Promoting Business Schools: A Content Analysis of Business Schools Magazines

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1 Promoting Buine School: A Content Analyi of Buine School Magazine Jenny Yin Zhen Emporia State Kevin R. Coulon Emporia State Jun Yu Emporia State Joyce X. Zhou Emporia State Among the effort made to attract tudent and upporter, many buine chool ue brochure or magazine to build and maintain relationhip with alumni and other takeholder, to attract new tudent, and to improve their overall viibility. Thee promotional material have variou content, uch a mea from the dean, academic program, tudent achievement, or faculty and taff new, among other. We perform a content analyi on the extent to which the content i utilized by AACSB-accredited buine chool in the United State. The tudy provide an initial picture of elf-promotion of buine chool uing chool magazine. The reult will increae our knowled in the area of higher education marketing and help inform marketing profeional in buine chool and colle or univeritie in neral. INTRODUCTION Buine chool have many way to communicate information to the public in order to build their brand, recruit new tudent, and make connection with alumni. There are tudie about marketing for buine chool, making connection through publication, communicating to perpective tudent through appropriate ource of information, recognizing the value of alumni, and the effectivene of univerity marketing and retention. However, few tudie about chool magazine are available. Although chool webite are one the mot popular tool, magazine are alo very important. They play an important role for buine chool publicity and brand building. So the preent reearch about the buine chool magazine i very neceary. It will analyze the categorie of thoe magazine and compare them among different chool. It i a detailed tudy about how buine chool ue magazine for promotion and what categorie are mot commonly ued. The current tudy will provide detailed information about the categorie of different buine chool magazine. It may be helpful to buine chool without magazine in the proce of creating their 106 Journal of Applied Buine and Economic Vol. 19(3) 2017

2 magazine, and for buine chool with exiting magazine to make improvement. The tudy will alo contribute to the broad literature of higher education marketing. The reearch objective i to analyze at leat 36 buine chool magazine acro the United Sate. Table will be ued to diplay the analyi of magazine categorie. Dicuion will be made baed on the analyi. LITERATURE REVIEW There are tudie about the marketing of higher education intitution. Thoe tudie conider tudent a conumer. A Wiee, Jordaan, and Heerden (2009) ugted, education can be claified a a ervice. Service can include a place, an idea, a peron or an activity, with atifaction or benefit offered for ale that are eentially intangible and do not reult in the ownerhip of anything (Wiee et al. 2009). And there are variou view about ervice. For example, ervice normally require more quality control, upplier credibility and adaptability (Kotler & Keller 2006). Some author view ervice a act, performance and experience that create benefit for cutomer (Baron & Harri 1995; Braington & Pettitt 2007; Lovelock & Wright 1999; McColl-Kennedy 2003). Wiee, Jordaan, and Heerden (2009) indicated higher education intitution can be claified a place with benefit or atifaction that offer ervice for ale. Therefore higher education intitution need to communicate with tudent by including intitutional information in the ource that tudent conult or ue. (Abaya 2004; Bodoh & Mighall 2002; Jarzabkowki & Wilon 2002; Melewar & Akel 2005). Many media can be ued in higher education intitutional marketing. International tudie report that marketing ource, uch a advertiement, webite, and brochure, are effective in reaching propective tudent (Wiee et al. 2009). According to a pre tatement by the Primary Group (2007), more than 47 percent of American univeritie ue webite advertiing to market their intitution. Earlier tudie report that univeritie in the Lo Anle area mainly ued recruiting catalog and gloy alumni magazine to market their intitution (Warren 1994), wherea ome univeritie made ue of guidebook, private counelor, and magazine to market their (McDonough 1994). The tudy conducted by Wiee, Jordaan and Van Heerden (2009) concluded that information directly from the intitution, uch a brochure, newletter, webite, campu viit and open day are the bet way to dieminate information to propective tudent. However, among thoe ource, the effectivene of each i different. And it alo differ acro univeritie. One tudy (Hoyt & Brown 2003) reported that webite were the mot important ource of information for propective tudent, while another tudy identified campu viit to be the mot influential ource of information (Seymour 2000). The leat influential ource of information were lited a advertiement in magazine, newpaper, radio and televiion (Wiee et al. 2009). In a tudy about branding buine chool, it i pointed out that univeritie face the challen to build a tronr brand for the ake of urvival (Shbaro et al. 2010). For graduate, a well-known univerity brand i an aet to benefit their long-term career life; for invetor, it i a guarantee that their invetment in donation are jutified effectively; for propective tudent, it i a top criterion when they chooe univeritie. Only with the creation and maintenance of a ditinctive brand ima, can univeritie have better chance to attract tudent, invetor, faculty and taff (Moogan et al. 2001). The author of the tudy nerally claified buine chool into two kind: independent chool and thoe belonging to larr univeritie (Shbaro et al. 2010). They concluded that thoe buine chool belonging to larr univeritie often benefit from the reputation of univeritie, but uually ignore creating their own chool brand to be maximally competitive in the buine chool market. On the other hand, the brand of mall independent buine chool are uually better built and maintained becaue there i no univerity brand and reputation they can rely upon. When it come to organizational tructure, mall independent buine chool are normally more flexible to chan, triving to create their own brand identitie (Shbaro et al. 2010). The tudy alo mentioned that due to the development of ocial media, the relative role of mea ender and receiver chand. Conumer are not paive information receiver any lonr. They are provided with many opportunitie to expre their own opinion and real experience Journal of Applied Buine and Economic Vol. 19(3)

3 (Shbaro et al. 2010). The current knowled gap in higher education branding urntly call for reearch on communication influencing the brand development proce from the perpective of future tudent, who are the conum higher education (Shbaro et al. 2010). METHODOLOGY The preent tudy analyze the content of 36 buine chool magazine around the United State, They have imilar media content. Some content categorie pan all magazine, uch a mea from the dean, colle or alumni new and o on. Other magazine utilize chool pecific content uch a column on innovation, port new, campu map and media contact. They are diplayed in different way in buine chool magazine. Table 1 and Table 2 provide baic information of the tudy. Thee buine chool are claified into type acro four major region in the U.S. in the flowing table. er in the table indicate the numb chool under each type. TABLE 1 REGIONS ABD TYPES OF SCHOOLS Region chool Type of School Midwet Total All content categorie appearing in the buine chool magazine in thi tudy are lited in the following table. They are put into five main area, which are mea from the dean, new, colle fact, profile and other pecial categorie. The numb chool which ued thee categorie in their magazine and the percenta of them among all the chool are lited. TABLE 2 NUMBER AND PERCENTAGE OF SCHOOLS UNDER EACH CATEGORY Category School Mea from the Dean % New Colle New % Faculty New % Student New % Colle Affair % Alumni New % Sport New % Academic New % Adminitrative New % Colle Fact Profeional Perpective % Innovation % % 108 Journal of Applied Buine and Economic Vol. 19(3) 2017

4 Global Outlook % Community Outreach % Profile Faculty Profile % Alumni Profile % Special Column Cover Story % Buine Reply Mail % Q&A % Buine Network % Cla Year Note % My Favorite Profeor % Campu Map % Media Contact % Fact of the Colle % Year in Review % Speaker and Viitor % School Adviory Board and % Leaderhip Team Contribution % Viion % Voice % Honor Roll of Invetor % Bolded number repreent the number and percenta of categorie that are mot popularly ued in each area. SUMMARY OF FINDINGS Baed on the baic information nerated, the tudy found out ome popularly ued categorie. Then the tudy ummarized thee categorie baed on the region of chool in table 3 and baed on the type of chool in table 4. Journal of Applied Buine and Economic Vol. 19(3)

5 TABLE 3 NUMBER AND PERCENTAGE OF SCHOOLS IN EACH REGION UNDER MAIN CATEGORIES Category chool Region of School (11) (8) Midwet(5) (12) chool chool chool Mea % 8 100% 5 100% % from the Dean New Colle New % % 5 100% % Alumni New % % % % Faculty New % % % % Student % % % % New Colle Fact Global % % % % Outlook Fact of % % % % Colle % % % % Year in % % % % Review Calendar of % % % % Event School % % % % Adviory Board and Leaderhip Team Profile Faculty % % 1 20,00% % Profile Alumni Profile % % % % Special Category Buine % % % % Reply Mail Cla Year % % % % Note Cover Story % % % % Q&A % % % % 110 Journal of Applied Buine and Economic Vol. 19(3) 2017

6 TABLE 4 NUMBER AND PERCENTAGE OF DIFFERENT TYPE OF SCHOOLS UNDER MAIN CATEGORIES Category Mea from the Dean Type of School (21) (15) (25) (11) chool chool chool chool % % % % New Colle New % % % % Alumni New % % % % Faculty New % % % % Student New Global Outlook % % % % Colle Fact % % % % Fact of % % % % Colle % % % % Year in % % % % Review Calendar of % % % % Event School % % % % Adviory Board and Leaderhip Team Profile Faculty % % 7 28,00% % Profile Alumni Profile 3 14,29% % % % Special Category Buine % % % % Reply Mail Cla Year % % % % Note Cover Story % % % % Q&A % % % % Journal of Applied Buine and Economic Vol. 19(3)

7 DISCUSSIONS AND CONCLUSION According to table 2, the mea from the dean i the mot popular category. School ued thi category almot 92% of the time and it i uually put on the firt pa of the magazine. All the magazine have a lot of new. Mot of them have neral new around campu, which i the colle new. Some of them have pecified the new into different kind. Their ranking are: alumni new, faculty new, tudent new, adminitrative new and academic new. In the fact of the colle area, global iue, reearch, and tatitic about the colle are popular categorie. In order to inform read the pat and future event, mot chool ue year in review and calendar of event. Mot of them have profile for notable faculty, and ome of them have alumni profile. In addition, ome buine chool ue their own categorie. One of the mot popular i the cla note. Some magazine include buine reply mail, o they can t ome feedback from the reader. Additional analyi i made among thee popular categorie. A it i indicated in table 3, chool in wet region have the mot tudent new, global outlook, calendar of event, chool adviory board and leaderhip team, faculty profile, and alumni profile. School in the northeat region have more alumni new, faculty new, and more information about reearch. Among chool in Midwet region, colle new and fact of colle are more popular. And they have more buine reply mail. Special categorie, uch cla note, cover tory, and Q&A are more popular among chool in outh region. The analyi in table 4 i baed on different type of chool. A it i hown in table 4, teaching chool and reearch chool employ different content tyle. Colle new and alumni new are more popular in private chool; faculty new and current tudent new are more popular in public chool. and teaching chool diplay more chool fact in their magazine. Profile of faculty and alumni are more popular in reearch chool magazine. And public and reearch chool tend to have more pecial categorie, uch a buine reply mail, cla note, and Q&A. LIMITATIONS AND RECOMMENDATIONS The ample of chool that were tudied i mall. More chool need to be analyzed in future reearch. The ditribution of chool in each region tudied differ. More chool in northeat and wet region are tudied than in midwet and outh. Analyi of the category indicate ome popular categorie. However, the effectivene of each category need to be determined. In the future, ome urvey on the effectivene of each category could be conducted among tudent, facultie and alumni. REFERENCES Abaya, E. (2004). Marketing Lakehead. Newletter, 21, 3. Baron, S. & Harri, K. (1995). Service Marketing. London: MacMillan Pre. Bodoh, J. & Mighall, R. (2002). Brand new ima. The Guardian, 10. Braington, F. & Pettitt, S. (2007). Eential of Marketing. London: Prentice Hall. Hoyt, J.F. & Brown, A.B. (2003). Identifying colle choice factor to uccefully market your intitution. Colle and, 78, 3-5. Jarzabkowki, P. & Wilon, D. (2002). Top team and trategy in a UK univerity. Journal of Manament Science, 39, Kotler, P. & Keller, K.L. (2006). Marketing Manament. New Jerey, USA: Prentice Hall. Lovelock, C.H. & Wright, L. (1999). Principle of Service Marketing and Manament. New Jerey, USA: Prentice-Hall. McColl-Kennedy, J.R. (2003). Service Marketing a Manarial Approach. Autralia: John Wiley. McDonough, P.M. (1994). Buying and elling higher education: the ocial 112 Journal of Applied Buine and Economic Vol. 19(3) 2017

8 contruction. The Journal of Higher Education, 65, Melewar, T.C. & Akel, S. (2005). The role of corporate identity in the higher education ector. Corporate Communication, 10, Moogan, Y. J.; Baron, S. & Bainbrid, S. (2001). Timing and trade-off in the marketing of higher education coure: a conjoint approach. Marketing Intellince & Planning, 19, Seymour, L. (2000). Giving the web the new colle try: tudent online urf to ample life on campu. The Wahington Pot, 11. Shbaro, K. Xu, M. & Liu, R. (2010). Branding buine chool: Introducing Student Deciion Journey a a guidance model. Mater Thei, Spring Warren, E. (1994). School pull out the top to lure buine tudent. Buine Journal, 18. Wiee, M, Jordaan, Y. & Heerden, N.V. (2009). Communicating to propective tudent through appropriate ource of information: a comparative tudy of elected public higher education intitution. Communicare, 28, APPENDIX I LIST OF SCHOOLS STUDIED School Region Type Wahington State Colle of Buine Goizueta Buine School, Emory The Culverhoue Colle of Commerce, The of Alabama Carl H. Lindner Colla of Buine, of Cincinnati The Binghamton School of Manament Michael G. Foter School of Buine, of Wahington Price Colle of Buine, The of Oklahoma Geor Herbert Walker School of Buine & Technology, Webter Midwet Midwet Magazine Iued Date Journal of Applied Buine and Economic Vol. 19(3)

9 Gatton Colle of Buine and Economic, of Kentucky The Simmon School of Manament Spring Hankamer School of Buine, Baylor Jon M. Huntman School of Buine, Utah State Lundquit Colle of Buine, of Oregon Mihaylo Colle of Buine and Economic, California State, Fullerton at Buffalo, The State of New York The of Texa at San Antonio Jee H. Jone Graduate School of Buine, Rice Boton School of Manament Summer Colle of Buine, Loyola New Orlean The Naveen Jindal School of Manament, the of Texa at Dalla Kenan-Flagler Buine School, the of North Carolina at Chapel Hill McDonough School of Buine, Geortown Hoftra October 16, 114 Journal of Applied Buine and Economic Vol. 19(3) 2017

10 Stern Buine School, New York Wake Foret Hankamer School of Buine, Baylor Buine Erivan K. Haub School of Buine, Saint Joeph' Villanova School of Buine, Villanova The Paul Mera School of Buine Alber School of Buine and Economic, Seattle The Haa School of Buine, the of California, Berkeley Carlon School of Manament, of Minneota Colle of Buine, California State, Chico Eller Colle of Manament, The of Arizona Saint Loui Pamplin Colle of Buine, Virginia Tech The of Oklahoma McDonough School of Buine,Geortown Collin Colle of Buine,The of Tula Midwet Midwet Midwet Fall/winter Summer Summer Summer Winter 2013 Journal of Applied Buine and Economic Vol. 19(3)

11 Daniel Colle of Buine, of Denver Robert H. Smith School of Buine, of Maryland The of ern Miiippi Seidman Colle of Buine, Grand Valley State The Geor Wahington Lubar School of Buine, of Wiconin Spring 2013 Winter 2013 Midwet Spring 2013 Midwet Winter 2013 About the author Jenny Yin Zhen obtain her MBA from St John, and i a marketing profeional. Kevin R. Coulon i a Profeor of Marketing in the chool of Buine, Emporia State. He received hi PhD in marketing from of Nebraka-Lincoln. He teache and reearch in the area of peronal elling and ale manament. Hi ha publihed in the Journal of Internet Commerce, Journal of Promotion Manament, The Journal for Advancement of Marketing Education, Adminitrative Iue Journal, The Journal of Legal, Ethical and Regulatory Iue, The Journal of Practical Global Buine, Journal of Marketing Manament, Academy of Marketing Studie Journal, and Journal of Marketing Theory and Practice. Joyce Zhou i an Aociate Profeor of Marketing in the chool of Buine, Emporia State. She acquired her PhD in marketing from Saint Loui. Her teaching and reearch interet are in the area of conumer behavior, advertiing, and international marketing. Many of her paper have been publihed in Journal of the Academy of Marketing Science, Journal of Buine, International Marketing Review, Journal of Small Buine Manament, Journal of Conumer Marketing, Journal of International Conumer Marketing, Journal of Internet Commerce, Journal of Promotion Manament, and International Journal of Manament Theory and Practice. Jun Yu i an Aociate Profeor of Marketing in the School of Buine, Emporia State. He received a PhD degree in marketing from of Texa at Dalla. He ha previouly taught at of Texa at Dalla, of Illinoi at Chicago and of Miouri at St Loui. Hi publication have appeared in Journal of Buine, Journal of Small Buine Manament, Journal of Conumer Marketing, Journal of International Conumer Marketing, Marketing Intellince & Planning, Journal of Internet Commerce, Journal of Manament Theory and Practice. 116 Journal of Applied Buine and Economic Vol. 19(3) 2017

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