Hi everyone. This is the beginning of the study week, and I just want to say that you should try to mix in some leisure amidst your revision schedule. Most of us are overtaxed by now, so if you find that your mind has decided to call it a day, it sometimes will benefit you more to take a whole day of from studying. This will allow you to come back refreshed; it sometimes requires 2 steps back to take that 1 step forward. So good luck with this!

Anyway, I have all your presentation grades already, but we're still trying to work out how to get these scores out to you. I have also compiled the feedback from the CNM staff who guested, which are supposed to go into the IVLE gradebook together with the grades. My own comments are more qualitative in nature, so I'm going to send them out by email. Since this presentation is over already, I'm also more concerned with giving you guys some tips that can be carried over to any of your presentations henceforth. So here goes:

First, all presentations should ideally open by first having a contents page. Some groups did this, while most did not. And if you do have a contents page, spend some time on it so that you can preempt your audience as to what they can expect from the presentation. This is especially important since time is short and you have a lot of material to go through. So, if your audience has already been told how the presentation will flow logically right from the beginning, this will help them to understand what you are saying a lot.

Next, when I say logically, this also refers to how you move from one slide to another. Just like in an essay, you need to close out each paragraph/slide by stating the logical link. So for example, if you have just finished going through an analysis of a client’s past advertising campaign, close out the slide by saying something like, “As we have shown, the problems with the past campaigns are ~~~. Based on this analysis, as well as from what we have gleaned from our research, we would now like to present the following creative draft to remedy these shortfalls that we have identified.” I noticed that many groups just jumped from very one section to a completely different one without warning the audience, which is extremely jarring. While I know that adding this one line here and there will eat into your time, do remember that your aim is to make your audience understand what it is you are saying, and this will definitely benefit your ability to communicate your ideas across more effectively.

When presenting, I noticed that many groups positioned all its members behind the computer even if not everyone would be presenting. This felt a little strange actually, to have so many pairs of eyes peering from that dark corner. So, what I would recommend, and which was what some groups did, is to sit those members who aren’t presenting down in the front rows. And, if all group members are presenting, it’s also ok to sit down until your turn is up. Another thing I noticed is that many groups weren’t presenting to the whole class, but only to the examiners. Well, your classmates are your audience too, so you should make eye contact with everyone single person who has come down to listen to your speech. Similarly, any materials shown in class should have been flashed to them as well.

Next, I would like to say some things about the slides’ content. First, if you are presenting graphs, please don’t speed through them. Just like the content page, please spend time explaining what all those figures and bars mean! Or, one group actually circled the relevant figures on the graph, and jumped straight into to explaining their significance, which I think is a great idea. The point here is that graphs and charts (usually) present a lot more information than bulleted points, so you need to really go through the numbers, once again, so that your audience knows what it is they are looking at. Don’t forget that they probably have never seen these before, so they need time to digest the information. And on this point, I also noticed that some groups would change the slide even before the presenter was done presenting. This is very distracting, and can be mitigated by the presenter first calling out “next slide please” as a prompt. Finally, and I make this mistake myself so I understand your difficulties, try not to include information or slides that you are not going to talk about at all. This is not only distracting, but it draws attention to the fact that you haven’t prepared well for your presentation.

Next, a word on the presentation of statistics. There is actually no need to state the tests you were using or your critical values unless you are asked to at the end. In a presentation, these details are like statistical hypotheses in a journal article: it is always left out. So when you present, rather than your alpha values, what is more important is the conclusion. i.e., “There was a significant difference between the attitudes of males and females towards the brand….” This is all you need to say IN A PRESENTATION. This being said, your written report is not a presentation, and should contain your Chi-square tests and alpha values, alright? So, understand the medium of delivery, and organize your contents accordingly. And, just a note for an advertising presentation: because it is important to know who your target audience is in order to understand your creative draft, it would have been necessary to cover the nature of your target and sampled audience in greater detail.

Lastly, I want to cover the use of 'gimmicks' in your presentation, which is great by the way, to induce some kind of interactivity with the audience in spite of the limited time and all. However, while handing out product samples and all is great, it is also important to remember to elaborate on these gimmicks. For example, in DW3, I wanted to see more being done the SIA girl (your group did an excellent job by the way, so don't take this singling out the wrong way). Think about how the air stewardesses were presented when SIA announced its tie-up with China Eastern; they may have been in the background, but they stood in a certain way, and conveyed a certain kind of image of the companies. So, this idea could have been developed further rather than just to allow what could have been the focus of attention become just another group member. Another case in point would be the Yeo's group in DW4. The drinks were handed out and then forgotten. I wish you could have seen how FLUXUS in DW3 did the same thing, but ultimately made it more meaningful to have the drink in your hands. So anyway, if you're going to do something out-of-the-ordinary, you might as well make it count, right? You can do this by relating the gimmick with your presentation objectives in order to milk the idea to the very end! Don't waste all that effort you've put in!

In summary, remember that your objective is to communicate your idea to an audience that doesn't have a clue to your presentation's content. So, always think about what information you need to give your audience systematically, so that you can lead them to agree with and understand how you got to your conclusion.

Ok, that's all from me. Your scores and the guests' comments should follow shortly. Thanks for being patient!

Hi guys,

Wonderful job in class this week! There were many great ideas out there, which resulted in some very inventive advertisements. I would just like to reiterate some important points here based on how the classes went. Remember that in any advertisement, it is important to come up with a creative plan that will break through the clutter. Nonetheless, the creativity should not be such that the USP becomes hard to understand, or the brand image is lost. Many of you focused on delivering the idea that the double degree program is beneficial in some way to prospective applicants, which was great! Regarding the brand image, I would just like you to think back to Pei's guest lecture, when she talked about how you really want a brand image, that has taken perhaps 100 odd years to build up, to continually be reinforced within the audience's mind. This really just returns to the point about really understanding your product/service concept.

I wasn't able to show my doodle in class, so I'm posting it up here:
            
Basically, I was trying to use a slice-of-death/benefits appeal. I tried to think of a headline that wasn't perhaps related to other kinds of product/services (except maybe the army...), with the giant satellite below being the visual counterpart. However, I didn't want to lose the idea that this ad is about education, so the double degree program comes in immediately as a subheading. The rest of the image in the center is meant to reflect the slick and dynamic image that NUS has tried to build up over the years. In the bottom right is the picture of a student and teacher, possibly in what looks like a really conducive high-tech learning environment. The copy below plays on the "fear" of not being able to keep up with the need for communications competency in today's working world, and a URL is provided for the reader to take action. At the lowest right is the NUS logo, which we really want to stick in there because we want to use the brand to carry the product/service. As one group pointed out, the NUS logo with the "Join Us" below is something that I think people remember, and which we might want to consider re-using. A final note regarding the copy is that I tried to tie them all together to deliver a coherent message vis-à-vis the appeal that I had decided upon.

Ok, a final word on the project. I would once again like to say that this project will be graded based on logical execution. The product you chose is merely the means to an end for us to see whether you are are able to constructively and correctly use all the knowledge that you have learnt so far in this module. So, from creative strategy to execution, you should reflect in your report your understanding of identifying the target audience and product concept etc., and show how this influenced how/where you decided to deliver your ad message. As such, your creative draft does not need to look professional, rather, it just needs to be good enough to communicate what it is you're trying to do. For e.g., if you have a couple of people wearing business suits as a way to present a more classy image, stickmen are probably not going to cut it because, well, they don't wear clothes. So, do enough so that your idea isn't discredited, alright?

Hi guys. As promised, here is the table that I had flashed during this week's tutorial. My apologies to the 2-3pm class; what I was saying would have made a lot more sense if I had been able to project this (the projector finally kicked in 5 minutes before the hour, when almost everyone had left. :(). The table basically reiterates the main characteristics, similarities, and differences between magazines and newspapers as advertising mediums, and is referenced from your textbook. The purpose of getting you guys to review the magazines in class was to get a hands-on feel for how advertisers are in reality making use of these characteristics.

To summarize this table, the major plus point of magazines is that they can reach very specific audiences, and which is an advantage that the magazines we looked at certainly took advantage of. However, the problem here is that this leads to a lot of clutter, which was reflected by your responses to those magazines with a high percentage of single or double-paged ads. As it is necessary for magazines to retain its core readership with content that is of interest to its target audience, one way to avoid this clutter then, is to have more advertorials. I am using this term very loosely here to refer to editorial content that endorses a product (see p. 394 in your textbook for the U.S. case). [I will also speculate that in Singapore, there are probably all kinds of loopholes where the law that necessitates the statement "Advertorial" to be printed can be circumvented, but anyway...] Doing this takes advantage of the high-involvement readers have with magazine content; readers' purchase intentions will be affected by an advertisement that is surrounded by related content. Thus, for example, a reader who has read about how good a particular MP3 player is might be more inclined to pay attention to the MP3 player's advertisement within the same magazine. Unfortunately, this is not as feasible in news magazines, which is why they depend on inserts and such to achieve the same effect (e.g., the TIME Instyle magazine that one group brought). Finally, as was evident in the table we drew up in class, most of the advertising you identified tended to be of products or services that depend more on affect in influencing purchase decisions (i.e., luxury goods or goods with low differentiation etc.). We thus saw how advertisers make full use of magazines to push products that are heavy on the affect dimension by taking into account the magazine's editorial content, as well as the ability to present their advertisements in vibrant colors.

The final column in the table is simply to draw your attention to the fact that, even though magazines and newspaper are both printed forms, they have quite different characteristics as advertising medium.

Ok, that's it! Remember to stay on track with your reading!

Hi everyone!

First of, I would like to once again apologize to everyone for making the "informal consultation" at such a late hour. Charlene and I will try to coordinate things so that this doesn't happen again. But as you all now, there are extenuating circumstances, so we would also like to ask for your kind understanding when things do screw up a little.

Second, I would like to run through some of the administrative issues that students who attended heard, but all of you should be aware of. (i) Attendance was not taken for this week's class (1st October), so there will be no penalties if you did not attend. (ii) Although there are no more formal readings scheduled in the lesson plan as yet, I would like you to continue reading according to what was originally posted. So for this week, try to cover Chapter 13. This is a very important chapter because it provides many of the pros and cons of certain kinds of mediums, which you will eventually need to justify in your report when you explain why you chose, say, to place your ad at the bus stop vs an underground tunnel. So, please read for your project if nothing else!

Third, I showed some Internet advertisements (or advertainments) in class, and I want to post the links here for those of you who are thinking of doing something more akin to viral marketing. By the way, advantages of Internet marketing is in Chapter 13. Ok, the first ad I showed was the "Get the Glass" campaign by the California Milk Promotion Board. I also managed to locate the corresponding TV ad that directed viewers online here. The second ad I showed was Blendtec's "Will It Blend" series of ads. More background information about the success etc. of this campaign can be found on Wikipedia. As I mentioned in class, using the Internet gives you the power of interactivity, so if your target demographic allows it (they must use the Internet!), then do give it a thought. Oh and, if anyone has interesting ads to show, please let me know, and I can pass the link to the class.

Finally, I would like to give this general comment regarding the projects based on my talks with the various groups for those who weren't around. Basically, I noticed that many of you were not really able to justify some of the decisions you had made. But, because the aim of this class is to test how you are able to utilize the advertising concepts you are learning, you should be able to have a reason for every single aspect of your creative draft. So, if I asked you a "why" question for anything, such as why you chose a particular target audience, why you are using a particular color, why you have decided to make the brand logo prominent, why you wish to advertise at bus stops, or why you decided to make an ad that is affective; you should be able to answer all these questions using your survey or focus group data. In other words, find out what your target audience wants and give it to them! Don't forget that your ad's effectiveness will NOT be evaluated, so you're free to put it together any way you wish as long as you can explain why. And this brings me to my second point regarding surveys - the questions you ask should be as general as possible so that you can squeeze as much data out of your respondents as possible. There are ways that questions can be phrased so that the information received can become more useful, so take due care in crafting them! And finally, don't forget to identify the primary competitor as well, which will allow you to more adequately formulate a USP, and so that you can craft your ad to effect attitude change etc.

Ok, that's all from me. Happy Children's Day, and see you all on Thursday!

Note: Since idiosyncrasies exist between the different brands and products, and would thus entail divergent methodologies, the following is not a prescription for how you should carry out your project. It should be treated as just a guide.

Project
Many of you have asked me for more details on how to execute the steps in the project guidelines. Referring to both the original and revised guidelines, you will see that it is necessary to do a situation analysis before you even begin your consumer/market research. Such an order exists because of very pragmatic concerns, i.e., you need to know what to ask your respondents before you begin any data collection. On a side note, target audience may be identified by either corresponding directly with the brand if they are willing to speak to you, or sampling a small population across different age groups to see the interest or intention to buy the product within these groups. The age group that gives the most favorable response can then become a justifiable segmentation demographic. You might want to further do a psychographic breakdown of this group by generalizing on their lifestyle habits etc. Insights into this behavioral set of components can probably be garnered by looking at generic surveys that may have been conducted by magazines and newspapers, or through your survey instrument itself.

Any survey that you will eventually carry out can be used to elicit 2 sets of information, (i) what the target audience thinks of the present product and ad campaign, and (ii) what kind of creative draft they may respond better to. Let's consider an example using the choice of source since this is still fresh in our minds, and use the case of Jack Neo's endorsement of Mitsubishi air-conditioners. Assuming that you do not know the target age segment, you might want to first run a small survey across age groups asking, for example, whether they have purchased an air-conditioner or have an intention to do so. Once you identify this group, you can then move on to further acquire (a) psychographic data for this group, as well as (b) their impressions of the present ad campaign. For (a), you might want to ask the respondents what they consider to be important in such a purchase (e.g., design, price, energy efficiency, sound levels during operation etc.) Note here that this is also why you need to understand your product well in order to seek consumer opinions on these attributes, which you may later choose to emphasize or down in your creative draft. For (b), you may want to ask your respondents whether they think Jack Neo is a good fit and why, or who they think would be more suitable. You can even test they're recall of a competitor's ad. If you are running an open-ended focus group, you may even get responses such as how a trustworthy source is important in such a purchase, or how they may find that using a celebrity source might be a distraction from more relevant technical specifications of the product.

Whatever the case, all the information that you gather will become useful when you have to design your own advertisement. And since you probably only have one chance to gather your data, it will be extremely important to ask all the pertinent questions in your survey instrument, which can only be done once you have done a proper situation analysis. Alright, I hope that this will help clear some of the doubts you may have concerning the project.

Factors Influencing Source Effectivenes
My gut feeling is that some of you may still be confused as to the relationship between source credibility and its mediating factors. What I can do on my end is to give you guys some readings as a follow-up. I have placed all of these on my Web site so that you don't need to waste time going through the digital library for them. Note that these are not mandatory, so only do them if you think it will be helpful. Alternatively, you may just want to read the introduction and discussion sections if you are short on time; understanding the statistics is not important. Information on involvement aside, I hope that you will also be able to realize that journal articles can be an excellent way with which to justify the creative direction that your advertisement takes. For example, you could argue that you have decided to use a particular source for a print advertisement because past research has shown that such a combination invokes an attitude change in users, so on and so forth. Anyway, without further ado...

Readings indicated in your textbook:
Eagly, Alice H. and Shelly Chaiken (1975), "An Attribution Analysis of the Effect of Communicator Characteristics on Opinion Change: The Case of Communicator Attractiveness," Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 32 (1), 136-144.
Abstract: This study tested the attribution hypothesis that message persuasiveness decreases to the extent that the position the communicator advocates is expected on the basis of a characteristic he possesses. Some subjects read a message by an attractive or unattractive communicator who espoused a desirable or undesirable position on one of two topics, while others, without reading the message, estimated the likelihood that the communicator would advocate each position. On expectancies, undesirable positions were judged more likely than desirable ones, and a Source Attractiveness X Position Desirability interaction showed attractive-desirable and unattractive-undesirable communicator-position pairings judged likelier than attractive-undesirable and unattractive-desirable pairings. On opinions, main effects showed attractive communicators more persuasive than unattractive communicators and desirable positions more persuasive than undesirable positions. However, a Source Attractiveness X Position Desirability interaction indicated that attractive communicators were more persuasive than unattractive ones given undesirable positions but only equally persuasive given desirable positions. The attractiveness main effect on
opinions was interpreted in terms of communicator likability, while the parallelism between expectancies and opinions (and other responses) with regard to the other effects supported the attribution interpretation. Choice or no choice about receiving a message had only a marginal effect on opinion change.

Sternthal, Brian, Phillips, Lynn W., and Ruby Dholakia (1978), "The Persuasive Effect of Source Credibility: A Situational Analysis," The Public Opinion Quarterly, 42 (3), 285-314.
Abstract: The interactive effects of source credibility and other variables which affect the communication process are reviewed, and the extent to which these data are ordered by cognitive response and attribution theories is examined. On the basis of this review (1) situations where a credible source facilities, inhibits, and has no systematic persuasive effect are identified; (2) the explanatory power of cognitive response and attribution theory is demonstrated; and (3) a common language linking these theoretical formulations is advanced, providing a framework for investigating the persuasive mass communication process.

Sternthal, Brian, Dholakia, Ruby, and Clark Leavitt (1978), "The Persuasive Effect of Source Credibility: Tests of Cognitive Response," Journal of Consumer Research, 4 (4), 252-260.
Abstract: Two experiments are reported identifying the circumstances In which high credibility either facilitates, inhibits, or has no effect on the communicator's persuasiveness in relation to a less credible source. These data provide support for the cognitive response view of information processing and suggest the importance of message recipient's initial opinion as a determinant of persuasion.

Factors of Source Credibility
Whitehead, Jack L. (1968), "Factors of Source Credibility," Quarterly Journal of Speech, 54 (1), 59-63.

Study on the Effectiveness of Source Credibility:
Hovland, Carl I. and Walter Weiss (1951), "The Influence of Source Credibility on Communication Effectiveness," The Public Opinion Quarterly, 15 (4), 635-650.
Abstract: In a new test of the process of forgetting, the authors found that subjects, at the time of exposure, discounted material from "untrustworthy" sources. In time, however, the subjects tended to disassociate the content and the source with the result that the original scepticism faded and the "untrustworthy" ma terial was accepted. Lies, in fact, seemed to be remembered better than truths.

Effects of Endorsement by Experts and Regular Consumers:
Wang, Alex (2005), "The Effects of Expert and Consumer Endorsements on Audience Response," Journal of Advertising Research, 45 (4), 402-412.
Abstract: This study examines the process by which audiences integrate expert and consumer endorsements into their product evaluations and how endorsement consensus affects this process. The results suggest that positive expert and consumer endorsements both enhance audiences' attitudes toward the endorsed product. However, positive consumer endorsements and higher perceived credibility of consumer endorsements, rather than expert endorsements, enhance audiences' behavioral intents when audiences are already interested in the endorsed product.

Endorser Effectiveness by Product Type
Friedman, Hershey H. and Linda Friedman (1979), "Endorser Effectiveness by Product Type," Journal of Advertising Research, 19 (5), 63-71.
Abstract: Celebrities worked best - with exceptions.

Audience Involvement and Source Credibility
Johnson, Homer and John Scileppi (1969), "Effects of Ego-Involvement Conditions on Attitude Change to High and Low Credibility Communications," Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 13 (1), 31-36.
Abstract: In a 2 X 2 X 2 design, male high school students received from a high or low credibility source a communication that was either plausible or implausible, and that was given under high- or low-ego-involvement conditions. Results indicated greater attitude change in low-ego-involvement-high-source-credibility conditions than in the other three combinations of source credibility and ego involvement. These latter three combinations did not differ significantly from each other. Results supported the theory that source credibility is a "set" influencing communication acceptance-rejection primarily under low-ego-involvement conditions. Extension of the theory to social conformity experiments is discussed.

Good luck!

First, I would just like to say to everyone that you guys did a very good job in looking at the ends. As you probably have realized, identifying the target population is very important in giving you the clues with which to benchmark an advertising's effectiveness. Once you have identified the target audience, which can sometimes be verified by contacting the PR officer of the company, you can then try to quantify their needs through some simple surveys. This will allow you to conclude more definitively whether the original marketing campaign is effective as per the benchmarks you uncovered. At the same time, you might want to try to identify the semiotics that the targeted group associates with the product, both positive and negative, so that you can either reinforce or rectify them. Then, you can place this information together with the needs of the product itself. Is it a new product? Is it a product where there is little or high differentiation? And, more importantly, is the product high or low involvement, and if so, is it so in an affective or cognitive way. Once you consider an advertisement holistically from all these aspects (and more), you should be able to understand why the advertisement was conceptualized as such. And if you feel that something isn't right, don't just toss that feeling away - quantify it, and either correct, or find a means to justify it.

Ok, the reason why that magazine is in my possession is actually a very boring one. I'm subscribed to a Japanese Studies forum where scholars in the field can post queries and such. One academic asked the question of where Japanese girls got their sex education from, and the reply was that it came from magazines like Seventeen. Actually, the specific title given was Hot Dog, and which I managed to get from Kinokuniya. The relevant pages, however, were all torn out. I won't tell you what was on those pages since some of you might be offended, but I'm sure that you can conclude on your own that it is not only explicit, but graphic. So anyway, when I went to Japan that year, I just grabbed a bunch of these magazines targeted at young females. It was a big miss though, since I did not even get a single magazine with the source material. This issue, for some reason, is the only one I have left from that fact finding mission.

For those of you who want to find out more about Marxist ideas and consumption, I have found the ideas of Guy Debord and Theodor Adorno to be quite fascinating. I have only come into contact with their ideas peripherally, but Debord talks about how capitalists create this thing called the "lack" to enslave consumers to their desires for more and more commodities. Adorno talks about how mass-culture divests the individual of power by destroying individual identity; if you have no identity, no "I," the implication is that you will be forced to rely on the capitalists to derive a self concept. One caveat with all these ideas though: you cannot make the assumption that there is a unified capitalist force that is directing its might to create such an ideological divide. There is usually no conscious road map in these kinds of situation, although the idea is that once identified, will be reinforced by the capitalists of course.

Anyway, this last bit is how a full-blown semiotic analysis of advertisements might be, and is for those of you who are more curious about what this the entity known as consumption might be. In this module, we are of course more concerned with how to sell, Sell, SELL!!! :P

For those of you who attended the lectures, this post is probably superfluous I guess, but I thought it important enough to also put it in writing here.

(i) Reading List
The readings seem to be appearing correctly in the Lesson Plan now, so all should be fine in this regard. I'm not sure why nothing comes out under week 2 in the student view though. Under the staff view in IVLE, the plan actually displays the information that I had posted in the last entry. Whatever the case, if there is any discrepancy from now on, I will keep everyone informed.

(ii) Project Timeline
As you should be aware, Project Guidelines are now in the IVLE Workbin. So, do refer to this document whenever you need to know tings about submission dates and project requirements etc. I would also like to draw your attention to the fact that there are 3 new brands for you to choose from: YaKun Kaya Toast, Bengawan Solo, and U.R.S. In addition, I should also point out that Pretty Fit and Bee Cheng Hiang have been ruled out as possibilities. If there are any other local brands that you think you may want to work with, do let me know.

Hi guys,

Here are the replies to the queries that were brought up in class.

(i) What should I have read?
As per the announcement on the IVLE, you should treat the Lesson Plan as the definitive reading schedule guide. I am told that you can actually access the Lesson Plan via a detailed week-by-week tabulation (go to Lesson Schedule in the IVLE). What it states so far is this:

Wk 1 - Intro
Wk 2 - Chapter 1 & Chapter 2. pp. 38 ~ 51
Wk 3 - Chapter 4

So basically, you should have read these 3 chapters by this week's end.

(ii) Do I need to submit a proposal, and when do I need to do this?
The answer is no, you do not need to submit a proposal. What I do need each group to do is to let me know which brand you have decided to work on as soon as you've decided. In terms of project timeline, you will need to depend on the Lesson Plan to time yourselves. My understanding is that the requirements for each week would require you to have reached a certain point in your project (such as having decided on a brand). Stick to this, and you should be fine.

The table on the course site, before it disappeared, also stated that presentations are due in Weeks 12 and 13. While this is probably no longer accurate, it might be helpful for those of you who need a more long-term view of things - in other words, make sure you are close to completion by Week 12. Details should come in as we move along.

By the way, TIME Magazine this week has a feature on Viking's market positioning in the U.S. This might be an interesting case study for you to put everything we've learnt so far in context. I think the link to the article will only last 2 weeks, so do head over quickly if you're interested.

See you all tomorrow then!

These 2 questions have been raised by some students, and I would like to address them here.

(i) Budget
The answer is no, you do not have to consider budgeting constraints. However, I would ask that groups still keep their advertising campaigns within reasonable boundaries. This is not only important to preserve rationality in your report, but it will also ease your workload considerably. For example,you don't want to assume an infinite budget where you can create different advertisements to cater to every single segmentation in your target audiences. You simply don't have the resources to pull of something like this within the confines of the module.

(ii) Using more than one advertising medium
In theory, there is nothing wrong with this. Nonetheless, groups who wish to pursue this should realize that they will then be required to produce more than one creative draft. For example, if you suggest in your report a print and television advertising campaign, you will then need to produce creative drafts for both.

I've gotten some preliminary word regarding the readings you guys need to do, as well as the project timeline. Let me finalize some details with Charlene, and I will try to give you all some answers promptly.

As this module places a lot of emphasis on your ability to work as a team, I thought that the following guidelines that I got from McGraw Hill might come in handy. Working well in a team is not intuitive, and does not come naturally to most of us, so always remember the following:

• Listen while others are speaking.
• Respect other people and their ideas.
• Stay on task.
• Be responsible for your own actions and responsibilities.
• Speak quietly and respectfully.
• Encourage other group members to participate.
• Check for understanding.
• Disagree constructively.
• Work toward a group consensus.
• Criticize ideas not people.

While these apply to everyone, it would be good to appoint a group leader to first create and sustain an open and conducive atmosphere. Note that the group leader should be prepared to shoulder more responsibility than the individual group members - that's what leaders are for!

Please refer to the following table when scheduling appointments. Preferred method of communication is via email. And, please do remember to indicate NM3215 in your email subject as well.