Attracting current undergraduate City University students towards the

postgraduate programs – A holistic approach

Prepared by: Group 11

Alba Ruco
Alisha Kothari
Izabela Perseng
Jocelyn Uthayakumaran
Sylvain Fresia
12. APPENDICES 21..................................................3
1. ACKNOWLEDGMENT.......................................................4
2. INTRODUCTION.............................................................5

3. EXECUTIVE SUMMARY....................................................5

4. BACKGROUND ON CURRENT SITUATION .........................5

4.1 Primary Research..............................................................6

5. A MORE HOLISTIC APPROACH.........................................8

6. COMPETITORS ATTRACTING STUDENTS ..........................8
6.1 Postgraduates courses....................................................11
6.2 Communication Software.................................................11

6.3 City University Website....................................................11

6.4 Events............................................................................11
7. ACTION PLAN: IMPLEMENTATION OF CRM SOFTWARE. . . .13
8. ADDITIONAL RECOMMENDATIONS ................................16
8.1 The City University “house”.............................................17
9. INVESTMENT AGAINST COSTS.......................................18
9.1 Outcomes........................................................................18
9.2 Incomes .........................................................................19
CONCLUSION...................................................................20
This report analyses the current situation at City University
in terms of targeting current students in order to retain
them for post-graduate studies and recommend appropriate
ways and incentives to achieve this goal. It was found that
only 29% of students in City wanted to stay for
Postgraduate studies, with still 42% undecided and 29%
negative answers. One of the aims of the report is to reduce
these undecided in order to keep 50% of City students for
Postgraduate studies. Further data was researched about
other universities to be able to see what incentives or
improvements could be made to retain students. It
appeared that university websites is holding an essential
role to communicate with students and offer them
information. Also offering students discounts and combined
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courses was a great encouragement for them to select a
university. In order to capture information about current
students and be able to target them better during
marketing campaign, the implementation of CRM software
appeared to be essential. These campaigns would include
different types of events and open days designed for
current students. After analysing the costs implied it was
concluded that, if asking for an important investment for
the university, it would create a high return on investment
on a longer term and provide City University with a
competitive edge............................................................20
10. REFERENCES.............................................................21
12. APPENDICES______________________________________________________
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______________________________________________________________________
______________________________________________________________________
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1. ACKNOWLEDGMENT
We would like to thank Jenny Rampling, for the time and effort, and the guidance
given to make this study possible, and Misha Hebel for giving us the opportunity to
work on a consultancy project that is close to us. In addition, we would like to thank
Stephanie Shaul staff of the student centre, and the marketing team of City University,
for providing us with some relevant information to carry out extensive analysis.

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2. INTRODUCTION
Analysing research recently carried out regarding postgraduate studies, it has been
found that 60% of current undergraduate students at City University are interested in
studying a postgraduate course once they are done with their undergraduate.
However, further analysis shows that although 60% are interested in doing a
postgraduate course, only 38% would consider City University as their place of study.
In addition, the actual conversion rate is found to be much lower than 38%. The aim
of this report is to analyse the current situation at City University, in order to grow the
market as well as the revenue stream further and to create an appropriate balance in
undergraduate and postgraduate student numbers.
In order to achieve the above objectives, qualitative and quantitative research has
been carried out, in order to identify how other universities attract current students to
continue a postgraduate course at their institutions, following which, research will be
carried out regarding how City University can capture information about those current
students who may potentially be interested in pursuing the university’s postgraduate
course. Finally, analysis will be carried out to identify appropriate ways to market the
university, and the costs of implementing the means recommended will be outlined.

3. EXECUTIVE SUMMARY
Primary research conducted at City University shows that a majority of students were
aware of the university’s courses through the internet. Therefore, City University
must continue to advertise its courses through the internet, as it is found to be a
successful informing approach. However, this also shows that the advertising
campaigns must be revised in order to further reach out to a larger potential market.
It is found to be lack of variety and lack of combined courses offered by City
University. This restricts the choice available to students who may wish to study
courses from two different faculties of City University. Therefore, this should be
analysed further and City University should consider introducing more combined
courses.
Based on similar initiatives that higher ranked universities have taken, it is
recommended that City University introduces customised CRM software in order to
capture the relevant information about students, to identify trends and finally target
them by designing appropriate marketing activities.
The recommended steps have been illustrated using a more holistic approach known
as Soft Systems Methodology (SSM). In addition to the above, a framework has been
designed to show the benefits of implementing the recommended options for City
University. This framework will also cover the additional recommendations that have
been identified in the report that follows.

4. BACKGROUND ON CURRENT SITUATION

In order to get an insight of where City University stands currently, some primary and
secondary research has been conducted. The gathered information helped in
understanding the situation of the current students from their perspective and
analysing the key issues arising from it.
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 4.1 Primary Research
A survey was conducted within the City University student community in order to see
what their point of view was about City and what their plans were for post-graduate
studies. The data collected was based on a 97-student sample from various faculties of
the university.
Please note that some questions of the survey were multiple choices, which explains
the percentages adding to above 100% on some questions.
Firstly it was observed how the students heard about the University. It appears that
48% of them have heard of it through the Internet. The 2 other main sources where
students heard about the University are through their family and friends and their
career advisors (respectively 38 and 22%). The newspaper (which includes articles
about the university and advertisement included in the newspaper) and advertisements
(flyers, posters in the tube for example) options obtained a very low response rate
(less than 2%).
From this data it is possible to draw the conclusion that City should focus its efforts
on the internet as a way to communicate with the students as the advertising apart
from being a costly option, does not have a high impact and efficiency on students.
On the other hand, the advertising campaigns should perhaps be revised, so that
although it is costly, it will have a greater impact on informing prospective students.
The second question of the survey was to know why the students of City selected it
for their Undergraduates studies. It appears that a majority (72%) of students selected
City for its reputation and/or ranking. The courses offered and its central location also
played important roles in selecting City, with a response rate of 45% and 40%
respectively. Thus it is apparent that the reputation of City University and the variety
of courses are crucial in the students view.
The third question is one of the most important ones for the study as it indicates the
percentage of students who will continue study further at City and who will not after
graduating from the undergraduate degrees. It appears that there is an equal 29% of
yes and no’s. But still 42% of students are undecided. This project aims at targeting
this fraction of unsure students and reducing the number of no’s. An ideal goal for
City would be to obtain 50% of yes and no’s. This balance is selected in order to
retain a higher number of City students after they graduate. However, it is important
to note that it would be best for the university to leave 50% of the remaining students
to come from outside the university. This is simply due to the fact that it is always a
good thing to allow new students; hence new ideas into the University thus create
diversity. It also creates variety within the University and finally enhances
competition between external students to enter the university, which would influence
the university’s reputation in the right way.
The 50/50 balance is a goal that was set for the project, but it is unrealistic to say
that it is possible to know/influence all the students choices in advance and avoid any
uncertainty. However, the aim of the project is to get as close to its goal as possible.
Following to that question, the students were then asked the reason why they would
select to study in city in their future. It is found that a major part of the students would
select City University as their postgraduate university, for the same reason they

6
selected it for their undergraduate, with 67 and 78 students selecting it for its courses
and reputation.
It is interesting to note that 57% of the students selected City University due to career
opportunities, proving that what the university advertises as being one of the best
universities for career prospects is appealing to students. It seems that 42 students
appreciate the location of the university. Also about 20 students would select City
University for their postgraduate studies due to the facilities and entry requirements.
Finally 7% of students have selected City for its tuitions fees, the social life and other
reasons. What comes out of this question is that the students are career focused and
appreciate high reputation and take interest in courses of the university. It reasonable
to assume that answers with a lower response rate are other factors influencing the
choice but not the main reason for selecting the university.
Another very important matter was to consider why the students did not select the
university, or whether they are unsure of their choice, and what would help them
make their choice/change their mind. The majority of students (42%) are expecting
better courses and/or teaching from the university. Very close to that, students would
appreciate financial support (39%) from the university and have other reasons that
would influence their choice (41%), which is going to be thoroughly discussed further
below. Students would also like to develop the facilities and research within the
university (23%) and improve the social life as a student (13%).
The last question was an open question relating to what would students want from
city if the choice that interested them was not present (students who hence selected
“other”).What stands out from this question is that students would appreciate:
-A better ranking/reputation of the university
-Better quality of teaching/staff (some students advising to recruit famous academics
and/or increase research budget in order to “generate” famous academics within City
University)
-More contact with lecturers and more information provided on courses
-Finally, some students would like a presentation demonstrating why they should
select City University for their postgraduate studies.
What was revealed from this survey is that Students are using the internet as their
main source of information about the University. There are still 42% of the students
that are undecided and these are the main target, hence, those students who have
decided not to further study at City University, can be the second target. But this
should stay a secondary objective as it is easier to influence and satisfy students who
are not yet sure of their choice rather than turning around students who already made
a choice not to stay on.
An important fact that comes out from this survey is that most students would like
city to have a better reputation or ranking along with the staff quality. Also students
would be interested in gaining information on the courses and on a more global basis,
to be demonstrated why they should stay on at City. Finally some students have
communication issues with their lecturers. Please see Appendix 1 for survey results.

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5. A MORE HOLISTIC APPROACH
In order to view the situation at City University as a whole, it is imperative to include
all the stakeholders, identify key issues and recommend feasible solutions through a
wider perspective. For this purpose it is recommended that systems approach, also
known as the holistic approach as which supports the ideas illustration and provides
practical solutions to improve the business situation. In the case of City University,
Soft Systems Methodology (SSM) is used to illustrate the major steps of analysis and
findings. This approach was firstly developed by Peter Checkland and his colleagues
in 1969 and is used in order to deal with more “soft” problem cases and structured
issues that take into consideration the main stakeholders and circumstances (Jackson
2000). This systems approach offers students’ perspectives as well as the university’s
perspective of the key operations and interactions between them. The SSM approach
consists of 7 steps and each of them will be illustrated below in this report according
to their relevance with the analyzed content.
As a first step of the SSM, the rich picture is one of the most common techniques in
dealing with complexity in problem situations, which may involve multitasks and
people. A rich picture is initially used to demonstrate the current situation at City
University illustrating the interrelation of the key stakeholders in the problem
situation. Please see Appendix 2.

6. COMPETITORS ATTRACTING STUDENTS

Our qualitative research was based on surveying students from City University as
well as four other comparable universities in order to have a representative sample in
which we could evaluate what leads students to continue postgraduate studies at their
current institutions. The selection of 4 universities was based on similar ranking to
City University (Times Online, 2009) and they are the following: University of
Westminster, Queen Mary’s University of London, University of Edinburgh, and
University of Southampton. One important aspect of the chosen universities is the fact
that two of the universities are in London and thus can be closely compared to City
University. The city of London itself makes a huge difference for people studying
there as it is one of the largest cities in the world and the students will most likely
have a different outlook on continuing their studies, which can also affect their career
perspectives. This comparison will be investigated further in the report.
The main method of research used was a conducted survey distributed to an equal
sample of 20 people in each university. (See Appendix 1). The students in the above
mentioned universities were contacted in person and through e-mails.
It is found that almost 37% of the students revealed that they were made aware of
their own universities through the UCAS web-site. A good number of them were
informed by friends and/or family relatives. Not surprisingly, almost 20% of the
whole sample got information about their chosen universities through the Internet.
Taking up a smaller percentage, other sources of information were resulted to be
actual location, career advisers, other students and others according to a decreasing
order of percentages.

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The majority of students from other universities, with an overwhelming statistic of
40.94%, agreed that the reputation factor played a considerable role in their decisions
to choose their university. Furthermore, 20.81% of them considered the offered
courses as an important criterion of decision. However, the results for this question
showed that some students considered other non university-related factors for making
decisions. These include 17.45% of the people that considered the social life, 14.77%
for location and 6.04% chose others.
Further into the survey 43.16% of the students stated that they were planning to
continue their postgraduate studies at their current university, and 28.42% said they
would not. Additionally, 28.42% stated that they were not sure about their choice.
These results relate to questions 4 and 5 (refer to Appendix 1), which are very
meaningful in finding out how to attract current students to pursue their postgraduate
studies. Over half of the people said that it was easy to find information on their
postgraduate programs whether it is through career fairs, the university website or a
career counsellor. The other half of students was split fairly equal between “No” and
“Haven’t tried” options. Unfortunately the larger statistic of “No” comes from the two
universities located in London.
The following question was “Which factors do you think are most important in
choosing a postgraduate program?” The answers to this question were differently
distributed; however, “career opportunities” earned the number one spot in this
category. After that it was “ranking/reputation” followed by “courses” and “tuition
fees”. It can thus be correct to state that when students are looking to pursue their
postgraduate studies they are considering the options which will improve their
chances for a better career. Furthermore, if theses answers are analyzed individually
by the university, the number one answer still remains “career opportunities” which
strengthens the answers and validates it even more.
Question number 6 asked the students what would make them study further for the
postgraduate programs at their current university. The majority of people answered
“better courses/teaching variability”. The only university which had a different
primary answer was the University of Edinburgh whose students answered “financial
support”. The reasoning behind this is that it is considered to be more expensive to
study there in comparison to the other universities, especially for international
students.
One of the most significant questions in our survey was regarding whether people
have heard about City University and if yes, in what ways they were informed about
it. This question was asked in order to get a general outside perspective of how other
students perceive City University and what are the actual effective ways of
advertising City University. This leads to a better insight on the university’s
reputation in the eyes of the outsiders.
According to the surveys’ results, nearly 85% of the students asked were aware of
City University. It was revealed that the main source of learning about City
University is from word-of-mouth from friends and/or family members. The UCAS
web-site has also played a significant role in informing people about City.
Apparently, the career advisers also have had a great impact on making people aware
of City University. A very small percentage of students said that have heard about
City University from newspapers. The last question provides some insights into what

9
outsiders think about City University and not surprisingly most people answered, “My
university is better”. However, 18.82% still answered that it has a “good in reputation
and courses”.
The survey provided a good and general point of view of how other students look at
postgraduate programs and also what the most important factors are in considering a
postgraduate university/program. This is considered as very valuable information for
considering our recommendations for improvements to City University.
Going more in depth for each of the universities, research was conducted on the main
ways they try to attract students for further postgraduate studies. This can then be
compared to City University’s market campaign.
Starting with the universities located in London, Queen Mary’s website is very clear
and easy to navigate for all the needed information to find particular postgraduate
courses. Furthermore, they provide “Employability and Graduate Profiles” which is
essential especially because most students answered that career opportunities were a
very relevant factor. Although their website isn’t flashy, it is full of detailed
information which is what most people are looking for, when researching on
postgraduate courses.
The University of Westminster takes a different approach by providing various
pictures of students on the website as well as frequently asked questions which they
give thorough answers to. Just like Queen Mary’s, their website is easy to navigate
and the colours add even more clarity through the menu’s and sub-menu of finding
tuition fees and application requirements. The photos provide even more clarity as
prospective students might gain a general positive idea of what the university looks
like as well as the people that study there.
Looking at the universities outside of London, Southampton’s and Edinburgh’s
websites are very informative and furthermore have a main page entitled “Why
Choose Us”. This answers the main question that students are mainly asking
themselves “Why would I choose this university over any other one?” As well as
giving information about the university itself, these two universities also provide
information about the cities themselves, alumni, environmental sustainability, and
continuous enforcement of career prospects. This is a noticeable feature as their
emphasis is definitely on what happens after the students graduate. Students from
both of these universities further stated that getting information about postgraduate
programs was straightforward.
After the thorough qualitative research, the results can now be compared to the actual
market schemes that City University uses to attract current undergraduate students to
continue their postgraduate studies. Having analyzed the main operations of actors
and the main factors influencing the problem situation by the rich picture, the main
human sub-systems have to be listed to offer a better insight of the issues (Jackson
2000). Please refer to the attached Appendix 3.
After analysing the gathered primary and secondary data it appeared that issues were
raised from 4 main sectors within the university. These are the following:

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 6.1 Postgraduates courses
There is an important lack of variety and lack of combined courses within the
University. What is meant by combined courses is that they are courses that mix
subjects from different horizons allowing students to have more choice. An example
would be courses that combine Music with Physics/Engineering, or Chemistry and
Management for example. Students would then have more options and could learn a
subject of interest and combine it with another subject necessary to have the basis to
apply the subject in another area.
These types of combined courses would encourage students’ interest in the
postgraduate courses. Also it would provide City with a whole new range of
specialized masters that would appeal to students who want to do specialize in their
postgraduate studies rather than doing a general course.
Finally there are unclear subjects routes for postgraduate studies, all the information
needed by the students are not present and very few master programs offer streams,
which further reduces the possibilities proposed to the students.

6.2 Communication Software

The main communication software between the students and the staff is CitySpace
and there are many issues arise from it.
Student and staff actually cannot have advanced interaction through it. They are
unable to talk the way they should/want by using the system, and are very limited by
it. Therefore, both students and academics suffer from the limitations of a poor
blackboard learning system. They are not able to organize it in a convenient way for
their needs, which leads to slow utilization and difficulty in finding relevant
modules/information. Finally, there is no personalization on the email system. Every
email sent in a module space can be seen (questions as well as replies) by everyone
who is online. Therefore, customized profiles might be implemented in order to have
personal emails and information only available to particular users.

6.3 City University Website

The website of the university is a very important issue to consider. Students are
struggling to access the information they are looking for. The information is not easily
accessible and often requires much time and effort to obtain the data needed. It is not
user-friendly and students do not feel encouraged to look for the information they
want and therefore might get discouraged to look for postgraduate information. There
is also an important lack of interactivity with the web pages compared to what could
be achieved with the new technologies available to everyone.

6.4 Events

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Although City is organizing workshops, open days and events, there is an apparent
lack of encouragement to attend these events towards the students who tend to skip
them. Especially current students who prefer avoiding open days because they are
more focused on external students rather than current students. Thus current students
do not attend them because they are not interested in seeing the facilities of the
university, which they already known. They would be more interested in having an
insight into what studying a postgraduate program at City University entails, through
workshops and open days that represent reality and are specially prepared for them.
Finally, the students seem not to be well targeted for these events, which lead to
students ignoring numerous emails about events that are not relevant for them,
sometimes missing events they would like to attend. It would be better to target
students and send few emails but only those that are relevant in order to obtain a
better response from students. After creating different options for our
recommendations, it was realised that the open days could have an impact on the
students of the university.
In order to verify this assumption, another survey was conducted including 20
students from City consisting of the two following questions:
-Did you attend an open day in City?
-If yes did it have a good influence on you to select City?
It appeared that 60% attended open days and out of these, 66% thought that the open
day had a positive influence on their selection of the university. As a result, it has
been easier to agree on the fact that open days if well lead could have a positive
impact on students making it an important point for this project. This survey was
conducted face-to-face in an informal way.
This research and its results have thus raised major issues especially related to the IT
aspect of the university and to the diversity of courses as well as the organized events
that do not appropriately target the current students.
The next step associated with the SSM includes the preparation of a set of relevant
systems regarding the current situation at City University (see Appendix 3).
Afterwards, a “Root Definition” paragraph is prepared for a specific system chosen
from the above list of issues in order to analyze it from a critical point of view. As the
emphasis of this study is on the process of attracting the current students in continuing
their postgraduate degree at City University, the chosen system would be: “A system
to retain the current students for postgraduate programs.” Please see Appendix 4.
The next step is developing a conceptual model in order to demonstrate the activities
mentioned in the system’s Root Definition. This model includes the logical sequence
of the activities included in the recommended action plan below. The Root Definition
indicates what the system is, whereas the conceptual map shows what the system does
(Jackson 2000).

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7. ACTION PLAN: IMPLEMENTATION OF CRM SOFTWARE
Organizations nowadays are struggling with capturing changes in their customers’
behaviour. The computerized technologies are used in the recent years to focus on
tracking their trends information and then utilize it for Research and Development
purposes in the supply chains (Wagner 2006). Customer-centricity concept has been
around for almost 50 years and it was first developed by the Practice of Management
“Guru” Peter Drucker. He emphasizes that the customers are the ones that determine
the success of a business and whether it will grow in the competitive market. Very
common software used to track customer information relating to behaviour, and then
utilize it across a range of touch points, is known as the Customer Relationship
Management (CRM) Software. CRM marketing is a business strategy that is aimed at
understanding, managing and personalizing the needs of an organization’s current and
prospective customers. Its implementation is offered by various software developing
companies, some commonly known as Microsoft, IBM, and other competitors such as
SAP and Siebel Oracle. Hobsons, another well-known software company develops
customized professional CRM software especially for educational institutions. It is
imperative for universities to attract skilful students while maintaining the marketing
and operations at a cost-effective level. Hobsons’ customized software provides a
centralized platform upon which students are managed on the basis of their
experience and lifecycle. The Hobsons software therefore allows the university to
manage the process of retaining current and attracting prospective students through
this centralized system.

13
According to Nicole Engelbert, the author of the study, “CRM in the Higher
Education Market” and lead analyst of vertical markets technology, this centralized
system helps to assemble three essential areas in higher education: recruitment,
retention and development, in order to create “the 360-degree view of the student”
(Musico 2008). Keith Hontz, CRM development director of SAP Higher Education
and Research (HER), supports the above view and emphasizes that universities have
been late in addressing these three key areas. Previously, universities had been
focusing on the older technologies from niche retailers, specifically on one of these
areas, however they are now taking a more holistic approach by offering fully
functional software that connects into the overall CRM system.
CRM Software at City University
Analyzing the research carried out for this study, there is a recognized need for the
implementation of customized CRM software at City University. This would be a
cost-efficient way to capture information for the purpose of attracting current students
to the postgraduate study. The steps to the action plan for implementation of this
system will be outlined below.
Step 1: It is imperative to be aware of certain information regarding current and
prospective students. This will allow the university to be informed of various
students’ personal information, which will be an indication of their interests in City
University. When students initially apply for the first year of City University
undergraduate programs, they provide facts on their personal statements in the
application forms. This data includes information about their backgrounds, such as
their nationalities, incomes, career focuses and expectations. Most importantly, it
takes into account information regarding their interests and hobbies.
Other sources of capturing information in the students’ first year degree will include
information related to their attendance in post graduate events such as open days and
fairs. In addition, data will be captured from students’ participation in various clubs,
societies and other social events. Finally, according to the carried out research, City
University will soon be introducing a Course Management System (CMS) known as
Moodle system (Hebel 2009). This is an interactive learning system and is based on
exchanging information in an open source community. Additional information about
students’ viewpoints and behavior will be captured by technologies enabling
collaborating sharing of information such as weblogs, wikis, forums and discussion
boards.
Step 2: This step is predicted to be implemented in the second year of the students’
degrees as they tend to be aware of their future plans, as opposed to their first year.
This data will be automatically captured and utilized by the CRM software. It will
help to identify trends and categorize students into groups, such as by demographics
or psychographics. Therefore, if City University aims to target students with
particular personality traits and abilities, which will be suited towards a given course
available, the CRM software will find those prospects and deliver their information to
the City University research and development team.
However, students’ opinions, from the first year of the undergraduate program to the
third year is most likely to change, and therefore the trend will be continuously
reviewed throughout the three years, such that if eventually the students wish to

14
change their career path, it can be identified, and can still apply to another
postgraduate course at City University.
Step 3: Having gained the above information, the City University can then
concentrate on designing and developing appropriate marketing campaign, in order to
target the current students towards enrolling in postgraduate programs. These
marketing campaigns should be designed such as to encourage current students to
perceive City University differently, which are found to be the underlying problem
from the surveys conducted. City University has to take into consideration online
ways of targeting the various groups of students as well as direct, face-to-face ways of
approaching them. Online means may include campaigning through personal emails,
through the communication software (Cityspace) and through the interactive website.
The direct, face-to-face ways of the marketing campaign can be used to broadcast to
students, the various benefits and advantages of further continuing to the postgraduate
programs.
In order to capture the image of City University in the eyes of the students, and to
ensure that they will consider the university’s postgraduate programs, it is imperative
to keep them up-to-date with the latest news and events for postgraduates. Research
carried out shows that the events currently taking place is not as informative as it
should be, and therefore students may not be as aware of the programs, especially if
they wish to change their career paths. Thus, each course should encourage
participation in a common workshop by perhaps the course director, whereby the
students will be informed on the various advantages and benefits offered to them by
City University. Guest speakers who were previous City University postgraduate
students can perhaps attend this workshop too. They can share their experience with
the prospective students and explain the benefits of going to such a high reputed
University, in terms of career opportunities. This may be found to be highly valuable,
for City University is known for its high career prospects. The course director may
deliver to the students, information to the current degree being studied, as well as
advertise new combined subject routes, for example Fashion Marketing. Since a lack
of knowledge may exist regarding the other degrees, and subject areas, free brochures
will be distributed relating to the additional courses. Moreover, some freebies as well
as free food and drinks will be provided, as it will help provide a lasting impression of
the event.
Students should also be made aware of the continuous advantages of going to City
University, which is located in the heart of London, as recruiters might be more likely
to employ such students due to the overall exposure available to them. In addition,
City University provides different assignments and projects that are mostly linked to
real life organizations and situations, thereby reiterating the fact that courses taught at
the University, are designed to be applicable to the real world. City University can
market this through open days, in the form of lectures or workshops, whereby rather
than showing the students the university facilities by tours, they can be assisted
through a real experience in the day of a postgraduate student.
In addition, when the prospective students attend various workshops and open days,
they should be informed of the benefits such as discounts available to them as they are
existing City University students. An example of the benefit offered by another
competitor for its current students, include London School of Economics offering
discounts on text books in the Waterstone’s book store.
15
There is a lack of information easily exposed on the postgraduate programs.
Therefore, City University should concentrate on providing relevant information,
however it should be noted that too many emails could be possibly viewed as spam
and disregarded.
Finally, City University needs to change the website, in such a way that it is more
appealing, easier to access information and there is more interaction between the two
parties. The website should include more advertisements for each degree and each
society, in order to increase students’ awareness.
Step 4: The last step will be implemented in the students’ final year of their
undergraduate degrees, since opinions are bound to change after having spent three
years at the institution. Although the last step, it is not the least important and will
include reviewing and monitoring the action plan to continuously improve its process.
In order to measure its overall performance, different Key Performance Indicators
(KPI) has to be taken into account on a long term basis. These KPIs can include the
overall number of students graduated from the postgraduate programs, as well as
general feedback received from source of information such as the interactive website
and conducted surveys. These conducted surveys may include formal and informal
ways of gathering relevant information from students’ opinions in their final year.
Having analyzed the feedback gathered, this data will indicate possible changes that
are required to be implemented in order to continuously improve the process. The
Agenda for debate (see Appendix 5) is the next step associated with the SSM
approach and it outlines the main changes regarding the problem situation.

8. ADDITIONAL RECOMMENDATIONS
Having conducted primary as well as secondary research, it is found that City
University does provide scholarships for their postgraduate programs. However, these
grants are not standardized. The City Law School for example, offers a scholarship of
£2000 for its postgraduate programs, whereas the other schools of City University
provide a percentage of the tuition fee. This proves to be an uneven distribution, and
may have an adverse effect on the image of the City University. Furthermore,
attempts to advertise their scholarship programs on posters and banners may fail as it
can create confusion in the minds of individuals, if different amounts are offered to
different schools of City University. Therefore, it is recommended that the scholarship
amounts offered to students should be revised, in order to create standardization and
equality.
Furthermore, a 20% discount can be offered to all current City University students
who are following on to the postgraduate programs. Indeed, City University will need
to consider their costs incurred in doing so, and therefore when revising the
scholarship programs, perhaps the university can lower the standardized scholarship
level set, and in addition offer this 20% discount to all the current students entering
the university’s postgraduate programs as well. This may prove to be highly
favourable, as current students will be offered a chance to feel valued as students. In
addition, the incentive of a discount on the tuition fees will surely encourage the
students to apply to the university for the postgraduate programs, and this is verified

16
by the surveys conducted within the university, which proved that money is an
incentive that drives students towards a university.
In addition, City University can create a partnership agreement with Apple, in order to
provide discounts on the purchase of laptops. The purchase of laptops is highly costly,
and this form of agreement is not currently incorporated in any university in London.
Therefore, if such an incentive it offered, it will allow City University to market itself
better.
When the current students are applying for the postgraduate programs, and are put
onto the waiting list for acceptance, City University should prioritize these currents
students, allowing them to receive an acceptance, as they were once current students
of the university. Although this cannot be marketed, it should be taken into
consideration.

8.1 The City University “house”

The above steps of action plan and recommendations are metaphorically compared to
the building blocks of a house, which in this case represents City University. This is
considered to be the developed holistic approach that demonstrates the key benefits of
the suggested action plan steps and activities. This system’s approach is summarized
using the following framework:

17
9. INVESTMENT AGAINST COSTS
9.1 Outcomes
The cost of the customized CRM software cannot be defined easily. The price
depends on how many services are required the number of features provided by the
software developing company and its users. However, after a thorough research, a
minimum price of £25,000 including the implementation of the software, IT expertise
and the training for an initial predicted number of 30 users. Implementing CRM
systems requires new computer hardware, systems software, network equipment and
security software.
Hardware
The costs of hardware vary according to the features required. In a wide range
dependent on the scope of implementation and platforms. However, in mid-sized
organizations where CRM are implemented, hardware could cost up to a quarter
million dollars.
Software
Just as the Hardware, the cost of the CRM software depends on the scope of the
software, its complexity (number of users, size of the database).The more users there
are, the more license the firm is going to need and probably more training too.
The cost of the software could then be reduced by reducing either the number of users
or the number of features.
Training
The cost for training depends on the number of users to be trained, and the level of
training provided. The more complicated the software is, with many features, the
higher the price per user is going to be. Please refer to Appendix 6 for further details
on the Software cost calculation.
Advertising
Advertising campaign includes posters and flyers, and for both of these projected
costs different providers have been consulted. An average investment of £2,000 is
recommended in order to reach a sufficient number of students.
Different sizes have been asked for quotes. A5 Flyers and A4 brochures will be
distributed during and before events such as open days, fairs and workshops. Their
format will involve A3 and A2 and they will be displayed in strategic emplacement
such as main entrances, corridors so they will be seen by a high number of students.
These costs are totally projected to be £2,294 (See Appendix 7)
Events

18
According to the City University marketing department, an open day currently costs
around 2500 pounds. We assumed that there should be 2 open days per year and that
they will differ from the original structure of current open days and thus it would cost
more than currently. It is predicted to cost around £5000 in total, including provision
of freebees (See Appendix 8) and the expenses for the organized workshops instead of
the traditional tours. The total costs for the events are projected to be £13,800.

Direct Costs
Direct costs would mainly include lecturers’ and staff’s salaries for the additional
recommended courses. This does not necessarily mean recruiting new lecturers as
many teachers with required qualification are already working for the university. Our
research and comparisons with other school brought us to these prices.
Except a course officer to supervise the course, no extra staffs are required to add a
combined course in the university’s program. The average salary of an experienced
course officer is around 40,000 pounds.
A course is divided in around 30 hours and each hour, the lecturer costs the university
around 30 pounds. Thus the annual cost for teaching is around 43,000 pounds. Hence
Total direct costs for adding one extra combined course in the university’s program
will rise 88,000 pounds. (See Appendix 9).
Assuming that less than 10,000 pounds would be invested for equipment and raw
materials, the total direct costs are projected to be 95,000 pounds.

9.2 Incomes
Ranking/Reputation
One of the main factors that students are seeking for their university is a good ranking
and good reputation. Thanks to a good internal promotion, current students get a
better image of their own university and will tend to give external people a good
feedback on their university and perhaps continue their further studies at City.
Better customer understanding
The aims of the CRM software are to have a better targeting of students, creating and
updating their profiles overtime. Thus the university could fulfil the students’ needs
and expectations. Students will appreciate that kind of personal attention. They
become more than a random student and are subject to a regular attention from their
institution. They will feel more secured and will know where to go if they need help.
Better Marketing
Open days, workshops, flyers and posters help reaching more current students and
improve the image of the university in their mind. It is easier to catch people attention
when the number of people in the audience is reduced. Thus, by conducting workshop
during lectures with a reduced number of participants, students feel more privileged
and closer to their university.
Strategic goals

19
In order to enhance the institution, City University has set strategic goals that they
should achieve by 2012. Different goals in terms of students, alumni, employers, staff
and Research have been set. In order to reach these goals, the university is willing to
undertake fundamental reviews of their educational offering. All these investments
described in this report are in a way part of this review and allow the university to
meet goals such as:
- Deliver better and higher quality courses.

- A better understanding of students needs.

- Be more students focused and listen to their feedback and their

recommendation.
- Raise standard of entry.

- Provide a better Management and HR systems.

- Offer students a high standard of curricular content.

However, two of their priority initiatives for 2010 are the review of their graduate
educational offering and the system for academic promotion and reward. Thus, our
recommendations are in perfect concordance with their goals.

CONCLUSION
This report analyses the current situation at City University in terms of targeting
current students in order to retain them for post-graduate studies and recommend
appropriate ways and incentives to achieve this goal. It was found that only 29% of
students in City wanted to stay for Postgraduate studies, with still 42% undecided and
29% negative answers. One of the aims of the report is to reduce these undecided in
order to keep 50% of City students for Postgraduate studies. Further data was
researched about other universities to be able to see what incentives or improvements
could be made to retain students. It appeared that university websites is holding an
essential role to communicate with students and offer them information. Also offering
students discounts and combined courses was a great encouragement for them to
select a university. In order to capture information about current students and be able
to target them better during marketing campaign, the implementation of CRM
software appeared to be essential. These campaigns would include different types of
events and open days designed for current students. After analysing the costs implied
it was concluded that, if asking for an important investment for the university, it
would create a high return on investment on a longer term and provide City
University with a competitive edge.

20
10. REFERENCES

Zoho CRM, Price Comparison Calculator, available at:

http://www.zoho.com/crm/price-calculator.html. Last accessed 03 Dec 2009

ZOHO. (2009). Create Collaborative Online Wiki Websites. Available:

http://wiki.zoho.com/login.do?serviceurl=%2Fregister.do. Last accessed 28
November 2009.

Salesboom. (2009). CRM & ERP Edition Comparisons. Available:

http://www.salesboom.com/products/editions.html. Last accessed 28 November 2009.

Wikipedia. 2009, Consumer Relationship System, available at: (Updated 18 July

2009) available at: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Consumer_Relationship_System. Last
accessed 03 Dec 2009

Wikipedia. 2009, Consumer Relationship System, (Updated 2 December 2009)

available at: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Customer_relationship_management. Last
accessed 03 Dec 2009

Salary.com. (2006). Average Education Job Salary Range and Education Pay Scale..
Available:
http://swz.salary.com/salarywizard/layouthtmls/swzl_narrowbrief_ed01.html. Last
accessed 18 November 2009.

City University London. (2009). Our strategy, available at:

http://www.city.ac.uk/aboutcity/strategy/our-strategy.html. Last accessed 03 Dec
2009

City University London. (2009). Strategic Goals, available at:

http://www.city.ac.uk/aboutcity/strategy/strategic-goals.html. Last accessed 03 Dec
2009

City University London. (2009). Strategic Priorities 2008 to 2012, available at:
http://www.city.ac.uk/aboutcity/strategy/strategic-priorities-2008-to-2012.html. Last
accessed 03 Dec 2009

City University London. (2009). Priority Initiatives, available at:

http://www.city.ac.uk/aboutcity/strategy/priority-initatives.html. Last accessed 03 Dec
2009

City University London. (2009). Key Performance Indicators, available at:

http://www.city.ac.uk/aboutcity/strategy/key-performance-indicators.html. Last
accessed 03 Dec 2009

City University London, 2009, Financial Statements for the year ended 31 July 2009,
available at: http://www.city.ac.uk/aboutcity/dps/Finance_Statements_2008-2009.pdf.
Last accessed 03 Dec 2009

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Vistaprint. 2009 Available: http://www.vistaprint.co.uk/personalised-pens.aspx?
GP=12/2/2009+6:45:38+AM#here. Last accessed 03 Dec 2009

National Pen Ltd. (2009) Available: http://www.nationalpen.co.uk/. Last accessed 20

November 2009.

Flashbay. (2008). Logo Branded USB Flash Drives - Welcome to the Source!
Available: http://www.flashbay.com/. Last accessed 20 November 2009.

Yo-Promotions. (2009). Welcome to Yo-Promotions. Available: http://www.yo-

promotions.co.uk/. Last accessed 20 November 2009.

Click Promo Gifts. 2009. Available: http://www.clickpromogifts.co.uk. Last accessed

03 Dec 2009

Amstore. (2009). Promotional USB & Custom USB Drives. Available:

http://www.amstore-memory.co.uk/. Last accessed 20 November 2009.

Bespoke USB. (2009). Get noticed - in a flash. Available:

http://www.bespokeusb.co.uk/. Last accessed 20 November 2009.

City University London. (2009). Why choose City University London?. Available:
http://www.city.ac.uk/study/choosecity/index.html. Last accessed 26 November 2009.

Queen Mary University of London. (2009). Postgraduate Study. Available:

http://www.qmul.ac.uk/postgraduate/index.html. Last accessed 16 November 2009.

Times Online. (2007). Good University Guide. Available:

http://extras.timesonline.co.uk/tol_gug/gooduniversityguide.php. Last accessed 16
November 2009.

University of Southampton. (2009). Postgraduate Study. Available:

http://www.soton.ac.uk/postgraduate/index.shtml. Last accessed 16 November 2009.

University of Edinburgh. (2009). Why choose Edinburgh?. Available:

http://www.ed.ac.uk/studying/postgraduate/edinburgh. Last accessed 16 November
2009.

University Of St. Andrews. ( ). School of History: Academic Support Officer.

Available: http://www.st-andrews.ac.uk/media/LA263%2009%20FPs.pdf. Last
accessed 18 November 2009.

University of Westminster. (2009). Postgraduate Study. Available:

http://www.westminster.ac.uk/study/pg/student-life/postgraduate-study. Last accessed
16 November 2009.

Moodle. (2009). Welcome to Moodle Community. Available: http://moodle.org/. Last

accessed 27 November 2009.

Hobsons. (2009). Providing Enrollement and Student Recruitment Marketing

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Solutions. Available: http://www.eduinreview.com/Education-Finder/Hobsons/. Last
accessed 30 November 2009.

Musico, Christopher. (Aug2008). Making CRM Mandatory for University

Administration.. CRM Magazine. Vol. 12 Issue 8 (N/A), p20-20, 1p, 1 chart.
Wailgum, T. (2007). CRM (Customer Relationship Management) topics covering
definition, systems, software, and more.. Available:
http://www.cio.com/article/40295/CRM_Definition_and_Solutions?
page=1&taxonomyId=1461. Last accessed 26 November 2009.
Jackson, M (2000). System Approaches to Management. 3rd ed. : Springer. 247.

23
Appendices

Appendix 1 - The surveys

Survey conducted at City University (1/3)

24
Survey conducted at City University (2/3)

25
Survey conducted at City University (3/3)

26
Survey conducted at Queen Mary University of London (1/2)

27
Survey conducted at Queen Mary University of London (2/2)

28
Survey conducted at University of Westminster (1/2)

29
Survey conducted at University o f Westminster (2/2)

30
Survey conducted at University of Southampton (1/2)

31
Survey conducted at University of Southampton (2/2)

32
Survey conducted at University of Edinburgh (1/2)

33
Survey conducted at University of Edinburgh (2/2)

34
All universities together (1/2)

35
All universities together (1/2)

36
 Appendix 2
Step 1 -The rich picture

37
Appendix 3
Step 2 - Relevant Systems
The key systems relevant to City University situation

• A system to transfer the knowledge

• A system to assess the students

• A system to market the activities to current and prospective students

• A system to retain the current students for post graduate programs

• A system to improve the current facilities

• A system to recruit skilful staff

• A system to improve the communication between the stakeholders

• A system to manage the budget

• A system to reflect the global environment to students

• A system to improve teaching quality

• A system to prepare students for future career jobs

• A system to provide students with team work abilities

• A system to offer social societies and organize social events

• A system to keep up-to-date with the latest IT trends

• A system to provide reliable Information Communication Infrastructure

between the main operations

• A system to deal with external economical factors, example, economical crisis

and governmental funds.
Appendix 4
Step 3 - ROOT DEFINITION
A system that enables the City University operations to capture information about
current students through gathering personal data, monitoring their attendance in post
graduate events, and receiving information from the website in order to identify
trends. City University will then target the students by managing the load of data and
organizing students in groups of trends, in order to design the marketing activities.
Finally, the university will obtain feedback by conducting surveys as well as
reviewing the marketing campaign, in order to measure the performance and
continuously improve the retention process of current undergraduate students.

38
In order to ensure that this Root Definition covers the main elements in the mindset, a
CATWOE (customers, actors, Transformation, Weltanschauung, owners and
environment) test has to be carried out. This will outline the main stakeholders in the
system and the Weltanschauung view will take different perspectives of looking at the
situation.

CATWOE TEST
- Customers – Current students

- Actors – University operations

- Transformation –Student personal information transformed into knowledge

for university, better targeting
- Weltanschauung – City University has knowledge to share with the students,
retaining them will create a bigger and closer Alumni community
- Owner – University dean, university operations

- Environment – Sufficient funds, capable staff for using the CRM software,
technology to allow this

Appendix 5
Step 4 - Agenda for debate

Item in Conceptual Present in the Real Debate?

Map World

Enables the City An ongoing process - YES

University reliable?

Capture information An ongoing process – YES

appropriate?

Gathering personal data An ongoing process – YES

imperative

Receiving information Functional– deliverable YES

from the website

39
Monitoring their Assessed from the YES
attendance online signed in students

Identify trends Not fully functional – YES

the students interests and
hobbies are not
included

Target the students An ongoing process – YES

appropriate?

Managing the load of Functional– deliverable NO

data

Organizing students in An ongoing process – YES

groups of trends reliable?

Design the marketing Functional -appropriate? YES

activities

Obtain feedback Functional – reliable? YES

Conducting surveys Functional – low rate of YES

response

Reviewing the Functional- deliverable YES

marketing campaign

Measure the Existing – does it work? YES

performance

Improve the retention Functional – are more YES

process students willing to stay
on at City?

40
Appendix 6
Software costs
In order to calculate the Software cost, different costs were projected.
Training: The price of training is included in the software price. The cost for training
one user per month is 42 pounds.

Price Price
Vendor
/ user / month / user / month

Oracle CRM Ondemand $70 £42,00

The number of users:

We assumed that lecturers were in overall not willing to be trained to use new
software and will tend to ask someone more qualified to do the task for them. We
assumed that the number of users for the software would be limited to 30 users.
Hence, following our recommendation of 30 users, the cost of the software is
approximately 15,000 pounds.
However, another simulation shows that if more staff from different departments
such as Marketing, Finance, and recruitment department would be trained. It would
come to a number of 200 users. Thus, the cost would rise to around 100,000 pounds.
Indeed, as the number of users is not limited and not a fixed factor, the price could
vary, and be adjusted by adjusting this factor.

41
Enter number of users 30

Cost incurred for the number of users mentioned above:

Zoho CRM Professional Edition $4 968 £2 980,80

SugarCRM Professional Edition $14 400 £8 640,00

Salesboom Professional Edition $16 200 £9 720,00

Entellium $18 000 £10 800,00

Salesforce Professional Edition $23 400 £14 040,00

Oracle CRM OnDemand $25 200 £15 120,00

42
Enter number of users 200

Cost incurred for the number of users mentioned above:

Zoho CRM Professional Edition $35 568 £21 340,80

SugarCRM Professional Edition $96 000 £57 600,00

Salesboom Professional Edition $108 000 £64 800,00

Entellium $120 000 £72 000,00

Salesforce Professional Edition $156 000 £93 600,00

Oracle CRM OnDemand $168 000 £100 800,00

43
Appendix 7 – Adevertisment costs

Flyers and Posters

Quantity Unique Cost Total

A2 Poster 500 £0,60 £298,00

A3 Poster 2 000 £0,16 £316,00

A5 Flyers 10 000 £0,03 £305,00

A4 8pp Brochures 10 000 £0,14 £1 375,00

£2 294,00

Different type of freebies could be taken into consideration, but we focused on

freebies that could be used on a regular basis so student will remember easily about
City University. Thus, freebies taken into consideration are customized plastic ball
pen, customized USB Flash drive, and customized mouse mat. All Freebies will
contain the logo of the university.
Customized pens
We forecast to buy around 2000 pens during the year, in order to cover both open
days and workshops. A wide range of pens is available. Different brands, different
quality.
However, the average unit price of a customized pen in plastic with the logo on it
would be around 30p. Hence, the average price for 2000 customized pens would be
around 600 pounds.
Customized USB flash drive

The USB drive is made of plastic and metal. On the plastic part, the logo of the
university will be displayed. The unit price of such customized USB Flash drive with
a capacity of 512MB is around 3 pounds. The idea is to load files with City University
details on the drive so when the student will use the drive for the first time, he will
find more detailed information and pictures or video to make him remember City. As
this freebie is a bit more sophisticated and more expensive, the number of unit
forecasted is limited to 1000 units and will generate a cost of 3000 pounds. It will be
only distributed during workshops.
Customized mouse mats
The unit price of a customized mouse mat is around 60p. It will be distributed during
both open days and workshops. Just like pens, the amount of units to buy would be
2000. It would generate a cost of 1200 pounds. The logo of the University and a
promotional message will be printed on the mat in four line colours.

44
 Workshop

Workshop will take place during open days and some workshops will be set during
lectures. It will be conducted by a lecturer, and brochures, documentation, freebies
drinks and food will be distributed. Freebies are already available and there is no need
to buy more. Also as the workshop takes place during a lecture time, it doesn’t
generate an extra cost for the lecturer.

Appendix 8 - Events costs

Events

Unit cost Unit/year Total

Normal Open day expenses (incl.food & drink ) £2 500,00 2 £5 000,00

Customized pens £0,30 2000 £600,00

Customized USB drives £3,00 1000 £3 000,00

Customize Mouse mat £0,60 2000 £1 200,00

Extra Food and drinks for Workshops £200,00 20 £4 000,00

£13 800,00

Appendix 9 – direct costs

Course officer Annual salary £40 000,00

Lecturers cost

Hour rate/lecturer £30,00

Number of hours per week 30
Monthly cost £3 600,00
Annual cost £43 200,00

Total Direct Costs for one course £88 200,00

45