particular hobby or interest such as surfing or sport or fashion. Start with the industry and all of the competitors in in. Then show how they all related. Keep this case study going throughout the course and build up the examples week by week as your course develops. You will then have an easy way of remembering and applying. That reduces the need to memorise facts as it will be part of you. You can then use this material for assignments and perhaps take different companies in your chosen industry to give variation.

Sponsors are looking for proof that there is a payback. This can be difficult to judge and here companies are looking for direct links between sponsoring a football team and meeting longer term brand building objectives. It is a little easier to tie sponsorship into shorter term tools such as specific product promotions.

The difference is that with sponsorship we are actively watching the sport and can spend hours at a time watching the game with the sponsors’ brand in full view. If the sponsor had to pay for 90minutes of advertising that would be a huge cost. The issue is that many people avoid adverts. Especially since the development of television recording such as Sky Plus. Whereas with the sponsorship we are not avoiding adverts.

The recession has much to answer for and that is shaping the marketing budget and the increased focus on marketing metrics and ROI

Really good example for a marketing assignment or marketing exam. This video has been watched thousands of time on uTube. For a marketing assignment or marketing exam it shows the secret of creating a brand. Building interest and humour. It uses the brand values of Life’s For Sharing and makes really good use of a range of people in the ad to show that it is across age groups and indeed music genres

Picture the scene. We are on the sofa, watching tv on an evening. This is unlikely to be our only activity. We maybe playing a game on the Wi, or emailing, Twittering etc. We have the attention span of a nano second. The days of watching an advert on tv and giving it our full attention are long gone

We are much more likely to buy online and use comparison websites to tell us which hotel to stay in. We tend to believe Trip Advisor etc much more than the corporate site of the hotel.

The media multitaskers buy more online compared with those who do not media multitask and are more likely to change their mind about a brand following online research. The EIAA calls this generation of multitaskers “super consumers”.

This is not just for the younger age group. Media multi taskers has increased dramatically in the 45-54 age group. This groups are more internet savvy, they join groups, shop, chat, and play games such as bridge

‘Media multitaskers’ minds are ripe for moulding, according to the study. Almost half (48%) of multitaskers admit to actively changing their mind about a product compared with 36% of non multitaskers’. Marketing Week

This consumer changes their mind but is also more open to new ideas and brands. So the marketers need to focus on the brand building and benefits to the consumer. The more involved the purchase the more difficult this becomes. We might happily try a nee fmcg product but tearing us away from a brand we might have bought over and over such as a car.

Use of multi taskers and multi media are key to the success in marketing in the current climate. Research is conducted in much greater depth and we chat on line. Happy to pass on our views and share the good the bad and the really ugly, in glorious colour

Marketing Lessons For a marketing assignment or marketing exam, build the multi media strategy, focus on delivering the brand values, don’t just promise fabulous experiences, make sure that happens. The online presence the growth of social media simply cannot be underestimated. Companies that manage this well will surely reap the rewards