UNIVERSITY OF ECONOMICS HO CHI MINH CITY International School of Business Mai Son Tung BUILDING AND DEVELOPING BRAND NAME THE CASE OF EASTERN INTERNATIONAL UNIVERSITY ID: 22140060 MASTER OF BUSINESS ADMINISTRATION SUPERVISOR: ASSOC. TRAN HA MINH QUAN Year 2016 LUAN VAN CHAT LUONG download : add luanvanchat@agmail.com Building and Developing Brand Name – The Case of Eastern International University TABLE OF CONTENTS EXECUTIVE SUMMARY. 4 Overview of the market of higher education in Vietnam. 4 History and Profile of Eastern International University.
5 STATEMENT OF PROBLEMS. 6 Brief description of beginning process. 6 Summary the result of in depth interview. 7 The point of view of the director of marketing department.
7 The point of view of EIU students. 8 Statement of problem. 9 Initial identification of possible problems. 9 The problem of market segmentation .10 The problem of brand positioning .12 Cause and effect tree .19 Stage 1: Market segmentation and potential customer identification .20 Stage 2: Brand Positioning.23 Stage 3: Adjusting and developing marketing programs.32 The core standards .32 The supplementary standards .37 2 LUAN VAN CHAT LUONG download : add luanvanchat@agmail.com Building and Developing Brand Name – The Case of Eastern International University EXECUTIVE SUMMARY Eastern International University (EIU) is a new university in the market of higher education in Vietnam.
The school was established in 2010 with 100% initial capital by the Becamex Corporation in Binh Duong province. The school was oriented to be the leader in training high quality of human resource for the Eastern and Southern areas. However, since 2011, they have not yet achieved their target in confirmation EIU brand name in the market of higher education. This document supplied the reference and suggestion to create and discover potential initiative in building and developing EIU brand name through a real research at EIU.
Method of analysis include horizontal analyses as well as qualitative data from indepth interview with the marketing department and EIU students. In the period between 2011 and 2016, the enrollment result of the school was disappointed. The brand name of EIU in mind of the community was faded and inconsistent. Year Target of Enrollment Real Enrollment 2011 1,000 742 2012 1,000 551 2013 1,500 428 2014 1,500 377 2015 1,000 477 2016 1,000 290 Result from the indepth interview and data analysed show that the problem is unclear in market segmentation and brand positioning.
It made the brand strategy of the school was very weak. Therefore my research has a purpose to propose an avenue to strengthen the brand strategy of EIU for building and developing the brand name of Eastern International University among communities. The designed solutions need to satisfy three big requirements. There are the functional requirements, user requirements and last but not least is boundary conditions.
- Functional requirements: Improve the result of enrollment, clear and consistent brand image in mind of the community. 3 LUAN VAN CHAT LUONG download : add luanvanchat@agmail.com Building and Developing Brand Name – The Case of Eastern International University - User requirements: The solutions are appropriate with the number and ability of employees in the marketing department - Boundary conditions: The level of budget for enrollment, the policies of Becamex IDC, the regulations of the Ministry of Education and Training I devided the process of applying solutions into three big stages: Stage 1: Clear market segmentation and potential customer identification. Stage 2: Clarification of brand postioning Stage 3: Adjustment of marketing department When EIU could clarify who are their potential customer. They could be clear in positioning brand name and set up marketing programs to approach their customer more effectively and economically.
It make students perceive the brand image of the school and strengthen EIU brand name. I also set up standards for evaluation the effect of our solutions could be divided into core and supplementary. The core standards include number students in one year of enrollment, cost in enrollment one student and the index of brand awareness especially the top of mind. The supplementary standards includethe feed back from potential students and the brand perception of potential customers.
However we have to admit that improvement internal power is the best solution in long term for any university to exis and develop in a fiercely competitive market of higher education. INTRODUCTION Overview of the market of higher education in Vietnam Since 2010, the number of university in Vietnam has increased significantly. A booming in the market of higher education led to fierce competition and thus caused many difficulties for universities especially is the private sector in remaining their activities. The demand for studying at university in Vietnam in recent years was decreased steadily while the supply was increasing significantly.
Therefore students would have many more choices for studying at university in comparison with the past. It caused problems for private universities in enrollment because students would have priority to apply to public school. For the purpose of competition with other schools, many universities were trying to 4 LUAN VAN CHAT LUONG download : add luanvanchat@agmail.com Building and Developing Brand Name – The Case of Eastern International University reduce their entry requirements. It lead to a lower quality input in comparison with the past.
The gap in receiving favor from the Government between public and private universities was very high. Therefore competition among public and private schools in Vietnam was unfair. In recent years, the growth of economic conditions and international cooperation in Vietnam create high demand for studying abroad or studying in an English environment. In conclusion, the market of higher education in Vietnam is extremely competitive.
It created many obstacles and challenges for new comers. However, it also had opportunities which a new school could exploit to be existed and developed further. History and Profile of Eastern International University Eastern International University was found by Becamex IDC Corporation in 2010 in Binh Duong province, one of provinces that generates a significant contribution for the country’s GDP and overall economic wealth of the country. The school began to enroll their first cohort of new students in 2011.
In the period between 2011 and 2015, the school achieved over 2,500 students in total. The school focused on three main field of education: Business Administration, Engineering and Nursing. The advantage of the school is support from Becamex Corporation. Becamex is renowned as one of the country’s largest industrial park operators, proudly hosting over 13,000 businesses located in seven industrial parks and infrastructure hubs.
EIU is surrounded by Binh Duong New City, the future hub of the province, which by 2020 is predicted to require over 150,000 working professional. Based on the supporting from Becamex IDC Corporation, EIU could obtain a close relationship with around 5,000 foreign companies in total of 13,000 enterprises in controlling of Becamex IDC. In order to successfully address the needs required, EIU’s mission includes fundamentally serving the community of Binh Duong and sustaining the local growing business sector with fully qualified and highly skilled graduates. EIU students will absorb a truly international learning environment.
Students will experience a valuable mix of modern academic facilities, a native speaking specialist English center, a unique pedagogy of teaching and learning methods, and challenging international curriculum subjects regularly designed to match current business requirements. 5 LUAN VAN CHAT LUONG download : add luanvanchat@agmail.com Building and Developing Brand Name – The Case of Eastern International University STATEMENT OF PROBLEMS Brief description of beginning process Despite very high efforts from the board of directors of EIU in bringing brand name of EIU into the communities. In the period between 2011 and 2016, EIU has not yet achieved their target in enrollment new students. Their enrollment result decreased steadily from year to year.
EIU also found that it was hard for them to recruit high quality researchers or professors. The table below show the real result of enrollment at EIU from 2011 to 2015: Year Target of Enrollment Real Enrollment 2011 1,000 742 2012 1,000 551 2013 1,500 428 2014 1,500 377 2015 1,000 477 2016 1,000 290 Their enrollment was low in comparison with other international university. For example RMIT easily achieved enrollment from 1,200 to 1,500 students every year. Some other international universities also got a quite optimistic result with around from 700 to 1,000 students such as SIU or FPT.
In comparison with universities in Binh Duong province, the result of enrollment at EIU was very low. Thu Dau Mot University could enroll nearly 2,000 new students in one year, while Binh Duong University could get between 800 and 1,000 university. In Binh Duong, there were around 8,000 students who would register to study at university annually. However EIU could only attract from 200 to 250 students among them.
These numbers made me considered that EIU had low result in their enrollment performance. There were many students who used to visit EIU or participated enrollment activities at the school, but they did not come back after finishing the national examination. I consider that there are many possible reasons would cause these problems. For example, a lack of effective marketing programs could make students do not know school brand name 6 LUAN VAN CHAT LUONG download : add luanvanchat@agmail.com Building and Developing Brand Name – The Case of Eastern International University or have negative evaluations about the school.
Brand equity is an essential factor to create huge advantages in competition with other schools. Universities which have a celebrated and trustworthy brand name can enroll high standard students, setting a high level of tuition fee and have many chances to cooperate with enterprises. Student who come from these universities have advantages in apply to both domestic and foreign companies. In addition, a bright brand name is also an appealing factor to attract talented researchers, scientists and professors.
On the other hand, universities which have low brand name would found many difficulties in enrollment new student or recruitment new talented lecturers. Another reason would be the policy of the school. A high entry requirement or the high tuition fee would be obstacles for recruitment new students. For the purpose of identification the key problems which caused low performance in enrollment at EIU.
I decided to contact with Mrs. Thu Trang, the director of the marketing department to make some of in depth interview. The marketing department is the functional part of the school which have responsibility in running all of marketing program. Therefore I believed that after my in depth interview with the director of the marketing department.
I would clarify the orientation in building and developing brand of EIU and thus I could identify clearly real problems happening. I also decided to make in depth interviews with some EIU students who live in Binh Duong province and Ho Chi Minh City to clarify the basic information including the reason why these students chose to study at EIU, what were their expectations, what is the channel student got most of information about EIU and thus I could make a comparison about gap between the real factors of EIU’s potential customers and the point of view of EIU’s top managers. I believed these information could be useful supplement reference for me in problems identification and designing potential solutions to improve the marketing department performance. Summary the result of in depth interview The point of view of the director of marketing department According to the manager of the marketing department, EIU carried out enrollment in the whole country.
They also focused on provinces belong to the South and East, especially is Binh Duong and Ho Chi Minh City. They considered that most people in Binh Duong 7 LUAN VAN CHAT LUONG download : add luanvanchat@agmail.com Building and Developing Brand Name – The Case of Eastern International University province know about the school but in other provinces the brand name of EIU still very faint. However the marketing department did not have specific information to support her consideration.