EVALUATING THE OPERATION OF AIESEC IN HANOI – OUTGOING GLOBAL VOLUNTEER PROGRAM AIESEC is the leading association that contributes to spread cultural exchange widely to society with an open view. There is substantial space to develop in this are with large amount of demand for it. Thus, an optimized sales cycle is a crucial requirement to convert effectively this immense inflow of interested people. The aims of this study is to have a deeper understanding about current status of sales cycle in one of biggest branches of AIESEC in Vietnam and figure out some bottleneck that can be foster sales performance of cultural exchange product in general and Global Volunteer program of AIESEC in Hanoi in particular. The research has shown that a sales funnel always need to be widen to convert as much as possible the leads and it run as the sets of stage frames. One of biggest obstacle that keep ineffective funnel is negative disqualifying process throughout the customer journey. Additionally, the length of all process is also not in the good condition and supposed to be cut down in many ways. In the other side, keeping member’s working attitude with high commitment with the goal and suitable task allocation is also important to finish the really long marathon in one sales term. This is expected to leave an humble foundation for the next researchers who would like to discuss more about this topic. Key word: Sales, sales cycle, AIESEC, Global Volunteer, Hanoi
BANKING ACADEMY FACULTY OF FOREIGN LANGUAGES GRADUATION THESIS EVALUATING THE OPERATION OF AIESEC IN HANOI – OUTGOING GLOBAL VOLUNTEER PROGRAM Ha Noi, May 2019 ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS First and foremost, I would like to send the deepest thank to my conscientious supervisor, Ms Tran Thi Thu Thuy for her stimulating suggestions and considerable encouragement Her devoted consultancy definitely assisted me during the implementation progress of my research despite my humble work and the lack of knowledge and professional working experiences Furthermore, I hope to send my best regards to the lecturers and students of Faculty of Foreign Language – Banking Academy of Vietnam for their cooperation More specifically, I would like to acknowledge with much appreciation the other researchers in this semester We, together, have devotedly supported each other to get over the most challenging time Especially, I also sincerely appreciates the support my classmate Do Minh Phuong for her profound recommendations and encouragement in the completion of my research Last but not least, I own more than a thank to my beloveds family members – my father, mother and younger brother for their endless motivation throughout my life They all support me and this thesis would not been possible without them DECLARATION This thesis is a presentation of my original research work Wherever contributions of others are involved, every effort is made to indicate this clearly, with due reference to the literature, and acknowledgement of collaborative research and discussions The work was done under the guidance of Ms Tran Thi Thu Thuy , Faculty of Foreign Language, Banking Academy of Vietnam, Hanoi TABLE OF CONTENTS DECLARATION TABLE OF CONTENTS LIST OF FIGURES LIST OF TABLES LIST OF ABBREVIATIONS ABSTRACT CHAPTER I – INTRODUCTION 1.1 Rationale 1.2 Background of the study 1.3 Objectives of the study 1.4 Significance of the study 1.5 Scope and delimitation 1.6 Definition of terms CHAPTER II - LITERATURE REVIEW 2.1 Overview of AIESEC in Hanoi 2.1.1 AIESEC 2.1.2 AIESEC in Vietnam 2.1.3 AIESEC in Hanoi 2.1.4 Why – How – What 2.1.5 Organizing structure 2.1.6 AIESEC’s products 2.1.7 AIESEC’s Operating structure 2.1.8 AIESEC’s Marketing-sales funnel 2.2 The importance of sales cycle in an organization 2.3 An traditional sales cycle 2.4 Important metrics to evaluate a sales cycle 2.4.1 Sales growth 2.4.2 Sales target 2.4.3 Customer Acquisition Cost 2.4.4 New leads 2.4.5 Sales conversion rate 2.4.6 Average sales cycle length 2.4.7 Sales volume by area 2.5 Related studies CHAPTER III – RESEARCH METHODOLOGY 3.1 Locale of the study 3.2 Research methods and instrument 3.2.1 Sales performance records 3.2.2 Analytical methods 3.3 Data Gathering procedures 3.4 Statistical treatment Chapter IV – FINDINGS AND DISSCUSSION 4.1 Results 4.1.1 Sales results by number of people approved of AIESEC in Hanoi from 2016 to 2018 4.1.2 Sales conversion rate 4.1.3 Proportion of marketing channels in creating new leads 4.1.4 Sales cycle length 4.1.5 Disqualification process 4.2 Discussion 4.2.1 Sales growth of AIESEC in Hanoi from 2016 to 2018 4.2.2 Sales conversion rate 4.2.3 Marketing channels 4.2.4 Sales cycle length 4.2.5 Disqualification process CHAPTER V – CONCLUSION AND RECCOMENDATION 5.1 Conclusion 5.2 Recommendation 5.2.1 Optimize Marketing-Sales funnel to decrease process time effectively 5.2.2 Establish leads tracker system 5.2.3 Implement virtual consultancy meeting 5.3 Limitation and Suggestion for further research 5.3.1 Limitation 5.3.2 Suggestion for further research REFERENCES APPENDICES Appendix 1: Performance analytics of AIESEC Appendix 2: Process time analytics of AIESEC Appendix 3: Customer database of AIESEC in Vietnam LIST OF FIGURES LIST OF TABLES LIST OF ABBREVIATIONS AIESEC: Association Internationale des Étudiants en Sciences Économiques et Commerciales KPI: Key Performance Indicator MoS: Measure of Success SEO: Search Engine Optimization SOP: Standard Operating Procedure Ads: Advertising KOL: Key Opinion Leader NGO: Non-governmental Organization MQL: Marketing qualified leads SQL: Sales-qualified leads ABSTRACT AIESEC is the leading association that contributes to spread cultural exchange widely to society with an open view There is substantial space to develop in this are with large amount of demand for it Thus, an optimized sales cycle is a crucial requirement to convert effectively this immense inflow of interested people The aims of this study is to have a deeper understanding about current status of sales cycle in one of biggest branches of AIESEC in Vietnam and figure out some bottleneck that can be foster sales performance of cultural exchange product in general and Global Volunteer program of AIESEC in Hanoi in particular The research has shown that a sales funnel always need to be widen to convert as much as possible the leads and it run as the sets of stage frames One of biggest obstacle that keep ineffective funnel is negative disqualifying process throughout the customer journey Additionally, the length of all process is also not in the good condition and supposed to be cut down in many ways In the other side, keeping member’s working attitude with high commitment with the goal and suitable task allocation is also important to finish the really long marathon in one sales term This is expected to leave an humble foundation for the next researchers who would like to discuss more about this topic Key word: Sales, sales cycle, AIESEC, Global Volunteer, Hanoi CHAPTER I – INTRODUCTION 1.1 Rationale Cultural exchange program is a new product which being paid more and more attention these recent years However, leading unit provides this opportunity in Vietnam which is AIESEC as a NGO are facing many obstacles in this incessantly changing era Research on how this association brings their product to customer and identifying the most effective way to utilize the resource and maximize the return of investment might bring benefits to not only AIESEC but also the young people who can experience this kind of positiveimpacted product By having a membership time for years here during bachelor studies, researcher have thus a deep knowledge about how its functions as well as a strong connection to it As for a year having been leading the department responsible for product development in one of the biggest local committee in Vietnam, researcher was behind some sales strategies that is implemented there and gained some personal experiences in the field of sales in NGO There is a fact that the same old process has not been change too much for several years and the runner are doing things based on experience in the past more than solution toward the future and it is alarming in this global integration era It affects the final outcome of the sales result when the number of interested people in product is increasing day by day It require for an innovation in sales cycle which is optimized to convert to the number of signing up as much as possible Moreover, the researcher have joined one of the project that organized by AIESEC abroad so for these above experiences, the research is expected to bring a more sufficient perspective from both stakeholders sides, customer and provider, that would be “outside-of-the-box” That all above reason lead to that the topic: “Evaluating the Operation of AIESEC in Hanoi – Outgoing Global Volunteer Program” has been chosen in this study 1.2 Background of the study Cultural, economic and societal change creates a need for different approaches to education Globalization, which is increasing international interdependence, and the creation of new knowledge, and the obsolescence of older knowledge, means that teachers and students alike must be open to change and new opportunities (Aleksandra Vujko, 2017) Cross-cultural experiences have been raised as a solution for students to earn much more practical experiences in challenging environment with deeper understanding about others culture People more and more understand about why English is significantly essential for nowadays As the result they all start asking what the most effective way to learning English is The immersion technique in cultural exchanges quickly becomes a common and favorite one Moreover, a foreign environment including mass of challenging experiences will enhance student’s communication and problem-solving skill “The ability to work with people from other cultures is becoming increasingly necessary in our global work environment Even if someone never travel abroad, it’s important to be ready to mix with other cultures as each year the number of immigrants is increasing”( Deborah Mackin, 2006) Another innovation about self-confidence and awareness also are realized clearly from returned exchange participants Language border have created many misunderstanding which lead to mostly conflicts and war in the past In today context, peace is not just about absolutely avoiding military war Peace emphasizes the harmony between religious, cultural, racing filed in difference humanity The world is expected to eliminate every dispute, conflict about the differences views of each other 1.3 Objectives of the study Research objectives: The research is aimed to clarify some issues as follows: Firstly, assessing the operation’s effectiveness of AIESEC in Hanoi through the following metrics in the period of 2016-2018 10 Figure 4.7 Proportion of the stages that customer quit the program (Source: created by author using internal data of AIESEC in Vietnam) It can be seen that the disqualifying process happened the most at the first two stages which is after being called and after being attending the consultancy meeting The proportion of these two stages rose from 55% in 2016 to 65% in 2017 and reached the highest number of 76% in 2018 4.2 Discussion 4.2.1 Sales growth of AIESEC in Hanoi from 2016 to 2018 As seen in the figure 4.1, the number of exchange of AIESEC in Vietnam followed a stable growth over the last years and hitting the highest in 2018 reach nearly 800 approvals which has shown that the popularity and reputation of the program and the brand as well also rise significantly among Vietnamese young people Comparing the two point of the period, AIESEC in Vietnam has been double-growth in two years from 353 exchanges to 793 exchanges that is really a dreaming number for every business Once again, the number from figure 4.2 emphasizes the common trend of product development in Vietnam, more and more people know about AIESEC’s product with 46 higher trust and reliability AIESEC in Hanoi have increased impressively with 75% from 2016 to 2017, which improved the brand popularity in the market especially in the area of Hanoi They see AIESEC more inside school for improving University Relation with some key performer including Banking Academy, Hanoi University and University of Languages and International Studies (ULIS) This growing was sustained when moving to 2018, the relative growth was not as high as the period of 2016-2017 but it was still a good number of 37% of growth 4.2.2 Sales conversion rate This is the success of marketing team when making Global Volunteer accessible to much more student in Hanoi area Gradually, AIESEC brand has gained more and more reputation among young people in terms of providing exchange opportunity proved by many exchange participant return from different countries As the result, more and more people start discussing about AIESEC activities on social media and other platforms as well By showcasing the real experience of returnee, AIESEC shape awareness of people about the picture when going volunteering and it is successfully attractive However, as the result of building this kind of fluffy content on publicity, almost every people register on the website is just info-seeker which makes conversion rate decreased drastically These people need more time to nurture and inspire before being called to action to send their application The pool of leads attracted at the moment may only get matched after months, months or even year The living standard is more and more raised along the time, so student nowadays spend more time for looking opportunity for self-development not only just focusing study time at school Therefore, AIESEC’s opportunities are the attractive ones for them The process hasn’t been optimized enough to adapt with the large increasing of interested customer They cannot apply the same SOP with the same number of members to achieve a higher goal There are three improving ways, enhance the quality or the quantity, or combine both of them Quantity express at the number of member recruited each period Quality is about member’s productivity and it is what AIESEC in Hanoi are trying to 47 achieve This is a sustainable direction to drive an organization even in the next few years Average number of exchange one member can deliver is raised from at 2016 to at 2018 To make it rising higher, the process need to be more simple For example, the consultancy phase could be virtually or more than one person at a time Moreover, applying more technology development into providing information also a developing trend that will occurs in the future In 2018, the number of dropping people out of the funnel is over 850 leads, comparing to 280 leads of 2016, which means the effectiveness of the funnel has decreasing a lot To be concluded, it cannot be considered AIESEC in Hanoi was growing because the conversion rate that indicated the effectiveness of sales cycle was decreasing There are abundant factors existing in the sales cycle of AIESEC in Hanoi which can be understood more in the next sections 4.2.3 Marketing channels AIESEC in Hanoi did such an amazing work in marketing strategy by moving from offline attraction to online attraction when increase the number of new lead significantly The remarkable increase of new leads is mostly due to online promotion, it take 70% equal to 700 leads out of total number in 2018 Gradually, due to the popularity of Facebook over the time, the number of it has increase incredibly People now prefer receiving information through online approach Along with the achievement of new leads increasing, this explosion of the inflow of the sales funnel also affected the effectiveness of the sales cycle With a huge amount of new interested people need to be served, the process could not adapt quickly to maintain the ratio through each stage of the funnel The number of approvals increased 59% from 31 people in 2016 to 76 people in 2018 While, the number of dropping people increased 78% from 180 people in 2016 to 850 people in 2018 The rising number of failed deals is much larger than that of closed deals It affects a lot the sustainable growth of AIESEC in Hanoi in the next years 48 With the shown data of conversion rate above, it pointed out that the qualification of leads attracted from online promotion is not sufficient to be converted right away like the one from offline promotion AIESEC in Hanoi has found out an effective online way to marketing but it need to be balanced with offline to ensure the sustainable growth for next generations 4.2.4 Sales cycle length To handle nearly double number of exchange participants in the same period of time, the process time need to be reduced to ensure the quality of service as well as the capacity of the member And it reached to the number of 96 approvals with the saving of days in process time and got efficiency This is showing the average number of process time which means the range of process time can be days or even reach to 30 days to get one approval When one exchange participant gets done all the resource can turn to another one and ensure the quality This is the only ways to raise the productivity of one member for delivering exchange in anytime Lengthening the sales process time bring more risks to the potential of the leads as well as the efficiency of converting framework The most effectual comparison of performance is to compare to others entity running the same product Top four highest numbers of approvals always keep the best condition in process time HCMC with the highest number of approval has maintained well the initial short process time through years and low it down to days of process in 2018 FTU HCMC is not the best performer at the beginning but they have changed remarkably when the problem of time has been solved from 14 days to half of it, 6.9 days Then, the result rise doubly from 70 to 143 Similar case is not apply for AIESEC in Hanoi, it always keep the position of longest process time in comparison in top in the same scale with Hanoi Its sales result has not remarkably increased with long process time To be concluded, it is the good signal of process time when reducing along the way, but when comparing to other local chapters running the same product with the same scale 49 AIESEC in Hanoi is behind the schedule when others entities have a much shorter process time 4.2.5 Disqualification process From the figure can be seen that the first two stages of being called and attending are the top of the funnel, these are the stage that salesperson had the most touch point with the customer However, from the graph, it has shown that the number of people dropping out of these two stages increased significantly from 122 people in 2016 to 727 people in 2018 That really affected the final result of the sales funnel because that the outflow of these stages are the inflow of the next stages It can be explained that with the large number of new interested people, one salesperson had to take care and deliver to many customers at the same time Thus, they could easily give up on one lead who’s still hesitating to move on to the next stage and turn focus into the new potential one That eventually kicked someone out of the funnel when they had not received enough effort from the salesperson 50 CHAPTER V – CONCLUSION AND RECCOMENDATION 5.1 Conclusion Cultural exchange has been widespread product in recent years that really benefits to young people as well as the local society AIESEC has been brought out as the reliable opportunity provider for young people to develop themselves and make positive impact on society which is proved by the number of people choosing Global Volunteer increasing year by year However, the decreasing of conversion rate has pointed out that the sales cycle is not effective enough to bring opportunities with this large of enrolled people With the large amount of people interested in the product, AIESEC in Hanoi need a more optimized sales cycle to save the resource as well as maximize the return of investment As the research has demonstrated, AIESEC in Hanoi is doing a good job in branding and spreading out the reliability of its product with potential markets with really high increasing number of new people enrolled each year Besides, in the current state, sales cycle length has been kept for quite long which can raise the risk of a leads will change their mind not to go to the close stage as well as increase the total work load a salesman need to take Lastly, marketing-sales funnel hasn’t been utilized due to ineffective disqualification process which did drop some potential leads out of their customer flow before being put effort into This research clearly illustrates the current state of sales cycle of AIESEC in Hanoi and point out with the specific fields need to be focused on However it also raises the question of what is the causes and factor leading to this current situation That is the suggested direction for further research in the future Further research need to determine the relationship between what is going well and the achievement to maximize current strength which prevents the case of being obsessed into the shortages 5.2 Recommendation 5.2.1 Optimize Marketing-Sales funnel to decrease process time effectively 51 This change is aiming to expand the objective of marketing part of the funnel not only to attract the leads but also to qualify the leads Since, the objective of telesales and consultancy meeting is just for application support and contracting submission and save the time A lead signing up an account on national website or leave a message at fan page will go through some specific info-providing support Firstly, they will be lead to an automation system and be a recipient in an information flow That is a flow of built email contents that a person should know about the product They will receive one by one through provided email address And these people will be recorded by the link clicks, favorite type of contents, and then when they move to the final click of I-want-to-join button, they will be change the status and move for sales team to contact Secondly, there is an automation answering system applied on the national website of AIESEC This is designed to equip all the frequent asked questions and answer that can be responded immediately the leads 24/24 Moreover, on the working hours, there will be an extra job description for fan page administrator with deep understanding about product and be responsible for replying all the request of Facebook user This work prefer to be in charge by a person who have sales experience before After experiencing both of above support from marketing team, the leads have been equipped enough the needed information about Global Volunteer Once they decide to have a consultancy meeting with salesperson, this is only for confirming objective and next step instruction The leads don’t need to be provided general knowledge like before The length of the meeting can be cut down and it saves time Moreover, salesperson doesn’t need to spend time for unqualified leads before filtering stage has been done before 5.2.2 Establish leads tracker system This tool is designed to serve the demand of nurturing phase to utilize the most of the pool of leads that go to the funnel As it can be seen before, the leads need time to make 52 an important decision so they need to be nurture and support to move to the bottom of the funnel, not to be ignored and moved focus for another more potential one Since, the objective of this system is to record every single step that the leads take in their customer journey Then we can evaluate their level of interest and qualification to specialize the certain action that they need to be provided at that time For example, there a girl who already joined product’s Facebook group, attended offline event of AIESEC, shared some product’s post on social media So this person has many touches with AIESEC and equipped quite much information about Global Volunteer What she needs right now is a call-to-action to make up her mind, so sales team will contact her and set up an consultancy meeting to encourage more and help her making decision One more example, if that girl has just joined only one event of Global Volunteer then there’s no question or response from then She needs to be inspired more by returnee’s stories, product’s benefits or KOL promotion So, her needed provision is to be sent some inspiring video clip of returnee or info graphics or leaflet that include Global Volunteer’s benefit She also should be invited to more event or touches with AIESECer and also product This is expected to raise the efficiency of disqualification process There is no one would be left behind with ignorance from sales team side Everyone should be provided a certain support that fit their demand 5.2.3 Implement virtual consultancy meeting This solution expects can solve partly the problem of overwork for salesperson at the later part of the term By implementing it, the sales process and other source of finance can also be reduced The principle is just simple as that the salesperson can conduct the consultancy meeting online one by one They don’t need to spend time for setting up an appointment, going to a venue Moreover, they find it hard to find a common schedule and venue for more than one leads can meet each other at one appointment By 53 conducting it online, it is much easier to set it out for two or three people at one time and save the time Because if these two above solutions can be ensured being implemented, the quality of the leads coming to this stage may be bettered and they required less effort of sales team to convert Thus, it makes sense when implement virtual consultancy meeting If the sales team can solve the number of leads gradually and divide equally to different periods of the term, it can save the effort of human paid out Moreover, it can prevent the situation of too much pending case at the later part of the term which helps to maintain the attitude of salesman towards it 5.3 Limitation and Suggestion for further research 5.3.1 Limitation Due to the limitation of time and competency, the research just focus on evaluating the cycle based on the internal efforts which is under control of sales team Besides, there are external metrics to assess the whole sales cycle of AIESEC in Hanoi such as moving on from customer’s side In additionally, all the data used here are secondary data collected from internal source of AIESEC which is quite analytical data, not practical as the primary data from interview or survey with salesperson and customer This is limit the point of view to evaluate the issue which has been raised 5.3.2 Suggestion for further research To prevent the same weakness as the research, some suggestion has been made as follows First, the approaching way to the issue should be from both salesperson’s side and customer’s side to gain a more objective perspective Secondly, other sources of information should be used such as surveys or interviews to have a wide and accurate range of evidence This help the research become more persuasive 54 Lastly, time management is really another key to have a complete research Trying to plan and 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