Direct marketing is an area within marketing that is growing rapidly. Many companies has realised the benefits of using direct marketing, such as receiving direct response from customers and gaining a better customer relation. The growth within direct marketing means that traditional mass marketing today face harder competition than ever. This thesis examines and look in to three well recognised Swedish companies use of direct marketing. Our main purpose is to establish how companies spend their marketing budget between direct marketing and traditional marketing activities.

In order to respond to a more complex community planning with increased cooperation and public participation, a common language and a common model to be used as a base for the communication process is needed. The thesis behind this dissertation for a master's degree is that a virtual 3D planning portal would respond to this need. Why and how are explained and described through studies of communication- and perception theory as well as technology and recent research. The introduction concludes that a broad participation and a transparence towards underlying information are important foundations for the coming work with the model. The first four chapters of the theory part show the benefits of using natural signs in our mixed cultural society, instead of the more arbitrary symbols. Using visual landscapes for storing information is motivated by the flexibility of our visual memory and its ability to understand complex connections.

In this essay different aspects of the motif of the criminal have been traced in Lotta Lotass?s Min röst ska nu komma från en annan plats i rummet and Vladimir Nabokov?s Lolita. By seeking its representation in the texts, the intention was to show how themes, stylistic patterns and narrative functions interrelate in the construction of the motif. The perpetrator?s position within the narrative structure and its consequences have also been assessed.By discussing the meta-fictive aspects of the novels I stressed the importance of the reader?s function, arguing the reader?s participation in the construction of the motif..

The purpose with this research is to examine how the green marketing in retail trade can be developed in order to promote the eco-labeled products closer to the consumer.The method for the survey includes interviews with managers of a few retailers and their customers in the industrial sector. The purpose with the interviews was to produce the retailer and the customer?s perspective of products with eco-label on.The research is limited to the region of Västra Götaland.The results from this research indicate that there is a lack of communication between the retailer and the consumer. The consumers don?t think that the product is available.

It is important to understand the process of appraisal of a business in order to establish its value. The purpose of our thesis is to establish which methods and models are used when evaluating a business and investigate the factors that may affect the value and price tag of a business. We have used a qualitative approach by conducting both indepth interviews and a survey as well as reading literature within the field. The main conslusion in our findings is that the common practice of discounted cash flow is widely used when bestowing a monetary value for a business, and in order to raise the value a well established customer relationship was the single most important factor. As far as lowering the value, the answers were of such a wide spread that a single factor could not be attributed.

In this thesis, the impact of collective ratings on customers? perception of a product is examined. The empirical data comes from an experimentally designed survey where the effect of collective ratings is measured in the setting of a traditional advertisement for a feature film. In contrast to what previous research would suggest be to the expected outcome, the authors of this paper concludes that in comparison with alternative designs of advertisements, there are no measurable advantages of including collective ratings in advertisements from the marketers point of view. We find two explanations to the result: (1) people tend to self-report that they are more influenced by collective ratings than they actually are, and (2) the advertisement which lacked a rating could be as attractive due to cultural interpretations of white spaces..

In recent years, increasing emphasis has been placed on streamlining the supply chain. Keeping inventory and warehouses is considered to be a waste of resources. It is however difficult to completely eliminate the need for inventory and warehouses in a supply chain. The purpose of warehousing is to provide a service for the customer. By keeping what the customer demands in inventory it is possible to make a quick delivery when a need arises.

Vi har kommit fram till att chefernas reaktioner inte beror på omorganisationen i sig utan hur förändringsprocessen har gått till. Deras reaktioner speglar ett motstånd mot sättet som förändringsprocessen har genomförts på. Det är personerna i organisationen och inte organisationsformen som är det viktiga för cheferna. Vi tycker att de faktorer som påverkar en lyckad förändringsprocess är medarbetarnas delaktighet, möjlighet till en bra dialog innan beslutet är taget, kommunikation samt känsla av sammanhang..

With the introduction of the Swedish Code for Corporate Governance in December 2004, most companies listed on the major Swedish stock exchanges were required to have a nomination committee responsible for, among other things, evaluating the incumbent board and nominating new candidates. This master thesis aims at analyzing the effects of these nomination committees on institutional investors in their corporate governance, through a qualitative study of 13 interviews. We have found that institutional investors have become more active through their participation in nomination committees and that they have gained more influence over the companies in which they own shares. We believe that in reality nomination committees have more influence over the selection of the board than was intended when the Swedish Code was written..

Studiens syfte är att utveckla storbankernas Retail Banking verksamheter genom att studera detaljhandeln, de nya bankaktörerna och storbankerna. Det empiriska materialet baseras på åtta semistrukturerade intervjuer med chefer inom bank- och detaljhandelsbranschen Studien konstaterar att storbankerna måste utveckla sina Retail Banking verksamheter för att bemöta konkurrensen från andra bankaktörer. Genom förbättrade CRM-system, bättre nyttjande av distributionskanaler och mer försäljningsinriktade organisationer är storbankerna redo för framtidens Retail Banking..

I dagens samhälle kretsar shopping inte bara kring själva produkterna som säljs, utan även om hur butiksmiljön är uppbyggd. Den visuella miljön och hur produkter presenteras har stor påverkan på kunders beteende och inköp. Ljus, ljud och färger påverkar våra sinnen både positivt och negativt, vilket butiker utnyttjar på olika sätt. Syftet med detta uppsatsarbete är att beskriva vad unga kunder (18-25 år) anser ska ingå i ett attraktivt och starkt butikskoncept. Syftet är också att undersöka hur unga kunder upplever likheter respektive skillnader gällande butikskoncept för butikskedjor och produktutvecklande varumärkesleverantörer.

Virtual Communities is an increasingly common phenomenon on the Internet. Most of the Virtual Communities are operated and maintained on a non-profit basis with a direction towards entertainment. However, as more state administrated and commercial services become web-based, we believe that the number of Virtual Communities with a community-based or commercial direction will increase in a near future. In this thesis, we describe our participation in, and studies of, a number of Virtual Communities with focus on the IRC-channel ?3dfxsweden?.

After the deregulation of the Swedish pharmacy market customers can be lost due to stock-outs. Optimization of pharmacy inventory levels has thus become increasingly important. To minimize inventory costs while considering the cost of shortages the latter must be estimated. However, the shortage cost is very difficult to compute. Thus, the aim of this paper is to estimate the pharmacy-specific shortage cost parameter and its relation to other inventory costs.

This study's main objective was to identify adolescents participation in alternative sport activities and which kind of physical activity that was preferred by adolescents who didn't had any earlier experience of sport clubs. The study combined interviews and surveys with the purpose to get both adolescents and sport leaders perspective. A total of five interviews were performed and fifty-four surveys was collected. The results showed that adolescents already physical active were those who participated in alternative sport activities. Who participate in alternative sport activities can depend on habitus, comprehended capital forms and in which social field the sport activities exists..

The purpose of this study has been to investigate advantages and problems with distributionsystem metering in substations. This report is a study in cooperation with Göteborg Energi.The analyses in this report are made for GENAB, a subsidiary company of Göteborg Energi.To analyse advantages and problems in advance is interesting information for GENAB. Theresult of the report could be based upon whether installation of metering in distributionsubstations will be implemented and in that case which kind of measurement that is relevant.The most relevant and strategic place to implement measurement is at the distributionsubstations on the secondary side (400V), this is due to the placement of the currenttransformers. The measurements in this study involve current, voltage, power, power factor,temperature, energy and power quality.Measuring instruments that are relevant to implement are intended to measure current,voltage, power, power factor, energy and, possibly, power quality in the same measuring unit.It is desirable to have a measuring instrument that measures both energy and power qualitybut since it is most often a cost question, it can be established that energy meters have a lowercost.Metering in distribution substations gives a better illustration of the power network. Thisresults in many advantages for GENAB.