Pretend the McDonald's corporate office has hired our class to create a Marketing Plan.We learn in this week's module that there are 5 key steps in creating a marketing plan. In this discussion post, we are going to brainstorm step 1: Conducting a Marketing Audit. The Marketing Audit is the foundation of any marketing plan.

In your initial post think of a McDonald's that you have gone to recently and in the post write:

• A property analysis (self-appraisalof their strengths and weaknesses - pg. 39-42).
• A competitive analysis (What customers are McDonald's competitors reaching that McDonald's is not? What competitive advantage does McDonald's have that its competitors do not? How can McDonald's differentiate themselves in the market? pg. 43--48)

48 Chapter 2 Occupancy Average = RevPAR Percentage X Daily Rate mark $ 88.00 $ 67.32 ketp Your Property 76.5% $ 86.00 $ 60.20 affe Downtown Hotel 70.0% 75.0% $ 85.00 $ 63.75 the Airport Hotel in t $ 86.33 $ 63.71 73.8% gov ket RevPAR gives you the ability to compare hotels of different sizes and varying ass average rates, allowing you to see precisely what you are earning in relationship to fac your competition. Because RevPAR takes into account both occupancy and aver- ma age daily rate, it is the most widely accepted comparative measure in the industry in today. A competition analysis also involves walking the properties of competitors, talking with competitors' employees, studying the advertising of competitors, and taking note of how your competitors are using social media. For an even clearer picture, actually staying at the properties of competitors is essential. Driving through their parking lots at night on a regular basis, paying special attention to the types of cars, the states represented by their license plates, and the number of commercial vehicles; eating in their restaurants; reading rack brochures and inter- nal literature; and conversing with their guests are excellent ways of determining differences between your property and other properties. Check your competitors' reader boards every day (a reader board is the board on which group meetings and other events going on at the hotel are listed), or subscribe to a reader board service. Make notes and prepare a game plan to land these organizations next quarter or next year. ber of sources: Other information needed for a competition analysis is available from a num- Local convention and visitors bureaus . Chambers of commerce Local, county, and state room tax reports3 Telephone yellow pages . Hotel chain directories Travel guides Yelp) Websites of competitors (and their presence on such sites as TripAdvisor and Social media sites (Facebook, Twitter, Pinterest, Instagram, Foursquare, LinkedIn, and so on) information-gathering tool. Making personal contact with other area hotel managers is also an effective Marketplace Analysis. To plan marketing strategies, it is essential to know as much as possible about the marketplace or environment in which the property operates. A marketplace analysis researches the property's current position in the