Upcoming events

No weekly vocab post this week, I'm afraid, as I'm going to be on the road for the week.

If you're a Business English or ESP teacher in the Amsterdam or Paris areas, there are two upcoming events you might be interested in.

On Friday 24th September, Cambridge University Press - in co-operation with the British Council, Cambridge ESOL and Intertaal - is organising a Business English / ESP day in Amsterdam. Full details can be found here.

And then on Saturday 25th September, Cambridge University Press France is hosting a 'Cambridge Day', with talks from Bill Mascull, Michael McCarthy, David Rea, Mark Ibbotson, Gary Anderson and myself. Full details here.

At both events, I'll be talking about collaboration in ESP and Business English course design and delivery.

Hopefully see some of you there.

Marketing vocabulary of the week: 'SWOT analysis'

A SWOT analysis is a tool for evaluating the internal factors (strengths and weaknesses) and the external factors (opportunities and threats) that an organisation faces.

Example usage (extract from an email from a Marketing Manager to his team, setting tasks for the writing of a company marketing plan):

"Scott and Jessica, can you take responsibility for the SWOT analysis? You’ll also need to do SWOTs for our main competitors."

(Taken from Cambridge English for Marketing, Unit 2 [The marketing plan 1: audit and objectives])

Marketing vocabulary of the week: 'stakeholders'

A stakeholder is an individual or group with an interest in an organisation’s activities, and who is affected by the behaviour of an organisation. We often refer to primary stakeholders (stakeholders who are vital to the organisation, without whom the organisation couldn’t survive) and secondary stakeholders (stakeholders that an organisation can survive without at the moment, to a certain extent). We also make a distinction between internal stakeholders (for example, employees or management) and external stakeholders (for example, customers or suppliers).

Example usage (extract from a job advert for a Marketing Executive):

"In this role, you will be responsible for building relationships and liaising with a range of stakeholders, both internal and external."

(Taken from Cambridge English for Marketing, Unit 1 [The role of marketing])

Marketing vocabulary of the week: types of research

Secondary research (also known as desk research) involves analysing existing sources of information which have been collected for a different reason, such as published statistics, websites, bought-in reports, etc. It contrasts with primary research (also known as field research), which is collected for a particular purpose directly from the original source. Examples include surveys and interviews.

Example usage (extracts from the outline of a market research plan):

Primary research
We would like to focus most of our time on field research, both qualitative and quantitative. We recommend beginning with a series of focus groups.

Secondary research
We do not anticipate that extensive desk research will be required.

Taken from Cambridge English for Marketing, Unit 5 (Market research).