SMALL BUSINESS VIDEO SERIES

Dr. Ed Rockey, a professor of applied behavioral science at Pepperdine’s Graziadio School of Business and Management, is no stranger to the strategic value of brainstorming. He is an expert on innovation, creative problem solving, communication, stress management, and leadership who has helped such corporations as Procter & Gamble and Prudential Insurance, as well as coached numerous executives and entrepreneurs. In the following series of short videos, Professor Rockey walks through how one conducts a brainstorming session to ensure lasting value.

• Starting a Brainstorming Session
• How Individual Styles Affect the Meeting
• Maintaining the Momentum
• Tools That Enhance Brainstorming Sessions
• Closing A Brainstorming Session

Starting a Brainstorming Session

Three keys to initiating a successful brainstorming session are a creative icebreaker, clear ground rules and consensus about the problem.

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SMALL BUSINESS VIDEO SERIES

• Customer Segmentation and “Unsegmentable” Markets
• How To Segment Markets
• Know Who You Are and the Benefits of Segmentation

Understanding customer segmentation and “unsegmentable” markets can be critical for the success of a small business. In the following video Dr. Andrea Scott, an assistant professor of marketing at the Graziadio School, explains customer segmentation and answers the question, “What if my market doesn’t seem segmentable?”

Everyone is not your customer and markets can always be segmented. Avoid wasting resources and increase profits through accurate customer segmentation.

Remember, seemingly “unsegmentable” markets typically apply to wildly popular brands like Facebook and Google.

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RESEARCH

Several of the older Graziadio Business Review articles have a long shelf life and are often visited by our readership. We wondered what the authors would share if the article were printed today. In the latest GBR issue, authors went back to eight of our most popular and most timely articles to give us an update. The authors explore how the economy and world events have impacted the information from their original article. continue

FACULTY

John Buckingham, a member of the practitioner faculty of marketing, has been appointed to the board of directors of Orange County’s newest online legal service, Legal Genie. As part of his duties as a board member, Professor Buckingham will work with private equity firms to secure funding for the future of Legal Genie.

Buckingham has been a successful corporate and entrepreneurial executive during his 30-year career starting a new division for Colgate Palmolive while still a MBA student in Boston. John has held both CEO and CMO positions in private and public companies, including West Chemical of Princeton, New Jersey and Intoximeters of St. Louis, Missouri. Buckingham has a BS with distinction in Pharmacy from Purdue and holds a MBA from Harvard. continue

Dr. David Ralph, Professor of Marketing, has been elected to the board of directors of Lancaster, CA-based Simulations Plus, Inc., a leading provider of simulation and modeling software for pharmaceutical discovery and development.

Dr. Ralph received his Ph.D. from the University of Southern California following bachelor’s and master’s degrees in Business Administration and Management from Pepperdine University. Dr. Ralph has taught courses on marketing and has provided marketing consulting services to organizations worldwide. Dr. Ralph will replace Dr. Richard Weiss on the Audit, Compensation, and Nominating committees of the board.

Simulations Plus, Inc., is a premier developer of groundbreaking drug discovery and development simulation and modeling software, which is licensed to and used in the conduct of drug research by major pharmaceutical, biotechnology, agrochemical, and food industry companies worldwide. The firm also provides a productivity tool called Abbreviate! for PCs as well as an educational software series for science students in middle and high schools known as FutureLab™.