【正文】 he data in your marketing plan. What primary research will Sonic need to support its marketing strategy, including product management, pricing, distribution, and marketing munication? What questions or issues should Sonic seek to resolve using primary data? What technological, demographic, and/or economic changes can potentially affect PDA development, buyer acceptance of PDAs, and development of substitute or enhanced products?Enter your answers about Sonic’s use of marketing research in a written marketing plan or in the Marketing Research, Market Analysis, Market Trends, and Macroenvironment sections of Marketing Plan Pro.ASSIGNMENTSSmall Group Assignments1. Obesity has been officially called an epidemic as cited in the opening vignette of the chapter. In small groups, have the students collect, from the university or college administrators, information about the students eating habits (on campus students would be one group。 muting students another group), exercise, and lifestyle. For example, how many students (as a percentage of the total student population) regularly take advantage of the available exercise facilities? How many students presently on campus are clinically obese? This is a very good project to demonstrate the skill of data mining and the use of secondary data. 2. To illustrate the concept of marketing intelligence, select a different group of students to conduct similar research to 1 above but from universities and colleges of similar size. These findings should then be presented to class as a parison to the findings prepared from the group(s) researching your own university or college. Challenge the students to suggest the factors that differentiate the two studies and ways to reverse or to continue the trend. Individual Assignments1. Select or suggest a current “fad” or “trend” exhibited by students on campus. Each student is to select either a fad or trend and then research this fad and trend in light of the marketing opportunities present. Would a firm be successful in capitalizing on this “fad”? If so, why? Should panies capitalize on this “trend”—What are the “upsides” for producing products that are currently “trendy”? What are the “downsides”? What generation do these fads and trends appeal to? How large is the potential market for the fad and/or trend? Students should prepare a report with as much detail into the specific characteristics of these markets as is available. This is a good secondary data and data mining assignment. 2. Each student is a member of an identifiable ethic and demographic segment of society. As an individual assignment, ask each student to describe their subsegment in terms of population, age distribution, growth potential, ine, education levels, and other demographic characteristics. The conclusion of their report should explain the marketing implications of their findings in terms of potential market, oversaturated market, declining market, or hidden or ignored market with potential. ThinkPairShare1. Global forces and macroenvironment factors continually challenge marketers. Selecting one of the macroenvironmental factors from Table challenge the students to prepare a report on how they see that global force affecting, influencing, and limiting marketers in the near future. For example, point 2 states that “the movement of manufacturing capacity and skills to lowercost countries” is one of the forces affecting marketing. How will this statement affect multinationals in their marketing plans for the future? Suggested responses might point out that the multinationals must consider the low cost of wages in these countries when pricing their products。 that the increase in manufacturing in lowercost countries may increase the countries resident’s standard of living, thus open up markets for new products such as time saving and labor saving devices. Open up the class for discussion regarding how these global forces will affect (positively and negatively) marketing practices in the 21st century. 2. The marketing insight, Ten Megatrends Shaping the Consumer Landscape illustrates those megatrends predicted to affect the consumer in the ing years. Select a particular product or service (medical devices for example as a product。 insurance sales as a service) split the class into ten equal sections and ask each section to ment on how their particular megatrend will affect the product and/or service. MARKETING TODAY—CLASS DISCUSSION TOPICS“Green Marketing” has been a challenge to firms producing environmentally friendly products. The obstacles stated range from overexposure and lack of credibility, to the consumer not willing to pay a premium prices for “green” products, to poor implementation on the part of panies engaged in the practice. Question: When faced with a decision to market its products as “environmentally safe” or to market its products along conventional lines (matching petitive positioning), does the pany have a responsibility to choose the more socially responsible manner or should the dictates of the marketplace (. consumer) decide its marketing strategy? ENDOFCHAPTER SUPPORT MARKETING DEBATE—Is Consumer Behavior More of a Function of a Person’s Age or Generation? One of the widely debated issues in developing marketing programs that target certain age groups is how much consumers change over time. Some marketers maintain that age differences are critical and that the needs and wants of a 25yearold in 2002 are not that different from those of a 25yearold in 1972. Others dispute that contention and argue that cohort and generational effects are critical and that marketing programs must therefore suit the times. Take a position: Age differences are fundamentally more important than cohort effects versus cohort effects can dominate age differences. Suggested ResponsePro: People are the “age” they think they are. We have experienced some fundame