Essay on Business Marketing

In 2004 Virgin Australia created a non-profit foundation called Virgin Unite to which it unites people and entrepreneurial ideas to they then create opportunities for a better world. Over the last decade, partners have inspired and raised an amount of magnificent relationships such as Ocean Unite, Carbon War Room and The Branson Centres for Entrepreneurship to which these groups have encouraged the change in the world that is needed. Branson says he spends his time now working with Virgin Unite to ensure that he creates a positive difference that is needed in the world. He supports the projects that he is truly passionate about to being an advocate for issues such as gay rights and using the power he has to raise his voice to the issues that

Discuss what is meant by the term “customer orientation”. Illustrate with examples how companies demonstrate their customer orientation by reference to at least two elements of the marketing mix.

Richard Branson is a billionaire who is creating a spaceship that is designed to take private customers up to space. . Branson has focused on his idea of taking people out into space within the last ten years. In this time frame, the company has been testing and building a spaceship that would bring six out of the 700 customers who paid for the trip out to space beforehand. These tickets started off costing 200,000 dollars, but then the price was raised to 250,000 dollars. Now, Virgin Galactic has been testing their spaceship through a series of test flights. If the tests have positive results, the spaceship would be able to be used for commercial flights.

Virgin Australia was established in early 2000, with operations comprising of two aircrafts flying one route and 200 employees. Since this, the company has greatly expanded its operations embracing a true national domestic network and then further expansion into the international flights by 2009 (Virgin Australia, 2012). Today Virgin Australia operates under the chairman of the Virgin group Sir Richard Branson and is owned by Virgin Blue Holdings, formally Virgin Blue Airlines. Under the brand name is V Australia and Pacific Blue, from which Virgin Australia flies its main aircraft

A dropout at the age of 16, Richard Branson pursued his goals which in turn, led to the introduction of Virgin Records. From there, he has expanded his company into different ventures like Virgin Galactic, a space-tourism company, and Virgin Atlantic, an airline company, but as time did pass, he was struggling to keep his businesses financially stable so he sold Virgin Records eventually to THORN EMI. It has crushed him but he was determined to follow his dreams and continued to set up different music ventures.

In 1992 Richard sold Virgin Music to Thorn EMI and invested the proceeds into Virgin Atlantic, improving on an already great service. In the same year we launched the first super economy service that went on to become our award winning Premium Economy. We spent most of the Nineties buying new planes, expanding our route network and generally breaking new ground in passenger service, both on the ground and in the air. In 1999 Richard sold a 49% stake in the company to Singapore Airlines valuing us at a minimum of £1.225bn. In the same year, for services to entrepreneurship Richard received a knighthood

This new territory caused the first major shift in the strategic thinking of Virgin as the airline was capital intensive and by 1985 airfares price war and the investment needs of virgin Atlantic (the airline) had taken its toll on Virgin finances with the result that publicly listed to raise more equity. Virgin’s music, retail, and vision business was brought together to form the Virgin Group and 35% of its equity was listed. Branson was not happy with this new arrangement because of the control that shareholders would hold on direction and this was not in keeping with his nonconformist style and also that he felt that his organization was misunderstood and undervalued by so called experts. The organization culture at Virgin was also at risk in this new arrangement and he seized the opportunity presented by the 1987 stock market crash to buy out external shareholders.

His role in the Virgin brand is very crucial and without there would not be any Virgin brand. He has taken a lot of chances that many would not take and he has made himself a front figure of the company, which means that he does all of these events and adventures, not only because he like to discover the world in an extreme way, he also does it because it gives the company such a high value of marketing. When he tried to cross the Atlantic Ocean the first time, he failed and had to be rescued by a helicopter. That event made a huge media coverage all around the world and pictures of the Virgin Atlantic Challenger, which is the boat where the Virgin name

It is estimated that if Branson's stakes in the various companies were put on the public markets today, they would be worth approximately $3 billion (Time Magazine, 5 March 2001). Since Virgin has such a diverse range of businesses and international activities, the company presents a challenging study in seeking to understand the overall Virgin strategy, critical success factors and why specific Virgin companies were launched. Also of interest are some of Virgin's rare failures and apparent present difficulties. The choice of Virgin as a target company presents additional challenges since it is not a publicly listed company, and consequently there is a limited amount of thorough facts and analysis available.

Entrepreneurship is one of the hardest investments to make because it requires more than just money. Consequently, it is also an ownership investment with extremely large potential returns. By creating a product or service and selling it to people who want it, entrepreneurs can make huge personal fortunes. Bill Gates, founder of Microsoft and one of the world's richest men, is a prime example.

His extreme sense of adventure is also a behavior that he is well known for. He is not afraid of failure but also has the attitude of "you don't know until you try". This has been reflected in some of his personal and business adventures that he has become famous for. In 1987 he was the first to successfully cross the Atlantic Ocean in a hot air balloon and also was the lead sponsor for the GlobalFlyer, the first aircraft to fly non-stop around the world. He created Virgin Airways and Virgin Records, and after words he sought to join the railway business which many thought was a risky adventure. Still he persevered against odds and was able to keep Virgin Trains alive in a struggling industry. His most recent "risky business" is a deal he made to start Virgin Galactic, offering to take passengers into orbital space by 2007.

Virgin Group Ltd. is a British multinational branded venture capital conglomerate created by entrepreneur Richard Branson. Its core business areas are travel, performing and lifestyle, and it also achieves ventures in financial facilities, transport, health care, food and drink, media and telecommunications; together, Virgin 's businesses contain of more than 400 businesses worldwide.

One might also argue that his extroversion is also well documented from his hot air balloon rides to the very name he selected to represent his brand. A brand name like "Virgin" demands recognition just for the name itself and I'm sure in 1970's England it drew the attention. Virgin seems to have a knack for doing things in a sort of "fun" way no matter what the product. When you think of Virgin Mobile, you think about how easy they made it for anyone (everyone) to have cell service. Similarly, Virgin Atlantic seems to make travel for anyone easier and a possibility by offering lower fares to many destinations. You imagine a younger hip executive flying Virgin Atlantic, while a stodgier older executive would fly British Airways. Even ventures that failed, such as Virgin Vodka, still conjure up the idea of fun. It's become "a way of life brand". In Good to Great, Collins discusses how Philip Morris found success when it diversified away from tobaccos by staying close to "sinful" products such as coffee, chocolates and beer. In a similar way, Virgin has branded its easy, fun, energetic way about doing things. We even joked in class that a Virgin bank might be the fun bank to transact business.

He left school at the tender age of sixteen. His passion was to create Student Magazine. He later did this with the help of his friend. From here, he introduced Virgin Records in the course of the 1970s (Hart, 2014). Branson became the pioneer of the Virgin Group. During the 1980s, he created Virgin Atlantic airline. The 1990s witnessed the introduction of Virgin Mobile and Virgin Trains. He remains one of the most renowned businessmen in the UK. Moreover, he is a force to reckon with as far as global business is concerned. Of great significance is the fact that he epitomizes the face of entrepreneurship.

Richard Branson is from a middle-class background. With no family connection to any of the businesses he has undertaken, he achieved success with Virgin Records, founding the Virgin Group from scratch after failing with various ventures previously.