For the second year running, an elective module available to students from all three of the Department of Marketing's MSc programmes, 'Marketing in a Digital and Cross-cultural World', took place on Strathclyde's Dubai campus.
Besides formal lectures, the class, led by Dr Catherine Demangeot, also exposed students to the cultural and digital practices of one of the world's most multicultural markets. Among other activities, students presented their findings from comparative observational research at the Buchanan Galleries and Dubai Mall to a retail expert to receive his feedback and insights. Practitioner input also involved Flip Media's CEO Yousef Tuqan discussing how Flip Media manages a multicultural office across several countries to enable their clients to engage with social media, and Lola Adewoyin-Banjo, a Strathclyde alumna herself, providing a concrete view, through myriad examples, of the regional digital marketing and cultural communication practices of international hotel chain Starwood Hotels and Resorts.
MSc International Marketing student Chantz Fox commented, "The elective allowed for the perfect platform for participants to be truly immersed within a cross-cultural setting and witness how the digital world is evolving and being adopted globally. One of the main benefits of the Sector Study elective programme was being able to interact with local students and leading industry professionals at Strathclyde Business School's Dubai Campus."
A major component of the programme consisted of a collaborative project with Emirati students from Higher Colleges of Technology Dubai – Women's Campus, during the course of which mixed groups had to take account of cultural considerations to plan the launch of a product in the UAE, in the process (and through the collaboration) learning about Emirati culture. One of the Emirati students involved reflected on the benefits she gained from collaborating with students from a variety of cultures towards a common objective, and with whom to share insights about their culture and traditions.
On the margins of a packed schedule, the students, who were accompanied by Postgraduate Administrator Carol Christie, also had time to discover Dubai's main tourist attractions, including viewing Dubai from the top of the world's tallest tower. On attending the launch of Strathclyde 100 Dubai, they also found out about the wider Strathclyde community of students, alumni, entrepreneurs and associates in the UAE.
A number of MSc International Marketing and MSc Marketing students also took a trip in March as part of the 'Sector Studies: Italian Style Marketing' elective in Venice, hosted by the Università Ca' Foscari where students attended lectures given by leading practitioners in the field of luxury branding.
Company visits were arranged and students had the opportunity of seeing how businesses operate internally from raw materials sourcing to final product. They were fascinated by how the "made in Italy" brand origin enabled thousands of small and medium niche businesses to command price premiums.
Jianxin Yong, one of the participating students, said, "This Venice course let me enjoy the beauty of this island and most importantly, it gave me an excellent chance to fully understand Italian style and luxury marketing management. The brilliant professors are amazing and knowledgeable. This experience is worth my whole life to remember and appreciate. In short, I would definitely recommend this course to other people."
"We also had a chance to visit some company headquarters and get a taste of how things work in reality. To some extent, the whole experience even made me rethink my perspectives on the way of doing marketing. Not only was it a very interesting learning experience but it was also a lot of fun. I would certainly love to do it again."