The X factor, Beautiful Women and Body Builders!!!

Well my work at Bayer is getting better and better each week, I can’t believe how many opportunities I have been given and how much I am learning. There is almost too much to write on this blog, so I have split it into my 3 key experiences this week.

The Pitch!

Ok, so it wasn’t quite the X factor but better in my opinion. I was given the pleasure of sitting in on several pitches from marketing companies wanting one of Bayer’s new projects. I have to say the ‘pitch’ is something I love about marketing. The idea of getting up and selling yourself and your ideas is rite up my street. I was always told by lecturer that its not something you can learn its just something you can or cannot do.

Well all of these companies could definitely do it, it was a fantastic experience. I couldn’t help but feel bad that they all couldn’t get the job. The amount of time and effort put into these pitches is evident and you can see how badly each company wants it.

I felt completely inadequate when it came to the final judgment, what could I possible contribute? I admired all their work and learned allot form all of them. I was reassured by a colleague that any of them could do the job and it purely came down to personality. An essential attribute in marketing I have discovered!

My department is filled with a lot of individual characters, you don’t quite know what to expect each day and there is always an element of surprise.

Concepts!

Definition;

“Management philosophy according to which a firm's goals can be best achieved through identification and satisfaction of the customers' stated and unstated needs and wants.”

I have also been working on a number of concepts for a new drug ready to hit the market in 2010. I have briefly studied concepts at university and I have to say it is definitely an art rather than a science. My boss Fabio had a meeting with me to discuss the creation of two new concepts he would like me to help put together.

After discussing our target market and all the attributes they seek in this drug it became evident that this was a hard task. Too create a concept that would focus on all the needs of the customer was simply not possible and would end up making an extremely bad concept.

Fabio gave me one of the best explanations for this “bad concept” effect.

 He stated that ; “if you took all the most beautiful women in the world and used each of there best assets to create one women you would end up with an extremely ugly, unattractive women that no one would desire.”

Any one with Photoshop, you should try it……its frighteningly true!