RECENT ASSIGNMENT

Task 1: Plan Social media
Performance objective
The candidate is required to plan a draft for a post for social media for DAWG, a specialty dog boutique franchise operation. The plan for the draft will document a task analysis, generating ideas, researching and planning an outline.
Assessment description
For this assessment task, plan your post, gather planning materials including a written plan/outline of your proposed draft, and meet with your assessor to answer questions in relation to writing task analysis, planning and organisational requirements.
This assessment task, once completed, will form a first step towards completing Assessment Task 2, in which you will follow your Assessment Task 1 plan, write the draft, edit the draft and produce a final document.
Procedure
1. Read the DAWG Case Study.
2. Analyse, generate ideas, research and plan an outline for the writing task scenario in the assessment description.
3. Produce a plan that includes:
a. PAMS analysis: Purpose, Audience, Message, Style.
b. brainstorming activities
c. mind mapping
d. outline.
4. The plan should include the following information on your planning process:
• Look at your PAMS analysis. What is the purpose of the writing task and how will you achieve this?
• Explain how your plan/outline shows an overview of the structure and contents of the social media post
• How does this content relate to the social media audience?
5. Submit planning documentation to your assessor in accordance with the specifications below.
Specifications
Your assessor will be looking for: ability to logically plan complex documents with regard to audience, structure and sequence of ideas or topics
ability to interact with people in a workplace environment using interpersonal skills:
? collaborating, negotiating and listening to others
? appropriate and professional tone
? appropriate vocabulary
? appropriate body language
evidence of appropriate use of technology to develop forms and conduct research.

SIMULATED BUSINESS CASE STUDY
DAWG is a pet business that was started on the central coast of NSW in 1996 by dog breeding duo, Marilyn and Daniel Bloom. The couples enthusiasm and extensive knowledge of dogs and dog breeding helped them to build a strong enough brand and customer base to initially thrive on the coast and then to carefully expand, first into the Sydney metro region and then interstate.
DAWG is not your ordinary pet shop. It specialises in dogs.
DAWG offers its own brands of dog food mixes with supplements that dog breeders use to keep the pets in peak condition. They also feature DAWG SALONS where pet pooches are pampered and groomed with special
DAWG brand shampoos as well as DAWG BOUTIQUES
featuring creatively inspired coats for dogs of all breeds and sizes. DAWG also offers walking/dog-sitting services and works with local pet resorts for longer stays.
DAWG expands
By 2010 there were 15 DAWG shops across Australia. By 2015 the Blooms decided to offer franchises of the business complete with site, shop set up, signage and systems. It took off and the franchise business grew to 40 shops scattered across the nation.
As the business grew and the franchises were taken up, it became apparent that the marketing communications strategy needed to be evaluated, as it was out dated in its media choices.
DAWG marketing audit
DAWG undertook an audit of their current marketing strategy, plans and promotions and discovered a number of things including:
• The market situation had changed and the competition had evolved
• The target market characteristics had segmented further with urban expansion
• The digital space and media preferences of their market had evolved
• The organisational requirements had become more complicated due to the franchising
DAWG target market definition
Like many
organically
grown small business
founders, Marilyn and
Daniel initially felt that they understood their target market well. In the
beginning, on the coast, the profile was:
• Male/female/couples
• No kids
• Combined income of circa $K150
• Age range of 19 to 36
• Fit and active
• Moderately fashion and trend conscious
• Moderately socially and environmentally conscious
• Sensitive to peer influences
• Watch free to air TV/Pay TV
• Moderately sensitive to service quality
Working for the city
As the business expanded into different and predominantly urban regions, what started out as coastal dwelling dog/pet aficionados who might or might not have kids and who lived in houses with backyards, changed to include inner city dwellers living in apartments and flats. Dogs to this market were often child substitutes who were not just pets but much loved companions who didn’t need schooling and expensive child care and were quite comfortable in a one-bedroom apartment as long as they were well fed and exercised regularly. In the city, smaller breeds were favoured so the DAWG shops stocked little dog coats for little breeds.
The DAWG brand food range remained unchanged, as did the DAWG Salons and services.
This market was growing as the cost of houses was now almost out of the reach of new homebuyers. There were also many new apartment complexes being developed right across the city.
This was the way many people would be living now and in the future.
DAWG strategic objectives for marketing initiatives.
Marilyn and Daniel’s initial marketing was driven by gut feeling and knowledge of their target market. Because of this, they formulated four major objectives:
1. To firmly position DAWG as a truly unique purveyor of dog products and services.
2. To re-launch DAWG to the early adopters, technology literate digital device generation
3. To develop a bolt on integrated marketing communication campaign for franchisees
4. To generate sales of $6,000,000.00 by end of 2018
DAWG online
DAWG has recently added an e commerce online shop to the website to allow purchasing and delivery functionality for their branded products. This has not been sufficiently promoted and is causing some frustration to franchisees who prefer in store sales and don’t want to lose their customer base to online sales. A process of customer/franchisee sales identification has as yet been undeveloped.
DAWG positioning statement refresh
Back in the beginning, Marilyn and Daniel developed the brand positioning statement ‘everything for the pet set’ as a play-on-words around the jet set. It was fun and playful and they thought, conveyed just how special dogs were to their owners. They also thought that it highlighted the unique personalities that these animals had and the special place they occupied in their owners hearts.
But these days, the notion of international travellers had changed from high-flying members of an exclusive club to global commuters enjoying pared down services on often discount carriers.
Maybe it was time to re think and re launch the brand with something new.
DAWG marketing promotions
DAWG’s marketing promotions program is simplistic, out of date and not yet integrated. The promotions are limited and predominately traditional. They don’t take into account the rise of social media and social media platforms.
Promotional activities Frequency Budget allocation
In store posters Quarterly $250,000
In store promotions Monthly $300,000
Press ads (local papers) Monthly $150,000
Product catalogues (printed and online pdf’s) Annually $250,000
Website content Static $50,000
Total spend $1,000,000
DAWG promotional budget
The global budget is currently $1,000,000.00 with franchisees expected to allocate $25,000.00 to their marketing spend. It has been identified that the current budget is insufficient and would need to be increased to around $2,000,000 across the promotional spend.
Franchisees will in turn increase their allocation accordingly but will also expect some return on investment.
Bringing in the specialists
The directors, in consultation with their stakeholders (including suppliers, staff and franchisees) have decided to contract a specialist, integrated agency to re-develop the creative, and plan a new integrated campaign for DAWG including developing a social media strategy.
DAWG owners love being social
After a successful pitch involving a number of agencies, your team was chosen to develop a social media strategy, plan the implementation and start developing content.
The team has spent time with DAWG management and some of the franchisees (as they will be part of the social media,) to identify some stories that will form part of the content.
The stories are around events (dog shows and competitions,) canine health, eating habits, rescue pets and some feel good stories.
The focus is that DAWG is not for your pet … it’s for your best friend.