Mkt630 GDB No. 1 Fall 2011 solution

Discussion Objective:

To understand distinct marketing approaches which are used for the same product in its different stages of product life cycle and to realize the difference in these approaches.

Point of discussion:

Assume that a group of business editorial writers related to leading newspapers of Pakistan are discussing the current business practices in Pakistan. You are there as a third party observer of this discussion and have to closely observe what they are talking. The description of discussion is as following. One of them initiated the discussion by saying that in the recent past it has been observed in the IT equipments market of Pakistan that used IT equipment are being imported and traded in local market at a massive level. The major IT equipments being traded are personal computers (both the desktop systems and laptops), printers, monitors, key boards and mouse pointers. Then he put forth a question that what can be the possible reason behind importing these used equipments? Are most of these products faulty and out of order and so these are firstly repaired and then sold in Pakistan or there is any other reason. Another question was raised that if these products are still usable then why the foreign countries sell these to Pakistan? One editor came up with the point that might be these products are exported to Pakistan because these products were at the last stage of their product lives and were declared outdated in the foreign countries. You have now been welcomed by them to bring your own flavor in discussion and to bring the discussion to a conclusive level as they are not clear about the whole happening.

Discussion Agenda:

You have to give your opinion by responding to the questions raised and opinions given by them.

Solution:

Small scale surveys and focus groups are low cost ways to gather information from potential and existing customers. Also most of the secondary data (statistics, demographics, etc.) is available easily to the SMEs to analyze according to their needs.