Organisational Structure

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Thoughts

I’ve spent the last 20 years of my life in France, including 15 of broad education which gave me quite a wide range of knowledge. I think I have a pretty good memory as well and don’t need to spend hours reading the same thing over and over again to memorize it, which is useful. I usually only work when I’m interested in what I’m doing and it’s fully happening with the subjects I’ve been taught at university. The Events module is of particular interest to me. Being in a band, I hope it'll provide me with skills or at least explanations as to how to properly set up a show for example.

If I don't make it myself, ultimately I’d like to end up managing a band and hopefully learning what’s behind the scenes of the music business here at London Met will help me achieve that. Being a foreign student, my interest in the English language proved to be useful, and my fears about not understanding what was being discussed evaporated quickly. It’s a challenge being taught classes in English, which is obviously not my mother tongue and I’m glad I’ve overcome this “issue”. It was the only major problem I encountered - let alone the fact that I didn’t know any other students, but everything else went without trouble. Since I’ve been able to adjust to the English way of life quite fast, I’m now looking forward to learn as much as I can and I’m highly motivated. London being the “place to be” music-wise, it’s a really nice opportunity living here to find connections within the music business. I already have contacts at Sanctuary Records and Riverman Management and I’ve been promised work experience at one of those two in the new year. Working there will give me in depth vision of what actually happens in the music business and will therefore make studies easier since I’d be somehow connected to both sides, it will also help me defining the nature of problems I’ll encounter in my studies, and vice versa.

Post Seminar 1

The primary objective of any charity organisation is to find fundings, essentially based on the help of private and public donors. To do so - these organisations competing hard to seek donations, they have had to adopt a marketing approach derived from the one used by private companies in order to conquer potential donors. The main aspects of their marketing mix include :

Finding a "product range" suitable to the market (different type of actions supposed to be relevant to a certain age range).

Using communication techniques suitable for that market.

What we are trying to get from our donors is essentially cash, which we will exchange for sense of community service and of economic / social progress. We are aiming for relationship marketing in the sense that the transaction here is primarily seller orientated. Customers stay loyal to familiar brands and / or organisations so we are looking to provide them with a high standard service that needs to have an attractive brand imagery because any failure in any part of the system will be regarded as a criticism of the organisation.

Services like the ones offered by a charity organisation are intangible, therefore their pricing can be very difficult to set and to justify. However, donors know they are expected to give money by agreeing to attend our event.

Services are often supplied direct from the provider to the customer to get direct feedback and interaction with the customer, which is why our event will be held at the company's headquarters. It will limit the number of customers so we will target only the donors likely to give away as much money as possible. The event will be happening at christmas time, which is a time of the year when people are in good spirits and more likely to look into charities.

The main target for our charity is high profile people aged 50-70, therefore old-fashioned communication techniques are best used here, there is no point in trying to send each potentially old donor a myspace bulletin. Personal fancy mailshots - the likes of wedding invitations, seem to be a relevant option. Since we can't show the customer a pretty packaging because we don't have any product to sell really, we want to give the guests a warm welcome and make them feel like they are an important "part of the family" and emphasise the benefits of "purchasing" our service by adding a brochure of what the charity does for example, including testimonials from satisfied customers. These can be very important because they will reassure the potential donor that the service works and that the outcomes will be positive.

^ This is the sort of invitation we'll send out.

www.e-digiprintshop.com is a "digiprint online shop", which offers to print out and deliver in 24 hrs 500 brochures for £254 and 500 flyers/invitations for £228. It is therefore not required to plan the mailshots 6 months in advance. On the other hand, we could plan and team with shops like Harrod's, Harvey Nichols or Selfridge's for example, by linking a product purchase with a cents-off coupon to a corporate donation to our charity and also for them to hold signs and advertisements of the event coming 3 months prior. A website will also be a good promotional tool.