Star Appliances Inc. - 5 Year Plan Essays - American Brands, Kenmore

Star Appliances Inc. - 5 Year Plan Table of Contents Mission Statement Company Objectives Company Overview 1. Historical Outline 2. Products and Services 3. Financial Statements SWOT Analysis ? An analysis of company's strengths ? An analysis of company's weaknesses ? An analysis of company's opportunities ? An analysis of company's threats Business Strategy Marketing Mix ? Product ? Pricing ? Place ? Promotion Analysis of Major Competitors in the Field ? Kenmore ? Whirlpool ? Kirby ? Maytag ? GE International Expansion 1. Hungary ? External Environment ? Industry Analysis ? Recommended Entry Mode 2. Japan ? External Environment ? Industry Analysis ? Expansion Strategy for the Future Five Years 4. Canada ? External Environment ? Expansion Strategy for the Future Five Years 5. Mexico ? External Environment ? Industry Analysis ? Expansion Strategy for the Future Five Years Growth Forecasts for Years 2000, 2001, 2002, 2003, 2004 Implementation The View Ahead Star Appliances Inc. Mission Statement Quality For over thirty years, Star Appliances Inc. has been helping people to manage their homes. Today, Star Appliances Inc. is one of the major competitors in the household industry and one of the most selling brand in America. Star Appliances Inc. Mission is to: ? Achieve technology excellence in current and future generations of products, processes, and services. ? Develop innovations by creating entirely new business opportunities. ? Help solve critical technical challenges. ? Attract and develop new technical leaders. ? Ensure leadership technology in all departments of Star Appliances. ? Drive corporate initiatives across Star Appliances. ? Expand its market by exploring a global economy Satisfaction All Star Appliances products contain proper warranty information. Each appliance comes with a pledge of Satisfaction Guaranteed or your money back. Star Appliances offers maintenance agreements and annual check-ups to keep your appliances running right. And should anything ever go wrong with your Star appliance (and we hope it never does), we offer a nationwide network of service technicians to make sure it gets fixed fast and fixed right. Value When you compare feature-for-feature, you'll find that Star Appliances offers more for the money than any other brand. Maybe that's why s leading consumer magazine recently ranked Star's washers, dryers, and vacuums NUMBER ONE in their respective categories. Have questions or need more information about new Star products? Call 1-888-1ST-STAR or speak to a Customer Service Representative For service information or to schedule a service, call 1-800-4MY-STAR. Star Appliances Inc. Company Objectives Integrity Integrity is an uncompromising characteristic for all Star Appliances employees. It is an implicit factor in customer relationships and the cornerstone of all Star Appliances business activities. Along with the company's reputation for innovation, growth and success, we value integrity among the essential and critical elements in our employees. It is the baseline by which we measure everything else and from which we never compromise. Creativity Star's continued success is the result of its employees' creativity. Every day, teams of Star Appliances people push the frontiers, developing new products and services to serve their customers. Focusing on highly specialized financial services segments, our people develop a unique understanding of customer requirements as they apply their collective talents to solving industry challenges. Intellect At Star, we've never separated ideas from actions?both are essential elements of the competitive equation. Developing the most advanced financial product or innovative service is meaningless if you don't move quickly to get it to market and delivered to customers. The people from Star understand the importance of both ideas and action to maintain the company's position as one of the leaders in the market. Quality as a corporate objective: Company-wide Quality, as a corporate objective, means attaining a level of overall performance and attitude that makes Star Appliances the natural choice of customers and earns the respect of all those affected by the Company's activities. Company-wide Quality, as an individual objective, is achieved by employees who aspire to be better than the best. Star Appliances is committed to providing flexibility in the design, calibration, repair, and testing services to customers while maintaining a consistent, optimum level of quality. The services we offer include standard service packages as well as customized service capabilities to accommodate unique customer requirements. Our business-wide commitment to meet the needs of customers is the foundation for the Quality System. Star Appliances is dedicated to maintaining close relationships with our suppliers. The overall objective is to make certain that we exceed our customer's expectations. Company Profile q Historical Outline Star Appliances Inc. designs, manufactures, sells and supports a line of household appliances. The company was started in 1970 and has grown

Business Weekly Assi. #14 Example

Business Weekly Assi. #14 Example Business Weekly Assi. #14 – Essay Example Visual Clichà ©s A clichà © is described in the dictionary as a trite phase or expression and a hackneyed theme, characterization or situation. A visual clichà © is a clichà © shown visually in the form of pictures. They are usually based on easily recognized or familiar cues which can be interpreted by majority.Avoiding Visual Clichà ©s Visual clichà ©s are something that cannot be avoided entirely but they need to be avoided as much as possible. The reason is that for avoiding them a person needs to have a very original and unique approach to visualizing and showing things or another way to avoid is to explore an area which is new to people therefore showing a unique point of view to new things. Repeatedly, we have been told to avoid clichà ©s because clichà ©s repeatedly, tend to make a person accepting things just the way they are. This effectively kills the creativity of a person and encourages laziness if nothing else comes to mind. Visual clichà ©s can very rightly be portrayed an old man with sagging eyes, worn knees and feet pointing in a circular direction since they don’t lead anywhere. They just lead us in circles showing the same old things over and over in slightly different ways making it same as everyone else’s.For the creativity and originality to come forward and for us to create and show new things with a unique and dynamic perspective is what is required in present times of visual progress, therefore avoiding any sort of clichà ©s is important by all. "ClichÃÆ' © - Definition and More from the Free Merriam-Webster Dictionary."  Dictionary and Thesaurus - Merriam-Webster Online. N.p., n.d. Web. 1 May 2012. Davis, Mike. "How do you avoid making a  clichà ©? - Blog - Picture Editor : Photography Consultant : Mentor : Mike Davis."  Home - Picture Editor : Photography Consultant : Mentor : Mike Davis. N.p., n.d. Web. 1 May 2012. Weintraub, David. "Eye on Image-Making: Visual Clichà ©s | Black Star Rising."  Bl ack Star Rising: Photography and Design. N.p., n.d. Web. 1 May 2012.

Visual Content on Social Media How to Use It to Improve Engagement

Visual Content on Social Media How to Use It to Improve Engagement Social media marketing is increasingly becoming a struggle to capture audience’ attention. It’s not enough that social networks are forcibly suppressing your content from the newsfeeds of your fans, but those fans are more fickle than ever. Visual content helps brands get their message across in a precise and engaging fashion. For this reason, visual content has gone from a â€Å"nice-to-have† to a must-have  vehicle for marketing messages. Here we look at the reasons why brands should spend their time, money and effort creating visual content, the different types of visual content they can create are and how these can contribute to your overall social media strategy. How to Boost #Engagement on Social Media with Visual ContentGet Some Free Resources to Create Better Visual Social Media Content Whats good advice without the right tools to put it into practice? Not much, thats what. Before we get too much farther along, here are some free goodies to help you create better social media content: 128 free photos, optimized for each social media network. Pinterest and Instagram Visual Marketing Infographic packed with useful tips and stats. Social Media Image Size infographic with all the size dimension information you need for every network. Why Create Visual Content? In social media circles, everybody knows that visual content performs better than plain text. If you still need convincing, we looked at data from the Facebook Pages  of the top 100 brands according to the Interbrand list. In 2016, 80.20% of all the Posts published were photos and videos. These were responsible for 92.15% of all interactions that these brands received on Facebook. On Facebook, there has been a steady increase in the amount of visual content being published. There was even an upward trend in the volume of visual content from one-quarter to the next in 2016. One of the main reasons why social media marketers favor visual content is the advantage it offers in terms of engagement. Showing is always better than telling. Look at the graph below that shows the average number of interactions that visual content received compared to other forms in 2016. Especially when you present facts and other information, it will be easier for your audience to assimilate visually represented content as opposed to a wall of text. Recommended Reading: How to Make the Best Social Media Images the Easy Way (+84 Free Images) How to Create Visual Social Media Content One of the best things about social media marketing is that there is something for everybody. Visual content creation on social media works along the same lines. You do not need a multi-million dollar social media budget to create visual content. The possibilities that are available to your brand may differ willing on the resources you have (talent, time, money). Yet, there are many things that brands can do even with a shoestring budget. As we have seen above, the kind of engagement that visual content can bring you makes a strong case for posting more photos and videos. Even if you do not have a full-time designer or an agency to handle social media content creation, you can create some stunning visual content. There are many free tools that are available online for creating various types of visual content. A basic starter kit for any brand would just be a willingness to play around with some free tools  like: Pablo Canva Infogr.am Piktochart Most of these are simple to use and are designed with a lay person (and not a designer) in mind. Recommended Reading: How to Be More Successful With the Right Content Marketing Tools These can help you create highly shareable visual content (A more detailed discussion on these tools follows on the next page). Remember, before you set about creating visual content, have a clear picture of why you want to do visual content. Are you looking to boost engagement, do you want more audience interaction or do you want to establish your brand as a thought-leader in your industry? The different types of visual content that you can take up can help you achieve these different goals. Look at this post that Innocent drinks  published that cracked me up (as they always do): Today is Penguin Awareness Day. We're doing our bit. Are you? Posted by innocent on  Friday, January 20, 2017 Or this highly engaging video by Dr. Pepper: Dr Pepper College Football – Grocery Run :15The carry-the-groceries-in-one-trip play – it’s not for the faint of heart. Here’s to those who push through, pick up the Dr Pepper, and take it to the house. Posted by Dr Pepper on Tuesday, November 22, 2016 These brands enjoy great engagement on Facebook usually. They do not need  engagement or interactions. It is hard to establish beyond doubt if someone would pick up an Innocent smoothie or a couple of cans of Dr. Pepper. Yet these do play a significant role in building brand personality on social media and help mold the way people feel about brands. If you look at some of the brands that publish outstanding visual content, you will see that they are very distinctive. This is the case with Starbucks, Dr. Pepper, GoPro, and so forth. While most of Starbuck’s content sports their trademark cups and their unmistakable logos, they also have a very recognizable indie vibe. Charm bracelets, woolen scarfs, freshly mown grass, fall leaves, knitted sweaters all feature regularly in Starbucks’ posts. In addition to reminding social media audiences about the brand, these posts make them crave for the warmth and coziness of a cafe or to start their day with the indie chill. Their content has become so iconic that their red cups have almost become synonymous with the holiday cheer. Ok, here's a hint: they're red. (Coming 11/10) Posted by Starbucks on  Saturday, November 5, 2016 GoPro, on the other hand, rarely uses their logo on any of their visual content. The photos themselves yell GoPro. The brand regularly puts up stunning visuals set in adventurous locations that makes these Posts identifiable as GoPro’s. There is no better way of establishing yourself as a brand that brings together amazing picture clarity and the spirit of exploration. The position that they hold within the community of travel and photography enthusiasts is further bolstered when they share user-generated content like the one below: Photo of the Day! Ryan Chan discovered that some of Hong Kong's best views are straight up! Posted by GoPro on  Monday, December 12, 2016 Here are some types of visual content that you can try your hand at and some free tools that will help you create them: Here are some types of visual content you can create (+ the free tools you'll need)Infographics Infographics are the best medium for marketers to use when they want to make their data tell a story. If you think that your eyes glaze over when you see a cramped table or a complicated graph, you are not alone. Infographics allow content creators to present data in an easily digestible and aesthetically pleasing way. Infogr.am  and Venngage  are among some of the free infographic-makers that are available online. With the templates they offer, you really don’t need a designer to dedicate their hard-pressed time for creating an infographic. Most of the infographic creation tools come with a  predesigned template. Each template is designed for a specific type of infographic. The type of infographic depends on what you are using it for – is it to convey some information or statistic, a how-to or a comparison. In addition to these templates, they also offer different elements, such as charts, text formats, symbols etc. The first thing you should have when you start out with an infographic is a story. The first thing you should have when you start out with an infographic is a story.Are you going to show your audiences how your company has grown in the past 5 years or are you doing to explain what the benefits of using your product is, or do you want to teach them how to use your product? Once you have that answer, choose the template that best suits your need. Make the necessary edits such as choosing the chart types you need, inputting the data that you have collected and customizing other design elements. Here’s an infographic  created using Venngage that was published in Adweek: Take a look at an infographic  that we did back in 2015 that got us a lot of traction: One of the things that we were able to do using this format is to do creative things with the data that we have. If you thought that only data nuts like us use infographics, see this Washington Redskins’ infographic that doubles as a 360 photo: Take our #PHIvsWAS postgame infographic for a spin. #HTTR Posted by Washington Redskins on  Sunday, October 16, 2016 Images Did you know that Facebook Posts with images get 2.3 times more engagement  than those without? There are a million different things you can do with images on social media. These can be professionally taken product shots, or just stock images with an interesting caption that accompanies your Post. If you have an extremely talented and resourceful photographer in your team, nothing should stop you from leveraging professionally captured images of your product on your website as well as on your social media handles. While most businesses will get a photographer (or someone with a DSLR) to get shots taken for websites or for important events and press releases, it is not always the case with more regular content needs. For instance, it is common knowledge now that text-only updates do not perform nearly as well as when they do with a photo accompanying them. For needs like that, you can always take the help of some of the free tools and stock photos available on the internet. Unsplash  and Pixabay  are excellent repositories of stock photos. It is easy to search and find beautiful photos for your search terms. Another tool that will be a boon for your social media manager is Pablo by Buffer. Here is a short snapshot of Pablo in action: What I like best about Pablo is that I do not need to go elsewhere searching for stock photos. Plus, I can add in a header, caption or lines of text or use a pre-existing template. The built-in editor lets me add simple, yet attractive filters. I can also customize the size of the picture depending on where I plan to post it – Pinterest, Instagram or Facebook. There isn’t a lot of room for customization but you can be done creating a beautiful graphic in under 5 minutes. Canva  is another one of my favorites which is a bit more dynamic. They offer more diverse templates and design elements create a photo to accompany my Facebook post or even create an infographic. Watch this video by Canvas  that takes you around the platform and explains what you can do with it in under 4 minutes. Recommended Reading: What 20 Studies Say About the Best Times to Post on Social Media 360 Photos and Videos In addition to these tools, you can also try your hand at some of the new visual content creation features offered by Facebook. 360 videos and photos were some such features that gained a lot of popularity last year. It is fairly simple to create 360 Photos. All you need to do is take a panoramic shot using your smartphone or your iPhone. For 360 videos, you need a 360 camera. Read this article  for a detailed how-to. Even if you think you are in a boring industry, 360 photos have the ability to go viral (with a little paid push of course). Take this 360 photo from German pharmaceutical and chemicals company Bayer. Today we’re taking you up onto the roof. Here you can see the illuminated Bayer Cross close up. Take a look around. Have a great weekend. Posted by Bayer on  Friday, August 5, 2016 It was their most shared piece of content in 2016 with 3,431 shares. If it didn’t resonate with people, then it wouldn’t have been shared so many times. Look at the level of detail Getty Images  achieved using this format: Happy National Color Day! Celebrate with this stunning Facebook 360 from the Nasir al-Mulk Mosque, also known as the Pink Mosque, in Shiraz, Iran. 📠·: Omid Jafarnezhad /360cities.net Posted by Getty Images on  Saturday, October 22, 2016 Both 360 videos and photos make your audiences feel as if they are immersed in the experience of the visual content that you publish. This contributes to greater engagement. If you are looking for some inspiration on creating 360 videos, take a look at this roundup that we did of top brands that use 360 videos on Facebook. GIFs It’s a meme-crazy world. GIFs are gaining traction among social media marketers as a staple content type. Some brands, like Nissan  below, are integrating this format into their contests and giveaways: The first 40 years- How many different Nissan GT-Rs can you spot? Answer in the comments for a chance to win $100 and a Gif-TR prize pack. http://rul.es/iqbvt9 Posted by Nissan on  Friday, March 25, 2016 Especially if your target audience includes the 9gag generation, GIFs are a low-cost, easy to create content type that can be part of your social media content strategy. GIPHY  now lets you create GIFs. You need only upload videos or supply YouTube links. You can take a regular video or use an existing video. Once you upload this or input the Youtube link, GIPHY allows you to specify which portion of the video you want to create a GIF of. You can then add in text and specify other settings. The final GIF can be shared on social networks directly. Videos Videos are becoming a vital part of every brand’s Facebook strategy. With the changes to the Newsfeed algorithm that gives an edge to video content, they gain better reach than other kinds of content. Brands often post video advertisements and product features that are professionally captured. Yet this does not mean that posting a video on Facebook needs to be a resource-intensive endeavor. Brands can do a variety of low-budget (and often free) videos on Facebook that can get them great engagement and reach. Recommended Reading: How to Do Facebook Video Marketing the Right Way How to Get Started With Twitter Video Marketing Live Videos Live videos, even though it was rolled out globally only by April 2016, have been enthusiastically taken up by many brands. The key advantage offered by live videos is that it makes the video format more interactive. It does not hurt that live videos gives a  huge boost to the engagement and reach that brands get. Facebook users can pose questions to the brand on what is being broadcasted on the live video and the presenters can address them then and there. This adds to the brand’s credibility. Also, the brand gets a keener insight into the pain points of potential consumers. Here’s how the cosmetics brand Mary Kay used live video  to win engagement: We’re LIVE with Mary Kay Global Beauty Ambassador Luis Casco makeup! He’s creating gorgeous eye looks for your holiday festivities and will also be answering your questions after the video wraps. Want more beauty tips tricks? Visit http://bit.ly/2g7FM3r! Posted by MARY KAY on Tuesday, December 6, 2016 How to Integrate Visual Content Into Your Social Media Strategy I have mentioned several studies (and our own data) to underline why brands should create more visual content. But your decision to create visual content should be guided by your larger social media goals. Only then will you be able to judge what kind of visual content will work best for you and where it fits in within your overall social media strategy. For instance, if you are on Facebook to let more people know about your product, videos might be the way to go. They get better reach and can get the word out about your product to a wider audience. Based on what your social media budget is like, consider roping in an influencer  to do the video. Based on data on your past performance and industry trends, arrive at an optimum frequency at which you should post to Facebook. If you are going to post 15 times a month, split this up into different categories based on your budget. You can allocate these 15 to lead to a major event around which you can create more content and get more people to participate. You can do a few resource-intensive videos or other visual content that needs time and specialized effort. For the other posts, the social media manager can do simpler, easier to make content and focus more on getting social media audiences to engage with it. A video with heavy production costs cannot stand alone as the only thing that you post on Facebook. It has to be part of a larger video marketing campaign. Contests and giveaways get brands more engagement and participation. This way, even if you do not promote, your future content will get better reach and visibility on Facebook. Especially with live videos you need to announce them in advance and build excitement around the event in order to get more people to participate. Recommended Reading: How to Increase Visibility With Social Media Optimization How to Ensure That Your Visual Content Gets the Attention it Deserves Now that you have a clear idea of why you should create visual content and how it fits in with your larger social media objectives, here are some measures that you can adopt to ensure that your visual content does not go unnoticed. While it is almost impossible to know with absolute certainty what content will succeed on social media, it is also a source of rich data. Using the record of how your past content has performed, you can glean insights on what is most relevant and appealing to your audience. It is essential that marketers constantly measure and monitor their social media activity. This coupled with an awareness of the industry landscape and trends there is key to pinning down a concrete strategy. With organic reach plummeting with each passing day, brands cannot always trust creative copy  and stunning visuals to do well on their own. In 2016, the top 100 brands promoted 18.65% of all their Posts. Over 78% of all the Posts promoted bore some visual content. Recommended Reading: How to Write for Social Media to Create the Best Posts The Non-Designer's Guide to Creating Better Blog Graphics It makes sense to promote at least some portion of the content that you publish to get good reach. This is extremely important when you have spent a lot of time, money and energy on making videos, or other resource-heavy visual content. Marketers should look at past data and industry trends to choose which content to promote. Marketers should look at past data and industry trends to choose which content to promote.An important thing for social media marketers to note is that the Facebook algorithm favors native videos  over those hosted elsewhere. Even if you do not record the video directly on your Facebook app, as long as it is uploaded directly to Facebook your video will get better reach than if you shared a link to your the video that you posted on YouTube. The algorithm gives preference to live videos  too. This makes a very strong case for brands to try their hand at this new format. Getting an influencer on board to help broadcast your message is a clever Facebook Reach hack. When you get a celebrity or an expert in your industry to create a video in collaboration with you, you can tap into their follower base. This helps broadcast your message to the people who follow that person. The best thing about this approach is that  the influencer’s followers are usually people who make up the target audience for your brand. Similarly, make full use of the options that Facebook offers you to target your messages to people who fall within certain geographical locations and interest groups. This ensures that the audience who get to see your post find it extremely relevant and that your efforts reach your targets rather than fall off the mark. From the data that we have discussed, it is possible to say without doubt that all brands that aspire to getting engagement on Facebook, need to create visual content. Visual content ups the relevance factor of a piece of content by presenting those aspects most relevant to the consumer. Marketers should strive to retain relevance as the hallmark of visual content creation by guiding creative decisions with data. Visual Content on Social Media How to Use It to Improve Engagement Social media marketing is increasingly becoming a struggle to capture audience’ attention. It’s not enough that social networks are forcibly suppressing your content from the newsfeeds of your fans, but those fans are more fickle than ever. Visual content helps brands get their message across in a precise and engaging fashion. For this reason, visual content has gone from a â€Å"nice-to-have† to a must-have  vehicle for marketing messages. Here we look at the reasons why brands should spend their time, money and effort creating visual content, the different types of visual content they can create are and how these can contribute to your overall social media strategy. How to Boost #Engagement on Social Media with Visual ContentGet Some Free Resources to Create Better Visual Social Media Content Whats good advice without the right tools to put it into practice? Not much, thats what. Before we get too much farther along, here are some free goodies to help you create better social media content: 128 free photos, optimized for each social media network. Pinterest and Instagram Visual Marketing Infographic packed with useful tips and stats. Social Media Image Size infographic with all the size dimension information you need for every network. Why Create Visual Content? In social media circles, everybody knows that visual content performs better than plain text. If you still need convincing, we looked at data from the Facebook Pages  of the top 100 brands according to the Interbrand list. In 2016, 80.20% of all the Posts published were photos and videos. These were responsible for 92.15% of all interactions that these brands received on Facebook. On Facebook, there has been a steady increase in the amount of visual content being published. There was even an upward trend in the volume of visual content from one-quarter to the next in 2016. One of the main reasons why social media marketers favor visual content is the advantage it offers in terms of engagement. Showing is always better than telling. Look at the graph below that shows the average number of interactions that visual content received compared to other forms in 2016. Especially when you present facts and other information, it will be easier for your audience to assimilate visually represented content as opposed to a wall of text. Recommended Reading: How to Make the Best Social Media Images the Easy Way (+84 Free Images) How to Create Visual Social Media Content One of the best things about social media marketing is that there is something for everybody. Visual content creation on social media works along the same lines. You do not need a multi-million dollar social media budget to create visual content. The possibilities that are available to your brand may differ willing on the resources you have (talent, time, money). Yet, there are many things that brands can do even with a shoestring budget. As we have seen above, the kind of engagement that visual content can bring you makes a strong case for posting more photos and videos. Even if you do not have a full-time designer or an agency to handle social media content creation, you can create some stunning visual content. There are many free tools that are available online for creating various types of visual content. A basic starter kit for any brand would just be a willingness to play around with some free tools  like: Pablo Canva Infogr.am Piktochart Most of these are simple to use and are designed with a lay person (and not a designer) in mind. Recommended Reading: How to Be More Successful With the Right Content Marketing Tools These can help you create highly shareable visual content (A more detailed discussion on these tools follows on the next page). Remember, before you set about creating visual content, have a clear picture of why you want to do visual content. Are you looking to boost engagement, do you want more audience interaction or do you want to establish your brand as a thought-leader in your industry? The different types of visual content that you can take up can help you achieve these different goals. Look at this post that Innocent drinks  published that cracked me up (as they always do): Today is Penguin Awareness Day. We're doing our bit. Are you? Posted by innocent on  Friday, January 20, 2017 Or this highly engaging video by Dr. Pepper: Dr Pepper College Football – Grocery Run :15The carry-the-groceries-in-one-trip play – it’s not for the faint of heart. Here’s to those who push through, pick up the Dr Pepper, and take it to the house. Posted by Dr Pepper on Tuesday, November 22, 2016 These brands enjoy great engagement on Facebook usually. They do not need  engagement or interactions. It is hard to establish beyond doubt if someone would pick up an Innocent smoothie or a couple of cans of Dr. Pepper. Yet these do play a significant role in building brand personality on social media and help mold the way people feel about brands. If you look at some of the brands that publish outstanding visual content, you will see that they are very distinctive. This is the case with Starbucks, Dr. Pepper, GoPro, and so forth. While most of Starbuck’s content sports their trademark cups and their unmistakable logos, they also have a very recognizable indie vibe. Charm bracelets, woolen scarfs, freshly mown grass, fall leaves, knitted sweaters all feature regularly in Starbucks’ posts. In addition to reminding social media audiences about the brand, these posts make them crave for the warmth and coziness of a cafe or to start their day with the indie chill. Their content has become so iconic that their red cups have almost become synonymous with the holiday cheer. Ok, here's a hint: they're red. (Coming 11/10) Posted by Starbucks on  Saturday, November 5, 2016 GoPro, on the other hand, rarely uses their logo on any of their visual content. The photos themselves yell GoPro. The brand regularly puts up stunning visuals set in adventurous locations that makes these Posts identifiable as GoPro’s. There is no better way of establishing yourself as a brand that brings together amazing picture clarity and the spirit of exploration. The position that they hold within the community of travel and photography enthusiasts is further bolstered when they share user-generated content like the one below: Photo of the Day! Ryan Chan discovered that some of Hong Kong's best views are straight up! Posted by GoPro on  Monday, December 12, 2016 Here are some types of visual content that you can try your hand at and some free tools that will help you create them: Here are some types of visual content you can create (+ the free tools you'll need)Infographics Infographics are the best medium for marketers to use when they want to make their data tell a story. If you think that your eyes glaze over when you see a cramped table or a complicated graph, you are not alone. Infographics allow content creators to present data in an easily digestible and aesthetically pleasing way. Infogr.am  and Venngage  are among some of the free infographic-makers that are available online. With the templates they offer, you really don’t need a designer to dedicate their hard-pressed time for creating an infographic. Most of the infographic creation tools come with a  predesigned template. Each template is designed for a specific type of infographic. The type of infographic depends on what you are using it for – is it to convey some information or statistic, a how-to or a comparison. In addition to these templates, they also offer different elements, such as charts, text formats, symbols etc. The first thing you should have when you start out with an infographic is a story. The first thing you should have when you start out with an infographic is a story.Are you going to show your audiences how your company has grown in the past 5 years or are you doing to explain what the benefits of using your product is, or do you want to teach them how to use your product? Once you have that answer, choose the template that best suits your need. Make the necessary edits such as choosing the chart types you need, inputting the data that you have collected and customizing other design elements. Here’s an infographic  created using Venngage that was published in Adweek: Take a look at an infographic  that we did back in 2015 that got us a lot of traction: One of the things that we were able to do using this format is to do creative things with the data that we have. If you thought that only data nuts like us use infographics, see this Washington Redskins’ infographic that doubles as a 360 photo: Take our #PHIvsWAS postgame infographic for a spin. #HTTR Posted by Washington Redskins on  Sunday, October 16, 2016 Images Did you know that Facebook Posts with images get 2.3 times more engagement  than those without? There are a million different things you can do with images on social media. These can be professionally taken product shots, or just stock images with an interesting caption that accompanies your Post. If you have an extremely talented and resourceful photographer in your team, nothing should stop you from leveraging professionally captured images of your product on your website as well as on your social media handles. While most businesses will get a photographer (or someone with a DSLR) to get shots taken for websites or for important events and press releases, it is not always the case with more regular content needs. For instance, it is common knowledge now that text-only updates do not perform nearly as well as when they do with a photo accompanying them. For needs like that, you can always take the help of some of the free tools and stock photos available on the internet. Unsplash  and Pixabay  are excellent repositories of stock photos. It is easy to search and find beautiful photos for your search terms. Another tool that will be a boon for your social media manager is Pablo by Buffer. Here is a short snapshot of Pablo in action: What I like best about Pablo is that I do not need to go elsewhere searching for stock photos. Plus, I can add in a header, caption or lines of text or use a pre-existing template. The built-in editor lets me add simple, yet attractive filters. I can also customize the size of the picture depending on where I plan to post it – Pinterest, Instagram or Facebook. There isn’t a lot of room for customization but you can be done creating a beautiful graphic in under 5 minutes. Canva  is another one of my favorites which is a bit more dynamic. They offer more diverse templates and design elements create a photo to accompany my Facebook post or even create an infographic. Watch this video by Canvas  that takes you around the platform and explains what you can do with it in under 4 minutes. Recommended Reading: What 20 Studies Say About the Best Times to Post on Social Media 360 Photos and Videos In addition to these tools, you can also try your hand at some of the new visual content creation features offered by Facebook. 360 videos and photos were some such features that gained a lot of popularity last year. It is fairly simple to create 360 Photos. All you need to do is take a panoramic shot using your smartphone or your iPhone. For 360 videos, you need a 360 camera. Read this article  for a detailed how-to. Even if you think you are in a boring industry, 360 photos have the ability to go viral (with a little paid push of course). Take this 360 photo from German pharmaceutical and chemicals company Bayer. Today we’re taking you up onto the roof. Here you can see the illuminated Bayer Cross close up. Take a look around. Have a great weekend. Posted by Bayer on  Friday, August 5, 2016 It was their most shared piece of content in 2016 with 3,431 shares. If it didn’t resonate with people, then it wouldn’t have been shared so many times. Look at the level of detail Getty Images  achieved using this format: Happy National Color Day! Celebrate with this stunning Facebook 360 from the Nasir al-Mulk Mosque, also known as the Pink Mosque, in Shiraz, Iran. 📠·: Omid Jafarnezhad /360cities.net Posted by Getty Images on  Saturday, October 22, 2016 Both 360 videos and photos make your audiences feel as if they are immersed in the experience of the visual content that you publish. This contributes to greater engagement. If you are looking for some inspiration on creating 360 videos, take a look at this roundup that we did of top brands that use 360 videos on Facebook. GIFs It’s a meme-crazy world. GIFs are gaining traction among social media marketers as a staple content type. Some brands, like Nissan  below, are integrating this format into their contests and giveaways: The first 40 years- How many different Nissan GT-Rs can you spot? Answer in the comments for a chance to win $100 and a Gif-TR prize pack. http://rul.es/iqbvt9 Posted by Nissan on  Friday, March 25, 2016 Especially if your target audience includes the 9gag generation, GIFs are a low-cost, easy to create content type that can be part of your social media content strategy. GIPHY  now lets you create GIFs. You need only upload videos or supply YouTube links. You can take a regular video or use an existing video. Once you upload this or input the Youtube link, GIPHY allows you to specify which portion of the video you want to create a GIF of. You can then add in text and specify other settings. The final GIF can be shared on social networks directly. Videos Videos are becoming a vital part of every brand’s Facebook strategy. With the changes to the Newsfeed algorithm that gives an edge to video content, they gain better reach than other kinds of content. Brands often post video advertisements and product features that are professionally captured. Yet this does not mean that posting a video on Facebook needs to be a resource-intensive endeavor. Brands can do a variety of low-budget (and often free) videos on Facebook that can get them great engagement and reach. Recommended Reading: How to Do Facebook Video Marketing the Right Way How to Get Started With Twitter Video Marketing Live Videos Live videos, even though it was rolled out globally only by April 2016, have been enthusiastically taken up by many brands. The key advantage offered by live videos is that it makes the video format more interactive. It does not hurt that live videos gives a  huge boost to the engagement and reach that brands get. Facebook users can pose questions to the brand on what is being broadcasted on the live video and the presenters can address them then and there. This adds to the brand’s credibility. Also, the brand gets a keener insight into the pain points of potential consumers. Here’s how the cosmetics brand Mary Kay used live video  to win engagement: We’re LIVE with Mary Kay Global Beauty Ambassador Luis Casco makeup! He’s creating gorgeous eye looks for your holiday festivities and will also be answering your questions after the video wraps. Want more beauty tips tricks? Visit http://bit.ly/2g7FM3r! Posted by MARY KAY on Tuesday, December 6, 2016 How to Integrate Visual Content Into Your Social Media Strategy I have mentioned several studies (and our own data) to underline why brands should create more visual content. But your decision to create visual content should be guided by your larger social media goals. Only then will you be able to judge what kind of visual content will work best for you and where it fits in within your overall social media strategy. For instance, if you are on Facebook to let more people know about your product, videos might be the way to go. They get better reach and can get the word out about your product to a wider audience. Based on what your social media budget is like, consider roping in an influencer  to do the video. Based on data on your past performance and industry trends, arrive at an optimum frequency at which you should post to Facebook. If you are going to post 15 times a month, split this up into different categories based on your budget. You can allocate these 15 to lead to a major event around which you can create more content and get more people to participate. You can do a few resource-intensive videos or other visual content that needs time and specialized effort. For the other posts, the social media manager can do simpler, easier to make content and focus more on getting social media audiences to engage with it. A video with heavy production costs cannot stand alone as the only thing that you post on Facebook. It has to be part of a larger video marketing campaign. Contests and giveaways get brands more engagement and participation. This way, even if you do not promote, your future content will get better reach and visibility on Facebook. Especially with live videos you need to announce them in advance and build excitement around the event in order to get more people to participate. Recommended Reading: How to Increase Visibility With Social Media Optimization How to Ensure That Your Visual Content Gets the Attention it Deserves Now that you have a clear idea of why you should create visual content and how it fits in with your larger social media objectives, here are some measures that you can adopt to ensure that your visual content does not go unnoticed. While it is almost impossible to know with absolute certainty what content will succeed on social media, it is also a source of rich data. Using the record of how your past content has performed, you can glean insights on what is most relevant and appealing to your audience. It is essential that marketers constantly measure and monitor their social media activity. This coupled with an awareness of the industry landscape and trends there is key to pinning down a concrete strategy. With organic reach plummeting with each passing day, brands cannot always trust creative copy  and stunning visuals to do well on their own. In 2016, the top 100 brands promoted 18.65% of all their Posts. Over 78% of all the Posts promoted bore some visual content. Recommended Reading: How to Write for Social Media to Create the Best Posts The Non-Designer's Guide to Creating Better Blog Graphics It makes sense to promote at least some portion of the content that you publish to get good reach. This is extremely important when you have spent a lot of time, money and energy on making videos, or other resource-heavy visual content. Marketers should look at past data and industry trends to choose which content to promote. Marketers should look at past data and industry trends to choose which content to promote.An important thing for social media marketers to note is that the Facebook algorithm favors native videos  over those hosted elsewhere. Even if you do not record the video directly on your Facebook app, as long as it is uploaded directly to Facebook your video will get better reach than if you shared a link to your the video that you posted on YouTube. The algorithm gives preference to live videos  too. This makes a very strong case for brands to try their hand at this new format. Getting an influencer on board to help broadcast your message is a clever Facebook Reach hack. When you get a celebrity or an expert in your industry to create a video in collaboration with you, you can tap into their follower base. This helps broadcast your message to the people who follow that person. The best thing about this approach is that  the influencer’s followers are usually people who make up the target audience for your brand. Similarly, make full use of the options that Facebook offers you to target your messages to people who fall within certain geographical locations and interest groups. This ensures that the audience who get to see your post find it extremely relevant and that your efforts reach your targets rather than fall off the mark. From the data that we have discussed, it is possible to say without doubt that all brands that aspire to getting engagement on Facebook, need to create visual content. Visual content ups the relevance factor of a piece of content by presenting those aspects most relevant to the consumer. Marketers should strive to retain relevance as the hallmark of visual content creation by guiding creative decisions with data.

Role of IT Managers in Organizations Term Paper

Role of IT Managers in Organizations - Term Paper Example In most institutions including Magnum Enterprises, tasks placed under IT departments are usually structured into IT projects. IT managers are, therefore, sometimes known as IT project managers, since they undertake project-driven exercises. Whether the objective is to install, design or reengineer, Information Technology projects are always to a large extent propelled by aggressive deadlines and durations of regular change. To achieve their objectives, IT managers must identify resources and allocate them. Similarly, they must ensure that activities are organized in consonance with business and technical needs. Projects that IT managers work on always come in various forms. They range from feasibility studies, design projects, development projects, to implementation and upgrade projects (Anderson, Gottschalk & Karlsen, 2002).  Mintzberg (1970) introduced the concept of management roles. Later, Jeong Kettinger and Lee pointed out the relevance of six roles from Mintzberg’s ro le topology. These are: leader, monitor, liaison, spokesman, and entrepreneur and resource allocator. The job of any manager consists of many roles and responsibilities at the same time. At some point, a manager may perceive some roles more important than others, depending on urgency and impact (Anderson, Gottschalk).  As a leader, a manager must supervise the ongoing activities under his jurisdiction, hire and train staff members on a regular basis, organize and coordinate all the activities under his/her docket.

Discussion Dissertation Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 5000 words

Discussion - Dissertation Example More or less, the same preference patterns are noted among G8 students from both genders. In addition, the same pattern of preferences has been found for the overall sample. Academic achievement also comes into play, and has been emphasized by Nolting (2002) who said that it goes up when students are actually aware of what learning style suits them best, as well as by Bahar (2009) who further noted that achievers displayed the key traits of independence, competitiveness, competence and participation. Wallace, meanwhile, found that students benefited a lot more when they worked alone as compared to when they worked within a group – provided, of course, that these students actually knew how to work effectively on their own. Still another study by Yazicilar et al (2009) focused on 5th grade students in order to correlate academic achievement and retention based on whether or not they received varied educational intervention depending on their learning style preference. This study , in turn, found that said treatment would have a marked impact on academic achievement among students. ... tyle as part of cognitive style and stated that â€Å"learning style, as one aspect of cognitive style, refers to a person’s characteristic style of acquiring and using information in learning and /or solving problems† (p.145). The outcomes above suggest that the quad learning style is preferred by high achievers, whereas low achieving students are more inclined to use multi-learning styles. Research Question 2 Are their differences in reading achievement of students due to their learning style preference? To answer this question, multivariate analysis of variance (MANOVA) analyses were carried out. This is to ascertain the influence of gender and each of the learning style types (VARK7G and multi-single) on the two dependent variables, RAAF and FT scores. The same procedure has also been carried out to determine the effect of grade level and learning styles category on reading achievement between males and females. Analyses of variance were carried out as a post hoc te st to MANOVA. To control for Type 1 error, the Least Significant Differences procedure was carried out. One finding from these is that there were significant differences for both gender and grade level on RAAF. No such differences were observed on VARK7G learning style categories in relation to the RAAF scores and FT scores. Moreover, there was a significant interaction between grade and gender on the reading achievement variables. A significant interaction between gender and learning styles VARK7G on the dependent variables. Moreover, the ANOVA outcomes indicate that there were significant gender differences on RAAF and FT scores. Moreover, there was a significant interaction effect between grade and gender on RAAF. Gender and learning style (VARK7G) likewise exerted a significant effect on RAAF. The

Measuring Skin Blood Flow and Vascular Permeability

Measuring Skin Blood Flow and Vascular Permeability The aim of this experiment is to compare the dose-related inflammatory response demonstrated by the skin following injection of histamine and bradykinin two inflammatory mediators. Methods used will demonstrate a non-invasive, quantitative way to measure blood flow and vascular permeability in the skin. INTRODUCTION The acute inflammatory reaction occurs to protect the body in response to a pathogen or other noxious substance. There are two components: adaptive immunological response (which is described as a more specific immune response) and the innate response which occurs immediately upon infection and consists of both vascular and cellular effects (Rang and Dale, 2007). The innate response will be studied in this experiment, specifically in the skin. Bradykinin and histamine are inflammatory mediators involved in the innate response and will be studied at different doses. The results can be used to provide a potential target for therapeutic use: further experimentation would allow the addition of inflammatory mediator antagonists to potentially reduce the four cardinal signs of inflammation: pain, heat, redness and swelling. The local oedema and vasodilation give rise to the wheal and flare. The reddening represents vasodilation of small arterioles, and the increased permeability of the post capillary venules is represented by the wheal. The flare occurs due to stimulation of sensory nerves causing release of vasodilators. This is known as the triple response. It will be the wheal and flare that will be measured and used to describe the action of the two inflammatory mediators. METHODS The methods used were in-vivo; the doses of inflammatory mediators (and saline control) were injected into 10 volunteers. It was confirmed there were no known allergies to either bradykinin or histamine and all correct health and safety procedures were followed. Each of the 10 subjects were injected first with 25ÃŽ ¼L of saline solution, used as a control to show there was nothing in the saline (that the inflammatory mediators were diluted with) causing an inflammatory response. This was followed by doses of 10, 30, and 100ÃŽ ¼M histamine for 5 subjects and the same doses of bradykinin for the other 5 was added, all at 30 second intervals. These were administered using a sterilised syringe which contained the correct concentration. The doses were injected into forearm intradermally and care was taken to ensure the complete volume of 25ÃŽ ¼L was taken up by the skin. Each successive administration was slightly further up the arm giving space for each of the four doses and to try and prevent the flares from overlapping. At periods of 2, 5, 10 and 15mins a clear sheet of acetate was placed over the centre of injection and the wheal and flare were circled using a non-wipe pen and repeated for each respective dose. This provided the area of the wheal and flare at each of the given concentrations at each of the given periods of time following injection, for each respective inflammatory mediator. The flare was cut from the acetate and weighed accurately to 4 decimal places. Subsequently, the wheal was cut from the centre of the flare and was also weighed. This process was repeated for each of the doses of inflammatory mediator (bradykinin and histamine) and for the saline control also. A 2cm2 square was ruled onto the acetate which was also cut out and weighed. This provided a conversion between weight and area, allowing the area of the wheal and flares to be calculated (credit to Dr. Dean Willis).This data was tabulated and can be found in the appendix and illustrated in the results. The data was checked for any anomalous values that could be defined as incorrect based upon logical criteria. Group 1 for the histamine set had flare sizes of 0cm2 however, had wheal sizes greater than this. Therefore this data was removed to all analysis as it is clearly incorrect. The data was then averaged for each of the 5 subjects for both histamine and bradykinin. There were two independent variables: time and concentration; and two dependant variables: wheal and flare areas. The independent variables were illustrated on separate graphs and the wheal and flare sizes were imposed on the same. To produce graphs to illustrate the change in area with concentration, first the largest average value recorded for each concentration was selected and tabulated. This allows comparison not only between different concentrations of the same mediator, but also between bradykinin and histamine. This also means time was irrelevant because it did not matter at which time recording the values were selected The increase in wheal or flare size due to inflammatory mediator was calculated (i.e. the difference between the wheal or flare recorded and saline). This increase in wheal or flare was plotted against the respective concentration and the concentration was plotted in log scale to illustrate a dose-response curve. To illustrate the change in area with respect to time, firstly, the data was scanned to select a concentration at which the change in wheal and flare was best illustrated. This concentration was taken to be 100ÃŽ ¼M (for both mediators to ensure continuity and to allow comparison). The Average wheal and flare size was then plotted against time for both bradykinin and histamine. RESULTS Removed data: (see appendix) Group 1 of the histamine section has a flare size of 0.000 recorded with a wheel size of greater than this. This is likely to be a systematic error in not realising the flare is indeed underneath the wheel and not visible, in this case the flare is the same area of the wheel. However this is just speculation, and in order to ensure all data used is correct saline recordings for each time interval both wheel and flare areas for group 1(histamine) were removed from analysis. The wheal size only increased slowly with increased concentration of bradykinin to a maximum of 0.414 at 100ÃŽ ¼M. The value at 10ÃŽ ¼M was actually lower than that for saline. This is not a significant decrease however as it was taken as a decrease of 0.04cm2, which is a small area and the limitations of the experiment are likely to be the cause. The flare size, however, increased more with increasing concentration. The size of the flare is likely to represent a dose-response curve with a classic sigmoid shape if the concentration of bradykinin were to be increased further. However, due to the nature of the experiment this would not be practical as a much large concentration of inflammatory mediator could be dangerous for the subject. It is also shown that the maximum flare area at 100ÃŽ ¼M was recorded at 10mins. It can therefore be deduced that it was relatively slow acting; however it cannot be determined whether the maximum value was indeed at 10mins recorded as 7.808cm2. Equally the flare area could have rose to a maximum between 5-10mins and decreased, or rose to a maximum after 10mins and reduced to that recorded at 15mins. It can be shown that at the lowest concentration (10ÃŽ ¼M) of histamine that there is only a small difference of 1.194cm2 between the maximum flare-area recorded by bradykinin. It can therefore be deduced that histamine caused a larger flare than bradykinin at the same concentrations. Ahe general trend is similar to that of bradykinin: small increase in wheal area, large increase in flare area. The maximum wheal area was only 0.03m2 larger than that recorded by bradykinin. Again, the wheal area had very little variation with time: increase of 0.2cm2. The flare area was at a maximum recording of 18.625cm2 after just 2mins. Therefore, it is likely to have been at the maximum area before 2mins. This shows that histamine is faster acting than the bradykinin. There is a relatively linear decrease with time to a minimum value of 9.120cm2 recorded at 15mins. The flare area did of course continue to decrease after the 15minute period until there was no apparent inflammation, likewise for bradykinin. DISCUSSION As mentioned previously, the innate inflammatory response consists of both vascular and cellular effects. Vascular events begin by dilation of post capillary venules, causing an increased blood flow. Vasodilation is caused by the action of histamine (and other inflammatory mediators), leading to increased local blood flow and an increased vascular permeability causing a local oedema. The fluid contains the components a proteolytic enzyme cascades producing bradykinin. Bradykinin is also an inflammatory mediator causing further vasodilation and vascular permeability leading to local redness and oedema respectively. This gives rise to the cardinal signs of inflammation: redness, swelling, heat and pain (also loss of function). The sensation of heat and pain ascend through sensory neurones via the spinothalamic tract. Upon the presence of a pathogen, pathogen associated molecular patterns (PAMPs) are recognised on the surface of bacteria and causing the release of cytokines from macrophages. Cytokines are small polypeptides involved in cell-signalling and orchestrate inflammation. This allows expression of adhesion molecules in the endothelial cells. Phagocytes then adhere to the endothelium and migrate towards the bacteria where phagocytosis takes place. In addition, exudation of fluid occurs in response to an increased vascular permeability due to a combination of cytokine and inflammatory mediator action (as well as increased vasodilation in response to inflammatory mediators). The fluid allows four enzyme cascades to occur producing inflammatory further inflammatory mediators by proteolytic cleavage from their native (inactive) state. One of these cascades gives rise to bradykinin (Pocock and Richards, 2006). Histamine is released in response to products of other enzyme cascade pathways such as C3a and c5a which make up part of the complement system. C3a and C5a bind with receptors on the surface of mast cells, causing a rise in intracellular calcium leading to exocytosis of histamine. Simple injection of bradykinin or histamine mimics these pathways. Bradykinin is a vasodilator and also increases vascular permeability leading to a local swelling. This is consistent with the findings in this experiment. After Intradermal injection of bradykinin, the typical triple-response was apparent; there was a wheel and flare as described by Sir Thomas Lewis. Breakdown is by kininases and it is likely to have cleaved bradykinin at a relatively fast rate due to the short lasting effect at 100ÃŽ ¼M where the flare area began to decrease after just 10mins. Histamine has a similar action to bradykinin but found to act faster and also found to be more potent at each concentration tested. The flare area was at a maximum after just 2 minutes. Histamine acts on H1 receptors to dilate blood vessels, therefore it is likely there is a high expression of H1 receptors at the skin surface, or histamine has a great affinity for its receptor. It is likely to be a combination of both, however to confirm these ideas, experiments could be conducted on other tissue perhaps on organ tissue in-vitro using an animal model. This response is characteristic of the acute inflammatory pathway; however, more recent studies suggest that histamine has a role in chronic inflammation involved in the immune response (Jutel et al., 2009). There is regulation of T-cells (which make up part of the immune response) by H1 and H2 receptors. There is a 4th histamine receptor, H4 and further evidence for the role of histamine in chronic pathways comes from expression of H4 receptors on immune cells (Jutel et al., 2009). It is apparent from figures 1 and 3 that an increase in either inflammatory mediator resulted in an increase in wheel area. As previously described, this is due to release of vasodilators from sensory nerves in response to stimulation. So it can be deduced that a larger concentration of bradykinin or histamine indicates a larger infection and therefore the cascade process is accentuated. The wheal area stays relatively constant in both cases, this could be due to no addition action of inflammatory mediators on the vascular permeability, or indeed there is already a full effect i.e. the post capillary venules are a permeable as possible. However another hypothesis could be that additional permeability would only lead to a further decreased extracellular solute concentration which would simply be reabsorbed by osmosis. STRENGTHS AND LIMITATIONS Strengths of the experiment were in that humans were used and methods were in-vivo. Therefore there is no reliance on animal models to use as a comparison. All subjects were of a similar age and gender was at random, hence, generally similar responses were found between each group. Limitations were found to be in injecting the inflammatory mediator intradermally. There was a tendency for not all of the solution to actually enter the skin, thus decreasing the number of moles of inflammatory mediator. This however did not seem to effect the results too greatly as 5 repeat groups would allow for some small error. It is still clear from the experiment that the aims were met and the mediators compared. Furthermore, measurement of the area was not particularly accurate. Firstly it was hard to judge the size of the wheel and flare and there was a tendency for the flares to overlap and was often left down to judgment of where to define the boundary. There were a few further cases where the w heel size exceed that of the flare (in addition the case described in the results) however these were only small differences and could easily have been to variations in the measurement of the weight. If the wheal and flare were the same size, the acetate could have been weighed twice and hence the small difference. This would not have affected the outcome of the experiment however so the data was accepted. Better methods of measurement of wheel and flare area would be to use an imaging technique and record the change in areas digitally. This would allow for calculation of the change in rate of area with respect to time (via differential equations) which would give a good indication as to the potency and allow for a more in-depth comparison.

Anthropology social relationships Essay

Social relationships in most cultures and societies impact heavily on how a person perceives their world. People create their social world but are also shaped by it, and part of this social world is the social relationships that are formed between individuals. These relationships vary in kind from family and kinship to friendship. Kinship and family are types of relationships that have been widely studied in the attempt to study and understand a culture or society. And whilst these are important, relationships of friendship also play a large part in the way the individual’s personality is shaped and how they view their social world. Relationships of kinship or family ties are generally unavoidable and are formed through generations of families or cultural ties. Tribes and small villages are a good example of this where the members of these social circles are in frequent contact with each other and are somewhat limited to the generations within the physical boundaries of their social world. The formation of these relationships does not require much effort and they are expected to continue even if transformed over time. Positive relationships can become negative and vice versa. Look more:  social process theories essay Within the classification of family ties and kinship, the individual’s ties’ with ones family would be described with him/her in the centre, his parents above, children and their descendants below and siblings to either side (Morgan, 1870, p.10). Kinship ties include those where an individual does not have close genealogical ties with another rather is related through an unexpressed social tie, marriage or other wider social circles. If you take rural villages as an example, the degrees of these relationships can be measured in a somewhat circular pattern, where immediate family is in the centre, followed by those related by marriage, and then the members of the village in various degrees of closeness. The ties of family are expected to continue even after death, i.e. the individual is still a son to his parents but is also a father to his children, a brother to his siblings, etc. If the ties of kinship are those of a wider social circle than that of family; then ties of friendship are to be considered in the somewhat grey area in the middle. Relationships of friendship are more informal yet private to some degree and are usually based on some common interest or sharing (Beer, 2001). This sharing is not limited to material objects, but also to thoughts and secrets; thus friendship is a relationship that is heavily dependant on mutual trust and loyalty as compared to blood ties of family or kinship. Aside from those with family, most other relationships can be created, sustained in some way or ended by the individual, and each relationship will have its effect on perception or the shaping of the individual and his/her world. It is as such a given that these relationships can be created or impacted on by the actions of the individual or both parties involved. In order for a social relationship to be established outside of the setting of ‘family’ many events and actions take place. Social relationships are important to the individual as well as their social world, these relationships are often the foundations of the individual personality. From a young age the first relationship would be with members of the immediate family, however as time passes, the social circle or boundaries per se, of the individual enlarge to include others. These relationships are created from different situations, a child’s first school friends, the relationships between parent and teacher, relationships of friendship between those who share mutual interest and those of work to name a few. These relationships can be established in several ways; the exchange of gifts, the sharing of interests, cultural beliefs and identity, or a shared interest. Gift giving being the easiest to understand can be condensed into the action of give and take between two or more parties. This process is not always a positive attempt towards the continuation, formation or beginning of a relationship as the refusal to reciprocate the gift giving can be also seen as an indication to end the relationship. Social relationships require a certain measure of give and take, gift exchange, secrets, conversation, and opinion. Gift exchange plays a large role in social relationships as it can be used in several ways; an indicator for the willingness to engage in a relationship, the intention to continue a relationship, etc. However, gift exchange has two parts, giving and receiving, and these actions have different results depending on the situation. Drawing on the article by Theodore Caplow (1982) on the connection between gift giving and relationships one can begin to understand the impact these actions have on relationships. Caplow describes the gift exchange as being mostly among kin, however he also mentions that gifts were also given among co-workers, friends and couples. Caplow described the gifts given and received between primary kin as being in a pattern where the gifts given from an older generation within family were likely to go downwards, i.e. more gifts were given by those older than 18 to those younger than 18. This process of gift giving and reciprocity is slightly uneven and occurs mainly among kin members. Parents do not expect much in the way of gifts from children and children only gift with what limited capability they have. However the gift giving changes in other relationships, for example, between couples who are dating or among friends. As such, the relationship between kin cannot be truly described as a relationship that is insomuch created as much as it is inherent simply to the birth of an individual, so when considering the process of creating social relationships, one must consider the relationships formed outside the circle of immediate family. Gift giving between individuals as mentioned above, is seen as a way to continue a relationship; one person gives a gift and expects one in return. To reciprocate and gift in return would indicate that one intends on continuing the relationship. Yet despite describing the action of gifting and reciprocity in the term of material gifts, it is not always material gifts that are exchanged. Gifts can be given to those one intends on keeping favour with the expectation of asking for something at a later date, which is not necessarily another material object, but it can be something like favour within a political setting. Positive social relationships also require ongoing maintenance and can be ended at any given moment by the actions of one or both parties involved for example in the case of two neighbouring Brazilian families in the town of Monte Verde where an old friendship ended in a feud (Descharmes et al. 2011, p349). In this case there remained a relationship, however it was a transformed, hostile relationship of revenge where one family would murder a member of the others and the opposing family would reciprocate with the same. This reciprocal opposition transformed the relationship from a positive relationship to one of revenge. In this case we see how a relationship is transformed, but transformations of social relationships can also be positive in weddings for example where two members of separate families are united and a new relationship is formed where those two individuals are now members of the others family. Marriage is a very common form of transformation for a relationship and is found in almost all societies and results in reciprocal rights between both parties whilst also creating a social process where new relationship are set up between the kin of both the husband and the wife (Brix, JH 2010, pp162). These transformations of social relationship occur often but with various results. In the formation of relationships of friendship, two individuals may move from being ‘acquaintances’ to ‘friends’. Beer makes the distinction between friendship and kinship; where kinship is usually used to describe close personal ties, not necessarily genealogical, and friendship is a relationship based on sharing of time, problems, plans, hopes and thought. As such with the sharing of secrets and personal thoughts, friendship is a social relationship that requires absolute loyalty and trust, as if the relationship is broken off; these secrets can be revealed to others. Over time, these factors affect a person and the way they shape their social world. If we consider that the individual shapes his/her social world and that this world in turn shapes them, we may also consider the effect social relationships have on this social world per se. Relationships between family or kin will shape a child in the early stages based on the culture and beliefs passed down from the parents or adults in the child’s kin circle. However as time passes, the social circle expands to include school peers and other adults. The biggest effect is usually from the friendships that are formed with others from a completely different kin circle to the individuals own. To go into a deeper understanding of the individual’s social world we must also understand their relationships. Drawing on the article by Ortner, 1993, on a high school graduate class, as a case study, we are given examples of some relationships that are formed and maintained. Ortner describes her high school graduate class and their sense of â€Å"community† during and after their school years. She goes on to describe the structure of â€Å"class† within the high school. this idea of a â€Å"class† system depicts the social circle or world that the members of these â€Å"classes† were a part of. These social circles are described as including members who had similar backgrounds or interests. Furthermore she goes on to describe the relationships that were maintained after high school. These relationships tended to run in the same circles as they had been during school years. So by analysing the social relationships of the individual we are given a deeper understanding of the way they shape their world. The social structure we give our world often is dependant on how we structure our relationships with others. The social relationships that alter the perception of social structure for one person may not always be applied with the same results for all people. This is due the many relationships we build and maintain with others over time. The formation of social relationships are created, sustained, transformed and ended with the actions of the individual and sometimes without. We may find ourselves in a relationship with others that has simply arisen through the relationship with kin or family. Yet these relationships help shape us and the way we crate our social world. These relationships are constantly in flux and changeable with the time that passes as a relationship can also change with the passing of time without many major or drastic changes. As such, these relationships play a major role in how we perceive our social world and inevitably our sense of self. Bell, S, Coleman, S 1999, The Anthropology of Friendship, Berg, USA Beer, B 2001, Friendship, Anthropology of, International Encyclopedia of the Social & Behavioral Sciences, Elsevier Science Ltd, USA Caplow, T. 1982 Christmas Gifts and Kin Networks. Sociological Review 47 (3): 383-392. Descharmes, B, Heuser, EA, Krà ¼ger, C, Loy, T 2011, Varieties of Friendship; Interdisciplinary Perspectives on Social Relationships, V&R Unipress, Germany Morgan, LH 1870, Systems of Consanguinity and Affinity of the Human Family, University of Nebraska Press, USA Ortner, Sherry 1997 Fieldwork in the Postcommunity. Anthropology and Humanism 22(1): 61-80. Turner, V. 1964 Betwixt and Between: The Liminal Period in Rites of Passage. in J. Helm (ed.) New Approaches to the Study of Religion Seattle: American Ethnological Society pp. 4-20. Vaughn, L 2010, ‘Marriage and the family’, in HJ Birx (ed.), 21st century anthropology: A reference handbook, SAGE Publications, Inc., Thousand Oaks, CA