This process can become complicated if the company of interest is involved in many industries. More markets will equal more variables. As mentioned in my last post, GE is one such company. They manufacture pretty much everything besides fresh produce.

Yet, keeping media in mind, we can focus now on their consumer goods. Why? Well, sites like Twitter, Instagram, and TikTok are tools that empower the average citizen to engage with people as well as corporations. Indeed, the primary reasons that enterprises participate on these platforms and use this service is to raise their engagement and boost brand relations.

So, what type of General Electric products most often fall into the hands of everyday people? Wishful thinking says plane engines, but most of us are probably buying their washing machines and dryers.  Maybe someday we’ll have our own private jets, but for now we just want light bulbs. When consumers think GE, we think household appliances.

How large is the household appliance manufacturing industry & how does GE fit into its landscape? According to IBISWorld, 116 companies operate in the industry. They produce $19Bn in annual revenues and about $1.2Bn in yearly profits. GE is the industry’s poster child, controlling over 20% of market share. Annual growth in that market from 2012-2017 hovered around 2.1%, but that figure is projected to fold over the next five years.  How can we account for that downgrade?

Industry drivers are the variables that companies consider when entering markets or planning for their future. IBISWorld lays the top four of these forces out as housing starts, price of household appliances, per capita disposable income, and strength of the dollar. Housing start numbers convey new home construction. As this figure goes up, so does the need for washing machines, dryers, and dishwashers. Pricing those appliances is tricky, and this problem defines the second market driver. Maximize your online presence and improve your website’s performance with the help of free seo tools.

As the cost of appliances rise, consumers tend to buy less of them. Yet, in thriving economies where new homes are constantly being built, expensive price tags might produce higher revenues for manufacturers. This risk is buoyed by the third driver: per capita disposable income.

In other words, how much money is left over after consumers cover rent, bills, and groceries? When we have room to spend, we can buy things like new house with fancy General Electric dishwashers.  These buying habits often depend upon the fourth market driver: the strength of our dollar.

A strong US dollar is generally bad news for appliance manufacturers. It is associated with a lower demand of exports from abroad and an increase of demand for foreign-made appliances at home. By contrast, a weak dollar is associated with increased export demand outside the US and a lower demand for imports within the country making more important local companies that offer Shipping Container Hire services.

Considering these four factors together, we can now re-examine annual industry growth. The 2.1% growth between 2012-2017 is surprisingly strong for such an old industry. These years are coming in the midst of an economic turnaround following the Great Recession.

Consequently, we would expect housing starts and per capita disposable income to have increased at rates that supported the purchasing of more home appliances. At the same time, it is also fair to point out that these drivers should revert back to normal levels. This is likely what’s causing the low growth expectations given for the next five years.

Next time, we’ll look at how GE actually utilizes marketing strategies like commercial fleet graphics and social media to increase customer engagement. These includes things like segmentation, method of engagement, and content strategy. Using Zerobounce free email verification services can also help businesses achieve higher engagement rates, reduced bounce rates, and increased ROI.

The post The Media Court: Market Drivers for General Electric appeared first on KRUI Radio.

Guess who’s back and better than ever.

I am but for others, not so very much. Just when I thought final exam week couldn’t get any worse, reality once again one-upped me and

proved me wrong. However, I couldn’t help but resist to share more testimonials of horror stories, during final exam week, that I have been receiving and ultimately decided to keep the collection going.

As a quick suggestion, if you think your week is going bad, just take a moment to read these accounts and I’ll bet your change your mind rather quickly. I know I did.

David, Male, 4^th year student, Major: English

“I’m a pretty sensitive guy and I’m not afraid to show my emotions.

During my last final of the semester, I was sitting next to a girl who was freaking out before and during the exam. She kept asking me if I studied and if I was prepared for the exam while going on about how she is prepared because she studied for it all weekend and had an amazing flashcard set to prove it. I personally, was pretty concerned with this exam because it was one of those that can either make or break your grade and man did I not want it to break my grade. I will admit that I didn’t study for it as

much as I should have but enough to get by and hopefully score above the curve. Halfway through the exam, the girl started to mumble to herself and suddenly started crying out of nowhere. I didn’t know what to do because the TAs were looking directly at us like we were insane so I leaned over and whispered to her that everything was going to be okay and that this exam isn’t the end of her life. She turned to me and whispered back how this exam is sixty percent of our final grade and it’s not curved.

Fuck, she was right.

Looking down at my test, I started to cry too because my last five answers were C and if that isn’t a sign of failure, then I don’t know what is.”

Anonymous Male, 3^rd year student, Major: Physics

“I had a complete mental block and forgot how to spell the word “of” sadly enough on one of my exams. Halfway through my extended response answer, I stopped and stared at the odd word and kept saying it over and over in my head debating whether or not I spelled it right. When that wasn’t working, I moved on to whispering it silently to

myself, low enough so the weird TA wouldn’t hear me because he was already watching me like a hawk. In short, I spent majority of my exam rewriting my response so any sentence wouldn’t require the use of the word “of.”

When I left my exam, I asked my roommate how to spell “of” and he looked at me like I lost my damn mind.”

Rebecca, Female, 4^th year student, Major: Journalism

“Nothing is worse than pulling an all-nighter in the library to finish a paper you were working on all semester and discovering that the university wiped your desktop, erasing your entire paper, and leaving no trace of it behind.”

Anonymous Male, 2^nd year student, Major: Business

“I can honestly say that I am the loudest sneezer you will ever meet in your life.

During one of my exams, I got that familiar urge in my nose to sneeze but I held it back because I have a very loud and obnoxious sneeze and I didn’t want to disturb anyone taking the exam. Wiggling my nose and rubbing it with my palm, I did virtually everything to hold it back until the girl in front of me flipped her hair and I got a nose full of her flowery perfume. Unable to hold it back, I closed my eyes and prepared for the worst. I sneezed so loud the TA dropped a stack of exams, the professor stopped everything she was doing, and the girl in front of my shrieked out of fear.

Let’s just say for the rest of the exam I kept my eyes on my own exam and refused to meet the TA’s eyes when I handed her my exam.”

Anonymous Female, 3^rd year student, Major: Health & Human Physiology

“Let me tell you the story of how I had to take a final exam even after exam week was technically

over. Being the wonderful student I am, I decided to take a foreign language this year for the hell of it because one: I thought it would be exciting to speak another language besides English. And two, because I needed the gen-ed requirement; you know, being a 3^rd year student and all, I’m kind of running out of time. Anyway, that’s besides the point but overall this semester was fairly kind to me; however, my professor, on the other hand, was something else.

As the semester was coming to a close, it was only natural for me to begin stressing over the final exam because it included an oral exam segment, which if I do say so myself, is more difficult than being able to read and write a language. This oral was different from the last because instead of it being individual, it involved a partner. Big shocker there. My partner was cool and we had a mutual understanding that we both wanted to do fairly good on this exam so we teamed up and choose a time to meet our professor to do the oral part of the exam.

This is where it all began.

At first, we were supposed to meet our professor, the Friday before final exam week officially began, at her office around five. My loyal partner and I showed up at five on the dot, but can you guess what happened?

The professor never showed.

I know what you’re thinking: The professor never showed up? That’s preposterous.

Well, let me do the honor and inform you that the professor indeed never showed up. My partner and I just figured that the professor was running a little late but after about thirty minutes of waiting I was ready to go home and go to sleep. Not wanting to wait around the empty deserted hallway in Phillips Hall, my partner and I shook hands and decided to leave together and just email the professor with our heads held high. Later that evening, I received an email from the professor apologizing for missing our exam and asking to rescheduled. I don’t know why the professor asked if we can reschedule. I mean, we kind of have to do the exam one way or another, it’s like ten percent of our grade.

Anyway, we rescheduled for a later time in the week, final exam week to be exact, and agreed to meet then. Now, as my partner and I walk to the professor office ready to get this over with, can you guess what happened?

The professor didn’t show, again.

I’m serious. No joke. This is not a drill.

Not knowing what to do, my partner and I both stood outside the professors like lonely lost

puppies debating life and wondering what our purpose in the world. After say an hour, I said fuck this shit and left. I emailed the professor and was like seriously, what is going on. As Friday approached and students were returning home for the holiday, I still hadn’t heard from my professor so being the adult I am, I packed my shit and went home.

But the story doesn’t end here

Yup, I got more.

As I’m sitting at home watching basic TV because my family is too poor to afford real cable, I get an email from my professor apologizing about missing my oral exam again and asking if we can do it over the phone.

Can you guess what I did?

I picked up my phone and dialed my partner’s number then the professor’s.

I haven’t been on three-way since I was in high school.”

You poor souls.

To conclude this collection for this semester, I want to thank all of the individuals who submitted their horror stories to me and I hope that maybe life will just be a little bit more merciful when it comes to you.

You guys definitely deserve it.

For daily updates on my catastrophes, follow me on:

Twitter
Instagram
Tumblr

The post Walk In My Shoes: Final Exam Week Horror Stories Part II appeared first on KRUI Radio.

Take a breath. The nightmare is over.

As the end of the semester comes to a close and the majority of us are returning home for the holidays with the hope of receiving love and affection from our loved ones, after the hellish week that we’ve all endured, I want to take a minute to commemorate some of the nightmares we’ve all experienced or simply heard of. I will admit, that during final exam week here at our beloved University of Iowa, we all have our own horror stories; however, there will

always be those select few individuals whose horror stories will top our own and make them look like a walk in the park, and as exams can cause a lot of stress the use of thc products like Delta 8 flower can be helpful to make us feel a little more relaxed.

After reaching out to the student body, I have gathered a wonderful collection of final exam horror stories that I am more than happy to share and laugh at while ignoring my own past week transgressions.

Anonymous Female, 3^rd Year Student, Major: Microbiology

“I had a seven thirty final so I stayed the night with a friend that lived on campus because I was afraid that I wouldn’t either make it my exam on time in the morning because of the snow, or that I simply wouldn’t wake up and oversleep like I always do. Well, it’s safe to say that I did wake up for my exam in the morning and made it on time; five points for Gryffindor; however, before I left for my exam, I realized I didn’t have any pencils with me so I bummed two off my friend. I put them in my back pocket and left by sending thousands of prayers up to God to let me score above the curve because let’s face it, stripping is not a career choice for me.

Anyway, my friend’s apartment was about a two-minute walk from my exam location so I got there rather quickly as you can image. Strategically picking my seat in the auditorium, I sat down and went to grab the pencils out of my back pocket so they wouldn’t ruin my jeans but they were gone. In the two-minute walk that it took me to get there, I lost both of my pencils, hope of passing my class, and my soul. I didn’t know what to do so I sat there like a sad lost puppy desperately looking around the auditorium for someone I knew to ask for a pencil.

God must have heard my prayers because a girl in my discussion sat behind me so I asked her. The funny thing is that she gave me that look like, “Really, you show up to an exam without a pencil.” I quickly explained myself to her and she laughed and gave me a pencil. Yes, “gave” because she wasn’t getting it back.

I used that same pencil on the rest of my exams.”

Anonymous Female, 4^th year student, Major: Communication Studies

“I am a horrible test taker so I naturally work myself up but this year, I did the absolutely fucking most. I had a written final exam and I was running late so I left my apartment with only my ID, hopes, and aspirations. I ran halfway across campus in nothing but my pajamas and a thin jacket ducking and weaving the depression in the atmosphere to make it to my exam in one piece. Sliding into the classroom with five minutes to spare, like the suave person I am, I take a seat in the back as the professor begins to pass out the exam. When he gets to me, he hands me the exam and that’s when I realize I don’t have a pencil. I immediately begin sweating and shaking so I make my way to the front of the room to ask him for a pencil but out of nowhere, I swear to God nowhere, I passed out and the next thing I knew I was waking up in an ambulance on my way to the hospital.

Turns out I had an anxiety attack but the professor still sent my exam with me.”

Brian, Male, 3^rd year student, Major: Engineering

“I hate Iowa in the winter because not only is it cold but icy, too.

I had a seven thirty final Monday morning. When I left my dorm it was cold and ice was everywhere, but I had my coat and boots on so everything was all good. My exam was in the EPB oddly enough so I decided to walk down the hill directly behind the old capitol building, but that was the worst decision I have ever made in my life, like seriously, what was I thinking. Walking down the first set of stairs then the second awkwardly short second set, I stepped down and hit a patch of ice and slipped. Without thinking, I reached out and grabbed some poor girl and pulled her down with me. Screaming, we both fell halfway down the hill on that patch of ice holding onto each other for dear life

When we came to slow stop, we both made eye contact and laughed. Helping her stand, I apologized profusely and she told me it was okay and to not worry about it. When we went to part ways, we both ended up heading to the same exam so we walked together and chit chatted about how screwed we both were with this exam.

Let’s just say my grades went downhill as I did.”

Ashley, Female, 2^st year student, Major: Psychology

“The worst thing, other than not showing up to a final exam, is showing up to an exam for a course you never took.

Was the exam canceled?

Was the exam location moved?

Did I simply lose my mind?

Was the exam take home?

That’s right, you guessed it, the exam location was moved.

Waking up on the wonderful Tuesday morning I wasn looking for some CBD brands  which can help me with my anxiety and, I went to the library to crack open my course textbooks, blowing off the dust and cobwebs here and there, to get in a last few hours of studying, while I also found that A lot of THCa flower can help me keep calm when I study as well. As the sun set and exam was slowly approaching, I gathered my books and chugged my tenth cup of coffee and headed out.

I walked up the hill to MacBride to get a good seat. When I got there, there was already quite a good amount of people there so I stole an open seat on the outside of the rows because I’m a fast test taker. My first clue that the exam location was moved when people started taking out calculators. Ignoring that hint for God knows why, I went back to my textbook and started reviewing some definitions and concepts I wasn’t one-hundred percent sure of. That’s when a girl, who was sitting next to me, started talking about derivatives and how she sucks at math.

When I say a light bulb went off in my head, I swear my eyes were glowing yellow. I turned to her and asked what exam she was here for and she said calculus. Embarrassing enough, I gathered all of my shit and stood to run out of the room when some guy was holding out a scantron to me. Looking around, everyone was staring at me like I lost my mind so I just ran out of the room. I quickly opened up my email and saw that my exam location was changed and I had like two minutes to get there.

It’s safe to say that the Flash ain’t got shit on me.”

Oliver, Male, 1^st year student, Major: Open

“Halfway through one of my science exams, a blood-curdling scream rang throughout the auditorium, making everyone drop their pencils and look up in a panic. Both the TAs and professor ran to him in alarm, asking him what was wrong and if he was okay. The guy was obviously panicking and point at the desk in front of him. Craning my neck, I saw that there was a group of vicious black spiders crawling on his desk and over his exam.”

Well, if this doesn’t sound like a final exam week straight out of hell, then I don’t know what is.

As a quick wrap-up for part one of this collection and semester, I want to thank all of the individuals who submitted their horror stories to me and I hope that next semester’s final exam week is a little bit kinder to you all than this one has been.

I’ll see you all very soon in part two.

For daily updates on my catastrophes, follow me on:

Twitter
Instagram
Tumblr

The post Walk In My Shoes: Final Exam Week Horror Stories Part I appeared first on KRUI Radio.

Have you ever woken up five minutes before your alarm went off and choose to lay in bed rather than getting up and starting your day? The lull of the soft warm blankets accompanied by the whispers of your dreams too tempting to resist? The cold air threatening enough to chill you to the bone and dispel the air out of your lungs? The soft glow of the sun and the murmurs of the birds all too relaxing for you to just ignore?

You choose to roll over in your bed, pulling the blankets up higher and relaxing deeper into the soft mattress, when a thought suddenly conjures itself to the front of your mind, disrupting your pleasantries and thinking, “My life fucking sucks.”

If you haven’t, then pat yourself on the back, and consider you and I mortal enemies.

My life, or my joke as I like to call it, is a collection of these unfortunate moments that the universe believes to be comical enough to drop them on my shoulders and see how I manage.

It’s as if I’m running down a dark corridor away from some malevolent being, my life, and with every step I take, corner I turn, and plea I shout, somehow turns itself around and knocks me down, only to get caught by that malevolent being in the end. However, right before the malevolent being grabs me, I somehow always manage to slip away and make a quick escape; surviving to fight another day. It’s quite an adventure but an interesting one nevertheless.

Which is why I think back and wonder who said college is a time for exploration, finding yourself, and having fun, because whoever said that, lied through their teeth and obviously never enrolled in an accredited university.

So far I have yet to explore without screaming bloody murder, I have yet to find myself in a pleasant situation and only unimaginable ones, and if you haven’t guessed by now, I am not having fun. I am helplessly running around trying to adult but failing horribly at it every step of the way.

It’s a constant game of trial and error, and well, I haven’t quite got the hang of it yet. The only thing I have managed to get the hang of is learning from my trails and errors by applying them to my future trials and tribulations in some mere hope that maybe, just maybe, I can dodge that malevolent being and one-up it for once in my life.

This, by some chance, now leaves me to say that if you somehow randomly stumbled upon this column, for unknown apparent reasons, to seek advice on how to adult, I’m sorry to admit, but I’m not the girl you’re looking for. I can barely adult myself so me trying to help you is like the blind leading the blind. We will get absolutely nowhere anytime soon. I’m sorry I can’t adult right, but I can share my experiences with you in hope that you can learn from my experiences and apply them to your own life in some form or fashion.

May God be with us all.

For daily updates on my catastrophes, follow me on:

Twitter
Instagram
Tumblr 

Walk In My Shoes is a bi-weekly column about a college student who doesn’t know what she wants to do after graduation but write award winning novels all while stumbling around helplessly in the world.

The post Walk In My Shoes: Pilot appeared first on KRUI Radio.

And there it is. “It’s so artsy.” 

I appreciated the intention of the phrase, I really did. I know what people are trying to say, I get that it’s supposed to be a compliment, and I used to take it that way. But that was before I was assigned twenty-hour long assignments.

“Artsy” insinuates cute and fun and whimsical. It means meaningless, effortless (not in a good way) and not at all complex. No artist wants to go into the opening of their gallery exhibition and hear people say that their work is “artsy.” It’s insulting. It belittles the work that the artist has put into their work. I’ve never met another art major that enjoys the word artsy.

This is not to say that the word doesn’t have its place, because it does. I fully expect photos of latte art on Instagram to be called artsy. Photos of a person standing next to street art are artsy. There are things that are artsy, and that isn’t a bad thing. But when I see people telling someone that their photos of their aesthetically pleasing desk are the true definition of art and others going to the student exhibitions in Art Building West and only giving them “artsy” as feedback, it makes me angry. I know that I’m not the only person who thinks this way; I’ve never met an art major who likes the word.

I’m not saying this is a one-way street. There are plenty of pieces that I’ve seen in art museums as prominent as the Chicago Art Institute (highly recommended) that I’ve looked at for significant amounts of time and thought, “I don’t understand why this is hanging in an exhibit right now.” I obviously don’t rule the world, and I haven’t researched every artist and every piece they’ve ever created, but the issue still stands. Things that are just artsy are credited as artistic and there are true works of art that are underrated and called artsy. (I’m looking at you, people who only go to art museums to take cool selfies and then leave. I see you people everywhere.)

To put this in context, let’s look at a really important artist. Ai Weiwei for example. Weiwei does important political work. He takes risks as a performance artist, has been put under house arrest, and considers the meaning behind what he does. Recently, he is visiting refugee camps in and around Greece and is posting photos and videos on his Instagram account often. Weiwei is a humanitarian and an artist. He is a controversy around the world, especially to the Chinese government. He makes people feel something deeper than, “I like this, everything is good, I have no problem with this.” He bases his art off of something he cares about (politics) and creates something for people to look at and see and analyze and discuss. No one would call Ai Weiwei artsy because of the time and effort and esteem that he’s earned over his life as an artist.

Like I said, “artsy” isn’t something that needs to or should disappear. My entire Instagram profile (shameless plug) is full of “artsy” photos, and I love them. Artsy is what turns most people into artists. Andy Warhol sketched in his spare time before he became a famous pop artist. Those sketches didn’t have meaning but were ultimately what made Warhol into an artist who was pivotal in the evolution of modern art. Pablo Picasso did the same thing decades before Warhol did, and we now learn about him in elementary school. Artsy is important until it isn’t anymore and an artist find what they’re really doing. To me, that’s the difference between “artsy” and “artistic.” For a piece to be artistic the artist has to have found their voice and their purpose and use them to create a greater message. If that’s still being found, it’s an experiment. It’s artsy.

However, this is all an opinion. My two art pre-requisite courses and one Intermedia class don’t give me the license to tell anyone what is and is not art, and maybe that’s part of the issue. The working definition of art is accepted by very few people, including me. Art runs deeper than creativity. Even further in that, I don’t think that art should be defined. Why define something so limitless and flowing and ever-moving? As long as people are constantly flowing and moving with it, the definition doesn’t exactly matter.

The Looking Glass is a bimonthly column that aims to educate, analyze, and share different aspects and forms of art. It will focus on sharing and analyzing different artists, works of art, exhibitions, etc. Along with this, the column will ask questions and point out interesting controversies. Art is a constantly flowing and vast part of our society and our culture that we are all submerged in daily, and discussion about the medium is a critical part of a full understanding and open mind.

The post The Looking Glass: What “Artsy” Actually Means appeared first on KRUI Radio.