Marketing and Competitive Environment University of Adelaide

Question: Discuss about the Marketing and Competitive Environment of The University of Adelaide. Answer: Background The University of Adelaide is a public university of Australia. It is situated in Adelaide, South Australia. The university has been founded in 1874. The university mainly possesses five faculties, such as- faculty of engineering, computer and mathematical, faculty of medical and health care, the faculty of humanities, the faculty of professions and the faculty of science. It is considered as one of the leading university in the world and Australia. It is the third-oldest university of Australia. In 2010 the University of Adelaide has taken a notable initiative to make the university campus smoke free (Adelaide.edu.au, 2017). The University management has introduced a smoke free policy in the university campus to prevent the tendency of smoking among the students. The university management provides a safe and enthusiastic atmosphere to their students to encourage them. The management pays special attention to the extracurricular activities of the students. They have included many new policies into the university rule book to motivate their students to achieve their goal. There are many other public universities of Australia that are giving tough competition to the University of Adelaide. The management is implementing new marketing strategies to promote the name of the University. They have strengthened all the segments of marketing to attract a large number of students from all over the world. The below mentioned article has concentrated on the marketing segment of the University of Adelaide. It discusses about the competition that the university is facing and different marketing segments. Market summary and demand assessment Labour market in Australia is not flexible and unemployment of this economy is also moderately high (Bishop Plumb, 2016). As Australian government has taken several initiatives for reform in higher education since 2012, demand for enrolment in the universities has increased. Higher education sector revenue in Australia is expected to grow at 4.5% over the five years from 2016-17. Figure 1: University ranking of Australia (Source: jll.com.au, 2015) Government brought a reform in the education sector by allowing private universities in student enrolment for higher and tertiary education. Both private and public universities are operated by market driven demand policies, where student fees are unregulated. As access for higher education has been made easier, this market has become competitive by removing restrictions on operation. Major universities especially public universities in Australia operate within particular state territory. Therefore, it is difficult for the individual universities to acquire a large market share in the Australian economy. Demand for The University of Adelaide comes both from domestic and international economy for different undergraduate and post graduate courses (australianuniversities.com.au, 2017). Segment and target market Market for higher education is segmented by The University of Adelaide according to the degree and study areas such as undergraduate and post graduate courses. There are separate department for different category of subjects such as humanities, science, music, and nursing. Market is also segment based on time of availing education such as part time, full time, on- campus and off campus study. Figure 2: Statistics of The University of Adelaide (Source: australianuniversities.com.au, 2017) As seen in figure 1, online enrolment percentage in this University is very low compared to offline students. In order to put itself in the competitive position in the international market, this university has to draw more foreign students to enrol in this university. Greater entrance of foreign students can make the revenue stream stronger. It is also seen that female enrolment is less in this university compared to the male student (Ibisworld.com.au, 2017). Therefore, the target group for this University is the online students and female students of Australia. Enrolment of female students at the undergraduate level is main focus group. Current marketing mix analyses This report focuses on the 4 Ps of marketing mix such as product, price, promotion and place. Main products offered by The University of Adelaide are bachelor degree, other technical and non technical undergraduate programme, Masters degree, postgraduate degrees in various subjects of different streams and other educational courses. Research based studies are also offered by this University. Currently, this University charges annual tuition fees AUD$29,900, annual post graduate tuition fees AUD$30,520 (australianuniversities.com.au 2017). On the other hand, international students have to pay Biz fees $83,600, Arts fees $73,500 and Science fees $87,700, which is higher than the domestic students. International student has to pay full amount of the tuition fees. As a current marketing strategy, The University of Adelaide uses online marketing platform in order to draw greater number of the international students. A greater number of students come to study Australia from China. Improvement of online platform for study is the main focus for the University. The University of Adelaide has four campus in Australia, North Terrace, Rose worthy campus, Waite campus and Thebarton Campus (Adelaide.edu.au, 2017). All the campus has convenience for transport and all the facilities available in big cities. PEST Analysis: Political/ Legal Factors: Political and legal factors refer to rules, law and regulations. Although, this rules and regulations help the organization to run successfully, sometimes the rise of the pressure groups influences the law and regulations. It can be harmful for the growth of the university (Ran et al., 2014). Environmental Factors: In this modern era, pollution rate is growing high day by day. High greenhouse gas emission, increment of air, land and water pollution can be harmful for the organizational management to run their organization successfully as high rate of pollution can cause health hazards for the students and faculty members. Social Factors: Every organization highly requires the support from the society and people around the organization. University management may face difficulties to run their organization successfully if there is a difference between the social belief and organizational belief. Technological Factors: Emergence of new technologies has made the life of human easier, but the innovation of mobile phone, laptops, internet and other gadgets has shifted the focus of students from the conventional way of study (Forsyth, 2014). Now days, people especially the youth are very much fond of mobile, laptops and other electronic gadgets. It has become easier for the students to download the study material directly from the internet. They are losing their interest in books and physical study materials. This is one of the biggest threats for the management of University of Adelaide. Competitor Analysis: University of Adelaide is facing challenges due to rise of other public universities like Monash University. Although University of Adelaide is considered as the largest university of Australia and possesses a large number of students, Monash University also has students around 62,567. This university has spread their network in all over the world like University of Adelaide. Monash University consists of 21,953 foreign students. Monash University is quite popular among the international students for its international research reputation and efficient professional courses. The management of Adelaide University is facing difficulties due to the growth Monash University. Monash is giving tough competition to University of Adelaide by providing attractive courses to their students (Frusher et al., 2014). SWOT Analysis: Figure 3- SWOT Analysis (Source: Created by: Author) Strength: University of Adelaide is known for being a leading and oldest university in Australia. It preserves a rich culture that attracts the students from all over the world. It has one of the most experienced and talented faculties (Vivian et al., 2014). Weakness: Being one of the oldest universities in the World, the University of Adelaide is mainly based on conventional study method. It is considered as one of the major weak point of this renowned university. In recent time, the students mostly prefer modern and innovative way of study (Mehan, 2016). Opportunity: As it is one of the renowned universities in all over the world, it is quite famous among the international students and the university provide healthy atmosphere to its student to motivate their creativity. The university management has taken some innovative initiatives like smoke free policy to provide healthy environment to the student for study. It attracts the students from all over the world. Threats: The emergence of other public university is one of the biggest threats for the management of Adelaide University. They are facing various obstacles due to the rise of Monash University, University of New South Wales and other public university of Australia (Pinto et al., 2014). Value and brand positioning analysis While formulating brand value positioning, The University of Adelaide need to focus on academic integrity that are linked with higher education, greater employment opportunity, positive experience during vocational training, offering business friendly courses (go8.edu.au, 2014). These strategies can bring competitive advantage for the University both in the domestic and international market. Ranking of this university is at the lower level compared to other top public Universities. Therefore, gender focus may be given priority to enhance brand value of this University. Conclusion The report has analysed marketing characteristics of The University of Adelaide. This University holds 100th position among the QS World University Rankings 2014 / 2015. The education industry in Australia is competitive with presence of both public and private universities and other higher secondary Institutions. 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