Blog 10: My Final Blog

Hi Everybody! 

Today I am writing my final blog post. As the semester comes to an end I can say that I definitely learned a lot about marketing and I hope that you did too.

In todays blog, I am going to take a look at some of the objectives and outcomes that my professor, Professor Nelson, laid out for us at the beginning of the semester. The objectives that I am going to focus on today are: (1) To examine and convey basic and emerging marketing concepts and terminologies, (2) To set personal and professional goals and positively contribute in an engaged class, (3) To have the opportunity to put marketing into action via team and individual projects, research, reports and presentations. The outcomes that I am going to talk about today is how through experiential learning, improve your knowledge and skills. I am also going to talk about how to analyze and evaluate basic financial statements and business formulas (profit, ROI, etc.).

1. To examine and convey basic and emerging marketing concepts and terminologies

This semester, I had so many opportunities to apply the marketing terminology and concepts that I was learning. We had so many group projects and activities in and out of the classroom that allowed me apply these skills while also enhancing them. We had a main group project that we worked on for the whole semester that allowed my teammates and I to test out these concepts during out simulation. We also had a few reports that we had to do where we needed to use the formulas that we learned in class to figure out certain things like Change in Sale, Change in Units, Return on Sales, the Break-even point and a few more. Writing this blog also allowed me enhance my understanding of certain terms and ideas. This was because I would pick out terms or ideas that I wanted to learn more about and then write a blog post on it to break it down for my readers, you, as well as myself.

2. To set personal and professional goals and positively contribute in an engaged class

Before I went into this class, I had already set a personal goal to work as hard as I can so that I could not only learn as much I can but to also get the best grade possible. At times throughout the semester this became very difficult because I had to deal with work in all of my four classes. I also wanted to try to engage in class at least once a week but with the goal of participating everyday. I hoped that by doing this I would be able to learn a lot more that would help me get good grades. While my grades are not where I had hoped they would be I did try my hardest for the most part, with a few slip-ups early in the semester, and I also participated in class multiple times a week. I guess you can say that I was somewhat successful with my personal goals. This class also gave me the tools to set goals for myself when it comes to the professional world, which will be a great help once I graduate and look for a job.

3. To have the opportunity to put marketing into action via team and individual projects, research, reports and presentations

The team projects really allowed me to put marketing into action throughout the semester. When doing the simulation this semester, we needed to create, sell and market a backpack to a specific target market.   We needed to decide how much to price the bag, where to sell it, and how to advertise our product. While doing this, we also need to do a few papers and presentations on what we have learned and what we were doing. The reports that we had to do required us to analyze the data that we received from the simulation in order to figure out if our business was successful. The presentations that we had to do allowed us to gain practice presenting out findings to a large group of people but to also focus on and learn more about certain marketing concepts that interested us.

4. Improve your knowledge and skills through experiential learning

This semester I had many opportunities to improve my marketing knowledge and skills through experience. The two experiences that I really learned from is definitely the Practice Marketing Simulation that I had to do as well as the through the Income Statement, Return on Sales and Market Share Analysis. The simulation allowed me to improve my decision-making skills because each week I needed to make a decision on what the next step was when it came to my backpack company. The Income Statement, Return on Sales and Market Share Analysis really helped me because I was not very good with Excel or with formulas. For this assignment we need to create formulas through Excel to form our Income Statement and to find out our Return on Sales and Market Share. It was also one of the first times that I was really able to create an Income Statement on my own which was really helpful because I will definitely need one in the future.

5. Analyze and evaluate basic financial statements and business formulas (profit, ROI, etc.)

Like I said right above this I to complete many financial statements and business formulas. Before this semester I was never really sure how companies calculated their profit or Return on Investment. As time went one I was able to figure out all of these formulas through practice as well as through having to use them in my Income Statement. When I graduate, I want to open a Lifestyle Clothing company so one day these financial statements and business formulas are going to very important so the fact that I learned how to complete them this semester is very important.

I just want to thank you all for staying will me all semester long and reading my blogs each week.

Thanks,

Chris