The quiz comprises an open book assessment aimed at establishing your familiarity with Marketing Communications, the communications process, planning consumer strategies, and digital challenges and issues. You will demonstrate your understanding of the concept of integrated marketing communications and examine how this co-ordinates the various elements of the marketing communications mix.

The learning content for these 2 quizzes will be covered during the first 5 weeks of the term (i.e., Chapters 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 7, 8 and 9 inclusive) is the focus of the assessment. Each quiz must be completed in one sitting – ie. you can only open each assessable quiz once.

There are 20 multiple choice, true/false or other questions provided for each of the two quizzes, for which the correct answers score 0.5 marks (20 x 0.5 = 10 marks for each quiz). The time allocated for completion of each quiz is 25 minutes.

Online Quiz 1

The learning content covered within Quiz 1 constitutes Chapters 1, 2, 3 and 4 inclusive.

Open: Monday, Week 4, at 9.00 am (AEST)

Close: Friday, Week 5, at 5.00 pm (AEST)

Online Quiz 2

The learning content covered within Quiz 2 constitutes Chapters 5, 7, 8 and 9 inclusive.

Open: Monday, Week 6, at 9.00 am (AEST)

Close: Friday, Week 7, at 5.00 pm (AEST)

IMPORTANT INFORMATION:

• Each quiz must be completed in one sitting – ie. you can only open each assessable quiz once.
• Each quiz can only be completed online in Moodle at a time suited to you between the given dates.
• Candidates are responsible for secure, reliable internet access, ISP, browsers, connection and computer use (irrespective of ownership).
• Equipment failure is not grounds for special consideration or extension. Use of computers/computer labs on university campuses does not absolve students of their responsibility for having reliable and continued access to the internet.
• Do not attempt the quiz from 4:30 pm of the due date. Once each quiz closes, no further attempts are permissible.

Candidates are responsible for secure, reliable internet access, ISP, browsers, connection and computer use (irrespective of ownership).

Equipment failure is not grounds for special consideration or extension. Use of computers/computer labs on university campuses does not absolve students of their responsibility for having reliable and continued access to the internet. Do not attempt the quiz from 4:30 pm of the due date. Once each the quiz closes, no further attempts are permissible.

For any new marketing campaign, the creative brief is the foundation document that is created during the initial meetings between the client and the advertising agency. A creative brief covers the goal of a new marketing campaign, the potential target audience and the key creative appeals to be communicated. A creative brief informs and guides the work until a marketing campaign is finalised. From the choice of font in print ads to the overall theme of the campaign, everything springs from the creative brief.

This second assessment task is related to the third assessment task!!

The integrated marketing communications report is due later in the term. You are required to use your chosen topic for both pieces of assessment. There are three options to choose from:

Option 1 (product category): You work as the marketing manager for a leading Australian based producer of digital entertainment products (video games and game inspired software). Reporting to the Senior Marketing Manager, you are responsible for the go-to-market and day to day marketing activities for gaming products of varying scale.

Option 2 (service category): You are the marketing manager for one of Australia’s most exciting fitness and lifestyle brands. Our current portfolio includes: brand and wellness studio design and marketing consultancy packages, online wellness and lifestyle teacher training and certification packages, and online live fitness, yoga and health tutorial class streaming sessions. Reporting to the Senior Marketing Manager, you are responsible for the go-to-market and day to day marketing activities for our online training and live streaming services.

(For your information, these are real job descriptions for current marketing positions in Australia!)

Option 3 (your choice): provides the flexibility of developing a creative brief for your current employer or a business you wish to start up (but not both). If you choose option 3 then you must gain approval from your local lecturer/tutor (on-campus students) or from the unit coordinator (distance students).

Whichever option is chosen, the product or service should only focus on targeting an Australian market segment.

This assessment requires you to develop a creative brief in the form of a poster presentation. You will develop a 2 - 3 page Word document (up to 1,500 words). Students are encouraged to incorporate visual ideas of creativity into their Word document, i.e. images and/or graphs, charts and other visuals.

Be sure to check out the information provided in Moodle under Assessment 2 Topic!!!

Title page

The title page will include the name of your organisation, the start and end date of the IMC plan (e.g. July-Dec. 2020), campaign name, your name, student id number and lecturer/tutor name and campus (for on-campus students) and course name and code.

The creative process consists of two key parts: what to say (message strategy statement and types of message strategies) and how to say it (appeals and execution).

What to say:

· A short brand statement (for the purposes of this assignment, include brief background information on your chosen product or service)

· A brief overview of the campaign’s objectives

· Key challenges that the campaign aims to resolve (this is your message strategy statement – outline the key idea/message you are trying to communicate. What is the major selling idea? What is the customer’s need or desire that the idea will solve?)

· Target audience for the campaign (With whom exactly do you wish to communicate? What are some key information, characteristics and behaviours already known about this Australian market segment?)

· Key competitors

· The type of message strategy to be used in your creative brief. (What type of message strategy is best suited to bring your campaign statement to life? For example, generic, positioning, unique selling proposition, etc. see chapter 10 for more information.)

· Primary message describing the brand’s values and market positioning

· Communication channels on which the campaign will run.

The BIG idea! – How to say it:

· The advertising appeals to be used, i.e. rational appeals, emotional appeals, fear appeals, humour appeals, or a combination of rational and emotional appeals.

· The advertising execution techniques to be used, i.e. scientific evidence, testimonials, animation, imagery, dramatization.

Make sure you include samples, fonts (styles and colours), brand colours, visual ideas and creativity in your creative brief, i.e. images, graphs, etc.

Finally, please include a reference list with at least five (5) references that outline your sources of information from a combination of scholarly academic journal articles, academic textbooks, trade journals and websites.

Key criteria that will be graded are provided below. A more detailed marking guide is provided on Moodle.

1. Brand statement (including background information on your chosen product or service)

2. The campaign’s objectives

3. Key challenges (message strategy statement)

4. Target audience (key information, characteristics and behaviours of an Australian market segment)

5. Key competitors

6. The type of message strategy

7. Primary message describing the brand’s values and market positioning

8. Communication channels

9. Advertising appeals

10. Advertising execution techniques

11. References

Your work will also be assessed on the following professional criteria:

12. The use of clear English expression and logical flow between the ideas

13. Accurate referencing of sources and correct presentation of graphs, tables, diagrams and/or drawings

14. Your use of visual aids as a core component of your creative brief

15. Clarity and design of brief

16. Concise and well-structured

17. Creativity and innovation

As previously stated, your final assessment task is the continuation and finalisation of the second assessment task. You are required to use your chosen topic for both pieces of assessment. All assignments should be submitted online through the MRKT19030 Moodle site. All reports will be checked by Turnitin to compare the report to other sources and will provide students and lecturers with a similarity score for the report. Reports with a similarity score index of more than 20% will be checked for plagiarism by the marker (although it may not necessarily mean that the student has plagiarised).

Whichever option you have chosen for your second assignment (creative brief), please follow through with this option for this second assignment (the IMC plan) with a focus on the Australian market.

The IMC plan should follow this structure:

Title page

The title page will include the name of your organisation, the start and end date of the IMC plan (e.g. July-Dec. 2020), campaign name, your name, student id number and lecturer/tutor name and campus (for on-campus students) and course name and code.

Executive summary (no more than 300 words)

The executive summary should not read like an essay. You need to highlight only those critical aspects from your IMC plan. You should provide a brief overview of the organisation (or proposed business) and product/service, outline the 3 to 5 communication objectives chosen with quantifiable targets and timeframe for achievement, present the creative strategy selected (including target audience) and highlight the main elements of the media plan (including total budget).

Use of sub-headings, dot or bullet points is recommended to better present the required information.

Table of contents

The table of contents will present each section of the IMC plan, including sub-headings, with their appropriate page number(s). Sections should be numbered (e.g. 1.0 Introduction). The introduction begins on page 1. Pages prior to the introduction use lower case Roman numerals such as i, ii, iii, iv, etc.

Introduction (no more than 200 words)

The introduction should present a brief outline of the organisation (or proposed business) and the product/service that is the major focus of this IMC plan. In addition, aims and structure of the report should be presented.

Background and target audience analysis (no more than 400 words)

The focus here will be on presenting information as to your chosen target audience. It is expected you research the communications management and marketing literature to better understand who is likely to have an interest in your product or service. A profile then needs to be outlined that gives the reader of your IMC plan a better understanding as to who you will be directing the proposed marketing communications. Consider market segmentation according to demographic, psychographic, socioeconomic and geographic customer characteristics. Use of additional sources of information to help support the discussion is expected.

3-5 Communication objectives

Present and explain 3 (minimum) to 5 (maximum) communication objectives for the IMC plan with quantifiable targets and timeframe for achievement. Some objectives of marketing communications include creating brand awareness and recall, establishing a positive brand image and encouraging purchase behaviour. Think about, and justify, why you have chosen these communication objectives for this particular target audience. Use of additional sources of information to help support the discussion is expected.

Media plan

Select the advertising media and vehicle(s), i.e. billboards, radio, newspaper, internet, etc., you will use to achieve each of your communication objectives and justify your use of this media based on how this best communicates with your target audience. The media plan should be a reflection of the duration of the IMC plan (start and end date) as presented in the title page. You must take into consideration the creative strategy to be adopted when selecting the most appropriate media to use.

For option 1 and 2, the budget is fixed at AUD $10,000.

For option 3, think of realistic figure/s given your organisation, communication objectives and the creative strategy to be adopted.

A table (including budget totals) summarising this discussion is encouraged. Use of additional sources of information to help support the discussion is expected.

Conclusion (no more than 200 words)

In your opinion, why do you think it will be possible to achieve each of your chosen communication objectives? Briefly outline the target audience, each of the communication objectives and the creative strategy adopted to explain your answer.

Reference list

The IMC plan should include at least ten (10) sources of information from a combination of scholarly academic journal articles, academic textbooks, trade journals and websites. All sources listed should be in alphabetical order and be cited in the main body of the IMC plan using the APA referencing style.

Further instructions

- The IMC plan should be presented as a formal business report.

- Your argument and analysis in this report requires theoretical support from a minimum of 10 journal article references.

Note: This is a recommended outline for your IMC plan. Any deviation from the above recommended outline runs the risk of not addressing the assessment criteria. To enhance the presentation of your assignment, you can use headings and sub-headings to identify the important information required for each of the above criterion. The assessment marking criteria below should guide you for this assessment task, in particular the weighting attributed to each section of the assignment.

Important:

- You should start working on the assessment as early as Week 3, even though it is due for submission in Week 12.

- Selection of literary support from Wikipedia, www.NetMBA.com, www.marketing, teacher.com, www.tutor2u.com, etc. will be treated very negatively. These are not appropriate sources for your academic assignment and their use is not acceptable.

- Students’ requests for an extension of the deadline for this assignment need to be submitted through the Assignment Extension System (AES). Requests for reasons not mentioned in the CQUniversity Assessment of Coursework Procedures policy and not supported by appropriate evidence will not be considered. For example, if a student has been sick for 2 days before the assignment is due, the student needs to submit his/her request in the AES by the due date for the assignment and upload a medical certificate dated the day(s) of the sickness.

A brief marking criteria list is provided below. A more detailed marking guide (rubric) is provided on Moodle.

· Executive Summary

· Introduction – provides a brief overview of the company, the aims and structure of the IMC plan

· Background and target audience analysis

· 3-5 Communication objectives

· Media plan – which media will you select to reach the target audience?

· Budget

· Conclusion

· Structure, grammar and presentation

· Citations and reference list

· Academic Quality

· Professionalism