PART I: breakeven analysis, international marketing, promotion, environmental analysis, ethics.

You MUST answer the following question.  50%

1. Urban College of Ohio has become increasingly concerned in recent years about the changing environment for higher education in the U.S.  To meet the increased competition that has resulted in a nationwide trend toward declining college enrollments, U.C. has implemented a number of programs aimed at total quality management, such as curriculum innovation and a goal of accreditation of all major academic divisions within the institution.  The program with the largest enrollments, and therefore the greatest focus, is business administration.

As a smaller private institution, U.C. believes that it can be a niche player in markets with needs that would be difficult to meet by larger and more prestigious schools, such as Ohio State, University of Cincinnati, Indiana University, and Penn State.  U.C. believes that its size enables it to be more nimble and flexible in its ability to quickly adapt to a dynamic market for higher education.  It is able, for example, to change course offerings within a few weeks of the start of a term to meet local demand for particular courses, meeting times, and off-campus meeting places.  One innovative idea that U.C. is considering is the offering of "distance learning" courses using television broadcast, video tapes, and the World Wide Web.

This innovation would allow students in distant locations to take courses for class credit.  Students would receive some live lecture materials on cable TV, would receive some materials to be viewed at the student's convenience on video tape, and would receive class handouts, assignments, announcements, and such, via a class World Wide Web page.  Exams would be administered via the internet: a page would be "unlocked" on the World Wide Web at some particular exam time and would remain open for two hours.  During this time, students would be expected to download the exam at home and to type their answers back via email.  That is, such exams would be timed, open-book exams with a definite starting time and a definite ending time.

In testing this idea for one class, the professor noted that she had been getting a number of inquiries regarding the program from prospective students in several foreign countries, especially from China, Taiwan, and India.  Apparently, "search engines" on the World Wide Web had begun to list U.C. as a business school in listings made up of primarily larger, more prestigious schools.  U.C. is within an hour drive of several reasonably large cities but itself is a in a rural town of only about 12,000 residents.  These international inquiries suggested that U.C. might be able to use the World Wide Web to maintain an international presence among prospective students who do not have any of the local perceptions of the "brand name" associated with many of its larger competitors.

The following costs are being considered with this idea: The fee for each of these "distance learning" courses would be $700 for domestic students (regardless of state of residency) and $900 for international students (i.e., students who are not U.S. citizens)." Setting up a computer system and server to run several courses and to do promotion on the World Wide Web would require an initial investment of $50,000 and would have a life expectancy of five years." Administrative expenses associated with this distance learning program would be allocated at $5,000 per individual section (course)." Costs associated with faculty salaries and benefits to run these courses would be about $8,000 per course.

Assess this idea.

PART II: costs of marketing

Answer ONE of the following two questions. 25%

2. Critics of Western marketing argue that promotion expenditures merely drive up the costs of products - i.e., that promotion is a marketing function that does not add value to the product.  Support arguments in favor of this view and arguments opposed to this view.

3. Critics of Western marketing argue that channel intermediaries drive up the costs of products.  Support arguments in favor of this view and arguments opposed to this view.

PART III: general

Answer ONE of the following two questions. 25%

4. What is marketing?  Does an organization really need a department of marketing?  If so, what should be the responsibility of the marketing department?  If not, who is responsible for marketing functions within the organization?

5. There are some who say that marketers exploit peoples' vulnerabilities, manipulating them to buy what they really don't need or want.  Under what conditions could this be true?  Under what conditions would this be false?