Readings for May 4: Emerging Technologies

1. Organizing Your Life with a Mobile Phone
   
2. Target's Not-So-Smart Cards
   

Readings for May 2: New Product Development and Emerging Technologies

1. Wi Fi for the Marketer
   
2. Biometric Cell Phones Coming - But US Will Be Last
   

Blog: More on building community

Many bloggers write posts that essentially 'comment' on other bloggers' posts. What do you achieve by this ? You are showing another blogger you are interested in what he / she has to say, and you have additional insight to add. This should draw that blogger to your site, thus adding more to your community etc. So how do you do this ?

Go to a blogger search engine, i.e. technorati.com Key in a search term that is related to your blog (if you are a Yankees blogger, yankees should work, a desperate housewives blogger would key in "desperate housewives" ("" are needed for a phrase)). The results are results of the most recent entries of blogs around the blogosphere that have included the keyword(s) you are looking for. Find something interesting ... and "blog it" (i.e. write an entry that includes a direct link to the post you are writing about).

Class Notes for April 27: Chapter 15 Wireless Marketing

The following are the slides for class, chapter 15.

EDIT: added:

1. New Product Development Slides: 1.
   
2. New-Product Development Slides: 2
   
3. How Product Developers Use The Internet
   
   

Handouts for April 25

The following are the handouts for Predictive Modeling Techniques.

Blog Project: Second Feedback and Office Hours

I plan to e-mail you, over the course of the next few days, a second set of feedback. I hope to complete this by next wednesday. On wednesday, April 27, from 12 - 2 pm, I will be in Anu's office and available for any issues you are having with your blog. I have also just posted the guidelines for the grading of the project.

Questions for Case: Living on Internet Time

1. (45 points) What are the similarities and differences between the four approaches to product development? What drives these differences?
   
   
2. (50 points) An old friend from college has come up with a great video game idea. The game would be aimed at high school and college students, and would allow them to play with or against each other on the Internet. The software would allow them to build cities in cyberspace, trade with each other, wage war, and engage in a variety of other activities. Your friend has a lot of experience with writing game software, but would like your help in designing a process for taking that idea to market. You have decided to accept this challenge (you love the idea.) Assume that you have funding for hiring enough (a half dozen or so) software developers, and any equipment that you might reasonably need. Specify the sequences of project phases, gates, and milestones, as well as any specific methodologies (user needs, contextual analysis, etc.) that you think you should use. Your process design should define the sequence of major product development activities.
   
   
3. (5 points): Formatting and cover page. See the following section for details
   

Formatting Guidelines for Writing up the Case Analysis
(Same for all cases to be analyzed this semester)

• Case Analysis Submission Instructions
  
• Submit assignment at the beginning of class.
  
• Cover Page
  

Assignment Title: Case Analysis Assignment

• Your full name:
  
• Course Title and Number – BUAD 477: Information Technology Applications in Marketing
  
• Semester: Spring 2005
  
• Assignment
  
• The assignment is to be written in the form of a memorandum addressed to the Instructor.
  
• Format:
  
• Text should be double-spaced and use a 12-Point Font
  
• 1 – inch margin on all sides
  
• Page Limit: Max. 5 Pages. - Not including cover page.
  
• Space saving hints
  
• Include Tables and other visuals in the appendix.
  
• Do not re-state information from the case. You can just refer to the information by stating the page number on which the information appears.
  
• Any format violation will be penalized with negative points.
  

• General Instructions for Written Assignment

• Papers will be evaluated for correct spelling, structure, grammar and punctuation.
  
• Remember, the spell and grammar checker on your computer does not catch everything.
  
• There is no substitute for careful proofreading to find typing and careless errors.
  
• If you use any information from external sources (print or otherwise), use a writer’s reference or writing style guidebook for assistance with effective writing or refer to the next section titled “Documenting Sources for an academic paper.”
  
• Written assignments are to be submitted with letter quality printing.
  

Documenting Sources for an Academic Research Paper

• As stated by Diana Hacker, the author of A Writer’s Reference, “In academic research papers and in any other writing that borrows information from sources, the borrowed information – quotations, summaries, paraphrases, and any other facts or ideas that are not common knowledge – must be documented.”
  
• See information on Plagiarism on Page 4 of Class Syllabus.
  
• Be careful not to copy words or paraphrase thoughts from the text, readings, or other sources.
  
• If you do use words or paraphrase thoughts from readings, text or other sources, you must properly document and cite your source of information.
  
• Use a writing style book, writer’s reference or a guide to writing research papers for specific guidelines for complete citations for books, articles, government publications, company annual reports, home pages, etc.
  
• As a general rule, provide as much information about the source as possible including author, editor, title, publication, publisher, date published, etc.
  

Examples to help with your assignments

• Book:
  Berkowitz, Eric N., et al. Marketing. 6th edition. Boston: Irwin McGraw–Hill, 2000.
  
• Article:
  Thurm, Scott. “Scanner Prices Plunge as Prices Soar.” Wall Street Journal December 17, 1998, Section B.
  
• World Wide Web Site:
  “History: Budweiser Through the Years…The Company Timeline.” Budweiser Homepage [Online]. Available: http://www.budweiser.com/archives.html [1999 Anheuser-Busch Inc., St. Louis, MO].
  

ADDITIONAL NOTES

• Remember that there is no right or wrong answer. The emphasis of the discussion will be on the analysis of a number of issues in arriving at a “well-thought out” decision on the ideal strategies for Internet ventures.
  

Blog Project: Grading Scheme

Blog project: how it will be graded.

We will ask you to e-mail alex@udel.edu during the last week of classes. This e-mail should include relevant links you will need to provide with respect to your blog project work (appearance in google, site's you have commented on etc.) and your assessment of your group members' blogs. Your blog will be graded as follows:

Overall Design 25%
This comprises the look and feel of the blog. It includes the extra links, consideration of the additional 'headers' used in the template and other resources and content linked to the template.

The grade will be assigned based on the overall look of the design and how the design is impacted by the additional content that has been included and linked to from the template (other links, other blogs, affiliate programs, adsence programs, other content included in the template that helps add context to the blog etc.)

Commenting: 25%
You will need to provide me all the blogs' URLs to which you have commented, this includes classmates blogs as well as outside of class blogs. It would be helpful if you provided me the direct link (permalink) of the actual entries to which you commented. I will also determine how well you have responded to comments on your own blog.

Content of your blog: 40%
This falls into two parts.
A. Content re: your posts
The quality of the posts (relevance to theme, writing style etc.), the frequency of the posts and the links provided within the posts.

B. content re: what you add to your template (links and additional resources etc.)
Additional content that has been included and linked to from the template (other links, other class blogs, Other theme-related blogs, sitemeter, affiliate programs, adsence programs, other content included in the template that helps add context to the blog etc.) Note, it is not a question of the more links and resources you have the better it must be, its the quality of the links and resources and how they tie to your blog that is critical.

Bloglines Subscriptions: 10%
You need to subscribe to:
A. this class
B. other blogs within your group
C. other resources, theme-related blogs (esp. those listed on your blog)
You need to make your subscriptions public and make sure this is listed on this class site along with your blog. If this is not the case, please e-mail me the appropriate link.

Opportunities for extra grade consideration. (10% extra)
While not required for a full grade, you will be rewarded for the following additional things:
a. your blog's appearance in google (need to send me the google URL of the search that lists your blog as one of the results)
b. your blog's link from other, NON class blogs (need to provide me the URL of the blog that lists your blog)

We will also get feedback from you about your group members' blogs. This feedback may be used to increase your overall grade. We will ask each of you to provide an overall assessment of each of the blogs within the group, the assessment will focus on the design and utility of the blog. The feedback you provide about your group members will also be assessed, in terms of its value to the blog that you are assessing, and again could effect an increase in your grade.

Some of the previous entries on this site with respect to the blog project:


Building Community

Initial Group Project Guidelines

Class Project

BusinessWeek article on Blogging

The following cover story on BusinessWeek: Blogs Will Change Your Business seems to be a decent 'survey' of the explosive growth of blogs and their potential impact on business and mainstream media.  At the end of the story BusinessWeek announces its own blog:  blogspotting.net  It may be interesting to follow this new entrant to the blogosphere!

Class Notes for April 18

The following are the slides for class, chapter 10.

More on RSS

The following is a very good explanation of RSS for us non technically-minded from What's Next Online. Found at Diva Marketing.

A couple of interesting excerpts:

What is does:

Essentially, RSS is a technology that allows website publishers to make their headlines and summaries of their content available through a syndicated "feed" that users can subscribe to receive. Users then view the feed with the help of an RSS reader like Bloglines or Feed Demon.


Why its cool:

Manually checking every site in which you are interested is incredibly time consuming. RSS is a better way to be notified of new and changed content on multiple websites. You receive the results in a well organized way, distinct from email.


A couple of marketing / technology resources you may wish to subscribe to to get you started (other than your group members blogs and other theme-related blogs):

• slashdot
  
• Scobleizer
  
• Diva Marketing
  

Your bloglines subscriptions

when i next provide feedback on your blog, i will also be looking at your subscriptions, there are still some of your public subsciptions i have not seen. please make sure:

1. You have subscribed to at least:
   
   
   
   1. this class http://buad477.blogspot.com/atom.xml
      
   2. your group members' blogs
      
   3. other theme-related blogs
      
   
   
2. made your subscriptions public (i.e. mine can be viewed at http://www.bloglines.com/public/alexbrown)
   
3. your public subscriptions are listed, with your blog on the left hand column of this blog
   

Please e-mail me (or leave a comment) with your address of your public subscriptions if you need them listed as in 3.

Handouts for April 13: Customer Lifetime Value

The following are the handouts for Customer Lifetime Value.

The Effects of Online Advertising: A Focus on Pop-Up and In-Line Ads

for anyone interested:

The "Department of Accounting & MIS Research Workshop" presentation is scheduled on 4/15 at Alfred Lerner Hall 231 from 11:00 a.m. - noon. Dennis Galletta (Temple University) will be presenting his paper (co-authored with Scott McCoy, Andrea Everard, Peter Polak) entitled "The Effects of Online Advertising: A Focus on Pop-Up and In-Line Ads."

Class Notes for April 13

The following are the slides for class, chapter 8.

Blog: Hugh Hewitt

Over the weekend I read:



This seems a decent book covering the emergence of the blogging phenomenon. The author has a pretty popular blog. It is very US centric and the author is clearly has a conservative agenda, but aside from that there are some decent insights into the emergence of this new communications medium for sure. The notes I wrote as I was going through the book include:

'open source journalism'
'transparency'
'traditional media scruntiny'
'fact checking'
'symbiosis with traditional media (MSM)'

He dismisses the need for an RSS feed, but we have to recognize that as bloggers we don't all have a talk radio show to 'push' our blog, so i would have liked to have heard more about the importance of RSS and aggregated news readers.

On the whole a good, quick read, if anyone wants to borrow my copy just leave a comment and its yours (to borrow).

Monday's Class (April 11)

There are no slides for this class. There will be Handouts on Customer Lifetime Value - which will be made available in class.

More on Building Community: link to blogs, visit, comment, and subscribe!

As you are now getting more familiar with the blogosphere and your particular blog etc. I thought I would write a little more on the practicalities of building community around your blog. Basically you NEED links out and links coming into your blog, especially those of blogs that you are interested in and have a similar theme to yours.

Why ?

Basically, when you link to a blog from your blog, and then follow that link to the targeted blog, the targeted blog can see that there is a link on your blog to their blog by referring to their referrer stats. (via sitemeter etc.) The targeted blog owner, like you, is also trying to build community, and, especially if it is quite a 'new' blog, will certainly visit your blog to see what it is about. If the targeted blog (owner) sees your blog is interesting enough, not only will that person visit your blog, but will create a link to your blog from their blog (returning the favour, a tradition in the blogosphere) and likely subscribe to your blog via Bloglines. This will help build your community, but you cannot get frustrated if you do not see quick results. Building community takes time, and plenty of it. (note, you can also comment on those targeted blogs, this will increase your visibility on those blogs beyond simply their referrer stats.)

I clearly encourage you to seek out blogs from the wider blogosphere to link to etc. but you can also start with blogs from this class that are related to your theme.

i.e. if you are doing a blog on desperate housewives, you might also want to link to the blog on Television Connection. If your blog is on the New York Yankees, perhaps link to other Yankees Blogs from the class etc. If you are doing a blog on movie reviews, you are not the only one ... and of course issues related to being a senior are pretty popular too!

Don't forget, for all the blogs you link to, also subscribe via your bloglines account. That way you only need to visit those blogs once you know there has been an update!

BizRate Case Questions

We will be discussing the case in class on Wednesday, April 20, 2005. Please read the case and prepare the answers to the following questions. Note, however, that the questions below are meant as a guideline for analyzing the case. Elaborate on questions that would help you make your case. I would suggest that you think about other issues that are not discussed through the questions below.

1. (20 points) What value does BizRate provide to customers?
   
2. (20 points) How does the value BizRate provide compare to that provided by Gomez Advisors?
   
3. (20 points) How does BizRate affect the merchant's relationship with its customers?
   
4. (15 points) In what ways is BizRate "the antidote to Amazon" and similar to eBay? What are the differences in Web site loyalty for BizRate vs. Amazon?
   
5. ( 20 points) Did Red October add value for consumers? How?
   For merchants? How? What should BizRate do regarding the Red October?
   
6. (5 points): Formatting and cover page. See the following section for details.
   

Highlighted Blogs

Having gone through each of the class blogs, I thought I would highlight a couple that show some interesting 'developments' that may be of interest for other blogs.

1. Atlanta Falcons. I like the introduction in the template AND the image in the template. As we know, flikr does not seem to allow you to do this outside of entries on your blog. When I asked Ryan how he had worked around this issue his response was:

   
   "All i did was up load it to flickr
   and said to blog this photo. After that i viewed my
   source page to see where it put the picture. I cut
   and pasted where it put the picture originally and
   then found where it says "begin profile" and i pasted
   the picture there. I was pleased to see that it
   actually posted in the right place!!!"
   

   
   

2. Japanese Kaizen. Creative use of ebay to show auctions of the products being sold. I am sure something like this may work for some other blogs.
   

Class Notes for April 6

The following are the slides for class, chapter 5.

More links to follow.

Feedback for your Blogs

Everyone should have received an e-mail offering feedback on your blog to date. Most went out yesterday. If you did not receive an e-mail, please let me know.

I will repeat this in about three weeks in order to guage your continued progress.

cheers, alex

Monday's Class: Guest Speaker

Monday's Guest Speaker is Joy Lynam who is the Associate Director of the University of Delaware's MIS department. She is responsible for the maintenance and development of the UDEL website. She will be talking about website development and maintenance issues.

Bloglines Helps Bridge The Vastness Of Space

Given our familiarity with bloglines for this course I thought you might be interested in their latest move to broaden their reach.