Bright Star Software is an educational gaming software company that produces and sells downloadable computer games that teach history, math, and English for k to 5th graders. Each software package has 10 to 15 modules, consisting of lessons that are gamified, making it fun for students to learn the topics. Bright Star has been ranked as the top choice educational software by the American Parents Association for five years from 2014-2018, where Bright Star was the most sought after brand for parents who want their children to excel in history, math and English, and its blue & yellow logo is well known by parents and teachers alike. Unfortunately the American Parents Associate started ranking another educational software company Pinnacle Education System as its top choice since 2019. Parents can log into Bright Star website, purchase the items that they want their children to complete, and download the software. The children would complete each course module which typically averages an hour offline and upload the results at the end of the module. Since the topics of history, math and English do not change, Bright Star has been complacent in its product enhancement efforts. Founded in 2010, the company had been doing well, with a total of 18 games. However, in the last three years, revenue has been decreasing, with some games approaching or at zero sales. You just joined Bright Star as the Chief Marketing Officer. First day on the job, the CEO called a senior management meeting, and told you that the marketing department needs to develop a marketing plan to decide how to streamline its current products and identify new products Bright Star should develop.

Question 1:

Being new to the company and trying not to panic, you decided to first learn the market space Bright Star has been competing. You determined that you should first do some secondary research to learn about the market before meeting with your team. Select which of the following secondary research sources you should get quickly without additional expenses (select 3):

A.Call the competitors' marketing managers and ask them what they are planning on doing

B. census data from www.census.gov

C. Call recent customers and ask them for input

D. Hire a consultant you read about who is an expert in education software

E. competitors' websites

F. Meet with the CFO of Bright Star to get profitability reports

G. Education Software Association market reports Bright Star has already been receiving every month

H. Send out an email survey to all the customers

Question 2: What product category does Bright Star's products belong? Why?

A.Convenience; parents need to buy educational software and as long as Bright Star makes it easy to buy, parent would buy

B.shopping; parents typically compare and research for best value with lowest price

C. Specialty; parents buy because of the well known Bright Star name and recommendations by the American Parents Association

D. Unsought offering: parents typically do not shop for the product until they urgently need them when they realize their children are not doing well in schools