Marketing Report: IBM - Research Paper Example

? Marketing Research Report: IBM Table of Contents Executive Summary Background Objectives Sample and design Result and Analysis Conclusion and Recommendations References Executive Summary With all the competitors in the market IBM is very close to gain or lose its market share to Hewlett Packard and Dell (Louis, 2002). According to the Overall Server Market Standings, by Vendor, HP held the number 1 position in the worldwide server market with 31.5 percent factory revenue share. IBM however held the number 2 spot with 29.2 percent share for the quarter as factory revenue increased 22.1 percent compared to 1Q10 and gained 2.4 points of share from a year ago. IBM experienced significant improvement for its Power Systems, while demand for System z servers and x86-based System x servers also remained strong. Dell maintained third place with 15.6 percent factory revenue market share in 1Q11 factory revenue increased 9.7 percent compared to 1Q10 driven in part by strong demand from SMB customers (Hally, 2005). IBM sales in the last quarter were remarkable, but not fiery. Tom Rosamilia, general manager of Power and z Systems said “IBM sold out 740s and 720s in the fourth quarter of last year, Power revenue grew 2 percent. It may not seem like a lot, but it was the first time we've grown revenue in 10 quarters.” It is IBM's global tech-services operations along with the tech-outsourcing business that drove this expansion. Still IBM has an edge over these companies for being the first market entrant and also for the 100 years of innovation most technology companies do not survive for about a 100 years that tells the success story itself but as IBM keeps working on the innovations the competitors will be more than happy to copy it as soon as it comes out in the market (Heller, 1994). IBM, with its mix of hardware and software expertise, is bound to be at the top of the list, many companies look to IBM to help operate this software, creating another source of ongoing revenue (Hally, 2005). IBM can surely retain its market revenue as its advantage as an investment is not just that it has large revenue, but also that much of that revenue is recurring. IBM does not have to replace a large portion of its sales each quarter. Customers are loyal and they are pretty much "locked into" IBM's ability to manage the technology its sells. That makes the company's sales stable, a desirable attribute when the market and perhaps the economy are in trouble (Young, 2009). As far as the general public opinion is concerned IBM had been into business for over a millennium now and if there wasn’t any public approval it would not have reached to the heights of success as since the very start. IBM is known for its quality management and offering infrastructure, hosting and consulting services. Customers are very much satisfied with the services and quality provided as IBM invests a lot in quality because decreased defects means more satisfied and loyal customers and that is why IBM has been the market leader in the technology business. This report is an insight into general public opinion about IBM. The report focuses majorly on the perception of people of IBM as a brand and the effectiveness of IBM advertising efforts. Background No one would have thought while living in 19th century that world around us would some day become a global village where news or an event happening in one corner of the globe can be heard and seen in the opposite corner of the globe (Petley, 2002). All this advancement in recent times can be attributed to recent technological innovations which have made life easy and comfortable and the most significant and crucial contributions are made by the growth of computer, hardware and software services where all these advancements have effected our lives in a way that we now can not even imagine a world without these hi tech innovations (Carroll, 1993). Personal Computers have seen an unprecedented growth in the last two decades, starting from early 1980s when personal computers first came into the market, they were not only very costly at that time but also were relatively inefficient (Samme, 2004). With the passage of time and constant innovation and advancement, computers manufactured today are many times faster than their ancestral counterparts; they have more storage capacity and can perform more functions and tasks as compared to the computers produced initially. This growth is not restricted to functional areas only but in fact it has reached financial segment also where computer industry is a multi billion dollar industry and have hundreds of thousands of employees who are either directly or indirectly associated with computer industry (Doug, 1999). Apart from the computer industry, software industry has also experienced a tremendous growth over the last few years. In year 2007, services related to software industry grew at an annual rate of 14 percent in United States and it constituted more than 261 billion dollars of US GDP during the same year. Software related services have a huge clientele where they provide solutions to a variety of clients with different needs and demands. Due to the advancement in software industry, operations of other industries relying on these software solutions have also become more efficient and productive over time. Hence, software industry is not growing itself but it is also stimulating growth in other industries (Young, 2009). Lastly, it is an established fact that although 21st century has brought amazing technological innovations to our lives but at the same time it has made life difficult for companies and manufacturers’ where competition has become highly severe. In this scenario, hardware industry has to persistently improve on their products and is supposed to deliver high quality products to their demanding customers (Slater, 1999). Like other industries, recession of 2008 struck hardware industry as well but it has started to recover now with the expectation of more growth in the near future. Moreover, entry of relatively smaller enterprises from regions like India is expected to bring in more growth and competition at the same time for major players of the industry (Emerson, 1996). There are big players in these industries who have dominated their areas of expertise for long time which include companies like Hewlett Packard (HP), International Business Machines (IBM), and Oracle Corporation etc but in recent times, competition has become stringent as more small and medium sized enterprises are entering these industries. This report will basically focus on the current standing of IBM and on the future of this company in the eyes of its customers (Young, 2009). Objectives The basic objectives of this report are: -To investigate the current standing of IBM in the eyes of customers -To study the general brand image of IBM as created by its advertising efforts -To see if the current advertising efforts are playing their proper role in keeping IBM as leading computer software and hardware providing company. Sample and design To conduct this research, a sample survey was conducted. These people, majority of them, knew a lot about the existing market shares of IBM and its competitors. A questionnaire was prepared and a set of question was asked to each of the competitors. The answers were noted and results were complied by classification of data. It was basically a primary research done through qualitative methods. By offering a range of answers, the qualitative answers will be somewhat quantified. Results and Analysis The analysis of data begins with the determination of sample which is under consideration. First two questions in the survey are meant to figure out the sample category including the functional area of an employee and total number of employees working in their organization respectively. Also, two other questions describe the company and the industry to which a particular employee belongs to. In the sample 125 people were IT decision maker, 257 were IT influencer so they had an indirect relationship with IT, and 618 were IT staff. In response to the second question 125 were working in the company with total employees strength of less than 50, 257 were working in an organization of less than 100 but more than 50 employees. But the arithmetic mean of the responses showed that most employees were working in company with a range of 500-1000 employees. There was no employee working in a company with more than 10,000 employees. In response to the category of industry, 21 companies were associated with consumer packaged groups, 95 employees were from financial services industry, while 69 belonged to health care sector. Information technology industry had 225 companies being covered in the survey. Next section included questions based on the relative satisfaction of employees with their companies and the quality of the products being offered by the company in their opinion. 282 respondents were completely satisfied with their jobs, while 470 were only satisfied and contented with their jobs. Only 9 respondents rated low satisfaction with their jobs and company itself. But overall an average of above 4 indicates that majority of the people were relatively satisfied with their companies. In response to quality of the products, 255 thought the quality to be excellent, 367 considered it very good while only 19 people rated the quality of their company’s product to be very low. An overall mean of 3.95 which is slightly under 4 indicates that people generally think that the quality of the products is very good by their companies. On the question of cost of ownership being incurred by the companies, only 13 respondents thought it to be very low, 124 considered costs to be very high while 282 thought they were high. Its average value lays around 4 which highlight the fact the employees believe that the cost of ownership including the cost of acquisition is high for the companies. In a question focusing on the value to money that a company’s product offers, majority of the people think that the value offered to the money through the product is very good with 327 and 140 respondents considering the value to be very good and excellent respectively. Going further into the analysis, this part looks at the relationship between the satisfaction levels of an employee to the particular company he or she belongs. The results indicate the majority of the people are satisfied with their companies. Moreover, the survey was designed to establish a relationship between an employee estimate on value of money their product offers, a response that was taken earlier in the survey with sales and support services their company is offering. Two questions were designed to figure out employee’s satisfaction with overall quality of services and product and non technical customer service that the company is offering. 186 and 73 considered it to be excellent respectively, while 346 and 182 thought it to be very good. Overall mean of 4 and 5.3 indicates that there is a positive relationship where employees who think the value to money of their products to be higher also think the customers support and overall quality of the product to be higher as well. Additionally, sharing views about the quality of education programs and technical support their company is providing, 174 and 228 respondents considered it to be very good while 94 and 138 rated it as excellent respectively. An average of above 4 indicates for both measures that employees are satisfied with their companies on these grounds which are also consistent with our results on the value to money the company’s product has to offer, which was evaluated at the beginning of the survey. Participants were further asked whether they would continue to purchase products from this company in the near future, the response was interesting as 324 and 356 respondents were extremely likely and very likely to purchase products respectively from the same company, while only 5 participants disagreed to the idea of purchasing products in the near future. The mean comes out to be slightly above 4 which again demonstrate the high likeliness of the participants engaging in future purchases of the products from the same company. These results are also coherent with the response of people on sales and support services questions which also depicted a high level of satisfaction with their company’s services. The relationship between recommending someone a particular company in IT industry if asked upon with the satisfaction level from sales and support services indicate the people would recommend their company in majority of the cases if they think the services to be very good or excellent which are being provided by their own company. Lastly, we evaluate the likelihood of next year purchases from the same company with the descriptive measures we did in the beginning including overall satisfaction levels of the employees with the product, cost of ownership and value to money of the product. It can be seen clearly that people scoring high on value to money of the product and overall satisfaction with the company itself and its product; their decision to purchase products from the same company will be positively correlated with the above mentioned variables which is also evident from the data. In the end, about the conversion of image variables to a reduced set of factors, a question on socially active company can suffice for factors on ethics and care to society. Secondly, a holistic approach can be used to infer the financial strength and the level of innovation in a particular company. Also, human capital should be incorporated at a general level instead of using only senior leaders along with the factor of company’s culture that determines the level of treatment for employees and staff. Conclusion and Recommendations International Business Machines (IBM) is the industry leader in computer hardware and software industry. The company was founded in 1911 from a merger of four different companies with its headquarters based in New York. IBM was ranked as the 18th largest firm by fortune in US and it was among the top ten firms who were most profitable in US in the year 2011. IBM has the honor of holding most number of patents in US in computer and technology industry and has several employees who have been awarded with noble prize from time to time along with ample other distinguishing awards. As per the survey done in this case, IBM is a well recognized and renowned brand in personal computers industry. Over the time, IBM has produced consistently latest models and designs in order to cater to the ever changing demands and needs of the customers. It has innovated efficient systems which not only enhance productivity of the users but are highly user friendly. IBM launched its first personal computer back in 1981 and since then it has manufactured a vast array of models with varied specifications to match the needs of its users. In other words, it can be said without any doubt that IBM was amongst the pioneers in personal computers industry and provided a platform for other companies to follow while consistently improving its own products. As the results of the survey show apart from the personal computers, IBM has also marked its name in the software services industry. Software consultants at IBM are now producing a huge range of intelligent software in order to make businesses more effective and productive. Latest developments at IBM are being done to make sure that the investments made by the customers and buyers are fully optimized by providing them with the latest and highly advanced software. IBM is also persistently updating its software portfolio and is now providing a wide range of solutions to its customers that include services on information management, solutions to business analysis etc. Also, IBM has acquired a few companies with the passage of time to augment its portfolio of software and hence to make it more embellished. Moreover, IBM has not only restricted itself to the personal computers and software industry but it has conquered hardware services industry as well by providing efficient solutions to all the hardware related needs of its customers. The company realizes the fact that hardware operations and its right working is crucial to the working of any system and hence people at IBM makes sure that their customers are satisfied and contented with their services and this is done by providing high quality hardware services round the clock. Additionally, services provided to the customers are cost effective and score high on quality in terms of extending the life of hardware. In long and short, IBM has come up as the triumphant in technology industry including software and hardware services along with its highly efficient personal computers. It is a well established company which is now recognized as the industry leader all across the globe. From time to time it has been awarded with prestigious awards which signify the success of International Business Machines (IBM). References Carroll, P. (1993). Big Blues: The Unmaking of IBM. Crown Publishers. Doug G. (1999). IBM Redux: Lou Gerstner & The Business Turnaround of the Decade. Harper Business. Emerson W. P. (1996). Building IBM: Shaping an Industry. MIT Press. Hally, Mike (2005:79). Electronic brains/Stories from the dawn of the computer age. British Broadcasting Corporation and Granta Books, London. Heller, R. (1994). The Fate of IBM. Little Brown. Louis V. Gerstner, Jr. (2002). Who Says Elephants can't Dance?. HarperCollins.  Petley, J. (2002) Advertising. North Mankato, Minnesota: Smart Apple Media,  Samme C. (2004). In an I.B.M. Village, Pollution Fears Taint Relations With Neighbors. New York Times. Slater, R. (1999). Saving Big Blue: IBM's Lou Gerstner. McGraw Hill. Young, Charles E., (2009) The Advertising Handbook, Ideas in Flight, Seattle, WA. Read More