Lisämyynnin parantaminen yritysasiakkaille Top Camping Yyterissä : Haastattelututkimus

Opinnäytetyön tarkoituksena on tutkia potentiaalisten yritysasiakkaiden halua käyttää Top Camping Yyterin palveluita ja sitä millaisia palveluita yritykset kyseiseltä yritykseltä toivoisivat. Tutkimus tehtiin puhelinhaastatteluna. Top Camping Yyteri on Porissa sijaitseva ympärivuotinen leirintäalue, joka on ollut Porin Seudun Matkailun alaisuudessa vasta kaksi vuotta. Tästä syystä myynnin kehittäminen on ollut heikohkoa. Tutkimuksessa tutkittiin myös yritysten mielipiteitä palvelun tasosta ja tyytyväisyyttä hinta- laatusuhteeseen. Yrityksiltä kyseltiin myös heidän mielipiteitään markkinoinnin keinoista. Top Camping Yyterin toivomuksesta suurin osa yrityksistä oli pienyrityksiä, mutta joukkoon mahtui myös keskikokoisia ja isoja yrityksiä. Tutkimukseen saatiin mukaan yhteensä 100 yritystä ja se toteutettiin syksyllä 2010. Tutkimuksessa ilmeni selvästi, että yrityksistä harva tiesi Top Camping Yyterin palveluista tarpeeksi. Todella harva yrityksistä oli käyttänyt palveluita ennen ja tutkimuksen tulokset jäivätkin sen osalta heikoiksi. Yritysten toivomat palvelut antoi paljonkin toivottuja ehdotuksia. Yritysten kiinnostus Top Camping Yyterin palveluita kohtaan oli myös huomattava ja antoi tutkimukselle positiivisen ilmeen. Opinnäytetyö sisältää laajan teorian myynnin ja myynnin edistämisen sekä markkinoinnin pohjalta. Opinnäytetyö käsittelee tutkimuksessa selvinneet tulokset ja kertoo ne tiivistetysti. Lopussa on myös johtopäätökset tutkimustuloksista.The purpose of her Bachelor’s thesis is to research the business customer’s wishes to use the services of Top Camping Yyteri. The research was conducted over the telephone. Top Camping Yyteri is a year-round camping site which is located in Western Finland, in a town called Pori. It has been under the authority of Porin Seudun Matkailu only for two years and that is why the development of sales has been weak. This research study also corporates views about service level and satisfaction with the price-quality ratio. Companies’ views on different ways of marketing were also inquired. Top Camping Yyteri wished that a large part of the interviewed companies would be small companies, but in the research, there are also medium-sized and large companies. The research was carried out in the fall 2010, and 100 companies were involved. The research revealed that only few of the companies knew enough about the services of Top Camping Yyteri’s services. Very few had used the services before and that is why the results about the service level remained weak. The services desired by the companies gave many proposals, which conformed to the wishes of Top Camping Yyteri. The interest towards Top Camping Yyteri was also noted, and it gave a positive expression to the research. This Bachelor’s thesis contains a theoretical section about sales, sales promotion and marketing. The thesis deals with the research results and discloses them. In the end there are also conclusions on the results

Opettajan rooli koulutuksen vientihankkeen vetäjänä

Toimin projektipäällikkönä Keskipohjanmaan Ammattikorkeakoulun EEK-hankkeessa. Hankkeen oli rahoittanut ulkoasiain ministeriö. Hankkeen rinnal-la kulki pohjoismaiden ministeriöneuvoston rahoittama EntreKarelia-hanke. Hankkeen tavoitteeksi oli asetettu kehittää suomalaiseen ja venäläiseen osaa-miseen perustuva täydennyskoulutusjärjestelmä, testata se pilottikouluissa ja valmistella jatkosuunnitelmana hankkeen täysipainoinen läpivieminen koko tasavallan alueella. Hankkeen päätarkoituksena on ollut edistää yrittäjyyttä ja yrittäjyyskulttuuria maaseutukouluissa. Työ on tehty yhdessä Karjalan Pedagogisen Akatemian kanssa. Akatemia vastaa ainoana seudun opettajakoulutuksesta

Why Do Open Rail Freight Markets Fail to Attract Competition? Analysis on Finnish Transport Policy

Since the beginning of 2007, EU legislation has encouraged member states to deregulate their domestic rail freight markets. While many countries have benefited from the resultant liberalisation, in others, markets are changing fairly slowly. The incumbent railway undertaking has a total market share e.g. in Lithuania, Ireland, and Finland. This paper analyses Finnish transport policy as well as the question why deregulation has not brought competition to the rail freight transport market. The research material was collected by using the Delphi technique. This paper illustrates that competition is expected in Finland, and there is a need for structural changes. Market inequality is manifested in access to incumbent’s services, governmental inactivity on market entry as well as in competition in general, traffic control organisation, and personnel training. This paper suggests that governments and governmental authorities should have an active transport policy in order to create a level playing field which could be a basis for equal and stimulating competition

Scenario driven requirement engineering for design and deployment of mobile communication networks

The numbers of users and usage of mobile data service are increasing dramatically due to the introduction of smartphones and mobile broadband dongles. For the next decade the mobile broadband market is expected to grow and reach a level where the average data consumption per user is orders of magnitude greater than today. For the telecom industry it is a magnificent challenge to design and deploy these s high-capacity wireless networks taking into account limitations in cost, energy and radio spectrum. The objective of this paper is to highlight the need to consider a multitude of scenarios for the requirements, design and deployment of mobile broad band networks. The R&D has for many years been targeting high peak data rates enabled by improved spectral efficiency, adding more spectrum bands, aggregation of frequency bands and offloading to local wireless networks connected via public fixed phones or broadband. However, many of these features driving the technology development are representative for the conditions in US and Western Europe. The wireless networks also need to be designed assuming deployment in regions in the world where both the availability of spectrum as well as the penetration of fixed phones and broadband are limited. --Mobile broadband networks,cost and capacity,spectrum,deployment strategies,telecommunications,management of technology and R&D,economic development of natural resources

Myyttinen synnytys : mistä synnytyspelot kumpuavat?

Opinnäytetyön tavoitteena oli lisätä kätilöopiskelijoiden ymmärrystä ja empatiaa pelokasta synnyttäjää kohtaan, sekä tuoda tietoa siitä, kuinka pelokasta synnyttäjää voi tukea. Tarkoituksena oli selvittää, kuinka tarinat ja myytit vaikuttavat naisten synnytyspelkoon. Opinnäytetyössä tutkittiin synnytyspelkoa seuraavista näkökulmista: Mitä synnytyspelko on ja mistä se aiheutuu? Mitkä ovat yleisimmät synnytyspelon aiheet? Kuinka myytit ja tarinat vaikuttavat synnytyspelkoon? Opinnäytetyön teoreettinen lähtökohta muodostui pelon ja trauman psykofysiologisesta ilmenemisestä, sekä synnytyspelosta muodostetuista teorioista. Teoriaosuudessa käsiteltiin myös synnytyspelon aiheuttajia ja kohteita, sekä kätilön roolia synnytyspelkoi-sen hoidossa. Tutkimusaineisto kerättiin internetin keskustelupalstoilta kysymysten ”Mitä pelkäät synnytyksessä?” ja ”Mistä synnytyspelot mielestäsi johtuvat?” avulla. Tutkimuksessa käytettiin kvalitatiivista eli laadullista tutkimusmenetelmää. Tutkimuksen tuloksiksi muodostui, että naisten pelot kohdistuivat vauvan hyvinvointiin, sairaalaympäristöön, kipuun sekä psyykkiseen ja fyysiseen selviytymiseen. Myös omien voimien riittämättömyys synnytystilanteessa pelotti naisia. Naiset kokivat synnytyspelkonsa nousseen tarinoista, tiedosta, kokemuksista sekä sisäisistä pelon aiheuttajista. Synnyttäjistä n. 6-10% kokee synnytyspelkoa ja se on yhtä tavallista niin ensi- kuin uudelleensynnyttäjilläkin. Osa synnytyspelon kohteista oli rationaalisia ja perusteltuja. Naisilla esiintyi kuitenkin myös vanhoihin uskomuksiin ja myytteihin perustuvia ennakko-odotuksia, jotka heijastuivat synnytyspelkona. Synnytyspelkoa voisi jatkossa tutkia naisen lisääntymisterveyden, lapsettomuuden sekä yhteiskunnan muutosten näkökulmasta. Lisäksi voisi olla tarpeen selvittää millaisia ominaisuuksia synnytyspelkoiset toivovat kätilöltään.The background of this bachelor´s thesis was to increase the midwife students´ knowledge about fearful parturient and provide information on how to support her during the delivery. The purpose was to clarify what kind of influence do the stories and myths about childbirth have on women´s fear of childbirth. On this bachelor´s thesis the problems of the study were: What does “the fear of childbirth” mean and what is it caused by? What are the most common objects in the fear of childbirth? The theoretical starting point of this bachelor´s thesis was the psychophysiological appearance of fear and trauma and theories about the fear of childbirth, better known as tokophobia. The theoretical part included the causes and objects of the tokophobia and midwife´s role in supporting the parturient during the delivery. The research material were gathered from the internet sites where women discuss their fear of childbirth. The women were asked following two questions: What do you fear about the delivery? What do you think causes these fears about the delivery? The research method that was used was qualitative method. The results show that the women´s fears focused on baby´s wellbeing, the hospital as an environment, delivery pain and psychological and physiological coping. Also the failure of ones own strength during the delivery was frightful for many women. The women told that their fears of childbirth were caused by stories and myths they had heard or their own experiences. Also the facts they had read about delivery caused fears to some women. About 6 -10 percent of parturients suffer from tokophobia. Some of the objects of tokophobia were rational and reasonable. But women also had expectations about delivery that were based on old beliefs and myths, these often appear as tokophobia. In future tokophobia could be researched from the perspective of reproductive healths and through changes in society. It might also be useful to research what kind of qualities does the women who suffer from tokophobia expect from the midwife

Business Innovation Strategies to Reduce the Revenue Gap for Wireless Broadband Services

Mobile broadband is increasing rapidly both when it comes to traffic and number of subscriptions. The swift growth of the demand will require substantial capacity expansions. Operators are challenged by the fact that revenues from mobile broadband are limited, just a few per cent of APRU, and thus not compensating for declining voice revenues, creating a so called "revenue gap". Concurrently, mobile broadband dominates the traffic, set to grow strongly. In this paper we analyze the potential of different strategies for operators to reduce or bridge the revenue gap. The main options are to reduce network costs, to increase access prices and to exploit new revenue streams. The focus in the paper is on cost & capacity challenges and solutions in the network domain. Operators can cooperate and share sites and spectrum, which could be combined with off-loading heavy traffic to less costly local networks. In the network analysis we illustrate the cost impacts of different levels of demand, re-use of existing base station sites, sharing of base stations and spectrum and deployment of a denser network. A sensitivity analysis illustrates the impact on total revenues if access prices are increased, whether new types of services generate additional revenues, and if it fills the revenue gap. Our conclusion is that the different technical options to reduce the revenue gap can be linked to business strategies that include cooperation with both other operators as well as with non-telecom actors. Hence, innovations in the business domain enable technical solutions to be better or fully exploited.Wireless Internet access, data traffic, revenues, network costs, spectrum, deployment strategies, HSPA, LTE, operator cooperation, value added services, NFC, B2B2C.

Mobile Broadband Expansion Calls for More Spectrum or Base Stations - Analysis of the Value of Spectrum and the Role of Spectrum Aggregation

The breakthrough for mobile broadband is taking the mobile communications industry into a new phase. The number of mobile broadband users in the world exceeds 400 million, and the share of the population in Western Europe with mobile broadband is around 10 per cent and over 15 percent in Austria and Sweden. This development has been propelled by the extensive diffusion of mobile modems (dongles) for laptops and smartphones given users ubiquitous access to mobile internet. Consequently, traffic volumes in the mobile networks have grown immensely, and the mobile data traffic surpassed the mobile voice traffic in the world by the end of 2009, and in for example Sweden, over 75 percent of the mobile traffic is data. --

Epistemic cooperation scripts in online learning environments

Using online learning environments in higher education offers innovative possibilities to support collaborative learning. However, online learning creates new kinds of problems for participants who have not previously worked with each other. One of these problems is uncertainty which occurs when participants do not know each other. According to the uncertainty reduction theory, low uncertainty level increases the amount of discourse and decreases the amount of information seeking. Therefore, uncertainty may influence online discourse and learning. This study investigates the effects of an epistemic cooperation script with respect to the amount of discourse, information seeking and learning outcomes in collaborative learning as compared to unscripted collaborative learning. The aim was also to explore how and what kind of information learners seek and receive and how learning partners react to such information exchange. The participants were 48 students who were randomly assigned to groups of three in two conditions, one with and one without an epistemic script. The results indicate that the epistemic script increased the amount of discourse and decreased the amount of information seeking activities. Without an epistemic script, however, learners achieved better learning outcomes. The results of two qualitative case-based analyses on information seeking will also be discussed

Future smart energy software houses

Software is the key enabling technology (KET) as digitalization is cross-cutting future energy systems spanning the production sites, distribution networks, and consumers particularly in electricity smart grids. In this paper, we identify systematically what particular software competencies are required in the future energy systems focusing on electricity system smart grids. The realizations of that can then be roadmapped to specific software capabilities of the different future software houses' across the networks. Our instrumental method is software competence development scenario path construction with environmental scanning of the related systems elements. The vision of future software-enabled smart energy systems with software houses is mapped with the already progressing scenarios of energy systems transitions on the one hand coupled with the technology foresight of software on the other hand. Grounding on the Smart Grid Reference Architecture Model (SGAM), it tabulates the distinguished software competencies and attributes them to the different partiesincluding customers/consumers (Internet of People, IoP)involved in future smart energy systems. The resulting designations can then be used to recognize and measure the necessary software competencies (e.g., fog computing) in order to be able to develop them in-house, or for instance to partner with software companies, depending on the future desirability. Software-intensive systems development competence becomes one of the key success factors for such cyber-physical-social systems (CPSS). Further futures research work is chartered with the Futures Map frame. This paper contributes preliminarily toward that by identifying pictures of the software-enabled futures and the connecting software competence-based scenario paths.Peer reviewe

"Olen koko elämäni yrittänyt selvitä lapsuudestani" : Lapsuuden perheväkivaltakokemusten merkityksiä yksilön elämässä

Opinnäytetyössämme käsittelemme lapsuuden perheväkivaltakokemusten merkityksiä yksilön elämässä. Lähestymme aihetta lapsen psyykkisen kasvun ja kehityksen, lapsen kaltoinkohtelun määrittelyn sekä yksilön kokemuksille antamien merkitysten avulla. Tavoitteenamme oli tutkia, mitä lapsuuden perheväki-valtakokemukset ovat mahdollisesti merkinneet yksilön lapsuudessa sekä millaisia merkityksiä yksilö antaa niille aikuisuudessa. Kokoamamme teorian ja kerättyjen tutkimustulosten pohjalta tuomme näkyviin mahdollisuuksia, miten havaita ja puuttua perheväkivaltaan varhaiskasvatuksen kentällä. Työmme on kvalitatiivinen eli laadullinen tutkimus, jossa käsittelemme tutkimusaineistoa fenomenologis-hermeneuttisesta näkökulmasta. Keräsimme tutkimusaineistoa osallistumalla Viola – väkivallasta va-paaksi ry:n lapsuudessaan perheväkivaltaa kokeneiden aikuisten vertaistukiryhmään. Kyseisen vertaistu-kiryhmän toiminta kesti elokuusta 2013 toukokuuhun 2014 asti. Tasavertaisina ryhmään osallistujina tutkimusnäkökulmaksemme muotoutui osallistuva havainnointi. Havainnoistamme ryhmätyöskentelyn aikana teimme päiväkirjamerkintöjä. Saadaksemme laajemman näkökulman tutkimusaiheeseen pidimme molemmat omia päiväkirjojamme. Lisäksi saimme ryhmäläisiltä vastauksia merkintöjemme tueksi kirjal-lisen kyselylomakkeen muodossa. Keräämämme aineiston perusteella vertaistukiryhmän jäsenet kokivat lapsuuden aikaisten perheväkival-takokemusten vaikuttaneen heidän lapsuuteensa kokonaisvaltaisesti aiheuttaen sekä fyysisiä, psyykkisiä että sosiaalisia ongelmia. Aikuiset ryhmäläiset kokivat lapsuuden traumaattisilla kokemuksilla olevan edelleen vaikutuksia heidän elämäänsä. He kokivat lapsuuden aikaisella perheväkivallalla olleen vaiku-tuksia muun muassa heidän minäkuvansa rakentumiseen, tunne-elämäänsä, vuorovaikutussuhteiden muodostamiseen sekä terveyteen. Voimakkaimmin nousivat esiin turvattomuuden ja pelon tunteiden mer-kitys sekä lapsuuden että aikuisuuden kertomuksissa. Perheväkivallan ennaltaehkäisyn ja puuttumisen tärkeys korostui myös ryhmäläisten kertomuksissa.In our bachelor´s thesis we discuss the meanings of childhood´s domestic violence experiences in an indi-vidual´s life. We approach the topic from a point of view of a child´s psychological growth and develop-ment, the definition of maltreatment of a child and the meanings that individual gives to these experiences. Our goal is to research what the domestic violence experiences have possibly meant in an individuals´ childhood and also what kind of meanings does an individual give to these in their adulthood. Based on the theory and the research data gathered we reveal the possibilities how to detect and intervene on domes-tic violence already in the level of early childhood education. We have used a qualitative approach in this thesis where we process our research data from a phenomeno-logical-hermeneutic point of view. We have gathered the data for this thesis by participating in a peer sup-port group by Viola – Free From Violence regional unit for people who have experienced domestic violence in their childhood. This peer group was active from August 2013 until May 2014. As equal participants of the group we ended up having a research perspective of a participatory observation. From our observations during our group work we did diary entries. To get a wider point of view of the research topic we both held our own diaries. In addition to these the peer group responded to a questionnaire form that supports our diary entries. Based on the data we collected, the members of the peer group felt that childhood´s domestic violence expe-riences affected them comprehensively causing both physical, psychological and social challenges in their lives. The adults in the group felt that their childhood´s traumatic experiences still effected to their lives. They experienced that the domestic violence has effected inter alia to building of their self-image and emo-tional lives, to forming of their interdependency and their health. The strongest feelings that arose in the group during our research were insecurity and fear in both childhood´s and adulthood´s experiences. The importance to prevent and intervene in domestic violence was highlighted in the experiences shared among the group members