Congratulations to the MBA presenters at the MATR gathering

Congratulation to the MBA teams who presented their "class projects" to the MATR on Friday. The depth of your research, technology and business intelligence was very evident throughout your projects.

You exhibited the presentation skills that will enable you to compete with other entrepreneurs attempting to earn business or attract funding. The group especially appreciated the innovation that you’re bringing to the Montana economy. I hope that the networking that followed your presentations will be helpful in your endeavors.

Please feel free to ask us for additional assistance from the members of the Roundtables who may be able to help you in the future.

All the best,
Russ

Here are the teams that presented their models:

Acquire Marketing: http://www.acquiremarketing.com

The goal of the project for this course was to provide an overview of a marketing plan for a new Missoula-based business that will offer search engine positioning services. In addition to reviewing other firms that provide these services nationally (including the services they offer and their pricing), this plan focuses on Acquire Marketing’s differential advantage, the approach it will take to serving clients, its marketing message (based on past search engine positioning successes done on a contract basis for local Websites), and pricing/service offerings.

Student Team: Tony Ferrini and Peggy Nisbett

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Child Care Resources: http://www.childcareresources.org/

Child Care Resources is developing on-line training for rural child care providers. Child care providers in most states are required to complete an average of 10 hours of annual training. In-home child care providers are self-employed, work an average of 60 hours per week and have limited access to traditional training opportunities. For the project for this course, I explored issues associated with developing on-line training (to deliver roughly 20 different training modules). Each module will include self-grading exams, a forum and chat room. Child Care Resources will develop the curriculum for each module, do the web development, host it and provide technical assistance. Our plan is to first market the training in Montana, then in neighboring states with a high annual training requirement (Utah and Wyoming), and then nationally to the 300,000 registered/licensed in-home child care providers in the United States.

Student: Jodie Rasmussen

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Nifty Tricks http://www.niftytricks.com

The main goal of my project was to analyze whether or not the current revenue model for this extreme sports website (online advertising) is still the best option for creating revenue for this online business. Also the project aided in the process of finding alternative business models, to which we could apply the strengths and capabilities of Nifty Tricks Media (close ties to extreme sports world, photo and video footage, and the knowledge of outstanding athletes).

Upon completing the project we decided that Online Advertising is still a viable option for creating revenue, yet it can’t be the only option. Alternatives like supplying wireless content, incorporating CD technology and the outsourcing of e-commerce resulted from the work done on the project. An analysis of each option, as well as ideas on how to implement them is included in the project.

Student: Mario Schulzke