The following appeared in a memo from the vice president of marketing at Dura-Sock, Inc.
"A recent study of our customers suggests that our company is wasting the money it spends on its patented Endure manufacturing process, which ensures that our socks are strong enough to last for two years. We have always advertised our use of the Endure process, but the new study shows that despite our socks' durability, our average customer actually purchases new Dura-Socks every three months. Furthermore, our customers surveyed in our largest market, northeastern United States cities, say that they most value Dura-Socks' stylish appearance and availability in many colors. These findings suggest that we can increase our profits by discontinuing use of the Endure manufacturing process."
In the memo from the vice president of Dura-Sock, Inc, it was concluded that discontinuing with their patented Endure manufacturing process will result in an increase in profits. While the conclusion is plausible and its realisation may have the intended effect, the arguments backing it in their current states are precarious. Much more evidence needs to be comprehensively analysed and several questions must be answered to show that the conclusion holds water.
Firstly, the vice president assumes that the study's result of their average customer buying their socks in a three month cycle negates the usefulness of their famous Endure process. This may not be the case. It is possible that the buyers' purpose to frequently buy new socks is to keep up to date with the latest fashion trends and not because their last purchase malfunctioned. Similarly, equally possible is that these are frequently bought as gifts and are not used directly by the buyer. Further, the study's result could be incorrectly aggregated. It could be that the variance between peek sale season during winter holidays with customers buying significantly more socks and the relatively dull summers could account for an average quarterly buying cycle. Such bias would invalidate any skepticism towards the Endure Manufacturing process.
Moreover, surveying existing customers may dissemble the true picture. As is often found for clothing articles, It is possible that a significant portion of sales of Dura-Sock depends upon new first-time customers. While the relatively few old customers may value Dura-Socks' color choice and appearance, what if the main point of attraction for any new customer is their advertised Endure process technology? Any volatility in their customer base will require them to focus on bringing more customers on board rather than appeasing existing ones. Therefore, the survey should also include potential customers, perhaps of a rivaling firm, in its investigation.
Finally, restricting the survey to the 'largest' market may not be representative of actual profits that the company churns. In a globalized market with dynamic pricing, shipping overheads, and labour costs, it could be so that their 'largest' market in terms of sale may not actually be their largest profit generator. What if even with relatively less sale in any other country's market, the higher profit margin compounds to a larger net profit overall profit when compared with northeastern United States cities? This would mean that opinion of other customers in different markets, especially ones responsible for the most profit, should also be taken into account before arriving at the conclusion.
Clearly, the conclusion derived may not hold water as the backing arguments are rife with flaws. The study's result should be critically analysed, and any implication from customers' buying cycle should be very carefully derived. The change in customer base and the opinion of potential customers should also be accounted. Furthermore, a more comprehensive survey inclusive of high profit markets should be conducted to validate the vice president's efforts.
Comments
e-rater score report
Attribute Value Ideal
Final score: 4.0 out of 6
Category: Good Excellent
No. of Grammatical Errors: 0 2
No. of Spelling Errors: 0 2
No. of Sentences: 23 15
No. of Words: 487 350
No. of Characters: 2599 1500
No. of Different Words: 253 200
Fourth Root of Number of Words: 4.698 4.7
Average Word Length: 5.337 4.6
Word Length SD: 2.766 2.4
No. of Words greater than 5 chars: 211 100
No. of Words greater than 6 chars: 157 80
No. of Words greater than 7 chars: 107 40
No. of Words greater than 8 chars: 77 20
Use of Passive Voice (%): 0 0
Avg. Sentence Length: 21.174 21.0
Sentence Length SD: 7.883 7.5
Use of Discourse Markers (%): 0.609 0.12
Sentence-Text Coherence: 0.279 0.35
Sentence-Para Coherence: 0.495 0.50
Sentence-Sentence Coherence: 0.073 0.07
Number of Paragraphs: 5 5
Grammar and spelling errors:
Line 3, column 813, Rule ID: A_INFINITVE[1]
Message: Probably a wrong construction: a/the + infinitive
...would invalidate any skepticism towards the Endure Manufacturing process. Moreover, sur...
^^^^^^^^^^
Line 7, column 594, Rule ID: ONES[1]
Message: Did you mean 'one's'?
Suggestion: one's
...tomers in different markets, especially ones responsible for the most profit, should...
^^^^
Transition Words or Phrases used:
actually, also, finally, first, firstly, furthermore, if, may, moreover, similarly, so, therefore, while
Attributes: Values AverageValues Percentages(Values/AverageValues)% => Comments
Performance on Part of Speech:
To be verbs : 25.0 19.6327345309 127% => OK
Auxiliary verbs: 22.0 12.9520958084 170% => OK
Conjunction : 9.0 11.1786427146 81% => OK
Relative clauses : 11.0 13.6137724551 81% => OK
Pronoun: 32.0 28.8173652695 111% => OK
Preposition: 53.0 55.5748502994 95% => OK
Nominalization: 8.0 16.3942115768 49% => More nominalizations (nouns with a suffix like: tion ment ence ance) wanted.
Performance on vocabulary words:
No of characters: 2655.0 2260.96107784 117% => OK
No of words: 487.0 441.139720559 110% => OK
Chars per words: 5.45174537988 5.12650576532 106% => OK
Fourth root words length: 4.69766713281 4.56307096286 103% => OK
Word Length SD: 2.84382908468 2.78398813304 102% => OK
Unique words: 259.0 204.123752495 127% => OK
Unique words percentage: 0.5318275154 0.468620217663 113% => OK
syllable_count: 822.6 705.55239521 117% => OK
avg_syllables_per_word: 1.7 1.59920159681 106% => OK
A sentence (or a clause, phrase) starts by:
Pronoun: 7.0 4.96107784431 141% => OK
Article: 9.0 8.76447105788 103% => OK
Subordination: 3.0 2.70958083832 111% => OK
Conjunction: 2.0 1.67365269461 119% => OK
Preposition: 3.0 4.22255489022 71% => OK
Performance on sentences:
How many sentences: 23.0 19.7664670659 116% => OK
Sentence length: 21.0 22.8473053892 92% => OK
Sentence length SD: 48.1157237641 57.8364921388 83% => OK
Chars per sentence: 115.434782609 119.503703932 97% => OK
Words per sentence: 21.1739130435 23.324526521 91% => OK
Discourse Markers: 4.52173913043 5.70786347227 79% => OK
Paragraphs: 5.0 5.15768463074 97% => OK
Language errors: 2.0 5.25449101796 38% => OK
Sentences with positive sentiment : 13.0 8.20758483034 158% => OK
Sentences with negative sentiment : 3.0 6.88822355289 44% => More negative sentences wanted.
Sentences with neutral sentiment: 7.0 4.67664670659 150% => OK
What are sentences with positive/Negative/neutral sentiment?
Coherence and Cohesion:
Essay topic to essay body coherence: 0.173547311591 0.218282227539 80% => OK
Sentence topic coherence: 0.0538098196571 0.0743258471296 72% => OK
Sentence topic coherence SD: 0.0596745834345 0.0701772020484 85% => OK
Paragraph topic coherence: 0.107201628016 0.128457276422 83% => OK
Paragraph topic coherence SD: 0.0403805719058 0.0628817314937 64% => OK
Essay readability:
automated_readability_index: 14.8 14.3799401198 103% => OK
flesch_reading_ease: 41.7 48.3550499002 86% => OK
smog_index: 8.8 7.1628742515 123% => OK
flesch_kincaid_grade: 12.7 12.197005988 104% => OK
coleman_liau_index: 14.33 12.5979740519 114% => OK
dale_chall_readability_score: 9.25 8.32208582834 111% => OK
difficult_words: 141.0 98.500998004 143% => OK
linsear_write_formula: 14.0 12.3882235529 113% => OK
gunning_fog: 10.4 11.1389221557 93% => OK
text_standard: 15.0 11.9071856287 126% => OK
What are above readability scores?
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Rates: 83.33 out of 100
Scores by essay e-grader: 5.0 Out of 6
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Note: the e-grader does NOT examine the meaning of words and ideas. VIP users will receive further evaluations by advanced module of e-grader and human graders.