Scenario: Neil and Maddison, were guest speakers at a recent small-medium business forum [SMB forum] [see the activity a chance encounter]. They announced that this was their second SMB forum and have recently documented the small-medium business planning process. Following the SMB forum, a relevant Government Department has invited them to produce a 6 X A4 page article for the department’s monthly magazine.

Senior officers from the  Government Department [who attended the SMB forum] have concerns that small and medium business owners lack the skills to undertake the business-marketing planning process. They believe a magazine article could help. After some discussion it was agreed that the article should communicate:

• what is the business-marketing planning process
• what are the key steps,[CADDIE]
• why is it important to conduct a business plan, marketing plan, and marketing action plan
• what are the benefits to organizations that undertake a rigorous planning process
• how do strategies and tactics work in concert
• how does the marketing philosophy and marketing theory assist with the business-marketing planning process

The magazine article

Within your article demonstrate your understanding of the marketing concept, a marketing philosophy, the 3 mega-marketing concepts, the 9 objectives of a marketing practitioner. In addition, discuss the business-marketing planning process and in particular the design and development of a marketing plan and marketing action plans.

This assessment does not lend itself to a formal academic essay style [the only required source is the e-book]; therefore a magazine-style is recommended. You may include images and it is acceptable to employ images from the e-book or slides. You should end-text the e-book and the activity but there is no need to in-text.

Learning objective: To ensure that students study and understand how the marketing concept, a marketing philosophy, the 3 mega-marketing concepts, the 9 objectives of marketing practitioners will assist marketing practitioners during the business-marketing planning process and in particular the design and development of marketing plan.

Task: An assessment scenario will be uploaded to Blackboard [this is it] following the close of submissions for assessment 2. Students will be asked to consider the assessment scenario and complete the task instructions. Like all assessments the task instructions relate to the learning objectives of the assessment and the learning outcomes of the unit [sections 1,2, & 3], however, it should be noted that section 3 module – the CADDIE business-marketing planning process is the focus of the assessment.