Posted: February 4th, 2015

Acting as a sports marketing consultant for a sports organisation of your choice, you are asked to prepare a detailed report analysing and critically appraising the organisation’s marketing activity

Paper, Order, or Assignment Requirements

The assignment brief states that, acting as a sports marketing consultant for a sports organisation of your choice, you are asked to prepare a detailed report analysing and critically appraising the organisation’s marketing activity. The key points here are that your report should critically analyse, not simply describe, the marketing activities of the sports organisation. In order to achieve this, your report should be underpinned by academic marketing theory from, at this level, primarily journal articles rather than textbooks, analysing the company’s marketing activities in light of the theory. The report should address the areas of the sports marketing mix and you might also want to touch on issues such as segmentation and positioning. For example, you might discuss the product mix of the organisation with reference to the Boston matrix, or discuss their pricing strategy with reference to literature on which strategies are most appropriate under particular conditions. Remember, these are examples and your report should adopt a wide range of literature and theoretical concepts to analyse the sports organisation’s marketing activities. The report should conclude with recommendations for the future for the company in terms of the most appropriate marketing strategies and tactics for the company to employ. These recommendations should be derived from your analysis of their current practice, making for a more coherent report. The recommendations can also draw on sports marketing models and theory, for example, you might use the Ansoff Matrix to structure recommendations about future product or market developments, or you might refer to literature on emerging trends in sports marketing practice.

It is entirely up to you which sports organisation you select for your report. Sometimes students who are working in a sports organisation select their own company because they have easy access to materials. However, you can find examples of the marketing activities for most sports organisations online, so you are free to select an organisation which interests you. While the theoretical references should be largely journal articles, it is expected that you will refer to web sources, company reports etc. for contextual information about the marketing activities of the particular company. My advice when selecting a company is perhaps to avoid the very large companies such as Nike, as their marketing activities are so diverse and numerous that it can be hard to go into enough detail within the 2000 word limit. If you do want to select a company such as this, then it is fine for you to concentrate on one particular division, for example, Nike Golf or Adidas Classics. In terms of selecting a smaller organisation, my only advice is to ensure that it is large enough to give you enough to talk about and for there to be information on its marketing activities. You are not likely to find academic materials about the specific companies. The academic literature will provide the theoretical underpinning, while commercial and web sources will provide you with the company-specific information. It is advised that you structure your report around the areas of the sports marketing mix, with an introduction at the start and conclusion and recommendations at the end. It is crucial at this level that you adopt an analytical rather than descriptive tone, therefore, you should make use of appendices where necessary to present background information about the company and descriptions of their marketing activities. You can then refer to these in your discussion, rather than spending too many words describing what they do. You are free to select an organisation which interests you. While the theoretical references should be largely journal articles, it is expected that you will refer to web sources, company reports etc. for contextual information about the marketing activities of the particular company. My advice when selecting a company is perhaps to avoid the very large companies such as Nike, as their marketing activities are so diverse and numerous that it can be hard to go into enough detail within the 2000 word limit. If you do want to select a company such as this, then it is fine for you to concentrate on one particular division, for example, Nike Golf or Adidas Classics. In terms of selecting a smaller organisation, my only advice is to ensure that it is large enough to give you enough to talk about and for there to be information on its marketing activities. You are not likely to find academic materials about the specific companies. The academic literature will provide the theoretical underpinning, while commercial and web sources will provide you with the company-specific information. It is advised that you structure your report around the areas of the sports marketing mix, with an introduction at the start and conclusion and recommendations at the end. It is crucial at this level that you adopt an analytical rather than descriptive tone, therefore, you should make use of appendices where necessary to present background information about the company and descriptions of their marketing activities. You can then refer to these in your discussion, rather than spending too many words describing what they do. You are free to include pictures, web links, videos and other examples of marketing materials to illustrate and support your report.
As you can see here, this assignment is designed to assess three of the module’s learning outcomes. You should refer to these when preparing your report because these closely map to the assessment criteria in terms of what we are looking for you to demonstrate in your work. Learning outcome 1 relates to knowledge and understanding of relevant theories, both generic and sports-specific. We will have covered some of these within the learning sessions, but it is expected that you will go beyond the course materials and your report should be informed by wider reading. Learning outcome 2 relates to critically evaluating the theories and practices of contemporary sports marketing. Therefore, your report should demonstrate a critical approach to evaluating both the company’s marketing activities and the theories themselves. The best example I can give to illustrate this point is that, you might be using a generic marketing theory and identify that it is not applicable in the case of your chosen organisation. With reference to the unique nature of the sports organisation, you may be able to offer a critique of the theory in a sports context. Similarly, you should be able to critique the practice of the organisation with reference to theoretical models and concepts. Learning outcome 4 refers to demonstrating a critical understanding of the marketing challenges faced by sports organisations. You can demonstrate this throughout your report as there should be a continuing narrative which sets your discussion in the context of the market or markets in which the organisation operates. For example, you may be able to analyse their promotional activities with relation to developments in new technology, or the internationalisation of sports markets, for example. Thus, you should infuse your report with knowledge and understanding of the wider sports market, to interpret the company’s marketing activities.

I would prefer to do this about the company and the department that I work for and have uploaded a zip file of the current marketing tools that we use and also a small brief about the company that I work for and the department in that company and how we go about our activities

The client has provided a small brief about Qatar Foundation and how we market:
Qatar Foundation is a semi-private, non-profit government supported and government funded organization. Its aim is to transform Qatar from a carbon based economy to a knowledge based economy (www.qf.org.qa).

One of the departments in Qatar Foundation is Recreation Services where I work and our focus is to promote a healthy lifestyle through the provision of facilities and activities to the Qatar Foundation community ONLY (staff and their families) a community of about 25, 000.
There a total of 6 venues in Qatar Foundation with 49 different facilities. This is what I want to focus this report on -the marketing activities of this department. Ahead of the financial year we plan all of our activities you can see in the attachment the breakdown of the 5 plans in PDF (Awsaj, recreation centre, cricket ground, HBKU and ECCH)
Activities can be broken down into the following
â�¢ Events – this would be a one off event, like a zumbathon (one day) cricket league (ongoing), bowling tournament etc.
� Kids classes for example swimming, basketball (with the academic term)
� Adults classes for example zumba, spinning (monthly)
â�¢ Social programs – pre-set times for specific sports where people can come and play in a pre-organized environment
Once the activity plans are approved they must be stuck to no official budget is put in place for marketing to the community.
We market in the following ways:
� Facebook (free) screen shot in folder, not well organised, uploads event pictures only
� Instagram (free) same as facebook
� Emailing our database (free) we have all the QF communities email addresses so emnail them whenever we have an event
â�¢ Company internal advertising system – intranet /portal kind of thing updated on a monthly basis (free) screen shot in folder
� Opportunity to be in the bi-monthly company magazine (free)
� We have E-notice boards in each facility (rolling posters of events, classes etc) (free) screen shot in folder
â�¢ Twice a year customer feedback sessions which is meant to also be an opportunity for us to advertise what we have (very poorly attended!) (cost of snacks for guests – minimal) also get to hear what the customer wants
� Leaflets at reception(s) of whats going on (free- other than the cost of paper)

We have a customer survey too on ipads – example from one venue: https://www.surveymonkey.com/s/IPadRecreationCenterSurveyDecember

I will attached all the examples of our marketing.

Our department vision and mission are
Vision
To provide comprehensive recreation and sports services by promoting the healthy life style among Education City community in a fun and safe environment.
Mission
Recreation Services is committed to promoting and providing comprehensive sports and recreation services by promoting a healthy life style among the Education City community in a fun and safe environment, through the provision of high quality facilities and the implementation of effective social programs, classes, events & activities.

We basically have no official marketing plan or strategy in place and just use the above

List of facilities include:

RECREATION CENTRE
1. Activity Room
2. Gymnastics Room
3. Studio Room
4. Ladies Fitness Room
5. Mixed Fitness Room
6. Wooden Floor Gym
7. Green Floor Gym
8. Squash Court 1
9. Squash Court 2
10. Olympic Pool
11. Training Pool
12. Splash Pool
13. Jacuzzi
14. Pitch 1 football
15. Tennis Court
16. Multi-Purpose Court
17. Kids Adventure
18. Male Spa
19. Female Spa
20. QA Blue Floor Gym
21. QA Green Floor Gym

ECCH (education city club house)
1. Main Swimming Pool
2. Baby Swimming Pool
3. Jacuzzi
4. Mixed Fitness Room
5. Squash Court 1
6. Squash Court 2
7. Tennis Court 1
8. Tennis Court 2
9. Multi-Purpose Court
10. Mini Football Court
11. Male Spa
12. Female Spa
13. Playground
14. Studio

AWSAJ
1. Multi-Purpose Hall
2. Mixed Fitness Room
3. Studio
4. Swimming Pool
5. Pitch 4
6. Activity Room

HBKU
1. E-bikes
2. Al Khor (school)
3. Al Wakra (school)
4. Pitch 2 football
5. Pitch 3 football
6. Beach Volleyball
7. Ladies Fitness Room
8. Mixed Fitness Room
9. Studio
10. CMU Ladies Fitness Room
11. CMU Mixed Fitness Room
12. GU Mixed Fitness Room

CRICKET GROUND
1. Cricket Field
2. Net Cricket