Question

The two most common types of formal, longer, business documents are reports and proposals. There are some similarities between the two but some important differences as well. Formal reports are internal documents. They are written to be read by other members of the organization. Proposals, on the other hand, are external documents. They are meant to be read by people outside of the organization. Based on your interests and experience, you will choose to write either a formal persuasive report or a business proposal.

If you choose to write a formal report, its subject will be the improvement of a product, service, or process that the company offers. The audience for this report will be the decision makers at the organization who have the ability to approve your idea. Here are a few sample ideas for formal reports.

• Assume you work in a bank. You have an idea to make it easier for new customers to switch banks without missing any bill payments.
• Assume you work for a charitable organization. You have a plan to encourage more donations or to attract more volunteers.
• Assume you are in the military. You have a plan to improve morale or to enhance combat readiness.

You may base your report topic on your current job or a previous one. If you don't have formal work experience, you may base your report on the type of organization you'd like to work for in the future.

Alternatively, you may choose to write a business proposal. A business proposal is a plan for a new business, aimed at attracting financial support. You may choose any type of business you like, but it should be consistent with your major and your career goals.

Important note: While reusing and recycling is great for the environment, it is not allowed here. You must use an original idea and original research for this assignment. You may not resubmit an assignment from another class.

Regardless of your choice, the required length is the same, a minimum of 1,500 words. In addition, you will create a presentation based on your report or proposal. It will be approximately 5 minutes long.

Answer 1

Business Proposal : Creative Industries, AVA Lausanne (Fashion Industry)

Introduction

Globalization has opened the ways for different brands to come up with their own strategies of expansion & diversification. Whereas, digitization& e-commerce has opened the ways for many industries to explore new channels of customer engagement which ultimately would lead to the growth in their sales. In this context, this project is aimed to analyse the different requirements & fundamental strategies which are instrumental in giving shape to an innovative business idea of branding, selling & expanding a fashion brand(Pani & Sharma, 2012).

Research Questions or Hypothesis

The research will mainly focus on identifying the different requirements & the development of certain strategies, which could prove to be a game changer for an innovative brand in the fashion industry segment(Bhardwaj & Fairhurst, 2010). The main objective is to find the opportunities & thereby define the path for performing a GAP Analysis. Further this Gap Analysis will help in understanding the steps which need to be taken in order to stand out from the rest of the competitors.

Rationale

Social Networks & use of apps have become a worldwide phenomenon where more than 1 billion people are connected to the same at any point of time. This has opened up many channels through which the different brands of the world could pitch in their products & services in order to successfully place their brands in the global platforms. For some time, the luxury brands were reluctant to utilize this platform, but with the advent newer technologies they too are forced to compete with their lesser counterparts. Social buying, interactive buying, social acceptance & Platformification are some of the most trending topics in the Fashion Industry(Cecilio, 2015). Thus the research will try to explore the opportunities & thereby recommend steps towards building a sustainable business proposal.

Research Review

The app that is being perceived, is a combination of both social media & a typical selling channel for the fashion Industry. While the application needs to have a robust platform, it also needs to have extremely efficient security protocols which would enable data security & give confidence to the users. The app also aims to give the flexibility of snapping some pictures & posting it in the profile without affecting the fringe rights of the sellers in the websites. Hence this modular feature should be well integrated into the application platform. There needs to be a separate expert section, where the fashion Industry experts will be interacting & suggesting the latest brands. While developers will be focused on developing the app, the marketing arm of the L’Armoire should devise the strategies which would be instrumentalin distributing the app & thereby attract more visits & downloads.

As per different researchers the success behind any app is the combination of a seamless experience along with the right strategies to promote the app at the right time, place &right channels(Varshneya, 2013). The research has also revealed the areas of focus for the app, which highlights the facts that the m-commerce sales through mobile app is set to increase by a whopping 43% by the end of 2020. As per the research firm, IbisWorld, the female clothing market has seen the second highest increase in sales in the UK Market when it comes to the sales through the different e-commerce channels whereas the menswear section has recorded the highest sales percentage in the time period of 2011 to 2015. As per the estimate of the same research firm, the sales of the Menswear through the e-commerce channels are set to increase by a CAGR of 14.3% globally(Veinteractive.com, 2016).

As per the Digital marketing specialist, DigitasLBi, the buying behaviour especially for the clothing & fashion wear are being influenced by various channels. In the year 2014, people used to take help of on an average 2.8 devices for making a purchase decision, whereas now the individuals are using atleast 5 devices while making a concerned purchasing decision(Mohr, 2013).

Analysis of Research/ Data

As per the research review & data collected, it is evident that there needs to be separate five vertical modules & each module would be able to interact with each other seamlessly.

Application & Evaluation

The app modularity structure as perceived is being shown in the figure below:

Fashion industry Security Seamless Experience Across the Modules & Enabling the Visitors to Buy the latest Trends Module for Picture Snapping Posting

Fig: Modular Structure (A Designer Perception) of the App

The Strategies for promoting the app

The app as described by the requirements should be an Online Platform which will facilitate buying, comparison, opinion gathering, blog writings, social media interaction and expert interaction modules. But the success of the app will depend on the willful execution of the strategies. At first, the focus should be given towards the KPIs which are relevant to the APP market in context of the industry & the segment in which the app needs to be opened. Before launching the app, it should be taken care that dedicated resources in the form of websites, servers, hardware & software are being allocated for the seamless experience by the users in their first use only(Fong, et al., 2015). Thirdly one should avoid to be pulled in different directions and rather focus on the specific target market & segments as identified through the secondary research. A mobile marketing expert needs to be identified for being the successful launch partner. That mobile marketing expert should also be responsible for correcting the glitches & for maintenance of the app platform. The last objective should be to market the seamless experience of the users rather than focusing on the marketing of the app itself(Gazdecki, 2016).