IMC Award 2014 Winners' Case-study: How TAPMI increased its applications in a slowdown

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MBAUniverse.com News Desk |
August 16, 2014
On August 9, the winners of prestigious IMC Awards 2014 were announced and presented by former Union Minister of Commerce Dr Subramanian Swamy and Mr Sunil Kant Munjal, Jt. MD of Hero MotoCorp at the 5th Indian Management Conclave (IMC).
The annual IMC Awards, an integral part of IMC Conference, recognizes the Innovations & Best-practices in Curriculum, Pedagogy, Industry-engagement & Marketing in Indian Management Education

TAPMI Manipal won the IMC Silver Award 2014 for its initiative titled ‘Experience TAPMI’. The initiative highlighted how TAPMI has managed to grow applications to its PGDM program for Admissions 2014, when most other B-schools were struggling to meet even their last year’s numbers.    

MBAUniverse.com presents the highlights from ‘Experience TAPMI’ Initiative. This detailed Case-study, along with all IMC Award Winners & Finalists, will be published as a book by global publishing company McGraw Hill in September.

Excerpts from TAPMI Case-study:

"Experience TAPMI"

By Prof. Chowdari Prasad,
Dean, Public Relations & Chairman-Admissions, T A Pai Management Institute (TAPMI), Manipal

Management Education in India is passing through consolidation stage. TAPMI being a three decade old B-School located in a remote area has been experiencing ups and downs in the intake of quality students in all its programs. Being a Globally Accredited and highly graded/ ranked B-School in the country, TAPMI has been adopting innovative methods in its input- process- output stages while withstanding the increasing competition from public and private B-Schools. TAPMI was the first non-IIM to use the CAT scores and scientific GDPI process in its Admissions. Over a period, other popular entrance tests like XAT, GMAT and MAT were also added to the process. Its Admissions policy is designed by a high level committee consisting of Director and Deans. Looking at the current market scenario and the profile of the aspirants for MBA, TAPMI entered into MoUs with various partners for executing its Admission process. Digital and Social Marketing are the current buzz words rightly adopted by TAPMI to reach out to candidates PAN India and attract best of the application pool. In the process, the outcomes have been phenomenal in attracting students for the existing 2 programs and introducing a third- PGDM- Banking and Financial Services.
Introduction to the Initiative:
Keeping in view the national scenario, TAPMI formulates its Admissions, Curriculum and Pedagogy and Placements criteria. Sometimes, instead of Out of the box thinking, a simple logical approach helps in cost effective solutions. A ‘step by step’ approach was followed by TAPMI for this year’s admissions for conducting GD-PIs at 9 centers during March- April 2014 for its 3 programs, viz: PGDM, PGDM-HC (Healthcare) and PGDM-BKFS (Banking & Financial Services). 

 

IMAGE 3: Step by Step approach/ Process to Admissions 2014

 

How was this initiative executed?

 

 

TAPMI conducted a survey during the admissions GDPIs in March/April 2013. A summary of these findings was useful in formulating the policy for the current year. The next step was to seek inputs from the existing students. The current batch of students, shared their experiences in selection process of other leading B-Schools. These inputs were a rich source of information on what is expected of the student community. An informative email was sent internally to existing students to elicit their suggestions.

Simultaneously, TAPMI website under Admission page was updated with all the relevant information like Application Procedure, Eligibility, Fee Details, Information on availability of Handbook, AICTE Approvals, Campus facilities, information on Manipal/Udupi, Contact Information, Educational loans and FAQs as also Refund Policy (AICTE).

This was followed by an advertisement in newspapers and business magazines, informing the aspirants as to what TAPMI is looking for Admissions (eligibility, exams accepted, start date of applications, Payment modes, last date of applications along with contact details and website).  This was also publicized using the digital/ social media to reach maximum aspirants and create a viral effect. TAPMI has, this year, reduced the expenditure on Print Media and moved towards Internet Media like Facebook, Pagalguy, etc., as also usage of YouTube extensively. TAPMI is listed in more than 30 popular MBA related websites like MBAUniverse.com, Careers360, Shiksha.com, premba.in, etc.

In order to facilitate the applicant and for a wider reach, TAPMI used both online and physical forms for its sale of Admissions applications pan India, done through Axis Bank and 2 coaching centers- TIME & IMS learning, besides Over The Counter sales at its Manipal and Bangalore offices. The online campaign partners were MBAUniverse.com, Careers360.com, Shiksha.com etc.

Besides, various online activities were initiated for the tech savvy students. They were

•Direct E-Mails

• Auto Reply emails

•Reminder Emails

• Visual Banners

• Thread in Pagalguy page

• Facebook Contest

• E-Mailers from different partners at regular intervals

• Web Activity Trackers

• Sponsored Handle with logo

• Admission Notification

• Online chat

• Social Media Integration of Content

• Articles on the events at TAPMI

• Ads in Emailers

• Counseling Thread

However, the submission of application was a fully online process. TAPMI moved from receiving physical applications to complete online process to cope with present technology where even laptops are being replaced with touch based palm sized devices. This move was user-friendly to both the Admission Team as well as the tech-savvy students, besides being environment friendly. An aspirant could log in from anywhere to key in his information for filling up the data which involved 5 simple steps. He could log back to fill in the application from where he had left.  On completion, an auto generated PDF document of the application is sent to the candidates to his registered e-mail id. These services were rendered by M/s. Thotmatrix enabling us to monitor the receipt of applications on real time basis with break up data for each of the 9 centers as also for each of the 3 programs.

Besides, an Auto reply facility was also created for students writing to Admissions Office seeking Clarifications. A set of 31 FAQs were also updated in the website for quick reference of the candidates. These drastically reduced the number of calls received in Admission Office as most questions were answered. This year TAPMI had partnered with 6 online portals as against 3 the previous year, besides using social media like Facebook, Pagalguy, blogs etc.

TAPMI website was very dynamic and was updated with all the necessary information for candidates. The Admission Page had information on

• Overview of Admissions

• Procedure for Applying

• Eligibility

•Fee Details

• Handbook- Online Application

•Campus Facilities

• Scholar Loan Scheme

• Information to Admitted Students

-Affidavits

- Medical Certificates

- Checklist

• Online Assessment- FLIP

•AICTE Refund Policy

• FAQs

• Information on Manipal/ Udupi

TAPMI website is very transparent and is exhaustive with Information. The Website as a whole has all the information on all the activities of the Institute that will answer any queries of the students and any visitor.

• 4 Years B-School Ranking Reports

• 6 years Placement Data (audited by IPRS)

• 17 TAPMI Silver Jubilee Leadership Lectures

• 28 Annual Convocation Speakers

• 31 TAPMI Founders day lecture speakers

• Alumni Data from 1984 to 2014

• Alumni in Top Leadership Positions

• Student Activities – Brandscan, Atharva, Disha etc

•Institute/ Faculty Achievements- Awards

• Corporate Speakers who addressed students

E-Mailers were sent to all the applicants/ aspirants from time to time by all our online campaign partners. Printed posters were sent to all leading engineering/ degree colleges for display on their notice boards.

Having regard to the past experience the Admission committee reviewed the formats for conducting of GDPI, weightages for each of the components like Academic performance (10th, 12th & degree level), Percentile scores of the entrance exams (CAT, XAT, GMAT & MAT), performance at the GD level, Written Ability Test (WAT) and Personal Interview (PI).

Due weightage was also given to both educational qualification and employment experience. Topics of Contemporary interest like socio-political- economic were given for GroupDiscussion/ Written Ability Test. In order to attract the best of the talents, Top performers at each of the centers were offered admissions and asked to pay a token amount of fee within a week’s time. Thereafter merit candidates were offered admissions. All communications were sent through electronic mails. All the payments were received online. Both the categories of selected candidates were given two more weeks’ time to pay the first installment fee.

Results Achieved:

• In view of all the above efforts and means of communication, the following results were achieved:

• Increased the number of applications registered from the previous year (6800 to 7667)

• Drastic reduction in the calls and emails from the previous year

• More Streamlined Admission Process

• Working professionals provided with enough time to attend GDPI as also in deciding to join the program

• Students from 25 states represent the batch

• Admitting students with high percentiles (CAT-97.58, XAT- 99.38 and GMAT- 720)

• 30 % of Fresher’s admitted

•Good Mix of Students in terms of number of States, Technical/ Non-Technical background

- ( 83 % Engineers & 17 % from other streams)

• A healthy gender mix of Male-Female

- (67 % male & 33 % female)

Overall, it was a fulfilling and challenging task for the Team Admissions at TAPMI in

• Strengthening the flagship PGDM program

• Maintaining PGDM – Healthcare Management

• Introducing a Sectoral program in Banking & Financial Services

 

About IMC Awards 2014

 

The annual IMC Awards, an integral part of IMC Conference, recognizes the Innovations & Best-practices in Curriculum, Pedagogy, Industry-engagement & Marketing in Indian Management Education. More than 50 B-schools including IIMs, XLRI, IIFT, SIBM and Great Lakes, participated in the 2014 nomination process. The IMC Award were judged by three highly respected MBA educators -- Dr Bakul Dholakia, Former Director, IIM Ahmedabad; Dr Rajan Saxena, Vice Chancellor, NMIMS University and Dr Rishikesha Krishnan, Director, IIM Indore. 

Global publisher McGraw Hill is publishing ‘IMC 2014 Conference Proceedings’, a hard-copy 200 page book that will document and highlight learnings from each of the IMC Award Winners. With the help of this publication, hundreds of B-schools will be also be learn and adopt these Best-practices.

Related Links

 

IMC 2014: Vision 2025 offers answers to challenges facing Indian MBA

IMC'14 at IIC New Delhi to be held on Aug 8 & 9; 40 speakers from 10 countries to address

IIMA Director Dr Ashish Nanda to address Indian Management Conclave 2014

 

Mr Sunil Kant Munjal, Jt. Managing Director, Hero MotoCorp to address Indian Management Conclave 2014

Stay tuned to MBAUniverse.com for more updates on Management Education trends.