Products

Scope and brands

The corporation markets specific brand names to different market segments.

Its Business/Corporate class represent brands where the company advertises emphasizes long
life-cycles, reliability, and serviceability. Such brands include:

 OptiPlex (office desktop computer systems)

 Vostro (office/small business desktop and notebook systems)
 n Series (desktop and notebook computers shipped with Linux or FreeDOS installed)
 Latitude (business-focused notebooks)
 Precision (workstation systems and high-performance notebooks),[35]
 PowerEdge (business servers)
 PowerVault (direct-attach and network-attached storage)
 PowerConnect (network switches)
 Dell/EMC (storage area networks)
 EqualLogic (enterprise class iSCSI SANs)

Dell's Home Office/Consumer class emphasizes value, performance, and expandability. These
brands include:

 Inspiron (budget desktop and notebook computers)

 Studio (mainstream desktop and laptop computers)
 XPS (high-end desktop and notebook computers)
 Studio XPS (high-end design-focus of XPS systems and extreme multimedia capability)
 Alienware (high-performance gaming systems)
 Adamo (high-end luxury laptop)

Dell's Peripherals class includes USB keydrives, LCD televisions, and printers; Dell monitors
includes LCD TVs, plasma TVs and projectors for HDTV and monitors. Dell UltraSharp is
further a high-end brand of monitors.

Dell service and support brands include the Dell Solution Station (extended domestic support
services, previously "Dell on Call"), Dell Support Center (extended support services abroad),
Dell Business Support (a commercial service-contract that provides an industry-certified
technician with a lower call-volume than in normal queues), Dell Everdream Desktop
Management ("Software as a Service" remote-desktop management),[36] and Your Tech Team (a
support-queue available to home users who purchased their systems either through Dell's website
or through Dell phone-centers).

Discontinued products and brands include Axim (PDA; discontinued April 9, 2007),[37]
Dimension (home and small office desktop computers; discontinued July 2007), Dell Digital
Jukebox (MP3 player; discontinued August 2006), Dell PowerApp (application-based servers),
and Dell Omniplex (desktop and tower computers previously supported to run server and
desktop operating systems).

Dell operated as a pioneer in the "configure to order" approach to manufacturing — delivering

individual PCs configured to customer specifications. In contrast, most PC manufacturers in
those times delivered large orders to intermediaries on a quarterly basis.[38]

To minimize the delay between purchase and delivery, Dell has a general policy of
manufacturing its products close to its customers. This also allows for implementing a just-in-
time (JIT) manufacturing approach, which minimizes inventory costs. Low inventory is another
signature of the Dell business model — a critical consideration in an industry where components
depreciate very rapidly.[39]

Green initiatives

Dell became the first company in the information technology industry to establish a product-
recycling goal (in 2004) and completed the implementation of its global consumer recycling-
program in 2006.[49] On February 6, 2007, the National Recycling Coalition awarded Dell its
"Recycling Works" award for efforts to promote producer responsibility.

Marketing

Dell advertisements have appeared in several types of media including television, the Internet,
magazines, catalogs and newspapers. Some of Dell Inc's marketing strategies include lowering
prices at all times of the year, offering free bonus products (such as Dell printers), and offering
free shipping in order to encourage more sales and to stave off competitors. In 2006, Dell cut its
prices in an effort to maintain its 19.2% market share. However, this also cut profit-margins by
more than half, from 8.7 to 4.3 percent. To maintain its low prices, Dell continues to accept most
purchases of its products via the Internet and through the telephone network, and to move its
customer-care division to India and El Salvador.

by selling computer systems directly to customers, we could deliver the most effective computing
solutions to meet their needs. Today Dell connects with more than 5.4 million customers every day —
on the phone, in person, on Dell.com and, increasingly, through social networking sites.
Our business is aligned to address the unique needs of large enterprises, public institutions (healthcare,
education and government), small and medium businesses, and consumers.

Corporate IT users say we’re number one in customer satisfaction for services that include on-site
expertise, on-site response time and phone support.

From Connected Classrooms to Virtual Labs, more primary schools and universities than ever
are deploying Dell™ education-specific technology solutions, making us the top provider of
laptops and desktops to schools in several geographies around the world.

As the number one healthcare IT Services provider in the world, Dell helps the medical
profession unleash the power of technology to help improve patient care.

We’re the number one provider of PCs to large enterprises around the world and the number one
provider to public sector customers in the U.S. We do business with 98 percent of Fortune 500
corporations.

As the number two provider of computer support to education customers, we are committed to

helping administrators, teachers and students harness the power of IT to advance learning.

Ten million small businesses work with us, and we’re the number one provider of computers to
small and medium businesses in the U.S.

Our customers can choose to do business with more than 60,000 partners registered with Dell
and certified to operate as our agents.

Making a Difference for Our Communities and the Planet

Consumers around the world can recycle their Dell computer equipment for free. To date, we
have recycled more than 275 million pounds of computer equipment.

We’re committed to keep approximately 20 million pounds of computer packaging materials out
of landfills from 2008 to 2012.

Dell was the first PC manufacturer to ship computers in packaging materials made from bamboo,
a highly renewable and compostable material.

We power eight facilities in the U.S. and Europe with 100 percent renewable energy.

Using the Power of the Internet to Connect With Customers

Dell started selling computers on Dell.com in 1996 — and today we have more than four million
visits to the site every day, resulting in an order placed online every two seconds.

Today Dell.com reaches customers in 166 countries and 34 languages around the world.

Dell helps power three of the top five Internet search engines.

Dell is the second most respected brand for breadth and depth of social media activities.

More than 3.5 million members belong to the Dell social Web community, which includes
Dell.com communities and Dell outlets on Twitter, LinkedIn, Facebook, SINA, Orkut (Brazil)
and other sites.

In 2007, Dell launched IdeaStorm™, where people could share ideas and vote on the ones they
liked — Dell has implemented more than 400 of these ideas to date.

Visitors to Dell.com can read about and contribute to more than 100,000 product reviews.

Email segmentation and targeting options

Learning from 6 layered targeting options used by online

retailers that can be applied to any business
There are many different levels in sophistication of targeting for email marketing. In this post I’ll
run through some of the most common examples used by retailers since I think they can often be
applied to companies who don’t sell online like relationship-building or B2B companies.

the segmentation approaches here can be used to other forms of online targeting through digital
marketing, particularly website personalisation or display ad network remarketing.

These are the six targeting options.

1. Customer profile characteristics (demographics).

2. Customer value – current and future.

3. Customer lifecycle groups.

4. Customer behaviour in response and purchase (observed and predicted).

5. Customer multi-channel behaviour (channel preference).

6. Customer personas including psychographics

Market segmentation is the fancy marketer's term for dividing up the pool of potential customers based
on shared characteristics. So a consumer marketer might segment markets based on demographics
(such as age or gender) while a business-to-business (B2B) marketer might use firmographics (such as
company size or industry).

At first, you might not see how the Web can differentiate your product. After all, you make what
you make, and the Web can only sell it. This is true, but only up to a point. The Web excels in
making vastly complex choices simpler, so your Web site can offer hundreds or thousands of
variations on your product that can be customized in ways that would be expensive or impossible
any other way.

Think about how Dell sells laptop computers—they let customers "build" their own computers
on their Web site. By providing an easy way of selecting how much memory or disk space is
desired, Dell simplifies a very complex task and provides exactly what the customer requested.
Talk about self-segmentation! Dell can reach customers that want a three-to-five pound laptop
built for games for under $1000—and show them exactly what they are looking for at the
moment they want it. The Web is a great way to mask the complexity of a customized
manufacturing process.

But you don't need to have Dell's customized manufacturing process to provide a similar
experience to your customer. Retail Web sites can provide similar choices to customers without
manufacturing anything. Look at Exhibit 1-1 to see how strikingly similar the experience can be.
Circuit City allows customers to narrow down their choice of laptop using almost any
characteristic (price, memory size, disk space, processor, brand, and many more) by listing all
the choices and letting customers click what they want.

The Web allows a nearly endless number of variations to be chosen, which is the equivalent of
custom manufacturing. So even though manufacturers and retailers might take different
approaches, the customer's ability to get exactly what is desired doesn't change one iota. (For
some reason, iotas never come in pairs.) A customer experience that formerly demanded a
massive investment in custom manufacturing now needs not much more than a Web server. In
Chapter 5, "The New Customer Relations," we'll see how you might provide this experience for
your customer.

So what's the big change here? Market segmentation is becoming market personalization. You
don't target markets anymore; you target individuals personally, using technology to do it. And
you can't separate sales from marketing anymore—that clear dividing line is gone. You need to
be ready to speak to customers as individually as possible from start to finish and to offer them
the exact product they want, not just what's "on the truck."

The ImageWatch program is a key communication tool

between Dell and its institutional and enterprise customers.
Customers can use the program to plan
upcoming technology and product transitions and to
manage images more efficiently. For more information
about the Dell Premier Page and ImageWatch programs,
customers should contact their account teams.

http://www.docstoc.com/docs/17210671/Dell-Corporation-network-marketing-strategy

Dell Communication

I got reminded By Robert to take another look at the Dell blog, a further company that is
changing tactics and attitudes with regards to the online world. From a company that seemed to
ignore online commentary to one that is making a serious effort to improve perceptions, Dell has
come a long way.

One commenter on Robert’s post said:

So, Dell’s plan is to find dissatisfied customers in the “blogosphere”, via Second Life, and get
feedback at CES???? What genius at Dell thought this up? That will likely reach probably 1% of
their customers. Great plan!

But those 1% may have a far greater influence. Look back at Rick’s experience last year, sitting
in a cafe:

I happened to be sitting across from a couple of bank tellers from TD Canada Trust, the bank in
our building. These two ladies I’d seen before so I knew where they worked.

Lady one: I was going to buy a new Dell but did you hear about Jeff Jarvis and the absolute hell
he is going through with them.

Lady two: Yeah, I know the IT guy told me that the cobler blog was recommending we stay away
from Dell.
Okay, after you are done laughing at this; laughing at Scoble’s name being mangled, laughing at
two random bank tellers talking about some one line blog entry about some guy pissed off about
his Dell experience; after you are done: Pay Attention.

Now, blogging won’t help fix the problems – if you have bad customer service

or a bad product then starting a blog is not going to help. But it is one further channel that can be used
to influence your customers and to give them a voice.

End-to-End Efficiency for a More Productive Organization

Getting things done is no longer enough. You have to do the job right and do more with less.

Dell™ Business Process Services can help you identify business process inefficiencies and
implement effective solutions. With our extensive experience and market-leading automation
technologies, Dell can help you:

 Streamline operations
 Improve productivity
 Ensure compliance
 Put valuable resources to better use
 Keep business moving around the clock
 Reduce costs

Customer Management  

Improve customer relationship management through a comprehensive contact management

solution.