Journal of Marketing Education

Today’s college students, often referred to as the “digital generation,” use an impressive assortment of technological tools in a wide variety of ways. However, the findings reported here suggest that students prefer more traditional instructional technology for effective engagement and learning. Faculty members, however, prefer the use of course-learning technology offered by their universities or publishers. In addition to this potential mismatch between preferences of students and teachers, the research finds that there are vast differences in preferences and usage across disciplines, in particular, business and economics instructors and students having stronger technology preferences than instructors and students of the fine arts and life sciences.

The purpose of this article is to examine how students are incorporating online resources into their self-regulated learning strategies. The process of developing these learning strategies and the importance of these strategies has been widely researched, but there has been little empirical research into how the students are affected by online environments. This preliminary study focused on the relationship between the use of online resources and the students’ overall outcome in the subject. The data were collected from first year on-campus (n = 105) and distance education (n = 258) students after completing their introductory marketing subject. The data were analyzed using correlations, simple regression, and Tobit regression to assess online activity and student outcomes. The results indicate that the use of these online resources has a significant and positive effect on the students’ grade. This finding suggests students are incorporating online environments into their learning strategies, which results in higher grades. Moreover, in practical terms, the results imply that teachers can help facilitate student self-learning strategies by creating encouraging and resource-rich online environments.

There has been an explosion of classroom technologies, yet there is a lack of research investigating the connection between classroom technology and student learning. This research project explores faculty usage of classroom-based course management software, student usage and opinions of these software tools, and an exploration of whether or not the use of classroom-based course management software enhances student perceptions of learning based on the Seven Principles of Good Practice in Undergraduate Education. The authors find that although students enjoy using many of the course management tools, they do not see the tools as highly effective at enhancing the learning experience. When designing courses and considering if or how to use course management tools, it is critical for faculty to consider the connection between the Seven Principles for Good Practice in Undergraduate Education and the specific technology tools. Implications of the research findings and suggestions for improved use of classroom management software tools are provided.

Timely, constructive feedback on assessment is critically important to students and yet is increasingly difficult for time-poor academics to consistently provide. Marketing educators also face pressure to incorporate sustainability into both the curriculum and practices such as assessment. This article outlines the development of an innovative computer-based marking tool, SuperMarkIt (SMI), which promotes sustainability. Using an action research method, this article reports the results of the sixth cycle of review and improvement with data gathered from both educators and students. Results support the improvements in sustainability achieved by using SMI. Educationally, students report improved feedback quality in areas such as timeliness, legibility, constructiveness, personalization, and detail. Economically, academics report major increases in feedback quantity, and students report reductions in time and cost. Environmentally, SMI reduces reliance on paper as well as reducing travel required to submit and collect hard copy assessments. Continued development of SMI focuses on improving aspects related to technology adoption by educators.

The design of a course has potential to help marketing students achieve their learning objectives. Marketing courses are increasingly turning to technology to facilitate teaching and learning, and pedagogical tools such as Blackboard, WebCT, and e-Learning Commons are essential to the design of a course. Here, the authors investigate the research discussing the sources of satisfaction in web design and apply these concepts to website platforms used in traditional classes. The purpose of the study is to enhance student learning by identifying fundamental principles to be used when designing website platforms. Our study includes in-depth interviews with graduate and undergraduate students. Among both student groups, our analysis reveals five fundamental pedagogical principles for enhancing student learning through the use of technology: (a) student-to-student connectivity, (b) instructor-to-student interactivity, (c) goal efficiency, (d) quality content, and (e) student appeal. The authors discuss the importance of the presence of the five pedagogical principles and offer useful implications for marketing faculty and suggestions for future research.

Recent years have seen unprecedented possibilities for the use of different technologies to enhance learning in marketing courses. Given the rapid and widespread diffusion of these technologies, particularly within the demographic of the student population, it is pertinent to explore and examine how such technologies can benefit student learning. This article discusses and empirically evaluates students’ experiences of using Twitter as a tool to facilitate learning in marketing courses. Although Twitter’s unique characteristics were used to enhance and facilitate the learning of marketing concepts, the use of Twitter also helped illustrate marketers’ use of innovative technologies and, therefore, added valuable contemporary curriculum content. Using in-depth interviews, and a questionnaire to evaluate learning outcomes, this research concludes that students’ perceptions of using Twitter were largely positive, though some anticipated and unanticipated barriers emerged to incorporating Twitter into marketing courses. Recommendations for adopting Twitter into the marketing curriculum are made, and future areas for research are identified.

Marketing professionals use Twitter extensively for communicating with and monitoring customers, for observing competitors, and for analyzing chatter concerning brands, products, and company image. Can professors use Twitter to engage students in conversation about a marketing course? The authors argue that Twitter has many benefits for marketing educators who are interested in engaging students in experiential learning. In a real-time environment for student learning, professors may use Twitter for direct communication with students to generate discussion and interest in the course topics and examples. Just as marketers use Twitter to generate interest, discussion, and brand image, educators can use Twitter to generate this interest in a course through social media. Furthermore, Twitter is a fast, easy method for making announcements, solving student issues, and performing course-related administrative duties. In three studies, both quantitative and qualitative data suggest that when students engage in Twitter use with the professor, students feel better prepared for future careers. In addition, students indicate that Twitter facilitates achieving traditional educational goals. The qualitative data offer insights into potential problems. Suggestions for educators interested in using Twitter are offered.

The goal of this study is to evaluate the effectiveness of an experiential learning social media project that was integrated into a graduate marketing class. As part of the semester-long project, students were required to work within a team and create a spoof video, which was posted on YouTube. Students’ success was partially determined by the number of views made of the particular video. After reviewing the results obtained by a semistructured survey, the research indicates that the inclusion of an experiential project into the core curriculum was associated with student motivation, engagement, team management, and communication skills. Furthermore, this integration promoted learning of technical and theoretical knowledge related to consumer-generated advertisements and virtual viral marketing. Results and implications are discussed.

There are compelling reasons for educators to consider incorporating virtual worlds (VWs) in their marketing curriculum. That said, the ways in which VWs can be implemented into the teaching curriculum are many and varied. This article reports on two studies in which notionally similar graduate classes are taught about marketing in Second Life (SL). The degree of student and instructor immersion is intentionally varied: One class is taught entirely in SL, by a technically expert instructor, while novice/intermediate instructors teach the second class in an interactive tutorial setting. Taken together, these studies offer marketing educators insights into developing “full” and “lite” approaches to teaching in SL, thereby lowering the barrier to uptake of the technology by catering to a broader spectrum of both instructor and student competencies, interests, and abilities.