The CEO Game

Television advertisement prices during the Super Bowl, The National Football League championship game, are expected to drop for the second time ever due to the financial recession.

The price advertisers paid for the 30 seconds advertisement during the Super Bowl game, which will be held this Sunday and will be broadcast by CBS, is expected to range between 2.5 to 2.8 million dollars – which is less than the 3 million dollars price it cost in the last Super Bowl. Last year NBC had made 224 million dollars from broadcasting the Super Bowl. CBS had already sold all the advertising spots , a week faster than NBC last year. According to estimations 100 million people are expected to see the Super Bowl on TV this year.

Super Bowl Madness

Several advertiser who traditionally bought spots on the Super Bowl , will be missing this year due to the financial recession, among them are the  car manufactures General Motors and Ford, and PepsiCo which wont advertise its leading trademark , Pepsi, or any other trademark for the first time in 23 years, after spending not less than 254 million dollars for advertisements during Super Bowl games in the last two decades.

Among the companies that will appear this year  are Intel, Motorola, Electronic Arts, The online broker eTrade, Honda , Hyundai, VolksWagen and Chrysler.

Ailon.

The CEO Game.

Market research supplies information that assists in marketing-related decision making. Through market research you can understand the business environment, assess competitive advantages, recognize threats and opportunities, measure performance, and develop an action plan for your product, advertising or distribution channels.

Searching For the Right Information.

In many cases market researches is an effective tool in getting information that supports decision making. Should you perform market research for every business call? Well, the answer is no. There are some situations that don’t require market research. To help you determine when you need market research, you should examine the following questions:

Is the research relevant to the marketing decision that we have to make? You probably should not perform market research just to satisfy your curiosity. You should only perform market research when it’s relevant to questions about your current strategic planning. Market research should supply all the information you need currently, depending on the types of decisions you have to make, and the current circumstances.

Is there any available information that can assist in the decision-making process? Occasionally you can find a lot of valuable information about the decision your about to make inside your organization. This information can be found in different kind of forms. This information can be from different market research done for other purposes, past experience of different persons, or different databases or software such as ERP, CMS and other organizational systems. You should try avoiding performing market research when it’s not really needed.

What are your time constraints? Performing market research requires time. You need time to gather relevant information from the field or even insert it into your systems. Performing the market research should be done under the consideration that it should be done before the relevant decision has to be made. Performing market research under too tight a schedule might cause inconsistent data and mistakes.

What is the Cost vs. Benefit ratio? It’s important that you first assess the value of the information that will be provided from the market research. It’s important to weigh the value of the information versus the relevant expense to see if it pays off or not.

In the CEO Game marketing research is one of the main tools in your marketing arsenal. Using it wisely can help you gain a strategic advantage over your competitors. Waiting your time on non-relevant market research will leave you behind.

Ailon.

The CEO Game.

A logo is a graphical symbol that differentiates a business from its competitors.  The logo creates the first impression that is left in the potential consumers’ minds, and therefore its importance should not be underestimated. Usually, the logo presents a message that is more emotionally complex than its shape. A well-designed logo will productively present the company’s values to its targeted audience and will create a clear empathy and a sensation of safety, in the consumer’s eyes, that is needed to buy the consumer’s trust. A well-known logo is probably what will be the final deciding factor when a consumer is hesitating between products.

Choose Your Logo Wisely

Today’s leading companies acknowledge the importance of a well-designed logo. The days in which you would have hired a third grader to design your logo are gone. The logo’s meaning is so tremendous that it in most cases require a professional to create it.

Few words about logo colors- Since the logo is the face of the company, colors are highly important. From a design view, the main color takes a key role in the message we try to pass to our targeted market. From a more technical view, the more colors you use the more complex your logo becomes and therefore less understandable.

What about Fonts?

Well fonts also a have a tremendous effect on our logo design. We select a certain font to pass along the company’s message. The font creates the atmosphere of the logo and therefore it is important to choose one wisely as part of your marketing plan. The font type also reflects on the company’s image and therefore it should reflect the company’s values.

In the CEO Game, you will have the opportunity to design your own logo. This is another reason why the CEO Game is the most realistic business simulation out there. Design wisely. Your logo is another weapon in your arsenal—do you want a butter knife or a bayonet?

Ailon.

The CEO Game.

Since marketing is one of the key corner stones of a successful company I decided to devote this post for some marketing strategy basics. In one of my searches I found this video that sums up the marketing basics that every CEO has to know and doesn’t have the time to learn anywhere else. Take in mind that knowing the basics is only the first step in a long journey for success. Another key issue is knowing when and how to combine the other factors in the company’s tool bar in order to achieve a better synergy. Like we mentioned before one of the key tools of succeeding in the CEO game is building an effective marketing plan which also includes branding your products. We in the CEO game will continue posting post about how to improve your marketing strategy in the next few weeks.

Ailon.

The CEO Game.

Branding is a business method which creates an image in the mind of the public about a specific product. Branding a product allows the product to be recognized as a different product from other similar products. Branding allows products to be perceived as unique in a relation to a specific attribute. In order to successfully brand a product the product must have a positive effect on our daily life style. Trying to brand a “weak” product won’t succeed on the long run and might even back fire. The process of branding a product might take months or even years, especially if the branding is targeting the international market.

What Is Your Brand?

The steps for creating a brand are first performing a market research and review. This step is a critical step in the branding process, without performing the research you will be lacking the basic tools which will help with dealing with the market’s needs.  This step will contain all of the important factors that you will need to analyze such as the product itself, the product advantages, weakness and the competition. After you finish performing the market research the next step is building your branding strategy. Branding a new project requires having a work strategy which will allow you to reach your branding goals in the most effective way. A quality branding must require a building an effective work strategy based on past experience in the branding field.  The third step of building a brand is to create and design a product concept.  This process will contain the creation of a product logo, symbols and writing the marketing message of your product. The final step of product branding is assimilation of the product image in the public’s mind. This step will be usually made in the interaction points between the company and the costumer such as ads, stores or sales points.

In the CEO game branding is a key tool in your marketing arsenal. Learning how to use branding correctly in this serious game will allow you to attain a reputation of your products that will assist you in your sales.

Ailon

The CEO Game.

Every once in a while I encounter some amazing new discovery that shocks the media for a day or two, and then it disappears like a dust in the wind, without leaving a trace for future notice. I just can’t stop wondering what had happened. Is the research gone bad just after the publicity? Was it all bullshit, just a trick for the media to enter some new excitements into our burring life?

Is this what the future holds for us?

Does the promising product got to the final stages but the company got bankrupt? Or, and that’s crazy thought, we just can’t see our world differently? Are we too frightened that some great invention will change us drastically, and the only way we can conduct to changes is slow but safe?. In most cases you can blame the marketing. It’s true, though, that it all comes down to the way we provide the world a product that it can understand it’s true quality and adjust to all it requires.

Of course Business is a tough game, and if ones invent something that might hurt other, the later will do everything to stop it. But, and there is a great but, imagine that one day we will all wake up to a world without oil, having flying cars or even posses an unlimited lands on another earth-like planet.  Think about the many times in our history, humanity made the impossible come true! Electricity, flight and even fire are some of the discoveries and inventions that changed the way we see the world.

Have you ever thought about the economic aspect of those earthquake inventions?  Let’s hypothetically describe what could have happen if some company will find some useful cheap way to create cold fusion energy based batteries. Think about the possibilities like buying a mobile phone with battery charged for 25 years or car needed to be refueled once a year.  Think what will happen to our high dependency on fuel and the geographic natural resource which divides the world into rich areas and all the others.  Think what will happen to all the green economy that has risen when most of the industry harms the natural environment.   Think of all the unemployment that will be created when the energy problems will vanish.  Think of the rise of new tycoons which will dominate the world for the next century.

In the bottom line – it will change our life, and we develop new reliance. New era!

The CEO game provide you with this article so you start thinking big.

We believe that with a lot business simulations (based on the concept of business serious games), along with hours of fun, you will learn everything you need in order to reach the next brilliant idea.  We invite you to register for the CEO Game beta today (The registration for is in the upper right corner), and soon start playing, learning and acquiring all the knowledge and experience you need in the future using our serious game.

Before we say goodbye remember that true entrepreneurs should always believe in their ideas, take chances and conquer the things that almost everyone considers as impossible. Maybe you have the idea that one day will change the way we all see the world…

Nimrod.

The CEO Game.

What is Behavioral Economics?

Logically wrong.

Behavioral economics is an academic field combining the departments of economics and psychology, providing useful implementation of studies done in behavioral science, in order to understand better the subject of decision-making at the economic field, and how it affects the economy: prices, investments yield, resource allocation etc.

The discipline deals mainly in rationalism or irrationality of market agents and public trends for decisions making.
Models of behavioral economics combine insights from the field of psychology with the theory of neo-classic economic.

Ok, that was a bit long and confusing.
So what is behavioral economics is all about?
It means that economics is not something you can measure in logical terms. The main key factor for eco-changes is humans, and those creatures as you already know, aren’t that rational.

If you study the cognitive and emotional factors, on a certain group, you may find explanations for some of the groups economic decisions.
One of the most important issues are the effect on market decisions and public choice.

Why we need it?
because we humans act irrational!

• Why gambles in casino are keep gambling although they know they’re gonna lost all their money?
• Why people always say they need to save money for retirement, start exercise, stop smoking, keep on balanced nutrition- and still do nothing?
• Why victims, who have been treated improperly, demand revenge, although it damages their interests?

All those (and many more – I can go for hours), harms the ‘economic person’ model, which has been the base of the classic and new-classic economics for hundreds of years.
The ‘economic person’ take rational and logical decisions, motivated by personal interests, after considering the cost-benefit and try to maximize his profits.
The ‘economic person’ is a wise, reasonable, selfish and analytic person, showing perfect self-control, and act in order to achieve his future goals. He is not moved aside by his mental or physical states.
This man is the base of all the economics theories and models for the past hundred years.
There’s one problem – He does not exists!

While dealing with real people, you find out different types of irrational behaviors.
Some actually damages the person himself, some showing altruist behavior and far from the one’s interests.
The bottom line: psychology takes huge part on the process of decisions making, revealing the conflict between logics and passions.

People, like animals, have basic tension between provide themselves immediate satisfactions, and patiently waiting for future satisfactions.
They want it here and now, and also wish to think about tomorrow.

In general, people act irrational when they are underestimating in the value of the future.
They (humans) spend too much value and effort for things we want to do right now, on the expanse of the other good thing we can do in the future.

And still- marketing is everything!

It has been shown that the wisdom of marketing is the base for motivating the mass and the crowd to change their way of thinking and choose one product over the others.
Marketing is a key factor in which the economic person reaches all the irrational ones, and affects them to do what is right, diverse from the immediate satisfaction desired.

Marketing, by the orientation of behavioral economics, must take into consideration the population it’s aiming too.
Geo-location, age, education, standards, latest trends and culture are one of the many things it should consider.

Is it also relevant for the CEO Game? Of Course!
One of the most important roles the CEO need to be very close to is the Marketing department. It must be creative, smart, and targeted.
The difference between become the hottest trend and be another shelf product as many others, is by taking the public heuristics into consideration.
Learn the area, learn your potential consumers, feel the market and think how to become outstanding (original rather than normal).
Develop a marketing plan and sale your products as they are the best thing the community could ask for, be aggressive but gentle, think big and give credit for your buyers.

And the most important, always remember that humans are irrational. You can’t predict the future.

Cheer’s!

Nimrod

The CEO Game.