Assignment

Responses to all questions are to be incorporated in ONE document.Response to each question attempted should be at least 500 words but should not exceed 750 words. Suggested font is Times New Roman (12 point).Document should be double spaced and adhere to APA guidelines.

While high quality outside sources are welcome, you should use information from the course materials to support your responses. When making reference to course materials, use properly formatted APA citations and references. Your submission must include onereference list at the end of the document with all of the references used in your responses. In addition to the reference list, you also must provide in-text source citation for direct quotation or paraphrasing of course materials.

• The assistance of a UMUC Writing Tutor is allowed with respect to writing style and clarity, paper format and proper citation for this assignment. No other outside assistance is authorized.

Answer any FOUR of the following five Questions. This individual Assignment counts for 10% of your total course grade, and each of the four questions carries equal weight i.e., 2.5% of your total course grade (or 25% of the total Assignment grade). There are no extra Credits for this Assignment.

1. Identify a firm in today's environment that you believe has shortcomings in its understanding and implementation of the ‘Marketing concept' - that focuses on creating, delivering and communicating superior customer value to target markets. Discuss the problems you see in that firm's strategies. How might this firm better align its strategy with the marketing concept to achieve and sustain strategic advantage over its competitors in the market place?

2. With reference to Christensen's paper on Rules of Innovation, discuss an example of a firm to analyze how it has responded to a challenge from a transformational technology that threatened its historical business model. In this context discuss the organizational factors that may have helped or hinderedits appropriate response to new technologies?

3. Choose a firm that demonstrates an excellent referral marketing strategy. a) How does the firm's referral marketing strategy help connect with its customers? b) What type of firms are most suitable for a referral marketing program? Give reasons.

4. What are the components of brand loyalty? Is B2C consumer brand loyalty thought to be on the rise or decline? Does brand loyalty apply in the same way in B2B marketing?

5. Brand extensions help companies to introduce new products under an established brand name. However if the brand extension is not a good fit with the parent brand then it can actually hurt the latter (i.e., parent brand). Discuss a case where brand extension failed and damaged the brand equity of the parent brand. Give reasons as to why the brand extension failed.