School of Business, Leadership and Economics Pride Awards Night

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On the 30th March, final year Events Management students Josh Lonsdale, Tom Gater and Lorna Wilde organised and hosted the first (and hopefully not the last) Business, Leadership and Economics Pride Awards evening. Staff and students in the School were asked to vote for nominations in various categories and the event was part of their final year project module.

The evening started with a buffet and bucks fizz and Lorna performing a wonderful selection of songs. We were all blown away with her brilliant singing voice and professional delivery. Isabelle Clarke was master of ceremonies and Lorna, Josh and Tom presented the awards.

The event was for both staff and students celebrating their contribution and impact they have on the School and University. It was held in one of the School’s rooms in Ashley
decorated by the students. As Josh said “it was great to see staff and student support each other hand in hand about the great achievements we had within the school” and “It has been a pleasure as final year Event Management students to put on an event that gets to showcase how many talented staff and students are in the school. We hope that this event will be continued by the school and we hope that the other schools may take the initiative to host a similar awards ceremony.”

The evening ended with Lorna again singing, this time ‘Somewhere over the Rainbow’ and ‘On My Own’ from Les Miserables especially for Carol and Angela. There was not a dry eye in the house – at least from Carol, Angela and me!

  

The winners of the awards were:

Exceeding Expectations Award

Given to a student who has gone above and beyond during their time here at the Staffordshire university Business School.

Dee  Rahmat

Commitment to Excellence Award

Awarded to a staff member who consistently and proactively help raise the reputation of not only the Business school but also Staffordshire University.

Karl McCormack

Outstanding Leadership Award

Awarded to staff members who lead students and or staff to achieve improved results across the Business school but also Staffordshire University.

Alison Maguire

Student Honours List

Awarded to students who have had a positive impact on Staffordshire University and the Business School throughout their studies.

The Hult Team, Daniel Griffiths, Danielle Nugent , George Balshaw and Sarah Wright

Future Leader Award

Awarded to a student who encompasses of the Staffordshire Graduate Attributes.

Henry Greentree.

Community Partnership Award 

Awarded to a member of staff who with the community while maintaining a positive image of the Business School at Staffordshire University.

Carol Southall

Exceptional Contribution Award

Awarded to a member of staff who has contributed to not just the business school but Staffordshire university for several amount years

Anni Hollins

Future Leader Award

Awarded to a member of staff who has developed an original and contemporary assessment with positive feedback

Angela Lawerence

Written by Anne Harbisher

How to sustain word-of-mouth advertising, the holy grail of marketing?

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Staffordshire University is a proud regional university which is important to the local community, contributes to the local economy and society, and cooperates with local businesses. Indeed, we use our expertise to help businesses grow; by using sound research we can support practice by theory to help businesses make well-informed strategic decisions.

We are so committed to create a strong and sustainable relationship between industry and academia that we not only make our undergraduate and taught postgraduate curriculum practice-based, but we even have special doctoral programmes that are designed to contribute to the body of knowledge as well as to practice. Professional doctorates, as they generally referred to, are a great example of the relevance and importance of applied research (i.e. research that seeks to solve a real-life problem).

Doctor of Business Administration

Andrew Stephenson joined the Doctor of Business Administration programme when he was the Human Resource Director at DFS, a UK leading sofa manufacturer. DFS, like many firms all over the world adopted the Net Promoter System (NPS), a customer loyalty metric which was introduced by Frederick Reichheld in his paper ‘The one number you need to grow’, published in 2003 by the Harvard Business Review. The NPS is determined by asking customers one question, “How likely is it that you would recommend [brand] to a friend or colleague?”. Customers are asked to record their answer on a scale from 0 to 10, with 0 representing ‘not likely at all’ and 10 being ‘extremely likely’. Respondents are categorised in three groups – detractors (0-6), passives (7-8) and promoters (9-10). The Net Promoter Score is then determined by subtracting the proportion of detractors from the proportion of promoters. It is not surprising that NPS quickly gained popularity with management in many industries; the measure is very simple to calculate, it has face validity and intuitive appeal to managers and other stakeholders, and it is a comparable metric that companies seek to include in their reports. DFS was no exception and thus decided to start collecting information from their customers, including the ‘magic’ question.

 
Both DFS and Staffordshire University soon realised the potential of establishing a collaborative relationship on this project and the benefits such collaboration would bring to both institutions. Staffordshire University would be able to contribute to a success of a business through research; academics working on the project would use it to contribute to the University’s Research Excellence Framework submission; students would benefit from having their learning supported by practice-based cutting edge research. DFS on the other hand, would get answers to the numerous questions that needed answering so that they could drive their company forward. This led to DFS providing Staffordshire University with access to a large data set of responses to customer satisfaction surveys.

We have now cleaned up the data and set it up for econometric analysis which is already yielding some very interesting results that will not only contribute to the existing body of knowledge on NPS but also directly to industry practice. One of the aims of the project was to determine what drives customer propensity to recommend a brand. We used factor analysis to reduce the large number of survey questions to a manageable number of explanatory variables which we then used in a logistic regression model to determine what influences the likelihood of a customer becoming a promoter.

The most important factors have been identified to be satisfaction with product quality and sales experience, and the ability of the company to exceed customers’ expectations. Therefore if businesses get their product right, implement basic sales techniques to deliver great sales experience, and exceed customers’ expectations, customers will reward them with glowing recommendations which in turn will attract more promoters, creating a multiplier effect which will sustain the word-of-mouth advertising, the holy grail of marketing.

I am very excited to be a part of this project where cutting-edge industry practices meet cutting-edge research; where theory meets practice; where outputs of robust econometrical analysis are interpreted in business context and applied to make well-informed strategic decisions; and I very much look forward to discovering the endless possibilities and opportunities this project will bring.

By Dr Jana Fiserova

So how can Snapchat be worth over $20 billion?

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Snap Inc, the parent company behind the disappearing images app Snapchat, has just floated on the New York Stock Exchange at $21.44 per share valuing the company at around $20 billion (yes, billion, not million dollars), making the founders Evan Spiegel and Bobby Murphy multi-billionaires. Not bad when you are not yet thirty.

Snap Inc’s shares jumped over 40% in early trading at the beginning of March, valuing the company at some $28 billion but a week later after some profit-taking by investors, dropped back 10%. So what, you might say, but Snapchat despite having 160 million daily users managed to lose $372 million in 2015 and over $500 million in 2016. Its trading loss 2016 was even more than its turnover, which takes some doing. It has never made a profit.To put Snapchat’s valuation into perspective, the company is now valued at more than the combined market valuations of established (and profitable) retailers Next, and Sainsbury’s. Is this all social media hype or will Snapchat become the “new” Facebook, currently valued at $393 billion, three times its valuation when it first became a public company in 2012. Snapchat has a long way to go – Facebook’s turnover in 2016 was $28 billion, some 70 times those of the “upstart” Snapchat.

Optimists will argue that share valuations are all about future, not past, profitability but, of course, the future is uncertain and Snapchat, which is only accessible by mobile phone, faces many challenges to justify such a massive valuation. When Twitter floated in 2013, it projected massive growth and plans to sell adverts to its large user base but three years on it is deep in the red and its share price has collapsed.

Snapchat’s unique selling proposition is that it is seen as “cool” and having 160 million daily users, up 48% on the previous year, is certainly impressive. But can Snapchat turn this mainly young and perhaps fickle audience into profitable customers generating substantial advertising revenue as successfully as the now-mainstream players, Google and Facebook? Can it compete with and emulate these big boys who have very deep pockets – particularly its more direct competitor Facebook, who own both Instagram and WhatsApp – or will it end up like the now-forgotten MySpace and Tumblr?

Only time will tell.

Paul Hammett BA, FCMA, FCMI, PGCHPE

Senior Lecturer

School of Business, Leadership and Economics at Staffordshire University

Service Quality in Tourism – The Road Less Travelled?

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BY Carol Southall – Award Leader for Tourism Management 

It is often purported that customer service is common sense. After all we know how to look after people; we know how to deliver good customer service. There are however two questions here, if we ‘know’ then how do organisations get it so wrong, and if it is common sense, why isn’t everybody delivering? In 2009 only 19% of visitors to Britain felt extremely welcome and whilst perceptions have improved significantly since 2009, Britain still ranks only 12th out of 50 Nations for welcome (Anholt Nations Brand Index in Visit Britain, 2017). Making visitors feel welcome however, is fundamental to customer service and enhances perceptions of service quality.

In an increasingly competitive marketplace, the pursuit of quality is an organisational imperative, regardless of industry sector, and yet the attainment of quality is increasingly difficult, not least because of the difficulties in reconciling different perceptions of quality. Organisations offering similar products and services are increasingly forced to review their quality of service, as it is often the only differentiating factor between organisations. Thus, the challenge for organisations is to enhance the overall experience to such an extent that customers, both prospective and current, will become and remain loyal.

Happy customers are more likely to be loyal and generate repeat business

Within the service sector and more specifically the tourism industry there is the additional problem of the temporal, spatial and fragmented nature of the industry. It is also characterised by inseparability, in that customers are part of the product, and further complicated by the nature of the intercultural encounter in tourism. Tourism organisations that realise the benefits of enhancing the cultural awareness of both their staff and customers in order to facilitate the service exchange, are more likely to retain the loyal custom so essential for businesses to survive. Additionally organisations that take into account cultural differences when gleaning feedback from customers are most likely to have a strategic advantage over those organisations that do not.

service

Customers of tourism services now require a range of services at times and in places convenient to themselves. The challenge for tourism organisations today, of providing a flexible, convenient and appropriate service, has never been greater. In today’s highly competitive tourism market, those organisations that fail to continuously meet and exceed customer expectations will be unlikely to survive in an industry highly dependent on repeat business and loyal customers. It is impossible to meet customer expectations without firstly ascertaining those expectations (Zeithaml, Parasuraman and Berry, 1990) and customer feedback has become a vital tool in the identification of customer needs, satisfaction and expectations (Crotts and Erdmann, 2000; Zeithaml, Parasuraman and Berry, 1990). Knowing what customers want makes it far easier to meet and even exceed their expectations.

The tourism industry, by its very nature, involves a very high degree of employee-customer interaction and consequently facilitating that interaction in order to enable as smooth a process as possible must be the prerogative of every tourism organisation. The opportunities for service failures to occur within such an interactive context are high and dissatisfied customers frequently switch between service providers in order to gain satisfaction. The highly competitive marketplace within which tourism organisations operate makes it very easy for customers to change allegiance very quickly if they feel dissatisfied. The tourism industry may be considered as the sum of its interactive and interdependent parts, and thus consistency in quality is even more difficult to attain.

UPDATE – The SMARTOUR Tool is now online and covers this topic if you want to learn more 

If you are interested in service quality  issues as a manager or want some service quality training yourself then sign up to our FREE half day event on 17th May at Staffordshire University

Useful links

Project website – http://www.smartourproject.eu/

Twitter @tourismsu   #SMARTOUR

Facebook page – https://www.facebook.com/smartourproject/

SMARTOUR logo

The European Commission support for the production of this publication does not constitute an endorsement of the contents which reflects the views only of the authors, and the Commission cannot be held responsible for any use which may be made of the information contained therein.”

Training and the hospitality industry – don’t get left on the platform !

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‘The UK hospitality industry contributed an estimated £57 billion to UK GDP in 2014’ (BHA 2015) and still, in my opinion, we can’t seem to be able to train our employees. Is training too expensive, does it take too much time or is it due to our industry’s high staff turnover. When an employee is recruited and gets their ticket isn’t that a guarantee to training?

I was working behind a bar once and I asked an employee to cut a lemon (I was making a gin and tonic). The employee came back and had literally cut the lemon in half! Lesson learnt – communicate precisely and don’t assume that they know what you know! Just because someone is on the train it doesn’t mean they know where they’re going. All employees need training; it makes them feel part valued and part of a team and in turn we’re getting the best out of them. Investing in someone could mean a simple five minute lesson on till procedures or a full day of health and safety.

I often compare the hospitality industry to the music industry. Many people think they can sing- but how many can actually sell records? Many people think they can work in our industry but how many people can be motivated and passionate about their customers and team during the first hour and the 13th hour of a shift? Employees are predominately practical people and this is why on the job training works. Training should be a continuous activity throughout an employee’s journey. Training on the job is about observing others and doing, it doesn’t always have to be formal and structured.

Our service industries are essential; not only to the economy but also to communities, commercial business and relationships! We create opportunities for people to dress up, meet up, relax and enjoy whether it’s latte or lobster! Each service is unique and our employees create that uniqueness to achieve a stand-alone experience that someone will keep coming back for. But we can’t create those experiences without truly investing in our people.

Training is just like being on a busy train – once you have your ticket you have to fight your way to the front to get trained and a seat. You know the journey is going to be long- so let’s make it comfortable. It doesn’t matter if your train isn’t on the fastest or direct route what matters is that you’re heading for the right destination!

train picture

By Tonia Barrett

UPDATE – The SMARTOUR Tool is now online and covers this topic if you want to learn more 

If you are interested in training issues as a manager or want some training yourself then sign up to our FREE half day event on 17th May at Staffordshire University

Reference -The British Hospitality Association (2015) The Economic contribution of the UK hospitality industry. A report prepared by Oxford Economics for the British Hospitality Association. [Online]

Useful links

Project website – http://www.smartourproject.eu/

Twitter @tourismsu   #SMARTOUR

Facebook page – https://www.facebook.com/smartourproject/

SMARTOUR logo

“The European Commission support for the production of this publication does not constitute an endorsement of the contents which reflects the views only of the authors, and the Commission cannot be held responsible for any use which may be made of the information contained therein.”

Pottery Places in the heart of England by Kelly Jansen (Final year student)

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Stoke on Trent, Staffordshire is the capital of Potteries in the UK. Stoke on Trent is the home of several international household names such as Emma Bridgewater, Wedgewood, Middleport Pottery (home to Burleigh Pottery) and Royal Stafford who all produce china and earthenware. Famously, these pottery places attract tourists to Stoke to visit the brand they know and love.

I was eager to learn about the different visitors and their reasons for wanting to come to Stoke on Trent, so I carried a Visitor Survey at Emma Bridgewater on behalf of their Marketing Team, as primary research for my dissertation.

One of my findings was that for 60% of visitor’s at the factory, the main reason for visiting Stoke on Trent was the Emma Bridgewater site. So how has it become a destination venue?

There are plenty of things to do whilst at the Emma Bridgewater Factory, although they get really busy so where possible, I recommend booking the activity prior to arriving.

Activities available include:

The Decorating Studio – Pick your choice of item to decorate (from a mug to a dog bowl). The price of your decorating experience is dependent on the piece you choose to paint and a £2.95 studio fee. You can either collect your master piece 2 weeks later or pay a £5 postage fee.

In the decorating studio

Factory Tours – Tours around the factory to see how everything is made for a small price of £2.50 and Under 16’s are FREE.

Experience Days – Includes a behind the scenes tour, Afternoon tea, a session in the decorating studio and it includes 10% off at the gift shop. All for £30 per person!

Afternoon Tea – A great price of just £12.50 for amazing sandwiches, soups and beautiful cakes.

Café – Great homemade food that was fresh (I would recommend the Pesto chicken sandwich). The café is open to the general public, so you don’t have to be taking part in any activities, you can just enjoy the daily specials.

Secret Garden – It’s a secret… you’ll have to visit and find out yourself.

Special Event activities – for example at Halloween they had Owls, a pumpkin counting competition and fancy dress. More detail for further upcoming events available on their website – http://emmabridgewaterfactory.co.uk/

Another bonus is the factory offer FREE parking and great transport links for example it is a 10-minute walk from Stoke train station and a 2-minute walk from Hanley bus station.

Factory Website – Facebook – Twitter – Instagram –

Kelly Jansen is in her final year of BA Tourism Management she tweets at @KellyJansen95 and is on Linkedin 

Kelly Jansen and Danielle Barnsley

Kelly Jansen and Danielle Barnsley on site at Emma Bridgewater

 

Project PERFECT and the University of Twente Purchasing Conference

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The PERFECT Project, funded by the ERASMUS+ scheme, is developing a pan-European harmonised higher education curriculum for Purchasing and Supply Management (PSM). The Project is Coordinated by Dortmund University of Technology (Germany), and Staffordshire University are working alongside the Universities of Mainz (Germany), Twente (Netherlands) and Lappeenranta (Finland). Regular partner meetings bring together representatives from the different institutions to discuss progress on the different parts of the project and ensure that the outputs of the project are timely and meet the diverse needs of the potential audience for the curriculum.

Members of the PERFECT team recently conducted a series of interviews with individuals at a wide variety of European companies in order to develop understanding of what skills and knowledge are required by PSM practitioners now and in the future. The University of Twente is currently developing a questionnaire to broaden this understanding. This work will inform the development of a robust and industry-focused curriculum that can be used by educational institutions across Europe and also inform in-house training for companies.Project PERFECT Team at University of Twente

Last week Dr Steve Kelly and Tom Ward were at the University of Twente in the Netherlands for a project transnational meeting at which representatives from all the partners were present. The meeting ended with the participants joining the annual University of Twente Purchasing Conference (UTPC), hosted by Professor Dr habil. Holger Schiele. Steve was delighted to be invited give the keynote address to an audience of practitioners, students and academics. In addition, other members of the project team delivered a workshop based on the findings of the project so far. The UTPC was organised by the students of the University of Twente who had designed a superb day, full of a variety of interesting talks and interactive workshops, and a great opportunity for networking. The participants found the work of the PERFECT project interesting and stimulating, and the workshop has opened up further opportunities for collaboration between industry and academia.Project Perfect logo

EU flag Erasmus+ logo

The creation of these resources has been (partially) funded by the Erasmus+ grant programme of the European Union under grant number 2015-1-DE01-KA203-002174. Neither the European Commission nor the project’s national funding agency DAAD are responsible for the content or liable for any losses or damage resulting from the use of these resources.

For further details of the project go to http://www.perfect.lfo.tu-dortmund.de/.

Contact Steve at stephen.kelly@staffs.ac.uk and Tom at t.ward@staffs.ac.uk.

Staffordshire University graduate’s journey to employment

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On Wednesday 1st March I was returning to my office after delivering a Financial Reporting tutorial when I was greeted by Rachel Heath (one of my personal tutees) with a beaming smile on her face.  She had just found out she had been offered a place on the NHS graduate scheme.

Rachel’s achievement is an excellent example of a highly motivated student taking advantage of all the support and guidance offered to her to enable her to achieve her dream job.

Rachel started at Staffordshire University in September 2013 studying a BA(Hons) Accounting and Finance Degree.  She had studied ‘A’ levels at Stoke-on-Trent Sixth Form College and then taken two years out of education.  However, she realised “how hard it is to progress without the knowledge and experience needed within an industry” so she decided to undertake a degree programme.

On Rachel’s second day I became her Personal Tutor, initially helping her to settle into University life and encouraging her to take advantage of all the opportunities presented to her.  In addition to regular meetings with Rachel she studied 2 modules which focus on the development of the student, Employability and Study Skills in the first year and Professional Development in the second year.  Karl McCormack the Accounting Awards Course Leader leads on both of these modules, the student’s personal tutor delivers the workshop sessions.  In these modules students develop communication and team-working skills, they focus on their career ambitions and produce development plans to ensure they gain the skills they require in order to be able to achieve their goals.  Part of the first year module involves the students getting their CVs checked by the University’s Careers Section.

The Professional Development module in the second year provides the skills and knowledge students need to help them gain a work placement.  Helping students to develop amongst other things CVs, letters of application and interview skills.

During this module Rachel started applying for placement opportunities with the support of her lecturers, Claire Bashford a Placement Consultant, Mark Wordley the Business School’s Placement Co-Ordinator and the Careers Section.  Rachel was successful in gaining a 12 month placement with Stoke-on-Trent City Council as a Business and Enterprise support student.

stoke-on-trent-city-council

During Rachel’s placement she developed her communication, teamwork and leadership skills.  She also gained valuable experience of working under pressure.  She was supported during her placement year by Tony Bickley who was her Visiting Placement Tutor at the Council.

Returning to University in September for her final year Rachel set about applying for her graduate job.  Having really enjoyed working in the public sector she was keen to follow up opportunities in this area.  In February she contacted me let me know she had been selected for a 2 day assessment centre in Bristol for the West Midlands NHS Finance Management Training Scheme.  Rachel had submitted an online application which included answering 6 scenario based questions and explaining why she was applying for the scheme and the qualities she would bring to it.  After passing that stage she had to complete verbal and numerical tests online.  Having passed these tests she was invited to the 2 day assessment centre.

nhs

She told me she had to prepare a 10 minute presentation so we discussed what she could include in this and agreed in preparation of the assessment days I would observe her presentation and give her feedback on it.  By coincidence I had also been in contact with one of my students who had graduated in June 2009 Himesh Patel who is now Divisional Finance Manager at University Hospitals Birmingham NHS Foundation Trust.

Himesh had undertaken his placement year with the NHS at the Princess Royal Hospital Telford.  They were so impressed with Himesh that he was offered a permanent full-time role when he graduated.  Within 3 years Himesh had gained his Chartered Institute of Management Accountants’ qualification and he has since also gained his Chartered Institute of Public Finance Accountants’ qualification.  During his time with the NHS he has gained several promotions to his current role as Divisional Finance Manager.

cipfa cima

I contacted Himesh to see if he would be able to give advice and guidance to Rachel and he was very happy to do this.  He gave feedback on Rachel’s presentation and advised her on topical areas she could research.

When Rachel arrived at Bristol for the assessment days she met a mix of candidates going for opportunities with the NHS in the South West and the West Midlands.  There were 3 vacancies available and approximately 12 candidates.  She had to complete a time pressured written task based around a case study, a group activity, a 10 minute presentation and an interview.

Rachel’s success is no more than she deserves she is a motivated hard-working student.  Reflecting on both Rachel’s and Himesh’s success I think the key messages are as follows:-

  • Undertaking a year’s placement is vital to gain the skills employers require.
  • The support available to students from their Personal Tutor, the Placement Consultant, the Business School Placement Co-Ordinator, the Visiting Placement Tutor, Subject Lecturers, the Careers Section and Alumni illustrate how we put the student “at the heart of everything we do”.
  • The structure of the Accounting Awards including the Employability and Study Skills and Professional Development modules very much supports students in developing subject knowledge and the skills they need to gain their placement and then graduate employment opportunities.
  • These Awards receive professional accreditation allowing students to gain exemptions from certain exam papers which enables our graduates to gain their professional accounting qualifications more quickly.

For me it is success stories like Rachel’s and Himesh’s that make the job worthwhile.

Helen Buttery SFHEA CPFA Cert.Ed.

Senior Lecturer

School of Business, Leadership and Economics

@h_buttery   #proudtobestaffs

Event – Tourism Management the ‘Smart’ Way 17th May

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SMARTOUR logo

UPDATE – The SMARTOUR Tool is now online ! 

 

Do you have staff that would benefit from some training? Maybe you would like to develop some knowledge in a new area such as social media or service quality? Would you like to strengthen your links in your region?

We carried out an international survey with managers and staff in the tourism industry to identify the topics that the tourism industry wanted to produce a set of learning materials, workshops and an online training tool. On the day, we will also demonstrate the online tool that has been developed so that after the event you or your staff can do the training at a time that is suitable for you.

Come along to this FREE event to network, update your skills and learn about future opportunities.

Venue: Ashley Building, Staffordshire University, Leek Road, Stoke on Trent, ST4 2DF

Schedule

9.00 Registration (teas and coffees) LT111/3

9.30 Introduction and welcome Prof Jon Fairburn

9.50 – 11.00 Workshops

Workshop 1 –– Managing service quality in tourism – Carol Southall and Tonia Barrett LT14

Workshop 2 – Saving money on your energy costs – Neil Packer LT 111/113

Workshop 3 – SMARTOUR Online learning tool – Prof Jon Fairburn and Tom Ward LT 12

Workshop 4 – Food for thought – Tom Pridmore LT11

11.00 – 11.15 Time to register for online tool or network

11.15  Promoting and sustaining your business with Ron Lawrence owner of Colton House, Lichfield and Gillian Thomson from the Green Tourism Awards LT111/113

12.15 Lunch LT111/113 and LT 115 if needed

1.00 Close

Please register on the link https://smartour.eventbrite.co.uk if you have any queries about registration please contact Tom Ward t.ward@staffs.ac.uk or 01782 294902

About the presenters

Ron and Gay Lawrence have won many tourism awards including Green Tourism Gold Awards and Gold Tourism Awards from Enjoy Staffordshire and Visit England. Colton House is a luxury 5* Gold rated B&B, with awards for breakfasts and dinners from VE and the AA. Colton House is the highest rated accommodation provider in Staffordshire, with the facilities of a boutique country house hotel. www.coltonhouse.com  Tel: 01889578580

Prof Jon Fairburn leads the SMARTOUR project, teaches on the MSc Digital Marketing Management and runs the No1 twitter account for Business Schools in the world (according to Edurank) @BusinessStaffs

Carol Southall is a senior lecturer and the Award Leader for Tourism Management courses at the University she has also worked extensively in the tourism industry over the last 20 years. @cdesouthall

Tonya Barrett has previously worked in the tourism and hospitality industry and current lectures at Staffordshire University

Neil Packer is a Senior Lecturer in Engineering he has previously worked in the private sector and public sector on energy issues before joining the University.

Tom Pridmore has worked in the tourism industry for over 30 years. He is currently a Ribble Valley Tourism Officer and a director of TEAP Associates and a leading member of the Tourism Management Institute 

If you are a member of a professional organisation then attendance should count as 4 hours CPD accreditation (more details to follow soon)

Useful links

logosbeneficaireserasmusrightfunded

 

A new and rapid way of marketing – Digital Marketing

Aside

Whilst supporting businesses, I’m often asked “What is Digital Marketing”, and frequently people think it’s just social media marketing, for example marketing via Instagram or Twitter.  Digital Marketing encompasses much more than this, so in this article I’m going to give a brief overview of digital marketing and discuss some key points about how to make it effective for businesses.

What is digital marketing?

Digital marketing unlike the traditional means of marketing, encompasses marketing of products or services through the numerous available electronic media. It presents marketing of these products/services in such a way that the channels and methods utilized will enable the service provider or product manufacturer to analyse, survey and review marketing trends, and therefore know what is working effectively. This part is very important, marketers must prove, with data, that each part of their digital marketing is working and providing a Return on Investment etc.

Blog 1

If done correctly, Digital Marketing can put customers in control, drive brand loyalty, reduce the selling cycle, build your brand, and it should be measurable and cost-effective.  The key areas Digital Marketing encompasses are:

  1. Social Media Marketing (SMM) These days, most people are on some form of Social Media e.g. Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, YouTube, Snapchat, Periscope etc. Social media marketing, involves using these platforms to gain website traffic or improve brand awareness and customer service. These platforms usually have analytics and a particular target customer base, e.g. LinkedIn for business people to network and also find employment. Therefore, each of these platforms can be used in a targeted way. As with any marketing tool there are good and bad ways of using them, for example, response rates can be shown to be higher with videos and pictures rather than just text. With good content curation, readers will share your social media with their networks and in effect become advocates. Readers are more likely to look at Social Media from friends than direct marketing from organisations, so it can be one of the most cost effective forms of marketing.  If this sharing becomes widespread it’s known as Viral Marketing. An example is the ALS Ice Bucket challenge, ALS did not invent the challenge but it became widespread and included Mark Zuckerberg and Bill Gates taking part.
  1. Website design Website designing is the process of gathering ideas and concepts, and the implementation of these concepts for the purpose of creating content on web pages or the internet, for the benefit of end-users to utilize and get the necessary information with any web browser. However, done properly it is much more than this. The website has to be easy to use and navigate, pleasing to the eye, and work in such a way that it gets results. The website design includes the website layout, colours, font, multimedia, interactive features and compatibility e.g. being mobile compatible. An organisation I have worked with, 6 Towns Radio, in some months can have over 60% of their website visits via tablets and mobile phones (see 6townsradio.com). Websites such as blogs can be developed in such a way that they can have a high SEO ranking and be monetised to earn income e.g. via affiliate marketing.
  1. Search Engine Optimization (SEO), is using a range of tools and techniques, so that ideally your website appears at, or near the top, of the not-paid for (organic) area of the search engine page, when people do an online search for your product or service. This is so that you can drive online traffic to your website and create awareness about your products. It involves the web-site and web-page design, words you use on your page, keywords terms, number and quality of web-sites linked to your page, how often it is updated and developed, etc, and being structured in such a way that search engines understand and rank it ideally higher than competing websites. On top of this, it has to be done without diminishing the value of what you have to offer.
  1. Pay per Click (PPC) is a way of buying visits to your sites rather than attempting to earn them through SEO. This is because PPC is a medium where marketers adverts should appear near the top and/or side of the first page of a search result and they will pay for every click made on their advert. The advantage of PPC is that if done correctly it can create instant results, the dis-advantage is that once you stop paying you stop getting results, whereas good SEO will carry on working. Creating an effective PPC campaign involves research, content curation and continually testing the results.
  1. Display advertising (banner ads) As technology advanced, advertising began to take new forms with the advent of digital advertising techniques. Essentially, it entails the use of ads that can be in form of text, video or audio for advertisement purposes on a website. With increasing sophistication of mobile apps and technology, banner advertising can be geo-demographic and person specific so that these become very targeted.
  1. Email marketing The electronic mail set the initial trend for internet advertising and even though many predictions have talked about the decline in its usage, it can still be a very cost-effective form of marketing. Email marketing can be a vibrant means of communication and helping a business to grow, by employing a very direct and cheap marketing means of sending newsletters and other types of information to a target audience. Online systems such as Email Servers and CRM systems can automate the subscription, sending, un-subscribing etc. of emails, for example auto-responders can send out targeted emails on a timed basis or automatically respond to an enquiry. Increasing concerns about receiving unwanted emails (Spamming) will soon mean that that you need to be able to demonstrate that customers have subscribed to your emails and they are not on an exclusion database, similar to the Telephone Preference Service (TPS), but for emails.
  1. Content Curation I’ve put Content Curation as a separate topic as it is a key factor in all of the above topics and in today’s digital world, content rules the space. Generally, content marketing cuts across infographics, webpages, podcasts, videos, books, eBooks, apps etc. It is a technique used for the creation and distribution of invaluable content in a consistent manner to a target audience. The aim of spreading the content and feeding it to the target audience is usually so that they can take some actions e.g. buy a product, apply or subscribe to a service etc. Content curation can take a company near bankruptcy and change it into one of the worlds most powerful brands as demonstrated by Lego who have developed an  interactive customer friendly website and even have Lego based films so customers are happy to watch, what is effectively, a very long advert.

Screenshot of Lego website

As mentioned a few times above, a key point is that if you are involved in marketing you need to be able to prove, with current data, what you are doing so that you can improve upon it.

When marketing via social media, websites, etc. you need to monitor and review:

  • which platforms your customers are using,
  • when they are using them, e.g. which days and what time,
  • how are they using them, e.g. a casual look or actually interacting with your marketing and using them as part of their decision-making to purchase,
  • And how this all links together to make a purchase, in what is known as the customer funnel.

If you do not use data you could be wasting your time and money marketing in areas that do not work, for example marketing on Twitter when your customers are using Instagram and Snapchat, or, marketing to potential customers on Snapchat during the working day when they typically use it early or late in the day and weekends.

An area that I get involved in with businesses and Social Enterprises is something called Conversion Rate Optimisation where we can improve the number of customers visiting and purchasing products/services. Typically this includes :-

  • checking and mapping how you are marketing and how your customers are using the internet;
  • measuring what customers are doing with your marketing, e.g. via Google Analytics or Facebook Insights;
  • testing via split-testing to improve results (also know as A/B testing),
  • continuing to test and improve customer conversions and the size of purchase.

As we can monitor and improve online and see instant results, it has led to a form of marketing called Growth Hacking. This is where we undertake and monitor rapid experimentation across online platforms to find the most effective and efficient ways to engage and grow a business customer base. It should develop long-term sustainable growth, not just short term profit.

The above and much more is covered in MSc Digital Marketing Management and BSc Digital Marketing Management at Staffordshire University.

 

Paul Dobson BSc(Hons), DIT, DMS, MSc, MA, MBA, PGCHPE, FHEA, FCMI, MAM

Senior Lecturer in Digital and Strategic Marketing – Staffordshire University Business School

Email: P.M.Dobson@staffs.ac.uk