Marketing Report FAO for a medium sized business

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Introduction
BigDenali Developments (BDD), a midsized US Software company which develops mostly customized productivity software for business to business sale, has a single flagship consumer product called a LiveSignature. The product is a custom animated graphic signature which is used for enhancing and personalizing online communications such as emails and newsgroup postings. The product recently entered the growth phase of the product cycle, prompting the company to begin to expand its consumer product line. BDD wishes to gain more revenue and recognition in its market segment of graphic electronic signatures by introducing a new product into its consumer product line called SignatureFonts. This new product allows the user's signature to be inserted into any document, such as faxes and form letters. Identifying and narrowing the target market and developing effective marketing strategies which will positively influence buyer behavior are critical to the successful launch of SignatureFonts.

New Product Description
Starting in January of 2006, the sales of the BDD animated signatures began to produce significant revenue and the owners saw this as a change in the product life cycle from introduction to growth. They reasoned that a second product might well take another three plus years to grow; therefore they began planning the launch of a new product called a signature font. A signature font is a customized computer font, which includes the user's signature as one of the characters. When the user selects his or her signature font from the list of fonts installed on his or her system in any given document, and types the first letter of his or her name, the user's handwritten signature will appear in the document.
S.W.O.T.T. Analysis
A. Strengths (internal)
a. The product can be used with any software.
b. The product can be installed and functions as any other font. The color, size, and placement can all be adjusted.
c. BigDenali Developments already has the technology to implement the signature font.
d. It takes minimal funds to support the product.
e. Customer can purchase product on the company website.
B. Weaknesses (internal)
a. Signature fonts can not be used for identity confirmation.
C. Opportunities (external)
a. The new product can be used for recreational purposes in personal letters, cards, etc.
b. The new product can be used for business purposes for official documents such as faxes or sales letters.
D. Threats (external)
a. Other competitors are selling the same product.
b. Ineffective marketing strategy can stall the sales growth of the new product.
E. Trends (external)
a. Many companies are using electronic signatures for electronic documents.
b. The United States legislature is about to pass laws enforcing specific requirements and purposes for the use of electronic signatures, but these would have to be authenticated and encrypted (Yates, 1996).

Product Differentiation and Positioning
BDD's new product SignatureFonts is one that could soon appear on every company's internal and external communications and add a personal touch to each of their employees' signature blocks. Although SignatureFonts will not be the only product of its kind on the market, it will be the only one that is being offered alongside personalized animated signatures for use in emails. BDD also offers excellent customer service to back-up its product mix. With other companies breaking in to this marketplace as well, BDD continues creating innovative ways of differentiating its product from the competition such as ease of ordering, and quick product delivery via email. When clients receive their signatures, they are able to add their personalized signature to letters, faxes, and, emails. This brings a sense of pride and credibility to the clients' correspondence. BDD's positioning strategy is to deliver the highest quality of product and service available in the industry. The high graphic quality of the signatures combined with their broad compatibility across a wide array of software and email clients executes this positioning strategy for BDD's entire product line, including the new SignatureFonts.

The relationship between product differentiation and positioning is that they work together to bring consumers what they need. Positioning the product helps the consumer to see that BDD stands out from its competition. Their website offers testimonials, easy instructions on how to order the signatures, and examples of signatures all of which help bring their clients a sense of confidence when ordering their signatures. These services plus quick response times help BDD to differentiate its products and services from those of its competitors and positions them to succeed in today's competitive technology ...