1. i
J&J Consultants
Jake Israel & Jesse Roszkowski
0232 Tawes Hall
College Park, MD 20742
November 18, 2015
Mr. Michael Barnett
University of Maryland
College Park, MD 20742
Dear Michael,
The purpose of this proposal is based on the grounds of attempting to make
TerpAMA the best possible club that it can be. As a result, we aim to increase overall
awareness of TerpAMA throughout the University of Maryland, and in doing so help
the group increase in membership totals. We believe that through the research we
have conducted as well as our ultimate recommendations, we can assist TerpAMA in
its goal of becoming one of the most prominent clubs on campus.
This report will address the overall interest of marketing at the University of
Maryland and specifically where TerpAMA should aim in guiding their external
promotion. Our primary research consisted of a survey in which we presented a
series of questions regarding club interest and marketing interest to a random
group of students at the University of Maryland. We also conducted research
regarding the interest of college students in club activity as well as the proper
tactics as to how to ideally market to a campus community.
As a result of our research, we have come up with various recommendations
including:
A brochure to be distributed throughout campus containing information
about TerpAMA
A digital advertisement which would be displayed on screens throughout
specific schools with students interested in marketing
Specific ways in which TerpAMA can attain the interest of marketing majors
Methods as to how the group can help maintain proper relationships
between members and the executive board
We would be pleased to hear your reactions to this report as well as discuss any
further details if necessary at your convenience. We appreciate the time you have
spent with us and we hope our results prove helpful.
Sincerely,
Jake Israel & Jesse Roszkowski
2. ii
Strategic Marketing Proposal for the
Planned Membership Growth of TerpAMA
Prepared For:
Michael Barnett
President, TerpAMA
University of Maryland
College Park, Maryland
Prepared By:
Jake Israel
Jesse Roszkowski
November 18, 2015
4. iv
Executive Summary
This report analyzes TerpAMA and their ultimate mission to help increase membership
numbers and to spread overall awareness of the club throughout the University of
Maryland. Through this report, we willshow TerpAMA our proposals regarding how we
plan on assisting the club on increasing their overall members through primary and
secondary research, as well as recommendations we have come up with that we feel will
benefit TerpAMA.
In discussing the issues whichTerpAMA faces with Michael Barnett, the president of
TerpAMA, weextracted various issues we felt could be fixed with our assistance. The
problems we chose to research and come up withrecommendations for were:
Lackof Membership regarding marketing majors
Lackof Membership regarding students outside of the Robert H. Smith Schoolof
Business
Overall insufficientawareness throughout campus
The rift between the executiveboard and other members
Through these problems, we came up withvarious methods of research in order to comeup
with solutions as to how to properly adhere to the issues Michael addressed to us. These
methods of research include:
An initial interview with Michael regarding where TerpAMA currently stands
A primary research survey whichaddressed the awareness of TerpAMA throughout
the University of Maryland
Secondary research regarding marketing toward college students and how to
approach them effectively
In conducting this research, we came up with various solutions to the problems we saw
regarding TerpAMA, as well as what Michael mentioned to us during our interview. These
findings include:
A brochure which wouldbe distributed throughout relevant areas of campus
regarding information about TerpAMA
A digital advertisement to be placed on the screens throughout schools with
interested students
Methods of attaining interest in promoting awareness of the club formarketing
majors
Multiple waysin whichthe group can help bridge the gap between members and the
executive board
By taking account of our recommendations, we feel that TerpAMA can grow in size as soon
as next semester as wellas destroy the stigma they have regarding their internal divide
regarding clubpolicies.
5. 1
Introduction
As you know, TerpAMA is the premier marketing club on the campus of the
University of Maryland. You have told us that your organization’s main goal is to
help your members in regards to their futures. This mainly entails having your
members make valuable connections with the various companies in the business
field, and also helping your members to become better marketers. Taking all of this
into account, we were very surprised to find out that low membership numbers is a
major problem within your organization. After all, the members are only helping
themselves by joining TerpAMA. The following pages will detail some of the issues
that your organization is facing, such as low membership numbers and we will offer
possible solutions to these issues.
TerpAMA Background
TerpAMA is the AMA’s (American Marketing Association) chapter here at the
University of Maryland, primarily based in the Robert H. Smith School of Business.
In being one of the 24 SUSA (Smith Underground Student Association)
organizations, TerpAMA has clearly excelled and has joined the prestigious group.
The group is currently comprised of mainly marketing majors as well as a mixture of
other majors and career fields throughout the University of Maryland. Many of the
members that are not marketing majors are still business school students. In
comparing various clubs and groups at this university, TerpAMA stands out due to
various accolades including SUSA Club of the Year in 2009 and 2015, AMA
recognizing it as an AMA National Bronze Chapter in 2015, and officially ranking in
the top 25 AMA clubs nationally in the past two academic school years.
Due to recent and historical success, it is truly an honor to have been able to work
with such a successful student-run organization and to have the opportunity to
provide insight on various issues the company faces internally and externally.
TerpAMA has membership dues, to which a majority go toward AMA nationals,
which members must pay each semester in order to retain membership. One of the
significant perks of being a member is the networking and external perspectives
TerpAMA provides.
As you know, your weekly meetings provide speakers from various companies such
as Under Armour, Target, the Baltimore Ravens and Stanley, Black and Decker.
These speakers allow members to learn about their respective companies, as well as
give students an opportunity to present hypothetical marketing plans, which give
members the chance to gain experience in various marketing and advertising fields.
As a result, TerpAMA should be able to provide a plethora of students, not just
business school students. This allows all University of Maryland students to explore
their potential interests in marketing, along with the opportunity to network with
6. 2
various companies in which they could ultimately seek an internship or even jobs
with.
Jesse’s Qualifications
Jesse is not a member of TerpAMA, nor is he a business school student. Because of
not being a member or business student, he brings an outsider’s perspective to the
project. For some this could be seen as a disadvantage, but we see this as an
advantage to the benefit of TerpAMA. Sometimes it is difficult to diagnose issues
within one’s own organization and having an outsider with new ideas is exactly
what the organization needs.
Jesse has also had a few jobs in the past that have required him to work with many
different individuals. Because of this, he has positively developed his interpersonal
communication skills, which is essential when recruiting new members to a group.
We feel that Jesse’s work experience and view point, as an outsider, will be very
valuable mainly in diagnosing and proposing potential solutions to the issues within
TerpAMA.
Jake’s Qualifications
As a member of TerpAMA, Jake has a lot of experience with the club and also has the
ability to retain constant contact with the group. As a member, he has seen how the
group functions on a daily basis and in doing so, has seen some of the issues that
TerpAMA faces. Although only a recent member, Jake has been able to see first hand
how TerpAMA can improve and as well as the opportunities for members to grow as
marketers and to network.
In combination with being a member of TerpAMA, Jake is a marketing major as well.
In marketing, he has had great experience in learning various ways in which to
properly design marketing plans, advertisements and general marketing concepts
which greatly helps in regards to how we have approached TerpAMA and their
problems which we intend to resolve. In his most previous internship at MLB
Network, Jake designed and presented various marketing plans regarding how to
contend with competitors in social media and help MLB Network grow in social
media followers and overall social media efforts.
Overall Group Qualifications
We feel that this balance between an insider and outsider’s perspective on TerpAMA
is extremely valuable. Like we previously stated, Jake knows how TerpAMA is being
run and has seen first hand the problems that have arisen within the organization.
Also, Jesse was able to immediately diagnose some of the issues that he saw within
TerpAMA. He was also able to use his prior experience working with many different
groups of people and different backgrounds to come up with solutions that could
help with the fix these issues.
7. 3
We are excited to explain to you the things that we have seen over the past few
weeks while we have been working closely with TerpAMA and can’t wait to help
your organization become not just the premier marketing club on Maryland’s
campus, but the premier on-campus club overall.
SWOT Analysis Chart
In looking at how to approach TerpAMA and determine its strengths and
weaknesses, ultimately leading to creating our recommendations, we felt it was
important to create a SWOT Analysis Chart. Through the creation of this chart, we
believe that we figured out what it exactly is that TerpAMA needs to change in order
to become more renowned on campus. The chart is listed below.
Strengths
1. Sustained great success within the business
school
2. Determined President and Executive board
proactive in trying to promote group
3. Retained willingness to hear from outside
sources
4. Built great relationships with successful
companies
5. Strengthened track record of members working
for successful companies
Weaknesses
1. Awareness of club outside of the business
school small
2. High competition within groups at Smith School
3. Cost of membership and payment
4. Divide between executive board and other
members
5. Lack of group members
1.
Opportunities
1. Large campus with many separate schools
2. Good relationships with successful companies
can help promote the group within the school
3 Members have experience in promotion and
advertising
4. Club willing to advertise outside of the
business school
Threats
1. Other business clubs within Smith School
2. Membership dues being too high
3. People tend to drop out of group after one year
4. Unsuccessful in bridging gap between
members and executive board
8. 4
SWOT Strengths
Upon looking at TerpAMA’s strengths, we felt that they had a strong background and
framework that they could carry over to potentially fixing their issues regarding
membership. You have possessed a strong reputation throughout SUSA and the
business school by winning various awards throughout the past few years. In doing
so, TerpAMA has built itself to become a premier SUSA club, which can easily carry
over to potentially building itself up campus-wide.
In our interview, you also explained to us how determined the Executive Board is
regarding how they plan on moving forward and how you attempt to rise in
membership over the next few semesters. With this strong executive board in mind,
TerpAMA can easily build itself from its members up and, in doing so, can branch
out to those who may potentially be interested in the future.
From our interview, we also realized how receptive TerpAMA is to suggestions from
outside sources. As a recent member, Jake began his tenure with TerpAMA within
the past few months and has seen various ways in which he feels the group can
progress and reach its goal of becoming a top club at the University of Maryland.
Through having a new company or firm visit each week to discuss their marketing
approaches, TerpAMA has built very strong connections with local marketing firms
and other businesses. With this in mind, TerpAMA has the ability to market itself to
interested students throughout campus by stating their resources and networking
abilities, which few groups at the University of Maryland can claim.
With this networking through businesses working with TerpAMA each week, you
have built a strong network between members and companies that will help
members apply for jobs and internships. By doing so, TerpAMA assists its members
greatly as they help members reach their ultimate goals of finding a job in
marketing.
SWOT Weaknesses
With all of these great strengths come great counteracting weaknesses as well.
Although TerpAMA has won various awards throughout the past few years, there is
not much campus-wide awareness of the group, which hurts its membership
numbers and overall success throughout the University of Maryland as a whole.
As a SUSA club at the Smith School of Business, it seems tough for TerpAMA to stand
out relative to the other highly successful groups SUSA promotes. As one of 24 SUSA
groups, it remains difficult for those in other SUSA groups to find time to join
another group since they are all extremely competitive within the business school.
TerpAMA faces an issue of having to charge membership dues each semester as
well. Due to national dues and local chapter dues, each prospective member must
9. 5
pay $60 each semester to remain active in TerpAMA. This can cause prospective
members who cannot afford membership to stay away, as well as others who
potentially are already paying dues for other groups or clubs such as fraternities
and sororities.
In our interview, you mentioned how although the Executive Board has done a great
job in leading the club, it feels as though there is a rift between the board and other
members of the group. With this mind set in place, the overall chemistry of
TerpAMA certainly is not at its capable ability and the members of the group may
not feel open to suggesting their ideas as a result.
We also discussed overall club membership totals and how they needed to improve
in order to see more success for TerpAMA. Membership totals currently sit lower
than your projected goals. This can become an issue in helping spread the word
through advertising as well as in looking at how interested prospective members
may actually be in the group.
SWOT Opportunities
As a whole, the University of Maryland has one of the largest undergraduate
populations of any university in the country at around 27,000 students. This leaves
a lot of opportunity for TerpAMA to promote itself throughout many of the various
schools within the University of Maryland to help try and increase your overall
awareness throughout campus, outside of the business school.
TerpAMA can also use its great relationships with successful companies to promote
itself throughout campus and to relay the message that networking is an ultimate
goal of the club. With this mindset, TerpAMA has an opportunity to valuably
promote itself around campus as students seek networking and ultimate internships
and jobs on a daily basis.
In being a marketing club, TerpAMA has the ability to seek ideas of how to promote
and advertise it from internal sources. With a majority of members as marketing
majors, members would love to grasp the opportunity to try and help promote
TerpAMA throughout campus, as it would be a great way to test their marketing
skills and abilities.
In our interview, we discussed how willing TerpAMA is regarding branching out of
the business school and you stated how open you were to tabling and digitally
promoting outside of the business school. This provides a great opportunity as
members of other schools would be able to learn more about the club and to
ultimately attend meetings if interested in marketing.
10. 6
SWOT Threats
As a SUSA club, there are many factors, which hurt TerpAMA both in promotion and
in membership numbers. As there are 24 total SUSA clubs, it is hard for TerpAMA to
promote itself to many who may not be as interested in marketing. There are also
many opportunities to join other groups as the SUSA groups provide many services,
which help their prospective members as well.
In SUSA having groups with lower membership dues, TerpAMA takes a hit as it
cannot potentially keep up with groups with small or even no dues. Due to AMA
being a national chapter and needing dues from each individual to remain
functional, TerpAMA has difficulty in promoting itself when the dues are higher than
those of other clubs.
One of the major threats TerpAMA faces is that they have seen a large statistic that
people have tended to drop out of the club as early as after one or two semesters.
The majority of these students are freshmen and sophomores and you mentioned
how you have not truly figured out the reason as to why these young members have
dropped out so quickly.
TerpAMA, as mentioned above, has had a very difficult time in bridging the gap
between its executive board and its common members. This creates a rift in the club
that cannot help in common activities, as the chemistry and ultimate relationships
you try to promote cannot function properly.
Problems TerpAMA Faces
Member recruitment is not an easy task for any club to undertake. Often it takes a
lot of time and effort from the current or founding members of a group to make
their club one of the biggest and most powerful clubs of a specific community. We
saw this first hand in our few weeks working closely with TerpAMA as it was
identified as the main problem that TerpAMA was facing. We will now explain in
more detail some of the problems that we saw and will eventually express how we
feel these problems can be addressed.
The main problem that you have mentioned and that we focused on was low
membership numbers. We feel that we definitely have some good ideas as to how to
address this problem. According to a study from the University of Arizona, 66% of
students surveyed agreed that joining clubs can help them further develop their
leadership skills (Knight).
Another issue that is tied to low membership numbers is that members often drop
out of the club before they graduate. As we discussed with you, we think it would be
very beneficial to branch out to the campus community as a whole.
11. 7
Our secondary research also backed this up as one source highlighted the
importance of branching out to people with different viewpoints and backgrounds.
The same source also includes how it is important to identify the members of the
population that can benefit from our club (Community Tool Box, KU). This goes back
to what you mentioned about getting more TerpAMA members that are marketing
majors. You told us that only 10% of marketing majors at Maryland are currently in
TerpAMA. This is definitely an issue that we need to address and we feel that we can
definitely work to raise this number and help more marketing majors benefit from
the vast opportunities that TerpAMA provides.
An article from Seattle University gave us some good ideas about how to address
some of these problems. The article focuses on marketing of events, which we have
identified as a problem within TerpAMA. We have seen that TerpAMA has struggled
to properly advertise some of the very beneficial events that TerpAMA hosts. The
article mentions good ways to advertise these events such as tabling, fliers, and TV
screens (Seattle U), all of which you will see we detailed in the following
recommendations section. By using the recommendations from this source, we were
able to come up with some great ideas as to how to address the marketing problem
of TerpAMA.
You also mentioned that there is high competition between business school clubs.
As you know, there are many other SUSA organizations that are taking members
away from TerpAMA. If we can prove that TerpAMA is the top business school club,
we can hopefully lure more members away from their other clubs and into
TerpAMA.
As you also pointed out, bridging the gap between club executives and regular
members has been a difficulty within TerpAMA. In other words, maybe some good
ideas that the members have about how to make TerpAMA better are not being
heard by the executive board members because of the divide between the two
groups. Luckily we have come up with ways to counteract these issues and share
them later in the report.
Survey Results
Together we came up with and conducted a survey that we feel to be very beneficial.
The survey, featured at Appendix A, asked basic questions such as what is your
major, are you interested in marketing, and have you heard of TerpAMA. Although
relatively basic, these questions were essential to our research as they allowed us to
find relative areas to promote TerpAMA. Based on the results, we were able to get a
good idea about awareness and possible interest in the campus community about
possibly joining TerpAMA. The results can be seen in the following table:
12. 8
What
year
are
you?
What is your
major?
Are you
looking to
join more
on-campus
clubs?
Have you
ever heard of
TerpAMA?
Do you have
any interest in
the marketing
field?
Are you interested in
learning more or possibly
working for companies
such as Under Armour,
Stanley Black and
Decker, or Target?
Junior
international
business No Yes No No
Junior finance, IB Yes Yes Yes Yes
Junior
Computer
Science Yes No No No
Junior
psychology and
English Yes Yes No No
Junior Accounting No Yes No Yes
Junior
Behavioral and
Community
Health Yes Yes No No
Junior Marketing No Yes Yes Yes
Junior Yes No No Yes
Junior Biochemistry No No No No
Junior Journalism Yes Yes No No
Junior Finance No Yes No No
Senior communication No Yes No No
Junior Math No No Yes Yes
Junior bioengineering Yes No No Yes
Junior
Chemistry and
Spanish Yes No No No
Junior
Marketing and
English Yes Yes Yes Yes
Junior Women's studies No No No No
Junior
Computer
Science Yes No No No
Junior
Public Health
Science Yes No Yes Yes
Junior Finance No Yes Yes No
Junior Criminal Justice Yes No No No
Junior
elementary
education No No No No
Junior
Public Health
Science No No No No
Senior Psychology No Yes No No
13. 9
Analysis of Survey Results
As you can see, we had two marketing majors answer the survey and both said that
they have heard of TerpAMA. Based on the results, you would assume that
awareness of TerpAMA among marketing majors is high. Going off of the data, the
only thing we would need to do among marketing majors is make joining TerpAMA
something that they cannot refuse. We had six survey respondents say that they
were interested in marketing. Of these respondents, their majors were two from
finance, two from marketing, one from math, and one from Public Health Science.
This survey gives us a good idea as to where we can potentially market ourselves
around campus. Since one was a math major, we can probably get our digital ad in
the math building. Also, another respondent was a Public Health Science major. This
was a welcoming sight because we had thought about possibly marketing in the
School of Public Health already. Jesse is a Kinesiology Sports Management major and
he has said that business tailored advertising is very minimal in the School of Public
Health. Knowing this and now knowing that we have Public Health Science majors
interested in marketing, we definitely feel that we should be marketing TerpAMA in
the School of Public Health. It would be very easy to occasionally set up a tabling
event or get our digital advertisement in the School of Public Health or Eppley
Recreation Center, where public health students spend a lot of their time. By tapping
into this previously unchartered territory, we can reach out to these students and
hopefully spike their interest in the group.
It can also be beneficial to note that of the 24 respondents, half of them said that
they were interested in joining more on campus clubs. Clearly there is interest in
getting involved more on campus and we just need to make buzz about TerpAMA
much more prevalent. Although the interest may not be directed immediately
toward marketing, and more specifically towards TerpAMA, with a desire to
0
2
4
6
8
10
12
14
Yes No
Interest in Joining Clubs?
14. 10
becoming involved, students may see some of the opportunities provided by
TerpAMA as vital to their futures, increasing overall club awareness. Plus, if our
recommendations are succesful and TerpAMA becomes the premier on-campus
club, more people will see the obvious benefits and will do anything to get involved
in and cash in on the benefits that TerpAMA provides.
Although at first sight the above chart may reflect negativity toward marketing
interest, due to the number of students at the University of Maryland this is an
encouraging statistic. Of the 24 responses, 6 of them responded saying they would
be interested in marketing. With this in mind, if approximately a quarter of students
at Maryland have interest in marketing, TerpAMA should be able to take advantage
of this and market throughout the entire campus.
Recommendations Regarding External Awareness
Through various research, we feel that we have strong recommendations as to how
TerpAMA can grow within and outside of the Robert H. Smith School of Business.
First off, in regards to how we can help with the issue of lower membership than
what is desired, we have come up with various solutions to this problem.
In regards to what TerpAMA can do around campus, we feel that tabling in various
schools with marketing interest as well as in more populated areas throughout
campus will definitely help the club gain great exposure. Although in our survey
results there were not many specific schools, which stood out in regards to interest
in marketing, as there were many students who claimed they had interest in the
companies that frequently visit TerpAMA. With this in consideration, by tabling in
individual schools regarding specific events with various companies, TerpAMA can
stand out throughout campus.
Interest in Marketing?
Yes
No
15. 11
Along with visiting various schools and providing information, we feel that
promoting the club at the Stamp Student Union could greatly help the club grow as
well. Since TerpAMA only gains absolute campus exposure at the First Look Fair at
the beginning of each semester, promoting various events inside and outside of
Stamp throughout the school year will easily help get the word out about TerpAMA
and ultimately lead to more students coming to meetings. With this given
recognition throughout campus, the club should have no issue in gaining more
members at a greater pace.
One of the perks of promoting throughout campus is that this will ultimately lead to
more awareness pertaining to younger students, more specifically freshmen and
sophomores. In promoting at Stamp Student Union and other locations such as
outside North Campus Diner, TerpAMA will gain more attention from students who
are currently undeclared and may have an interest in business and even marketing
as well. Since undeclared students likely do not have any classes in Van Munching
Hall, they are unable to gain any knowledge about TerpAMA.
In promoting to areas that younger students spend a lot of their time, TerpAMA can
gain much more campus exposure throughout this demographic and can eventually
grasp the market of undeclared students who are looking to get involved in various
opportunities around campus. Tapping into this group is a very simple and effective
way of increasing membership.
Another recommendation we have in regards to how we can effectively promote
TerpAMA throughout campus without needing members to table throughout
campus is our deliverables. We have designed two deliverables, a physical brochure,
which TerpAMA can hand out as well as leave throughout various locations on
campus, and a digital advertisement, which we plan on providing for TerpAMA to be
able to promote on the various TV screens throughout schools of interest around
campus.
We feel that the digital advertisement can be useful because it is very flexible. It
would be very easy to make this advertisement into a tangible flyer that can be
handed out at the tabling events that we recommended TerpAMA host. The
flexibility and inexpensive cost of this deliverable can be a very effective solution to
the problem of limited awareness of everything that TerpAMA has to offer.
In regards to our brochure, we plan on distributing copies of the brochure
throughout relative areas of interest around campus. Since TerpAMA’s only campus-
wide promotion efforts are during the First Look Fair on McKeldin Mall, they are not
able to provide much further information during the entire semester.
With the brochure, TerpAMA will be able to provide information to those potentially
interested during the entire semester by placing the brochures in the Stamp Student
Union, in on campus diners, different classroom buildings, underclass dorm
buildings, and other relevant areas throughout Maryland’s campus.
16. 12
Currently, TerpAMA only has digital advertisements in Van Munching Hall. Through
our research and prior knowledge of schools which have shown interest in
marketing, we have decided that TerpAMA would be best providing digital
advertisements in locations such as Knight Hall, which is the home of the School of
Journalism, buildings which focus in Communications and English like Tawes Hall,
Skinner Building, and many of the other buildings on McKeldin Mall.
Other than Communications focused classes, many of these buildings provide class
space for General Education classes, which could help promote toward undecided
students and underclassmen. The final area of promotion where we look for
TerpAMA to place our digital deliverable is in the various freshmen dorms on North
Campus. We feel that in providing these advertisements to these buildings, we can
interest large groups of freshmen and sophomoresliving there who may be
interested in marketing or in the companies from which TerpAMA provides lectures.
Recommendations Regarding Marketing Majors
In regards to promoting within the Smith School of Business and more specifically
for marketing majors, we have come up with various ways in which we feel
TerpAMA can master this market and ultimately grow exponentially. As a marketing
major for the past three years, Jake has seen various examples within Van Munching
Hall of how TerpAMA can properly advertise events and the benefits of joining
TerpAMA toward marketing majors other than our deliverables.
The first idea of promotion for marketing majors is to provide various information
sessions within Van Munching Hall. Although TerpAMA does provide tabling on a
weekly basis, there are times where students do not have time to gain information
or are in a rush. This potentially hurts prospective members as they cannot find
proper times to learn about TerpAMA.
In having information sessions occurring at least two times a month, prospective
members will have time to learn about the club and if scheduled properly, TerpAMA
should have great success in informing marketing majors and other business
students about the perks of membership. We saw this issue first hand in our English
class. We were presenting our ideas for our project to the class and at the end there
was a short question and answer session with our classmates. One classmate
explained to us his interest in TerpAMA, but expressed his dejection at the fact that
the meetings are only on Tuesdays and how he cannot attend on those days because
of a prior engagement.
This got us to thinking that maybe there are things that we can do to tailor to
individuals like this that have time conflicts to get information about the benefits of
TerpAMA. By holding information sessions and question and answer sessions,
TerpAMA can appeal to those who have concerns about the club, but have been
unable to address these concerns.
17. 13
Another method of promotion regarding marketing majors is to present future
events prior to marketing specific classes. In Van Munching Hall, many groups such
as SUSA Student Government succeed in gaining attention because they advertise
recent or upcoming events prior to the beginning of lectures. If TerpAMA focused on
having members within these classes or those members with free time go to
marketing based classes and promote future events or information sessions,
TerpAMA will likely grow in meeting attendance, which will lead to increase in
membership.
Another issue that TerpAMA has is having is low attendance at meetings, so by
promoting events on a weekly basis, students are more likely to attend meetings
and gain interest in the club. As a marketing major, Jake did not hear about
TerpAMA until the end of his sophomore year when he went to a table session in
Van Munching Hall. With lack of awareness by marketing majors as a whole,
TerpAMA cannot physically branch out and increase membership. As a result, with
weekly promotions within relevant classes, TerpAMA should have no issues in
increasing overall meeting attendance and membership numbers.
Recommendations Regarding Internal Communication
One of the problems discussed in the interview is the gap between executive board
members and the rest of the members of the group. In our interview, we discussed
how there has been a recurring issue of how the executive board, consisting of 17
members, seems to be the only members who feel as though they are valuable assets
to the TerpAMA community. As a result, the group in its entirety feels the executive
board is doing all of their work behind the scenes without any true help from the
members. Albeit this is not truly the case, we have come up with various suggestions
that will help deter members from feeling this sense of absence from group activity.
In providing methods of social interaction outside of the meetings, such as various
external events including dinners and team-building activities, the idea of the gap
between the executive board and the rest of the members can easily be bridged. By
having member only events, which promote building internal interaction and
relationships, TerpAMA will definitely benefit and help everyone feel as though they
are part of the TerpAMA community. In doing so, members will feel more obligated
to eventually find their way into executive roles and ultimately remain in the club
for longer periods of time.
Another recommendation regarding how to bridge the gap between members and
the executive board is to allow various members to attend executive board meetings
at various times throughout the semester. In allowing members to attend these
executive board meetings, members who have ideas or suggestions regarding the
progression of TerpAMA will be able to bring up these concerns. Allowing members
at the executive board meetings will also help members to gain knowledge of the
operations of TerpAMA. This can assist the club in bridging the gap between regular
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members and executive board members because it will give the regular members an
opportunity to approach the executive board and remove the stigma that the
executive board is doing everything for the group.
In embracing these suggestions, TerpAMA should have no issue in fixing this
substantial internal problem. By allowing members to communicate properly with
each other in settings other than meetings, all internal problems should eventually
become obsolete and the club can work better as a whole.
Deliverables
As mentioned in the recommendations section, we have come up with two
deliverables, both of which we feel can greatly help TerpAMA in their campus-wide
promotional efforts. These deliverables consist of relative information regarding
club efforts, as well as upcoming events, which will ultimately help bring in
interested students and help promote TerpAMA outside of the business school. We
hope that in viewing these deliverables, TerpAMA will take our efforts into
consideration and apply these deliverables as soon as they feel necessary
throughout the University of Maryland campus.
Our first deliverable is featured at Appendix B. The deliverable is an advertisement
we constructed, focusing on the upcoming event with AKQA. We feel that flyers like
these can be really effective because they are cheap, easy to make, and get a lot of
good information out about TerpAMA and the actual event. As well as being printed
out and handed out, this flyer is what we hope can be placed digitally throughout
the screens in various buildings around campus. As you can see we really wanted to
market both AKQA and TerpAMA.
We feel that this is a good strategy because it can grasp the attention of people
interested in learning more about AKQA, a very popular digital design firm, in the
hopes that they will also learn about TerpAMA and all the benefits that being a
member hold. This kind of advertisement can be made for any event that TerpAMA
hosts. If this deliverable is properly exposed around campus, then awareness of
TerpAMA will increase and subsequently, membership numbers.
The second deliverable, featured at Appendix C, is the brochure we have created for
TerpAMA regarding general information about the club and where to go for further
information. With this brochure, we will be able to help spread relative information
about TerpAMA throughout various outlets in Stamp Student Union, the dining halls,
class buildings, dorm buildings, and other areas where the club deems it necessary
to focus their attention.
The brochure will also help the club in regards to not needing to table as frequently
in areas outside of the business school. This will help TerpAMA be able to focus on
marketing majors and others within the business school, while the TerpAMA
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brochure will be more focused on getting the attention of those outside of the
business school looking in becoming more involved.
Conclusion
Overall, through our research internally and externally regarding TerpAMA, we feel
that we have come up with multiple great recommendations as to how to properly
fix the issues TerpAMA has had in the past. We feel that through marketing toward
specific schools and younger age groups will greatly help increase membership
numbers. In doing so, TerpAMA can ultimately expand greatly, which is one of the
problems the club has seen in the past few years.
Through our deliverables, we feel that overall awareness of TerpAMA will definitely
increase inside and outside of the business school. Through our recommendations
regarding marketing majors, we feel that marketing majors will become more aware
of the benefits TerpAMA can provide to them and this will help increase marketing
major members from what it currently resides at, 10 percent.
In viewing how to bridge the gap between executive board members and standard
members, by having various events, which will help intercommunication throughout
the club, TerpAMA will certainly become more productive and properly provide
each member awareness of what is going on as well as a voice that they may have
not previously felt they possessed.
Through our research and ultimate results, we feel we have successfully achieved
the goals we came up with in our initial interview, and provided TerpAMA with a
proper path toward their ultimate goal of helping the club become the most
successful and prominent group or club at the University of Maryland.
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Works Cited
Increasing Participation and Membership. Community Tool Box. Retrieved from
http://ctb.ku.edu/en/increasing-participation-and-membership
Knight, J. (n.d.). Student Participation in Collegiate Organizations – Expanding the
Boundaries. Retrieved from
http://www.leadershipeducators.org/Resources/Documents/Conferences/L
exington/Hegedus.pdf
Marketing Your Event. Seattle University. Retrieved from
https://www.seattleu.edu/involvement/clubs/planning/marketing/
