Fall 2019 Professional Workshops in Marketing

Marketing majors will complete three blocks of classes. The first block is the foundation set of four courses that all marketing students must complete. The second block is the concentration, marketing management, sales management or integrated marketing communications. The third block is the professional experience. As a part of the professional experience, students will have a choice between 3 credit Internship or three 1-credit professional workshops.

Please note that students that are double majors must have a professional experience for each of their majors. Thus for example a double major in IMC and Marketing Management could have a 3-credit Internship in Marketing Management and then could take three 1-credit professional workshops to count towards the professional experience in IMC.

The Professional Workshops will be taught by area business executives and will explore career pathways as well as specific cutting edge marketing topics in-depth from an executive perspective. A description of each workshop and the time it will be offered is listed below. If you choose to take one or more of the workshops listed below, please note the section number, then return to registration and complete the sign-up. The Saturday workshops will run for two consecutive Saturdays.

New For Spring 2019 – In order to receive a Credit (Passing grade) – students are required to attend both Saturday sessions. No make-up assignments will be provided if a Saturday session is missed. Excused absences and emergencies include court appearance, jury duty, death of a family member, hospitalization, illness with Doctor’s note. There are no exceptions to this. Excused absences include official University of Akron events, such as sales competitions, or student-athlete travel commitments or competitions. Verification and documentation will be required to be considered an excused absence.

View a PowerPoint presentation designed for workshop instructors.

6600:491:981: Social Media Workshop

Time: Saturday 9:00 am – 4:30 pm
Instructor: Shon Christy, President, Shon Christy Social
Meeting Dates: 8/31/19 & 9/07/19

Workshop Description: As of January 2018, 69% of online adults in the US use social networking sites according to Pew Research Center. Social media has changed the how we get the news, connect with friends, and even shop. While the platforms may change, the basic principles and practicalities of marketing through social media remain the same. Strategy, content, management, and analysis are all key components for success in social media marketing today. Students will put into practice what they have learned through hands on exercises and presentations.

In this workshop, participants will learn how to:

Design a social media marketing strategy
Develop content for a variety of audiences
Identify and leverage tools to drive results
Analyze results to determine campaign progress and success

6600:491:982: Data Visualization with Tableau

Time: Saturday, 9:00 am – 4:30 pm
Instructor: Rachel Byerly, Manager Transaction Services, Grant Thornton LLP
Meeting Dates: 9/21/19 & 10/05/19

Workshop Description:The global data visualization market is growing at nearly 9% per year. This is being driven by a shift in analytically driven decision making. It is also being accelerated by the use of dashboards by multiple levels within an organization and their increased adoption by small and medium sized firms. This class will be focused on the use of Tableau for visualizations. You will work in teams and we will align teams based on Tableau experience. Ideally students should have taken 6600:375 Marketing and Sales Analytics, or had some prior experience with Tableau.

In this workshop, participants will:

Utilize many of the features of Tableau
Clean up data
Design an effective dashboard
Tell a better story for decision makers

6600:491:983: Trade Show and Event Marketing

Time: Saturday 9:00 am – 4:30 pm
Instructor: Jane Smith,Formerly in Channel Commercialization, JM Smucker Company
Meeting Dates: 9/21/19 & 10/05/19

Workshop Description:Did you know that nearly 70% of buyers of goods & services consider trade shows to be their primary source of information? More than 4 out of 5 people who attend trade shows have purchasing authority and 99% of marketers said they found unique value from trade shows that they did not get from other marketing mediums.. Shows & events are a means to have effective conversations with both current customers and prospects, allowing sales and marketing teams to secure new business and reinforce existing relationships.

In this workshop, participants will learn:

The history and importance of trade shows and event marketing
How all marketing tactics can work cohesively together to create an impactful message
Strategy for multimedia usage, graphic considerations, effective spend, and multi-touch point marketing plans
To set strategy that translates into action that drives measurable business results

6600:491:984: Creative and Profitable Market Segmentation

Time: Saturday 9:00 am – 4:30 pm
Instructor: Don Wedding, Ph.D.
Meeting Dates: 10/19/19 & 10/26/19

Dr. Wedding has over 20 years of experience in Data Science having developed models in customer segmentation, prospecting, forecasting and customer lifetime value. Don has applied his analytical skills in several capacities, having worked at Sprint, and the SAS Institute, as well as teaching at Northwestern University.

Workshop Description: With the increased availability of large data bases, marketers and sales staff are using decision trees to make better management decision. Decision trees are a visual representation of the choices available (eg, direct mail versus email campaign) and their results are in the form of a tree (response rate for example). In this workshop students will understand the concepts behind decision trees and then utilize the “R” programming language to help make informed segmentation models.

In this workshop students will learn:

The importance of market segmentation
How to design a decision tree, and applications in “R”
Applications of Decision Trees for optimizing marketing and sales decisions
Creating profitable segments from Decision Trees

600:491:985: Introduction to Digital Video Production for Marketing

Time: Saturday 9:00 am – 4:30 pm
Instructor: Michael Adams, Video Specialist, Monsters Unlimited
michael@thinkmonsters.com
Meeting Dates: 10/19/19 & 10/26/19

Workshop Description: In the world of digital marketing, there’s no doubt content is king. With Snapchat and Instagram, Periscope and Twitch, YouTube and Facebook, Netflix and Hulu--consumers are enjoying more video content than ever before; and marketers are looking for more ways to incorporate video into strategy. In this workshop, we’ll look at professional tools and fundamentals of video production, as well as analyze creative uses of the medium in marketing campaigns. Students can expect to learn:

How professionals get the most out of their cameras
Editing tools and effects
The process from pitch to production
Explore concepts and best practices in use of video in marketing campaigns
Why metrics, like engagement rate, play rate, shares, clicks are important for judging success

6600:491:986: A Deeper Dive into Digital

Time: Saturday 9:00 am – 4:30 pm
Instructor: Jeff Staats, SpinVista
Meeting Dates: 11/09/19 & 11/23/19

Workshop Description: This workshop will explore the various ways that digital technology is enabling interaction between business and the customers they serve. We will explore how digital technologies provide efficiencies within existing business processes, entirely new ways of working, and how the digital space is changing how companies interact.

Topics to be covered will include:

Knowledge management: how to capture, retrieve and interpret digital data
Prediction: How to use Big Data/Analytics for predicting future customer desires, wants and needs
Application: How can companies maximize return from their Digital Strategies to integrate and support other marketing efforts
Our focus will be to explore and discuss, real life applications, through hands on classroom exercises.