Marketing students from City University of Hong Kong (CityU) were honoured at an awards presentation ceremony today (11 January) for the quality of the marketing consultancy projects that they conducted for local and multinational corporations.

The corporations - Bank of Communications Co., Ltd. Hong Kong Branch; CASH Group; The Diary Farm Group; HYFCO Travel Agency Limited; Octopus Rewards Limited; Wellcome Supermarket; Wilson Communications Ltd; and Wyeth (H.K.) Limited - praised the students for their success at identifying needs, providing professional marketing research and devising creative proposals to help boost businesses.

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The students' creativity and presentation skills also received special mention, and CityU was commended for the excellence of its training in marketing.

The corporations were commenting on the achievements of 108 final-year students from CityU's Department of Marketing who provided them with marketing research and consultancy services from September to December 2006. Working in 17 teams, the students looked at how to increase customer loyalty, explore new markets and new customer groups, build brands, raise sales and enhance promotional effectiveness.

Six of these 17 teams emerged as winners of the "Student Marketing Consultancy Projects Awards", which were awarded by the corporations to recognize the best marketing research and proposals developed by the students.

In his welcoming address at the ceremony, Professor David Tong Shuk-yin, Deputy President of CityU, said the University encouraged students to practice what they learned in real-life situations, adding that the "Student Marketing Consultancy Projects" provided a great opportunity to achieve this aim.

"Working with corporations lets students apply knowledge to solve problems in a fast-changing market. It is encouraging to see that the corporations appreciate so highly the performances of our students," Professor Tong said.

Participating students said the experience working as professional marketing consultants laid a solid foundation for their future careers. "We have been given the opportunity to live up to the CityU motto 'From Student to Professional'," said student representative Ailie Tang Kit-yee.

Mr Alex Tham Koy-siong, the Leader for the Bachelor of Business Administration Marketing Programme, has been working on the "Student Marketing Consultancy Projects" since 1995. He said: "Students have gained a lot through the support of the business community, further encouraging us to provide quality professional education to nurture professionals."

A concurrent ceremony on 11 January was held for the "Student Learning Enhancement Project". This project gave CityU marketing students the opportunity to design a new brand targeting young people and its related promotion strategy for FORTRESS. The aim was to encourage marketing students from all years at CityU to participate in marketing consultancy work.

Altogether 37 students worked in 15 teams, and the winners were Carol Ng Yuen-kwan and Douglas Ko Tak-chun. Recommendations in their winning proposal are being implemented by FORTRESS.