Question 1:

Part 1: Business Description:

Write a description for a business. You will use this for most assignments throughout the rest of the course. Feel free to update the description if the idea evolves through the semester. If you need to make an update, please message me and I will send you further directions.

This part of the exam is worth a possible 60 points.

The description of your business should include:

• Name, what will you call your business? (5 points)
• Is your business profit or non-profit? (5 points)
• A well written mission statement that follows the rules from the articles in this module. Don’t forget to include the “why, whom, and how”. (15 points)
• A description of your products or services. State what your business is and what products or services you offer. (15 points)
• Pricing strategy, how much will you charge for your services or product. Please be a specific as possible. (10 points)
• A description of the industry and how your business fits into it. Discuss the industry specific to the location in which you plan to open your business. How are similar organizations faring in the industry? How does your business stand out? How your business will be incorporated? (5 points)
• Outline the steps you will take to incorporate and describe why you’ve chosen that strategy. Explain what you expect to gain because of your decision, both financially and legally. (5 points)

Part 2: Hierarchical Organizational Chart Assignment

Create a hierarchical organizational chart for the entity described in your business descripition, including at least five employees, one of which should be you. List the responsibilities that each staff member will have, what skills/qualifications they would need to complete the job, and to whom they will report.

You will receive 3 points (no more than 15 total points) for each complete employee listing. A complted employee listing must include the list of employee responsibilities, skill/qualifications needed to complete the job, and to whom they report to.

Part 3: Staff Budgeting

Based off the hierarchical organizational chart in “Part 2” of this exam, determine what the cost of each employee will be, including:Base Salary: Research what similar employees make in the area. (You can use online resources like GlassDoor.com, Salary.com, PayScale.com.)
Employment Taxes
– Social Security Tax: 6.2% per employee
– Medicare Tax: 1.45% per employee
– Unemployment: 6% per employee
– Multiply the tax rate for each of the 3 types of taxes to determine the tax amount for that type.
Benefits: May include life insurance, health coverage, vision and dental, long-term disability insurance,
dependent care, tuition reimbursement, etc. Consider benefits that will help recruit the most qualified
employees to your organization. List the cost of these benefits for each employee.
Add the base salary, employment taxes, and benefits together to get the total cost for each employee

You will receive 5 points (no more than 25 total points) per employee that is correctly calculated. This mean that you have also created formulas to demonstate the calculation used to determine the cost of taxes per employee and other calculations within the document.
Part 3 must be uploaded as an Excel document.

Question 2:

Create a Customer/Buyer Persona of a customer that would use your product or service. Your marketing persona should include at least 10 different identifiable habits or specific adjectives that would help define who you are marketing to. You will receive 1 point for each identifiable habits or specific adjectives you submit. This assessment is worth 10 total points.

Question 3:

Create a Marketing and Fundraising Plan

Create a marketing and fundraising plan based off the business entity you previously described and will be using for the final project.

If the buisness is Not for Profit please include the following:

Executive Summary (10 points)

Write in complete sentences a summary of your Target Market, Marketing Strategy, Crowfunding Strategy, Appeal Letter Strategy, and Finanical Goals as described below.

Target Market (10 points)

Create a customer personal that fits with the product or service you are offering. Include at least 10 adjectives and descriptors.

Marketing Strategy (20 points)

Choose two of the Integrated Marketing Communication Tools. Describe in detail (at least one paragraph) of how you will use two of these tools to successful communicate your product or service to the Customer Persona you designed in this assignment.

Crowdfunding Strategy (30 points)

Briefly describe your strategy for a crowdfunding campaign:

What type of crowdfunding will you use?

How will you set up your campaign?

How will you promote your campaign?

How will you thank your donors?

Appeal Letter Campaign (20 points)

Write a brief letter that you will send out to your donors (either via electronic or “snail mail”). **TIP: Don’t forget to include a call to action!**

Financial Goals (10 points)

Describe how much money you anticipate on bringing via your marketing and fundraising campaigns. How much of your product or service will you have to sell? How much money will you need to fundraise? Describe how you will get to these goals via marketing and fundraising.

If the buisness is For Profit please include the following:

Executive Summary (10 points)

Write in complete sentences a summary of your Target Market, Marketing Strategy, Crowfunding Strategy, Investor Letter Strategy, and Finanical Goals as described below.

Target Market (10 points)

Create a customer personal that fits with the product or service you are offering. Include at least 10 adjectives and descriptors.

Marketing Strategy (20 points)

Choose two of the Integrated Marketing Communication Tools. Describe in detail (at least one paragraph) of how you will use two of these tools to successful communicate your product or service to the Customer Persona you designed in this assignment.

Crowdfunding Strategy – many for profits launch with some type of crowdfunding to raise awareness and start up funds (30 points)

Briefly describe your strategy for a crowdfunding campaign:

What type of crowdfunding will you use?

How will you set up your campaign?

How will you promote your campaign?

How will you thank your donors?

Investor Letter Campaign (20 points)

Write a brief letter that you will send out to potential investors, the same tactics as writing an appeal letter will apply, you are still trying to convince someone why they should invest in the company. The big difference is that investors will probably receive some type of stock or profit sharing from their investment (either via electronic or “snail mail”). **TIP: Don’t forget to include a call to action!**

Financial Goals (10 points)

Describe how much money you anticipate on bringing via your marketing and fundraising campaigns. How much of your product or service will you have to sell? How much money will you need to fundraise? Describe how you will get to these goals via marketing and fundraising.

Question 4:

Using the provided template as a guide and starting point, please upload a Pro Forma Income Statement (i.e. revenue and expenses using all projected numbers) that represents forecasting for 12 months. (pasted in files)

NOTE: I have not added any formulas into the excel sheet, please add where appropriate and helpful.

REVENUE:
Include 3 – 10 sales categories (5 points)

SOM – include in the SOM notes box how many people you predict will buy your service or product and tell me how you calculated this number. For example you could discuss that you used 100,000 Facebook ads at a projected 1% return that will result in sales of 1,000 units of your service or product (5 points)

Based on your SOM, how many units do you expect to sell for category – also include notes in the SOM notes box how you came to this number (5 points)

Average sale for each category -if you have many products, you can categorize each one and enter an average, if you have 10 or less products list each product and enter what they cost. (5 points)

To determine your revenue from fundraising, add the number you included as your financial goal from Unit 3, Module 2. (5 points)

EXPENSE:
If you create a product or otherwise known as “good” such as a visual art product, multiply how much each will cost you to create by the number of estimated units you forecasted will sell (5 points)

If you provide a service such as producing a play estimate how much each performance will cost and and
how many seats you will need to meet the demand of your SOM. (5 points)

To determine your marketing expenses using 8% of your total sales forecast create the following line items to describe your marketing expenses: web site design and optimization, social media advertising, email marketing, graphic design costs, video marketing production, search engine optimization (this is money spent to make sure your web site is at the top of a google or other search engine list of suggested web sites), direct mail. You may decide to spend “$0” in one or more of these categories but please leave a note why you chose this direction.

To determine your fundraising expenses assume your crowd sourcing campaign will be covered by your marketing expenses – staffing, and email marketing expenses – include a line that will multiply the average expense of sending direct mail (78 cents for this excercise) by the number of letters you discussed sending in your assignment from Unit 3, Module 2. (5 points for including fundraising and marketing expenses)

Transfer your total staffing expenses from Unit 2, Module 1, transfer your facility expenses from Unit 2, Module 2. Add office supplies expenses by taking the total number of employees you listed in Unit 2, Module 1 and multiply by $200. Add a one time furniture and equipment expense for desks, tables, and computers for employees by taking the total number of employees you listed in Unit 2, Module 1 and multiply by $5,000. (5 points)

Calculate the Return on Investment. **Reminder ROI is calculated as Revenue – Expense/Expense (5 points)

**TIP: For many people this can be a difficult assignment, try your best and submit something. I will provide notes if you missed anything so you can re-submit by the end of the semester.**

Question 5:

You will then need to resubmit your Pro Forma Income State BUT add an additional two years of forecasting so we have a financial snap shot of the first 3 years of business. In year 2 you will assume a 4% growth in revenue and 3.22% growth in expenses to match inflation. In year 3 you will assume a 7% growth in revenue and 3.22% growth in expenses to match inflation. You will receive 25 points for correctly displaying the update Pro Forma Income Statement with adjusted revenue and expense.

You will next need to write a brief narrative, worth 25 points, explaining your strategy for growing the business as explained. Tell me what will be different after year 1, what will you focus on to create growth?

Lastly, you will need to describe a paying position within the company that you will hire yourself in. Include a letter of agreement for the position and a monthly income statement based off this position. (Similiar to Unit 1 Exam but relevant to the business you are presenting)

You will receive 25 points for the letter of agreement that includes; Date of agreement, Header & Employer name/contact information, Scope of work and deliverables details (what will you be doing and what you won’t be doing, what will you be giving to them as the final product, what do you need from them in order to do your work, etc.), Schedule (due dates for work and deliverables, dates of events/activities, and payment), Rights/ownership of work (who owns the work you’ve created/completed), Terminating/Canceling the contract (what happens if either party doesn’t follow through with what they agreed to), Acceptance of Agreement (signatures and dates of the two parties entering into the agreement)

You will receive 25 points for a monthly income statement that includes; Net Income Calculations, AGI and monthly expenses; Rent, Transportation, Groceries, Entertainment, Dining, Student Loans, Utilities.