World University: Business Model, Issues, and Recommendations Report

This report examines the 'World University' concept, a global online education model connecting lecturers worldwide. It delves into the business model, including initiatives like the 'StudyTogether' loyalty scheme and social media promotion strategies. The report analyzes potential business issues, such as non-refundable fees and mandatory laptop purchases, along with recommendations to improve the model, including refining the loyalty program, offering flexible fee structures, and enhancing website security. The report emphasizes the importance of social media for marketing and brand awareness and concludes with suggestions for business growth and student satisfaction, focusing on the business aspects of online education.

Running head: ISSUES OF BUSINESS
Issues of Business
Name of the Student
Name of the University
Author Note

1ISSUES OF BUSINESS
Executive Summary:
The report will introduce the ‘World University’. Basically the world university is a
concept in which the private lecturers around the globe will came together. The report will
further discuss the business issues that arise with the study and some recommendations to
solve the issues. Several schemes are implemented in the business to promote the model and
the models will be discussed in the report.

2ISSUES OF BUSINESS
Table of Contents
Introduction:...............................................................................................................................3
The main idea behind the university:.........................................................................................3
Business model initiatives:.........................................................................................................4
Social media role to increase sales:............................................................................................5
Conclusion:................................................................................................................................6
Recommendation:......................................................................................................................6

3ISSUES OF BUSINESS
Introduction:
The main objective of the World University is to provide a universal education for all.
In the concept it coveys that lecturers from different institutions around the globe. The job of
the professors is they have to able to cater the students by providing online lectures for them
(Wieling & Hofman 2010). The course would have to be diverse which are to be provided to
the students. Since the university is online, the interaction between the students and the
interaction between the staffs will be online (Croxton 2014). One of the highlighting feature
of the university is to provide the students with the choice of selecting a country where they
want to graduate from. The student who is residing from USA can choose to graduate from
Australia because of the world university (Allen & Seaman 2013). Because of this university
the geographical constraints can be removed in education. The report will emphasises on the
model implementation properly. The process of the business are studied thoroughly in the
report, there may be some issues arise after implementing the decision of the senior
management and this will be further discussed in the report (Hammer 2015).
The main idea behind the university:
In the recent time online study becomes more popular than earlier. In the case of
America, in 1986, a university in California first offered a degree online and after this the
online education grows rapidly (Forbes Welcome 2018). On a survey it is reported that out of
the twenty million students in America one third portion of students are taking the inline
courses. In a research it has been said that the online study is that the online study is more
ferior than the study in classroom. With the help of the Information technology the online
study has gained a lot of potential. The feature of online study is basically the student can
learn anytime from anywhere. The student will get the opportunity to study from home in
his/her comfort zone. The main idea to build the world university online is to changing the

4ISSUES OF BUSINESS
format of the education. By this way the students concentration power will be increased. In
the traditional education system the cost is high but in the online university students can save
their time and cost. From the business point of view it will also beneficial as there is no need
to build or rent any infrastructure only they need to buy a online server that can host the
website.
Business model initiatives:
Several steps have been taken by the senior management to help the World University
in terms of business and education. The aim is to make the world university an interesting
place to study as well as to gain certain amount of revenue. The upper management also
introduced a scheme that is called “StudyTogether”. It is a loyalty scheme which is provided
to the students for their loyalty. Students will be rewarded with fee credit when they refer any
other student to take admission in the Wold University. The fee credit will depend as per the
course in which the referred students takes admission. The application approval process is
very fast as the approval came in less than 5 minutes. The management decided that the
payments will be non-refundable. As the whole system is online so the payment of fees have
to be online and the students have to pay the university fee by the PayPal or by credit card. In
the course e-book and laptops are also included. The student have to buy the e-book and the
laptop online. There is no option of opting out the student must have to buy the pre-
configured laptops with e-books. The required software for the particular course will be
provided by the management. Investments have to make by the management for the
successful implementation of the model. In the web site the management must include a
video presentation that what is the university and what are the objective of the company so
many students will attract by this and take admission and it will be helpful as the business
perspective. A model should be developed for the students that how they can refer and
promote their university. A scheme can be introduced for them that if one student can give

5ISSUES OF BUSINESS
referral to the 10 or more students than the student will get 50% or more discount on their
course fee. The successful application of the model can be effective for the university to grow
faster and to gain more revenue from the students. Customer loyalty programme is a good
option to implement. As many large organization provide rewards for their customers. A
good loyalty programme will provide the business along tern sustainability in the current
market scenario.
Social media role to increase sales:
In the recent time social media is growing rapidly and billions of people are using the
social media for various purpose. At first the social media came as a communication platform
or rather entertainment platform but the tide has changed. Now the social media is used as a
plat form of promotion business online. As the university idea is a start-up idea so it will need
a certain platform for the promoting the university and social media is the best online
platform for the promotion of the business. As the platform is broader so the chances are high
for the business to grow faster than before. Huge amount of people will be aware of the
business and many students will take admission in the university which will help the
university to affiliate more student and from the business point of view it will help the
business to earn huge amount of revenue. Additionally, in the social media the business can
promote without investing a single penny to a certain level. If the business wants that more
people will engage with the ads that are posted they have to pay a nominal amount of money
for the advertisement (Cheung & Vogel, 2013). The social media promotion and
advertisements are far better than the traditional advertisement and promotional method. The
social media can do analysis which can be helpful for the business to know which people are
really interested with their university and wants to take admission and which people are the
spammers. In the social media the business is can see the actual amount that the ads are seen
by the people and how many people open their page or the advertisement. The awareness of

6ISSUES OF BUSINESS
brand is the most important factor for the any business to grow. Social media is a powerful
tool for the brand awareness ((Hutter et al., 2013).). The proper set of audience can be
targeted using the social media the people whole are really need this kind of university they
will be targeted as per the age group or by the qualification measure. The business must
upload videos and post regularly to keep the audience updated with the surrounding of the
university ((Rennie & Morrison, 2013).). One on one communication can be done by the
social media, if a student have any query regarding the university the student can directly
message on the university page and ask the queries.
Conclusion:
From the above report it can be concluded that for an online business like the world
university to implement such business plan that can help the business to grow and to provide
the students with benefits as well. The first step toward the implementation of the model is
the loyalty program where the loyalty reward is given to the students. Secondly, the
implementation of promoting the advertisement on the social media will gain lot of revenue.
There is various benefits for the students to half their course fee, to increase their
concentration and awareness. And the most important is in the report the main focus is on the
business side of the education not on the teaching side.
Recommendation:
The issues that are generated in the model will be discussed here in the paragraph.
The first flaw is the loyalty reward will be given as soon as the student give referral. The
issue is if after the referral and the loyalty reward if the students does not takes admission.
Fee credit must give after the referred students pay the full course fee and complete the total
course. As the fees are non-refundable this can be an issue for some student if the student has
any doubt and don’t want to do the course then the fee should be refunded to the student.

7ISSUES OF BUSINESS
There may be some students who afford to buy the laptop or the student already cannot have
the laptop so it is a total waste of money to take another laptop. So there must be an opting
out option so that they can opt out of buying the laptop. Some scholarship program if
introduce so the needy students will afford to by the laptops. As the total process is based
online so proper security regarding the website is needed (Alsabawy, Cater-Steel & Soar,
2013). The data must be properly sucured as in any case the data breach cannot happen. The
data must be encrypted as the whole personal data of the student is given in the website and
that can be hacked and exposed if the data is not encrypted properly .

8ISSUES OF BUSINESS
References:
Allen, I. E., & Seaman, J. (2013). Changing course: Ten years of tracking online education
in the United States. Sloan Consortium. PO Box 1238, Newburyport, MA
01950.
Alsabawy, A. Y., Cater-Steel, A., & Soar, J. (2013). IT infrastructure services as a
requirement for e-learning system success. Computers & Education, 69, 431-
451.
Cheung, R., & Vogel, D. (2013). Predicting user acceptance of collaborative technologies:
An extension of the technology acceptance model for e-learning. Computers
& Education, 63, 160-175.
Croxton, R. A. (2014). The role of interactivity in student satisfaction and persistence in
online learning. Journal of Online Learning and Teaching, 10(2), 314.
Forbes Welcome. (2018). Retrieved from
https://www.forbes.com/sites/tomlindsay/2014/10/08/the-top-eight-things-
you-need-to-know-about-online-education/#d21a62a6fd47
Hammer, M. (2015). What is business process management?. In Handbook on Business
Process Management 1 (pp. 3-16). Springer, Berlin, Heidelberg.
Holzweiss, Peggy C., et al. "Online graduate students’ perceptions of best learning
experiences." Distance education35.3 (2014): 311-323.
Hutter, K., Hautz, J., Dennhardt, S., & Füller, J. (2013). The impact of user interactions in
social media on brand awareness and purchase intention: the case of MINI on
Facebook. Journal of Product & Brand Management, 22(5/6), 342-351.

9ISSUES OF BUSINESS
Lee, Y. H., Hsieh, Y. C., & Chen, Y. H. (2013). An investigation of employees' use of e-
learning systems: applying the technology acceptance model. Behaviour &
Information Technology, 32(2), 173-189.
Rennie, F., & Morrison, T. (2013). E-learning and social networking handbook: Resources
for higher education. Routledge.
Wieling, M. B., & Hofman, W. H. A. (2010). The impact of online video lecture recordings
and automated feedback on student performance. Computers &
Education, 54(4), 992-998.