Spring 2020 Live Business Cases

PROJECT 1: DATA ANALYSIS & SOCIAL STRATEGY RECOMMENDATIONS

SYNOPSIS

As a small local retail business, Glidden Florist knows that they really need to continuously refresh their marketing techniques in order to attract and retain customers. A big piece of that is their online presence and social media marketing strategy. Like many small businesses, Glidden Florist is having difficulty tracking their digital marketing performance and is looking to improve their strategy moving forward. Their goal is to drive more engagement, increase their follower base, and ultimately convert more prospects into customers. They have an online marketing budget and they need your help to think through ways they can improve their social media marketing strategy in order to make the most of their spend.

PROJECT PROCESS

PART 1: Understand the company’s business model and KPIs

• What is the Glidden Florist Business Model?
• How many different Products/SKUs does the company offer?
• What products are the best sellers?  (What’s the product mix?)
• What are the different customer segments? What channels are used to earn those customers?
• What are the key drivers for customers to purchase flowers?
• How does the supply chain/purchasing process work for Glidden Florist?

Milestone Deliverable – Due on February 7th: Prepare an in-class presentation on Glidden Florist’s business model

PART 2: Deep Dive on Data & Social Media Traction

• How is the company tracking their KPIs? Study reports from Point of Sale (POS) System.
  • How is the company generating this data? What data is available?
  • What insights can be derived from the data?
• Dive deep into marketing analytics and social media data.
  • What channels are they using?
  • What key metrics are they tracking?
  • What other insights are available?

Milestone Deliverable –Due on March 6th: Prepare an in-class presentation on Glidden Florist’s data. Showcase your understanding of the company’s KPIs, data systems, and social media traction.

PART 3: Social Strategy Analysis & Recommendations

• How does Glidden Florist’s social strategy compare with peers and other companies in the local economy? What works well? What could they be doing better?
• What social KPIs are they/should they be tracking? How is the company performing from a social media perspective?
• How is the social media strategy regularly coordinated and executed? What resources can be used to make the process more efficient or effective? What would be the cost/benefit?
• Based on data and insights from the prior two parts, what recommendations do you have to improve Glidden Florist’s social strategy?
• Generate a set of sample social media posts for current and prospective platforms. How might these fit into a social media calendar? How do these coincide with major holidays?

Suggested Milestone Deliverable – Due on April 3rd: Prepare an in-class presentation on Glidden Florist’s current social media strategy and traction. How is the company performing and what high-level recommendations do you have for the company in order to improve?

PROJECT 2: DEKALB, ILLINOIS B2B MARKET ANALYSIS & RECOMMENDATIONS

SYNOPSIS

Most local retail businesses tend to use a B2C commercial strategy, meaning they try to attract individuals and families as customers. B2B, on the other hand, refers to a business model that attracts companies and other types of organizations as customers. Although the sales cycles tend to be longer, companies have much deeper pockets, meaning it’s easy to score much larger (and often recurring) deals. Glidden Florist believes there are novel ways for them to attract customers in a B2B fashion. They were able to accomplish this with NIU and several local commercial enterprises in the past. The company needs help analyzing the local business scene, including key players and industries that are represented. Their hope is that you’ll be able to come up with a B2B sales strategy that they can use to increase sales throughout the next few years.

PROJECT PROCESS

PART 1: Understand the company’s business model and KPIs

• What is the Glidden Florist Business Model?
• How many different Products/SKUs does the company offer?
• What products are the best sellers?  (What’s the product mix?)
• What are the different customer segments? What channels are used to earn those customers?
• What are the key drivers for customers to purchase flowers?
• How does the supply chain/purchasing process work for Glidden Florist?

Milestone Deliverable – Due on February 7th: Prepare an in-class presentation on Glidden Florist’s business model

PART 2: Deep Dive on DeKalb B2B Market

• What does the local/regional DeKalb, Illinois business ecosystem look like?
• What types of businesses exist? What is the size of the total market? What industries are represented? How else can you categorize/better showcase an understanding of the local B2B economy?
• Who are the biggest influencers / largest players in the local economy?
• Does Glidden Florist have any competitors?
• What has Glidden Florists tried previously in terms of targeting businesses locally? How have they been successful? (Study Anytime Bouquet)

Milestone Deliverable –Due on March 6th: Prepare an in-class presentation on the DeKalb, Illinois market from a B2B perspective. Showcase your understanding of the local market, especially as it pertains to the B2B flowers market.

PART 3: B2B Sales Strategy Recommendations

• Are there potential B2B customers worth targeting? If so, who? How?
• What about prospective partnerships? How can you build relationships with other local entities that will help drive sales?
• What strategies would you propose to increase B2B sales?

Suggested Milestone Deliverable – Due on April 3rd: Prepare an in-class presentation on different sales and marketing strategies Glidden Florist can use to increase B2B traction.

PROJECT 3: GUERRILLA MARKETING ANALYSIS, STRATEGY DEVELOPMENT, & TEST

SYNOPSIS

Sometimes the best marketing tactics are the ones that are the most unique and creative. Guerilla marketing, for example, refers to marketing initiatives that are low-cost, high impact, and contain an element of surprise. Often, guerrilla marketing tactics enable consumers to learn of your brand and interact with your value proposition in a way that’s highly memorable. The hope is that these campaigns drive new customers, and in the most ideal cases, repeat, high lifetime-value customers. Glidden Florist has experimented with these types of highly effective campaigns in the past, like the Anytime Bouquet, which has been pretty successful. Through a careful analysis of their previous guerrilla marketing techniques, their goal is to leverage you and your creative minds to come up with new guerrilla marketing tactics worth testing.

PROJECT PROCESS

PART 1: Understand the company’s business model and KPIs

• What is the Glidden Florist Business Model?
• How many different Products/SKUs does the company offer?
• What products are the best sellers?  (What’s the product mix?)
• What are the different customer segments? What channels are used to earn those customers?
• What are the key drivers for customers to purchase flowers?
• How does the supply chain/purchasing process work for Glidden Florist?

Milestone Deliverable – Due on February 7th: Prepare an in-class presentation on Glidden Florist’s business model PART 2: Deep Dive on Glidden Florist Current/Former Guerrilla Marketing Campaigns

• Do a deep-dive on Glidden Florist’s successful current guerrilla marketing campaign, the “Anytime Boquet”
  • What metrics is the company tracking?
  • How has this campaign been successful? Speak to users of the “Anytime Boquet” to get their feedback.
  • What could make this campaign more successful?
• Survey regular consumers in the local DeKalb economy…
  • Have they heard of Glidden Florist? Have they ever purchased flowers/gifts from there before?
  • Are they purchasing flowers or similar products from elsewhere? If so, where? If not, why not?

Milestone Deliverable –Due on March 6th: Prepare an in-class presentation on the local B2C DeKalb, Illinois economy and the effectiveness of Glidden Florist’s example guerrilla marketing strategy. PART 3: Develop and Test New Guerrilla Marketing Strategy

• What other guerrilla marketing campaigns might be worth exploring? What have other similar businesses done previously?
• What would be the cost and potential up-side?
• How would you measure success?
• Suggest and test a guerrilla marketing strategy. Is it working? Why/why not? What can be improved?

Suggested Milestone Deliverable – Due on April 3rd: Prepare an in-class presentation on the different gorilla sales and marketing strategies you’ve tested/like to further test, develop, and scale for Glidden Florist.

PROJECT 4: CUSTOMER RETENTION ANALYSIS & STRATEGY DEVELOPMENT

SYNOPSIS

A key way to survive as a retail business in the 21st century is to retain customers and provide them with something unique that they can achieve online. Earning a customer is tough work, but getting them to keep coming back is even tougher. The goal of this project is to help Glidden Florist increase the lifetime value of their customers by analyzing and strategizing ways they may be able to better track and market to them.

PROJECT PROCESS

PART 1: Understand the company’s business model and KPIs

• What is the Glidden Florist Business Model?
• How many different Products/SKUs does the company offer?
• What products are the best sellers?  (What’s the product mix?)
• What are the different customer segments? What channels are used to earn those customers?
• What are the key drivers for customers to purchase flowers?
• How does the supply chain/purchasing process work for Glidden Florist?

Milestone Deliverable – Due on February 7th:
Prepare an in-class presentation on Glidden Campus Florist & Greenhouse’s business model

PART 2: Deep Dive on Glidden Florist’s Customer Base

• Do a deep-dive on Glidden Florist’s current customer base…
  • Interview different existing/former customers that purchase from Glidden Florist:
    • Who are the best customers?
    • Where do they come from?
    • What do they buy?
    • Why do they keep coming back?
  • What are the different types of customers that purchase products at Glidden Florist?
    • How can you classify, organize, and categorize them? What metrics are available on each category?
    • What types of products are each of these customers segments buying?
    • Are these customers coming back? If so, how often? If not, why not?

Milestone Deliverable –Due on March 6th:
Prepare an in-class presentation on Glidden Florist’s customer base. Showcase your understanding of their customer retention, the different customers segments they serve, and the product mix that is sold to each.

PART 3: Develop Customer Retention Strategy

• What percentage of customers are repeat vs. one-time purchasers? How can the company better track and manage their customer base?
• What is the company doing to ensure customer satisfaction?
• What similar strategies have competitors or other local retailers tried that work to retain customers?
• How can Glidden Florist  retain more customers? Are there opportunities to reengage existing customers? If so, how?

Suggested Milestone Deliverable – Due on April 3rd:
Prepare an in-class presentation on Glidden Florist’s customer retention effectiveness and strategies that might work to enhance that process.