Entrepreneurship And Marketing Essay Analyzes

Discuss About The Entrepreneurship And Marketing Paper Analyses?

The success of any business depends on different factors. One of these factors is the way in which the entrepreneur plans, controls and markets their enterprises (Hapiro, 2013). To succeed in any business any business operation, entrepreneurs should be risk takers because the process of running business is associated with various risks. Entrepreneurs are characterized by being passionate, optimistic and future oriented. They trust being successful and are always willing to risk their resources to attain profit. They have high levels of energy and are at times impatient. Being a successful entrepreneur one has to know important aspects involved in running businesses like marketing, managing of resources and so forth.

One of the factors which challenge the success of businesses is competition. This means good strategies of marketing should be considered by entrepreneurs who want to succeed in their ventures (Dávila & Mora, 2013). Before starting a business, entrepreneurs should understanding several factors associated with running a business like for example what are the dark sides of entrepreneurship, why sell this service, who are the target customers, which is the best way of segmenting the potential market and so forth. This knowledge assists entrepreneurs to plan on how to manage their businesses in a manner which can assist them to attain a competitive advantage.

The life of entrepreneurs is associated with different dark sides. Some of them include mood swings, balance, and trust.  For mood swings, entrepreneurs are associated with abrupt and apparently unaccountable change of mood especially when things do not go their way. They at times want to attain something which means a lot to their business but when that does not happen, they switch off their moods until something positive happens (Fbci, 2011). For entrepreneurs, work-life balance is something they do not value because they convince themselves and their friends that business is their life. They do not consider that their minds require refreshing from time to time. In most cases, people come and go in the lives of entrepreneurs (Berman, 2014). This makes them to lose trust and question everything and everyone. Stopping to believe and trusting acts as threat to the entrepreneurs because it contributes to their failure.

A good example which indicates that running a business involves dark sides which entrepreneurs need to plan for is Goodman’s idea of questioning his ability of delivering the product to the market and taking some time to make it work. Good entrepreneurs are not the one who always succeeds, but the ones who knows how to use their mistakes to come up with strategies which can assist them to attain their goals (Dávila & Mora, 2013). Entrepreneurs should also know how to address their dark sides in a manner which can assist their business to succeed

Marketing and strategic planning

Basing argument from GoPro case, Peter Drucker’s statement should be refuted because entrepreneurship seems not to do anything with learning. This is because the process of initiation this company began without a lot of education or undergoing any course related to entrepreneurship. Woodman began from creativity and passion (Bessie, 2012). There was nothing to do with learning because from the case study we are told that this man was mostly focused on sports than books. Being focused on sports had something to do with the kind of business he was to operate because when the business started one of the target customers were sports people.

Another reason which leads to disagreement with Peter Drucker’s statement is that entrepreneurship is about planning not about the going through a particular course (Grzegorz, 2012). From the case study, woodman had never failed in anything apart from computer science engineering classes. The case study also indicates that this man was passionate and good in planning. This shows that his entrepreneurship was primarily triggered by his ability to plan well and desire to succeed.

Woodman became a millionaire at younger age not because he was learned but because he was innovative and the ability to challenge those in charge. Challenging those above him means this man was able to think critically and could also put his ideas into reality. Putting ideas into reality is an important aspect in entrepreneurship because beginning a business involves identifying a gap and putting ideas into action

Another factor which leads to disagreement with Peter Drucker’s statement is that from the Case study stated, woodman that if he did not follow his passion for surfing, he would not have come up with the concept to make a wrist camera. In this case, woodman did not mention education in his idea of coming up with a wrist camera. Passion, planning, determination and risk taking are what make an entrepreneur, not education. The start of GoPro and its success was mostly triggered by passion and risk taking.

There are various factors which assisted this company to attain a competitive advantage. One of these factors is using excellent marketing strategies (Pankaj, 2016). From the case study, it is clear that GoPro had a clear idea of its products and the customers it was to target. For example, Woodman knew the sports industry was in need of high quality cameras for recording games. One of the factors which shows the cameras had demand in sports is EFL using them to capture different events during games. The company also targeted the military because woodman had an idea that it required good cameras for recording their training sessions.

Another factor which made this company to attain a competitive advantage is coming up with quality product and proving to the customers that quality differentiates its products from those of other companies (Kurian, 2013). For example, woodman used his camera during his flight to record his journey. Different people can perceive his action differently but arguing from marketing perspective one can say that his main idea was to advertise GoPro products through making the people realizing that the cameras can record events which need to be kept for memories.

Competitive advantage of this company is also triggered by using good advertisement tools. For example, from the Case study we are told that though Woodman does not have Twitter account and is inactive on Facebook, he spends millions of dollars every year to make sure the GoPro name is hashtagged. The use of social medial in advertising has gained popularity in the recent years because of its ability to connect large number of people. Using social media and spending millions of dollars shows that this company values using the best advertisement tools irrespective of the cost.

Innovation has also enabled this company to maintain its competitive advantage (Dusan, 2013). Since its inception, this GoPro has been working through innovation and technology to come up with products which can assist it to challenge its main competitors. For example from the case study, Woodman needed to come up with a camera which was durable enough to take the wear and tear of the sea. This shows that this company is always committed to come up with products which can enable its customers to have new experiences, and ones which can perform better than those of its competitors.

Good pricing strategy is also another factor which assisted GoPro to attain and maintain its competitive advantage (Berman, 2014). Since its inception, the company has been making sure that its pricing is worth the quality of its products. It also ensures that the pricing are decided based on several factors like for example the target customers, key competitors and so forth. This strategy has been assisting this firm to attract many customers because consumers compare price and quality when making buying decisions.

Differentiation also plays a significant role in assisting GoPro to attain a competitive advantage. The company designs its products in a unique way which enables the customers to differentiate them from those of other companies (Karel, 2011). The fact that the company was initiated and operated by a millionaire played a significant role in assisting it to attain a competitive advantage because he was able to meet all marketing costs.

From the case study, one of the threats which this company is facing is impact from the use of cell phones. As time goes on, people are moving from using the GoPro cameras to relying on their smartphone cameras to record events (Ronald, 2015). This factor has been triggered by the fact that technology and innovation is leading to emergence of smartphones with cameras which have high mega pixels. This means people are not finding the sense of buying another camera when their phones can serve their various needs including taking pictures as well as recording videos.

To address this threat, the company should improve the quality of its cameras so that customers can find the sense of purchasing them (Hess, 2011). One of the strategies of improving their quality is by improving megapixels and storage capacity. When these two features are closely related to those of advanced smartphones, customers will prefer purchasing the smartphones instead of GoPro cameras because the phones can do what the cameras can do and still serve other needs.

Another way of addressing this threat is changing the pricing strategy (Cheryl, 2012). The management should price its products wisely because the company competes with not only with firms which deal with cell phones but also with other companies which deal with similar products. Prices in this case should be planned based on those of advanced smartphones and also those of other companies which deal with similar products like Sony. Another way which this company can address the threat of smartphones is through targeting the right customers and segmenting its market properly.

The other threat which this company is facing is pressure from competitors (Wolfigang, 2014). Some of the companies which this company competes with have taken note of its success and have established strategies to challenge it. For example, from the case study we are told that Sony wants to position its self as the ‘strong number two’ with features like image stabilization and stereo sound, which this GoPro does not have. This means competitors are taking the advantage of GoPro’s weaknesses of to come up with strategies which can make it lose its market share.

To address this threat, GoPro should analyze the strategies used by its competitors and use the information obtained from these analyses to come up with strategies which can assist it to maintain its market share and competitive advantage (Daniela, 2012). The company should also introduce what it does not have because consumers like purchasing from companies which provide a wide variety of products.

GoPro should also innovate and use quality as one of the factors which can assist it to maintain its competitive advantage. This is because some companies which compete with it like Sony have strong brand names which make the customers believe their products are of good quality. Quality in this case will not only assist GoPro to maintain its competitive advantage but will also help it to have strong brand names (Rajeev, 2012). One of the strategies which this company can use to improve the quality of its products is being innovative and incorporating the modern technology in its operations. The company should find out the customer expectations and work based on them to ensure it comes up with products which satisfy their needs.

Though woodman feels that the market he created is big enough for multiple companies, Sony is ready to take the advantage of being a “camera company first”. This means Woodman should not feel the market he created is sufficient for multiple companies because some of its competitors are ready to dominate the big market. Instead of feeling the market is big for multiple companies, woodman should direct the company towards attaining a bigger market share through providing products based on customer expectations and using good marketing strategies which can assist in improving and maintaining customer loyalty.

Conclusion

Entrepreneurs face three major dark sides which include mood swings, balance, and trust (Dusan, 2013). To overcome these dark sides, proper planning before commencing a business is required. Based on the case study, Peter Drucker’s statement seems not true because based on how Woodman started and operated the business, one cannot refer entrepreneurship as a discipline which one can learn. This is because woodman’s entrepreneurship was mostly triggered by passion, planning and risk taking. From the case study we are told that woodman paid more attention on sports than in studies and could challenge those above him, meaning education had to do nothing with his entrepreneurship skills.  

GoPro obtained its competitive advantage by using unique marketing strategies like targeting the right customers and making the people realize the importance of using its products. This company faces two major threats which includes shift from using GoPro cameras to using advanced smartphone cameras, and also the threat of increased pressure from competitors.

References

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Cheryl, L., 2012. Consumer Marketing Orientations: Does Your Customer Want a Relationship?. Luczak, Cheryl, 18(2), pp. 34-45.

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Dusan, P., 2013. Marketing and Marketing Communication in SMEs. European Research Studies, 16(4), pp. 345-502.

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Rajeev, V., 2012. Marketing Accountability: How to Measure Marketing Effectiveness. South Asian Journal of Management, 19(3), pp. 78-89.

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