BIZZCOMM Guide PDF

Competition
Playbook:
Pretty much everything
you need, to win
any competition
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This Playbook will serve as a guide geared for winning case study competition. We have covered commonly
assessed conceptual and case-based materials that companies rely on to better understand the breadth &
depth of a candidate’s knowledge.
Special credit to Freepik.com & Flaticon.com for their wonderful images
Ingredients of Winner’s submission
2. Research
3. Idea that
that never
is needed
ends
1. Team that Circle of 4. Solution

works Significance that is
together Practical
6. Unbiased 5. Don’t
validation make slides,
by numbers Make stories
Building the
Right Team
A good team is essential to win any competition.
So, What are the ingredients of a good team?
1) Ability to respect each other. No mutual respect, No team

2) Ability to work in collaboration, Hussain bolt can’t make a 4 men team win single-handedly
3) Ability to understand each other & patience to listen. Don’t take hulk in your team, he may
look all strong & mighty but he will ruin it all with his sheer ego
4) Ability to put team goals ahead of personal goal. As they say famously, there is no “I” in a
team
So, now you have made Team Hygiene Check!
Congratulation, getting these 4 points are the toughest town in your trip to Winner’s Palace.
Setting the
Right Roles
Having set the right team, below are ROLES,
members need to assume as per their skill levels.
One person can take multiple roles &
vice-versa
1. The Hermione:
Every team needs a great researcher who isn’t scared of long articles, large PDFs & has the
patience to visit the second page of Google.
This person will help everyone understand what the competition is about & what is going on in the
real world about the problem.
2. The Da Vinci:
An astute listener & even a better dreamer. He can understand Hermione & he never shies in
fabricating an innovative Idea. He brings in new Ideas & builds a practical prototype of the
solution.
3. The Mike Ross (Watch Suits if you don’t know him)

He is great with numbers, and now is his time to get into the party with The Da Vince & The
Hermione to find out how feasible is the Idea. Does it all add up financially, makes commercial
sense?
4. The Magician
This genius paints Concept, Solution & Numbers on beautiful slides. He creates the flow of the
presentation, the erstwhile complicated solutions, now look so obvious. That’s his magic.
5. The Jobs (Of course, I am talking about Steve Jobs)

This man has two Jobs, one to gel the entire team & second is to deliver the Idea like an Elixer.
He will be the mediator among various Ideas.
He will be the motivator & help team get things done.
Likely Mix for a team of 3:
Mix A:
Member 1- He/She can assume role of Hermoine + Mike Rose
Member 2- He/She can assume role of Da Vinci + Magician
Member 3- He/She can assume role of The Jobs
Mix B:
Member 1- He/She can assume role of Hermoine + Da Vince
Member 2- He/She can assume role of Magician
Member 3- He/She can assume role of The Jobs + Mike Ross
You may mix your team roles as per skill sets of your team-mates
How to
Research?
• Research for winning a case study is like making a sandcastle on the beach
• You will find plenty of sand (Information) on the beach (Google), which will help you build
your castle
• But what differentiates a castle from a Grand Castle are those rare shells, perfectly round
pebbles & a coral
• To find those rare items, you need to scavenge the bottom of the beach like a SEAL
• You don’t right away start putting a block of the castle. First, you need a plan, a 3D
isometric blueprint your grand castle
• Where will you get the plan? Simple, by understanding the case study or problem
statement
There are two aspect of any research
1. Internal (Reading the Case study/Problem)
2. External (Google, Bing, DuckDuckGo, Surveys)
Lets talk about Part 1: Internal

• While reading a problem statement, maintain an unbiased Point 2
neutral stand Point 3
• “Man see what he wants to see”, don’t be that man when it Point 1
comes to Case-studies
• Make a Stickman of what case study expect from you, label
each limbs, head, legs, etc. to make sure you cover all aspect
of the case
• If the case-study is just a “One-liner”, understand the meaning Point 4 Point 5
of it, discuss the meaning among the team & understand how
each member perceives the title.
Stakeholder Analysis
• List down all the Stakeholders and map their needs.

• This will help you generate ideas and build tailored solutions.
• Prioritize what matters the most. It could be profitability, acquisition, sustainability, brand
equity, strategic gain etc.
Let’s talk about Part 2: External

1. Google, Bing, DuckDuckGo, etc.
What to look for:
• Search each query on your Stickman
• Find reports from consulting companies such as BCG,
Mckinsey, Bain, AT Kearney, etc.
• Look for various bodies that are associated with subject of the
case e.g. ASSOCHAM for IT, Retail Association of India for retail,
etc. These associations may have published reports that are
relevant to your case
2. Skim through some reference books and see if you can find
similar cases or an example or a framework that you can use
3. Primary surveys: Companies love this, because your external

survey will be unbiased & novel. Make a good questionnaire from
your stickman concepts.
How to ?
1. Search for scholarly articles on any topic. Google will show research
papers from the top institutional bodies on the subject
2. Use Quotes (“”) to find an exact phrase
3. Use “-” to exclude words from your search
4. Use filetype in search query to search specifically for pdfs, ppts etc. [eg.
Valuation techniques filetype:pdf]
5. Switch between tabs (Web, Video, News etc) to find exactly what you’re
looking for
6. Search on specific sites using “site:” [Google Place Marketing

site:marketingweekly.in]
7. Find related sites by using “related:marketingweekly.in” syntax
Some example of
research topics
This list outlines some basic research elements that will be required in almost all
case studies. However, requirements will alter as per case-study & topic under
consideration
1) Market sizing of the product or problem in question (In Mn or Bn). If market size
is not available in reports, use the formula:
No of potential users x Penetration Rate x Average Price of the service or
product
Detailed article on market sizing here
2) User base or affected population (Mn). Find in the markets where the case
study solutions implemented
3) Demography/Geography/Psychology/Education of the potential users
4) Find cultural/emotional aspects associated with the product/problem
5) Competition landscape. Detail about what they are doing. How? Where? When?
6) Charts & Data about any secondary survey conducted are great, it is more valid
that primary survey. More about chart in annexure
7) Find various trends in the industry. Find exact data points, insights & opinions
Inventing an
Idea
• Best Ideas are the ones which completely solve the problem. The solution
should be laser-focused & provide exactly the case study asked for
• Don’t fall in love with the first Idea you get. This will cloud your judgement
• Ideally, every member should bring in 2-3 ideas. Brain storming is important
• Make sure you don’t go ahead with an idea just because the loudest person in
the team is more vocal about it. List down all ideas and understand which
one solves the problem and is feasible. Go ahead with an idea on its merit.
• Your idea doesn’t need to solve everything. Case study creator hasn’t ordered
a McDonald’s Happy meal, they are here to get their next burger. So present 1
ACE instead of 3 Queens
• There is nothing new under the Sun.
Check if a similar kind of project has been undertaken before. It can be in
another country or another industry. This will not only help you in your
solution but also give validation to your idea
Finding the Right
Solution
Solution should be Practical.
It shouldn’t be something you feel will solve the problem but is not feasible.
This kind of solutions gets outrightly rejected by Judges
E.g.
Case Study: Solve Traffic Problem
Idea: Anything that reduces vehicle from road
Solution: Flying cars or Hyperloops
On a Lighter Note, most companies don’t have Elon Musk’s resources or disregard for
returns in search of passion
Your solution should check the following boxes
1) Solves problem completely when fully implemented
2) Quickly solves the problem
3) Easy to implement in real life
4) Cost benefit analysis is positive
5) Sustainable in the long run
6) Cool enough for customers’ to fall in love (Marketable)
7) Smart enough for a company to accept your proposal
Getting the Right
Numbers
I have written numbers instead of Finance,
Because marketing competition don’t focus too much on finances. It is not to check how good you
can calculate IRR or P&L statements.
Having said that, simple math should be on your side
Few points you should mention in your deck:
1. Market potential of your product. It is about marketing size of your solution
2. Pricing of the product must be set right in comparison to your competition, cost, customer
acceptance, etc.
3. They would love to know how much sales can the product do. You may mention how much
budget you may need if you are planning any ATL/BTL campaign, etc.
4. Trade Marketing/Cost of customer acquisition cost is very important metric for a marketing
manager. Although it is tough to estimate based on secondary research, you can come up with
some simple math model of the same
5. Promotions are big part of marketing cost, do mention how much your promotional activities will
it affect profitability
Go-To-Market (GTM) Strategy
This is the Marketing Step after finalizing on Idea, Solution & Finances.
Get our Comprehensive Marketing Compendium Here which will help you in GTM.
Following steps are general guide to GTM (Although it varies product to product or service)
1. Create brand persona of your product/service using perceptual maps or Kapferer
brand prism or any other similar framework. Check Annexure 1
2. Set pricing of your product. Check our compendium for full list of pricing strategy
3. Decide Packaging & branding merchandise as per positioning & distribution
4. Decide what all distribution channels you want to employ to reach end users.
Channels include Ecommerce, General trade, Modern trade, special company Internal
stores, B2B, etc. Activities
5. You may want to launch in phases, first on Digital & then on physical like
Smartphone brands. Decide it
6. Find a suitable time for the launch. E.g. if you are launching a new car, maybe
Dashera is a good time. For that you have to plan your events so that maximum
traction reach on Dashera. It is the same reason why Salman Khan releases his
movies on Eid
7. Supplying required products/infrastructure to distributors. Decide on trade
marketing schemes to retailers/influencers
8. Brand Activation Activities. It can be done via various ATL/BTL activities & tying up
with influencers or users. Digital marketing also to be started along this. (7 & 8 External
should be done simultaneously) Activities
9. Once product is made available, suitable promotional activities needs to begin in
order to improve customer acquisition
10. Checking results & course correction, if need any strategic change
Giving
Presentation
Like a Pro
Part A: Understanding the purpose
✓ Usually case-studies have restriction on no. of slides to use, so planning the flow
is important
✓ You already have the Idea, Solution & GTM, all you need is the flow so that your
audience can understand your presentation. More in annexure 2
✓ Good flow should introduce the industry landscape, Idea, Solution,
Implementation & results
✓ Priority: Idea > Solution > Implementation > Result > Landscape
✓ Don’t add data that is not needed. Less data is better than crowded data. It
disinterests the judges
✓ Always oblige to the guidelines of case-study, if they want all in black & white,
give them B&W
Part B: Basic Hygiene points that people forget:
✓ Always have a mouse. No mouse, No Presentation
✓ Get a mouse with a roller inside. Use Ctrl+ Roll to zoom in and out. (Try it, it will make your
presentation super-precise)
✓ Use PNG and HD Images. Poor images can never make Rich Presentation
✓ Never use Smart Art. Instead, design the same using shapes, it will give you more
flexibility and looks cleaner
✓ Search “Color themes” & try maintaining themes. Your presentation will never look pretty
if you mess up with colors
✓ Keep theme uniform throughout the presentation
✓ If you can’t decide on the color, just pick Grey, Black, Dark Blue & Dark Yellow
✓ Use no more than 2 fonts in a single sheet
✓ Keep font size & type uniform (for title & body) throughout the presentation. Use simple
fonts such as Calibri or Arial (Never use Comic Sans please)
✓ You (Team) are your own judge, take a look at the slide & review it at least 3 times. Ask
for feedback from a friend who isn’t participating in the competition
Part C: Tools that are important while making a presentation
✓ Insert Shape, Icon & Pictures tool is your bread & butter, you will need them all
the time (In Insert Menu)
✓ Charts are important but I suggest you import a chart from excel. That way you
can easily make edits
✓ Slide Size option in the Design menu is important if you want to change the
aspect ratio of your presentation. I recommend using 16:9 because most
screens are now 16:9
✓ Keep transition simple. Don’t use Origami or Dissolve. A simple fade or push
works best.
Must explore Morph option in transition, check this link!
✓ In animation, keep things limited to Fade or Wipe. Dare not using Swivel or
bounce please (Keep animation minimal as it will distract you while presenting.
Also, system do hang at times because of heavy animation)
✓ If the company asked to record a video of your presentation, use Record slide
show option
✓ The format option is your most important tool, make a habit of aligning
everything using align option rather than manual, use Shape & text fill as per
your need but don’t overdo it with colors, check the merge shapes option on the
left side in insert shape, select two shapes overlapping each other & use
fragment option in merge shape
Part D: Making presentation ready for the story
✓ Keep pen and paper handy. Draw in real and then bring it alive on presentation
✓ If you’re finding it tough to get Ideas, image search for “Cool PPT designs”, “Best
PPT Slides”, “PPT Templates”, this will give you good design Ideas. Try to replicate
the same using tools available in presentation
✓ Create a communication story in a book about how you will engage your audience,
presentation is all about entertainment when you are in top 3
✓ Use your team to create an impact, a demonstration, an example, etc. More
visualization & energetic it is, better your chances of winning
✓ Do not read from the slides. It is a waste of both yours & your host’s time. Slides
are just the prop, your team is the real center of attention
✓ Rehearse, Rehearse, Rehearse (Same goes with PPT Rework > Rework > Rework)
✓ Prepare for cross questions, keep those research phase document handy &
remember important details from it.
✓ If possible ask a friend to review your presentation & give you a mock judge
cross-questioning
✓ If you don’t know something, just say it. Don’t try to conjure a story. It is okay not
to know everything.
Download 2 Awesome Template which will be helpful in your Presentations
Annexure 1:
Few Frameworks
Companies love frameworks. It helps understand ideas easily.
1. SWOT analysis:
It is the most common framework with Strength, Weakness, Opportunity & threat.
Where do What are What

What do you need your obstacles
you to growth do you
do well? improve? prospects face?
?
2. BCG Matrix
What is the BCG matrix?
• BCG matrix is a product of the Boston Consulting Group

• It is a 2*2 matrix which helps in the portfolio analysis of a business unit.
• It helps to determine in which products to invest, expand & which to sell.
3. Kapferer Brand Prism
The Brand Identity Prism is a hexagonal diagram that helps us understand how the different
elements of a brand relate to each other.
4. Ansoff Matrix
Ansoff Matrix is vital for strategic planning to find out opportunities that can help grow
business by developing new products & services or tapping into new markets. Also known as
Product-Market Matrix.
ANSOFF matrix of XIAOMI
EXISTING NEW
Product
EXISTING
SMARTPHONES POWER EARPHONES SMART

SUPPLIER WATCH
IP
CAMERAS
MARKET PENETRATION MARKET DEVELOPMENT
Market
DRONES ELECTRIC SCOOTER

NEW
MI TV LAPTOP
VR HEADSET
PRODUCT DEVELOPMENT
DIVERSIFICATION
5. NxM Matrix
It is the most versatile framework where you put two types of variable on each axis &
formulate the strategy.
You can use NxN matrix almost in any case-study!
Below is the example of e-commerce case study where they have asked to decide on a launch
of new category, so we have put 6 variables on x-axis & 5 potential category on Y-axis.
We then rate each category based on the value & finally pick two category which got highest
score. You can tailor your matrix as per your case’s requirements
Category Selection Matrix
Priority 1 2 3 4 5 6
% of non
Revenue in Average Growth of branded Returns of Shipping cost Sum of
Criteria Rs. Points margin (%) Points segment (%) Points products Points product (%) Points (per order) Points Points Rank
Electronic Accessories 67,109,537 4 28.53 4 15% 1 90 5 22% 4 56.4 5 23 1
Home Furnishings 28,871,483 1 -2.24 1 30% 2 NA 1 16% 1 87 3 9 4
Footwear (Men & Women) 73,984,452 5 24.97 2 80% 5 40-60 3 25% 5 106.45 1 21 2
Ethnic Wear (Men &
Women) 37,345,334 3 39.01 5 75% 4 60 4 19% 3 72.65 4 23 1
Home & Kitchen Appliances 34,180,815 2 25.02 3 45% 3 NA 1 18% 2 106.15 2 13 3
6. Here is the Perceptual Map of some famous frameworks where you put opposing
qualities on each axis.
Here on X, we have put Marketing & Strategy
On Y we put Versatile & Niche
SWOT PESTEL Versatile 4P/7P

Porter's 5 force n X n Matrix
& Pyramid Flow Charts Marketing Funnel
PR
Smith's SOSTAC®
BCG
McKinsey 7S Perceptual
Strategy Mapping
Marketing
Ansoff
Trifecta Strategy of
Digital Marketing
Attribution Kapferer
Niche Flowchart Brand Prism
Annexure 2:
If a competition is about launching a new product in Biscuit Category
Your Idea flow should be :
Slide 1:
Current landscape of biscuits, Growth in each category of biscuits, market size, trends in
other countries, Demography of consumers , STP analysis
(Here you have shown them your research prowess. You have their attention now, time to
dazzle them)
Slide 2:
Introducing your product, Rationale of introducing it, revealing the brand identity, target
audience, Packaging
(This slide should be all about your product)
Slide 3:
GTM of biscuit, Product Launch, Brand activation, Distribution, Promotion, Pricing,
Expected revenue forecast, etc.
(This slide should be how you will market your product)
Annexure 3:
Data Visualization
Excel is enough to create a visualization or graph for any case-study
Charts can tell better a story than words, so use charts wherever there is a scope
Below charts are recommended
1. Pie Chart:
When data is adding to complete market. 100%
E.g. Type of cars in India Market.
(Exhaustive & Mutually exclusive)
Or ethnic population of a country
2. Line Chart:
Use it when comparing Time (Days/Mth/Yr) on X-axis
Comparing revenue of various social media platform with
years
3. Radar Chart:
Use it when you want to compare qualities.
E.g. Footballer’s mapping on 7 qualities.
Or Smarphone qualities
4. Tree-maps:
It is like a Pie Chart but with extra space,
can be used when number of headers are
more.
E.g. Internet audiences worldwide, you can
also use pie chart instead of tree maps
5. Scatter:
Scatter is used when you want to correlate
two variables & see how they are behaving
with each other.
E.g. A scatter plot of customer satisfaction
vs. Revenue
6. Combined:
It is simply 2 charts in one, it uses
secondary axis to see how any change in
one parameter affect another. It is used
when a simple scatter chart is not enough
E.g. here we can see, rainy day is bad for
business

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Competition

To get all our future publications, including a 100 Pager

Special credit to Freepik.com & Flaticon.com for their wonderful images

1. Team that Circle of 4. Solution

So, What are the ingredients of a good team?

1) Ability to respect each other. No mutual respect, No team

So, now you have made Team Hygiene Check!

3. The Mike Ross (Watch Suits if you don’t know him)

5. The Jobs (Of course, I am talking about Steve Jobs)

Likely Mix for a team of 3:

Lets talk about Part 1: Internal

• List down all the Stakeholders and map their needs.

Let’s talk about Part 2: External

3. Primary surveys: Companies love this, because your external

2. Use Quotes (“”) to find an exact phrase

3. Use “-” to exclude words from your search

6. Search on specific sites using “site:” [Google Place Marketing

7. Find related sites by using “related:marketingweekly.in” syntax

1. Market potential of your product. It is about marketing size of your solution

audience can understand your presentation. More in annexure 2

✓ Good flow should introduce the industry landscape, Idea, Solution,

Implementation & results

disinterests the judges

give them B&W

flexibility and looks cleaner

if you mess up with colors

✓ Keep theme uniform throughout the presentation

✓ Use no more than 2 fonts in a single sheet

fonts such as Calibri or Arial (Never use Comic Sans please)

for feedback from a friend who isn’t participating in the competition

Download 2 Awesome Template which will be helpful in your Presentations

Where do What are What

What is the BCG matrix?

• BCG matrix is a product of the Boston Consulting Group

SMARTPHONES POWER EARPHONES SMART

DRONES ELECTRIC SCOOTER

Category Selection Matrix

SWOT PESTEL Versatile 4P/7P

If a competition is about launching a new product in Biscuit Category

Your Idea flow should be :

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