IGCSE & A LEVELS GUIDE

Chapter 19 - The Marketing Mix, Product and Price Learning Objectives: To understand the marketing mix (product) characteristics The Marketing Mix are the four most important tools in a Marketer's toolbox: The right or wrong decisions in the Marketing Mix will tell whether a business will sell its products profitably. These four decisions are interrelated and should always be thought of together rather than individually. The need for consistency is key when deciding on those

Chapter 18 - Market Research Learning Objective: To understand the basics of Market Research What is Market Research? "Market research is the action or activity of gathering information about consumers' needs and preferences, competitors, and the market itself." Market Research reveals important information about customers, competitors, and the market in which the business competes. It is useful for various reasons: It helps businesses understand what customers like and disli

Chapter 17 - The Nature of Marketing Learning Objective: To understand B2B, B2C, and Market Segmentation (Mass vs. Niche) Consumer Market (B2C) and Industrial Market (B2B) Consumer Products are sold to households and individuals whereas Industrial Products are the ones produced and used by industries: Selling to Business rather than to consumers have some big differences: Industrial goods are often much more complex - it requires specialist sales and support employees; Indust

Chapter 17 - The Nature of Marketing Learning Objective: To understand some of the most common marketing concepts What is a market? A market is a group of consumers interested in a product, with resources to purchase it legally. - It is the group of customers interested in a product and with the resources to purchase it; - The potential market for a product is the total population interested in the product; - Target market is the segment of the total available market that the

Chapter 17 - The Nature of Marketing Lesson Objective: To understand Price Elasticity of Demand One of the many roles of the Marketing Department is determining prices - which is part of meeting demand profitably. Note: The demand for a product is how much of that product customers are willing to buy at a certain price point. Let's start by understanding how the demand for a product changes following changes in price: Price, therefore, does influence demand. However, there ar

Chapter 17 - The Nature of Marketing Lesson Objective: To understand the basic concepts in Marketing In your opinion, what is Marketing? Marketing is a business function that involves various activities: Market Research; Product Design; Pricing; Advertising; Distribution; Customer Service; Packaging. In a nutshell, marketing is about: Identifying and understanding customer needs of a target-market through Market Research and then trying to satisfy those needs better than the

We all understand that there are mainly four leadership styles: Democratic; Autocratic; Laissez-Faire; Paternalistic. We also understand that different managers have different approaches towards their workforce: some have a more soft approach and others a more hard one. But what are the factors that determine what management style a manager will use? According to Douglas McGregor the attitude of managers towards their workers will have the largest impact on how they will mana

Chapter 12 - Management Learning Objectives: To learn the different leadership styles and the functions/roles of management. Being a manager is no easy job! There are two main theories regarding managers' functions and roles: Fayol Functions of Management Mintzberg Management Roles According to Fayol (POCCC), the 5 following functions of management are to facilitate the management process - they focus on the relationship employees vs. managers: Planning objectives and tactics

Motivation is the desire of workers to see a job done quickly and well: By meeting their individual objectives, motivated workers drive companies to reach their own goals (MBO). Motivation is a management issue: effective managers are able to align workers' individual objectives to the business goal while maintaining motivation levels high. Highly motivated workers have positive impacts on a business productivity and efficiency. They are also more likely to be loyal (reduce t

Chapter 10 - Human Resources Management Learning Objective: To understand employee appraisal, career plans, and trade unions Human Resources Managers are responsible for a very complicated issue: Appraisal is about evaluating an employee's performance against pre-set objectives; Development, on the other hand, can take the form of new challenges and opportunities, trainings, promotions, etc. - motivation; Development and Appraisal are important parts of employee satisfaction

Chapter 10 - Human Resources Management Learning Objective: To further explore HRM responsibilities To continue with the many responsibilities of HRM, let's now discuss Employee Morale and Welfare - an important concern amongst Human Resources Departments: Services such as advice and counseling to employees in need of support (e.g. family or financial related issues; It boosts employees’ morale and their sense of loyalty towards the company; It can improve productivity and lo

Chapter 10 - Human Resource Management Learning Objective: Understand various responsibilities of the HRM There are different reasons why a business might recruit new workers, for example: Business is expanding and need workforce to support the growth; When workers leave and need to be replaced. That's when the process of Recruitment & Selection comes in - a process made out of various stages that can either be handled by the business itself or outsourced to specialist recrui

Chapter 10 - Human Resource Management To-Do-List: Activity 10.3 Learning Objective: To understand the purpose of Human Resources Management What do you think are the responsibilities of a Human Resources Manager? Human Resources is the business function responsible for activities such as: Recruitment of capable, flexible, and committed staff; Management and rewarding the performance of workers; Development of staff skills given the organization's objectives; The purpose of H

Chapter 5 - Stakeholders in Business Learning Objective: To understand how businesses approach conflicting stakeholders' interests. As you understand now stakeholders have various and conflicting objectives. How should a business go about solving those? Think of the following situations: A factory deemed to close may do so slowly rather than abruptly (business costs keeping this factory will go stretch overtime but this will allow workers to have enough time to find new jobs)

Chapter 5 - Stakeholders in Business Learning Objective: To understand the several stakeholders and their various interests New Airport Near World Heritage Site (p.62) Who are stakeholders? These are the people or groups of people who are impacted or can impact an organization - one way or another. Therefore, stakeholder groups are interested in the business actions - these interests may differ from stakeholder to stakeholder: Consider the following: Businesses, therefore, s

Chapter 4- Business Objectives Learning Objective: Communicating, changing, and translating corporate objectives. We discussed the various different objectives companies can have: Profit maximization; Profit satisficing; Growth... It's important to understand, however, that business objectives change overtime. What are some of the reasons for that? Market recessions and crisis may lead businesses in to having survival as their main objective instead of profit or growth - this

Chapter 4 - Business Objectives Learning Objective: Hierarchy of Objectives Objectives are also of key importance because they allow strategies to exist - set of tactics that will guide the business to reach its objectives. Objectives and strategies, however, are not static and are prone to change. The SMART framework increases the odd of successful objectives. Companies also have so called corporate aims, very long-term objectives that provide purpose to the business activit

Chapter 4- Business Objectives Learning Objective: Business objectives of private and public sector businesses Business objectives are important for directing, controlling, and reviewing the success of the business activity: They give a sense of direction to employees - increasing their motivation; They give targets for strategies to aim for - focus on what to work towards; They make it possible for success/failure to be assessed against. There are a few objectives that are v

Chapter 3 - Enterprise, Business Growth, and Size Learning Objective: Business Growth (3.3) There are many reasons why businesses want to grow: With growth comes higher sales which consequentially leads to more revenue and higher profits. Growth generally brings a higher market share. Companies with more market share have a higher bargain power to suppliers which can result in lower materials cost. As a consequence, businesses become more profitable. Led by growth is also the

Chapter 3 - Size of Business Learning Objective: Small & Family Businesses (Ch. 3.2) Mongolia is a great place for us to discuss small businesses: look around and see the amount of them in our daily lives! What constitutes a small business, though? It depends on where you live, but here is an example: Not only small businesses are heavily present in our daily lives but they are also of extreme importance to countries, customers, and the economy in general. Jobs: although smal