PTE Fill in the blanks -3-

1. Drive down any highway, and you’ll see a perforation of chain restaurants -- most likely, if you travel long and far enough, you’ll see McDonald’s golden arches as well as signs for Burger King, Hardee’s and Wendy’s, the “big four” of burgers. Despite its name, though, Burger King has fallen short of claiming the burger crown, unable to surpass market leader MacDonald’s No.1 sales status. Always the bridesmaid and never the bride, Burger King remains No.2.
Worse yet, Burger King has experienced a six-year 22% decline in customer traffic with its overall quality rating dropping while ratings for the other three contenders have increased. The decline has been attributed to inconsistent product quality and poor customer service. Although the chain tends to throw advertising dollars at the problem, an understanding of integrated Marketing Communications theory would suggest that internal management problems (19 CEOs in 15 years) need to be rectified before a unified, long- term strategy can be put in place.
The important of consistency in brand image and messages, not all levels of communication, has become a basic tenet of IMC theory and practice. The person who takes the customer’s order must communicate the same message a Burger King’s famous tagline, “have it your way,” or customer will just buzz up the highway to a chain restaurant that seems more consistent and therefore, more reliable.



2. For all his fame and celebration, William Shakespeare remains a mysterious figure with regards to personal history. There are just two primary sources for information on the Bard: his works, and various legal and church documents that have survived from Elizabethan times. Naturally, there are many gaps in this body of information, which tells us little about Shakespeare the man.




3. Gas drilling on the Indonesian island of Java has triggered a “mud volcano” that has killed 13 people and may render four square miles (ten square kilometers) of countryside uninhabitable for years.In a report released on January 23, a team of British researchers says the deadly upwelling began when an exploratory gas well punched through a layer of rock 9,300 feet (2,800 meters) below the surface, allowing hot, high-pressure water to escape. The water carried mud to the surface; there it has spread across a region 2.5 miles (4 kilometers) in diameter in the eight months since the eruption began.
The mud volcano is similar to a gusher or blowout, which occur in oil drilling when oil or gas squirt to the surface, the team says. This upwelling, however, spews out a volume of mud equivalent to a dozen Olympic swimming pools each day.
Although the eruption isn’t as violent as a conventional volcano, more than a dozen people died when a natural gas pipeline ruptured.
The research team, who published their findings in the February issue of SGA today, also estimate that the volcano, called Lusi, will leave more than 11,00 people permanently displaced.