The term project is an individual project will find you analyzing the firm you work for (or one you have worked for in the past), or a local business that you would like to assist and the market you compete in. This is not a marketing plan, but a treatise on how you as a firm are currently competing in the marketplace and why? What type of strategy you are following, how well is it working, what issues are you currently facing that either strengthen or threaten your business? The idea is to get you to look at the issues you are you facing in your business such as: growth opportunities in new markets, new technologies, mature or declining markets, distribution challenges, pricing problems, new competitors, eroding margins, etc. I want you to analyze a business using the following guidelines. This is not a template that is etched in stone, but one you can use to think about how your firm competes and the strategies you follow.

Name of your firm and the market segments you compete in.

What is your overall current business strategy?

Your Organizational Goals and Objectives, (market share, margins, etc.) plus some background on where youve been over the last 10 years.

Competitive nature of your business, number of competitors, market position of key competitors, how each competitor competes.

What environmental opportunities and threats do you face?

How do your customers and distributors view the various industry participants? Who do they consider the market leader? Innovation leader? Price Leader? Customer Service Leader?

Who are your target customers?

What is your Value Proposition?

What are you doing to develop company value, improve profits, increase revenues, market share?

Product Life Cycle What is the current product life cycle of the key products you and your competitors sell, how long have they been in the market, what did they replace, what are you going to replace them with?

What are your Product strategies in order to compete in the future?

How many market segments do you compete in and how do you select your segments?

How do you position yourselves vs. your competition?

What is your positioning statement?

How do you forecast sales?

What are your growth strategies?

How are you defending yourself from competition?

What is your sustainable competitive advantage?

What are your Pricing strategies, what has happened to pricing within your industry, who initiates the pricing moves?

How do you sell, direct sales force, distribution, retail? What sales tools do you use and how effective are they?

What are your Distribution strategies?

What are your Promotional strategies?

Define your brand strategy? Image?

What is your brand slogan?

What are you doing to manage customer relationships?

What incentives are you providing to obtain new customers and reward current customers?

What challenges is your organization currently experiencing? What could be done to improve your standing in your marketplace?