Marketing Management in the Digital Era: A Study at State Vocational High School 1 and 2 Tamiang Layang

Abstract

Digital Era and globalism need massive transformation when educational change and competition become complex. Educational institutions, such as Vocational High School, need to respond to the changes in the digital era to renew the learning and teaching process. Furthermore, the educational concept help students to acquire life, soft, and hard skills and develop critical thinking, creativity, and open-mindedness. Educational and business competition in the global market allow schools to maintain effective strategic marketing and influence parents and students as prospective customers. Therefore, this study aimed to analyze digital marketing as the answer to these issues using various approaches. For instance, observation helped understand and describe planning, organizing, actuating, and controlling Vocational High Schools in the digital era. Qualitative approaches were used to systematically describe speech, writing, behavior, and facts of the objects. The data were collected through interviews, observation, documentation, and interactive analysis from Miles and Huberman. This involved data collection, reduction, display, conclusion, and single and multi-site analysis verification. Moreover, data validity was examined based on credibility, dependability, and confirmability techniques. The results showed that marketing is planned through goal formulation, target setting, competitor analysis, inhabiting and supporting factors, as well as financial plan and strategy. Organizing began by making a marketing team, a legal decision letter, job descriptions, and resources. The marketing action is actuated from the product, price, promotion, place, and strategy. Furthermore, controlling includes performance monitoring, financial auditing, and achievement measurement. Controlling is also performed yearly based on the successful and failed strategy that needs fixing, the school benefit, and the customers. It is difficult to implement conventional marketing strategies such as socialization, spreading brochures, and arranging school events because of the Covid-19 pandemic. Therefore, marketing through social media, such as Facebook, Instagram, WhatsApp, and Websites is a superior strategy because it is quick, effective, and efficient.