Jeremy Ryan

Final Exam Essay

My goal in my career is to become a Creative Director for a video game studio and direct my own
original intellectual property. After doing plenty of research, I found that many successful Creative
Directors studied marketing and communications, which is why I decided to study marketing here at
Western. My plan is to eventually become a Marketing Director or Brand Manager for a successful video
game studio and learn as much about development as I can in my free time and during lunch breaks at
the studio. Once I feel comfortable enough with the studio, I will pitch my idea to the studio executives. I
know it might take a while to even be hired by a game studio, so I plan on starting as a Marketing
Associate at a large company to gain experience and work my way towards a Marketing Director or
Brand Manager position.

Throughout this course I have learned about many different theories and concepts that apply to
business and to my career. One of the concepts that I will use the most will be the marketing mix. The
marketing mix refers to the ingredients that go into a marketing program, these ingredients are product,
price, place, and promotion. I believe that these will be very important for my career in marketing.
Working as a Marketing Associate, I will be working with companies to develop products and services
that consumers will use. A good way to see if these products and services are what consumers want is by
test marketing, where potential users will test the product or service and provide feedback. Working as a
Brand Manager I would ensure that all branding is consistent to differentiate my company’s product from
the competitor's products. After deciding on the product or service that will be provided, the pricing
model would need to be developed. Many factors can influence the price, such as manufacturing costs,
distribution costs, and promotional costs. After determining the price, the consumers need a place to
buy and use our products and services. The place can depend on the type of product or service, common
places to buy products are retailers, grocery stores, and ecommerce websites. The last part of the
marketing mix that I would use would be promotion. I would have to inform people about the product or
service and motivate them to purchase and use it.

In addition to the marketing mix, I will also be conducting market research to determine
opportunities, detect challenges, and find information to make decisions. I’m sure that I will research the
markets of products that are being developed to identify any trends that will benefit our product. I will
most likely not only focus on consumers, but also employees and shareholders in the company I work for,
media representatives, brand ambassadors, and other stakeholders. The first step in market research is
to define the question by looking for a problem or opportunity, such as a spiked consumer interest in a
certain kind of product. Next, I would use a combination of secondary and primary data to collect
information related to my question. Secondary data would be available through published journals and
books or through information provided online. Primary data could be collected through online surveys or
by using focus groups. After collecting the data, it would need to be analyzed and turned into useful
information. Once the data is turned into information, I would use that information and present ways to
move forward to decision makers.
 I currently work as a Graphic Designer, and I intend to keep using my skills in my future career in
marketing. Advertising is a definite interest of mine, and I see myself using the advertising concepts
regularly. As a Marketing Director or Brand Manager, I would play a large role in concepting and creating
advertisements for products. I would work with Marketing Associates and Graphic Designers to create
advertisements. I would also hire and work with video production companies to create television
commercials and possibly even infomercials. Orchestrating product placement deals with companies
producing television shows and blockbuster movies could also be a future responsibility of mine. I
personally believe that digital and online advertising will soon be the most effective way to reach
consumers. I have already spent time using advertisements on Google and Facebook for internships, so
I’m sure this will continue to grow and become a more effective way to advertise products and services.
Using social media can be a great tool to test advertisements and to reach consumers directly. I plan on
engaging with customers directly to form a better relationship between the company and consumers.

As a consumer, I love when companies have sales promotions, it’s a great way to motivate
consumers to buy products and services. As a Marketing Director, I will play a role in determining when
sales promotions are active, and which products will be included in the sale promotion. Sales promotion
efforts can be targeted towards people with direct contact with consumers, such as salespeople and
customer representatives. These efforts include sales training, sales aid development, and trade show
participation opportunities. As a Marketing Director, I could be in charge of hosting a trade show or
webinar. I like the idea of webinars because people from different areas can join and participate in
learning about new products and services. I think having people leave their offices will be the future and
webinars will become more popular as I further my career. Sampling is a great way to let consumers
know if they would like to buy a product or service. Personally, after trying something and liking it, the
chances of me purchasing that product is way higher than it would have been if I had not tried it out.
Displays and marketing material to support the sales promotion would also have to be created. As a
Brand Manager or Marketing Director, I would have to ensure that the displays and marketing material
are consistent with the brand of the product.

Being a Creative Director on a video game project is no easy task, a big part of being a Creative
director is motivating the other people working on the game. As a Creative Director, Marketing Director
or Brand Manager, I will use concepts from the Motivating Employees chapter to ensure that I am
working with a productive team. While extrinsic awards are good motivators, I believe that intrinsic
rewards offer the best motivation. I think talking to my team, telling them how everyone’s hard work will
come together for millions of people to enjoy will be the best way to make a productive team. As a
leader I plan to have my team’s psychological, safety, social needs met, and I will aim to have them
achieve their esteem and self-actualization needs. I want to satisfy the employees needs for hygiene
factors as well as things that will motivate them to be productive. I plan to achieve this by providing a
friendly and more laid-back work environment, while giving them recognition when goals are met and
achievements are made.
 While I think everything that was touched on in this course will benefit me in some way during
my career. The marketing mix, advertising, sales promotion, and motivating employees concepts will
have the most benefit on my journey to become a Creative Director in the video game industry.