On April 15, 2017, the “Learning Program Open Day” activity was held in the Li Dak Sum Building. Deputy Director of the Department of Marketing of our School Prof. Liyin JIN brought a keynote speech titled When “Marketing” Meets “Psychology”– Perceiving Humanity in Marketing Practice.

Prof. Liyin JIN first introduced a little psychological test and then, in combination with selection of the three marketing forms in Harvard Business Review, revealed “under the situation where the core object of judgment or product itself is unchanged, change in peripheral information input influences people’s judgment about the value of the core object of judgment and product and finally changes people’s final choice.” On this basis, he carried out further elaboration in combination with marketing activities: “When we cannot improve a product itself more effectively (when the cost is high), switching to another mode of thinking to change the information input and reference environment of consumers’ knowledge about the product, e.g. changing information on competitive products emerging in the course of consumers’ understanding of the product, can also improve consumers’ assessment of our product’s value.”

Not all phenomena in the market can be understood and predicted rationally. Prof. Liyin JIN introduced the second important psychological concept “information accessibility” with the classic psychological case of dramatic increase in Mars chocolate’s sales during heated discussion on the topic of the Mars probe’s launch. He proved to us once again with a real case in the field of secondhand car transaction that some seemingly strange market phenomena still follow psychological laws. Then, he introduced the psychological field theory of Kurt Lewin, a famous psychologist in the early 20^th century. “A person’s behavior is the function of the interaction between this person himself and the environment he is in. We can hardly change his behavior by changing this person himself, but we can change his behavior by changing the environment he is in.”It can also be applied in enterprises’ marketing activities: by designing consumers’ psychological field, we can change the course of consumers’ establishment of brand preferences and finally realize intervention in purchase behavior.

At the end of the speech, Prof. Liyin JIN mentioned the classic theory of “delay of gratification” in the field of psychology. Through projection of Sigmund Freud’s self-system to marketing topics, he pointed out “the key to marketing topics about desire is how to maintain consumers’ desire for continuous product consumption”. He reminded the audience with the sealing strategy extensively used by stores that different strategies might be the same essentially viewed from the economic perspective, but whether the difference between the drive of “essence” and the drive of “information input” is considered determines the degree of a marketing strategy’s success.

After the keynote speech, four alumni of the School of Management shared their original purposes of choosing the MBA/IMBA/BI Norwegian Business School – Fudan University MBA Program and gains. General Manager of Hansheng Trade Consulting Co., Ltd. and alumnus of the HKU-Fudan IMBA Program Taiqi HAN said “the best talents can enhance career competitiveness at Fudan University”. The Fudan MBA Program gave him “very clear thoughts and the ability to integrate resources”. Vice President of Shanghai Weaver Network Co., Ltd. and alumnus of the Fudan MBA Program Shaojun WEI decided to engage in advanced MBA studies 14 years after his graduation. with plenty of entrepreneurship experience, he suggested, “a breakthrough in knowledge reserve needs to be made” and the theories learned in the Fudan MBA Program “will become potential driving forces behind career development or industrial change”. Brand Building & E-commerce Director of the Marketing Department of Unilever (China) Co., Ltd. and alumnus of the BI Norwegian Business School – Fudan University MBA Program Jingjing ZHAO gained more from avant-garde modes of thinking, which allowed him to cut in from diverse perspectives while seeing new and old things and quickly accept new things. Founding partner of Glory Ventures and alumnus of the Fudan IMBA Program Zongyi BAI jumped from engineering to finance. He thought “the result of development after entering the platform of the School of Management, Fudan University depends on one’s heart and devotion”, and emphasized “a clear goal is very important”. The four alumni all fully affirmed the importance of MBA to milestone improvement. “We should learn to go out of our comfort zone” so as to be prepared while facing the future full of uncertainties.