uconn mba website rejuvenation

UConn-‐ MBA Website Rejuvenation

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UConn MBA website Rejuvenation-‐Marketing Plan

MKTG-‐5250

Prepared for Professor Joseph Pancras Author: Albert (Tzu-‐wen)Lin, Ruby ( I-‐Li) Lu, Sherry Chen, Thomas Jose, Shweta Jagatap


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Table of Contents

Managerial Summary ............................................................................................................................................................ 2

Statement of Research Purpose and Objective ...................................................................................................... 2

Research Design and Methodology ............................................................................................................................... 3

Analysis Results ....................................................................................................................................................................... 6

Recommendations .................................................................................................................................................................. 8

Appendix……………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………13


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I Managerial Summary: Usually prospective students first hear about their universities of choice

through various ranking websites or online forums. Due to globalization and rising numbers of

business schools worldwide applicants get overwhelmed and find it difficult to make admission

related decisions. University websites play a critical role in attracting both domestic and

international students as they act as first official hosts of prospective students. Getting into MBA

involves many other important decisions such as staying jobless, relocating, planning for future jobs

etc. Current University of Connecticut School of Business website is doing a fairly good job by being

informative. However, through our preliminary secondary research we found that there are many

aspects that need modifications such as regular updating, layout, design and to some extent content.

Objective of our proposal is to make the UConn-‐School of Business website more interactive and

attractive primarily for MBA students. Our recommendation is five faceted that primarily targets

appearance and content using some latest advances in the technology that make the website more

attractive for the potential candidates

II STATEMENT OF RESEARCH PURPOSE AND OBJECTIVE (5%)

Background:

Decision Problem: More than seventy years old UConn School of Business is one of the

distinguished public schools in US that also enjoy locational advantage of being close to major

states such as Boston, New York which host many recognized employers. UConn’s one more

attractive feature is the real world learning opportunities offered to students through various

accelerators. Though current website is sufficiently informative when other B-‐schools are getting

benefited from use of advanced technologies and social media connections , UConn needs to follow

the similar path by creating a distinctive website that is more attractive than its competitors. To

find the right remedy for the website it is very important to know what exactly the potential spaces

for improvement are in the current website. This is especially true for students who are either from

other countries, states or even those who need to relocate after joining this program. These non-‐


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local students need some additional information other than routine information about admission

process and program. Knowing more about the actual residential life of the student or the weather

conditions in this region can help them to be well-‐prepared for this major migration in their life.

Also, knowing about return on investment i.e. career opportunities after the course completion are

also vital thing. Overall, despite the absence of any obvious issue that needs immediate attention

our marketing research focusses on taking preventive measures to prevent any hindrances arising

from not very appealing to one of the most creative and informative website.

Research Problem:

What changes are necessary in the current UConn-‐MBA website to make it more Attractive,

Innovative, Informative & User-‐friendly as compared to other MBA websites?

Research Questions:

1. What are the major shortcomings of the current website that we need to address in order to

be effective?

2. What are some innovative ideas that other websites used to make the sites more appealing

for the potential applicants?

3. What are different segments of the visitors who visit the websites?

4. What is the reaction of the population to our recommendations?

Research Hypothesis:

III RESEARCH DESIGN AND METHODOLOGY

Questionnaire design: The main purpose of the project is to attract high quality prospective

students by improving the quality and content of UConn full-‐time MBA website. Thus, we aim to

figure out the problems and difficulties within pages. By comparing and analyzing various MBA

websites, finding from Focus group interview, secondary data we finalized four parts main


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concerns of current & potential MBA students. In all questions we tried to use either interval or

ratio scale that can give in-‐depth information rather than using nominal or ordinal scale.

Part A is to make initial segmentation.

By selecting only relevant survey participants who have MBA degree, are pursuing MBA degree or

are interested in MBA degree we excluded people who are not interested in MBA studies right at

the beginning. Further we classified them based on the usage of MBA websites because some

respondents from Focus Group interview have got recommendations from friends and did not use

MBA website while applying.

Part B is to obtain MBA website users’ main concerns and focus.

Based on our primary and secondary research, we believe that there are some relationships among

social media links, website appearance, listed information and applications. To understand the

needs of our site visitors primarily international and non-‐resident individuals’ we designed

questions about importance of accommodation, social life, etc. After that, we wanted to spot correct

or accessible channels to promote MBA information to our targets. So, we designed two questions

to know the significance of social media, including Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, etc.

Part C is to draw individuals’ to check UConn MBA website and to obtain their opinions and suggestions.

We wanted to know their opinions about MBA website. Since we do believe UConn MBA website

needs to improve in various ways, we design many types of question to increase concurrent

validity. We tested some suggestions and findings from our Focus group interview. Also, we had

one opened questions for gathering recommendations and viewpoints about UConn MBA from

respondents.

Part D is the general information of each respondent.


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To ensure the accuracy of our survey, we made efforts to segment them into different demographic

features, such as home town/country, marital status, educational level and nationality. Also, we

tried to find out whether there is a relationship between years of working experience and listed

information.

To sum up, we do provide a comprehensive questionnaire for our recommendation and to finalize a

brief improvement plan for UConn MBA website. In the practical side, we gather direct opinions

from respondents so that the survey can direct us to the way to improvement.

Sampling plan: Due to time limitations we decided to choose combination of different non-‐

probability sampling methods such as convenience sampling, judgment sampling and snowball

sampling. Survey participants were selected randomly from our acquaintances primarily from three

categories-‐ people with MBA degree, currently pursuing MBA or planning to do MBA in near future

(population). We sent the surveys to UConn MBA class 2012-‐13, some online forums for

international students such as http://www.chasedream.com/ ,

http://www.beatthegmat.com/mba-‐website-‐survey-‐t113226.html(Convenience Sampling) and our

known friends who probably fall in one of these categories (Judgment Sampling). We also asked

these people to refer it to their friends (Snowball sampling).

Limitations of this study:

Due to time limitations, though we aimed for getting at least 100 usable responses, we could get

only around 50. This study clearly has some limitations. Because the data was collected from

anonymous sources, it is impossible to verify the information. By selectively choosing the sources

(sites/ MBA group) we tried to eliminate non-‐sampling errors. The length of the survey was

probably helpful in discouraging individuals who were not serious about providing their

information. The sample is not entirely reflective of the general population. In regard to region,

international students were over represented and other groups were under represented. In


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addition, potential MBA students are under-‐represented as well. The sample size limited the ability

to fully test the research hypotheses.

Data collection and data entry:

An online survey was created on Qualtrics.com. 66 respondents attended the survey. 17 were

ineligible due to not being planning to do MBA program and did not hold MBA degree, so we got

only 49 valid respondents.

IV ANALYSIS RESULTS

During our analysis of the survey results we came up with many interesting facts that could be

useful to understand the behavior of the potential MBA applicants or MBA degree holders. We are

listing few of them here.

1. (Appendix E.1)One interesting fact that came out of the analysis is that importance of academic

program is more for local students than for non-‐local students. Here dependent variable is

importance of academic program and independent variable is students’ original residence. We

used Chi-‐square test as dependent variable has ordinal scale and independent variable has

nominal scale. Even at 95% confidence level: p-‐value (0.05)> significance of 0.041. So, we can

reject null hypothesis. Percentage (70.6%) of students from Connecticut rank academic

program1 significantly (p = 0.041) more than percentage (50.6 %) of students from non-‐

Connecticut and percentage (53.6%) of students from other countries. Thus, any improvement

on academic program would be more effective for Connecticut students than from non-‐local

students. One possible reason for this behavior could be that international or out of state

students have many other preferences such as living facilities, getting into the school itself, job

opportunities, getting into US, etc.


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2. Descriptive analysis of the data shows that participants preferred online and email

communications over other forms of communication. But they also preferred using Facebook,

YouTube and LinkedIn as source of information. Around 75.5 % of people are in the favor of

online communication. Almost 60% people are in somewhat agree-‐ strongly agree range for the

usage of YouTube videos. This strongly supports our recommendation of using more videos by

adding YouTube links in the MBA website.

3. Regression analysis [Appendix E2] of the percentage points allocated to student life section of

UConn website and Age and Work-‐experience of student population show some dependency.

About 10% of the change in points can be attributed to the age and years of work experience.

This ten percent is significant as it is dependent only on two variables out of many in the list.

Also, in most of the cases, the decision making factor of a student depends on website quality

and the elaborate details associated with it. As our analysis pointed out earlier, the

improvement of UConn MBA websites in order to attract students with many age groups are

significant for keeping UConn competitive in the MBA application arena. Moreover competitive

schools have many applications come in and less acceptance rates. So, not only the fact that we

can improve the pedigree of school, but we can improve the revenues at UConn as more

applications results in more money for the school.

4. As modern lives are filled with social connections and circles, we found it very important to

analyze [Appendix E3] which mediums are the best for students to contact UConn and also in a

way our analysis shows which mediums should be given a look going forward. We found that

Mean is highest and standard deviation is lowest for Online communication. This shows that if

UConn has a online spokesperson to have live chat with the potential students, it really helps.

The next best way to communicate through email (already exists). Projecting the email in

important spots of website will help in this case. Among the social networking sites, Linkedin

(Both mean & SD are third best in the category) leads the pack closely followed by Facebook.


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Our analysis shows that increasing UConn’s presence in these sites for admission related

knowledge is very important along with Youtube videos offering admission tips.

V RECOMMENDATIONS

Our recommendations are based on the survey results, secondary data analysis and focus group

report. In the external secondary data, we collected information from total 22 Full-‐Time MBA

program websites’ to compare with that of UConn MBA’s. The comparison including the website’s

appearance, content (include major emphasize, main message, and overall structure), social media

link, attractive feature, and contact information. We analyzed the pros and cons of each category of

these websites and expected to find the better model for UConn MBA website

(Please see our secondary data analysis in the attached MBA website compared Excel sheet)

1. Appearance:

We suggest three aspects to improve the appearance of website:

• Color:

We categorized all the websites by two types of color appearances – traditional style (see

Appendix D1-‐figure 1,2,3,4) and colorful style (see Appendix D1-‐figure 5,6,7). The UConn

website is more likely to fall into traditional category. Since most MBA websites are part of the

B-‐school they cannot use different color scheme. Our survey indicates that about 44.9% of our

survey participants prefer traditional than brightly colored (vividly colored) website (see

Appendix-‐D2 Chart 1). Also, we found one of our focus group participant’s opinions very

interesting that traditional looking classy website reflects the long history and high reputation.

In conclusion we suggest that UConn website continue with the traditional color scheme.

However, the colors used for some parts of the text and tabs are too light. A user might miss

some important message due to this light colored font. According to our survey, about 30.6% of

the users agreed that adding colorful tabs in UConn MBA website will make it attractive website


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(see Appendix D2 Chart 2). In conclusion, we should change the color of important tabs such as

"Experiential Learning", “Global Initiatives”, “Academic Excellence”, and “Career Placement”

tabs in the top right page (see Appendix D3).

• Video:

Some MBA programs embed videos such as student life, student experience, and campus tour in

the homepage, for example, (see Appendix D4-‐figure 1,2,3,4).

In the focus group interview, many respondents suggested UConn to put more videos on the

website. Some suggested putting alumni/professors videos, while some (especially

international students) suggested showing more about facilities classrooms and residential

life’s videos. Since, it is difficult for international students to visualize the college they also

suggested the visual tour video or a panoramic view of campus. From our questionnaire service,

38.8% respondents agree that watching class video clips online will give them a clear

understanding about UConn MBA program (see Appendix D5-‐Chart 1). Over 70% of the

respondents agree that showing a live telecast of UConn campus will be a good way to know the

residential life (see Appendix D5-‐Chart 2). About 46.9% participants agree that using live

recording of on-‐campus life will make UConn MBA website more attractive (see Appendix D5-‐

Chart 3).

• Flash Picture:

Front page of UConn MBA website embeds a meaningful picture to show how UConn-‐MBA

“takes you farther”. However, according to our secondary research, many schools are good at

using flash picture on their website. For example (see Appendix D-‐6 Figure 1,2,3), In the focus

group interview, after showing the other program websites, the respondents were immediately

attracted by the flash view of MIT-‐MBA website(see Appendix D-‐6 Figure 3), and one of them


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from Europe also mentioned that many popular website in UK using flash. Since flash pictures

can create more value in a limit space, and almost over half of the respondents in survey agree

or somewhat agree that using flash picture will make UConn MBA website more attractive (see

Appendix D7). Therefore we recommend UConn MBA website change the original fixed picture

on headline to flash pictures.

2. Content:

• Major emphasize:

Every MBA program has their own specialties that they emphasize (see Appendix D8-‐a:). The

emphasis areas always show their distinct advantages. According to our exploratory research,

the main two reasons of choosing UConn MBA are “Experiential Learning” program and the

“Locational advantage” (close NYC and Boston with enticing job opportunities). Since, the

experiential learning is already strongly emphasized at the top of the page, we suggest doing

the same for the “locational advantage”. This will accompany with a clear map showing hiring

firms (see Appendix D8-‐b). We found the statement that “Connecticut is conveniently located

within driving distances of New York, NY and Boston, MA. Hartford city is state’s capital and is also

a financial center.” on general MBA page. Adding this statement to Full-‐time MBA page might

influence potential applicants proceeding with the application process as future job prospect is

one of the key factor in making admission related decisions.

• Main message

According to our research, most respondents were indifferent in their opinion about UConn

Website’s main message “UConn MBA takes you farther” (see Appendix D9. a & b) From the

focus group interview, some current MBA students never even noticed the message until we

showed them or did not find it unique. In the secondary data, we collected messages from 22

schools and chose some great samples as references (see Appendix D9 c.).


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• Overall structure

The overall structure of UConn MBA website is informative and clear. Our questionnaire

research discovered that there were 36.7% and 30.6% of the respondents agreed or somewhat

agreed that it was easy for them to become skillful at using UConn MBA website. (see Appendix

D10-‐a ). However, many words and categories put in the same page causes international

students feel frustrated when reading. For example, in our focus group interview, an MBA

student from Vietnam complained that she found it very difficult to get what she was looking

for. When we performed cross tabulation on the data we found that men were happier with the

current website in aspects of user-‐friendliness but women’s responses ranged primarily in the

strongly negative to negative categories (SPSS output-‐ cross tabulations result). Therefore, we

recommend UConn to improve the overall structure by two aspects.

Firstly, making the categories bars distinct from each other. As you can see from the UConn

Full-‐time MBA homepage (see Appendix D10-‐b), each category or title do not separate clearly

by any box or line. While compare with other great structure samples such as Temple

University and MIT (see Appendix D10-‐c&d), it is obvious that their overall structure look more

clearer than UConn’s.

Secondly, putting important actions in separate bars that can be more easily discover by users,

thus they don’t need to find those resources or information from un-‐known categories. For

example, Michigan State University puts “Sign-‐up for an Event”, ”Apply”, “Connect with a

Student”, and “Request for Information” in an obvious position, so the users can click the

buttons and get what they want. (see Appendix D10-‐e)

Finally, in the focus group interview, some applicants provided the idea of using comparison

tables for different MBA programs likes the BusinessWeek reports so that users can compare


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different aspects quickly. However, this table has a risk of exposing shortcomings of program,

and is only useful while comparing something at which UConn MBA exceptionally strong (such

as the #1 Public MBA program in New England).

3.Social media link:

Among the 23 schools studied only Wake forest University did not have social media links to its

homepage. Even UConn MBA website unlike www.uconn.edu doesn’t have social media links yet.

Social Media link is important because more and more people sharing and receiving information

through this platform. There are two types of social media link-‐ sharing and following. Most of

websites with social media buttons input following link in order to lead users to their Facebook,

Twitter, or LinkedIn page. Few of them adopt both sharing and following buttons (see Appendix

D11-‐a). According to our survey, people intend to follow MBA information from Facebook,

YouTube, and LinkedIn (see Appendix D11-‐d). They also enjoy sharing MBA information via social

media platform (see Appendix D11-‐e).

Therefore, we recommend UConn MBA website to add social media links to the website. There are

some great examples for adopting the links, (see Appendix D11-‐b&c) as the reference.

4.Contact information:

The contact information can display in many ways. In general, most schools including UConn simply

put the general information (email, phone numbers, and fax numbers) in the corner of the page

(seeAppendic D12-‐a&b). However, from our secondary data, we found that there are many

excellent ideas to improve the contact information form and make it friendly for users. We

recommend UConn MBA website create the online respond system. Users can type in their

information and questions directly on the online form and send it to the office (see Appendix D12-‐

c). This method benefits international applicants who don’t think phoning school is a practical


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option. This system also enables the programs to collect personal information from potential

applicants and send application reminder emails to them. According to our survey, 80% of the

respondents need an application reminder email to remind them the next steps (see Appendix D12-‐

d).

Fisher’s MBA has integrated all contact methods in a box (Appendix D12-‐e), that makes all contact

methods easily approachable. Thus, we strongly suggest UConn MBA replaces the information text

to an integral box with all contact information and methods.

Attractive feature:

Here are some innovation features that can make UConn MBA website more attractive for potential

applicants.

• Successful Alumni stories

Put successful alumni stories on a webpage to descripted how their MBA experiences and who they

are working for now. (see Appendix D13-‐a&b)

• Career

The most important factor for choosing MBA programs is their career service. In order to pursue an

image of great career service, we suggest to post the hiring firm lists (see Appendix D14-‐a),

alumni/networking information (see Appendix D14-‐b), and online career resources system (see

Appendix D14-‐c) on the website.

• Program news

Embed the well updated program news can make the program look vivid and increase the

awareness of the website. (see Appendix D15-‐a)


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• Student life photos and videos

In the focus group interview, some respondents suggested to post more information about the

residential life. This information is especially important because they may spend two years in the

new environment. Rice University has excellent videos and photos about MBA life (see Appendix

D16-‐a&b). University of Maryland has student ambassadors and MBA blogs to introduce campus

life (see Appendix D16-‐c). University of Illinoi-‐ Urbana Champaign provides very detail list for

student’s life such as the best restaurants, Art & Culture events and international food stores (see

Appendix D16-‐d).

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