This thesis discusses the possibilities of using cluster analysis methods for customer segmentation. The theoretical part is focused on description of selected methods of cluster analysis and explanation of other concepts related to this topic, such as CRM, segmentation and targeted communication. In the practical part are applied cluster analysis methods to real data unnamed company with the aim of creating a default substrates useful for planning and implementation of targeted communication. For the main calculations is used program R, for data and output editing is used MS Excel. At the end of the work are evaluated applied methods and summarized lessons learned from the cluster analysis. For a company were created and characterized databases which could be useful for marketing decisions.

The demand for labour force in the European building industry has increased in recent years due to the constant migrations and the need to provide housing, schools and hospitals to accommodate this growing population. Due to this scenario and to governmental policies that were created to supply this need, Swedish building companies want to recruit more female employees in particular. The purpose of this case study is to investigate whether, and if so how, the building company NCC uses its external communication to strategically attract more women to the industry. Our research was of a qualitative nature. We analysed, with the help of a Multimodal Critical Discourse Analysis approach, recruitment materials and job advertisements published on the company’s homepage, in order to demonstrate how men and women are represented in NCC’s recruitment communication and in which way the company communicates specifically to women. We have also analysed which aspects of the company’s recruitment communication were appealing to women, through focus group interviews made with female engineering students. As theoretical ground for this case study we have chosen previous research and literature in the fields of organizational communication, employer branding, decoding in communication processes, gender studies, stereotyping and gender aware recruitment. The findings in this study show that both men and women are represented in NCC’s recruitment communication, but that a bigger focus is placed on the visual representation of women.  NCC strategically aims at attracting women both in the way female workers are visually portrayed on the homepage but even in the wording found in the company’s recruitment texts and job advertisements. This targeted communication does not reach its full potential in terms of attractiveness to women though, perhaps due to the rather cosmetic visual representation of the company’s work environment, as well as the lack of personal connection that is made between the portrayed employees and the potential job candidates.

Syfte: Syftet med detta arbete är att öka förståelsen för hur företag arbetar med strategi och taktik för att skapa förväntan på marknader innan en produkts premiär. Hur det går till när förväntan skapas innan produktpremiär, utan att det slår över och får negativa konsekvenser för produkten eller tjänsten, är ett område som kan anses vara outforskat. Området är en viktig källa till framgång eller fall för marknadsföring och lansering av nya produkter, vilket gör det relevant och intressant, både teoretiskt och praktiskt. Metod: I denna studie har vi använt oss av en kvalitativ forskningsmetod, semistrukturerade intervjuer. Respondenterna är marknadsförare och produktansvariga med en bred bakgrund från olika typer av företag. De var hälften kvinnor, hälften män i olika åldrar. Vid analyseringen användes tematisk analys, då vi kodade intervjuerna för att sedan bilda teman. Resultat & slutsats: Resultatet som har framkommit i denna studie är att företagen lägger stor vikt vid att skapa och förankra planer internt och hos samarbetspartners innan en produktlansering. Samtidigt måste företaget arbeta med förståelse för och val av målgrupp, för att med dessa bitar på plats kunna leverera information till konsumenterna som skapar förväntan på marknader. Om någon del inte är välgjord ökar riskerna till att det blir komplikationer för lanseringen och uppbyggd förväntan riskerar att sänkas. Är grundarbetet välgjort har företagen goda förutsättningar att skapa förväntan. Sedermera är arbetet med att skapa förväntan en process som startar långt innan premiär. Examensarbetets bidrag: Kunskapsbidraget för denna studie är en unik insikt och översikt över hur företag arbetar med strategi och taktik för att skapa förväntan på marknader innan en produkts premiär. Förslag till fortsatt forskning: Ytterligare undersöka konsumenternas perspektiv om detta ämne och deras vilja att använda deras röst. Undersöka hur negativ buzz i slutändan kan bidra till produktframgång. Undersöka skillnaderna mellan tillverkare, grossister och butik när det kommer till kompetens och förståelse för strategier för att skapa förväntan genom sociala medier. / Aim: The purpose of this paper is to increase understanding of how companies work with strategy and tactics to create anticipation in markets. The way in which anticipation is created before the product premiere, without it having a negative impact on the product or service success, is an area that can be considered unexplored. The area is an important source of success or failure for marketing and launching new products, which makes it relevant and interesting, both theoretically and practically. Method: In this study we have used a qualitative research method, semi-structured interviews. The respondents are marketers and product managers with a broad background from different types of companies. They were an equal proportion of women and men of different ages. Thematic analysis was used for coding the interviews and then forming themes. Result & Conclusions: The result that has emerged in this study is that the companies put great emphasis on creating and establish plans internally and with partners before a product launch. At the same time, the organization must work to create an understanding of and choose a target group, in order to be able to supply information to consumers who create anticipations in markets. If any part is not well done, the risk increases that there will be complications for the launch and built-up anticipation risks being lowered. If the groundwork is well done, the companies have good opportunities to create anticipations. Later on, the work of creating anticipation is a process that starts long before the premiere. Contribution of the thesis: The contribution for this study is a unique insight and overview of how companies work with strategy and tactics to create anticipation in markets before a product's premiere. Suggestions for future research: Further explore consumer perspective on this topic and their willingness to use their voice. Examine how negative buzz can ultimately contribute to product success. Examine the differences between manufacturers, wholesalers and retailers when it comes to skills and understanding of strategies to create anticipation.

When planning to implement a marketing tool such as Integrated Marketing Communication (IMC) into ones company, marketers need to know what IMC means or is perceived to be in their environment. The definition of IMC is shown in the background chapter of this study and more definitions are stated in the theoretical frame chapter as well. Months of research lead to the conduction of a study, that is to test the perception of IMC in the Swedish market by sampling and sending questionnaires to Swedish marketers. Five Hypotheses were formed to test if each factor has a positive or negative relation with IMC. A questionnaire was formulated that tested all of the five main success factors (customer focus, targeted communication, customer-brand relationship, synergy and communication channels) in relation to IMC and how the Swedish marketers perceived each one of the factor’s connection to IMC. The marketers were chosen due to the fact that they would know most about IMC since it’s within the field of marketing.  It was found that Swedish marketers support 2 out of the 5 hypotheses. This means that the results showed that Swedish marketers perceive that there is a positive relationship between both channels of communication and IMC, and customer brand relationship and IMC, while targeted communication, customer focus and synergy were denied to be as positively related to IMC. This study would be of great help to a Swedish company trying to implement IMC because it gives directions to the Swedish perception of it, thereby making it more clear to know exactly what they are implementing, which help them find out in what way they should implement IMC, in order to avoid failures that could be very expensive.

The study of self-assembling robots represents a promising strand within the emerging field of modular robots research. Self-assembling robots have the potential to autonomously adapt their bodies to new tasks and changing environments long after their initial deployment by forming new or reorganizing existing physical connections to peer robots. In previous research, many approaches have been presented to enable self-assembling robots to form composite morphologies. Recent technological advances have also increased the number of robots able to form such morphologies by at least two orders of magnitude. However, to date, composite robot morphologies have not been able to solve real-world tasks nor have they been able to adapt to changing conditions entirely without human assistance or prior knowledge.In this thesis, we identify three reasons why self-assembling robots may not have been able to fully unleash their potential and propose appropriate solutions. First, composite morphologies are not able to show sensorimotor coordination similar to those seen in their monolithic counterparts. We propose "mergeable nervous systems" -- a novel methodology that unifies independent robotic units into a single holistic entity at the control level. Our experiments show that mergeable nervous systems can enable self-assembling robots to demonstrate feats that go beyond those seen in any engineered or biological system. Second, no proposal has been tabled to enable a robot in a decentralized multirobot system select its communication partners based on their location. We propose a new form of highly scalable mechanism to enable "spatially targeted communication" in such systems. Third, the question of when and how to trigger a self-assembly process has been ignored by researchers to a large extent. We propose "supervised morphogenesis" -- a control methodology that is based on spatially targeted communication and enables cooperation between aerial and ground-based self-assembling robots. We show that allocating self-assembly related decision-making to a robot with an aerial perspective of the environment can allow robots on the ground to operate in entirely unknown environments and to solve tasks that arise during mission time. For each of the three propositions put forward in this thesis, we present results of extensive experiments carried out on real robotic hardware. Our results confirm that we were able to substantially advance the state of the art in self-assembling robots by unleashing their potential for morphological adaptation through enhanced sensorimotor coordination and by improving their overall autonomy through cooperation with aerial robots. / Doctorat en Sciences de l'ingénieur et technologie / info:eu-repo/semantics/nonPublished