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The Marketing Game!
Preface
We are indeed excited about this new second edition of The Marketing Game! And we hope you will be too. It includes many new innovations and improvements that build on the success of our original simulation.
Eight years ago, we started work on the first edition of The Marketing Game! Our aspiration was not just to improve on other competitive marketing simulations that had been available in the past, but rather to pioneer a new generation of simulations. We wanted the game to be flexible, so it would effectively serve a wide variety of marketing teaching and learning needs, from the most basic to the most sophisticated. We wanted it to be the best simulation in the world, and at the same time the easiest to use so it would be attractive to people who had never previously considered teaching with a simulation. We wanted to design it to be rich in student interest and realism, and yet to create a strategy planning environment where random events would not mask the relationship between good decisions and results achieved. No one leams anything in situations like that, but they were all too typical of most simulations. We also wanted participants both to have fun and be challenged analyzing the results of the simulation and planning new strategies, while at the same time making it fast and easy for instructors to diagnose how participants were progressing. In sum, our wish list in preparing the first edition of the game appeared to represent a tall order!
It is indeed gratifying that the game has proved so successful and that students and instructors alike have been enthusiastic about what we achieved toward our original objectives. At the same time, creative colleagues at hundreds of colleges, universities, and companies who had worked with the first edition of the game for a number of years came up with a host of great ideas on ways to make it even better. We are grateful to the many students and faculty who have shared suggestions, criticisms and ideas about ways to improve or update this student manual, the student and instructor software, and the other instructor materials that accompany the simulation. Our most ardent supporters and loyal users have often been our best critics!
In the spirit of the first edition, this new second edition of The Marketing Game! is designed to provide the basis for a high-involvement learning experience. It's fun. But it is also challenging. The focus is on effective marketing strategy planning in a competitive environment. It gives you the opportunity to analyze markets and target market needs. You make decisions in a number of strategy decision areas to develop a marketing plan that satisfies your target market and earns a profit for your firm. If you wish, you can use the PLAN software that comes with this manual to more easily and quickly evaluate the budget and financial implications of your strategy.
It has been a priority to make the simulation and the market environment realistic. Firms compete by developing and marketing one or more software products and supporting customers with service after-the-sale. Marketing managers select and focus on target markets from among a variety of business and consumer segments and reach their targets with different channels. Promotion including personal selling, advertising and sales promotion must consider middlemen and final customers. Prices must be set to offer customers the value they seek and yield profits for the firm. The simulation starts in the growth stage of the product life cycle and continues into market maturity. R&D decisions make it possible to modify the produces) over time to better meet customer needs and competitive challenges. The game can continue for as many decision periods as the instructor desires. The instructor also has a variety of optional ways to "set up" or adjust the market environment to meet specific teaching and learning objectives.
Both the text and computer simulation have been carefully written to build on the marketing strategy planning framework and the 4Ps organization pioneered by E. Jerome McCarthy. This organization is used in Basic Marketing most widely used text in marketing. But, importantly, it has been adopted and used in almost every other marketing text. Moreover, because this framework really works, it has become the cornerstone of marketing strategy planning in most firms. By building on this standard we ensure that the simulation will work well in a variety of learning and teaching situations and with students who have different levels of knowledge and experience whether the students are just learning about marketing or are seasoned executives.
In fact, this flexibility is possible because the game is not based on just one simulation, but several simulations within one integrated framework. It has been specially designed so that the instructor can select the number of decision areas and increase the number of decision areas (and thus the difficulty level) over time. This innovation, introduced with the first edition of the game, is one reason the game has quickly became one of the most widely used marketing simulations in the world. It is why the game works well whether it is used with senior executives in management development programs, with undergraduate and graduate students in the first marketing course, or with students in electives such as marketing strategy and product management.
One of the key advantages of using a simulation rather than some other realistic learning approach such as case discussions or industry studies-is that it provides immediate feedback. Even in the real world feedback is often slow and mistakes can certainly be very costly. In contrast, with a well-designed simulation, strategies can be formulated and then tested and refined over time. The experience and learning that result are cumulative.
We have designed The Marketing Game! to ensure that these pedagogical benefits are realized. It is set in a dynamic market environment. Thus, a poor decision early in the competition does not frustrate the learning process or leave a student/manager with poor results from then on. New decision periods bring opportunity for new successes. And firms with early successes can't coast on their laurels, but must constantly "earn" their customers' business. Thus, there is ample opportunity to learn from both successes and mistakes.
In addition, this is not a narrowly defined market in which success by one firm dooms others to failure. There are a number of different types of opportunities to pursue. Each firm can develop its own effective and profitable marketing strategy. As in the real world, the marketing manager in the game decides whether to compete head-on with other firms or pursue a niche with less competition. Either way, however, good decisions produce good results. As simple as that sounds, it is perhaps the single greatest strength of this simulation and where so many others fall short.
Moreover, this is not a "zero sum" game one in which one competitor must lose for another one to win. While many other simulations rely on the assumptions of zero sum competition, we believe that approach fails to consider the pedagogical reasons for using a simulation in the first place. It simply doesn't make sense to assume that if one student participant does a good job that another must be doing a bad job. In The Marketing Game!, good work and smart decisions are reinforced with good outcomes and that reinforces the learning process for everyone involved.
A marketing budget for each firm in each period highlights the trade-offs among marketing expenditures that marketing managers must make when developing a marketing strategy. A "smart" marketing strategy must be based on a marketing mix that is consistent with target market needs but that doesn't mean that it must be a high-cost strategy.
The text includes budget planning and marketing strategy forms that help develop skills in analyzing alternative marketing plans. These can be used by themselves or in combination with the accompanying PLAN software, which is discussed in Appendix A at the end of this text.
There is a very complete Instructor's Manual to Accompany The Marketing Gomel The manual gives many suggestions to help make the simulation a successful teaching/learning experience for instructors and students alike.
We have made hundreds of revisions and improvements in the simulation software, the instructor materials, and in this book. We won't catalog all of the changes here. After all, a long "what's new" list probably isn't relevant for most students who are participating in the game for the first time. But instructors who have used the game in the past will find a detailed list of the changes at the beginning of the revised instructor's manual.
Our students and hundreds of our colleagues from around the world who teach with the game report that The Marketing Game! is an exciting and integrating learning experience. Our sincere hope is that you will have the same reaction.
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