MARKETING STRATEGY ON MAINTAINING THE INTEREST OF PROSPECTIVE STUDENTS IN HIGHER EDUCATION DUE TO THE PANDEMIC OF COVID-19 : THE CASE OF PRESIDENT UNIVERSITY

Abstract

Indonesia is facing the COVID-19 pandemic which has become one of the worldwide pandemics that influences every security aspect of the nations, one of them is the economy. The pandemic is influencing business in the world, one of it is the higher education business in Indonesia. President University could not fully conduct itself in terms of their academic ornon-academic activities, nor the marketing activities in order to gain more students. It is alsoinfluencing the decreasing income in the business. Thus, it is important to find the suitable strategy for President University in order to maintain their position and competition among other universities in the market. This thesis is going to analyze the strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threats of President University to find out the best marketing strategy. The analysis is going to be conducted by using the PESTEL analysis, Porter’s Five Forces, SWOT, VRIO, Product and Operations, Research and Development, Marketing Mix, IFE, EFE, SPACE Matrix, Grand Strategy Matrix and QSPM Matrix. This thesis is also going to be explaining about the competitive advantages of President University as well the implementation of the analysis above. Whether President University is going to strengthen their internal assessment, their digital marketing through social media and websites, or findingthe way to attract their prospective students online or offline during the COVID-19 era. Whichis also kind of “tricky” because the market of President University is the Generation Z that has the evolving characteristics in which it is always moving forward as the world is also changing due to globalization.