Pharmasim Situation Analysis Process

 

Pharmasim Periods 0-2

For those of you who are unaware of what Pharmasim is, it is a computer program that helps a marketing student to analyze and make marketing decisions about a fictional over-the-counter cold medicine company. So far, it has been a very eye opening experience that has helped in connecting the analysis methods learned in class to a real life situation.

Coming into this experience, I was nervous because I had never had such  practical experience that would be so hands on. I had done case work before and analysis of specific points of a decision making process, but never anything this intensive. And that's a good thing! All aspects I have learned in class have given me a better understanding of how a marketing plan works in real life situations. Granted, there is still a long ways to go with the Pharmasim process, I feel like it is making me a stronger analyst and decision maker. And it's great to have a partner in all of this to bounce ideas off of and challenge me as well.

In the beginning of Pharmasim, we were able to do trials and practice how the actual program works. That was huge! I was able to understand how all the buttons and categories meant and did. It certainly helped in my understanding for the beginning of the first part of this assessment.

The situation analysis has by far been the most intensive work I have done so far in graduate school work. The amount of time and research that was necessary in order to make our decisions took a lot of focus and attention. And that was just for Periods 0-2...there's about 8 or 9 more to go! And that's only the beginning. The actual situation analysis took even more time, attention, research, and focus. We had 8 days to make an analysis of what you would think a marketer would do in a few weeks (Well, not necessarily. I'm sure they do it faster. Again, I'm still new to this!). The excel workbook we were able to use to analyze the Five C's, strengths, weaknesses, trends, competition and market information, and issues to address in the future was a great help. Very long and draining, but overall it helped me have an overall in-depth look of our product. And the memo helped me to put all of this information in an organized, practical form. Though this process was stressful and at times frustrating in terms of the amount of time and effort required to go into this, I can't help but admit it was helpful in understanding not only the product and market better, but understanding the practical processes of marketing in general. I never realized how much actually went into something as simple as a situation analysis. It's crazy to see how many different factors go into making future decisions. 

I now feel prepared for the next step in the marketing analysis of the Allstar Brands cold medicine product in Paharmasim. But first, I have to get some sleep...