Compare & Contrast
Objective:
The goal is demonstrate an understanding of how to analyze a basic market offering of a firm for potential competitive advantage and parity for a specific intangible "solution" based upon relevant factors.
Constraints:
References should be done in a recognizable format such as APA, MLA, or Harvard-style.
Guidelines:
Pick a local business that has an intangible product as a key component of the core market offering in which you can observe some aspects of service delivery. Research this from a customer and managerial perspective and outline the value provided to both perspectives, as warranted. Your work should likely include major theoretical frameworks as well as maps/diagrams or sufficient narrative to present at least a basic understanding of the how the process operates. Explore what differences or advantages there seem to be when compared against another firm's offering in terms of the targeted customer of in the same basic category.
An example might be one of the following:
An upscale vs. not-so-upscale hotel.
A specialty retail store vs. WalMart.
"The mall" and a free-standing store selling similar items.
Group exercise to personal training.
Walgreen's pharmacy vs. WalMart pharmacy.
University of Arkansas vs. University of Phoenix.
The University Coffee Shop (or any other)
A hospital or clinic
Tools that you might consider using (you really should not use all of them):
Porter's 5 forces and/or Value Chain
Resource-based view or VRIO-based assets of the firm
The 4 (or up to 8) P's
Generic strategies
SERVQUAL
SWOT
UML or other process mapping methods
PESTEL
Constraints Theory
The role of technology