MBA Student Satisfaction Case

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How do marketing campaigns influence customers' perception of a product? Organizations often collect customer data to help answer this question. For example, a University in Boston is concerned with the satisfaction of students in their flagship MBA course, that is, their MBA in Analytics. They collected data on student satisfaction earlier this year and considered different options to improve satisfaction.

The University considered two options. Option 1: increase the quality of the MBA course by hiring three nationally recognized professors and revising the curriculum. This would require a significant investment. Option 2: keep the course as is (i.e., no new professors or curriculum revision) but instead create a marketing campaign to enhance the perception of students regarding the benefits and quality of the course. The goal of this campaign is to emphasize the amazing career opportunities in analytics and how the MBA will help students benefit from those opportunities.

The University decided to go with Option 2. Their hypothesis was simple: the marketing campaign would improve the satisfaction of MBA students despite the fact that no changes or improvements were made to the MBA course. This is a fascinating strategy: there's no need to improve the product. Instead, let's change the customers' perception of the product.

The university is finishing a new round of data collection, which will allow them to test this hypothesis soon. Complete the following tasks:

1. Do you believe the data will support this hypothesis? In your post, present TWO reasons to justify why you believe the hypothesis will hold or not hold. Your answer should be at least 100 words long, and include at least one reference (e.g., an online article, study, etc.) to support your argument.
2. Reply to one of the other posts. Indicate if you agree with the arguments presented or if you learned something new from the other post.