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Entrepreneurial Commercialisation for New Ventures, offered in SP4

Undergraduate course BUSS 3048 (was previously called Entrepreneurial Marketing for New Ventures)

Answers to FAQs about entrepreneurship courses in general

Answers to FAQs about this course in particular

See what's special about entrepreneurship courses.

This course can be thought of as "marketing without advertising". It aims to develop insight and understanding into the principles and practices of marketing for growth-oriented entrepreneurial enterprises, and the commercialisation of new technology-based products and services for new business ventures that have limited resources and that target national and international markets.

A "free elective" (BUGE course): This is a business elective for students who are enrolled in degrees in the Division of Business.  This is also a "free elective" for students enrolled in other divisions.  This course is available to students from all campuses. You may need to check with your Program Director if you have space for such an elective in your degree, and if you are eligible to do this course (the coordinator of this course cannot check this for you). You can enrol online for this course in the same way that you enrol for your other courses. If you have any problems in enrolling, contact Campus Central. The HECS fee for this course is shown on the course home page.

Cross Institutional Enrolments: If you are enrolled in another university and you have space in your degree for an elective course, then you can apply through your own department to take this course as a cross-institutional transfer student. We have a number of people doing this already. You will also need to get the form signed by the course coordinator, who is located in Room 20 on Level 3 of the Elton Mayo Building at the corner of George Street and North Terrace, City West Campus.

Audit Students: If you do not have room in your degree, you can apply to attend this course as an audit student, but there is a fee attached. UniSA Campus Central (8302 0511) can provide information about this option and the fees. The HECS fee for this course is shown on the course home page.

What if you have a timetable clash? You may have a timetable clash with one of the lecture/seminar sessions, and this may stop the system from enrolling you in this course.  You can get an over-ride form from the Campus Central office, complete it, sign it and give it to Campus Central staff.  You do not need any other signatures.  This will allow you to enrol.

Next scheduled: This course is conducted at City West in SP4.  Download the detailed course timetable. Put the seminar and workshop dates in your diary! This course is run in intensive mode only (face to face). We regret that this course is not available in external or online mode.

Prerequisites: none, but you will find this course easier if you have already done Entrepreneurial Enterprises and if you have studied the Division core course 'Marketing Principles Trading and Exchange'.

Course home page: follow this link Please note that the key dates (census and withdrawal dates) for all courses are on the "Class Timetable" page that you can access from the course home page.

Course coordinator: Peter Balan.

Teaching and learning arrangements

This course is run in intensive mode only (face to face). We regret that it is not available in external or on-line mode. Lecture/seminar sessions are conducted over two weeks, and these are followed by an optional workshop session and a report presentation and review session (check the detailed timetable). Altogether, these formal sessions are equivalent to a standard semester-long course. Lecture/seminar and workshop sessions are supplemented by independent study, and teamwork. This course therefore requires 120 hours of student time - which is the same as a standard semester-long course. Check the answers to FAQ for this course for detailed comments about course delivery.

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Aim

To develop student insight and understanding into the principles and practices of marketing for two contrasting types of enterprises: both small entrepreneurial business, and high-technology ventures that have limited resources and that target national and international markets.

On completion of this course, students should be able to:

Syllabus

Assessment

Team Project Report

The class will be given a business idea as the subject for the team project work and project report. You will have access to details at the start of the lecture/seminar series.

Teams are required to present their team report as a poster plan (two A3 pages).

A "Plan presentation and feedback" session is scheduled for all teams to display their marketing plans, to examine what other teams have submitted, and to present the strong points of their plan to the whole class. There will also be a general discussion of the plans, including comments from the lecturer. This will be a valuable session for receiving feedback on this interesting assignment, and for learning from other teams.

Textbook

Schindehutte, M, Pitt, L & Morris, M 2008, Rethinking Marketing: The Entrepreneurial Imperative, Pearson, New York

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Recommended reading

Balan, Peter (1991). Creating Achievable Marketing Plans (2nd edition).  Polyglot, Adelaide. A book with lots of checklists, useful for creating actual marketing plans. City West library. A soft copy is available from the course web site.

Bjerke, B, & C. M. Hultman. Entrepreneurial Marketing: The Growth of Small Firms in the New Economic Ear. Edward Elgar, Cheltenham, UK. City West library 658.8 B626.

Chaston, Ian, & Terry Mangles (2002). Small Business Marketing Management. Palgrave, London. City West LIbrayry 658.8 C491.

Geroski, Paul (2003). The Evolution of New Markets. Oxford University Press, UK. City West Library 658.8 G377.

Mohr, J., S. Sengupta & S. Slater (2005). Marketing of High-Technology Products and Innovations (2nd edition). Pearson Prentice Hall, New Jersey.

Moore, Geoffrey A. (1999). Crossing the Chasm: Marketing and Selling Technology Products to Mainstream Customers. Capstone, Oxford, UK.

Shane, Scott A. (2005). Finding Fertile Ground: Identifying Extraordinary Opportunities for New Ventures. Upper Saddle River, NJ: Wharton School Publishing.

Preliminary reading

Though none of the following books is written as a textbook, all are aimed at small business owners, and are highly readable. If you have not studied entrepreneurship before, it is recommended that you read the book by Hawken or by Kawasaki. Hawken's book applies more for small businesses, Kawasaki's for larger start-ups. If you have not studied marketing before, the Horowitz or Philips and Rasberry books are recommended. It will be helpful if you can read - or at least scan - these before the first class session.

Horowitz, Shel (2000). Grassroots Marketing : Getting Noticed in a Noisy World.  Chelsea Green, Vermont. City West Library 658.8 H816.

Philips, Michael and Salli Rasberry (2001). Marketing without Advertising (3rd edition). Nolo, Berkeley, USA. City West Library 658.8 P562. 3.

Hawken, Paul (1987). Growing a Business. Simon and Schuster, New York. City West Library 658.1141 H392.

Kawasaki, Guy (2004). The Art of the Start. Portfolio, USA. City West Library 658.11 K22.

Business Review Weekly - every issue has articles on innovation and entrepreneurship.

Sessions and modules

This course will consist of several half-day sessions. Each session will include a number of modules, with each module lasting about one hour. Each module has 5 main components:

  1. Introduction to the topic - not covering anything substantive: the exact topic covered by this module, how it links in with previous and forthcoming topics, resources available for it (textbook, readings, etc.), and work required. Ends with initial questions from students.
  2. Lecture on the topic. The key issues, and how they fit together. This is an overview, and does not go into detail (that is left for students reading.
  3. Exercise on this topic - working alone, or in small teams, each with 3 or 4 students.
  4. Feedback from groups to whole class, with responses by lecturer.
  5. Comment by lecturer on practical outcomes, contribution to theory, and answers to further questions.

Details of sessions and modules

Sessions

Modules

Session 1: Commercialisation and marketing

Introduction to the course (and allocation into teams)
The commercialisation process

The marketing essentials

Models of marketing

Session 2: Entrepreneurial marketing

Entrepreneurial aspects of marketing

Entrepreneurial positioning and targeting

Session 3: Preparing for the marketing plan

The marketing planning process

Secondary market research

Primary market research

Session 4: Key marketing decisions

Adoption of innovation - identifying your first customer

Specifying the product or service

Distribution channels

Entrepreneurial pricing

Communications planning

Session 5: Getting the message to the customer

Communicating with customers

Direct marketing

Marketing through networks

Trade shows and exhibitions

Social network marketing

Website marketing

Session 6: Assembling the marketing plan

Budgeting for marketing

Putting together the marketing plan

Course review

Workshops

Following the main sessions will be a workshop when the lecturer will answer any questions and give assistance. This will be followed by a report presentation and review session when all teams will present the results of their teamwork.

For more information about this course, please see this page of Frequently Asked Questions.

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