Impacts of MIS - A Case Study

State of Information Technology in Demo Marketing Firm

Elijah Clark

Abstract

The purpose of this paper is to gain an analysis and evaluate the organization's key management

information system initiatives. Drawing from a series of interviews with current managers of

Demo Marketing Firm, The state of information technology within the marketing and branding

firm have been assessed. The key element of this paper is the identification and framing of the

organizational problems that relate to management information systems, knowledge

management, competitive advantage, and outsourcing. This research leads to identifying

problems and possible solutions to the problems identified. The knowledge gained from this

paper will present benefits and disadvantages of various approaches to the problems.

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State of Information Technology in Demo Marketing Firm

Demo Marketing Firm (DMF) is a company that offers design and marketing services for

its customers. The organization has a desire to build its marketing and brand awareness, which it

believes will increase sales. Brand building will involve restructuring of DMF's brand marketing

and rebranding its online presence. Similar to most companies, DMF uses management

information systems (MIS) on a daily basis (Haag & Cummings, 2008). MIS allows

organizations to plan, develop, and manage information technology (IT) (Haag & Cummings,

2008). In addition, knowledge management (KM) can accelerate MIS and IT if properly

implemented (Mohamed, Stankosky & Murray, 2006). IT gives organizations the ability to

obtain information through technology such as computers, cell phone, and the Internet (Haag &

Cummings, 2008). DMF believes that within its industry, technology is not optional if its

organization desires to remain relevant and competitive. Outsourcing organizational IT is a

growing need and desire for businesses (Gottschalk & Solli-Sæther, 2005). Along with

outsourcing, DMF uses the Internet commerce of business to business (B2B) and business to

consumer (B2C) to sell services uniquely to its customers. B2B refers to selling services to other

businesses, and B2C refers to selling to the end user (Haag & Cummings, 2008).

Management Information Systems

MIS provides organizations and their managers with the tools necessary to effectively

manage departments within the organization (Haag & Cummings, 2008). MIS tools may include

decision making software, information databases, and programmable applications. MIS

managers have the responsibility to monitor information and technology systems and develop

solutions for items that hinder workflow within the organization that involves the use of

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technology (Haag & Cummings, 2008). DMF has many tools to monitor its information systems.

However, it rarely uses these systems considering it does not adequately monitor its

organizational success. DMF does monitor its online traffic as well as its phone calls. However,

the third party systems such as Google platform tools and Call Fire digital phone service controls

these systems. Google gives DMF the ability to track its online traffic, such as how many people

visit the website, which pages they visit, how long they remain on the website or webpage, and

details about the user such as their location, operating system, and browser. Call Fire allows for

the tracking of phone calls, which include the customer's phone number, length of call, and a

recording of the phone call that DMF uses to enhance customer support.

Information Technology

Over the years, technology has always been important to DMF. Only recently, have DMF

customers become so involved with technology. The customers' knowledge and understanding of

technology has caused DMF to expand its own knowledge and present data and reporting to

customers using technology and software based systems. With the use of computers, faster

Internet, and mobile devices, consumers now desire access to information and can monitor their

success without the need of DMF putting together customized reports. For instance, if DMF had

a customer that purchased search engine optimization and desired DMF to place them first on the

search engine page for a particular keyword, previously that customer would receive the

information from DMF or notice the difference in sales. Now, however, customers can go and

seek the information themselves by using similar tools that DMF offers or by setting up alerts

whenever their Google rank lowers. Because of the consumer utilization and knowledge of

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technology, DMF has to stay current with technology and have many more answers for a more

interested and technology aware user base.

The state of IT within DMF's organization is acceptable, but not up to the standards of its

competition. DMF has a good use of technology implemented within its organization, but there

are many more tools in which DMF could use to help them aim better at marketing its brand

versus only tracking and online monitoring. DMF believes that it has a good amount of IT

available to them. However, its managers believe that there may be better tools that can assist

with their daily task and minimize their workload. With technology changing so often, it is

difficult to know what tools are available and of those tools, what may be most effective. In

addition, by implementing more technology, there would be the need for learning the new tools

and systems.

DMF has been on the negative end of many different problems involving IT. One of

those problems included weekly emails of reports not sent to their customers on the scheduled

Monday. The results of this problem generated backlash from customers requesting the reports

they rely on to view their data for the previous week. To resolve the weekly report issue, which

was triggered by the third party that provided the reports, DMF had to work with the third party

provider to get manual reports pulled and sent to the customers the following day. This problem

caused DMF a full days worth of work managing the customers and working with the third party.

In addition, because it cost time, likewise, it cost DMF money. Though the third party provider

did offer a discount on services, it did not make up for the loyalty lost by the customer. This

problem creates a concern with why outsourcing services to third party vendors can complicate

work because of lack of status information.

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When it comes to issues with IT systems within DMF, solving problems involves DMF

becoming more involved with its IT systems in which it uses (Haag & Cummings, 2008). If these

services or platforms were in-house, DMF could have better control over the outcome and

provide realistic expectations to its customers (Haag & Cummings, 2008). In addition, DMF

should have a backup plan to restore confidence of its customers and potentially offer them a

discount for the interruption.

Competition

DMF believes that its ethics and transparency are what sets it apart from its competitors.

Ethics are guidelines that help produce positive behaviors according to moral concepts and

judgments (Chekwa, Ouhirra, Thomas, & Chukwuanu, 2014; Haag & Cummings, 2008). In

addition, ethics is a matter of interpretation (Haag & Cummings, 2008). DMF managers agree

that what uniquely defines them from their competitors is that they are transparent with their

services and results. DMF has a goal and desire of allowing its customers to see all of the success

and failures regarding their projects concerning marketing. With the use of online technology

through marketing and reporting, customers can monitor the progress of DMF and their

campaigns. This method allows DMF to be transparent and causes less confusion for the

customers.

A disadvantage of being transparent is that customers often do not agree with what they

see. Being too transparent allows the customers to see results and data that may hinder DMF's

reputation and reliability. With DMF relying heavily on third party technology and platforms to

show success, if that technology fails, or if DMF fails to achieve high ranks or scores based on

these third party services, the customer can see this information and will often complain to DMF

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about the adverse effects and results. It could be beneficial to DMF if they only showed

customers the good information and kept the negative data for in house technicians to resolve. In

addition, DMF could have the information available, but make it more complex for the customer

to view. Currently, DMF sends all information to customers on a weekly basis to their email

inbox. In addition, they allow customers to login to DMF's online platform to view details of the

data. This setup is very different from its competitors, and it makes DMF unique. However, the

competition's method has proven better success and clients of the competition are satisfied.

Furthermore, the general complaints that DMF receives from its customers are information

regarding the negative data DMF is handing over to the customer.

DMF believes that its practice of giving customers full control of the methods used to

generate success for their clients is a successful unique opposition. DMF gives their customers

full access to files, data, and allows them to adjust campaigns that DMF creates and customizes

for them. This however, has allowed DMF's customers to achieve success, and then take their

success either to a competing company at a lower value or use the information to manage their

own campaigns. The end result has been that because of DMF's transparency, customers can

achieve success with DMF and then cancel their services without damaging their marketing,

reputation, or seeing any decrease in sales. Considering DMF generates its revenue from

subscription based customers, and because DMF desires to make each of its customers a long-

term customer, this method of being transparent has and will likely continue causing the

organization losses in income and user loyalty. Unfortunately, while transparency is what

customer’s desire, it has not proven successful for DMF. DMF could produce the same or better

quality services for its customers if it focuses on its overall cost leadership (Haag & Cummings,

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2008). DMF can offer its knowledge and experience to its customers through strategic marketing

plans (Bhatt & Grover, 2005). To gain new customers, DMF could provide products and services

that are unique to its industry and possibly not be so transparent (Carr, 2003; Haag & Cummings,

2008).

Outsourcing

DMF outsources most of the services it offers to its customers. The reason for this is that

it allows them to manage their customers and increase sales to gain new customers. In addition,

DMF outsources because of the financial burden it would be to hire skilled workers. An

organization outsources when it delegates portions of its workload to third party vendors (Haag

& Cummings, 2008). DMF believes that its current business structure is not in the best possible

condition for it to keep all task and projects in-house, or hire the best workers for the task. With

the skills needed and the low cost of its services, it would be nearly impossible to place skilled

individuals under a deserving salary. In addition, there would be the cost of the needed

technology, training, and worker benefits. By outsourcing, the outsourced agents are responsible

for their work benefits, and technology used to achieve results. Outsourcing has many benefits

that allow organizations to cut cost, save time, and use knowledge and resources outside of their

ability (Gottschalk & Solli-Sæther, 2005; Haag & Cummings, 2008; Tafti, 2005).

While outsourcing does save time and helps to lower expenses, it does have its

disadvantages for DMF. DMF currently does not have reliability from its outsourced agents, and

no agent is under any type of contract with the organization. Unfortunately, because of this, the

outsourced agents may take a leave of absence, quit, or simply not complete task for DMF at

their discretion. Outsourcing causes many problems for DMF considering their customer base

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has high expectations and often need quick responses to problems that arise. Problems include

merely needing to change a misspelled word on a website, adjusting marketing campaigns, or

editing a graphic. While the adjustments are minute and should only take a few minutes to

complete, it often takes days because the outsourced agent may have task ahead of DMF.

Outsourcing helps DMF offer additional services and acquire leading-edge technology

(Gottschalk & Solli-Sæther, 2005; Haag & Cummings, 2008; Tafti, 2005). Considering DMF

does not implement the changes in-house, keeping cost down is crucial for the sake of the

customer or the finances of DMF. If the cost is too high and unexpected, DMF has to invoice the

customer for the cost. The problem with this is that this method cripples DMF from being able to

give reliable upfront cost to its customers and it will likely mean that the customer receives

multiple invoices based on the needed adjustments. This method causes confusion and frustration

for the customers, and creates distrust.

Business Model

DMF started its business by marketing and selling its services directly to the consumer.

Because of the involvement needed for completing the task, marketing to B2C became time

consuming and did not pay well because of the lowered prices based on consumers' needs, which

were relatively simple. DMF was able to achieve success by moving its structure to focus on

selling to businesses. B2B allows DMF to generate higher earnings because of the bigger needs

and budgets that businesses offered. Focusing on B2B gave DMF the opportunity it needed by

focusing on higher quality and not a quantity of clients. The fewer customers allowed DMF to

focus its attention on those customers. A disadvantage of this type of quality over quantity client

list is that if a B2B customer discontinued its services with DMF, it could damage the companies

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finances because of the tremendous cost the business would be taking elsewhere. With B2C, a

customer could leave DMF with minimum damage to its finances. When dealing with B2B and

B2C processes, customer satisfaction is paramount to success (Duffy & Dale, 2002).

Knowledge Management

KM is an important strategy that DMF can utilize to help facilitate IT (Chong, Chan, Goh

& Tiwari, 2013). If DMF implements KM and focuses on creating, understanding, managing,

and generating value for its brand, it would likely achieve organizational success (McIver, C.

Lengnick-Hall, M. Lengnick-Hall & Ramachandran, 2013). Currently, DMF lacks knowledge of

its brand, and because of this, they have not had great success with online marketing (McIver et

al., 2013). DMF could work together with its outsourced agents to build knowledge for

understanding its own brand. With these many streams of ideas and innovation, DMF can expand

its knowledge base and generate customer interested, loyalty, and sales (Garstenauer, Blackburn

& Olson, 2014). KM has many benefits, and DMF can use these benefits to improve its

productivity by implementing more KM intangible systems such as databases (Yilmaz, 2007).

With the appropriate technology, DMF can revolutionize its KM objectives (Mohamed,

Stankosky & Murray, 2006). KM can be implemented into the structure of DMF if the

organization can find focused KM activities and incentives that will influence knowledge sharing

(McIver et al., 2013). If DMF can discover and implement what customers want from their

organization and the industry, they should be able to achieve a competitive advantage (McIver et

al., 2013).

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Conclusion

MIS allows organizations to plan, develop, and manage IT (Haag & Cummings, 2008). If

DMF focuses on understanding the benefits of KM, it could achieve its marketing goals

(Mohamed, Stankosky & Murray, 2006). In today's knowledge economy, having a competitive

advantage is paramount to organizational success (McIver et al., 2013). By finding and

understanding the points in which it operates, DMF can effectively identify the most efficient

business exchanges and structure (Cullen & Webster, 2007). Creating new and unique services

could cost DMF additional marketing and management cost (Subramani & Walden, 2001).

However, considering DMF is a technology driven company, aligning additional new services to

their current structure should be easy to implement (Subramani & Walden, 2001). DMF

understands that, in order to create a positive experience, they must have and generate a positive

online presence integrated into IT systems (Duffy & Dale, 2002). DMF can become more

productive with the use of IT, if it is carefully, cautiously, and structurally introduced

(Mohamed, Stankosky & Murray, 2006). To help DMF find the proper market for its business, it

could use a marketing mix, which are tools and techniques that help search and monitor different

marketing campaigns through unique testing (Cullen & Webster, 2007; Haag & Cummings,

2008).

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Impacts of MIS - A Case Study

Business

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