Week Eight Reflection

This past week in HONB200-02 , the primary center of attention was on the class SMARTProjects. On Tuesday, we had a different class setup compared to all of our previous meetings. This involved each SMARTProject group sitting together at separate tables and one by one meeting individually with Professor Spotts to discuss any new updates on the projects in order to receive feedback. Due to Professor Spotts being my group's marketing consultant, we luckily had already had a meeting with him earlier in the week and thus we had a broad idea of what he was going to ask us concerning our project.

Prior to this class session, my group had created a set of potential survey questions that we would like to ask possible consumers of the BedBug. In this way, we would be able to determine exactly how large or small of a target market the product would have, and thus be able to advertise for it accordingly. Additionally, the creation of this survey would theoretically help to enhance the product so that its consumers would be both willing to purchase it and be fully satisfied with it. We then narrowed down these questions to the most crucial ones and carefully arranged them in a well-thought out order so that the survey would appear to be organized and practical. We also developed a value proposition canvas for the BedBug, which displayed the predicted customer needs, wants, and fears, in relation to the product's benefits, features, and experiences gained from using it. The completion of this has allowed our group to be able to see areas that are in need of improvement, such as the addressing of our customers' fears on the product.     

Upon officially meeting with Professor Spotts during the allotted class time, our group presented him with the newly created survey. As he had helped us originate a majority of the questions on it in our prior meeting, the class meeting was relatively quick in comparison to many of the other groups'. He gave us a few tips of ways in which we can reorganize the order of the survey, as well as a few related questions we could consider adding to it. With the completion of the meetings, we each received binders containing feedback on our progress thus far in the class, given that this week signaled the middle of the term. Overall, I considered the class to be a success in terms of having time in our groups to work both together as teams and with Professor Spotts to further develop the marketing of our products.  

On Thursday, the class setup was returned to the typical style, with the class sitting in their respective groups while as a whole discussing new material unrelated to our specific SMARTProjects. This material was specifically centered around the actual buying of products itself, with two main topics being covered. One of these said topics was the Diffusion of Innovation concept, which describes the average consumer's adoption process of a product. This process begins with Innovators and Early Adopters, both of which are the consumers that are deemed to be the most willing to try new products, despite not knowing what the outcome of the products will be. After these consumer types there is a chasm, which serves as an indicator of whether or not a product will be successful. If a product cannot advance past the chasm, then it is a failed product. However, if it does advance past the chasm, then the next consumers in line are the Early Majority and Late Majority, which serve as the middle ground of a product's customers by being mainstream adopters. The final portion of the diffusion of innovation are the laggards, who are known as being the resisters to try new products. In our SMARTProject groups, we then decided who our consumers that would make up each stage in the theory would be.

The second topic of discussion was the largely regarded Product Life Cycle. There are four known stages in a product's life cycle, all of which culminate to show a growth curve. At the beginning low point of the curve is the Introduction stage, during which there are slow sales of a product and no profit is being made. Next comes the Growth stage, through which there is a rapid growth of sales and profits are beginning to be generated. This is followed by the Maturity stage, which is the highest point of success on the curve that a product can reach. At this stage, sales are steadily increasing at a slower rate, there is a great deal of competition from other products, as well as a lot of promotion of the said product. However, towards the end of the Maturity era, profits may start to fall, leading into the final stage of the life cycle; Decline. At the point during which a product is experiencing its Decline, sales are greatly falling, product advertising slows before coming to a halt, and the production of the product may be stopped completely. 

The class largely discussed the iPhone as an example product to be referenced when learning about these two topics. While some students believe that it's possible that the iPhone could soon be reaching the decline stage in its life cycle, others believe that the product will remain in the maturity stage for the remainder of its existence. I personally think that the iPhone will officially reach its decline stage at the point in time in which smartphones as a whole will cease to exist, if that time ever comes. My reasoning behind this mentality is that due to Apple having built up such a well-regarded legacy, especially concerning their iPhone products, consumers will continue to purchase their products knowing that it's a brand used by the majority of people in this day and age, and one which they can rely on for the most part.