Introduction

The Introduction should identify the topic and explain why it is important. It must
be adequately informative, yet easy to follow. It should state the problem as
simply as possible, taking into account the broader view of the discipline as a
whole.

The student should not overestimate the reader's familiarity with the topic. The
Introduction will be read by those who are somewhat acquainted with the general
area, but not all readers will be specialists in the particular topic. The student
should write in an intelligent, logical, concise manner, but the Introduction should
be presented in such a way that one who knows little of the literature or particular
topic will gain a solid understanding of the dissertation's purpose and subject
matter.

The Introduction must be interesting, as well. If the reader becomes bored while
reading the first section of the dissertation or thesis, he or she is unlikely to regain
interest in the following sections. In fact, the reader may stop reading altogether!
To prevent such disaster, tradition permits prose in the first few paragraphs that is
less dry than the formal, scientific or literary norm.

Statement of the Problem

There must always be a clear rationale for a student's hypothesis. Such rationale
is typically presented in the form of a problem statement that explains what issue
or controversy needs to be resolved. The writer's hypothesis will make a
prediction about the problem's likely resolution.

Hypothesis

The hypothesis section of a thesis or dissertation identifies the problem to be

explored and its importance to the field of study. It asserts that the student's
research may help to solve the problem under investigation. The writer's
hypothesis is essentially a statement of what he or she believes the study will
prove and/or solve.
Rationale
 The rationale for a study is based on the writer's belief in the need
for additional or completely new research on a unique problem in a
given field. The rationale should explain, defend, and/or prove that
the current literature (if any) and current findings (if any) on the
given problem are inadequate, outdated, and/or inaccurate.
Basically, the rationale should identify the student's reasoning and
justification for writing a dissertation or thesis on the particular
subject.

Literature Review

The Literature Review is a thorough summary of the recognized facts and

information in academic literature about a given subject. Most cited sources in a
dissertation or thesis are listed in the Literature Review. The student must locate
previous research studies (usually found in professional journal articles) that
have contributed to the field in a manner similar to what his or her own thesis or
dissertation proposes. If little academic writing exists on a given subject,
composing the Literature Review will be a very difficult task. The standard
Literature Review should:

• justify the reason for the student's research. The student must convince
the reader that his or her research is important and beneficial.

• allow the student to establish his or her theoretical framework and

methodological focus. The Literature Review often becomes the basis for
the entire thesis or dissertation.

• summarize each piece of literature in a few sentences and identify the

approach taken by each author.

• evaluate the approach of each author and put it into a context.

• explain why each piece of literature was chosen as reference material for
the dissertation or thesis.

• demonstrate the student's knowledge of the field. The student should not
merely report what he or she has read. Instead, the student must show
that he or she has a thorough, deep connection to the area of study;
knows what the most important issues are and their relevance to his or her
investigation; understands the controversies; recognizes what has been
neglected; knows where previous studies have gone and anticipates
where the field will go as a result of his or her study.

Methodology

The Methodology section can vary significantly in length and content, depending
 on the subject matter, type of experiment being conducted, and particular
requirements. Most academic institutions require this section to include a
detailed explanation of the subject population, procedures, timelines, objectives,
limitations, instruments, data collection, ethical considerations, tools, and
statistical analysis. The writer must be extremely thorough and detailed.

Statistical Analysis

Included in the methodology section should be a thorough explanation of data

and the methods by which data was obtained. Instruments of data collection
vary, but common methods include surveys, interviews, questionaires, and case
studies. The writer must show methodological expertise through analyzing the
benefits and limitations of every method of data collection used in preparing the
project.
Data Collection

Included in the methodology section should be a thorough explanation of data and

the methods by which data was obtained. Instruments of data collection vary, but
common methods include surveys, interviews, questionaires, and case studies.
The writer must show methodological expertise through analyzing the benefits
and limitations of every method of data collection used in preparing the
dissertation or thesis.

Data collection must not conclude until a sufficient number of subjects are
evaluated, establishing a solid basis for assertions and the applicability of findings
for the subject population. The writer must display knowledge and understanding
of the differences between qualitative and quantitative data.

Subject Population

Included in the methodology section should be a thorough explanation and

definition of the subject population (person or thing being studied). The writer
must not only identify the subject population, associated demographics, and
resulting data, but also acknowlegde any possible biases or irregularities resulting
from gender, age, race, sexuality, religious beliefs, political affiliation, educational
level, etc.

Conclusion

The conclusion may be the most important part of the project. The writer must not
merely repeat the introduction, but explain in expert-like detail what has been
learned, explained, decided, proven, etc. The writer must reveal the ways in which
the paper's thesis might have significance in society.

A conclusion should strive to answer questions that readers logically raise--"Why

are you telling me this? Why do you think I need to understand your main point?"
The conclusion may place the paper in a larger context, serve as a call for action,
set forth a warning or hypothesis, intentionally complicate the issues already
introduced, raise a question or questions, introduce a relevant quote, or tell an
appropriate anecdote.

Again, the writer should not depend on the conclusion to sum up the body
paragraphs. Paragraphs should flow naturally into one another and connections
should be made among them. Summary can be an important function of a
conclusion, but this part must be brief; readers know what they've just read. The
writer should point out the importance or implications of the research on an area of
societal concern. The writer could also mention the lack of conclusion in the field.
This demonstrates understanding of the subject's complexity. The writer may
choose to propose what may be the natural next step to take in light of what the
argument is attempting to convince. The conclusion should not end with a
quotation or statement that could very well be the subject of another paper. The
former deflects attention away from one as writer and thinker; the latter deflects
attention from what one is conveying in the paper.
Results

The results section is not the place for opinion or conjecture. The writer should
limit this section to clear, concrete facts. The findings and results should be
completely and accurately stated, regardless of whether or not they support the
writer's hypothesis.
Discussion

The writer must critically analyze the unbiased results of the research. One should
present statistical data and analyze the resulting figures in an attempt to judge the
suggestions inherent in his or her findings. The writer may also reference the
Literature Review in order to show how his or her research builds upon previous
work in the field of study.

Recommendations

This section should be included in a report when the results and conclusions
indicate that further work must be done or when the writer needs to discuss
several possible options to best remedy a problem. The writer should not
introduce new ideas in the recommendations section, but rely on the evidence
presented in the results and conclusions sections. Via the recommendations
section, the writer is able to demonstrate that he or she fully understands the
importance and implications of his or her research by suggesting ways in which it
may be further developed.

Endnotes and Footnotes

Endnotes (citations and reference lists gathered at the end of each chapter or at
the end of the paper) have been popular among academic writers, primarily
because they make the transition from a submitted manuscript to published
resource so much easier. Even so, parenthetical documentation styles (and their
corresponding "Works Cited" and/or "Bibliography" list) have supplanted both
footnotes and endnotes in most academic disciplines. Because of its relative ease
in both writing and reading, parenthetical documentation is greatly preferred by
most instructors.

For writers in some disciplines, however—most notably in some of the humanities

disciplines such as music, art, religion, theology, and even history—footnotes are
still widely in use. A student must check with his or her instructor to make sure
that parenthetical documentation is an acceptable method of citing resources.

If used, the placement of footnotes can be at the bottom of the page, the end of
the chapter, within the text (e.g., Johnson, 2003), or combined at the end of the
text of the thesis, depending on the manuscript style. The writer must be
consistent, however. An advisor or professor should approve of the footnote style.
Remember, if consistent with the style sheet, footnotes or endnotes can be single-
spaced.

Footnotes and endnotes appear with their corresponding superscript number and
are written with the first line indented.

Bibliography and Works Cited

The bibliography lists books, articles, or other works consulted in preparing the
paper. It must be included even if endnotes or footnotes are used. The
arrangement of the bibliography and the information in each entry is determined by
the chosen style (MLA, APA, Harvard, Turabian, Chicago, etc.).

In the Works Cited section, all cited sources should be listed in alphabetical order.
Vita

A vita is an academic resume that highlights one's scholarly goals and

accomplishments. Unlike a business resume, which is 1?2 pages in length, a
curriculum vita grows in length throughout one's academic career. The contents
of a curriculum vita differ across disciplines, and one's vita probably will not
contain all of the categories below. (List items chronologically within each
category of the vita, with the most recent items first.)

Contact information
Include name, address, phone, fax, and e-mail for home and office, if applicable.

Education
Indicate major, type of degree, and the date each degree was awarded (or will be
awared in the future) for each postsecondary school attended.

Honors and Awards

List each award, granting institution, and the date awarded. If there is only one
award (e.g., graduation honors), consider incorporating this information within the
education section.

Teaching Experience
List any courses in which serverd as a TA, co-taught, or taught. Note the
institution, role held in each, and supervisor.

Research Experience
List assistantships, practica, and other research experience. Include the
institution, nature of the position, duties, dates, and supervisor.

Statistical and Computer Experience

This section is especially relevant for research-oriented doctoral programs. List
courses taken, familiar statistical and computer programs, and competent data
analysis techniques.

Professional Experience
List relevant professional experience, such as administrative work and summer
jobs.

Grants Awarded
Include title of agency, projects for which funds were awarded, and dollar
amounts.

Publications
Separate publications into sections for articles, chapters, reports, and other
documents. Document each publication in the citation style appropriate for one's
discipline (i.e., APA or MLA style).
 Conference Presentations
Similar to the section on publications, use separate sections for posters and
papers. Use the appropriate documentation style for one's discipline (i.e., APA or
MLA style).

Professional Activities
List service activities, committee memberships, administrative work, lectures
invited to deliver, professional workshops delivered or attended, editorial
activities, and any other professional activities.

Professional Affiliations
List any professional societies (e.g., student affiliate of the American
Psychological Association or the American Psychological Society).

Research Interests
Briefly summarize research interests with 4?6 key descriptors.

Teaching Interests
List courses prepared to teach or would like the opportunity to teach.

References
Provide names, phone numbers, addresses, and e-mail addresses of referees. Ask permission beforehand. Be sure that they will speak highly of you.

Building your brand name

With the majority of the population in developed countries already Internet savvy the
information to make an educated purchase is now readily available. An entrepreneur or
early stage marketeer needs to understand that the modern consumer will seek and
discover the very essence of your product in record time. Here are some steps that could
be useful in augmenting your brand equity:

1. Pick a name: sometimes easier said than done. Finding a name that accurately
represents the core value of your product is a challenge by itself. Nevertheless,
without a catchy name you are bound to create yet another obstacle to
exponential growth. Something less than 8 characters with plenty of vowels would
be nice. If what you want is already taken then consider buying it from its current
owner (assuming it is reasonably priced). Another important early on decision is
whether your company name should be the same with your product name. There
are pros and cons with picking the same name. On the plus side, you achieve a
more focused image, save some money along the way and make it dead easy to
remember for your potential customers. On the minus side, you may be limiting
the scope of your business and creating the perception that you are a one trick
pony.
2. Launch a limited featured but high-quality product: your first product does
not need all the bells and whistles of the competition. Instead, focus on the 80%
that most of your customers will demand and make that work all the time, no
compromises. Let common sense and early customer feedback drive your core
feature set selection. Remember that it is always easier to add a feature than to
remove one. If you do decide to launch with a flaky product be prepared for
permanent damages to your brand image.
3. Blog the night away: once your product is out, plan to spend substantial
amount of time reading and posting blogs. Unlike traditional advertising channels
 the “new way” is all about interaction with the customer. Collect carefully any
feedback you receive from your customers. Anyone that is willing to write about
your product is a current or potential customer. Listen and do your best to
incorporate their opinion to your road map.
4. Learn your customer segments: go above and beyond what you have on your
own web site in order to learn what is being said about your product anywhere
online. Use watch and auditing tools, collect data and establish a process to
regularly go through them, looking for early signs of brand success or failure.
When your customers are using your product in ways you have not even imagined
then you are up to something good. Create role-models that closely match the
prototypical customer for all distinct customer segments. Real-time search is
going to be huge in this direction with some early signs already appearing in the
horizon.
5. Total customer experience: given the ability to badmouth or even return the
product at almost any time, post-sale support and activities become integral to
building a superior brand name. Getting a product to the customer’s hands is half
the job. The other half, is making the customer keep the product and buy again in
the near future. Sales, customer support and product marketing need to
coordinate in every step of the way to pass this test.
6. Use brand boosters appropriately: SEO, TV, radio, paper and other means of
broadening your message can be very useful if used at the right time. Return on
investment (ROI) is often hard to assess. Before committing on a big splash
campaign and millions of dollars make sure you have achieved some viral
adoption of your product. Sometimes online blogs, forums and chat rooms can put
a dumper even on some of the most creative advertisements. When in doubt, go
for something concentrated in volume or area of coverage first. If things go well,
quadruple and conqure.

Building Viet brand name – how?

16:36' 30/11/2007 (GMT+7)

VietNamNet Bridge – Building a national brand name is surely a thorny process, and Vietnam is
still at the starting point on the long road.

VNR500: seeking Vietnamese brand names

VNR500: seeking Vietnamese brand names (chapter 2)

When purchasing a product, the first thing consumers do is find out where the product is made. If it
is a Japanese or American product, it surely has high quality. Thai products have good quality and
prices are acceptable. Chinese goods are not as good as Thai or Japanese ones, but they are
very cheap. If the product is made-in-Vietnam, it…

The second part of the sentence remains open as Vietnam has not found a way to follow to build
its national brand name, and there is no exact image that can help consumers imagine Vietnam.

Positioning
 Doing marketing is the task of every citizen and the government as well. In the photo,
Vietnam’s ACB bank presents a picture of a Vietnamese landscape to its partner
Microsoft
Pham Chi Lan, an economist, a former member of the Prime Minister’s Research Team, said that
several tens of years ago, Thailand also made low-cost products, and then it gradually began
trying to make good products. Nowadays, Thai products are exported everywhere in the world.

“Thai people are wiser than us, we should learn from them,” said Mrs Lan.

Thailand, China and the Republic of Korea all have been successful in finding specific ways to
build their images and brand names.

Vietnamese businessmen, management authorities and politicians all well know that positioning is
the first and most important work Vietnam has to do to build a national brand name.

“If we cannot do the positioning well, we will never be able to build a national brand name or
national image,” said Mrs Lan.

Which should be the most specific characteristics for Vietnam? This is the topic of many
discussions among researchers and economists. Ton Nu Thi Ninh, a famous stateswoman,
always mentions Vietnamese cuisine, while businessman Nguyen Tran Quang thinks that it is
necessary to highlight the traditional national character in every product. At the APEC Summit 14
held in Hanoi, a lot of Vietnamese products were served and highly applauded.

The building of specific characteristics for Vietnamese products is a long and thorny process,
which will take a lot of money and time, but it is necessary. If Vietnam cannot find its own way to
follow, its products will be mixed with a lot of other products, and the world’s consumers will never
know about Vietnam and Vietnam’s products.

Marketing and transmitting messages

When Vietnamese officials and businessmen go abroad and ask foreigners what they know about
Vietnam, many of them say that they only know Vietnam as the country of wars.

It is because Vietnam has not let the world know that wars are in the past, and the country now is
a friendly and peaceful land which is inviting business cooperation and investment.
Vietnamese goods are being sold to China and Thailand, which import and then re-export them to
the US and Europe at prices much higher than the import prices. It is clear that poor
communication and marketing works have made Vietnamese businesses miss opportunities to sell
products under their own names and at high prices.

Philip Kotler, the father of modern marketing, asked when visiting Vietnam: “How many people in
the world know that Intel and Canon decided to choose Vietnam as the site of big plants instead of
China?”

“Vietnam should write stories about the country and I believe that the world’s investors’ circle will
become more excited after they read the stories,” he said.

Government also needs to do marketing

Ton Nu Thi Ninh, Deputy Chairwoman of the National Assembly Foreign Affairs Committee,
related that at a meeting with international politicians, the Korean ambassador gave her Korean
lipstick. Mrs Ninh called this a very artistic way of marketing.

It is clear that foreign officials are superior to Vietnamese ones in marketing. It is difficult to find a
Vietnamese official who readily markets for the nation’s benefit like the Korean ambassador.

American professor Julio Aramberri said that in the US he had never seen a programme
advertising Vietnam’s tourism. American people don’t think of coming to Vietnam because they
don’t have enough information.

The professor shared the same view as economist Pham Chi Lan: doing marketing is the task of
every Vietnamese citizen and of the government as well.

The Ministry of Foreign Affairs should support marketing campaigns in key markets by asking the
help of embassies, consulates and commercial counselors, the professor suggested.

Philip Kotler, in his talk when visiting Vietnam, also emphasised that the government needed to do
marketing. “Is there a Vietnamese Minister of Marketing?” he asked.

Mr Kotler said that Vietnam should learn from the model followed by Ireland. Over 500 US
companies have set up factories there, simply because the country has a Ministry of Marketing,
and the ministry can control three other ministries: industry and trade, investment, and tourism.

Dang Vy

Khi nào quản trị chuỗi cung ứng trưởng thành ?

21 December 2008 633 views No Comment

Trả lời: Chỉ khi các công ty ghi nhớ ba nguyên tắc cơ bản dưới đây.
growp up SC?

Nhiều năm qua, các công ty trong nhiều lĩnh vực khác nhau đã cùng nhau xây dựng vị trí
quản lý cấp cao về quản trị chuỗi cung ứng. Lucent Techonologies và H.J.Heinz là những
công ty mà vị trí quản lý cấp cao về mua hàng sánh ngang với các nhà quản lý cấp cao về
tài chính, hệ thống thông tin. Còn Dupont thì đã có vị trí Phó chủ tịch cấp cao phụ trách
Logistics và mua hàng toàn cầu. IBM năm ngoái cũng đã bổ nhiệm vị trí phó chủ tịch cấp
cao về quản trị chuỗi cung ứng tích hợp, một ví trí mà công ty này tuyên bố rằng sẽ giúp
quản lý toàn bộ chuỗi cung ứng bao gồm mua hàng, sản xuất, logistics và dịch vụ khách
hàng.
Việc “bổ nhiệm các chức danh mới cho quản trị chuỗi cung ứng” này không có gì là lạ, bởi chưa
bao giờ chuỗi cung ứng toàn cầu lại phức tạp và tốn nhiều chi phí đến thế. Trên toàn thế giới các
công ty đã tiêu tới 19 tỷ đô la cho hệ thống thông tin trong quản trị chuỗi cung ứng, còn số do tạp
đoàn IDC cung cấp.
Trên phương diện truyền thông, chưa bao giờ sự quan tâm hiểu biết về chuỗi cung ứng lại rộng
lớn như hiện này. Một nghiên cứu của ABI/Inform, công ty hàng đầu cung cấp dữ liệu kinh doanh
toàn cầu, cho thấy có tới hơn 5 bài báo viết về chuỗi cung ứng mỗi ngày, so với con số 1 bài một
tuần của một thập niên trước.
Vào năm 1982, trên tờ báo Financial Times viết về Keith Oliver, chuyên gia từ vấn hàng đầu về
chuỗi cung ứng, cho rằng thuật ngữ quản trị chuỗi cung ứng (SCM) sẽ chìm nghỉm trong lịch sử
của những khái niệm kinh doanh. Nhưng, thay vì biến mất, thuật ngữ quản trị chuỗi cung ứng đã
nhanh chóng trở thành một từ khoá phổ biến- chỉ một concept vô cùng ý nghĩa với các nhà quản
trị đó là sự đấu tranh bất tận với các thách thức của mua hàng, logistics, sản xuất, bán hàng và
marketing trong cùng một nhịp điệu.
Không may là sự quan tâm to lớn ấy vẫn chưa đáp ứng sử mong đợi của các công ty. Gần một
nửa trong số các phản hồi của khảo sát toàn cầu gần đây được thực hiện bởi Booz Allen
Hamilton- công ty tư vấn hàng đầu thế giới- cho họ thất vọng bởi những kết quả gặt hái được từ
việc đầu tư vào xây dựng hệ thống quản trị chuỗi cung ứng. Cho đến tận hôm nay, quản trị chuỗi
cung ứng vẫn là một chủ để chính –“thách thức” chính- trong các trường kinh doanh và làm đau
đầu nhiều doanh nghiệp.
Chẳng lẽ âm thanh và sự cuồng nhiệt với quản trị chuỗi cung ứng chẳng đem lại điều gì chăng?
Tại sao đứa trẻ nổi bật nhất của thập niên 80 ấy lại không lớn lên tí nào? Nếu nhìn vào lịch sự trải
qua những kinh nghiệm thành công nhất đến những thất bại, hẳn sẽ giúp bạn hiểu được phần nào.
Lớn như thổi
Vào cuối thập niên 70, ông Oliver đã cố gắng tổng hợp từ những ý tưởng của mình thông qua quá
trình làm việc với nhiều khách hàng bao gồm SKF, Heineken, Hoechst, Cadbury-Schweppes, và
Philips. Ông bắt đầu xây dựng một tầm nhìn cho phép chia công ty thành những bộ phận chức
năng tách biệt để phân tích bao gồm sản xuất, marketing, phân phối, bán hàng và tài chính nhằm
giúp từng bước giảm tồn kho và nâng cao dịch vụ khách hàng. Để tìm ra một thuật ngữ dễ nhớ
cho khái niệm ấy, nhóm tư vấn của Oliver đưa ra từ quản trị tồn kho tích hợp hay viết tắt là I2M.
Sau đó, trong buổi họp của ban điều hành, nhóm của Oliver đã trình bày quan điểm về thuật ngữ
mới. Nhiều ánh mắt ngờ vực vì thuật ngữ này nghe không hợp lý. Một vị giám đốc yêu cầu
Oliver giải nghĩa của “I2M”.
Ông Oliver trả lời “ Chúng tôi định nói về việc quản lý một chuỗi các hoạt động cung cấp trên
quan điểm của một thực thể duy nhất chứ không phải là một nhóm của các chức năng riêng biệt”.
“Nhưng tại sao các ông không đặt tên quan điểm như vậy”
“ Gọi là gì” Ông Oliver hỏi
”Quản trị chuỗi cung ứng tổng thể”
Và từ đó thuật ngữ chuỗi cung ứng đã tiến hoá mạnh mẽ hơn hai thập niên qua. Nhưng thực sự,
theo tiêu chuẩn ngày nay, phạm vi ban đầu của quản trị chuỗi cung ứng khá là hẹp. Ban đầu, quản
trị chuỗi cung ứng chỉ áp dụng trong phạm vị của một công ty đơn lẻ. Thách thức chỉ đơn giản là
làm sao bảo đảm sản xuất, bán hàng, tài chính, marketing và phân phối hát cùng nhịp trong quá
trình vận chuyển và đảm bảo sự sẵn sàng của hàng hoá trong nội bộ công ty.
Khi mà quản trị chuỗi cung ứng bắt đầu ngước ra ngoài bốn bức tường của công ty, thì nơi mà thu
hút sự quan tâm đầu tiên, rất tự nhiên, chính là khách hàng. Tuy nhiên, từ cuối thập niên 90, nhiều
công ty hàng đầu lại tập trung sự quan tâm đến cắt giảm chi phí và đổi mới từ phía nhà cung cấp
trong chuỗi cung ứng. Với sự tiến hoá này, phạm vi của quản trị chuỗi cung ứng đã mở rồng ra
ngoài sự dịch chuyển hàng hoá và nguyên liệu đơn thuần. Ngày nay, thuật ngữ quản trị chuỗi
cung ứng đã kết nạp thêm các khái niệm như là mua hàng chiến lược và quản trị nhà cung cấp
trong quá trình phát triển sản phẩm.
Ngày nay, quản trị chuỗi cung ứng quan tâm đến rủi ro của khả năng tối ưu hoá cục bộ gây ra bởi
không chỉ sự xung đột giữa các phòng ban mà còn giữa các công ty với nhau. Tuy nhiên bất chấp
phạm vi của quản trị chuỗi cung ứng ngày càng mở rộng, thì ba nguyên tắc cơ bản dưới đây vẫn
còn nguyên giá trị và cần thiết :
1. Xây dựng chiến lược cho chuỗi cung ứng
2. Phân tích một cách nghiêm túc các sự hoán đổi (trade off)
3. Ứng dụng hệ thống CNTT hỗ trợ
Xây dựng chiến lược chuỗi cung ứng
Đầu tiên và trước hết, một công ty phải xác định cho được các mục tiêu chiến lược và hình thành
các chính sách về chuỗi cung ứng để đáp ứng mục tiêu ấy. Trong quá trình khi mà chuỗi cung
ứng phần lớn được ứng dụng trong quản lý tổn kho thành phẩm, thì các công ty tiên tiến lại đưa
ra một cái nhìn chiến lược về nhiều vấn đề cốt lõi như là thời gian giao hàng, cấp độ dịch vụ ảnh
hưởng đến tồn kho, và khả năng khai thác tối đa công xuất sản xuất. Những chính sách này sẽ
giúp giải quyết xung đột về quyền lợi giữa các phòng ban. Một trong những xung đột như thế là
phòng marketing muốn giữa tồn kho ở mức có thể tối đa hoá doanh số và nỗ lực của phòng sản
xuất nhằm sản xuất mọi thứ theo đơn hàng nhằm duy trì sự tối ưu hoá sản xuất với chi phí thấp.
Ngày nay, các nhà lãnh đạo trong lĩnh vực chuỗi cung ứng đã có một cái nhìn thoáng hơn về một
“doanh nghiệp mở rộng” để thấy được các vấn đề chiến lược khác như là thuê ngoài dịch vụ
logistics, mua hàng toàn cầu và thậm chí xây dựng chiến lược sản xuất mới. Định kiến quản lý
theo chức năng vẫn còn song đã có nhiều lựa chọn hơn nhờ sự mở rộng của quản trị chuỗi cung
ứng.
Nhưng không may, có quá nhiều công ty đã giải quyết các xung đột giữa các phòng ban thông
qua thoả hiệp hơn là phá vỡ sự hạn chế. Phá vỡ sự hạn chế một cách chiến lược sẽ mở ra một
cánh cửa mới cho các doanh nghiệp hiện nay và trên hết nó giúp tạo ra lợi thế cạnh tranh.
Lịch sử của Hệ Thống Sản Xuất Toyota sẽ cung cấp một ví dụ về cách phá vỡ sự hạn chế trong
chuỗi cung ứng. Taiichi Ohno, cha để của mô hình Hệ Thống Sản Xuất Toyota người đã bị cuốn
hút bởi mô hình cửa hàng thực phẩm hiện đại vào thập niên 60. Và ông đã nghĩ ra một hệ thống
sản xuất theo đó mỗi khi một dealer bán được một chiếc xe, thì ngay lập tức một chiếc xe khác
được bổ xung cho dealer ấy, như cái cách mà các kệ hàng thực phẩm được bổ sụng khi mỗi hộp
ngũ cốc được bán. Theo cách ấy cung và cầu khớp một cách hoàn hảo.
Ý tưởng nghe thì có vẻ đơn giản, nhưng để áp dụng vào thực tế tập đoàn Toyota cần phải sản xuất
ôtô theo từng lô nhỏ-lý tưởng nhất mỗi lô chỉ có một chiếc xe ôtô. Ông Ohno quay sang kỹ sư
Shigeo Shingo và thách thức ông áy có thể giảm thời gian khởi động sản xuất xuống còn khoảng
4 giờ. Một nhóm nghiên cứu đã được thành lập trên ơ sở nghiên cứu so sánh các kinh nghiệm tốt
nhất để giảm thời gian khởi động sản xuất xuống còn khoảng 90 phút.
Nhưng ông Ohno không dừng ở đó, ông thách thức nhóm nghiên cứu làm sao có thể giảm xuống
còn 3 phút. Mục tiêu của ông là phá vỡ hạn chế của việc cản trở sản xuất theo lô nhỏ. Kết quả là
nhóm của ông Shingo đã đạt được mục tiêu và mở ra một cuộc cách mạng về sản xuất đúng-thời-
hạn (just-in-time).
Giống như Toyota ở thập niên 60 và 70, ngày nay các công ty hiệu quả nhất đều đã phá vỡ các
hạn chế hơn là sống chung với nó. Ví dụ tiêu biểu gần đây nhất là trường hợp của tập đoàn máy
tính Dell. Bằng việc loại bỏ nhà bán lẻ trung gian và xây dựng hệ thống bán hàng trực tiếp, Dell
đã phá vỡ sự hạn chế mà đã gây ra nhiều khó khăn cho các công ty máy tính khác: chính là hiệu
ứng bullwhip do bởi việc khác biệt về cầu và dự báo cầu của các kênh phân phối. Dell chỉ giữ tồn
kho của mình dưới ba ngày. Kết quả là, chu kỳ tiền mặt của Dell là âm 37 ngày so với dương 30
đến 60 ngày của các đối thủ khác.
Phân tích sự hoán đổi
Một nguyên tắc quan trọng thứ hai trong quản trị chuỗi cung ứng là các công ty cần phân tích sự
hoán đổi (trade-offs) một cách hợp lý. Bởi chúng ta đang sống trong một thế giới không hoàn
hảo, thậm trí có những chiến lược và chính sách rõ ràng, thì các hoán đổi vẫn tồn tại. Ví dụ, làm
thế nào công ty có thể xử lý tình huống tồn kho tăng cao tại nhà phân phối do doanh số thấp-hơn-
dự báo? Liệu có nên đóng cửa nhà mấy một tuần hay đưa ra chính sách khuyến mãi? Những sự
đánh đổi như vậy sẽ không thấy được nếu chỉ nhìn trên quan điểm của từng bộ phận. Thay vào
đó, các giám đốc của từng bộ phận phải hi sinh các thước đo hiệu quả bộ phận để dự báo các giải
pháp đem lại lợi ích chung tốt nhất cho công ty.
Trong thời kỳ chuỗi cung ứng là của chung nhiều bộ phận, các nhà đổi mới chuỗi cung ứng cần
phải xúc tiến các cuộc họp liên phòng ban để đưa ra các quyết định hoán đổi. Mà thường được đề
cập đến với cái tên lập họp nhằm kế hoạch chung sản xuất và bán hàng (SOP) hay sản xuất, bán
hàng và tồn kho (PSI), những cuộc họp như vậy trở lên rất phổ biến ở nhiều công ty.
Ngày nay các công ty đang nỗ lực mở rộng quy trình ra quyết định chéo ra bên ngoài công ty
thông qua khái niệm lập kế hoạch, dự báo và bổ xung hợp tác (CPFR). Mặc dù không cần thiết
phải có các cuộc họp thường xuyên để thực hiện SOP/PSI, CPFR nỗ lực bảo đảm khách hàng và
nhà cung cấp làm việc trên cùng một giả định và có chung một sự thấu hiểu.
Mặc dù ngày càng có nhiều sự chấp nhận mô hình SOP/PSI và bây giờ là CPFR, phần lớn các
công ty vẫn phải vật lộn để bảo toàn lợi ích vì họ không thể đưa ra một khung chiến lược cần thiết
theo như nguyên tắcđầu tiên. Thay vào đó, họ cố gắng chữa lửa ở cấp độ chiến thuật hơn là chiến
lược.
Các công ty lớn lại đang hướng tới mô hình mà chúng tôi có thể tạm gọi là hoạch định “liên
bang”. Xuất phát từ quan điểm của các nhà theo chủ nghĩa liên bang đã hình thành lên một chính
phủ hợp chủng quốc, mô hình của chúng tôi cũng thấy rằng các thành viên trong một doanh
nghiệp nối dài là những chủ thể độc lập nhưng có những mục tiêu chung. Tuy nhiên, cũng như
các bang liên kết với nhau hình thành lên chính phủ liên hiệp với những lợi ích tương hỗ, các
thành viên trong một doanh nghiệp nối dài có thể hợp tác xung quanh nhưng mục tiêu chung chia
sẻ.
Mô hình hoạch định theo kiểu liên bang không hẳn là một giấc mơ không tưởng mà quên đi các
xung đột hiện hữu giữa các đối tác trong chuỗi cung ứng (như là tối đa hoá cổ tức cho cổ đông).
Thay vì với giả định rằng một doanh nghiệp nối dài có thể tối ưu hoá trên phương diện là một
thực thể duy nhất, thì hoạch định theo kiểu liên bang sẵn sàng chấp nhận tối ưu hoá từng thực thể
độc lập..nhưng không hẳn sẽ gây ra tối ưu hoá cục bộ. Các đối tác trong chuỗi cung ứng có thể
hợp tác để đưa ra các sự đánh đổi và phá vỡ những hạn chế tiềm tàng bên trong một doanh nghiệp
mở rộng.
Ví dụ, Kroger và Unilver – hay Ahold USA và P&G đã thoả thuận chiến lược tái lập lại mạng
lưới phân phối, loại bỏ các kho thừa thãi.
Nguyên tắc thứ ba giúp củng cố vững chắc chuỗi cung ứng là ứng dụng hệ thống thông tin hỗ trợ
chéo các bộ phận chức năng. Giống như hai nguyên tắc đầu, nguyên tắc này tập trung vào dẹp bỏ
quan điểm chia rẽ các bộ phận chức năng ở cả hai cấp độ chiến lược và chiến thuật; đồng thời
giúp liên kết chéo giữa các bộ phận.
Vào đầu thập niên 80, hệ thống thông tin kinh doanh chỉ được thiết kế nhằm hỗ trợ từng bộ phận
trong quá trình ra quyết định. Ví dụ họ cần một hệ thống hoạch định các yêu cầu về phân phối
nhằm tối thiểu hoá chi phí phân phối. Tương tự như thế, họ cũng có hệ thống hoạch định sản xuất
độc lập nhằm tối ưu hoá sản xuất mà không hề liên kết với bộ phận phân phối. Bộ phận mua hàng
thì có quá ít thông tin về sản xuất và nhà cung cấp. Thông thường các hệ thống này được phát
triển độc lập bởi nhà cung cấp phần mềm và nếu có liên kết thì cũng rất lỏng nẻo.
Xuất phát tác động to lớn hiện tương Y2K, buộc các công ty phải nâng cấp hệ thống thông tin của
mình, rất nhiều các công ty lớn trong thập niên đã buộc phải nghĩ lớn hơn. Họ đã bắt đầu ứng
dụng hệ thống ERP (hoạch định nguồn lực doanh nghiệp tổng thể) liên kết và phối hợp giữa các
bộ phận để tối ưu hoá quy trình. Ngày nay, thậm chí các nhà cung cấp phần mềm còn phát triển
rộng hơn hệ thống ERP thành eERP cho phép liên kết với khách hàng và nhà cung cấp qua mạng
internet.
Tuy nhiên với một hệ thống phức tạp và tích hợp như vậy đòi hỏi phải có những bước đi tịnh tiến
hợp lý, song chúng tôi cảm thấy quan ngại vì có quá nhiều công ty xem hệ thống này như một
chiếc hộp đen không thể kiểm soát nổi-một thiết bị chỉ đem lại câu trả lời thông qua một quy trình
mù.
Ví dụ, trong quá trình tư vấn cho một nhà cung cấp thiết bị nhà bếp gần đây, chúng tôi phát hiện
ra rằng công ty này đã đầu tư một hệ thống ERP hiện đại trị giá hàng triệu đô la sắp rơi vào lãng
phí. Giống như nhiều nạn nhân khác, vị khách hàng này đã bị rơi vào cái gọi là những lời hứa quá
mức từ nhà cung cấp phầm mềm rằng hệ thống mới nhất này có thể giúp họ giải quyết các vấn đề
về chuỗi cung ứng.
Thay vì đổ một đống tiền vào hệ thống theo kiểu “cái hộp đen” với một mớ các thuật toán rối
rắm, thì các nhà thực hành chuỗi cung ứng hàng đầu lại chuyển sang các nhà cung cấp phần mềm
thông minh hơn và nhỏ nhắn hơn, như Viewlocity hay Jonova chẳng hạn. Những công ty nhỏ này
đã phát triển những công cụ nhằm hỗ trợ các doanh nghiệp ra quyết định trong toàn chuỗi một
cách toàn diện và cặn kẽ. Theo quan điểm của chúng tôi, việc chia nhỏ các công cụ có tính chiến
thuật là câu trả lời tốt nhất trước khi phát triển một hệ thống phức tạp.
Và khách hàng mong đợi gì
Mặc dầu nhiều công ty đã đạt được những thành công nổi bất với việc chỉ đơn giản đi theo các
nguyên tắc cơ bản trên, song nhiều thách thức vẫn đang ở phía trước.
Sự ra đời của các công ty dot-com đã nâng cao yêu cầu của khách hàng về giao hàng nhanh, và
internet tiếp tục là mảnh đất thay đổi cơ bản hành vi của khách hàng. Các nhà sản xuất truyền
thống như là IBM hay Lucent đã phải theo đuổi chiến lược thuê ngoài nằm theo kịp với các đổi
thủ thông minh như Dell hay Cisco System. Cạnh tranh từ các quốc gia mới nổi như Trung Quốc
và Việt Nam đã đặt nhiều áp lực lên chuỗi cung ứng. Những sự hạn chế sẽ tiếp tục bị phá vỡ bởi
các nhà sáng tạo trong chuỗi cung ứng, nhưng những hạn chế mới lại tiếp tục sinh sôi nảy nở, là
cơ ợôi cho những thế hệ của các nhà đổi mới tiếp theo. Hãy đợi đấy.

Vietkha/Kurt Binh (dịch từ Business+Strategy)

============

Vietnam: Rise of the New Fast Food Nation

As Vietnam enjoys unprecedented economic growth, its people have
discovered a taste for high-calorie, high-fat, Westernised food - and are
beginning to suffer the consequences.
by Jeremy Laurance

Outside the Rex hotel in the centre of Saigon - the name by which most residents still refer to Ho
Chi Minh City - the evening rush hour is a scene of motorised pandemonium. Tens of thousands
of scooters sweep along the six-lane highways, blithely ignoring the rules of the road, like herds
of migrating wildebeest across the Serengeti plains.
As darkness falls, clusters of tiny plastic tables and stools spread
across the pavements - improvised street-side restaurants to feed the
armies of office workers. The acrid smell of pigs' trotters seared overThe public health
charcoal braziers beside pans of meat bubbling on spirit burners fills message was to eat
the humid night air. less and exercise
The transformation of this war-ravaged rural economy into a booming more but this was
industrial power is happening at astonishing speed. Ten years ago, the hard to get across
bicycle was the dominant mode of transport. Now it is the motor to people raised in
scooter. Back then crisps, cola and ice-cream were novelties and fast- the shadow of
food restaurants featured only in Western magazines. Now they are
hunger.
part of the everyday scene. Vietnam, like its neighbour China to the
north, is experiencing double-digit economic growth. Cranes festoon
the skyline, factories complain of a shortage of labour - 20,000 extra
workers are needed in the south of the country - and people are being Dr Anil Kapur, vice-
drawn in growing numbers from the country to the towns. president, World
But progress has a price. Across the Far East, growing urbanisation, Diabetes Foundation
rapid industrialisation and increasing obesity associated with decreased physical activity is
fuelling an epidemic that has killed as many as AIDS but has received a fraction of the attention.
The disease is diabetes, and its incidence is accelerating around the world. From 170 million
affected in 2000, doctors predict the total will rise to 370 million by 2025, leading to an epidemic
of amputations and blindness, the two commonest effects of the condition. Developing nations
will be hardest hit; they bear 90 per cent of the burden but have only 10 per cent of the resources
to deal with it.
Professor Pierre Lefebvre, president of the World Diabetes Foundation (WDF), told an
international conference in Hanoi last week that there was a worldwide explosion in the disease.
"If we do not change this we face a catastrophe. It is called the tsunami disease. We know it is
coming and it will come if we do not do something to prevent it." On the streets of Hanoi and Ho
Chi Minh City, fast-food chains such as Kentucky Fried Chicken are starting to appear, alongside
the snack bars, cake shops and mobile food carts catering for the worker on the move.
Traditional dishes that have sustained people over generations are disappearing, to be replaced
by Western-style cooking that uses more fat, salt, sugar, oil and meat. Ordinary restaurants now
offer a special version of the standard Pho Ga - chicken noodle soup - aimed at more affluent
office workers that contains 22 per cent more calories than the basic dish.
The casualties of the trend can be seen in hospitals around the country. Squatting on an iron
bedstead covered with a thin straw mat, Le Quang Can, aged 58, is unaware of the threat the
disease poses to his life.
He arrived at the endocrinology clinic in Thanh Hoa province in northern Vietnam, 90 miles south
of Hanoi, at 7 am for a routine test. He has unexpectedly been kept in for observation because
his blood sugar level is sky high, and he could slip into a coma at any moment.
A retired soldier with six children, Mr Can waits for the insulin with which he has been injected to
bring his blood glucose level down. He wears a woolly hat and blue pyjamas against the cold - it
is winter in north Vietnam and a chill wind is blowing down from China. He and his wife work in
the rice fields and the doctor will later warn him that unless he controls his diet he could end up a
blind amputee, dependent on his family. Outside, scores of patients wait patiently on the steps
under the corrugated iron roof for the results of tests carried out in the morning. The clinic, funded
by the WDF, sees 130 diabetes patients a day in this provincial town, one of the poorest in
Vietnam, and the scale of the need it has uncovered has persuaded the government to set up
similar clinics across the country.
Diabetes is a chronic disease which first disables its victims and then slowly kills them. An
estimated global total of 2.9 million deaths, equivalent to the number killed by AIDS, were
attributable to the disease in 2000, according to a study in Diabetes Care published in May 2005.
The most striking thing about the patients at the Thanh Hoa clinic is how few of them are fat. In
the West, obesity is the chief driver of the epidemic - the Royal College of Paediatrics and Child
Health has just released a new report showing that soaring levels of obesity among children in
the UK are sparking a crisis of diabetes in under-16s. But Mr Can is lean and spry as are most of
the other patients. Doctors do not know why Asians are more prone to the disease. One theory is
that because of their slighter build, compared with Westerners, they have less muscle bulk and
more fat, so do not need to gain much weight to put themselves at risk. Malnourishment in
infancy or in the womb, which is known to increase the risk of diabetes, may also play a part.
Seven out of 10 of the worst affected nations by the disease are in Asia. India already has a total
of 31 million cases, the highest in the world, closely followed by China with 20 million. The Far
East is expected to see the fastest growth by 2025, with a near doubling in the current total of 81
million cases to 156 million.
Becoming blind or losing a limb is a huge problem anywhere but in the developing world it is a
disaster. In India, 45,000 amputations are carried out a year because of diabetes, all of them
unnecessary with the correct care, according to Anil Kapur, vice-president of the WDF.
"We are faced with a diabetes pandemic," Dr Kapur said. But the world only recognised infectious
diseases as a threat. Of the $2.9bn (£2bn) given in overseas aid for health in 2002, just 0.1 per
cent was allocated to chronic diseases including diabetes, he said.
The road to Thanh Hoa from Hanoi passes small village stores selling crisps, ice-cream and soft
drinks, which are often cheaper than water. It is thronged with scooters but is free of the children -
who once walked beside it to school - they now travel by bus. The disappearance of traditional
diets and lifestyles and their replacement with junk foods and motor transport are believed to be
behind the growth in the disease.
"As the economy grows, lifestyle and eating patterns change," Dr Kapur said.
The public health message was to eat less and exercise more but this was hard to get across to
people raised in the shadow of hunger, he added. Mothers are being urged to feed up their
infants but then to curb the appetites of their adolescent children. Social custom, Dr Kapur
explained, dictated that when food was available it should not be restricted. "Often in our society
being overweight is seen as a sign of prosperity and good health. If you are well off you must
have a paunch," said Dr Kapur. Only half of people with diabetes are diagnosed, the remainder
living in ignorance of their condition often until it is too late and they suffer irreversible side
effects. Yet even those who find their way into care are poorly managed.
Three studies of diabetes care in Asia, covering 45,000 patients, found one- third had kidney
damage, while a similar proportion had damage to the nerves in their feet and a smaller number
were developing eye damage. Only one patient in five was properly controlled.
"Care is inadequate, complications are common. There is an increased economic burden on
society, on the family and on the individual. Those who believe treating diabetes is expensive
should change their opinion. Not treating it is very expensive," Dr Kapur said.
The food companies exacerbate the problem with sales techniques such as mini-sizing,
according to Gauden Galea, regional adviser for the World Health Organisation. Mini-sizing -
selling soft drinks and fast foods in miniature portions - is a growing practice in the region. While
the food companies argue they are offering customers a low cost option, Dr Galea claims it is a
cynical way of boosting their business.
"They are sowing a taste for fast food by inveigling their way into people's eating habits. As
people become more affluent they move from mini size to super size." But Dr Galea says the
global trend towards increasing weight, which is fuelling the pandemic of diabetes, can be halted.
Successful public health projects were carried out in Da Qing, China, a decade ago based on
intensive education on diet and exercise, which led to a 47 per cent reduction in the incidence of
diabetes over six years. Similar projects in the United States, Finland and India achieved
comparable results.
"These projects demonstrate very conclusively that you can delay or prevent diabetes with only
minor reductions in weight," Dr Galea said. The challenge, he added, was to ensure that the care
given to Mr Can could be delivered across the Far East.
© 2006 Independent News and Media Limited
###

8 Steps to Creating a Simple Business Plan for 2009 Subscribe FREE to

© Herman Drost Marketing Tips
Newsletter
Your business plan is like a road map to long-term success. Please enter your e-
Have you ever been in a situation where you didn't have a map mail address below to
to find your destination and got lost wasting precious time and receive original in-depth
money? Well, the same can happen to your business if you Marketing Articles every
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Submit
Why you need a business plan.

It gives you a clear direction where your business is heading. NEW Ebook
Many business owners just jump into creating a business 101 Highly Effective
without researching and making a concrete plan. Strategies to Promote
Inevitably, they soon find that they are out of money and Your Web Site
have no time or clear strategies how to market their business.

Here are 8 simple steps to creating your own business plan

(this is by no means a comprehensive plan but a primer to get you
started):

1. Name of your business - create a name or reevaluate the name

of your business. Does it integrate well with what you are
selling? Is it easy to spell and remember? Is it a name that can
be well branded over time?

2. Vision - what will your business look like 5 years from now?
Think of how you may want to expand it to include other branches
or extra employees.
Hosting from $30/year
3. Mission statement - this defines what your business really
does, what activities it performs and what is unique about it
that stands out from your competitors.

4. Goals and objectives - clearly define what you want to

achieve with your business. Make sure they are quantifiable and
set to specific time lines. Set specific goals for each of your
products or services.

5. Strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, threats (SWOT) - by

analyzing these characteristics in your business, you will get a
clearer idea of what it will take for you to not only to survive
but also prosper.

This could include such factors as:

- your companies own changing industry

- the marketplace which may change due to social and economic
conditions.
- competition which may create new threats and/or opportunities.
- new technologies which may cause you to change products or the
process
in how you do things.

Evaluating your SWOT will help you to:

- build on your strengths

- resolve your weaknesses
- exploit opportunities
- avoid threats

Doing this analysis will help you create a more realistic

strategic action plan.

6. Strategic action plan - this is the most critical step of

your business plan, because without it, your business will not
get off the ground. This should include your sales and marketing
strategies.

Rread How to create your web site marketing plan

7. Financial plan - a business can operate without budgets, but

it is clearly good business practice to include it. With budgets, you will be
more likely to achieve your business objectives, you will make
more-reasoned decisions and you will have better control of your
cash flow.

For any period, a cash flow statement would include:

- The cash and credit sales (or accounts receivable) expected to be
received during the period.
- The anticipated cash payments (for example, expenses for purchases,
salaries, utility charges, taxes, office expenses etc.)
- A description of other incoming and outgoing cash, with a calculation
of the overall cash balance.
This will assess how much money is on hand to meet your
financial obligations - what cash has been received and what has
been paid out. Knowledge of this cash flow cycle will help you
predict when you will receive funds and when you will be
required to make a payment.

8. Measuring and evaluation - you wrote your business plan and

set the goals with the intent of achieving them. So now break
them down into measurable pieces and monitor the results
regularly. A plan that cannot be measured is almost always
destined for failure. Celebrate your wins and recharge yourself
to accomplish your next goal.

Decide beforehand what constitutes a real serious loss and what

loss will be acceptable.

If you find your goals are unrealistic and unattainable, adjust

them, but realize that it takes hard work to achieve them, so
don't give up easily.

Conclusion:
Now that you have a business plan, make it a part of
you by knowing and understanding it clearly. Build upon it
continuously and refer to it often, so you remain on track to
building a profitable business.

Resources

Small business association -

http://www.sba.gov/starting/indexbusplans.html

Download a free business plan template:

http://www.business-planware.com/freepln7.zip

Sample business plans

http://www.mplans.com/spm

Online business planner -

http://www.planware.org/strategicplanner.htm
==================================================
Herman Drost is the author of the popular ebook
"101 Highly Effective Strategies to Promote Your Web Site"
a powerful guide for attracting 1000s of visitors to your web site.

Subscribe to his “Marketing Tips” newsletter for more original

articles at: subscribe@isitebuild.com. Read more of his
in-depth articles at: www.isitebuild.com/articles

This is an outline of a complete business plan:

Summary
Business concept
Current situation
Key success factors
Financial situation/needs
Vision
Vision statement
Milestones
Market analysis
The overall market
Changes in the market
Market segments
Target market and customers
Customer characteristics
Customer needs
Customer buying decisions
Competitive analysis
Industry overview
Nature of competition
Changes in the industry
Primary competitors
Competitive products/services
Opportunities
Threats and risks
Strategy
Key competitive capabilities
Key competitive weaknesses
Strategy
Implementing strategy
Products/services
Product/service description
Positioning of products/services
Competitive evaluation of products/services
Future products/services
Marketing and sales
Marketing strategy
Sales tactics
Advertising
Promotions/incentives
Publicity
Trade shows
Operations
Key personnel
Organizational structure
Human resources plan
Product/service delivery
Customer service/support
Facilities
Creating the financials of the business plan
Assumptions and comments
Starting balance sheet
Profit-and-loss projection
Cash flow projection
Balance sheet projection
Ratios and analyses

A Plan for All Seasons

By David E. Gumpert | Oct 24, 1999

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Inc. Newsletter

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Inspiring profiles and best practices for savvy business owners.
In Chapter 1 of the book How to Really Create a Successful Business Plan, author David E. Gumpert suggests that a carefully
crafted business plan isn't useful just for getting start-up financing, but can be an important sales tool for the life of the business.

How does a business plan sell the business? By allowing the business to exploit the opportunities that arise in the life of a business
from start-up to maturity--and are essential to achieve success. A written business plan becomes your company's representative,
much as a salesperson or executive serves as its representative during sales and conference presentations and meetings. Here are
some of the main ways in which a business plan can serve your company:

1. Obtaining bank financing

For most banks, it's usually enough that an applicant provide past and current financial statements to get a formal
hearing for a loan. But in today's world, just getting a hearing isn't enough. Because more companies are seeking bank
financing than banks have money available, only those businesses that make the best case will receive funds.

A business plan helps set you apart from the crowd. I've had any number of bankers tell me that while their banks don't
require business plans, companies that submit plans immeasurably improve their chances of getting the funds they
seek.

Keep in mind that bankers are nervous, averse to risk. A written business plan carries an important message even
before it's read: it says the company's executives are serious enough to do formal planning. That's an important
message because bankers believe that those individuals who plan are better risks than those who don't, and more
deserving of bank funds.

2. Seeking investment funds

Venture capitalists and other investors require a business plan from any company that wants to be taken seriously for
funding. It's the first thing most ask for, much as a personnel manager asks job applicants for a resumé . Investors use
business plans as a screening device, looking to be turned on to a business with significant growth potential. When
something catches their eye, they read more carefully and, if they are still intrigued, they will come back to the
executives for further discussion.

3. Arranging strategic alliances

Strategic alliances are arrangements between large and small companies to carry out joint research, marketing, and
other activities. They have become more common in the last few years. For small companies, arranging a strategic
alliance with a large company can mean gaining access to important financial, distribution, and other resources. But
before a large company will even consider a strategic alliance, its executives will want to examine a smaller company's
business plan.

4. Obtaining large contracts

Smaller companies seeking to obtain a large chunk of business from a major corporation can encounter a common
obstacle. It comes when the corporate representative says something like: "Everyone knows who we are, but very few
people know who you are. More important, we don't know whether you'll be around long enough to fill all the
obligations we expect for the big bucks we'll be paying you." At this point, producing a business plan can go a long way
toward reassuring a corporation.
 5. Attracting key employees

For a smaller company going after a top-notch executive, there's usually a two-way due diligence process going on. The
company wants to be sure the executive is as good as presented and the executive wants to be sure the company is right
for his or her talents. A business plan can save a lot of conversation, besides instilling the necessary confidence to snare
that hotshot.

6. Completing mergers and acquisitions

Whether you want to sell your company or acquire another one, a business plan can go a long way toward helping you
stand out from the crowd. And in today's frenzied merger/acquisition world, that can be very important. When you go
to sell your company, you'll be scrutinized by potential buyers who are looking at many companies. One large chemical
firm looked at more than 200 companies in its search for a small specialty chemical business to acquire. When it found
a company that looked solid, its business plan helped seal the deal.

This material was excerpted from Chapter 1 of How to Really Create a Successful Business Plan by David E. Gumpert.

Executive Summary as a Guiding Light

A good executive summary is hard to write. It should present your entire business plan in miniature.

By David E. Gumpert | Oct 24, 2000

Inc. Newsletter

Inc.'s Small Business Success Newsletter

Inspiring profiles and best practices for savvy business owners.

There's no one right way to go about writing a plan. One of the most effective approaches I've discovered is to begin by writing an
executive summary.

Certainly the most significant part of any business plan is its executive summary. So vital is a good executive summary to a
business plan that I'm tempted to wax eloquent about its literary merit.

What is an executive summary? Probably the best way to begin defining it is to explain what it isn't.

The executive summary is not an abstract of the business plan.

The executive summary is not an introduction to the business plan.

The executive summary is not a preface.

The executive summary is not a random collection of highlights.

Rather, the executive summary is the business plan in miniature. The executive summary should stand alone, almost as a kind of
business plan within the business plan. It should be logical, clear, interesting -- and exciting. A reader should be able to read
through it in four or five minutes and understand what makes your business tick. After reading your executive summary, a reader
should be prompted to say, "So that's what those people are up to."

The executive summary should be no more than two pages long. The farther it goes past that point, the less it qualifies as an
effective executive summary.

If capturing an entire business in two pages or less sounds like a tall order, it is. In fact, it is probably the most difficult part of the
plan to write.

That's because it's usually more difficult to write concisely than it is to write at length. I believe that problem stems from our
schools, where students are typically encouraged to write reports that are as long as possible.

The executive summary should serve several purposes, both for you and for readers of the business plan. For you, it should
accomplish the following:

1. Crystallize your thoughts.

Since the executive summary is the business plan in miniature, it contains the plan's highlights, its key points. To write an executive summary, focus
on the issues that are most important to your business's success -- past and future -- and set aside those matters that are tangential.

2. Set priorities.
The executive summary, like the business plan, should be organized according to the items' order of importance. Writing it forces you to pick and
choose from among the many points you want to make in the business plan and decide on their order of importance.

3. Provide the foundation of the full plan.

Once you've written a version of the executive summary, you've made the process of writing the plan much easier. Suddenly, you've provided yourself
with a takeoff point for each section of the plan. The four or five sentences that summarize the means of making the product or providing the service
give you the basis for that section of the plan. As we all know, it's much easier to begin writing with something on the page than it is to begin with a
blank page.

For readers of your business plan, the executive summary is usually the first stop in the reading process. (This assumes that the
executive summary is at the very beginning of the plan and that the reader goes from front to back. You can control the former, but
not the latter. Some investors, for instance, turn first to the founders' ré sumé s and others to the marketing section.) In any case,
from the readers' perspective, your executive summary should have the following attributes:

1. Capture others' attention and imagination.

This is particularly important if you want your plan to help you get a bank loan or attract investment funds. But any reader should be intrigued with
your executive summary. It intrigues readers most by conveying your commitment to -- and excitement about -- the business.

2. Make readers want to read more.

Because bankers, investors, and financial types have more business plans to read than they have time for, they have to decide easily and quickly which
ones to analyze carefully. The executive summary helps them make that decision. Thus, if you hope to obtain financing from the plan, the executive
summary has to keep the banker or investor interested. Otherwise, that person will not go further in the plan.

3. Convey the flavor of the rest of the plan.

Readers should have a good feeling about your business and what the rest of the plan will cover. The executive summary must succeed in capturing
the enthusiasm and energy that resonate through the plan as a whole.

This material was excerpted from Chapter 4 of How to Really Create a Successful Business Plan by David E. Gumpert.

Business planning is a favorite subject of mine. In the seven years since founding Net Daemons Associates, I've learned a lot about
planning. In the same seven years, I've spanned the scale from way too little planning to way too much of it.

NDA began nearly as an accident. A good idea, the right timing, easy to launch - so who needed a plan? A large-company spinoff,
NDA was founded to provide computer-consulting networking services to companies that either didn't have an in-house staff or
needed to augment their staff. Because a recession was on and because NDA's former parent was strong, we had a lot of ready-
made business. Recessions are great for contractors, and existing contracts from people we knew didn't hurt either.

NDA, in short, was a no-brainer. Our "no-plan plan" was us just trying things out to see how they worked. It was a few years before
we determined that, yes, things were working, and it was right before our second managers' meeting that we wrote our first plan.
The genesis was an off-site gathering, when our managers said, "You know, it would be so much easier to focus on strategy if we
had a plan." It's embarrassing and almost shameful to say this caused lightbulbs to go off, but it did!

Always a First Time

Our first plan was based on a planning software package, full of big sections for which we had no use. But the package gave us a
structure and enabled us to organize our thoughts, which is what we really needed. By that time, the laissez-faire landscape of our
early days had given way to rapid growth: revenue more than quadrupled, causing us to mutate from a two-person to a 15-person
firm - all of whom wanted to know what to expect in the future. For us to tell them, we needed to know what we expected. Hence, a
plan.

Over time, putting together and then revising the plan, first by our management and then by our employees, became an annual
ritual. After the reviews, we made changes, and the result was our strategic plan for the year ahead. Based on that strategic plan,
we could create a budget, an operations plan, department plans, and spending plans. Since everyone knew about the plan and had
a say in it, it was easy to get support for management's objectives.

Each quarter, we managers give financial reports to the company, detailing our progress to date. Not only is this process useful,
but it helps to keep the entire company focused and provides pieces for everyone to address.

Before having any plan at all, we didn't know if we were performing under, at, or above an expected level. With a plan, we know
where we stand and where we need to be more or less focused. Without a measuring stick, it's hard to measure.

Not Too Hot, Not Too Cold

For entrepreneurs who don't have a plan, it's OK! But don't just wash your hands of it. In the early days, when NDA had a "no-plan
plan," that might have been too little. Now that we have many plans, perhaps that is too much: we need to make sure that planning
doesn't overtake performance.

In other words, entrepreneurs need a just-right plan, one that's not too hot, not too cold. That means if you aren't sure of your
goal, particularly at the beginning, it's OK not to have a road map. I think you can do a lot with a company prior to working from a
formal plan - but there isn't any guarantee that you couldn't have done more by starting with one.

A lot of planning comes down to how you think, a personal preference for order and its priority in your mind and in your life.
While a plan can make order from chaos, it can also restrict it. And in the Lawton view of the world,you need some level of chaos
to recognize opportunity.

Having Your Plan and Your Chaos Too

Against the backdrop of an entrepreneur's need for both chaos and a stick against which to measure it, I have some firm thoughts
about business planning.

1. Timing Is Critical
There's a right time and a wrong time for planning. Overplanning up front can sometimes put the focus on the wrong area at the expense of the right
area. Some companies can get by without ever having a plan, and that's fine. On the other hand, if you feel that a lot is out of control and you don't
know whether you are doing well or not, it's time for a plan.

2. Trust Your Gut

Consider your comfort level. If a plan would help you sleep better at night and stop eating Tums like they were M&Ms, you probably need a plan.

3. It's Never Too Late

If you think you're late in the game, think instead about all the data from which you can now draw. Never look at the process as "too little, too late."
Look at it as a way to uncover untapped opportunities.

4. Personalize Your Plan

One entrepreneur's plan is another's disaster. Our software package notwithstanding, there isn't any real formula. At NDA, we're partial to logic and
 readability; our plan is open, clear, concise, witty, and easy to take in. Use the format that works for you. If it doesn't look like your CEO friend's plan,
don't worry. It's your tool, for use in your company.

5. The Audience Matters

At this point, alarms should be going off. While your inside plan can be anything you want it to be - on purple paper with pink polka dots - a plan
meant for outsiders needs to adhere to the expectations of the external audience. In particular, if your plan is for fund-raising, spend some time with
venture capitalists, angels, and bankers to understand what they look for. Listen carefully: what they're telling you is truly what they want to see. With
investors, show your creativity through knowledge and skillful presentation.

6. Spread the Wealth

Share your plan with as many entrepreneurs as you feel comfortable with. Help them with their plans, and have them help you with yours. Some of
the best ideas come from others in unexpected ways. Our advisory board was helpful in getting our plan into a workable form. One member in
particular hammered me every five minutes with the question, "What is your goal?" NDA is an amalgam of great ideas borrowed from others. I firmly
believe that no one person knows all there is to know about anything.

I learned somewhere that you need to have data before you can draw conclusions. And then, another time, I learned that there are
no problems or solutions, only challenges and opportunities. Planning embraces both of these adages.

Embrace the challenge of planning to take advantage of the many opportunities that are just outside your door.

Jennifer Lawton is senior vice president of consulting and technology at Interliant Inc., an Internet hosting company formerly
called Sage Networks Inc. She also serves as vice president of strategic relations on the board of the Young Entrepreneurs
Organization. Previously, Lawton was CEO of Net Daemons Associates Inc., a computer-networking and consulting firm that
she cofounded in 1991.

The Bulletproof Business Plan

How to bulletproof your business plan during a slumping economy.

By Emily Barker | Oct 1, 2001

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The Inc M.B.A.

It's straight-shooter time in the search for investors. No fluff. No dodges.

In January 2000, when Patricia Adams started looking for outside funding, she put together a business plan that was just 15 pages
long. The CEO of College Capital, a two-year-old business based in Scottsdale, Ariz., knew what investors were looking for: "a
short, quick, fast read explaining what [the business] is and explaining how much money you want," Adams says. What she herself
needed was $1 million to move her college-preparation services onto the Internet.
Two months after Adams started sending out her business plan to venture capitalists and angels, the Internet bubble popped, and
suddenly investors were guarding their checkbooks more closely. In the end it took Adams a year and a half to find the money. By
then, summer 2001, her business plan filled two three-inch binders. "It's a little bit of overkill," Adams admits.

CEO PATRICIA ADAMS: When the market changed, so did her business plan -- drastically.

Indeed, 25 pages is a more typical length for business plans, even now. Still, the business plan that impresses investors today is a
very different beast from the one that pulled in the dough two short years ago. These days it's back to basics with a vengeance. So
what makes a business plan truly bulletproof at a time when the air seems to be thick with bullets? Here's our take on the "new"
fundamentals.

The Executive Summary

Investors are looking for a clear, solid business model that makes a profit or will make one soon. So among other things, you need
to describe the business in an understandable fashion.

That was the advice that Donald Spero, director of the Dingman Center for Entrepreneurship, at the University of Maryland at
College Park, gave Chesapeake PERL. The first time he read its plan's executive summary, he thought it was too technical -- not an
uncommon problem. So Chesapeake president Terry Chase revised the summary, rinsing out the jargon and using much simpler
language: "Our manufacturing system changes simple insect larvae into efficient mini-bioreactors that produce recombinant
proteins at both high quality and low cost."

"It tells you something about what they do even if you don't understand what a recombinant protein is," says Spero. "Second thing,
she explains that this can reduce the time by a lot and the cost by maybe an order of magnitude to produce stuff that sells for
between $1,000 and $3,000 per gram. That's a way of saying there are good gross margins in this business."

The Market Analysis

Simply citing a study about total market size from Gartner or Jupiter Media Metrix "isn't very compelling to investors today," says
Brad Weirick, partner and chair of emerging technologies at Gibson, Dunn & Crutcher, who works with many West Coast start-
ups. "They've seen the same glowing reports for every company they've funded, and yet a lot of investors are having problems with
those companies."

Instead, talk about your competitors in detail in your business plan: identify direct, indirect, and even potential competitors and
describe their offerings, their percentage of the market, their funding, and their pricing, distribution, and promotion strategies.
Most important, the plan should be crystal clear about how your own offering is different and why it gives customers a better
value.

Some evidence that customers will buy your product -- and buy it at the price you're charging -- is essential in a business plan
today. Take the plan of a former General Motors engineer who went to angel Carl Meyering recently looking for funding to
produce a new electronic monitoring device to protect battered spouses. Though the engineer's business was promising, Meyering
didn't agree to fund it until the entrepreneur secured a $250,000 order from an Ohio court system.

If start-up founders can't produce full-fledged paying customers, they might do well to provide information on beta customers,
who have used a test version of the product. Results from focus groups made up of potential customers can also provide some
proof of demand.

Finally, when it comes to sales and distribution, entrepreneurs shouldn't rely on an if-you-build-it-they-will-come model any
longer, cautions Kathy Elliott of the Boston angel group Renaissance Partners. Today a business plan should include information
about the industry's principal distribution channels and typical sales cycles and a well-thought-out -- if possible, proven -- model
for the company's own sales and distribution. Elliott cites the example of one start-up that recently won over Renaissance after
switching its plans from hiring an expensive sales force to using already established value-added resellers.
One model that angel and venture capitalist Patty Abramson of Women's Growth Capital Fund and WomenAngels.net, in
Washington, D.C., likes to see is sales and distribution partnerships with larger, more established companies. They bump up a
young business's credibility, she says, not just with investors but also with customers

The Path to an Established Brand Name

ven.vn - 24/12/2007

Establishing Vietnamese Brand Names: Identities Create

A workshop entitled, "

Different Value", was held on December 1 in Hanoi, under the direction of the Vietnam Investment Review,
the Richard Moore Associates and the Vietnam Youth Trade Promotion Joint

Stock Company. The workshop was to provide information and experience for the Vietnamese business community, regarding
establishment, development and preservation of brand names.

Mr. Richard Moore

At the workshop, most experts discussed the establishment and development of brand names, as well as branding problems for enterprises.
Deputy Minister of Planning and Investment, Truong Van Doan, said that there are about 300,000 enterprises in
Vietnam and it is expected that the number will increase to 500,000 by 2010 . The rapid development of enterprises in all economic sectors has
contributed to boosting the economic growth. However, most Vietnamese enterprises are medium, small and very small-sized and are weak regarding
finance and competitiveness, particularly in foreign markets. To overcome the challenge and to grow post-WTO ( World Trade
Organization), there is a dire need for Vietnamese enterprises to establish brand names.

Workshop attendees understand the need for enterprises to gain recognition of their brand names

Richard Moore, a branding expert, presented an itinerary to establish a brand name. He said that this is the right time for Vietnamese
enterprises to reach an international level of branding and that consumers have a growing feeling of the great impacts of communications on sales of
any product or any company. The most important thing for enterprises during the process of branding is to create identities for their brand names. In
addition, to enjoy a branding success, they must become consistent with their marketing and communications strategies.

Actually, Vietnam is unlike most other free and developed markets where marketing people and traders influence and lead consumers to some
expectations by carefully and consistently using their images. Most Vietnamese marketing people have not really caught up with
these kills, while consumers have an increasing demand for the quality of images. Experts said that now that Vietnam is a member of the WTO, there
is a serious challenge for the Vietnamese trade sector.

Richard Moore said that to establish a brand name, Vietnamese enterprises first need to build a strategic foundation and use it as a
criterion for the development of brand names and logos regarding color, font and format. These are essential factors for establishing identities of a
brand name. The branding criteria must be followed during the process of using a core identification system for marketing via means of
communications. Without this core identification system, enterprises will not see any positive outcome even in the event that they have produced eye-
catching marketing materials.

An established brand name will stay in customer's mind. Once an enterprise carves a niche for its brand name, it will gain an advantage over the
rivals. With this in mind, Richard Moore said that an overall and thorough brand identity program will help concentrate communications-
marketing activities to establish a favorite brand in the market. Successful enterprises have managed brand identities like other marketing advantages,
which are all important for branding. In Vietnam, because most budget for communications-marketing activity has not been used effectively
due to a dearth of an overall branding combination system, there are not many Vietnamese big-name companies that have gained worldwide
recognition and have carved a niche in the eyes of international consumers.

Richard Moore also said that before establishing identities for their brands and gaining recognition among consumers, enterprises need
to register their brand names to avoid potential legal collision. Regarding marketing abroad, Vietnamese enterprises need to register their brand
names in those markets where they plan to step in./.

Vietnamese Brands Seek Worldwide Recognition

ven.vn - 12/03/2008
On his recent visit to Vietnam he spoke to Vietnamese people about branding. He said that building and strengthening a brand name requires a
systematic approach and long-term strategy and this is needed if a company wants to establish a position for itself in the domestic or international
market.

Professor John Quelch, Senior Associate Dean of Harvard Business School,

was straightforward and enthusiastic during a recent interview in Vietnam. He has been called a marketing and branding wizard and has studied
emerging markets, including Vietnam, for many years.

What can a company do to establish a strong brand?

First one needs to be aware of what consumers want. Companies need to understand their customer base and develop products for them. When
purchases increase and customers increasingly trust a brand name, one could say that it is 'getting established'. Very few companies have
established a brand name without first understanding their customers.

How do you think Vietnamese brands are doing?

The Vietnamese economy has been developing very rapidly and many companies have been both dynamic and creative. But, even
though there are some 300,000 companies in Vietnam, most small to medium in size, Vietnamese brands are rarely seen overseas. Many

Vietnamese brand-name products have gone under because most Vietnamese companies focus on establishing a brand name, but then
they do not pay attention to product quality.

What are you advising companies to do?

I tell business managers that they need to know what goes on inside their business, and what customers think of their products. I've been told by
some Vietnamese businesspeople that they feel that a brand name becomes old, not modern, after a period of time, and they care less about that
brand over time. If the company does not promote its brands in the marketplace, customers may be lured away and the brand will in effect be less
competitive.

Now that Vietnam is a member of the World Trade Organization (WTO), Vietnamese entrepreneurs feel optimistic but they're
also worried. What would you say to them?

My view is optimistic, not because Vietnam is a member of the WTO but because of the potential for market growth here, your enthusiasm for doing
business and your willingness to take risks. WTO membership will increase investor interest in Vietnam. This will benefit local businesses but it also
means the arrival of foreign businesses which will compete directly with them. Just to survive, Vietnamese companies need to improve production
practices and add value to their products to protect their market share and brands. Companies should plan for the future and not assume that if things
are good today they will be fine tomorrow. Companies must make the effort to protect themselves and prepare for different contingencies. They do
need to appreciate and take care of the customers they now have. Unfounded, irrational worry is to be avoided because it leads to unsound decisions
and mistakes.

If Vietnamese companies could compete in overseas markets, their position in the domestic market would be strengthened. With this in
mind and to gain worldwide recognition, Vietnamese companies should try to get listed on US and EU securities markets rather than securities
markets in Asia. It is expected that brand names of Indian and Chinese products will become well known in the next five years and that some
Vietnamese brands will gain worldwide recognition in 10 years./.
REFERENCES
http://www.inc.com/articles/2000/04/18470.html
http://www.inc.com/structuring-a-business-plan
 Chiến lược xây dựng thương hiệu
Đỗ Hòa Marketingchienluoc.com.
Hai gợi ý về định hướng chiến lược xây dựng thương hiệu.
Thương hiệu & định vị
Trong khuôn khổ bài viết nầy tôi xin bàn với các bạn một số cách tiếp cận phổ biến nhất
trong chiến lược xây dựng thương hiệu của doanh nghiệp.

1.Chiến lược thương hiệu dẫn dắt chiến lược sản phẩm.
Với chiến lược nầy, thương hiệu luôn luôn đi đầu. Người ta tạo ra sức mạnh cho thương
hiệu thông qua một chiến lược truyền thông đầy tham vọng nhằm mục đích nhanh chóng
chiếm được một định vị đã được tính toán trước cho thương hiệu với thứ tự nhận biết cao,
những giá trị, thuộc tính và hình ảnh thương hiệu theo ý đồ đã vạch ra từ trước. Sản phẩm
và giá được phát triển và xác định dựa trên chiến lược thương hiệu, hay nói một cách
khác là dựa trên vị trí mà thương hiệu đã tạo dựng được.
Về mặt tổ chức bộ máy, bộ phận phụ trách brand đứng cao hơn hoặc ngang hàng với bộ
phận marketing.

Điểm mạnh:
- Điểm mạnh rõ rệt nhất của chiến lược nầy là tốc độ thâm nhập thị trường nhah chóng
của nó. Nó có thể đưa một thương hiệu mới vào vị trí top 3, top 5 trong một thời gian chỉ
vài tháng thông qua một chiến lược truyền thông dội bom.
- Hỗ trợ tốt cho kế họach thâm nhập thị trường, phát triển kênh phân phối.
- Nhanh chóng tao ra giá trị cộng thêm cho sản phẩm và giá trị thương hiệu.
- Thích hợp cho một chiến lược giá cao cấp nhờ vào các họat động truyền thông ATL.

Điểm yếu:
Tuy nhiên, nó cũng là một chiến lược đầy rủi ro do những yếu tố sau đây:
- Đòi hỏi một ngân sách marketing khổng lồ. Nếu không đáp ừng đủ, sẽ không đạt hiệu
quả và có thể thương hiệu ấy sẽ chết yểu.
- Đòi hỏi sự phối hợp nhịp nhàng, chặc chẽ trong việc triển khai kế họach marketing. Các
kế họach liên quan như kế họach bán hàng, kế họach cung ứng và kho vận, kế họach phát
triển kênh phân phối, kế họach khuyến mãi ... phải được tổ chức và phối hợp một cách
nhịp nhàng nhằm để nắm bắt kịp thời những hiệu ứng do truyền thông ATL tạo ra và
những thành quả mà thương hiệu đạt được.
- Hầu như không có cơ hội làm lại nếu thất bại.

Chiến lược nầy thường phát huy tác dụng tốt hơn đối với thị trường B2C (thị trường hàng
tiêu dùng) nơi mà khách hàng mua sản phẩm vì họ tin vào những giá trị vô hình (quan hệ
tình cảm cá nhân đối với một thương hiệu, cá tính, đặc điểm của một thương hiệu ...).
Các thương hiệu theo chiến lược nầy có thể kể đến: Coca Cola, Pepsi, Nokia, Nike,
Number One, Trung Nguyên, Bia Lazer.

2. Chiến lược thương hiệu phụ thuộc vào chiến lược sản phẩm.
Với chiến lược nầy, thương hiệu được xây dựng dựa trên khả năng của doanh nghiệp về
công nghệ sản phẩm. Nói một cách khác, người ta xây dựng nên một sản phẩm dựa trên
khả năng công nghệ sáng tạo, tạo ra những điểm khác biệt nổi bật cho sản phẩm, rồi xây
dựng chiến lược truyền thông để đưa sản phẩm vào thị trường thông qua một định vị
thích hợp với tính năng, đặc điểm, lợi ích của sản phẩm so với sản phẩm cạnh tranh.
Về mặt tổ chức bộ máy, bộ phận brand nằm dưới sự quản lý của bộ phận marketing.

Điểm mạnh:
- Được xem là "chậm mà chắc", ít rủi ro vì thương hiệu được dựa trên nền tảng "một sản
phẩm tốt"được hỗ trợ bởi một nền tảng R&D mạnh.
- Không đòi hỏi một ngân sách marketing khổng lồ, nhiều thương hiệu được xây dựng
thậm chí không cần đến truyền thông ATL.
- Những thay đổi về thương hiệu không tạo ra rủi ro cao vì dựa trên chất lượng, tính
năng, lợi ích, sự khác biệt vật thể hơn là vì những giá trị phi vật thể như tình cảm, cá tính
của thương hiệu.

Điểm yếu:
- Tốc độ phát triển và thâm nhập thị trường chậm hơn so với chiến lược (1). Có thể để vụt
mất cơ hội, nều đối thủ cạnh tranh nhanh chân hơn.
- Khó đạt được định vị cao cấp trong một thời gian ngắn.
- Nguy cơ khi thế mạnh của sản phẩm bị yếu đi.
- Đòi hỏi duy trì ngân sách R&D liên tục để không ngừng cải tiến sản phẩm, tạo ra sản
phẩm mới.

Chiến lược thương hiệu nầy phù hợp với những doanh nghiệp tập trung chú trọng vào
chất lượng sản phẩm và công nghệ chuyên sâu, rất phổ biến đối với các nhóm nghành
nghề thuộc thị trường B2B nơi mà người mua chọn sản phẩm vì các giá trị hữu hình (chất
lượng, tính năng, lợi ích, công nghệ...) của sản phẩm nhiều hơn là giá trị vô hình (quan hệ
tình cảm cá nhân đối với một thương hiệu, cá tính, đặc điểm của thương hiệu...)
Các doanh nghiệp theo chiến lược nầy có thể kể đến 3M, Microsoft, Intel, Gạch Đồng
Tâm, Võng xếp Duy Lợi, Xi măng Hà Tiên, Pho 24...

3. Chiến lược Hybrid

Trên thực tế thị trường, có nhiều doanh nghiệp khởi đầu bằng chiến lược (1), sau đó do
sức ép cạnh tranh, họ buộc phải điều chỉnh chiến lược thương hiệu và áp dụng cả chiến
lược (2) để duy trì vị trí thị trường.
Đồng thời cũng có nhiều doanh nghiệp xuất phát điểm xây dựng thương hiệu dựa trên
nền tảng công nghệ sản phẩm (chiến lược 2), sau đó điều chỉnh chiến lược bằng cách áp
dụng thêm chiến lược (1) để tạo ra giá trị gia tăng cho thương hiệu.

Tóm lại.
Cùng một đích đến là xây dựng một thương hiệu mạnh nhưng có nhiều hướng đi. Một
chiến lược đã mang lại kết quả tốt cho doanh nghiệp A không có nghĩa là nó cũng sẽ
mang lại hiệu quả cho doanh nghiệp của bạn. Bạn phải chọn cho mình một hướng đi phù
hợp với đặc điểm thị trường, tình hình cạnh tranh và khả năng của doanh nghiệp bạn.
http://brandkeyvn.com/index.php?
option=com_content&task=view&id=53&Itemid=38
Brand Consulting

Unilever, P&G, Vinamilk, Kinh Do..are fully

On the way, the well-known brands such as
advertising on the shops, supermarkets, outlets...Truly, any company must have brand to
compete. A lot of companies have good products but are not awared in the market. Some companies so much spend to
advertising but are not successed. Others are afraid of expenses to build brand.

.
Building brand must base on take customer insight to design, position, combine strategy, promote
and evaluate brand. You define how to customer aware actively and maintain brand loyal for long
term.

Situations
¤ You don't know how to invest to your brand in future.

¤ It is difficult to sale your products at high price compare other competitors.

¤ Customer have not yet awared of your brand.

¤ Company are facing difficultly when participate a new segment.

¤ You don't take the insight of target customer
¤ Customer are not loyal with your brand.
¤ Products are difficultly penetrated to distributive channels.

¤ Market share is decreasing.

¤ Brand expenses at high level compared company resources .
¤ Staffs at the sections have not yet oriented in customer benefits.
Types of brand consulting
¤ Brand research
¤ Designing brand
¤ Building brand identity system
¤ Implementing brand strategy
¤ Brand communication
¤ Brand management

¤ Evaluating and trecking brand health

Types of other consulting

¤ Implementing marketing strategy, building brand in distributive channels

¤ Restructuring company base on the brand

.
Types of whole brand service

Building brand: Building corporation brand or new brand or expanding brand for products or
services.

Building brand strategy: We research market, analyse customer, plan marketing, design
brand, position brand, build brand identity system, select brand strategy, promote brand, evaluate
brand health..
Brand Manager for Hire:

We are on behalf of your company as a brand manager such as: researching market, planning
marketing, building brand, evaluating brand health, reporting on board of director, training staffs.

Brand Research

Brand Audit

Through our Brand Audit, Brand key researchs all aspects of clients' brand, competition and
market, helps understand customer and provides insight into future opportunity. We can work with
you to develop research that meet your objectives and budget Research and analysis are key
tools to decorery brand core, helps design brand(name, logo, packing, print-ad..), build identity
system, define brand strategy and communicate brand.

Somes of our most common research englarment

• Focus group
• Experiental research
• Quatilitive research
• Brand equity analyses
• Price ilaslicity.

Brand health evaluation

One of the most fundamental ways to maintain brand is to check brand health. This research helps reposition brand, enforce brand
Brand health evaluation includes mearsures customer's loyalty, awareness,
management.
associations, behaviour of your brand and competitors.

Brand Design

Brand design has the ability to drive awareness, perception and loyalty and is a key expression of
brand strategy. Through customer insight, Brand Key discover customer benefits and personality
to bring together an acclaimed design capability spanning corporate design, packaging design,
retail & environments, poster -print ad and print literature..

Building Brand Identity

The look & feel of your organisation is often crucial to make a good impression.
Logos, corporate identity, ... but also documents or signs are applications of vital
importance. Designing a visual identity for companies and organisations, based on
a thorough analysis and a clear strategy, that is Brand Key 's core business.

Brand Key uses the following tools for a correct analysis:

 corporate identity audit (touchpoint-analyse)
 image research (actual versus desired image)
 brand architecture analysis (monolithic/endorsed/branded)
 competitor analysis and positioning analysis
 corporate identity workshop - brandwatching
 customer satisfaction survey
 corporate culture / personality analysis

Base on analysis information, Brand Key design brand identity : visual identity, verbal identity and
invisible identity

Once have created the brand identity, we develop brand identity applications such as following
categories:

 Brand communication
 Baseline (brand promise)
 Tone of voice
 Brand culture
 Customer relationship management

Brand Strategy

Brand strategy is the assimilation of data into the functional, inspirational and aspirational
benefits of the brand. Our brand consultants work in partnership with our clients to identify new
or hidden market opportunities and to help position their brands for short-term impact and long-
term value. We then help articulate that positioning through a clear and codified brand
architecture system.

The Brand Strategy phase is comprised of three components:

¤>> Brand positioning

¤>> Brand architecture
¤>> New product development

Brand positioning

The Brand Positioning component involves identifying perceptions that your brand should own in the minds
of its target market.

The process recommended for developing a compelling brand positioning involves establishing consensus
on key brand attributes with internal client stakeholders in a workshop setting. In the workshop, exercises
incorporating a variety of sensory elements are utilized to stimulate discussion and ultimately identify critical
brand attributes. Results from the workshop will drive the brand through all points of contact with key
stakeholders.
 Brand Architecture

Alignment with customer requirements is the key to effective brand management. Brand Key
works with companies to organize and manage their customer offerings, with the overall
objective of maximizing strategic leverage and increasing the value of the portfolio.

Key issues :

¤ What improvement opportunities within the current brand architecture strategy and
framework exist to better align with the marketplace?
¤ Should the company employ a masterbrand strategy or compete via individual brands and
subbrands?
¤ How many brands should be supported, and through what means?
¤ How should a newly acquired brand be integrated into the existing brand portfolio?

Approach to work:

Establishing an effective portfolio begins with an understanding of the company's overall

business objectives and strategies. From there, we establish the category framework and
inventory the current brand images and interdependencies within the portfolio. Alternative
architectures are then constructed and assessed. Strategic work sessions are conducted to
ensure the recommended portfolio meets the overall business objectives.

New Product Development

Managing new products and services involves balancing new product strategy formation, customer needs assessment, creative concept
development and marketplace execution. It is best accomplished using a disciplined strategic framework.

Brand Key works closely with cross-functional client teams to establish new product objectives, strategies and plans. Using proprietary creative-
analytic tools, we help clients develop innovative new product concepts which are then optimized in "real time" with target customers. Plans for
commercialization and launch are then developed, guided by strategic, financial and operational screening.

Key issues addressed:

What is the optimal new products strategy and what roles should new products play?
How should the portfolio and pipeline be balanced to ensure a continuous stream of innovation?
What unmet needs or friction points exist in the category today? How can these translate into innovation sparks to fuel new product
development success?
How should the new products be commercialized to increase the chance of market success?

Approach and anticipated results:

New product development projects often begin with a diagnostic audit to identify the strengths and improvement opportunities of the current
approach. A new products strategy is then created, which clearly outlines the growth gap and expected roles of new products. A market needs
assessment, including an environmental scan, helps identify potential new product platform opportunities. Concept ideation and iterative optimization
follows, leading to fully developed concepts and prototypes ready for commercialization and launch.

Brand Management

Brand management requires taking a long-term view of marketing decisions. Any action that a
firm takes as part of its marketing program has the potential to change consumer knowledge
about brand awareness or brand image.

Brand Key offers other activities to manage your brand such as repositioning brand, reinforcing
brand, adjusting brand elements, protect brand, empowering employees and vendors, building brand in channels,
implementing customer relationship management(CRM) and more

Introduce to Enterprise Training

(Base on order from companies)

We have implement the training program in the fields such as: brand,
marketing, sales, market research. Training team includes the members
with high qualification, have experienced brand manager, marketing, sales
manager in the multination companies, now take part to consult and train
at companies.

The benefits when you choosing the training service at your company

• Surveying company and consulting in selecting reasonable training program

• Training content and materials relate to your company practice
• Giving examples, discussing and consulting in situations at your company
• From junior to senior from other sections and the board of director maybe take part
training program and cooperate efficiently.

The training programs including

Marketing and brand training

¤ Building and managing brand (Xây dựng và quản lý thương hiệu)

¤ Customer insights (Thấu hiểu khách hàng)

¤ Customer relationship management (Quản lý quan hệ khách hàng)
¤ Customer care (Chăm sóc khách hàng)
¤ Market research (Nghiên cứu thị trư��?ng)
Sales training
¤ Sales representative skills (Kỹ năng đại diện thương mại)
¤ Sales supervisor skills (Kỹ năng giám sát bán hàng)

Training program

BUILDING AND MANAGING BRAND

 Introduce

The factors affect to brand relate to products, company culture, distributive channels, customer care, management, process and procedure,
marketing communication....So, not only marketing department but also board of director and other sections should participate to service customer
base on customer benefits to maintain loyalty overtime.

Training objectives
.
¤ Increasing the responsibilities of departments about building and managing the brand
¤ Reinforcing the system of brand identity
¤ Understanding customer benefits to service better
¤ Maintaining customer loyalty for brand.
¤ Pushing brand communication
¤ Creating brand-based company culture
.
Who are participant
.
¤ Board of director
¤ The seniors and juniors from departments
¤ Other members direct or indirect relate to service customer
.
Training content ( 4 days , 8 hours/ a day)
.
¤ Brand vision and mission

¤ Understanding customer

¤ Building and managing brand assets

¤ Building the system of brand identity

¤ Brand positioning strategics

¤ Brand creative

¤ Brand communication

¤ Checking brand health

¤ Brand culture

¤ Brand risk management

¤ Summary
The representative of section submit report
Sharing experience and resolving problems

Conveniences

¤ Free materials
¤ Training and implementing relate to your company
¤ Directly learning and sharing experience with the brand consulting expert

Understanding Consumer Behavior

Situation

Companies have faced to difficulties as following :

¤ Leaders hardly implement trading strategies such as: where market to participate, which consumer to choose, which segment to invest
¤ Sales team uneasily look for customers
¤ Marketing team unefficiently carry out the activities of promotion, advertising
¤ Other departments have not yet oriented to customer benefits
¤ Company have not yet understood consumer to build brand
¤ It is difficult to collect consumer information
¤ The training course of consumer behavior provide you about what consumers want and need to trade successfully

Training objectives
.
¤ Understanding consumer to implement marketing and sales efficiently
¤ People take care consumer better
¤ Looking consumer and implementing the strategies of promotion, advertising efficiently
¤ Understanding consumer to improve the quality of product and service.
¤ Recognizing important information from consumer to collect
¤ Defining how to build brand base on customer
.
Who is participant
.
¤ Board of director
¤ Seniors from the departments of sales, marketing, R&D, production, human resource, import-export
¤ Sales and marketing team
.
Training time ( 3 dates / 24 hours)

Training content
.
¤ Introduce to consumer behavior

¤ Consumer buying decision process

¤ Situational influences to consumer behavior

¤ Psychological influences to consumer behavior

¤ Social influences to consumer behavior

¤ Consumer behavior and marketing strategy

¤ Summary
Sharing experience and resolving problems

Conveniences

¤ Free materials
¤ Training and implementing situations relate to your company
¤ Directly trained and discussed with brand consulting expert

Customer Relationship Management

(Quản lý quan hệ khách hàng - CRM)

Situation

On average, businesses lose 15 percent to 20 percent of their customer base each year and half of their customers within five year of acquisition.
Given that it costs five to ten times more to acquire a new customer than to sell an existing one. It's no wonder companies are investing heavily in
customer relationship management. Strong customer relationships have grown increasingly vital to companies for competitive advantage, multi-
channel marketplace. Customer relationship management(CRM) is a business strategy aimed at maximising the understanding of customer needs so
stronger relations can be developed with them.

Training objectives
.
¤ Enforcing long-term relationship with customers
¤ Determine key customers and give right customer service for these customers
¤ Developing up-to-date information about customer to make decision
¤ Improving customer service at all interfaces with the customer base.
¤ Defining customers who are most profitable
¤ Preparing action plan to exploit the customer benefits
¤ .Implementing processes and systems to support company objectives

Who is participant
.
¤ Junior and middle level executives responsible for marketing and working on service or manufacturing organizations
¤ Seniors from the departments of sales, marketing, R&D, production, human resource, import-export
¤ Sales and marketing team
.
Training time ( 4 dates / 32 hours)

Training content
.
¤ The nature of customer relationship management

¤ Understanding consumer

¤ Customer data, data warehouse, data mining

¤ Winback and acquisition strategies

¤ Customer retention strategies

¤ Sales force automation and customer service

¤ Customer loyalty and measuring customer satisfaction

¤ Implementing customer relationship management system

¤ Summary
Sharing experience and resolving obstacles

Conveniences

¤ Free materials
¤ Training and implementing situations relate to your company
¤ Directly trained and discussed with brand consulting expert

Training program

CUSTOMER CARE
Situation

Customer care are interested and implemented at large companies. Multination companies have enforced customer care by establishing the
customer service section. Nowaday, customer care relate to not only staffs but also board of director and managers at other departments. Base on
customer care, companies understand customer needs and decover the gap of products and services. Good customer care are also ways to build
brand, maintain customer loyal.

Objectives
.¤ Defining customers and their benefits
¤ Establishing the criterion of customer care
¤ Enforcing capacity of customer care for staffs
¤ Improving the process of customer service
¤ Controlling the quality of products and services
¤ Measuring customer satisfaction
¤ Maintaining customer loyal
¤ Establishing company culture base on customer

Who is participant
.
¤ Boar of director
 ¤ Managers
¤ Staffs
.
Training context ( 2 days /16 hours)
.
¤ Who are customers ?

¤ Thinking from customer service to customer care

¤ Measuring customer satisfaction

¤ Selecting creative principle and customer care service

¤ Establishing customer care system

¤ Summery

Sharing experience and resolving obstacles

Conveniences
¤ Free materials
¤ Training and implementing situations relate to your company
¤ Directly trained and discussed with brand consulting

Training program

SALES REPRESENTATIVE
Situation

To increase segment and revenue and enforcing brand, companies of industrial sales must own the professional team of representative They need
to have the skills of industrial sales, know control themselves, implement sales strategies, cooperate with other sections, establish the teams of
multifunction sales, apply the service of customer care. The team of good representative enable to easily look for customers, clearly understand their
needs and behavior, create the service accordance to each customer and establish the relationship closely. We would like to be cooperated to train
your sales team become professional

Training objectives
.
¤ Building the skills of industrial sales representative
¤ Developing the skills of communication and customer care
¤ Enforcing career growth will and moral
¤ Resolving the situations in practice .
.
Who is participant
.
¤ Board of director
¤ The representatives of industrial sales
.
Training during ( 3 day / 24 hours)

Training content
.
The style of modern industrial sales
¤ Function of industrial sales representative
¤ Segmenting industrial customer by needs and behavior
¤ Renewing from professional sales to consultative sales
¤ The difference between good sales Rep. and poor sales Rep.
¤ How to be a good industrial representative
¤ Exercises, discussion

Skills of industrial sales

¤ Buyer process of industrial customer
¤ The whole of industrial sales process
¤ 7 steps of industrial sales skill
¤ Exercises, discussion
Enforcing skill of industrial customer care
¤ From customer service to customer care
¤ Customer types and their benefits
¤ How to measure customer satisfaction
¤ Establishing standard of customer care for sales Rep. and company system
¤ Exercise and discussion

Industrial sales management

¤ Building industrial sales strategies
¤ Establishing sales policies
¤ Defining objectives and targets
¤ Management of sales team
¤ Exercises , discussion

Management skill of industrial sales representative by themselves

¤ Defining roles and responsibilities
¤ Planning by themselves and managing time
¤ Overcome moral baffles
Building team moral
Exercises and discussion

Summary
¤ Sharing experience and resolving problems

Conveniences

¤ Free materials
¤ Training and implementing situation relate to your company
¤ Directly learning and sharing with the sales consultancy expert

Introduce to Brand

What is brand ?

Brand is the internalised sum of all impressions received by customer and

consumers resulting in a distinctive position in their "mind's eye'' based on the
perceived emotional and functional benefits.

The benefits of strong brand ?

¤ Long-term security and growth

¤ Increased asset value
¤ Higher sustainable profits
¤ Own unique competitive differentiation
¤ Easily sold at premium price
¤ Higher sales volumes could be achieved with strong brands
¤ They have a better economies of scale
¤ Strong brands even help to reduce costs
¤ They own greater security of demand
Key mistakes leading to failure when building brand
Building brand mainly base on advertising, events without analyzing market and taking customer
¤ insight. This leads to results : brand position is false; revenue increase at beginning stage but
decrease fast when finishing advertising period.
¤ Spending so much on advertising but brand design or brand identity systems is not good.
¤ Having not customer insight to create a discriminative brand position compares competitors
¤ Building brand without good product or service
¤ Having not defining the brand vision for long term.
¤ Building brand without showing key benefits of brands to targeted customers.
¤ Building or expanding a new brand with unsuitable brand architecture.
¤ Management system or company culture is not good.
Đặt tên cho thương hiệu như thế nào?
Vấn đề thương hiệu luôn được quan tâm trong kinh doanh ngày nay bởi nó
quyết định đến số lượng tiêu thụ sản phẩm của doanh nghiệp.

Bất cứ doanh nghiệp nào cũng cố gắng tìm cho mình một chính sách
thương hiệu tốt nhất.
Đơn nhãn hiệu hay đa nhãn hiệu?
Chính sách nhãn hiệu rất quan trọng vì chính sách này có thể hỗ trợ để doanh nghiệp hoàn thành
nhiều mục tiêu kinh doanh khác nhau. Một nhãn hiệu duy nhất hay còn gọi là một nhãn chung cho
dãy sản phẩm có thể hữu ích trong việc thuyết phục khách hàng rằng mỗi sản phẩm cùng một
nhãn hiệu sẽ có cùng một chất lượng hoặc đáp ứng một số tiêu chuẩn nào đó. Mặt khác, khi ngôn
ngữ của hai hay nhiều quốc gia giống nhau thì một nhãn hiệu chung nhất có thể được sử dụng để
hoạt động quảng cáo đạt nhiều hiệu quả khác nhau. Ví dụ một nhãn hiệu chung có thể được sử
dụng cho cả Áo và Ðức, đặc biệt khi quảng cáo xuyên biên giới.
Đa nhãn hiệu có thể được sử dụng ở nhiều thị trường quốc gia khác nhau để đáp ứng những nhu
cầu của mỗi thị trường riêng lẻ. Ví dụ công ty sữa của New Zealand, Dairy Board, một nhà xuất
khẩu thực phẩm từ sữa đã sử dụng nhiều tên nhãn hiệu khác nhau cho sữa bột của họ tại các
quốc gia như Fernleaf (Malaysia), Fernleaf ở vùng Caribbean, Magnolia (Singapore & Philippines)
Mainland (Australia). Tương tự, công ty đã sử dụng tên nhãn hiệu Fern cho sản phẩm bằng bơ,
mặc dù tên Anchor là nhãn hiệu hàng đầu của hãng, đã nổi tiếng từ lâu ở Tây Âu, đặc biệt ở Anh.
Bên cạnh đó, đa nhãn hiệu cũng có thể được sử dụng như là một phần của chính sách kinh
doanh để bán một sản phẩm có thành phần cơ bản giống nhau cho các thị trường khác nhau
trong một thị trường quốc gia. Một lần nữa, trở lại ví dụ về hãng sữa của New Zealand, chúng ta
thấy rằng có nhiều nhãn sữa bột được sử dụng ở Ðài Loan để đáp ứng cho các yêu cầu khác
nhau của một thị trường với trên 30 nhãn hiệu cạnh tranh.
Mặc dù có những trở ngại, các công ty vẫn thích việc sử dụng nhãn hiệu toàn cầu. Sara Lee, một
công ty hàng tiêu dùng có cơ sở rộng khắp đã mở rộng thành công nhãn hiệu toàn cầu Dim, một
sản phẩm về tất và đồ lót hàng đầu ở Pháp. Nhãn hiệu Dim không chỉ được phát triển ở châu Âu,
mà còn thành công tại Mỹ và châu Á. Không chỉ dừng lại ở Dim, Sara Lee còn mở rộng sản phẩm
đồ lót nam và áo T. Shirt với nhãn hiệu Gerber.
Cẩn thận với những "bất ngờ"!
Tại sao hãng thực phẩm nổi tiếng của Pháp, Anchor không sử dụng sản phẩm bằng bơ và không
xúc tiến thương hiệu sữa bột của họ ở Malaysia? Đơn giản bởi vì nó trùng tên với một loại bia địa
phương đã được quảng cáo rộng khắp. Các bà nội trợ ở một xứ sở mà Hồi giáo là quốc đạo
thường không thích mua sản phẩm sữa cho con họ vì theo họ như vậy có thể tạo ra cho trẻ con
mối liên hệ tiềm thức với một loại nước giải khát có cồn.
Vừa qua, một số công ty với những nhãn hiệu được thiết lập rất tốt xét thấy cũng cần thiết phải
thay đổi nhãn hiệu của họ bởi vì nó có nghĩa xui xẻo ở một ngôn ngữ khác. Ví dụ: công ty VICK’S
chemical đã phải đổi thành WISK’S ở Ðức bởi vì tên công ty là một từ tục tĩu trong ngôn ngữ Ðức.
Hay một công ty đã chào hàng một loại thiết bị với tên là Grab Bucket ở Ðức, nhưng nhãn hiệu
này được dịch ra là các loại hoa được cúng ở nghĩa trang.
Trên thực tế, việc chọn tên nhãn hiệu có liên quan đến cả những vấn đề pháp lý và sáng tạo. Vì
vậy, hiện nay ở nhiều quốc gia, các doanh nghiệp đang dần có xu hướng thông qua các công ty
chuyên môn như các hãng quảng cáođể giải quyết những vấn đề liên quan đến xây dựng và phát
triển nhãn hiệu.
Building Brand Trust

Build-A-Bear Workshop provides a unique brand experience for their

diminutive customers (called “Guests”) in which they build their very own
stuffed animal friend for life.Guests to the Build-A-Bear Workshop retail
locations can select from thirty different choices in stuffed animals, from
bears, dogs, cats, turtles, to even dinosaursBuilding Brand Trust.

Then it is stuffed with fluff and checked by the guest for hugability to ensure just the right amount of stuffing is put in. Guests can put in a sound chip
with either a personalized recording or pre-recorded sounds. Then guests can take a velvet plush heart and place it inside their stuffed animal,
giving their new friend a life of its own, figuratively speaking. An identification chip is also inserted into the stuffed animal, to ensure that if ever lost,
the animal can be returned to the rightful owner.

Guests can also choose from a variety of clothing and accessories for their new stuffed animal. Several third-party companies have partnered with
Build-A-Bear Workshop to provide mini clothes, shoes, and even leather jackets. Brands like Limited Too, Sketchers, and even Harley-Davidson.

It is unfortunate, that a company that has figured out the magic in stuffed animals and customer experience has a stock price that fluctuates wildly.
On the surface, this company looks like the model in customer satisfaction and management. But look behind some of their product offerings and
you will find where things get disconcerting. Several of their stuffed animal options are based off of character in animated movies, like Shrek 3,
Happy Feet, and more. These movie characters are popular when the movies first get released, but that popularity does not always extend to the
Build-A-Bear Workshop’s stuffed ogres or penguins.

Because of these few high profile movie characters that sometimes sit on the shelves or in the storage rooms, is making financialists worried. That
worry makes their stock price unpredictable, which then carries over to stockholders that get uncomfortable when the stock price drops with no
warning. So, although Build-A-Bear Workshop is providing a truly unique and heart-warming product and experience, stockholders are holding their
breaths as the stock price roller-coasters up and down.

It just goes to show that a company that has a great product line, unique customer experience, and overall strong brand loyalty, can still create
waves in the stock market if just one or two products within their line sell slower than hoped.

brands - building a brand

What factors are important in building brand value?

Professor David Jobber identifies seven main factors in building successful brands, as illustrated in the diagram below:

Quality

Quality is a vital ingredient of a good brand. Remember the “core benefits” – the things consumers expect. These must be delivered well,
consistently. The branded washing machine that leaks, or the training shoe that often falls apart when wet will never develop brand equity.

Research confirms that, statistically, higher quality brands achieve a higher market share and higher profitability that their inferior competitors.

Positioning

Positioning is about the position a brand occupies in a market in the minds of consumers. Strong brands have a clear, often unique position in the
target market.

Positioning can be achieved through several means, including brand name, image, service standards, product guarantees, packaging and the way in
which it is delivered. In fact, successful positioning usually requires a combination of these things.

Repositioning

Repositioning occurs when a brand tries to change its market position to reflect a change in consumer’s tastes. This is often required when a brand
has become tired, perhaps because its original market has matured or has gone into decline.

The repositioning of the Lucozade brand from a sweet drink for children to a leading sports drink is one example. Another would be the changing
styles of entertainers with above-average longevity such as Kylie Minogue and Cliff Richard.

Communications

Communications also play a key role in building a successful brand. We suggested that brand positioning is essentially about customer perceptions –
with the objective to build a clearly defined position in the minds of the target audience.

All elements of the promotional mix need to be used to develop and sustain customer perceptions. Initially, the challenge is to build awareness,
then to develop the brand personality and reinforce the perception.
First-mover advantage

Business strategists often talk about first-mover advantage. In terms of brand development, by “first-mover” they mean that it is possible for the
first successful brand in a market to create a clear positioning in the minds of target customers before the competition enters the market. There is
plenty of evidence to support this.

Think of some leading consumer product brands like Gillette, Coca Cola and Sellotape that, in many ways, defined the markets they operate in and
continue to lead. However, being first into a market does not necessarily guarantee long-term success. Competitors – drawn to the high growth
and profit potential demonstrated by the “market-mover” – will enter the market and copy the best elements of the leader’s brand (a good
example is the way that Body Shop developed the “ethical” personal care market but were soon facing stiff competition from the major high
street cosmetics retailers.

Long-term perspective

This leads onto another important factor in brand-building: the need to invest in the brand over the long-term. Building customer awareness,
communicating the brand’s message and creating customer loyalty takes time. This means that management must “invest” in a brand, perhaps at
the expense of short-term profitability.

Internal marketing

Finally, management should ensure that the brand is marketed “internally” as well as externally. By this we mean that the whole business should
understand the brand values and positioning. This is particularly important in service businesses where a critical part of the brand value is the type
and quality of service that a customer receives.

Think of the brands that you value in the restaurant, hotel and retail sectors. It is likely that your favourite brands invest heavily in staff training
so that the face-to-face contact that you have with the brand helps secure your loyalty.

Free Dissertation Sample: The Informatics Training

Center Model and Experience
July 2nd, 2008 at 4:41am
The Informatics Training Center Model and Experience
The Project Aims
The purpose of the paper is to discuss and analyze the setting up and the management of
a successful training and education franchise operations in China. Both the factors
affecting the success of the training and education franchise model in China as well as the
challenges will be discussed and analyzed as well. The paper will also compare the
Informatics training center model with other successful model in other industry such as
McDonald’s and KFC, which represent franchises that have adapted best to the China
market. The objective of the paper is to eventually provide a paper that will serve as a
guide to those in the training and education industry who are contemplating to enter the
China market through the franchising approach.
Summary
According to information, China has become the second-largest franchising market in the
world and the most promising destination for those overseas franchise systems aiming at
the far eastern region. Moreover, it has been more than ten years of franchising in China
and there have been more than 1,900 franchises successfully developed locally along
with the entry of China to the World Trade Organization there are more foreign
franchisors like for example McDonald’s and KFC will be allowed to do franchising in
the marketplace of China with less restrictions in the future years of franchising business
in China. Thus, KFC may be a commercially revered icon in China, but McDonald’s has
upped the ante in the intensifying competition by recently hiring Chinese basketball star
Yao Ming as their official spokesperson in order to improve brand recall and steal a
march on its competitors also signed a contract to sponsor the 2008 Summer Olympics in
Beijing. ”Several companies with a high profile franchising operations internationally
have entered the Chinese market with a standard foreign-investment model. This involves
a limited-liability joint venture with a strong domestic company, followed by the opening
of branches in many locations,” says Fraser Mendel, known IPR expert and Beijing-based
senior associate, corporate department, Morrison & Foerster. Franchising is ‘’a type of
business, in which, by contract, the franchiser licenses the franchisee to use the
trademark, trade name, business format and other business resources which the franchiser
has a right to license; and the franchisee carries on business under the uniform business
operation system in accordance with the agreement and pays franchise fees to the
franchiser’’ (Regulation for Administration on Commercial) as a booming sector in the
Chinese economy. The franchising model, which allows people with limited capital to
enter an established business, is well suited to a developing economy. China’s franchising
industry is set to enter a rapid but orderly development as franchising has emerged in
China as the most notable was KFC’s first Chinese outlet in Beijing as the franchising
industry has experienced a period of chaotic development. Today, there are about 200
franchise brands in China ranging from supermarkets and drug stores to fitness centers.
Nearly 60 industries have applied for franchise operations, including the traditional
sectors of catering, retailing and individual services, as well as newly developed fields of
education, commercial services, family services and automotive care. In terms of the
number of franchisers, the catering industry leads by 35 percent while retailing accounts
for 30 percent and auto sales 3 percent. Though China has the most franchise systems in
the world, the scale of franchise operations is still relatively small. China’s promising
economic environment is leading to more companies adopting the franchising model.
Increasing numbers of enterprises became qualified to market their franchise after
improving brands, technology and management.
McDonald’s:
As the most successful franchiser in the world, 70 percent of McDonald’s outlets were
opened all over the world through franchising. However, in China McDonald’s is
operating through a joint venture. McDonald’s set up a joint venture with a local
company in Beijing when it entered the Chinese capital during 1992. McDonald’s has
about 600 outlets in China but not operating through direct franchising. In recent years
McDonald’s started to adjust its strategy on franchising in China. In 2004, McDonald’s
(China) opened its first franchise outlet in Tianjin and announced that batches of
franchise restaurants are to be launched sooner. Thus, McDonald’s is planning to further
expand its franchise business in the second-tier cities and in the countryside.
KFC:
KFC opened its first outlet in China in 1987 and now has over 1000 outlets in 200 cities
all around China. At the beginning most KFC outlets were entirely owned by Yum
Brands which is a registered company in Shanghai and established dozens of subsidiary
companies in various large cities. Following this model, Yum Brands, formerly known as
Yum Brands, has full rights to control the overall operations of the business. In 1993
KFC opened its first franchise outlet in Xi’an.
Project Outline
Informatics core business activities are in training and education services. Franchising is
one of the company’s main strategies to enter and expand into foreign and unfamiliar
territories. While the company has been relatively successful in its franchising activities
elsewhere in the world, the territory of China offer much challenges as well as
tremendous market potential. This paper will focus on Informatics China franchise model
and experiences, from its initial entry into China and its use of the franchising strategy to
grow the operations all over China. The paper will assess the pros and cons of franchising
in China, and offers proven best practices for building a successful franchise system
while covering strategic issues and challenges faced by Informatics as a foreign
franchisor in China. The outline of the paper will include the designing of the franchise
system, recruiting, selecting, managing and supporting of franchisees, establishing
territories and pricing and managing the expansion. Drawing on studies of some
successful franchise like Mc Donald and KFC , proven principles and techniques for the
entire franchise system development process: defining products and services, planning
support, establishing royalty rates and advertising programs, mapping territories,
recruiting and managing franchisees will also be identified and discuss.
Evaluation of the training and education industry in China: Informatics competitive
position and competencies
Education and Training that involves investment in the education industry will become
very popular in the future. China’s fast growing economy creates a sound and budding
environment for foreign language training. English First is a franchise education
organization operating successfully in China. With the growing demands for foreign
language training, teamwork training and business training, there will be great market
potential for education and training. Training and Education Industry in China can be
evaluated through the successful Informatics that they have adapted throughout the recent
times most in dealing to franchises that will give a clear emphasis of the matter along
with important information needed for the integration and realization of training and
education of the country. As Informatics is considered as a global leader in quality
lifelong learning services, today announced that its Informatics has been appointed as
accredited training and testing center for the International Council of E-Commerce
Consultants (EC-Council), a leading provider of e-Business certification programs in lieu
of a prestige partnership, Informatics has begun offering the only authorized programs in
the world leading to an Ethical Hacker Certification and Hacker Forensic Investigation
Certification for IT professionals.
Informatics, which provides leading IT training and certification for computer
professionals across fifty two countries through the network of training centers around
the world and has already begun offering training and authorized testing mapped to EC-
Council’s CEH exams in China through the better competitive position and competencies
that enhances growth and value of Informatics franchises in China.
The advantage to the franchisee
The franchisee is the proprietor of its own business and owns the tangible assets of the
franchise outlet. What makes the franchise different from any other business is that it
gains from the franchisor the entire business concept with full training, assistance in
every aspect of setting up and running the business, and access to necessary materials and
supplies. In addition, it must make regular payments to the franchisor in the form of
management services which is an agreed mark-up on supplies obtained from the
franchisor.
The disadvantage to the franchisee
The franchisee is not an independent entrepreneur as the franchisee must follow the
franchisor’s instructions.
The advantage to the franchiser
The main advantage of franchising to the franchiser is that it allows the latter to increase
its number of outlets with minimum capital outlay and so accelerate the network’s growth
and probably its profitability. Self-employed franchisees are highly motivated than
salaried managers in order to produce better results for less expenditure of capital on
behalf of the franchisor.
The disadvantage to the franchiser
The disadvantage of franchising to the franchiser is that it has to control and co-ordinate a
network of semi-independent businessmen and ensures that they build and maintain a
favorable image for the whole franchised operation. The policing and monitoring of
standards by the franchiser is vital but can at times be difficult. The franchiser will
sometimes have to resort to the use of both carrot and stick to get franchises to improve
the current performance.
Key Franchising Policies
Ø Training and/or ongoing support provided by the franchisor
Ø Assigned territory
Ø Duration of the franchise agreement
Ø Franchise fee and total anticipated investment
Ø Trademark, patent and signage use
Ø Royalties and other fees you are expected to pay
Ø Advertising
Ø Operating protocol
Ø Renewal Rights and franchisee termination/cancellation policies
Ø Resale rights
Franchisee Support and Assistance
The franchise and product distribution group has a broad range of experience
representing franchisers in matters throughout. The group’s clients includes automotive
supply companies, construction materials manufacturers, electronics manufacturers, fast
food franchisers, industrial equipment manufacturers, petroleum companies, publishing
and distribution companies and manufacturer trade associations.
Counseling
Members of the group advise customers with value to franchise and product distribution
issues that arise in their client’s on-going business operations. Important areas of
counseling include the drafting of sales and distribution agreements, the creation of brand
standards and dealer incentive programs and the drafting and development of sales
representation agreements. The group assists clients in developing franchising policies in
key areas such as corporate identification, minority dealer representation, product
allocation, and pricing. It also provides advice on matters such as advertising, gray
market trading, and trademark licensing and management. The group frequently works
with clients in developing market representation strategies and in determining where to
place dealers within a network.
Litigation
Members of the group litigate commercial disputes involving franchise and product
distribution issues. The group has defended franchisers in a number of significant cases
seeking to impose franchisor liability for franchisee conduct, including in a nationwide
class action context as the group regularly represents clients in disputes arising out of all
aspects of the franchiser-franchisee relationship. Members appear regularly before
administrative agencies and they have argued significant franchise matters before state
supreme courts. Members of the group have filed amicus briefs in important franchising
cases and several of the group’s cases have resulted in a substantial restructuring of a
state’s franchising law.
The Franchise Business Directors need have to provide complete business consulting
support for franchise groups. Their primary focus is to analyze evaluation results,
marketing data and training information and then work with franchisees to create tactics
and business strategies to help improve an organization’s operations, local store
marketing, people development, financial opportunities and training effectiveness and
efficiencies. The Regional Marketing Directors provide support and assistance to
franchisees in marketing plan development, assist with local store marketing efforts,
evaluate and analyze marketing effectiveness and, in general, are a resource for
franchisees for all marketing and advertising needs. They help align regional marketing
efforts with our national plan. They also assist with media planning, purchasing and
analysis.
The Operations Specialists evaluate the efficiency of restaurant operations. They conduct
comprehensive restaurant evaluations. The results are then provided to the Franchise
Business Director as one means of reviewing a franchisee’s business and selecting tactics
to help restaurants perform more effectively. Furthermore, franchise Services is a
partnership as the franchise support is imperative to the success of the company. The
elected franchise representatives and corporate representatives meet quarterly to discuss
operational issues, the business environment, company standards, growth strategies and
that the franchise representatives will have to communicate these important issues to their
fellow franchisees.
Franchisees are being provided with comprehensive support and training during the pre-
launch period, support and training encompass editorial, sales, marketing and business
management. The official launch of the new franchise will be centrally supported to
ensure maximum awareness and visibility. Training: provision for continuous training to
update franchisees on new products, customer service and market developments.
Marketing: initiation of marketing, public relations and advertising campaigns,
promotional materials and brochure. Business: advice and assistance for franchisees on
management and technical issues. Editorial: assistance to enhance editorial quality. Sales:
regular statistical feedback to ensure sales performance is optimized
Territorial Strategies
Ø Chinese Government will need to encourage the franchising sectors and businesses to
provide ways of a better territorial policies
Ø Restructuring of rural areas and the need for franchising reforms
Ø Evaluating the demand for franchising model and experience
Ø Establishing better franchising policies and measures in acquiring good location and
market position
Ø Further analysis of different situations in terms of territorial reviews
Pricing Franchises
There are options which reflect the level at which the franchisee wishes to embrace the
opportunity and allows the franchisee to acquire a franchise at the level of risk they feel
most comfortable with:
Ø An initial fee of $ negotiable and based on domain name chosen with an ongoing
return to Franchises of ten percent of the generated revenue
Ø An initial fee of $ negotiable and based on domain name chosen with an ongoing
return to Franchises of thirty three percent of the generated revenue
Ø An initial fee of $ negotiable and based on domain name chosen with an ongoing
return to Franchises of fifty percent of the generated revenue
The options could possibly be subject to negotiation and discussion from Franchises such
as KFC and McDonald’s in order to ensure that potential franchisees have the full grasp
of the opportunities that exist and the level of commitment and work that is involved.
Franchise Product Strategies
Operational excellence
The development of the ability to produce its products and services lower than its
competitors
Customer intimacy
The enhancing of a close relationship with its customers regarding on an excellent
knowledge of customers’ business
Technological superiority
The business franchises offers products and services that is superior to the competitors
There are several strategies to apply in product franchising:
Ø Improvement of the products and services better at a lower price
Ø Deliver the products to the customers more faster
Ø Maintaining and increasing the level of franchise qualities
Ø Have a better follow-up and support services to go along with the product service
Ø Give guarantees and warranties of satisfaction
Ø Make the product easier to acquire and more readily available
Ø Make the prices and terms more attractive and convenient
Ø Include additional products and services at the same price
Moreover, the goal of every entrepreneur is to seek out profit-making opportunities as
profit comes from adding value in some way, before the competitors do it. The number of
ways you can add value to your product services and to your customer is limited by your
imagination.
Expansion Strategies
It is entering new levels of success or areas of business that can position your company as
a leader in its markets. It may require increases in debt, personnel, equipment, physical
space, or marketing expense. It will require the development of new business goals and
strategies, operational changes, and your organization’s attention and commitment.
Strategies:
Ø Create and implement business plans and strategies
Ø Conduct market research
Ø Develop business projections
Ø Align business processes with strategies and goals
Ø Provide leadership development and organization training
Ø Implement operational performance measurement mechanisms
Ø Analyzed business plans and strategies to assess alignment with goals
Ø Developed plans for acquiring other companies
Ø Explored international opportunities
Ø Evaluated market potential for ensuing five years
Ø Developed quantitative and qualitative success measures
Ø Created management and employee training programs
Legal and Institutional Environment for Franchising
Informatics Franchise in China will have to support the development of legal and
institutional environment for the franchising business markets throughout the country
depending on the level of its process and development that the franchise market has
achieved along with the appropriate legal and institutional approaches to the franchising
environment. Thus, the legal and institutional environment is basically adequate to
support franchising model and experience that helps decision makers to strengthen the
franchise structures and frameworks. Informatics franchise normally starts by reviewing
the existing legal/institutional environment outline. The legal review addresses not only
laws that regulate Chinese government but also legislation that governs franchise capital
markets as well as trust mechanisms. The institutional environment looks at both public
and private business franchises in the promising market, the flows of resources,
incentives to invest in the sector, the depth of the capital market that relates to a sequence
of legal and institutional reforms and supporting actions with justification and
alternatives as needed of the enabling environment as a whole to strengthen key financial
entities that play a direct intermediation role in franchising market in working to establish
franchise systems as a means of encouraging franchise development market.
Recruiting, Selecting and Managing Franchisees
The new franchiser has spent a huge amount of money on preparations, with nothing to
show for in return. His banker and his investors are becoming impatient and the
temptation is great to accept all-comers as franchisees just because they can support the
investment with the franchise relationship often compared to a marriage, it is important
that the parties share the same values and the passion for the business that have combined
to make the franchiser successful in his core business. A franchise development plan that
has been based on a realistic assessment of the network’s capacity to support franchisees
and a franchisee profile based on careful observation of the traits that make successful
operators in this field should have been drawn up at an earlier stage. It is vital to the long-
term success of the network that the franchiser ignores pressure applied by investors and
others and adheres to the plan per se. Selecting and managing franchisees is no longer as
easy as it used to be but is possible of having a sound franchise opportunities, an
increasing number of well-established companies have recognized the power of
franchising as the competition for qualified prospects has forced franchisers to become
more professional in the way they recruit and support their franchisees. Thus, it is crucial
that the franchisers ensure that inquiries are handled promptly and professionally and the
follow up should be swift and realism must prevail and should be guided along the
evaluation path with care while ensuring that the eventual decision is based on a full
understanding of the underlying realities.
Recommendations and Improvements
Henceforth, a franchise needs to be competitive in the market. Competitive advantages of
a franchise not only are an important source for attracting new franchisees but also are an
important element for maintaining franchisees’ loyalty in the franchise model and
experience. The competitive advantages may come from brand name, efficient execution
of the franchise model system as basis for improving the quality of franchise as the
impression that franchisees have of their franchiser’s services. Moreover, the
competitiveness of the Informatics franchise model may affect franchisees’ satisfaction
and intention to remain in the franchise integration system. Thus, in establishing and
maintaining a competitive advantage in today’s world of constant changes requires
franchisers to respond quickly to changes in the market environment. If they cannot
provide competitive offers in the market, they definitely will face sever competition from
other competitors. A franchiser should understand that although daily operation
assistance cannot improve franchisees’ overall dissertations satisfaction directly, it
definitely can improve the trustworthy image of the franchise system. Many alternative
models to enhance franchising potential opportunities and foster territorial
competitiveness on the business social and institutional context as governance differ from
country to country. Thus, the discussed recommendations will have to emphasize the
improvements to be made in order to enable the collection, analysis and dissemination of
comparable informatics franchising application in China respectively.
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Free Dissertation Title Page

June 18th, 2008 at 4:08am
Dissertation Title Page is the very first page of your dissertation project. At the top of the
title page within the advised margins, give the title and any sub-title of the dissertation,
followed by the volume number, if more than one. The full name of the author should be
in the center of the page. At the bottom center of the page should be the words “A
dissertation submitted to the University of Bristol in accordance with the requirements of
the degree of MSc in Information and Library Management in the Faculty of Social
Sciences”. The words ” Graduate School of Education” and the month and year of
submission should also appear. The word count (of the text only, not appendices) should
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Writing Geography Dissertation? Consider This Before

You Continue…
May 10th, 2008 at 7:23am
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Building a national brand: the four step cycle.

By Pressly, Scott

Publication: Franchising World

Date: Monday, November 1 2004

Dunkin Donuts. Marriott. Century 21. Incredible brands that bring images of market dominance, high quality, and mass appeal. Wouldn't you like your

franchise company to be viewed as the dominant player in your segment with national and international recognition?

Franchising represents a great way to develop a national brand. There are four critical success factors that, when combined, can help create a

powerful national brand: investment in the franchise infrastructure, an unwavering

Franchise Finder

Find the right franchise for you!

Explore our directory of over 800 franchise opportunties.

Get started now.

Industry:

Location:

focus on franchisee economics, aggressive unit growth, and increased scale.

Investment in the Franchise Infrastructure

The chief executive officers of various franchise companies have told us, "We're a franchisor and don't need additional capital to grow." For those

companies that seek to add 10-20 new units each year in hopes of developing a solid local or regional brand, we agree. On the other hand, to add 25-

100 or more locations a year in search of national prominence, significant capital investment is required. Functions such as training, franchise sales,

marketing, new product development, public relations, real estate and technology are all crucial.

An investment in a fully developed franchise system requires a long-term and patient view. Typically, it takes three to four years before achieving

break-even status, thereby making many owners reluctant to make the proper investment in infrastructure. To have the fortitude to make this

investment well ahead of any potential payback requires a strong belief in your brand, your product or service, and the franchise business model.

Focus on Franchisee Economies

The most important aspect in developing a national brand is the continuing focus on franchisee economics. No other measurement is as critical. If the

franchisees aren't successful nothing else will matter.

The two key aspects of franchisee economics are the turn-key development costs, (franchise fee, build costs, working capital, inventory, initial

marketing) and the annual cash profits an owner/operator can generate. The best franchisors continually find new ways to improve both metrics in

order to provide a franchisee with the best chance for success. In addition, the focus on franchisee economics is a never ending proposition. Better

same-store sales, faster ramp-up for a new franchisee, lower initial investment costs, ad fund contributions, new product developments, and more

effective training programs are all integral to the continued success for the franchisee and ultimately to the growth of the brand.

Aggressive Unit Growth

With a strong infrastructure in place and a successful economic model, a company is well positioned to materially accelerate its unit growth. An

experienced franchise sales team armed with a compelling franchise model can dramatically increase the store base. Further, the excitement of the

existing franchisees can be the greatest asset in the process of selling to prospective franchisees. A satisfied franchisee will promote the brand better

than anyone. Positive references from existing franchisees to a person considering your system, materially improves the likelihood that a prospect will

become a new franchisee. In addition, profitable franchisees have a higher likelihood of opening a second or third location.

Increased Scale

A comprehensive infrastructure, attractive franchisee economics and strong unit growth can combine to create increased scale. The larger a chain

becomes the greater the opportunity to gain economies in areas such as purchasing, advertising and brand recognition. Successful franchisees pay

more royalties and advertising dollars than troubled franchisees. More advertising dollars allow for increased investments in marketing programs,

point-of of-sale material, brand studies, information systems and new product development. Success breeds success, allowing the franchise model to

be a powerful tool in developing a brand.

Conclusion

The good news is that franchising is more popular than ever. According to an International Franchise Association study there are already more than

760,000 franchise businesses in the United States, and an increasing number of people are considering the franchise model as a means to develop

their brand. The bad news is that franchising is more popular than ever. Because it takes time to develop a system, it is easy for competitors to see

your new products, prototypes, and innovative ideas as soon as they are introduced to the market.

Therefore, the ability to grow and capitalize on your proprietary ideas is more important than ever before. Proper investment in people, information

systems, training and marketing programs, quality assurance and new product development can all help improve franchisee economics, unit growth

and, in due course, increase scale. Together, these critical aspects can drive the growth of the brand into a super-regional, national or international

player

http://www.brandidentityguru.com/brand-name.htm
http://www.namedevelopment.com/brand-name-research.html
http://www.igorinternational.com/process/company-product-names.php
Creating Great Product and Company Names
Successful product and company names may appear to have been created by magic, but it
is possible to develop names that are dynamic, effective and fully leverage a brand's
potential if you have the right process in place. A process that is clear, insightful, logical
and focused will lead to a name and tagline that are powerful components of your brand
strategy, and pave the way for buy-in throughout your organization.
Before you begin, it is essential to decide what you want your new product or company
name to do for you. To make that decision, you need to understand the possibilities. A
name can:

• achieve separation from your competitors

• demonstrate to the world that you are different
• reinforce a unique positioning platform
• create positive and lasting engagement with your audience
• be unforgettable
• propel itself through the world on its own, becoming a no-cost, self-sustaining PR
vehicle
• provide a deep well of marketing and advertising images
• be the genesis of a brand that rises above the goods and services you provide
• completely dominate a category

Every naming project is unique and our process is customized for each of them. We make
sure that all aspects of a work plan are designed to complement your naming project,
corporate culture, approval process and timeframe. Consequently, our process is flexible
enough to be tailored to the specific needs of your company.
Whether we are developing product or company names, the process steps outlined below
are what gives us the ability to create powerful and lasting brands:

• Competitive Analysis – Our process begins with a thorough competitive analysis,

in which we quantify the tone and strength of competitive company names or
product names. Creating such a document helps your naming team decide where
they need to go with the positioning, branding and naming of your company or
product.
• Positioning – The next step is to help you refine and define your brand
positioning. The more specific and nuanced your positioning is, the more
effective the name will be. All great product and company names work in concert
with the positioning of the businesses they speak for.
• Name/brand Development – Product or company name development begins by
applying the positioning strategy to figure out what you want your new name to
do for your marketing, branding and advertising efforts.
• Trademark – We prescreen names under development through our trademark
attorney to determine the likelihood that your company will be able to procure the
names. We do this in order to feel confident that the names your attorney submits
 for final trademark screening and application have been deemed by an attorney as
likely to pass muster for registration. If not, valuable time is lost.
• Creative / Testing – A standard part of our naming process is the production of
creative support materials to flesh-out potential names, and market research
testing when appropriate. These may include stories, ad treatments, or graphic
layouts featuring leading name candidates.
• Name and Tagline – Final names and taglines, along with a well-defined
positioning strategy, are the outcome of our process.

Competitive Analysis
A competitive analysis is an essential first step of any naming process. How are your
competitors positioning themselves? What types of names are common among them? Are
their names projecting a similar attitude? Do their similarities offer you a huge
opportunity to stand out from the crowd? How does your business or product differ from
the competition? How can a name help you define or redefine your brand? Can you
change and own the conversation in your industry? Should you?
Quantifying the tone and strength of competitive company names or product names is an
empowering foundation for any naming project. Creating such a document helps your
naming team decide where they need to go with the positioning, branding and naming of
your company or product. It also keeps the naming process focused on creating a name
that is a powerful marketing asset, one that works overtime for your brand and against
your competitors.
We display the results of a given sector of names in the form of taxonomy charts. Here
are some example name taxonomy charts, along with a blank one for your own use. This
format is also utilized at Igor to examine taglines and language common to an industry.

• Accounting and Business Services Name Taxonomy – As usual, and as you might
expect, most of the companies on this list have lower-level functional names.
Included is the name Vanilla, which Igor created.
• Airline Name Taxonomy – Some major airline names classified by category and
by level of engagement.
• Biotech / Pharmaceutical Name Taxonomy – This is an extensive taxonomy of
company names in the biotech / pharmaceutical industries, classified by category
and by level of engagement. On this chart, note that nearly all of the company
names are heavily clustered in the lower levels of engagement.
• The Company Names of Naming Companies Name Taxonomy – If you think
that's a mouthful, take a look at this chart of the company names that most of our
competitors in the naming and branding space choose for themselves.
• Computer Port Technology Name Taxonomy – This chart compares the names of
computer peripheral device ports and the devices that love them.
• Continuing Medical Education (CME) Name Taxonomy – Nearly all CME
companies have not-very-engaging Functional or Experiential names. Until Igor
came up with the Antidote for this brand disease (brandemic?), that is.
 • Defense Industry / Defense Contractor Company Name Taxonomy – Most of the
companies in the defense industry are on defense when it comes to their own
company names, playing it very conservative with the naming. An exception in
our view being Primordial, the defense industry company name created by Igor.
• Juice Name Taxonomy – If you're looking for a juicy name taxonomy, you've
come to the right page. Here is our competitive analysis name taxonomy of juice
brand names. Fresh squeezed, and all the usual metaphors.
• Margarine Name Taxonomy – If you thought that margarines -- aka "butter
substitutes" -- existed in a parallel universe, you were right! Here is our
competitive analysis name taxonomy of margarine brand names. Eat your heart
out.
• Music and Media Download Service Names Taxonomy – AKA the iTunes space,
but here including movie as well as music download services, plus tangential
services such as NetFlix and TiVO that offer different combinations of online,
offline, broadband, cable or satellite delivery of multimedia content.
• Search Engine, Browser and Web Portal Names Taxonomy – Here are some
names you may be familiar with in the Internet industry. Note how many search
engines went with Functional names that include the words "search" or "crawler."
• Social Networks Name Taxonomy – Social networks have existed on the web for
some time in the form of discussion groups, online communities, bulletin boards,
webrings and matchmaking services. This chart is confined to rating the names of
the new breed of social networks, those that leverage many levels of relationships
in the form of "a friend of a friend." Included is the name Tickle, which Igor
created.
• Sport Utility Vehicle (SUV) Names Taxonomy – This chart compares the
(mostly) rough-and-tumble names of the behemoth cars many people either love
or hate. Note the prevalence of Western themes, both of the American and
Spaghetti varieties.
• Sweet Snack Food Names Taxonomy – The names of snack foods are tough to
rank in an unbiased way. Our perceptions of snack food names are deeply
influenced by emotional connections to the products formed at an early age.
• Toothpaste Names Taxonomy – When you Reach for those Pearl Drops to give
your mouth an Ultra Bright Super Smile, is your Sure Choice based solely on
what will make you the most attractive Close-Up, or is it Ultrabright branding
that's taking Aim at you as if yours were the First Teeth to Crest the tide of Oral-
B(eauty)?
• Your Name Taxonomy – Here is a blank name taxonomy chart you can print. Try
plotting your competition's product or company names on this chart and see how
they sort out

Brand Positioning
Our next step is to help you refine and define your brand positioning. The more specific
and nuanced your positioning is, the more effective the name will be. All great names
work in concert with the positioning of the business or product they speak for. The best
positioning finds a way to reinvigorate or change the conversation that an industry has
been having with its consumers.
Our positioning process is predicated on understanding everything about your brand,
where it's been and where it's headed. The resulting naming process is based on a
forward-looking positioning strategy that takes into account your brand, your
competition, and your entire sector.
While it's important to understand what competitors are doing in order to act in a
distinctive and powerful way, it's also useful to learn from their mistakes and successes.
For instance, the company that became Apple needed to distance itself from the cold,
unapproachable, complicated imagery created by the other computer companies at the
time that had names like IBM, NEC, DEC, ADPAC, Cincom, Dylakor, Input, Integral
Systems, Sperry Rand, SAP, PSDI, Syncsort, and Tesseract.
The new company needed to reverse the entrenched view of computers in order to get
people to use them at home. They were looking for a name that was unlike the names of
traditional computer companies, a name that also supported a brand positioning strategy
that was to be perceived as simple, warm, human, approachable and different.
Of course, once they had a clear positioning platform in place, there were still hundreds
of potential names for the new company to consider. The process for finding that one
perfect name is detailed in the next section.

Name Development
The first step in name development is deciding what you want your new name to do for
your marketing, branding and advertising efforts. Making this decision allows you to
narrow your name search to a certain category of name. The relative strengths and
weakness of the four major categories of names are discussed on the following pages:

• Functional / Descriptive Names – Functional names are purely descriptive of what

a company or product does.
• Invented Names – There are two kinds of invented, as in made-up, names: those
that are built upon Greek and Latin roots, and those poetic constructions that are
based on the rhythm and the experience of saying them.
• Experiential Names – Experiential names offer a direct connection to something
real, to a part of direct human experience.
• Evocative Names – These names are designed to evoke the positioning of a
company or product rather than the goods and services or the experience of those
goods and services.

Functional / Descriptive Product and Company Names

When descriptive names work:

When a company names products and their brand strategy is to direct the bulk of brand
equity to the company name. Examples of companies that follow this name strategy are
BMW, Martha Stewart and Subway.
When descriptive names don't work:
When they are company names. Company names that are descriptive are asked to
perform only one task: explaining to the world the business that you are in. This is an
unnecessary and counterproductive choice.
The downside here is many-fold. This naming strategy creates a situation that needlessly
taxes a marketing and advertising budget because descriptive company names are drawn
from a small pool of relevant keywords, causing them to blend together and fade into the
background, indistinguishable from the bulk of their competitors - the antithesis of
marketing.
As an example of the "brand fade out" caused by choosing descriptive company names,
consider the names of the following branding and naming companies:
Brand/Branding Companies Name/Naming Companies
Brand-DNA (.com) ABC Name Bank
Brand-DNA (.net) Brighter Naming
Brand A Moore Names
Brand 2.0 Name Development
Brand Design Name Evolution
Brand Doctors Name Generator
Brand Evolve Name-It
Brand Evolution Name Lab
Brand Forward Name One
Brand Juice Name Pharm
Brand Ladder Name Quest
Brand Link Name Razor
Brand Maverick Name Sale
Brand Mechanics Name Sharks
Brand Meta Name-Shop
Brand People Name Stormers
Brand Positioning Name Tag
Brand Salt Name Trade
Brand Scope Namebase
Brand Sequence Names-n-Brands
Brand Slinger Nameworks
Brand Solutions NameWorks
Brand Vista Naming Systems
CoreBrand Naming Toolbox
iBrand Naming Workshop
Independent Branding Namington
Not Just Any Branding Namix
The Better Branding Company Strategic Name Development
The Brand Company The Naming Company
The Brand Consultancy Wise Name
These kinds of company names are easily avoided if a thorough competitive analysis is
performed and if the people doing the naming understand the following basic concept:
The notion of describing a business in the name assumes that company names will exist
at some point without contextual support, which is impossible. Company names will
appear on websites, store fronts, in news articles or press releases, on business cards, in
advertisements, or, at their most naked, in conversations.
There are simply no imaginable circumstances in which company names can exist
without contextual, explanatory support, which means they are free to perform more
productive tasks.

Invented Product and Company Names

There are basically two types of invented names for products or corporations:

1. Names built upon Greek and Latin roots. Examples: Acquient, Agilent,
Alliant, Aquent

The upside:

o These names breeze through the trademark process because they are
unique, eliminating the potential for trademark conflict.
o For companies looking for a hassle-free way to secure a domain name
without a modifier, this is a fairly painless route to go.
o They are free of negative connotations.
o Because these names are built upon Greek and Latin morphemes, they are
felt to be serious sounding.
o For the above reasons, these are the easiest names to push through the
approval process at gigantic global corporations.

The downside:

o Because these types of names are built on Greek and Latin morphemes,
you need the advertising budget of a gigantic global corporation to imbue
them with meaning and get people to remember them.
o While they don't carry any direct negative messages, such names do cast a
cold, sanitized persona.
o These are names with no potential marketing energy -- they are image-free
and emotionally void.

2. Poetically constructed names that are based on rhythm and the experience of
saying them. Examples: Snapple, Oreo, Google, Kleenex.

The upside:
 o They breeze through the trademark process.
o Easy domain name acquisition.
o By design, the target audience likes saying these names, which helps
propel and saturate them throughout the target audience.
o Highly memorable.
o Emotionally engaging.
o They are rich with potential marketing energy.

The downside:

o Tougher for a marketing department to get corporate approval for. When

making a case for a name based on things like "fun to say, memorable,
viral, and emotionally engaging," you need to present a solid, quantifiable
case. We can show you how.

Experiential Product and Corporate Names

Experiential names offer a direct connection to something real, to a part of direct human
experience. They rise above descriptive names because their message is more about the
experience than the task.
For instance, in the web portal space, descriptive product names include Infoseek, GoTo,
FindWhat, AllTheWeb, etc. Experiential names of web portals include such product
names as Explorer, Magellan, Navigator, and Safari.

The upside:

• These names make sense to the consumer.

• They map to the consumer's experience with the company or product.
• Because they require little explanation, experiential names are easily approved in
a corporate process.
• They work best for products within a brand strategy designed to accumulate brand
equity for both the company and the product.
• Experiential company and product names are most effective for the early entrants
in a business sector, becoming less effective for later adopters.

The downside:

• Because they are so intuitive, experiential names are embraced across many
industries with high frequency, making them harder to trademark.
• These are names that tend to be historically common in the branding world.
• Their over-usage makes them less effective in the long run. For instance, while
Explorer, Navigator and Safari are web portal names, they are also the names of
SUVs.
• The similarity in tone of these names across an industry is indicative of
similarities in positioning. As web portal names, Explorer, Navigator, Safari and
Magellan are all saying exactly the same things in exactly the same ways to
 exactly the same people. Consequently, they aren't pulling any weight when it
comes to differentiating a brand

Evocative Product and Corporate Names

One important way that evocative names differ from others is that they evoke the
positioning of a company or product, rather than describing a function or a direct
experience.
Continuing with more examples of the names of web portal companies:

• InfoSeek, LookSmart = functional

• Explorer, Navigator = experiential
• Yahoo = positioning (Evocative)

Another example – companies from the airline sector:

• Trans World Airlines = functional

• United = experiential
• Virgin = positioning (Evocative)

and finally, from the computer industry:

• Digital Equipment = functional

• Gateway = experiential
• Apple = positioning (Evocative)

The upside:

• A rare type of name, making it a powerful differentiator.

• Nonlinear and multidimensional, making it deeply engaging.
• Helps create a brand image that is bigger than the goods and services a company
offers.
• Trademark process is better than average.
• When created in sync with positioning, it is a branding force that can dominate an
industry.

The downside:

• When created out of sync with brand positioning, it's an ugly mess.
• Because evocative names for companies and products are created to compliment
positioning rather than goods and services, they are the toughest type of names to
get corporate approval for, being a bit of an abstraction for those outside the
marketing department.

For advice on how to create and secure buy-in for evocative product and company names,
see the Evocative Naming Filters page in the Naming Tools section.
Trademark Screening of Product and Company Names
During a naming project, all names we present to clients are at minimum prescreened
against the US trademark database. Depending upon your needs, names are also screened
by trademark attorneys for availability worldwide or in the select countries that are of
most concern to you.
We do this in order to feel confident that the names your attorney submits for final
trademark screening and application have been deemed by an attorney as likely to pass
muster for registration. If not, valuable time is lost.
Other options include a global linguistic connotation screen of names in as many
languages as you deem necessary and detailed NameProtect trademark and common law
searches.

Creative / Testing
These are tasks that are constantly performed throughout our process. However, near the
end of every project it comes time decide which of the leading name candidates will best
serve our clients.
At this point, the job is to exhaustively and specifically flesh out the relative strengths of
each name. We present names with a range of taglines and contextual positioning support
in the form of print ads or commercial treatments. This presentation is key to helping
everyone involved understand how a given product or company name could work in your
marketing and advertising campaigns. It lifts the naming process out of the realm of
theory and breathes life into the names, a vital step in the decision-making process.
These same materials are designed to work seamlessly for any focus group testing or
market research that you feel is necessary. We can advise you and/or run the testing
phase for you if you wish. And we have extensive experience presenting positioning,
brand strategies, names and taglines to boards of directors.
Here is a sampling of some of the many contextual support images created during the
course of the Tickle project (images blurred to respect photo rights):
Depending on a project's requirements, we also perform domain name availability
screening, global linguistic screening in dozens of languages, and a wide variety of
consumer and industry group testing.

Names and Taglines

Once a name is chosen, we more fully develop a range of taglines, images and language
that help you pinpoint the most effective, perfectly nuanced personality with which to
present your name.

A key point at this stage is exploring how different taglines and collateral can shift and
enhance the efficacy of your name and brand. For example, here are a few ad lines and
taglines that the name Igor brings to the table:

• Igor. Get over the hump.

• Igor. A few spare parts and a good storm. (The ingredients of all innovation.)
• Igor. Throw the switch.
• Igor. Bringing your vision to life.
• Igor. A Moveable Beast.
• Igor. Own your shadow.
• Igor. Talk of the town.
• Igor. No job too horrifying.
 • Igor. The other white meat.
• Igor. Never say die.
• Igor. A good brain is hard to find.
• Igor. Alive.
• Igor. Better living through science.
• Igor. Building the perfect beast.

And on and on and on. When deciding between names for your own project, go ahead
and make a list of taglines for each potential name. It will make the decision-making
process crystal clear, because if you can't get inspired by a particular name, your
customers aren't likely to.
One of the most important things that the best brands accomplish is being thought of as
greater than the goods and services offered. Nike's "Just Do It" helps them rise above
selling sneakers. Apple's "Think Different" is bigger than computers. Fannie Mae's
"We're in the American Dream Business" elevates them from mere mortgage brokers.
Like names, taglines come in four flavors. Sometimes it makes sense for an evocative
name to be launched with a functional tagline, migrating to an evocative tagline over
time. The specifics of your business, where it is going, and the state of your industry will
define which of the many different combinations of types of name and types of tagline
will be most effective.

Naming Tools

Name Taxonomy Charts

• Accounting and Business Service Companies
• Airline Names
• Biotech / Pharmaceutical Names
• The Company Names of Naming Companies
• Computer Port Technology Names
• Continuing Medical Education (CME) Names
• Defense Industry / Defense Contractor Company Names
• Juice Names
• Margarine Names
• Music and Media Download Service Names
• Search Engine, Browser and Web Portal Names
• Social Network Names
• Sport Utility Vehicle (SUV) Names
• Sweet Snack Food Names

• Toothpaste Names

• Your Names – Here is a blank name taxonomy chart you can print. Try plotting
your competition's product or company names on this chart and see how they sort
out.
Naming Filters
• Evocative Naming Filters – understanding positioning and evocative name
creation
• Name Evaluation – nine criteria for evaluating names under consideration
• Theory of Negativity – the negative deconstruction of provocative names and why
consumers never do it.

Studies in Naming
• Allstream – the perils of overused language
• Alphanumeric Car Naming – Mercedes' plethora of numbers
• Avlimil – an unusual but effective brand positioning strategy
• Better Naming Through Chemistry – naming and branding in the medical,
biotech, and pharmaceutical industries
• Chrysler Crossfire – seeing names from the consumer's point of view
• IBM's T-Rex – code names vs. "official names"
• Pepperidge Farm – a wonderful job of creating evocative product names
• Roomba – a perfect made-up product name
• Silk – great consumer product name creation in action

Studies in Branding
• Juice Branding – Simply Orange, Tropicana and POM Wonderful
• Verizon's Tagline – a positive negative
• Yahoo! Personals: Believe – a tagline creates brand engagement
• Yellow Freight – the friction between a color and a name creates engagement

News and Analysis

• Visit Igor's Naming and Branding Meta Blog, which aggregates posts from the
two other blogs published by Igor:
o Snark Hunting – all about naming and branding in popular culture
o Wordlab – focused on naming and language issues

http://keysplashcreative.com/5-core-steps-to-building-a-business-brand-strategy/
http://ezinearticles.com/?id=617527
http://www.articlesfactory.com/articles/marketing/personal-brand-building-first-5-
steps.html
http://www.asmro.com/?p=1
http://www.apmforum.com/hariini/archives/000286.php