Advanced Business English 1 Information Search Portfolio
Submitted by: Nguyễn Thùy Hạ Vy Student ID: 2160650 Class: AVKDNC1-200 Date: 21/6/2018 Table of contents 1. Communication
How to communicate effectively.......................................................................1 2. International Marketing
How to build customer loyalty...........................................................................3 3. Building Relationships
How to build good relationships with customers...............................................5 4. Success
Elements of a successful business......................................................................7 5. Job satisfaction
Factors affecting job satisfaction........................................................................9 6. Risks
Types of business risks.....................................................................................11 7. Unit 1: Communication
Topic: How to communicate effectively
Communication is the indispensable daily activity of human. It is not just the
exchange of information but also as a means of connection between us. Having
good communication skills is an advantage in work and daily life. Becoming a
good communicator is not easy; however, it is not too difficult if we learn the
following ways to communicate effectively.
The first thing of effective communication is listening. Because the most
important purpose of communication is understanding; therefore, listening is
the best way for us to understand others ideas or opinions. Besides listening we
also need to have an awareness of body language to understand non-verbal
language of human. Secondary, we have to respect others opinions. Denigrating
and criticizing opinions of others person just make the conversation worse. If
we respect the opinions of others, they also will respect our opinions. This will
help to develop good communication.
The third way to communicate effectively is know how to organize
communication. Before we speak, we should arrange the information in logical
order so that the listener can understand exactly what we mean. Moreover, we
have to impart information clearly and focus on the issue we want to talk about.
Avoiding rambling when talking will make the communication easier. In
addition, use the right words is also important. We will select the words to use
depending on the subject that we communicate. Professional terms or words 1
with complex meanings require the listener to have a certain education level to
understand. Thus, we should use simple words to avoid misunderstanding
between the speaker and the listener.
In conclusion, communication is one of the most important skills that we
must learn. Having good communication skills will bring many benefits for us
as well as giving us many opportunities in work and life. Knowing effective
communication methods will help us to have better relationships and success in life. References
Belonwu, V. (2013, November 19). 20 ways to communicate effectively with
your team. Retrieved from https://smallbiztrends.com/2013/11/ways-to-
communicate-effectively-in-the-workplace.html
DiPirro, D. (2010, August 30). 10 ways to communicate effectively. Retrieved from
http://www.positivelypresent.com/2010/08/10-ways-to-communicate- effectively.html
Dignity & Respect. (2015, November 18). Ways to communicate with respect. Retrieved from
https://dignityandrespect.org/ways-to-communicate-with- respect/
Lorton, A. (2016, September 29). 10 ways to be a better communicator. Retrieved from
https://www.success.com/article/10-ways-to-be-a-better- communicator 2
Unit 2: International Marketing
Topic: How to build customer loyalty
Loyal customers are always important to businesses or brands. Every
business wants to have a large number of loyal customers for their businesses.
However, with the advent of new products of many different brands, it is very
difficult to maintain customer loyalty. Therefore, businesses need to have a
strategy to keep customers always buy their products. There are some tips about
how to build customers loyalty.
The first tip to keep customers loyalty is let customers knows that we care
about them. This means that businesses or brands do use the activities and
promotions or just simply remember the name of customers to let customers
feel that businesses or brands care about them. Sending “Happy Birthday”
message and personalized emails for regular customers is a simple but very
effective action. This will make customers feel they valued to the company. The
second tip is customer gratitude. Customer gratitude programs with attractive
incentives are the great way for businesses or brands build the loyalty of customers.
The third tip is let your best customers skip the line. This is one of the
privileges reserved to loyal customers as well as a way to maintain loyal
customers. Moreover, this is also a way to build loyal customers. For example,
Vietnam airline always offer special services for each level of customers. With
regular customers or customers have membership card will be served the best 3
service of Vietnam airline such as no need to queue when doing the procedure
or use waiting room in the airport. Besides, brand image also related to building
customers loyalty. This means customers believe in the quality of products or
services of a brand will easier to make loyal customers. As an example, Japan is
well known for its quality products and good service. Thus, customers
especially Vietnamese tend to buy a product that have labeled “Made in Japan”.
To conclude, I learned that building customer loyalty is very important for a
business. The number of loyal customers of a business has is a reflection of the
success and development of that business. References
Daum, K. (2014, May 13). 7 great ways to build customer loyalty. Retrieved from
https://www.inc.com/kevin-daum/7-great-ways-to-build-customer- loyalty.html
Entrepreneur Staff. (2013, March 18). 6 ways to build customer loyalty.
Retrieved from https://www.entrepreneur.com/article/226064
Lister, M. (2018, April 9). 5 ways to earn & build customer loyalty.
Retrieved from https://www.wordstream.com/blog/ws/2016/11/10/customer- loyalty 4 Unit 3: Building Relationships
Topic: How to build good relationships with customers
Building relationships is an important key to the success of a business. As
well as building good relationships with suppliers, employees, or partners, it is
also important to build good relationships with customers for a business. As a
role of a business, there are some tips that we have to learn to build good relationships with customers.
The first tip of building relationships with customers that businesses have to
know is understands the needs of customers. Besides ensuring the quality of
products and services, companies need to understand customer’s expectation.
Researching expectations of customers will help businesses to deliver products
and services that achieve customer satisfaction. There are many ways to
research customer expectations such as conducting surveys about products and
services or interacting with customers. From those activities, businesses can
offer products and services with good quality that exceed customer’s
expectations and build trust with customers. Building trust with customers is also important in business.
The second tip of develop customer relationships is connection. Today with
the development of technology, connect with customers regularly become very
easy, especially with loyal customers. Sending emails about company events,
new products, or company promotions will is an effective way to create a strong
connection between company and customers. The third tip is always asking for 5
feedback from customers. Asking for feedback will help companies know their
products and services that satisfy the needs of customers or not. In addition,
feedbacks from customers help businesses develop their products and services more quality.
To summarize, I think building good relationships with customers is one of
the important processes that lead to the success of a business. It also creates
opportunities for the development of the company because no business survives
without relationships. From this, I have learned many tips to assist me for my future work. References
Beard, R. (2013, September 3). Building customer relationships (6 tactics).
Retrieved from http://blog.clientheartbeat.com/building-customer-relationships/
Hassan, W. (2017, February 22). 6 keys tactics for building strong customer
relationships. Retrieved from https://www.business.com/articles/6-key-tactics-
for-building-strong-customer-relationships/
Kappel, M. (2017, January 13). 5 ways to build killer relationships with
customers. Retrieved from https://www.entrepreneur.com/article/282364 6 Unit 4: Success
Topic: Elements of a successful business
Every year, thousands of companies are established, but only a few
companies can develop into a successful business. We all know that to create
success in business is not easy. To be able to build a successful business
requires a lot of elements and the efforts of all the members of the company.
The following are some of the common elements of many successful businesses.
The first element that creates a successful business is motivated workforce.
The success of a business springs from the contributions of individuals in the
company. Therefore, to make employees work more efficiently, the managers
need to create motivation for their employees. Motivating employees not only
makes them work better but also bring many benefits to the company. A
motivated workforce is less likely to make mistakes, give more ideas and less
conflict in the workplace. In addition, this easily makes up the solidarity of
employees to work together and find solutions to solve problems more effectively.
The second element of a successful business is having effective strategies.
With a business, profit is not the most important factor for creating success.
Business strategies are the key to the success of company’s revenue and
reputation. Each member of the company must be clear about the company’s 7
vision, mission, and goals. Working under the strategy will ensure the long-term
success of the business. Finally, the third element that determines the existence
of a business is constant innovation. The development of the world and
technology entails new business development trends. Thus, businesses also
need to adapt and innovate to be in line with the trends. Besides, creative
thinking is also a necessity for a successful business.
In summary, to be successful a business needs to motivated workforce, have
effective strategies, constant innovation, and many elements. To create a
successful business is not easy, but not too difficult if the business can follow
these elements. I think that these elements can become a complementary
knowledge for my future development.
Blank, S., Dorf, B. (2012, May 30). Successful business: 9 most important
elements. Retrieved from https://www.inc.com/steve-blank/9-most-important-
elements-successful-startups.html
Ehrlichman, M. (2015, June 17). The key 3 elements to make your business
a success. Retrieved from https://www.entrepreneur.com/article/247414
Strickland, L. (2016, May 3). 10 elements of successful businesses.
Retrieved from https://www.focusresourcesinc.com/10-elements-of-successful- businesses/ 8 Unit 5: Job Satisfaction
Topic: Factors affecting job satisfaction
In unit 4 about success we learned that one of the elements of a successful
business is motivated workforce. From the motivated workforce we can infer
the job satisfaction of employees of a business. Employees’ job satisfaction is
very important that can lead to the development of a business. Therefore, there
are many research studies about job satisfaction of employees and find out the following factors.
The first factor that makes employees satisfied is financial rewards.
Compared to fringe benefits such as vacation or health insurance, other
payments tend to make employees more satisfied in their job. Besides, financial
rewards such as bonuses, overtime pay, or remuneration are the best way to
motivate employees to work harder. The second factor is opportunity for
advancement in the job. Employees will feel satisfied with their current job
when they have the chance to develop such as learn more skills or be trained
abroad and have the opportunity to promote in the company. Moreover,
satisfaction about achievement is also one of factors affecting the satisfaction and motivation of employees.
The third factor affecting job satisfaction is working environment. A good
working environment is very important for employees’ satisfaction because the
workplace is where they will work for eight hours or more. Thus, it will be very
frustrating when employees are forced to work in a poor conditions 9
environment such as too hot or too noisy. In addition, uncomfortable working
environment is also a reason to affect the performance of employees. An
example for a good working environment is Google. Google is evaluated to be
the company with the best working environment for employees with many
services such as canteen, entertainment place, and other incentives. For this
reason, there is no doubt that Google has become an idea model for employee’s workplace.
In short, job satisfaction of employees is very important for businesses
because it has positive effect on work efficiency or loyalty to the organization.
From these factors, I have more knowledge about human resource management
in order to create better conditions for employees to work effectively as well as
to understand the benefits of employees in company.
Bell, C. (2017, June 12). Top 9 factors that impact employees motivation.
Retrieved from https://www.m3ssolutions.com/article/top-9-factors-impact- employees-motivation/201
Hill, B. (2018, May 16). What are the factors affecting job satisfaction? Retrieved from
http://smallbusiness.chron.com/factors-affecting-job- satisfaction-20114.html
Morgan, J. (2014, December 15). The top 10 factors for on-the-job employee happiness. Retrieved from
https://www.forbes.com/sites/jacobmorgan/2014/12/15/the-top-10-factors-for-
on-the-job-employee-happiness/#25970e935afa 10 Unit 6: Risks Topic: Types of business risks
In life, risks are something that no one wishes to encounter but it can come
at any time. As well as in business, we cannot avoid facing risks that can only
reduce the level of risk that businesses face. Therefore, companies need to have
a risk management department to avoid causing serious losses to the company.
There are many types of risks that businesses have to face, but in this article we
only learn some of the risks that businesses often meet.
The first risk that businesses often face is strategic risk. Strategic risk is the
risk that affects the profitability and performance of the business. Strategic risk
is likely to cause serious damage to the business if they do not aware early and
evaluate carefully this risk. An example of strategic risk is the failure of Nokia.
The phone company from Finland has encountered failure while on the top of
success in competing with rivals such as Apple or Samsung due to mistakes in
the strategic direction. However, strategic risk will not be disastrous the business can adapt to it.
The second risk is financial risk. Financial risk is any type of risk that related
to finance, including financial transactions, lost revenue or corporate loans. For
example, any business has a link to suppliers and customers. As a role of a
business, we have to pay for the supplier for the material and make product and
sale to the customer. In the case the revenue of the month is reduced then we do
not have enough money to pay for supplier and we have to borrow money from 11
outside. This will increase loans and cause financial damage for business. The
third risk in business is reputational risk. In business, reputation is the most
important thing for all businesses. It decides the trust of customers for a
business and the development of that business. When a business encounters
reputational risk, this may involve a lot of hassle for company and even face
legal troubles. Furthermore, the most serious damage about reputational risk is
that it can lead to bankruptcy for a business.
In conclusion, risk is inevitable, but if we know how to manage it, the risk
will cause less damage to the business. Through this unit, I have more
knowledge about the types of risk in business as well as way to mitigate the
risks. This will help me a lot in future work when running a business.
Blackman, A. (2014, December 8). The main types of business risk. Retrieved from
https://business.tutsplus.com/tutorials/the-main-types-of- business-risk--cms-22693
Griffin, D. (2018, January 31). Types of business risk. Retrieved from
http://smallbusiness.chron.com/types-business-risk-99.html
Spacey, J. (2017, April 6). 20 types of business risk. Retrieved from
https://simplicable.com/new/business-risk 12