Environmental Scanning

The mobile microinsurance marketing plan boasts itself as it highlights the overview of the mobile microinsurance industry, its current market condition, its external and internal factors driving and affecting its growth, its competition arena, and its key players through the lenses of different stakeholders.

The paper describes the current marketing situation of the mobile microinsurance industry as it gives a thorough narrative on the market trends of the said industry both in the perspective of the local and international arena. It gives a bird’s eye view of the current battlefield of the said industry by illustrating the interconnection of various players and its roles in the industry. Moreover, the paper prides itself in showing the target market’s behavior which can be later used in formulating strategies for capturing the target market.

The paper also emphasizes various macro and micro environmental forces that can greatly affect the mobile microinsurance industry. As such, pertinent examples are also illustrated in order to prove that such factors should not be overlooked in order to maximize the benefits it may enjoy on successful mobile microinsurance product launch.

After discussing the foregoing concepts, the paper moves on to propose appropriate and winning marketing strategies based on grounded principles and proven success stories in other countries with similar situations and challenges faced by the existing regulatory environment of the Philippines. The proposed marketing strategy also identifies clear marketing and financial objectives so as to position the mobile microinsurance product well that can attract customers. It also seeks to have the firm cross the technology chasm in the shortest possible period while maximizing and enjoying the benefits of such strategies.

Furthermore, the proponents recommended various marketing mixes that clearly define the advertising and branding strategies that are founded on marketing principles across the diffusion curve.

The proponents well understand the value of effective pricing strategies for mobile microinsurance aim for low-cost, high-volume business. As such, this paper gives suggestions for various pricing options that can cater the marginalized and low-income earners which are the target market of the mobile microinsurance industry.

Moreover, the paper gives an in-depth market research that is sourced from consultations and interviews gathered from various relevant stakeholders from the regulatory sector, mobile microinsurance providers, down to its potential customers.

An in-depth financial forecast of sales and revenue for the next 3 to 5 years is also included in this paper. It analyses the possible profit and losses of the firm and how marketing could affect these movements of the firm’s money. A marketing budget is proposed in this paper to allow insight on the different activities that will entail in the marketing plan, coupled with the equivalent costs for each activity.

Finally, the aforementioned strategies, after taking into consideration various concepts and all reasonable risks, the paper gives detailed implementation measures and contingency measures should the plan fail to materialize.

GCash Insure provides a way to protect every Filipino through affordable comprehensive insurance. It uses microinsurance to bridge the lower financial bracket to a better financial plan. In this paper, we propose an integration of GCash Insure to the GCash mobile application by creating a separate module for monitoring and control of the user’s policy. Through the module, users can avail a microinsurance policy, upgrade their current policies, pay for their policies, view and monitor their policies, add dependents, and inquire more about GCash Insure. Different technologies were advised to be included in the module to empower users with the best customer experience. This paper also includes the current pricing strategy and what needs to be enhanced and considered for the long run. Activities internal and external to the organization were also proposed to have a strong primary and secondary brand knowledge.

Cash has still been the preferred payment method of the Filipino majority—amounting to 51.3% of the population; while there were only 7.1% that prefer using mobile phone or app payments (TheNerve, 2019).

Despite the cash-heavy transactions of the country, a recent report from Oliver Wyman, an international management consulting firm, forecasts a gradual decrease of transaction share of cash but a steady increase of transaction share of e-money from 2018 to 2022 (Woods, George, & Pardiwalla, 2018) and TheNerve (2019) noted this as a 116% compound annual growth rate. This can be seen in the aforementioned 2018 3rd quarter Financial Inclusion report by BSP (2018) which noted a growth of 6 million pesos (or 9.2%) in inflow transactions and 18 million pesos (or 6%) in outflow transactions from 2016 to 2017.

The motivation for innovation in the e-Money industry can be attributed to the power of the consumers as they are the primary users of the technology and ultimately, their adoption would dictate the success or failure of the innovation. Although it is also relevant to point that merchant adoption and the whole ecosystem may also influence the motivation for innovation, in the end, consumer adoption would still outweigh the other.

Numerous researches have focused on studying consumer adoption to identify the antecedents or drivers that influence technological adoption by consumers. Studies concluded that consumer adoption factors of e-Money technology are security, cost, convenience, characteristics of mobile service provider, characteristics of mobile payment vendor, characteristics of mobile technology, disposition of trust, and disposition of culture. These factors provide basis to the development of radical or incremental innovations in the e-Money industry. The high mobile penetration and tech-savviness of Filipinos also makes the Philippines a mobile money innovation hub. GSMA noted that the dramatic rise in smartphone adoption has been one of the factors in the increasing adoption of Filipinos (Pasti, 2019) despite the country’s lagging Internet speed.

The e-money has several use cases that drive its economic forces across the country’s economy. It ranges from airtime load top-up, bills payment, online shopping, transportation payment, insurance payment, ticket purchase, social media payments, QR code payment, NFC payment, e-money transfer, to B2C payment (Miroshnichenko, 2015). A survey report conducted by TheNerve (2019) accounted online shopping as the top use case of e-money; followed by bills payment and e-money transfer. Moreover, GSMA listed “domestic remittance needs” as one of the six primary conditions that contributed to the development of e-money in the Philippines (Hasnain, 2016). The development of this condition is due to the common Filipino practice wherein the breadwinner of the family goes to a highly urbanized region, like Metro Manila, and regularly sends money back to his/her home province (TheNerve, 2019).

GSMA (2016) also highlighted the low banking penetration as another driver of e-money in the Philippines. In 2017, the banked penetration rate stands at 34.5%. This means that 70 million or 65% of the Filipinos are still unbanked—a large avenue to drive financial inclusion through e-money.

The introduction of e-Money technology like G-Cash and Smart Money in the early 2000s in itself was a radical innovation and could possibly become a threat to banking and credit card technology. This technology fosters financial inclusion in the market as it taps both the banked and unbanked users. One doesn’t need a bank account in order to use e-Money as it utilizes a user’s mobile phone through SIM-based remittances and micro-payments, making use of a vast network of agents, such as sari-sari stores, to facilitate the cash- in and cash-out transactions.

Incremental innovations have thereafter followed with the introduction of phone applications or ‘apps’ that complement this technology by allowing users to monitor their balances, pay bills and even remit money (P2P) on their own through the apps.

The move for e-Money providers to transform into the ultimate lifestyle super app also encourages incremental innovation in terms of apps’ program and features. This new model is when existing apps branch out to other services apart from their initial intended service. A prime example would be Grab, which started as a ride-hailing app and has recently expanded their services to courier and food delivery.

Competitors dominate the e-money market by having the following characteristics: have existing partnerships, have an existing customer base, can be easily integrated in other platforms, have little to no transaction, convenience or additional fees, and offer rewards, incentives, or rebates.

Alternatives for mobile phones as storage devices for e-Money are also being introduced in the market. Biochips are devices embedded in a person’s body, often under the skin, which stores your e-Money, train tickets and can even act as keys to doors (Agence France-Presse, 2018). There may come a time when biotechnology will be the centralized adaptation of both the biotechnology and fin-technology industries, which may greatly affect the e- money value chain.

The industry value chain can be categorized into two major areas: one is content, another is infrastructure and services. Under the content area, there are three main parts: content creation, content packaging, and market making. Infrastructure and services also have three main parts: mobile transport, mobile services and delivery transport, and mobile interface and application.

Different firms in the Philippines, banks and non-banks, have adopted e- money. They compete for high API integration, updated infrastructures, an omnichannel banking strategy, customer convenience, strong security, and best blockchain technology adaptation.

E-money has different suppliers involved in the industry, including network operators, technology suppliers, authoring tools, application development tools, and mobile service technologies. Currently, cloud computing is the most popular and advanced tool in using e-money.

On a business standpoint, the only barriers to entry are the required high paid-up capital and the required high-level of technical skills. After passing through the said barrier, since the Philippines has a good enabling environment, the next battle will be competing with incumbent players in the industry—having a portion of the market share pie.

The mobile microinsurance marketing plan boasts itself as it highlights the overview of the mobile microinsurance industry, its current market condition, its external and internal factors driving and affecting its growth, its competition arena, and its key players through the lenses of different stakeholders.

The paper describes the current marketing situation of the mobile microinsurance industry as it gives a thorough narrative on the market trends of the said industry both in the perspective of the local and international arena. It gives a bird’s eye view of the current battlefield of the said industry by illustrating the interconnection of various players and its roles in the industry. Moreover, the paper prides itself in showing the target market’s behavior which can be later used in formulating strategies for capturing the target market.

The paper also emphasizes various macro and micro environmental forces that can greatly affect the mobile microinsurance industry. As such, pertinent examples are also illustrated in order to prove that such factors should not be overlooked in order to maximize the benefits it may enjoy on successful mobile microinsurance product launch.

After discussing the foregoing concepts, the paper moves on to propose appropriate and winning marketing strategies based on grounded principles and proven success stories in other countries with similar situations and challenges faced by the existing regulatory environment of the Philippines. The proposed marketing strategy also identifies clear marketing and financial objectives so as to position the mobile microinsurance product well that can attract customers. It also seeks to have the firm cross the technology chasm in the shortest possible period while maximizing and enjoying the benefits of such strategies.

Furthermore, the proponents recommended various marketing mixes that clearly define the advertising and branding strategies that are founded on marketing principles across the diffusion curve.

The proponents well understand the value of effective pricing strategies for mobile microinsurance aim for low-cost, high-volume business. As such, this paper gives suggestions for various pricing options that can cater the marginalized and low-income earners which are the target market of the mobile microinsurance industry.

Moreover, the paper gives an in-depth market research that is sourced from consultations and interviews gathered from various relevant stakeholders from the regulatory sector, mobile microinsurance providers, down to its potential customers.

An in-depth financial forecast of sales and revenue for the next 3 to 5 years is also included in this paper. It analyses the possible profit and losses of the firm and how marketing could affect these movements of the firm’s money. A marketing budget is proposed in this paper to allow insight on the different activities that will entail in the marketing plan, coupled with the equivalent costs for each activity.

Finally, the aforementioned strategies, after taking into consideration various concepts and all reasonable risks, the paper gives detailed implementation measures and contingency measures should the plan fail to materialize.

GCash Insure provides a way to protect every Filipino through affordable comprehensive insurance. It uses microinsurance to bridge the lower financial bracket to a better financial plan. In this paper, we propose an integration of GCash Insure to the GCash mobile application by creating a separate module for monitoring and control of the user’s policy. Through the module, users can avail a microinsurance policy, upgrade their current policies, pay for their policies, view and monitor their policies, add dependents, and inquire more about GCash Insure. Different technologies were advised to be included in the module to empower users with the best customer experience. This paper also includes the current pricing strategy and what needs to be enhanced and considered for the long run. Activities internal and external to the organization were also proposed to have a strong primary and secondary brand knowledge.

La veille informationnelle peut soutenir une organisation qui se veut durable (Fadaili, 2013). Mais comment la veille informationnelle et la veille stratégique contribuent-elles respectivement à la durabilité d'une organisation? Notre communication propose une réflexion théorique qui vise à comparer les définitions de ces deux concepts pour pouvoir discuter de leur apport dans un contexte d'organisation durable.

Importance of environment scanning and ethics in the business world is superlative and global in its nature. The ethical action and environmental scanning of businesses in developing countries are highly linked with business performance. This study therefore evaluates the business environmental scanning and ethics impact on the performance of small-scale enterprises, Las Palmas Restaurant. The research approach used was exploratory. Primary data has been collected by using questionnaire, interview and focus group discussion to collect the desired data from managers and employees. The study has been conducted through a case study. As the target population of the study has been managers and employees. A Sample size of 40 is taken; the collected data analysis has been supported by Microsoft Excel 10. As result shows that business environmental scanning and ethics have positive effect on the performance of small scales.

In this paper, we examine the environmental scanning strategy of manufacturing companies in southwestern Nigeria against the background that manufacturing companies in Nigeria exist in a challenging environment characterised by high import dependency, inappropriate policies, lack of transparent governance and weak industrial capabilities. Empirical data was collected with a questionnaire from a sample of 84 manufacturing firms in southwestern Nigeria. It was observed that generally companies in the industry actively engage in systematic gathering, analyses and assimilation of information about the business environment as strategic input into planning. The main objective of firms’ search was to obtain information required to initiate or support strategies for competing in the domestic market. Central among the factors determining the companies’ level of intrusiveness into the environment are companies’ capacity to interpret changes in the environment, available channels of information and quality of information.