Cover Letter

4781 NW Amanda Place

Corvallis, OR 97330

trevor.jenssen.1990@mail.linnbenton.edu

541-207-7560

November 25th, 2016

Mr. Dean Pinto

Head Salesman

Tillamook Beef Jerky

7002 SW Iron Horse St.

Wilsonville, OR 97070-8878

Dear Mr. Pinto,

Evenflo Plumbing, based out of Corvallis, is the fastest-growing plumbing company in Oregon.  No, Mr. Pinto, I am not a plumber.  I am in charge of all of Evenflo’s marketing as well as being warehouse manager.  I make sure that the warehouse is always stocked with inventory and that the plumbers always have what they need to do their jobs efficiently.  

You might not see the correlation to promoting sales in the plumbing industry compared to beef jerky.  But I assure you there are more than meets the eye.  The experience I have gained while working there, I believe it is almost, if not more valuable than the paychecks I receive.

Being only a junior in college and having zero experience in the plumbing industry did not make me the most qualified applicant for my job.  However my boss and I instantly connected on the vision he had for the company.  His vision is innovation.  Plumbers are old school, they fight change; pencil and paper kind of people.  But what we are doing at Evenflo is going to change the game.  

Automation in the warehouse and utilizing the internet to reach out to new customers is a lot of what I do for Evenflo.  If a plumber needs a part from the warehouse he uses a new program I installed.  My boss has also been paying for me to learn how to design and change/maintain our website (Evenfloplumbing.com) through a web designer based in Los Angeles.  

I look forward to being in contact with you and hopefully working together to take Tillamook Beef Jerky to a whole new level.   

Sincerely,

Trevor Jenssen

Enclosures:

LinkedIn:  linkedin.com/in/trevorjenssen

Post Marketing Case Write Up

        I chose to do my marketing case study on BIKETOWN, which is a public transportation system in Portland that was funded by Nike.  BIKETOWN is all throughout Portland, it is a bike share system.  A bike share system means that anyone can ride the bikes (as long as you have the app).  To make BIKETOWN possible, Nike teamed up with Motivate Co. which is the number one provider for bike share systems in the United States, as well as SoBi, who is in charge of providing the bikes for people to ride.

        To be able to ride one of the bikes, all you have to do is download the app on your phone and set up an account.  Once the account is set up you get a pass code to unlock the bikes.  All you do is type your code into to LED screen located on the back of the bike, and you're off!  As far as rates go, there are three options.  The first is the single ride option.  It is only $2.50, but only gets you 30 minutes of riding time.  The second option is a day pass.  A day pass is $12, but comes with 24 hour access to the bikes and 180 minutes of riding time.  The final option is the annual membership.  The membership is $12 a month and comes with unlimited access to the bikes paired with 120 minutes of riding time per day.

       I think it was really smart of Nike to endorse BIKETOWN because it is not only promoting a healthy lifestyle and a somewhat profitable business idea, but the marketing aspect is pretty phenomenal.  Every single bike is decked out with Nike logos, with 1000 bikes, that's 1000 advertisements for Nike that they are being paid for.  It's genius!
  I would say that their value proposition is, "cheap and eco-friendly public transportation."  However I also think it could include something about getting paid for advertising.  I know that the whole idea of marketing is to invest in an idea and the marketing idea eventually ends up paying for itself and more.  But with BIKETOWN it is doing that AND making money while people ride the bikes around.  

Week 5 Blog Post

1.  The person I chose that does a great job of marketing himself is Dan Bilzerian.

2.  All he does is post bad ass pictures and videos of himself on social media.  He promotes his ridiculous lifestyle, pictures with naked women, huge stacks of cash, parties, big guns.  Just look at his Instagram page.

He promotes himself as the ultimate man,  While I may not agree with the image he promoting, you cannot deny that people eat it up and he makes money by showing off himself spending money.  It works because guys want to be like him.  Dan is really just an excellent poker player, but he uses the money he makes off poker to promote himself and through social media he has made himself a celebrity.

3.  One of the things he does so well is how he interacts with his fans through social media.  On twitter he has 1.4 million followers.  It seems like he is always having fans come party with him, having them enter into his sweepstakes, which in hand promote him even more.  It is a technique Dave Kerpen references and Dan does it flawlessly.  On Snapchat, he tells fans to bet on football games through an app, and to use his promotion code to get some kind of deal on the bets.  Every time a fan uses his code, Dan cashes in.

Week 2 Blog Post

Topic 1:
The brand I selected was Hydro Flask.  Their value proposition is that they have the best technology for keeping your drinks either hot or cold.  When I went and looked them up on social media it was nothing but positive remarks about the brand.  One person on Twitter (@jaxieparker)said, "Don't cry because you've lost your second HydroFlask this year. Smile because you're about to buy your third :)." Another person (@coreyrathe) said, "Am I the only one with a really personal attachment to my hydroflask." On Facebook Hydro flask has 4.7 out of 5 stars. It is clear they are doing something right. If I was the brand for Hydro Flask I don't think I would change a thing. Word of mouth is a very powerful marketing tool and it is working wonderfully for Hydro Flask. They have a product that is superior in their field, they don't need to convince you to buy it.

Topic 2:
The article I read was about to former Silicon Valley software engineers and how they made a multi-million dollar company selling yarn. The way they did it was instead of just selling yarn like everyone else, like in a bundle, they created a system that you subscribed to and got yarn sampler bags. Instead of ordering a mess of yarn, you subscribe for either 3, 6, or 9 months and every month you get sent a cloth pouch filled with various types of yarn, new patterns to try, and even needles and crochet hooks. When they first stared this new idea, all they did was put up on ad on Facebook. They had to take the ad down because they got so many subscribers that they couldn't handle it all at once, they company outgrew itself in one night! I think there is a lot you can take away from this ad. It is not necessarily marketing as much as it in entrepreneurship though. Innovation, all they did was come up with a new idea for knitters and they LOVED it. Last year the company brought in profits of more than 8 million dollars. Instead of continuing to sell yarn the way everyone else did, they came up with a new way to do it, slightly different, nothing too crazy; and it has made them millions,

Article Link.

Week 1 Marketing Blog

Topic One

I enrolled in this class because spring term Rob suggested I take this class.  It is teaching me how to be better at my job.  I am the marketing coordinator for Evenflo Plumbing, I have little to no marketing experience and have been teaching myself as I go.  I hope this course will help me become even better at my job as i continue to help the company grow and expand.

I am currently a marketing major and if i get my GPA up enough I hope to study abroad and double major with international business (keep your fingers crossed!).

I am really wanting to learn how to help my company grow.  The plumbing industry is a tough place for marketing.  I want to be original and creative but need some inspiration and guidance.

There are a few things I really love.  First is my little brother, Ethan. he is an 8th grader here in Corvallis.  I have been able to coach him in all of his sports and watch him grow into an incredible young man.  At age 7 he said he wanted to be an aeronautical engineer... c'mon man slow down!!  Something Ethan and me are really able to connect on is our love for baseball.  I am a die hard San Francisco Giants fan and played baseball all the way until my sophomore year of college.  Ethan wants to play college baseball and I get to work with him and help guide him to take the right steps so he can do that.  I am also very passionate about my friends.  I am one of those people that doesn't have a ton of friends but that is by choice.  I am very picky about who i associate myself with, but the people in my life I would do anything for, and I know that they would do the same.

Topic 2

The article I read was talking about how all of the new tech entrepreneurs entering the market has completely changed the face of marketing.  It has made people more inclined to try new things and take bigger risks with their marketing ideas and plans.  It also talked about how everyone wants to be a part of the new tech market.  They gave the example of reigning MVP for the NBA Stephen Curry, is also the owner of not one, but two new tech start ups.  With the rate that the new tech industry is growing it has completly changed how people are going about marketing for it.  Long term strategies are becoming less of a thing and are being replaced with sporadic and more experimental approaches.  At the end of the article the author gave a list of suggestions for people that are trying to strive in the new tech industry,  This section, to me, was what i took the most from.  I think it is pretty obvious that marketing has been changed and continues to change everyday.  But how do you stay ahead of the curve?  How do you make sure your experimental ideas for marketing and detrimental to the future of your company?  The number one thing the author suggested was to "obsess with customer needs."  Your customers tell you what you want and it is your job to provide that.  It might not be the new and shiny product but if it is what the customers want, it will strive and be more profitable.  The other point of emphasis I thought was really important was to "fear the easy path."  No one said it is going to be easy, it shouldn't be.  Embrace the struggle and grind instead of trying to find the easy way out and you will be better off in the long run.