Brick and Mortar Business to an E-Business Essay Example for Free

Brick and Mortar Business to an E-Business Essay Company Background Sam Walton, who was convinced that the American consumers wanted something more than retail shops, opened his own discount and retail shop in Rogers, Arkansas. Walton realized he could do better by passing on the savings to his customers and earning his profits through volume. This insight would form a cornerstone of Waltons business strategy when he launched Wal-Mart in 1962. Cost-cutting was an obsession in the Wal-Mart culture, and Walton understood that a major requirement for keeping costs down was controlling the payroll. In 2012, Wal-Mart celebrated 50 years of helping people save money so they can live better. The company employs 2. 2 million associates worldwide and serves 200 million customers each week at more than 10,000 stores in 27 countries. Among the many business enterprises and organizations that changed the world, Wal-Mart holds a very important position. As compared to other genuine companies that changed a lot in the world of entrepreneurs, Wal-Mart has a short, yet highly-acclaimed story of success that is backed by brute force of efforts put in by many members and employees. Wal-Mart adopt E-business What business processes were changed? Possibly the single greatest success story of e-business and B2B implementation is that of the rise to dominance by Wal-Mart in the North American retail market. Wal-Mart has impressive growth in such a short time span and the single most important factor in this rise was their harnessing of the power of e-business. Wal-Mart built an inventory and supply chain management system that changed the face of business making it very competitive as an e-business. Like many companies, Wal-Mart started down the road to total integration by first linking its internal systems. Then the focus shifted toward an emphasis on integrating Wal-Mart’s systems with those of its suppliers. More recently, Wal-Mart has initiated efforts to bring processes and systems from the customer side of its business into the loop. What’s left is a customer-to-supplier architecture that allows Wal-Mart to follow its customer’s shopping habits so closely as to know their likes and dislikes and to parlay that information into pinpoint promotions. (Robinson ;amp; Kalakota, 2004) Wal-Mart has revolutionized supply chain management by using a pull model where customer demands drive the suppliers. Inventory control is finely honed and purchasing trends are available to suppliers, whom now must be able to quickly respond to the needs of millions of customers. The business decision to decentralize the procurement process means that front-line staff in every store can immediately order the appropriate stock electronically, which will in turn require rapid turnout of product from the suppliers. This rapid replenishment system, coupled with accurate purchasing forecasting, helps Wal-Mart reduce overall costs. While not always good for suppliers in general, Wal-Mart’s power as a giant in business has helped in establishing new standards for B2B e-commerce. Wal-Mart’s mindset of cutting costs at all costs resulted in them deploying EDI over the Internet to eliminate the costly VAN altogether. EDI over the Internet (EDI-INT) uses a new standard called AS2, a communication protocol that attempts to make EDI communications over the Internet both secure and reliable. By mandating their suppliers to use AS2, Wal-Mart leads the way in creating a demand for a new generation of EDI, and in turn drives the whole world of e-business forward. Early on, Wal-Mart saw the value of sharing that data with suppliers, and it eventually moved that information online on its Retail Link Web site. Opening its sales and inventory databases to suppliers is what made Wal-Mart the powerhouse it is today. Would the company survive without the E-Business aspect? Why or why not? Wal-Mart has so many great strengths to leverage throughout the global market, and Wal-Mart will survive without E-business. Some of those strengths are that Wal-Mart best-positioned global retail, and it has a strong price leadership. There is no doubt that Wal-Mart is the best-positioned global retailer to address the needs of customers around the world. Wal-Mart’s growth through new stores remains a priority, with supercenters the primary driver because they continue to offer the greatest returns and allow customers a one-stop shopping experience through more than 3,800 stores and over 617 million square feet of selling space. Wal-Mart reinvigorated their fundamental price promise of provide low prices day-in and day-out on the broadest assortment. Their price message, backed by the strongest ad match policy in the industry, ensures that we are driving price separation with competitors. The certainty of great values throughout the store such as best-positioned global retail and a strong price leadership has been fundamental to Wal-Mart for 50 years, and this company will to survive. Would the company survive without the Brick-and-Mortar aspect? Why or why not? Wal-Mart e-commerce websites is not going to replace bricks-and Mortar stores, because the key to Wal-Mart’s emerging e-commerce strategy is integrating store and online marketing. This strategy is product of ideas such as pick up at store. â€Å"Wal-Mart launched on Tuesday its Site to Store program, in which Walmart. com customers can opt for free shippingprovided they are willing to pick up their order at a Wal-Mart store instead of having it sent to their home. The items ordered are shipped within 7 to 10 business days to a Wal-Mart store, and then an e-mail is sent to the buyer that alerts him or her to pick up the order. † (McCarthy , 2007) Retailers say that tying online and in-store inventory together lets them sell more products to more customers. Nordstrom recently combined its inventory so that if the online stockroom is out of a jacket, a store that has it can ship it to the Web customer. Encouraging customers to retrieve items they have ordered online in a store increases visits to the stores, which usually increases sales. What were the unique advantages of this IT solution? Any noticeable drawbacks? Wal-Mart is strengthening their Global e-Commerce business by investing in new talent and technology such as Wal-Mart new iPhone application that allows

Pop Art1 :: Essays Papers, informative, pop art

Pop Art1 The birth of Pop art (short for Popular art) emerged in England between the years of 1950 and 1960, but heightened to its full potential in New York. Pop art was a form of rebellion against Abstract Expressionism. Pop artists felt that â€Å"Abstract Expressionism was an elite art, to which only a tiny class, mainly of painters and poets, could respond† (30 Compton). Pop artists also considered them pretentious and over-intense and at the same time, only selling to the greedy middle class. So, in order for the artists who were against Abstract Expressionism to dissent from that pretentious position they created Pop art. Pop art is the imagery of popular culture drawn from the cinema, television, advertising, comics and packaging to express abstract formal relationships. Furthermore, Pop artists also duplicated common mass production images such as beer bottles, soup cans, comic strips and road signs in paintings, collages, and sculptures. Others actually incorporated the objects themselves into their paintings and sculptures, and often times modifying them as well. Materials of modern technology, such as plastic, urethane foam, and acrylic paint, were also included in some of their art works. Critics did not easily accept this new and bizarre style of art. In fact, the â€Å"politically engaged critics †¦ complained that Pop art is the art of passive acceptance† and that the subject matters are wild and impassioned, â€Å"and therefore in itself a satire on American life†. (30 Compton) However, that is rarely the case, the artists may be radical but they never intend to satirize the American life.

How Does Phonics Develop Early Reading?

How does phonics develop early reading and how should phonics be taught? The most important skill any child can leave primary school with is the ability to read independently and effectively for meaning. ’ (DFE National Literacy Strategy) Reading has become an integral part of our lives; within the world we live in today we rely heavily on information and environmental text. It is important that from an early age Children are immersed in books everyday.With parents reading short stories to there children daily it will be inevitable that those children will stand a better chance at becoming stronger fluent readers. However distractions at home can have a detrimental affect on children’s development in reading as parents may not have enough time to help this. Many subjects rely on access to texts and an holdup or absence in basic literacy skills will effect progress in these areas. Phonics is â€Å"a method of teaching people to read by correlating sounds with symbols in an alphabetic writing system. (Oxford Dictionaries) Phonics is not something new and has been used in schools to help children learn and read since the â€Å"mid nineteenth century† (Browne 2011, 27) Although it had become less significant within schools during 1950’s it has continued to appear in practice within schools since. Within this essay I will be looking into the role of Phonics within teaching children to read while also looking at the different phonic systems in place and choosing the most effective one.I will be talking about the theory I have learned as well as my experience in schools while on placement with my foundation two class. There are two methods of teaching phonics in the classroom both Synthetic Phonics and Analytical Phonics. I will be concentrating more on Synthetic Phonics as it is considered to be â€Å"the best method for teaching reading. † (DfE 2010, p11) Children are taught to read and spell during the same period. They are taugh t the individual correspondences between sounds that are known as phonemes and written letters, which are known as graphemes.An example of this would be h-a-t = hat. They can also use this technique to pull apart those sounds that would help with spelling of words. For example hat = h-a-t. (Rowlingson) Whereas Analytical phonics is the complete opposite as they will start with a whole word and analyse a part of it. â€Å"In English there are 44 sounds (Phonemes) which are written using 26 letters of the alphabet† (Browne 2011, p27) There are many more Graphemes than Phonemes with most phonemes being represented by a number of different graphemes. Synthetic phonics can be taught in many ways.The Primary Framework for Literacy (DfES, 2006a) gives a progressive plan on how to teach phonics. I found during my time with Foundation year 2’s the teacher I was working with concentrated on implementing four new letters every week as well as recapping what they had learnt from t he previous week. I asked her if it worked well and she certainly seemed to think so. Before she would be doing a new letter a day, although this would allow her to teach at a good pace she noticed the children were struggling to remember all the letters and sounds they would learn.Because of this she had to revise the way she was teaching the phonics to go at a pace the children were comfortable with. She revised her plan so that every day her children would recap over the letters they had previously been taught. I noticed that however much planning was in place that it was always best to go by how the children would cope and over time you will become familiar with the class you are working with and this will come naturally.Once the alphabetic code has been taught you will advance to more complex graphemes and simple consonant-vowel-consonant words to much more complex CVC words. This will give the children a good understanding of being able to read and write these. It also allows them to then combine what they have learnt from the sounds into whole words. This however doesn’t always work with all words that are known as ‘phonically irregular’ also known as ‘tricky words’ as they do not comply to the phonics rules that are being taught.An example of this will be l-i-g-h-t, which clearly won’t make much sense when viewed from a phonics point of view. These words will be learnt by rote, which is a memorizing process using repetition where the teacher feels appropriate based on how successful the child is at reading. By understanding these procedures of reading it is possible to decode entirely unfamiliar words. From my experience within my Foundation year two class I learnt that it was important to keep the phonics lessons short, with around thirty minutes a day dedicated to this.Some people may believe that because it was only a short period of time to cover phonics the lesson will be very restricted with the children ha ving to take in all the information they are being given by the teacher with no participation. While being on placement I witnessed first hand exactly what happens in the typical Phonics lesson; it would start with ‘Fast phonics first’ where the children would watch a musical animation of the alphabet being sang out with the children engaging and singing along.The lesson then covers what the children had learnt the previous week in a short recap while then covering the new letters. This can be done in many ways. The teacher often puts the new letter on the interactive board and plays magic finger which sees the children watch the letter being drawn in the air with her finger and gets the children to copy this and then write this down on there own individual whiteboards which keeps them involved.This way it allows the children to experience an engaging lesson that they will remember, its also important that the teacher recaps on the letters the following day so that the children will keep the letters in there minds much longer. Over my six weeks I saw that the lessons would get gradually harder which follows what The Primary Framework Literacy (DfES,2006a) plan states.The diagraphs such as consonant diagraphs where two consonants join together to produce a single sound the most popular being â€Å"ch† â€Å"sh† and â€Å"th† Vowel diagraphs can also be used such as â€Å"ai† â€Å"ea† and â€Å"oo† etc by using these as well as CVC words it will help with the children’s understanding and knowledge of reading. A structure is very important when teaching Phonics and in Jim Rose’s independent review of the teaching of early reading many people agree with this. The review itself was conducted during 2005 with Jim Rose publishing his discovery early the following year.He talks about how phonics should be taught at the age of 5 years from foundation until year 2 and beyond. It should be Systematic c arefully planned and progressive which fits well to my observations while on placement. It should also be taught discretely daily at a brisk pace with the main point being that children are learning to decode and encode print. The key point from this Rose review however is that â€Å"it is part of a broad, rich curriculum† Meaning it should be used in all areas of teaching the children and not something that is separate.Another scheme would be that of Michael Gove Secretary of state for education who stated â€Å"A solid foundation in reading is crucial to a child’s success as they progress through primary school, into secondary school and then in later life† (Michael Gove 2012) He talks about how expected reading levels of ages 7 and 11 are simply not achieving with the government are looking to raise the standard of reading in the early years of primary school, his idea is that he wants children to read to learn information rather than reading to learn to read . We are determined to raise literacy standards in our schools, especially of those not achieving the expected level – a light-touch phonics-based check will provide reassurance that children in Year 1 have learned this important skill, will enable us to pinpoint those who are struggling at an early age and will give them the help they need before it is too late. (Michael Gove 2012) Systematic Synthetic Phonics is an extremely valuable program that works effectively within the reading and writing of children’s lives however It should be used alongside other strategies such as analytical I briefly mentioned earlier this is because every child is different and just because something works well for one child doesn’t always mean it’s the same for every child. With other strategies it will help every child no matter what the ability maybe. By using more than one program, most topics will be covered that suit the child. â€Å"Phonic knowledge can be taught in many ways† (DfES,2006a). 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The Success And Failures Of The Modern Police Operations

Introduction When it comes to issues within any organization, it is always important and critical to examine the origins, the successes and failures in order to grow and improve. The Modern Police Operations is not excluded from that process. In this body of work, the history of law enforcement operations as well as the key law enforcement agencies that are responsible for enforcing law, the explanation of one major change to law enforcement operations and the reason why the change was necessary, the opinion of the author in regards to whether or not the change was an improvement to police operations and lastly, discussing the main requirements related to training that local and federal law enforcement agencies must address. Keywords: Police, Operations, law, changes, positive, negative History: Summation of Criminal Investigation From the 1900’s to today, criminal investigation has undergone a transformation of sorts. Within this timeframe, the obtainment and process of evidence has not only become easier but, it has also become detailed in the results, helped with the capturing and apprehension of suspects and provide a tracking system to Law Enforcement Officials in regards to suspects and ex-offenders. In reference to the history of Criminal Investigation, it would be improper to not address some of the tools that help officials garner results. In the 19th century, the potential of fingerprints was realized but, was not brought to its fullest potential until the 20Show MoreRelatedFragile States : Causes And Impact1484 Words   |  6 PagesQuestion 1: Fragile States - Causes Impact. Discuss the characteristics of a state described as â€Å"fragile†, â€Å"failing†, or failed and address the possible causes of state failure as well as the â €Å"danger signs† that might warn of impending failure. No global definition exists for states described as â€Å"fragile†, â€Å"failing†, or failed because they come in all shapes and sizes. Yet, countries that have failed at the basic responsibilities of governance and sovereign authority are generally lumped intoRead Moreperformance apprisal research paper1283 Words   |  6 Pagescompetence, enhance performance and distribute rewards. In this paper that has been investigated effect of performance appraisal practice on employee satisfaction. The objective of this study is to assess the effect of performance appraisal practice of police commission on employee satisfaction and fill its gap all the necessary data has been gathered from the source. 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A form of communication - Free Essay Example

Sample details Pages: 20 Words: 5914 Downloads: 10 Date added: 2017/06/26 Category Statistics Essay Did you like this example? Advertising as a form of communication intended to persuade its viewers, readers or listeners to take some action. It usually includes the name of a product or service and how that product or service could benefit the consumer, to persuade potential customers to purchase or to consume that particular brand. Modern advertising developed with the rise of mass production in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. Don’t waste time! Our writers will create an original "A form of communication" essay for you Create order It has different connotation related to the different people related to the field of advertising. To the CEO of a corporation, advertising is an essential marketing tool that helps create brand awareness, loyalty and stimulates demand. To an art director in an advertising agency it is a creative expression of an advertising concept. Advertising related issues most often are left to the discretion on the viewer. Some might perceive these issues as ethical while others may loathe the advertisements on liquor and alcohol. Although the Indian government has taken a moral stand of banning the advertisements of these substances, but the manufacturers of these products have resorted to something called as surrogate advertising. Surrogate Advertising is done when the original product is not allowed to advertise itself on mass media. In India, alcohol brands are not allowed to give advertisements on television, so alcohol marketing firms use surrogate products like mineral water, soda, juice to hit consumers with the brand name. The brand name of the alcohol product is the same as the surrogate product. Kingfisher advertising packaged water, liquor manufacturers like Bacardi advertising compiled music CDs and Jagjit Industries advertising Aristocrat Premium apple juice are some of the prime examples of surrogate advertising in India. When people view these advertisements they associate themselves with these products. The extent to which Kingfisher is successful in this strategy is the topic which is being studied in this paper. Objectives/Research Questions: Our main objective is to evaluate the impact of surrogate advertising by Kingfisher by measuring its imact on the relationships between Brand Awareness, Brand Attitude and Brand Image amongst consumers. Literature Review Hypothesis: The review of literature shows that a number of studies have been conducted, especially in developed countries, on the ethical dimensions of surrogate advertising, (Zanot and Pincus, 1983; Hunt and Vitel, 1986). Few studies have been carried out to measure the effectiveness of surrogate advertising by products such as liquor and tobacco. But these studies were conducted in countries where the advertising of such products is not banned. Surrogate advertising is a fairly recent phenomenon emerging in countries where direct advertising of such products is banned completely. We begin by examining the impact of surrogate advertising of alcohol brands (Parulekar, 2005) on their brand equity (as defined by Keller 1993). The Government of India banned advertising of alcoholic beverages and cigarettes vide Rule 7(2) of the Cable Television Networks Rules 1999. In response, marketers of alcohol brands resorted to advertising of non-alcoholic beverages, sports gear, bottled water and a host of other alcohol-unrelated products as extensions of their alcohol brands. This form of advertising is now referred to as surrogate advertising. Brand Awareness: Brand awareness has been an important and often used construct for researchers assessing advertising and sponsorship effectiveness (e.g., Johar, Pham, Wakefield, 2006; Keller, 1993, 2003, 2008; Lardinoit Derbaix, 2001; Macdonald Sharp, 2003; Sandler Shani, 1993). Keller (1993, 2008) pointed out that brand awareness, or consumers ability to recall and recognize a brand from memory, is an important factor in the consumer decision-making process. For example, it is important that consumers are able to retrieve the name of the brand when they think of a particular product category. Brand Awareness consists of brand recall and brand recognition and brand recall can be further divided into aided recall and unaided recall (Zinkhan, Locander Leigh 1986). Brand Recall is the extent to which a brand name is recalled as a member of a brand, product or service class, as distinct from brand recognition (Leigh Menon, 1986). Brand Recognition reflects the ability of a consumer to see a particular brand as an established brand and not as a brand which they are seeing for the first time. Brand awareness measures the accessibility of the brand in memory. Brand awareness can be measured through brand recall or brand recognition. Brand recall reflects the ability of consumers to retrieve the brand from memory when given the product category, the needs fulfilled by the category, or some other type of probe as a cue. Brand recognition reflects the ability of consumers to confirm prior exposure to the brand (Miladian, Hossein, and K. Nagendra Badu., 2009). In addition, brand aw areness is important as it alone can affect consumers decisions about brands in a consideration set (Keller, 1993). This is especially true for low-involvement products (e.g., soap) as consumers are likely to minimize their decision-making efforts (Keller, 1993, 2008). Consumers attempt to save time and cognitive effort, by selecting a brand they know (Macdonald Sharp, 2003) or with which they are familiar (Aaker, 1991). Brand Image: Brand image is variously defined as the set of beliefs held about a particular brand (Kotler, 1988, p. 197) or a set of associations, usually organized in some meaningful way (Aaker, 1992, pp. 109-10).The second school, variously termed the brand image school, (Joyce, 1967; Ogilvy, 1963), humanistic advertising (Lannon and Cooper, 1983) and right-hand side of brain approach (McDonald, 1992) has at its core a more symbolic, intuitive and emotional view of products and advertising in the scheme of consumer decision making. Brand Image is the overall perception of a product which the consumers have. It is basically the kind of association which they develop between the product attributes (existing as well the non-existing but desired) and the brand name. Brand Image is built through a period of time and advertisement plays a large role in this. Brand Awareness and Brand Image: Brand awareness is also a necessary step for creating an association with the image of a brand. Without awareness of a brand, no other form of communication effects (e.g., brand attitude, brand images, and brand experience) can occur (Aaker, 1991; Keller, 1993, 2003, 2008; Macdonald Sharp, 2003). Keller (1993, 2003, 2008) explained that in addition to brand awareness, these effects comprise brand knowledge and they serve as the source of brand equity . Brand awareness and brand preference will affect the core brand image (Shwu-Ing Wu Chen-Lien Lo. 2009) and is positively related to core-brand attitude (Kardes and Kalyanaram,1992; Alpert and Kamins, 1995). Various theories on advertising and strategy have stated the positive brand awareness will lead to heightened brand image. This is a part of the well established Communication Strategy (Percy, Larry, Rossiter, John R., Elliott, Richard, Strategic Advertising Management, 2001). Four communication effects have been discussed in the work of Rossiter and Percy, and it will be from these effects that the following communication objectives were drawn: category need,brandawareness,brandimage builfing, andbrand purchase intention. Category need refers to the target audiences feeling that they would like a particular product or service in order to satisfy a specific need. It is important to remember here that category need is a perception, and therefore it can be established by the advertiser. By successfully establishing a belief in the target audiences mind that links the product category and a felt need, the advertiser can stimulate primary demand for the product category. Category need is the communication effect that causes primary demand. Brand awareness is the target audiences ability to identify a brand within a category in sufficient detail to purchase or use it. We have already seen that at the product category level consumers will not buy unless there is a perceived category need. At the brand level, consumers cannot buy unless they are first made aware of the brand. As a result, brand awareness must always be considered first, before any other communication effect. Hence we propose the following hypothesis: H1: Brand Awareness and Brand Image are positively related. Surrogate Advertising and Brand Awareness, Brand Image: The cue actually used by the consumer in place of another to evaluate alternatives may be called a surrogate indicator (Cohen, 1972). Brand awareness has been one of the most important ways of assessing the success of any marketing campaign. The available research literature on Brand awareness explores a variety of issues like factors affecting Brand Awareness of Virtual Advertising (Tsuji, Bennet Leigh, 2009), study on Brand Awareness towards common Hair Shampoo brands (Kathuria Jit, 2009). Therefore, the impact of marketing and advertising campaigns on Brand Awareness has already been studied by various researchers. Although cognitive awareness of Brands has been measured effectively to determine the strength of marketing and advertising campaigns, the effect of surrogate advertising on Brand Awareness has not been explored in developing countries. A research paper measuring this becomes all the more significant because a lot of industries like liquor and tobacco have resorted to advertising their products via this method in India. A few examples of such Brands could be Kingfisher, Bacardi etc. A research paper which attempts to explore this territory is Consumer Psychographics and Surrogate Advertising: An application of multiple discriminant analysis (Sharma Chander, 2007), but this paper too falls short on measuring the impact of surrogate advertising on Brand Awareness levels. Keeping the deficiencies in the existing literature in mind we attempt to study the impact of surrogate advertising on Brand Awareness. We went through literature to examine the effect of advertising on brand image. The function of advertising is to create the symbolism and imagery around the product which will result in a relationship between the brand and the consumer. The consumer is seen as active, knowledgeable, sophisticated and involved in the process of giving meaning to brands. Brand choice is based on emotional and intuitive feelings about brands, their images and meanings for consumers and how these brands satisfy consumer needs and seem to fit into the consumers relationship with his/her world. Based on the literature, we have arrived at 2 main functions of advertising on brand image. The first function is largely informational in character in that performance specifications of the brand are presented. The second function is to imbue the brand with human-like rather than mechanistic performance-oriented values. Brand image is the perception which the consumer holds of the product and its attributes (Cohen, 1972). Essentially perception is built through environmental cues and it is here that surrogate indicators through advertisements can play a very important role. The consumer often lacks complete information about the products and to fill this gap surrogate indicators play a crucial role. For eg: price can be seen as factor determining quality. The customer is dependent on these even more when he/she has not used the product before and in such cases perception of the product plays an even more important role. Similarly there are various indicators which effect the perception which the consumer builds. Some of these are colour (Kingfisher Beer uses red colour for its bottles and the same can be found on the drinking water bottles as well), symbols and endorsements which are shown in the advertisements. When the consumer cannot make use of proper evaluative criteria to compare and select br ands, it is these cues which then guide him to make his perception. We were able to site numerous research papers on the ethical aspect of surrogate advertising for alcohol and tobacco in India but hardly any on the relation between surrogate advertising and the corresponding brand awareness and brand image. This is used as a strategy to advertise products like liquor or tobaccoà ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã¢â‚¬ the advertisement of which otherwise, is banned in our country (Sharma Chander, 2007). It relates to advertising by duplicating the brand image of one product extensively to promote another product of the same brand. When consumers look at these advertisements, they associate these with banned products. Hence, such products are indirectly advertised, and therefore, influence their behaviour. There is no doubt that the hidden call for alcohol consumption behind the surrogate advertisements is not escaping the eyes of viewers of the worlds fourth highest liquor consuming country. Their paper discusses the psychographics of the target audience since they are th e final evaluators of advertising. The implications thus, are left for the advertisers to modify and redesign their advertising strategies in accordance to the consumer psychographics, so that they can find a way out which is more ethical and positive for the society or their target market rather than resorting to surrogate advertising. A significant negative impact on the brand awareness level and brand association set was found for 4 out of the 6 alcohol brands evaluated (Parulekar, 2005). The common factor for these 4 brands was that they were non-beverage extensions. The author concludes that the extent of dilution of brand equity is a function of prior brand exposure, the surrogate category chosen and articulation of advertising for the surrogate product. This suggests that surrogate advertising has two effects on the mind of the consumer. First, it dilutes the recall of the actual product and focuses the consumers attention on the surrogate product (for eg. Consumers attention might get diverted to Kingfisher Mineral Water which is the surrogate product from Kingfisher Beer, which is the actual product the UB Group is trying to advertise). Secondly, as stated above, this may lead to ethical implications where certain consumers think it is unethical for companies to adopt this strategy and lead to weakening the relationship between brand awareness and brand image. This leads to our second hypothesis: H2: Post exposure to Surrogate Advertising, the relationship between Brand Awareness and Brand Image would get weakened. Model: The objective of the research is to study the effect of Surrogate Advertising done by Kingfisher on the relationships between Brand Attitude, Brand Image and Brand Awareness of Kingfisher. The above model has been proposed for the same. The independent variable (IV) is Brand Awareness, which will be used to gauge its effect on the dependent variables (DV) Brand Image and Brand Attitude.The moderating variable is surrogate advertising. Brand Attitude: Brand attitudes are defined as consumers overall evaluations of a brand (Wilkie, 1986). Brand attitudes are important because they often form the basis for consumer behaviour (e.g., brand choice). A widely accepted approach to capture brand attitude is based on a multi-attribute formulation in which brand attitudes are a function of the associated attributes and benefits that are salient for the brand. Fishbein and Ajzen (1975; Ajzen and Fishbein, 1980) proposed what has been probably the most influential multi-attribute model to marketing (Bettman, 1986). This expectancy-value model views attitudes as a multiplicative function of (1) the salient beliefs a consumer has about the product or service (i.e., the extent to which consumers think the brand has certain attributes or benefits) and (2) the evaluative judgment of those beliefs (i.e., how good or bad it is that the brand has those attributes or benefits). Attributes are those descriptive features that characterize a product or service-what a consumer thinks the product or service is or has and what is involved with its purchase or consumption. Product-related attributes are defined as the ingredients necessary for performing the product or service function sought by consumers. Hence, they relate to a products physical composition or a services requirements. Product-related attributes vary by product or service category. Non-product-related attributes are defined as external aspects of the product or service that relate to its purchase or consumption. The four main types of non-product-related attributes are: Price information. Packaging or product appearance information. User imagery (i.e., what type of person uses the product or service). Usage imagery (i.e., where and in what types of situations the product or service is used). Benefits are the personal value consumers attach to the product or service attributes-that is, what consumers think the product or service can do for them. Benefits can be further distinguished into three categories according to the underlying motivations to which they relate (Park, Jaworski, and Maclnnis 1986): functional benefits. experiential benefits. symbolic benefits. Brand Image and Brand Attitude: Whatever be the brandattitudestrategy, it must be associated with and preceded by first building the right brand image. As a type of brand association, brand image should have a direct effect on brand attitude (Faircloth, Capella, Alford, 2001), which, it has been noted, includes the consumers perceptions of all associations (e.g., Aaker 1991; Keller 1993). There is a positive direct influence of brand attitude on brand image. Thus, brand attitude has a direct effect on brand image which has been established by the above research paper. This research considered that brand attitude is a type of brand association, and therefore, should also indirectly influence brand equity through the brand image construct. Wilkie (1986) and Keller (1993) indicated that a consumers attitude towards a core-brand referred to the consumers overall evaluation of that core-brand, and forms the basis for consumer behavior towards that brand. There are numerous studies indicating that the accumulation of brand image and use experience is key determinant of attitude towards core-brand attitude (Carpenter and Nakamoto, 1989; Kardes and Kalynaram, 1992; Alpert and Kamins, 1995; Martinez and Chernatony, 2004; Ghen and Liu, 2004). This indicates that core-brand attitude can be influenced by core-brand image and use experience of core-brand that are as follows. Hence, we propose our third hypothesis: H3: Brand Image and Brand Attitude are directly, positively related. Advertising and Brand Image, Brand Attitude: Brand Extension is a strategy used by most companies to leverage an existing brand name for other products (Serrao Botelho, 2008). Kingfishers packaged drinking water is an example of brand extension. The effect of brand extension on brand image of the original product has been studied by in the above mentioned paper. Brand Image is essentially the set of perceptions which a potential consumer hold of the product attributes. Stronger is this set of perceptions, stronger is the brand image. Now brand extension can have both effects on the brand image of the initial product. It might go on to dilute it in case the extended brand is not able to meet the expectations or it can also reinforce it. In our case where advertisements of liquor are banned, surrogate advertisements can be the sole medium of building more information about the product and hence can strengthen the brand image. This leads to our last hypothesis: H4: Post exposure to Surrogate advertising, the relationship between Brand Image and Brand Attitude will be strengthened. Gap in Literature: The Literature Review has helped us in understanding the various factors that are to be considered in analyzing the effectiveness of surrogate advertising, i.e. the literature aided us in defining the variables of our study. While the various research papers provided above have studied extensively about the impact of surrogate advertising in countries where these advertisements are not banned i.e. mostly developed countries, little work has been done to in this field in developing countries like India where liquor and tobacco are major industries and surrogate advertising is banned. Thus this research will help in understanding the effectiveness of surrogate advertising on the Indian consumers. Although Jamshedpur is being taken as a representative sample for this study which has its distinct demographics and lifestyle, our objective is to get statistically significant results which could be extrapolated to states in India and developing countries across the world with similar charac teristics. Operationalizing and Measuring variables for study: Brand Awareness: Researchers have assessed brand awareness through the use of recall and recognition scales, which test the ability of consumers to remember advertising from memory. In the paper Dimensional Relationships Aided recall and recognition (Zinkhan, Locander Leigh 1986) it was determined that cued recall is less demanding for the consumer because they are provided cues to access the appropriate memory trace. Recognition is much easier than the previous two methods in that target items are presented along with one or more distractor items to the respondents (Leigh Menon, 1986).Therefore, recognition is solely dependent upon ones ability to discriminate the correct items from the distracters. According to this literature, in an advertising recognition test, there are two possible responses (i.e., yesor no) to two types of advertising stimulus (i.e., real or distractor), which create four possible outcomes. First, a hit is recorded when an individual responds,yes to real advertising. If, however, one fails to recognize the real ad, the response is called a miss. Another incorrect judgment by a respondent is false alarm in which the subject answers yes to a bogus advertising stimulus. Finally, a correct rejection occurs when the subject says no to a distractor. Further analyses of recognition tests mainly use the hit rate (H) and the falsealarm rate (FA) for adjustments and corrections (Leigh Menon, 1986). A hit rate is calculated by the ratio of targets correctly chosen (Tc) to the total number of target stimuli available (T), whereas the false-alarm rate is the ratio of incorrectly chosen items (Dc) to the total number of distractor items included in the test (D) (Leigh Menon, 1986). For instance, a hit rate of 1.0 denotes that the respondent correctly selected all target stimuli in the test set. However, a hit rate of 1.0 would not be a brilliant score unless his or her false-alarm rate is also low. Scores of both 1.0 on both hit rates and false-alarm rates imply that the subject answered yes to all items. When one has a same score on both hit rate and false-alarm rate (i.e., H = 0.3, FA = 0.3), it implies that the responses occurred by chance. Therefore, a researcher seeks high hit rates and low false-alarm rates from respondents. Recognition tests are criticized for their failure to account for respondents errors. Shapiro (Shapiro, 1994) argued that recognition studies that use only the correct number of responses would be unable to completely understand the human recognition process. He noted that research that merely counts the number of correct responses may incorrectly conclude that recognition memory is substantial, when, in reality, it was changes in judgment about memory. He put forward the argument that a simple measure of hit rate (H) minus false-alarm rate (FA) would suffice. In our study, this formula will be referred to as corrected hit rate or HC. HC = Hà ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã¢â‚¬ FA According to Keller (Keller, 1993) Brand Awareness refers to customers ability to recall and recognize the brand under different conditions and link to the brand name, logo, jingles and so on to certain associations in memory. It helps the customers to understand to which product or service category the particular brand belongs to and what products and services are sold under the brand name. It also ensures that customers know which of their needs are satisfied by the brand through its products. For the purpose of our research we have that Brand Recall and Brand Recognition lead to Brand Awareness. Brand Recall: The extent to which a brand is recalled as a member of a product class and is distinct from brand recognition. Brand recall is to an extent measured by the degree of unaided recall. For eg, a person can be asked to recall the names of cigarettes or beer brands he may know. Researchers have found that brand recall is the sum of unaided and aided recall.The extent to which a brand is remembered when pointed is called aided recall. An example of such a question is What is Kingfisher famous for brand. For brand exposure companies look for high degree of unaided recall with respect to their competitors. The top of the mind recalled brand is the first to be evaluated in consumers mind for purchase. For the purposes of our research Brand Recall is being measured through the Likert Scale. Measures: Please name all the brands of beer you can think off. Please name all the brands of beer you can think of that you would bring to a youth party. We realize that it is not only important to measure the depth of recall (the percentage of people who know about the brand) but also the width of recall (the cues that lead to brand recall), which in our case is the kind of surrogate advertising which helps the consumers recall the brand. Typical cues would be: Subcategories. Consumption occasions / goal ( beer you would like to take for a beach-party ). Places (available in super-markets, bars etc.). People ( drink alone, in a group ). Brand Recognition: Brand Recognition reflects the ability of a consumer to see a particular brand as an established brand and not as a brand which they are seeing for the first time. In a recognition task consumers see stimulus ( e.g. mineral water bottle of Kingfisher ) and must say whether they have seen it before. Here it is important to make the task as realistic as possible by allowing only a short amount of time to answer the recognition question and by using realistic stimuli and context. The experimental group and control group are exposed to different stimuli (e.g. competitors brand). In the next step people see the old stimuli again with new ones and are asked to decide if the stimulus is old or new. To correct for peoples tendency to guess ( to say that they recognize when in fact they are uncertain ) one can compute a score called d-Prime score (HR-FA), Where, HR : Percentage of respondent who correctly identify the target stimulus: FA : Percentage of respondents who incorrect identify a new stimulus which has not been shown before. The following questions could be asked: Here is a list of (brand/ads/logos), do you remember seeing these today, yesterday, last month etc. Complete the following: K_NG_ISH_R, B_C_RD_ etc. Brand Image: Brand Image is the overall perception of a product which the consumers have. It is basically the kind of association which they develop between the product attributes (existing as well the non-existing but desired) and the brand name. Brand Image is built through a period of time and advertisement plays a large role in this. Whenever an advertisement is made, a company makes certain claims about the attributes of the product. This forms part of the expectations which potential customers generate and a positive relation between these expectations and the actual product helps build a strong brand image. Measuring Brand Image: Brand Image can be measured on 2 aspects, General Brand Image(GBI) which is associated with the brand in consideration and its symbolic aspects and Product Brand Image(PBI) which specifically relate to the physical attributes ,functional, emotional and self-expression benefits of the product (Martinez; Chernatony, 2004). Since we are considering brand image through surrogate advertisements it makes more sense to consider the GBI since physical attributes cannot be gauged through this form of advertisements. We propose to use Likert 7 points scale varying from à ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã¢â‚¬ ¢ completely agree à ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã¢â‚¬ ¢ to completely disagree for measuring the GBI on the following items (Martinez; Chernatony, 2004): This brand provides a good value for money. There is a reason to buy the brand instead of others. The brand has personality. The brand is interesting. I have a clear impression of the type of people who consume the brand. This brand is different from competing brands. Brand Attitude: Brand attitude can be viewed as the understanding a person has in terms of how they evaluate a particular brand and its ability to satisfy what the consumer is looking for in the product. There are four important characteristics about brand attitude that we need to understand. First of all, brand attitude depends upon what the potential buyer wants now from the product, which is the motivation that drives someones behaviour. Second, brand attitude is made up of what someone knows about a brand (cognitions or beliefs) and what they feel about the brand (affect or feelings). Thirdly, someones knowledge is usually made up of a number of different beliefs about a brand. And finally, brand attitude is a relative concept. Scale: Again a 7 point likert scale was used from 1 to 7 where 1=very and 7=not at all (Kathleen J. Kelly, Michael D. Slater, and David Karan,2002). Extent to which the brand is appealing. Extent to which the brand is cool. Extent to which the brand is In -Style. Extent to which the brand is likeable. Method: Participants (n = 110) were people aged between 24 to 40 years across India. People were administered a questionnaire to assess brand awareness. Since brand awareness consists of brand recall and brand recognition, both these aspects were measured using this questionnaire. Brand recall consists of unaided and aided brand recall. Unaided brand recall was measured by showing the respondents a set of 30 advertising images of various beer brands. Then they were asked the question as to which brands do they recall on the prompt. Images of surrogate ads of kingfisher were mixed with a few distracters of beer ads images like Fosters. Every time the respondent mentioned a kingfisher ad which was there in the images we recorded it as a hit (H). However every time he recalled an advertisement which was not there we recorded as a false alarm (FA). When the respondent mentioned an ad which was in the images but it was not Kingfishers we gave it zero weight age. Combining the hits and the false a larms of the respondent, the corrected hit rate (HC) was calculated as HC = H-FA for each respondent. The similar procedure was repeated for all the 110 respondents. To measure aided recall the respondents were prompted with a 10 options of images to choose from in which there were a few distracters as well which were not there in the original set of images. To measure the hits every time the respondent marked the option which was there in the original set of images we recorded it as a hit and every time the respondent marked an ad which was not there in the original set of images, it was recorded as a false alarm. However every time the respondent marked an option which was there in the images we gave it zero weight age. To measure brand recognition we blurred the images of certain surrogate ads of Kingfisher along with a few distracters and asked the respondent if he could recognise the ads. Every correct recognition of a kingfisher ad was recorded as a hit while every incorrect r ecognition was recorded as a false alarm. However, every correct recognition of a distracter was given no weight age. A few of the images shown to the respondents are as follows: The questions for the brand attitude and brand image scales have already been mentioned above. They were administered twice, one before and once after the respondent was exposed to the external stimuli (surrogate ad). The sum of each scale was taken and a linear regression was run to find the significant values and check for hypothesis. Research Design Respondents: 110 respondents aged between 24 to 40 years across India. Data collection: For the purposes of administering the questionnaire we had short one to one interactions with the respondents. Further online questionnaires were floated to target students and working professionals. Control of extraneous variables: Since most part of the research was done through an online survey, there was little scope to control the effect of extraneous variables. Ideally, the study should have been conducted in a controlled environment wherein each respondent was exposed to the external stimuli in the same setting and environment, but due to resource constrains this could not be done. Results and Analysis: We intend to study the relation between brand awareness and brand image; and brand image and brand attitude and the effect of surrogate advertising on these relationships, before and after the application of external stimuli. Brand AwarenessÃÆ'  Brand Image: Brand Image ÃÆ'  Brand Attitude: Now we ran regression for both the equations (before and after the participants saw the surrogate advertisement advertisement video) and the significance was observed. Next the standardized Beta coefficient was compared before and the video to establish the effect of the video. Relationship: Beta (Standardized): The level of significance is greater 95% for Eqn. 1 in both the cases (pre and post exposure to stimuli), with a positive standardized beta which means that there exists a positive relationship between brand awareness and brand image. Hence our hypothesis (hypothesis 1) has been proved. Brand awareness and brand image are positively related. In the case of Eqn. 1, the value of the standardized coefficient, Beta, has decreased post exposure to external stimuli, which means that the relationship between brand awareness and brand image actually weakened after the respondent is exposed to the external stimuli. Hence our hypothesis (hypothesis 2) has been proved. Post exposure to Surrogate Advertising, the relationship between Brand Awareness and Brand Image would get weakened. The level of significance is greater 95% for Eqn. 2 in both the cases (pre and post exposure to stimuli), with a positive standardized beta which means that there exists a positive relationship between brand image and brand attitude. Hence our hypothesis (hypothesis 3) has been proved. Brand image and brand attitude are positively related. In the case of Eqn. 2, the value of the standardized coefficient, Beta, has increases post exposure to external stimuli, which means that the relationship between brand awareness and brand image actually weakened after the respondent is exposed to the external stimuli. Hence our hypothesis (hypothesis 4) has been proved. Post exposure to Surrogate Advertising, the relationship between Brand Image and Brand Awareness would get strengthened. The reasons for a slightly lower alpha coefficient could be: The scale proposed for measuring brand image comprised of General Brand Image and Product Brand Image scales. However as Product Brand Image Scale consisted of specific product attributes which cannot be gauged through surrogate advertisements we took only the General Brand Image items for measuring the brand image. This could be one of the reasons for lower value Cronbachs alpha coefficient for brand image. Adaptation of the scales to Indian context. Low control on extraneous variables. Likely implications: Our research could be of benefit to various liquor and tobacco companies in India to help in marketing and advertising and also to the various regulatory bodies. Ethical Implications- Surrogate advertisements are a debatable topic especially considering the fact that direct advertisements of liquor and tobacco is banned in India. If it is established that these form of advertisements actually increase the brand image and thereby resulting in increased sales then the whole purpose of banning the direct advertisements is defeated. Commercial Implications- However if the government still wishes to allow surrogate advertisements then even other companies can find this model useful. Limitations: The study is mostly conducted in Jamshedpur which is not a very big city. Beer consumption itself is low compared to metropolitan cities and choices of people may be influenced more by local brands than by established ones due to cheaper prices. Therefore even if surrogate advertisements are actually helpful in building a better brand image and awareness it might not get reflected in a city like Jamshedpur. For measuring brand awareness a large number of sample images need to be shown to the respondents under controlled conditions. Since the respondents responded to the questionnaire independently and not in a group extraneous variable like noise, light etc. could not be controlled for the lack of time and resources in carrying out the research. Scope for future research Evidently, there is a lot of scope in the field of surrogate advertising and its direct impact on brand image, brand attitude and brand awareness relationships. Future research can be expanded to larger cities and more quantifiable parameters like total sales volume can be used to determine the effectiveness of surrogate advertisements. Also, if brand awareness is measured overcoming the limitations mentioned above possible mediation of brand image leading to increased brand image through increased brand awareness on exposure to surrogate advertisements can be established. Effect of Surrogate Advertising on the Relationship between Brand Awareness, Brand Image Brand Attitude.

Australian Healthcare Funding - 1367 Words

Australian healthcare funding The healthcare system in Australia is complex involving many funders and healthcare providers. In 2011 to 2012 the health expenditure in Australia was estimated to have been $140.2 billion, which made up 9.5 percent of gross domestic product in that year (AIHW, 2013). Responsibilities are split between different levels of government, and between the government and non-government sectors. With non-government sources funding for about 30 percent of the total health expenditure each year (AIHW, 2013). Australians make their contribution to their healthcare system through taxes, including the Medicare levy, and through private financing such as private health insurance. Private health insurance in Australia is a voluntary facility for private funding of hospital care and ancillaries. Insurance funds may cover the costs of treatment for private patients in private or public hospitals and can include some services that Medicare does not cover. The Australian governments fund for almost 70 percent of the health expenditure each year (AIHW, 2013). The federal government contributes to approximately two-thirds, while State, Territory and local governments together contribute for the other one-third (AIWH, 2013). As a generalization the Australian government is primarily responsible for the funding of healthcare, through health insurance arrangements and direct payments to the state and territories, while state and territories are primarily responsibleShow MoreRelatedThe Australian Healthcare System Has Been Evolving Since The Beginning Of The Colonisation Of Australia1596 Words   |  7 PagesIntroduction The Australian healthcare system has been evolving since the beginning of the colonisation of Australia. Today, Australia has an extremely efficient healthcare system although it still has several issues. 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The Hunters Moonsong Chapter Seventeen Free Essays

â€Å"That was amazing! Seriously,† Bonnie said happily, skipping along with her hand in Zander’s. â€Å"I am, like, the Queen of Quarters. Who knew I had this hidden talent?† Laughing, Zander threw his arm around her shoulders and pul ed her closer. We will write a custom essay sample on The Hunters: Moonsong Chapter Seventeen or any similar topic only for you Order Now â€Å"You are pretty awesome,† he agreed. â€Å"Drinking games, visions, astrology. Any other skil s I should know about?† Snuggling against him, Bonnie frowned in mock concentration. â€Å"Not that I can think of. Just be aware of my general wonderfulness.† His T-shirt was soft and worn, and Bonnie tilted her head a bit to rest her cheek against it. â€Å"I’m glad we got our friends together,† she said. â€Å"I thought Marcus and Meredith real y hit it off, didn’t you? Not romantical y, at al , which is good since Meredith has a super-serious boyfriend, but it was like they shared the same secret jock language. Maybe we can al hang out in a group again sometime.† â€Å"Yeah, Meredith and Marcus real y bonded over their workouts,† Zander agreed, but there was a hesitation in his voice that made Bonnie stop walking and peer up at him sharply. â€Å"Didn’t you like my friends?† she asked, hurt. She and Meredith and Elena had always had what they privately cal ed a â€Å"velociraptor sisterhood.† Cross one of them and the other two would close in to protect her. Zander had to like them. â€Å"No, I liked them a lot,† Zander assured her. He hesitated, then added, â€Å"Elena seemed kind of †¦ uncomfortable, though. Maybe we’re not the kind of people she likes?† Bonnie stiffened. â€Å"Are you cal ing my best friend a snob?† she asked. Zander stroked her back appeasingly. â€Å"Sort of, I guess. I mean, nice, but just kind of a snob. The nicest kind of snob. I just want her to like me.† â€Å"She’s not a snob,† Bonnie said indignantly. â€Å"And even if she was, she’s got a lot to be a snob about. She’s beautiful and smart and one of the best friends I’ve ever had. I’d do anything for her. And she’d do anything for me, too. So it doesn’t matter if she’s a snob,† she concluded, glaring at him. â€Å"Come here,† Zander said. They were near the music building, and he pul ed her into the lit alcove by the front door. â€Å"Sit with me?† he asked, settling on the brick steps and tugging her hand. Bonnie sat down, but she was determined not to snuggle up to him again. Instead, she kept a distance between them and stared stubbornly out at the night, her jaw firmly set. â€Å"Listen, Bonnie,† Zander said, pushing a long strawberry blonde curl out of her eyes. â€Å"I’l get to know Elena better, and I’m sure I’l like her. I’l get her to like me, too. You know why I’m going to get to know her better?† â€Å"No, why?† said Bonnie, reluctantly looking at him. â€Å"Because I want to know you better. I’m planning on spending a lot of time with you, Bonnie McCul ough.† He nudged her gently with his shoulder, and Bonnie melted. Zander’s eyes were so blue, blue like morning on the very first day of summer vacation. There was intel igence and laughter with just a touch of a wild longing in them. He leaned in closer, and Bonnie was sure he was about to kiss her, their first kiss at last. She tilted her head back to meet his lips, her eyelashes fluttering closed. After a moment of waiting for a kiss that didn’t come, she sat up again and opened her eyes. Zander was staring past her, out into the darkness of the campus, frowning. Bonnie cleared her throat. â€Å"Oh,† he said, â€Å"sorry, Bonnie, I got distracted for a minute.† â€Å"Distracted?† Bonnie echoed indignantly. â€Å"What do you mean you – â€Å" â€Å"Hang on a sec.† Zander put a finger to her lips, shushing her. â€Å"Do you hear something?† Bonnie asked, uneasy tingles creeping up her back. Zander got to his feet. â€Å"Sorry, I just remembered something I have to do. I’l catch up with you later, okay?† With a halfhearted wave, not even looking at Bonnie, he loped off into the darkness. Bonnie’s mouth dropped open. â€Å"Wait!† she said, scrambling to her feet. â€Å"Are you just going to leave me here† – Zander was gone – â€Å"alone?† she finished in a tiny voice. Great. Bonnie walked out to the middle of the path, looked around, and waited a minute to see if there was any sign of Zander coming back. But there was no one in sight. She couldn’t even hear his footsteps anymore. There were pools of light beneath the street lamps on the path, but they didn’t reach very far. A breeze rustled the leaves of the trees on the quad, and Bonnie shivered. No sense in standing here, Bonnie thought, and she started walking. For the first few steps down the path toward her dorm, Bonnie was real y angry, hot and humiliated. How could Zander have been such a flake? How could he leave her al alone in the middle of the night, especial y after al the attacks and disappearances on campus? She kicked viciously at a pebble in her path. A few steps further on, Bonnie stopped being so angry. She was too scared; the fear was pushing the anger out of her. She should have headed back to the dorm when Meredith and Elena did, but she’d assured them, gaily, that Zander would walk her back. How could he have just left her? She wrapped her arms around herself tightly and went as fast as she could without actual y running, her stupid high-heeled going-out-dancing shoes pinching and making the bal s of her feet ache. It was real y late; most of the other people who lived on campus must be tucked into their beds by now. The silence was unsettling. When the footsteps began behind her, it was even worse. She wasn’t sure she was real y hearing them at first. Gradual y, she became aware of a faint, quick padding in the distance, someone moving lightly and fast. She paused and listened, and the footsteps grew louder and faster stil . Someone was running toward her. Bonnie sped up, stumbling over her feet in her haste. Her shoes skidded on a loose stone in the path and she fel , catching herself on her hands and one knee. The impact stung sharply enough to bring tears to her eyes, but she kicked off her shoes, not caring that she was leaving them behind. She scrambled up and ran faster. The footsteps of her pursuer were louder now, starting to catch up. Their rhythm was strange: loud periodic footfal s with quicker, lighter beats in between. Bonnie realized with horror that there was more than one person chasing her. Her foot skidded again, and she barely caught her balance, staggering sideways a few steps to keep from fal ing, losing more ground. A heavy hand fel on Bonnie’s shoulder, and she screamed and whipped around, her fists raised in a desperate bid to defend herself. â€Å"Bonnie!† Meredith gasped, clutching Bonnie’s shoulders. â€Å"What are you doing out here by yourself?† Samantha came up beside them, carrying Bonnie’s shoes, and doubled over, panting for breath. â€Å"You are way too fast for me, Meredith,† she said. Bonnie swal owed a sob of relief. Now that she was safe, she felt like sitting down and having hysterics. â€Å"You scared me,† she said. Meredith looked furious. â€Å"Remember how we promised to stick together?† Meredith’s gray eyes were stormy. â€Å"You were supposed to stay with Zander until you got home safely.† Bonnie, about to respond heatedly that it hadn’t been her choice to be out here alone, suddenly closed her mouth and nodded. If Meredith knew that Zander had left Bonnie out here by herself, she would never, never forgive him. And Bonnie was mad at Zander for leaving her, but she wasn’t quite that mad, not mad enough to turn Meredith against him. Maybe he had an explanation. And she stil wanted that kiss. â€Å"I’m sorry,† Bonnie said abjectly, staring down at her feet. â€Å"You’re right, I should have known better.† Mol ified, Meredith swung an arm over Bonnie’s shoulders. Samantha silently handed Bonnie her shoes, and Bonnie pul ed them back on. â€Å"Let’s walk Samantha back to her dorm, and then we’l go home together,† she said forgivingly. â€Å"You’l be okay with us.† Around the corner from her room, Elena sagged and leaned against the hal way wal for a moment. It had been a long, long night. There had been drinks, and dancing with the huge shaggy-haired Spencer who, as Samantha had warned her, did try to pick Elena up and swing her around. Things got loud and aggravating, and the whole time, her heart hurt. She wasn’t sure she wanted to navigate the world without Stefan. It’s just for now, she told herself, straightening up and plodding around the corner. â€Å"Hel o, princess,† said Damon. Elena stiffened in shock. Lounging on the floor in front of her door, Damon somehow managed to look sleek and perfectly poised in what would have been an awkward position for anyone else. As she recovered from the shock of his being there at al , Elena was surprised by the burst of joy that rose up in her chest at the sight of him. Trying to ignore that happy little hop inside her, she said flatly, â€Å"I told you I didn’t want to see you for a while, Damon.† Damon shrugged and rose graceful y to his feet. â€Å"Darling, I’m not here to plead for your hand.† His eyes lingered on her mouth for a moment, but then he went on in a dry and detached tone. â€Å"I’m just checking in on you and the little redbird, making sure you haven’t disappeared with whatever’s gone sour on this campus.† â€Å"We’re fine,† Elena said shortly. â€Å"Here I am, and Bonnie’s new boyfriend is walking her home.† â€Å"New boyfriend?† Damon asked, raising one eyebrow. He’d always had – something – some connection with Bonnie, Elena knew, and she guessed his ego might not be thril ed to have her moving past the little crush she’d focused on him. â€Å"And how did you get home?† Damon asked acidly. â€Å"I notice you haven’t picked up a new boyfriend to protect you. Not yet, anyway.† Elena flushed and bit her lip but refused to rise to the bait. â€Å"Meredith just left to patrol around campus. I notice you didn’t ask about her. Don’t you want to make sure she’s safe?† Damon snorted. â€Å"I pity any ghoul that goes after that one,† he said, sounding more admiring than anything else. â€Å"Can I come in? Note that I’m being courteous again, waiting for you out here in this dingy hal way instead of comfortably on your bed.† â€Å"You can come in for a minute,† Elena said grudgingly, and opened her bag to rummage for her keys. Oh. She felt a sudden pang of heartache. At the top of her bag, rather crushed and wilted now, was the daisy she’d found outside her door at the beginning of the evening. She touched it gently, reluctant to push it aside in the hunt for her keys. â€Å"A daisy,† said Damon dryly. â€Å"Very sweet. You don’t seem to be taking much care of it, though.† Purposely ignoring him, Elena grabbed her keys and snapped the bag shut. â€Å"So you think the disappearances and attacks are because of ghouls? Do you mean something supernatural?† she asked, unlocking the door. â€Å"What did you find out, Damon?† Shrugging, Damon fol owed her into the room. â€Å"Nothing,† he answered grimly. â€Å"But I certainly don’t think the missing kids just freaked out and went home or to Daytona Beach or something. I think you need to be careful.† Elena sat down on her bed, drew her knees up, and rested her chin on them. â€Å"Have you used your Power to try to figure out what’s going on?† she asked. â€Å"Meredith said she would ask you.† Damon sat down next to her and sighed. â€Å"Beloved, as little as I like to admit it, even my Power has limits,† he said. â€Å"If someone is much stronger than me, like Klaus was, he can hide himself. If someone is much weaker, he doesn’t usual y make enough of an impression for me to find him unless I already know who he is. And for some ridiculous reason† – he scowled – â€Å"I can never sense werewolves at al .† â€Å"So you can’t help?† Elena said, dismayed. â€Å"Oh, I didn’t say that,† Damon said. He touched a loose strand of Elena’s golden hair with one long finger. â€Å"Pretty,† he said absently. â€Å"I like your hair pul ed back like this.† She twitched away from him, and he dropped his hand. â€Å"I’m looking into it,† he went on, his eyes gleaming. â€Å"I haven’t had a good hunt in far too long.† Elena wasn’t sure that she ought to find this comforting, but she did, in a kind of scary way. â€Å"You’l be relentless, then?† she asked, a little chil going through her, and he nodded, his long black lashes half veiling his eyes. She was so sleepy and felt happier now that she’d seen Damon, although she knew she shouldn’t have let him in. She missed him, too. â€Å"You had better go,† she said, yawning. â€Å"Let me know what you find out.† Damon stood, hesitating by the end of her bed. â€Å"I don’t like leaving you alone here,† he said. â€Å"Not with everything that’s been happening. Where are those friends of yours?† â€Å"They’l be here,† Elena said. Something generous in her made her add, â€Å"But if you’re that worried, you can sleep here if you want.† She’d missed him, she had, and he was being a perfect gentleman. And she had to admit, she would feel safer with him there. â€Å"I can?† Damon quirked a wicked eyebrow. â€Å"On the floor,† Elena said firmly. â€Å"I’m sure Bonnie and Meredith wil be glad for your protection, too.† It was a lie. While Bonnie would be thril ed to see him, there was a decent chance Meredith would kick him on purpose as she crossed the room. She might even put on special pointy-toed boots to do it. Elena got up and pul ed down a spare blanket from her closet for him, then headed off to brush her teeth and change. When she came back, al ready for bed, he was lying on the floor, wrapped in the blanket. His eyes lingered for a minute on the curve of her neck leading down to her lacy white nightgown, but he didn’t say anything. Elena climbed into bed and turned out the light. â€Å"Good night, Damon,† she said. There was a soft rush of air. Then suddenly he whispered softly in her ear, â€Å"Good night, princess.† Cool lips brushed her cheek and then were gone. How to cite The Hunters: Moonsong Chapter Seventeen, Essay examples