Micro, Macro and KSF

Hi There,

Following on from last week, we are going to update you about our research of Nike Footwear. We have been looking further into the Macro analysis; each of us developing on our specific sections, which are:

Political & Economic--> Chelsea

Social--> Ross

Technology & Environment--> Kirstie

After looking at these PESTLE macro factors (external factors that will affect your brand), we went onto look at the micro factors, which are internal factors that affect your brand, these include:

1.    Customers- study of consumer markets, business markets, reseller markets, government markets and international markets.

2.    Competitors- position against, gain strategic advantage and adapt to needs

3.    Public- any group that has the interest or impact on an organization, ability to achieve objectives (media, local groups ect)

4.    Suppliers- resources to produce goods

5.    Company- Research and Development, finance and data

6.    Intermediaries- Agency, distribution

From these we have been able to share information found with each other and develop a TOWS analysis, this is:

T-- threats-- What is happening in the macro environment that might generate a threat to our organization?

O-- opportunities-- What is happening in the macro environment that might generate opportunities for our organization?

W-- weakness-- Within the context of the micro environment, what are our weaknesses?

S-- strengths-- Within the context of the micro environment, what are our strengths?

These assess and use both these macro and micro factors, it is important that we do a TOWS analysis as it is the most accurate assessment of a company’s strengths and weaknesses that are undertaken on the basis of the opportunities and threats in the market.

In the marketing context session we learnt the importance and implications of undertaking the process of analysis in the right order and the use of high quality information to support market analysis.

Next we need to look at the Critical/Key Success Factors (KSF) and discuss as a group how we can use our strengths to capitalize on these opportunities, how we can use our strengths to minimize these threats, how can we remedy our weaknesses so that we might take advantage of these opportunities and how can we remedy our weaknesses so that we might minimize these threats. Once we have agreed on our KSF we need to put them in order of importance, including which are the most important opportunities and which are the most serious threats. We are still developing on all of our research and pinpointing the key parts in which we can use to back up our market analysis. We are then going to look into the effect of short, medium and long-term perspectives.

Kirstin Ledson, Chelsea Lane, Ross Lindley

11.00am 17/02/2013 

Hi There,

We are going to tell you all about our recent developments on our Nike research project from the previous week. After conducting some primary research and an assessment of Nike as a whole we have decided as a group to specify in Nike footwear. 

In our lesson we explored 2 particular target markets, we chose Athletes and Youth Fashion. We chose Athletes as if they wear Nike footwear then it promotes the products and encourages sports enthusiast to purchase them. Encouraging consumers to think 'if they are good enough for professionals then they are definitely good enough for me'. So it would be influential and with such a variety of different sports trainers available the target market is huge. Youth Fashion is also a huge target market due to trends and the 'cool' thing to wear, with a huge variety of styles and sports shoes and the option to customize your own shoes, the demand is sky-high. 

After evaluating these target markets we went onto thinking about Nikes competitors and what Nikes competitive advantages are. For Nike, there are 2 types of competitors; from a sports perspective it would be Addidas and Puma and from a fashion perspective it would be brands like Converse and Vans. Nike has a competitive edge because they are stylish with a wider variety of products; they are popular and have a great reputation of the quality of shoes. There style of market appeal to more people and the Nike 'tick' is one of the most recognizable symbols around the world. Nike has also branched out and sponsors many athletes and sports, ranging from football teams to individual surfers; this will influence people to purchase products from Nike. 

From our breakout session we learnt that good information is the lifeblood of effective marketing analysis. So we are going to explore databases such as WARC, Mintel, Nexis, Marketline Advantage ad Social Brand for relevant information on Nike, especially in the Microanalysis stage.

First of all we are going to carry out some macro analysis, we have divided this research into 3 main areas, Political and Economic, Social, and Technology and Environment. Once we have all carried out research in these areas we are all going to come together and discuss our findings, evaluate them as a group and go onto researching all together microanalysis using the specific databases listed previously.

Political & Economic--> Chelsea

Social--> Ross

Technology & Environment--> Kirstie

Kirstin Ledson, Chelsea Lane, Ross Lindley

13.30pm 03/02/2013