Improving Marketing Students’ Writing Skills using A One-Page Paper

Abstract

Employers of marketing graduates view good writing as a core marketing skill, but many marketing students are weak writers. The improvement of student writing should therefore be an important objective in a well-designed marketing curriculum. One-page papers combine the effective teaching of marketing concepts with writing instruction while keeping demands on instructor time manageable. This innovation most improves the writing of weaker writers in a class. Combined with a more challenging group writing assignment, it provides a mechanism for improving the writing skill of all class members while fostering an ability to thoughtfully apply marketing concepts to solve unstructured problems.

Full text

Encouraging Marketing Students’ Writing Skills
by Using a One-Page Paper
By
Newell D. Wright, Ph.D.*
Director, Center for Global Initiatives and
Professor of Marketing
North Dakota State University
Dept. 2430
PO Box 6050
Fargo, ND 58108-6050
USA
Phone: (701) 231-6532
FAX : (701) 850-3798
E-Mail: newell.wright@ndsu.edu
and
Val Larsen, Ph.D.
Professor of Marketing
MSC 0205
James Madison University
Harrisonburg, VA 22807
USA
Phone: (540) 568-3858
FAX: (540) 568-2754
E-mail: larsenwv@jmu.edu
*Contact Author. The first author wishes to thank his late father, H. Curtis Wright, who was a
professor of librarianship and who first introduced him to the idea of incorporating writing into
courses by using a one-page paper assignment.
Area in which paper fits: GENERAL MARKETING EDUCATION ISSUES

Developing Marketing Students’ Writing Skills
Using a One-Page Paper
Abstract
Employers view good writing as an essential marketing skill, but many marketing
students are weak writers. The improvement of student writing should, therefore, be an important
objective in a well-designed Marketing curriculum. This article discusses an innovation, the one-
page paper, which can facilitate effective writing instruction in Marketing classes while keeping
demands on instructor time manageable. The innovation most improves the writing of the
weakest writers in the class. Combined with a larger group writing assignment, it provides a
mechanism for improving the writing skill of all class members.
The Problem
Writing often tops the list of skills employers desire when hiring a marketer (Taylor
2003). Indeed, employers value good writing more than knowledge of specific marketing
concepts (Morris 1995), though the ideal candidate has both concept knowledge and polished
writing. Genres such as the business memo and press release continue to be important in business
practice (Amare and Brammar 2005; Taylor 2003), and modern students struggle with these
genres of formal communication. Though they write more than previous generations did due to
email, texting, and social media, their writing tends to be (as is typical for these technologies) too
fast and careless, too full of shortcuts and grammatical errors (Purcell, Buchanan, and Friedrich
2013). Students today need individualized instruction in writing, so individual instruction should
be part of a well-designed Marketing curriculum. What they generally get are group writing
assignments that are manageable for the instructor but that allow the students who most need to
improve to delegate the writing task to more skilled and confident team members (Hansen 2006).

The One-Page Paper
The innovation presented in this article, the One-Page Paper (1PP), facilitates
individualized instruction in writing and is especially well adapted to the needs of the weakest
writers. The 1PP requires students to express themselves in writing, at multiple points during the
semester and to improve their writing based on instructor feedback. It allows the professor to
grade both writing and marketing knowledge rigorously, in any marketing course, without being
overwhelmed by papers to grade. The 1PP requires students to integrate and summarize what
they have learned in a short written response. See exhibits 1 and 2 for the general 1PP
assignment, exhibit 3 for a sample 1PP assignment, and exhibit 4 for a sample response.
In Principles of Marketing, we typically give a 1PP assignment with each chapter, which
usually means students write 16-18 1PPs, though we have had as many as 21 1PPs during a
semester. This provides ample opportunity to practice writing. The course grade is largely based
on the quality of the 1PPs. There are no tests, but there may be other grade elements, e.g., class
participation and/or a group project. We drop the lowest 1PP grade. To mark writing errors
efficiently, we use an abbreviated shorthand (see exhibit 5). Codes direct students to a larger
document that describes each error and explains how to correct it. All error examples are drawn
from student writing. Writing handbooks with error codes are also readily available.
By the third or fourth paper, student writing usually improves dramatically. Students soon
realize that errors affect their grade, that both correct writing mechanics and deep marketing
insight are necessary to earn a good grade. And while grading the first papers takes more time
because of the many errors, by the third or fourth assignment, grading a 1PP normally takes
about 2 to 3 minutes. So for a sixty student section, grading time is about two to three hours.

Solving the Writing Problem and Increasing Understanding
The 1PP requires students to be precise and efficient in both their writing and their
thinking. It is generally more difficult to express ideas briefly than to express them verbosely.
And deeper understanding of material is generally required to respond effectively to an open
ended questions such as those used in a 1PP than to recognize or recall information for a T/F or
multiple choice test. So the 1PP tends to increase both writing ability and marketing knowledge.
Assessment of Effectiveness
To assess the effectiveness of the 1PP in improving student writing, we drew a sample of
three papers, the 1st, the 11th, and the 21st, from a set of 1PPs written by Principles of Marketing
students in a recent semester. Twenty sets of three 1PPs were then evaluated by a colleague with
a Ph.D. in English and seven years of experience teaching grammar and composition. The
colleague marked all writing errors in each 1PP and rated the overall coherence and cohesion of
the 1PPs on 7 point Likert scales that read as follows: a) The coherence of the argument in the
1PP is… b) The cohesion of the writing in the 1PP is …. The first scale was anchored by Very
Strong and Very Weak while the second scale was reverse coded with Very Weak and Very
Strong as anchors. The Likert scales were combined in a single scale for analysis, with higher
scores indicating better writing. The reliability of the two-item combined scale was measured by
Cronbach’s alpha (.95 for 1PP #1, .91 for 1PP #11, and .87 for 1PP #21).

Results for writing errors and coherence/cohesion are reported in the tables above. Mean
errors declined from 8.10 in the first 1PP to 6.45 in the 11th to 5.65 in the last 1PP. This decline
was significant, whether tested by a within-subjects one-way ANOVA (F = 5.197, p = .010) or by
a linear contrast (F = 8.481, p = .009). The coherence/cohesion of 1PPs improved from 3.95 on
1PP #1 to 4.38 on #11 to 4.72 on #21. This improvement was also significant when tested by
one-way ANOVA (F = 7.397, p = .003) and by linear contrast (F = 12.181, p = .002).
However, the evaluator noted that weak writers seemed to benefit most from the 1PP
assignment. We tested this supposition by dividing students into strong and weak writers based
on number of errors committed in 1PP #1. In a median split, number of 1PP #1 errors ranged
from 0 – 6 for strong writers (μ = 4.10) and from 7 – 20 for weak writers (μ = 12.10). The
hypothesis that initial writing ability affected degree of improvement was tested by a two-way
ANOVA that had the within-subjects 1PP factor (#1, #11, #21) and a between-subjects Writing
Skill factor (Weak, Strong). Number of writing errors was the dependent variable. The 1PP x
Writing Skill interaction, shown in the first graph below, was significant (F = 8.851, p = .001).
The interaction reflects the fact that weak writers do improve as they write additional 1PPs (F =
12.055, p = .000 in a one-way ANOVA including only weak writers) but strong writers do not
improve (F = .246, p = .785 in an ANOVA including only strong writers). What was true for
errors was also partly true for coherence/cohesion. Weak writers improved significantly as they
wrote additional papers (F = 8.298, p = .003) but strong writers did not significantly improve (F
= 1.365, p = .281). The 1PP x Writing Skill interaction for coherence/cohesion was not
significant.

While these results indicate that 1PP assignments improve writing, especially for the
students whose writing most needs to be improved, they also suggest that there may be
diminishing returns in the improvement. Paired samples t - tests confirm this supposition for
error reduction but not for improvements in coherence/cohesion. With respect to error reduction,
there is significant improvement from 1PP #1 to 1PP #11 (t = 1.948, p = .033) but no significant
improvement from 1PP #11 to 1PP #21 (t = 1.303, p = .104). Coherence/cohesion improves both
between 1PPs #1 and #11 (t = 1.945, p = .033) and between #11 and #21 (t = 2.208, p = .020).
Discussion
These results suggest that the 1PP is an effective tool for improving the writing of
Marketing students. But since the rate of improvement diminished after the 11th paper, they
suggest that much of the improvement could be attained with just 10 or 11 1PPs rather than the
21 used in this course. Since the 1PP is most beneficial for weak writers, an optimal course
design for improving the writing of all students might combine 10 individual 1PPs with a major
group project and paper assignment. Performance on the 1PPs could be used as an index of
writing ability, and groups could be formed with a mix of weak and strong writers.
The group paper should be a more complex writing assignment than the 1PPs, and groups
should be encouraged to optimize the quality of their work by having the best writers in the
group do most or all of the writing, i.e., what usually happens without encouragement on group

projects. This more challenging assignment may provide all students with an opportunity to think
more deeply and integrate more broadly than is possible in a 1PP the main theories and concepts
of the course. And it may provide a suitable writing challenge for the strong writers in the class
who are not challenged by the 1PP so that their writing, like that of the weak students, may
improve based on their experience in the class.
While our data come from a Principles of Marketing course, the 1PP it is easily adaptable
to any marketing courses (and we have used it in multiple courses), especially if it is combined
with the larger group project and paper. In any course, it can provide multiple opportunities for
students to improve their writing while not being too time consuming for the professor.
Concerns
An important potential problem with the 1PP, especially if it is used as the main basis for
the grade, is plagiarism. To minimize this problem, we forcefully condemn plagiarism in the
syllabus and have a zero tolerance policy for it. Students caught plagiarizing receive an
automatic F in the course and are reported to the department, college, and university. Since we
use custom assignments, students who plagiarize typically must mix some of their own writing
with the plagiarized material to meet assignment requirements. The admixture of good and bad
writing is a telltale sign that plagiarism has occurred. We also recommend an anti-plagiarism tool
such as turnitin.com to combat plagiarism if the 1PP is a major determinant of the course grade.
References
Amare, Nicole and Charlotte Brammer (2005), “Perceptions of Memo Quality: A Case Study of
Engineering Practitioners, Professors, and Students,” Journal of Technical Writing and
Communication, Vol. 35, Number 2, 179-190.
Corbin, Steven B. and Karen A. Glynn (1992), “Writing in the Marketing Curriculum,” Journal
of Marketing Education, Summer, 46-52.
Glenn, David (2011), “The Default Major: Skating Through B-School,” New York Times, April
14. Available online at http://nyti.ms/1EvyCzV.

Hansen, Randall S. (2006), “Benefits and Problems with Student Teams: Suggestions for
Improving Team Projects,” Journal of Education for Business, Sept./Oct., 11-19.
Hansen, Randall S. and Katharine H. Hansen (1995), “Incorporating Writing across the
Curriculum into an Introductory Marketing Course,” Journal of Marketing Education,
Spring, 3-12.
Morris, David (1995), “What is Wrong with Marketing?” Marketing News, 29 (25), 4.
Purcell, Kristen, Judy Buchanan, and Linda Friedrich (2013), “The Impact of Digital Tools on
Student Writing and How Writing is Taught in Schools,” Pew Research Center. Available
online at http://pewrsr.ch/1EvyHUv.
Taylor, Kimberly A. (2003), “Marketing Yourself in the Competitive Job Market: An Innovative
Course Preparing Undergraduates for Marketing Careers,” Journal of Marketing
Education, Vo. 25, No. 2 (August), 97-107.
Exhibit 1
General Guidelines for One-Page Papers
The ability to think systematically and write thoughtfully is a key marker of an educated
person. Your learning will be apparent to others not from what has been put into you in your classes but
from what comes out of you as you write and speak. Thus, an important part of this university’s
mission is to develop students’ capacity to think and write. This assignment contributes to the
attainment of that university objective.
The one-page paper requires you to state what you know about an assigned topic in a brief,
systematic, and thoughtful way. It efficiently communicates your distilled understanding of the topic.
Write the paper in your own words with organization that reflects the logic of your argument.
Incorporate in the paper the best ideas that come to you from class instruction, assigned readings,
cases, videos, online tools, and all other elements of this class. Your grade will depend in substantial
part on the quality of your one-page papers.
I will read your papers as if I were the editor of a scholarly journal devoted to publishing
thoughtful articles on the topics you have been assigned. To get a high grade, you must convince me
that the article could be published as is, without revision. Seek, therefore, to attain the standard of
publishability. Your paper will be evaluated against five criteria: 1) substance (the content of what you
say); 2) form (the way you say things, the tightness of your logic and correctness of your grammar and
punctuation); 3) originality (whether you contribute something new or merely re-plow cultivated soil);
4) factuality (your ability to use evidence); and 5) significance (the practical value of your
interpretation). In most fields, a paper is assured of publication if it meets these criteria. A good paper,
remember, is a significant combination of substance and form produced by an original thinker who
makes use of evidence.
"The braggart who talks a great game, but cannot score a point--that's form without
substance. A concerto in which all the notes are played, but played badly--that's
substance without form." --Jeffrey Holland, former president of Brigham Young
University (Provo, Utah, USA; www.byu.edu).

Exhibit 2
Rules
The brevity of a one-page paper necessitates the following rules. As you submit electronic versions of
this paper, please observe the following:
Papers MUST be composed in Microsoft Word.
Put the word count of your paper near your name. (To get a word count in Word 2013,
highlight the words. The word count then appears on the bottom, left-hand side of your screen).
The paper should be double spaced with one-inch margins on all four sides of the document.
Use a 12 point font. Never exceed 250 words. As a heading, include your name, my name, the
assignment name and number, the word count, and the title. These elements do not count
toward the 250 word limit. You will be marked down for violating these rules. I stop reading
your paper after one page and issue a grade. The third page of this document includes a sample
one-page paper that is formatted correctly.
No quotations, footnotes, or bibliography. I cannot tell what you know if your paper is full of
quotations. Say everything in your own words, paraphrasing others’ thoughts if you use them.
Papers are due on or before 11:59 p.m. on the due date specified in the syllabus.
Submit your paper via Blackboard. In exceptional circumstances, you may also submit via e-
mail, if you have permission from me in advance.
Cheating will be dealt with severely. If you are caught submitting a plagiarized paper, you will earn an
F for the entire course and you will be reported to the department, college, and university.
Exhibit 3
Chapter 1 One-page Paper
To prepare for this one-page paper assignment, read chapter 1, review your lecture notes and the
PowerPoint slides, and listen to the audio summary. Also, review requirements for the one-page paper
(located in the Course Documents section of Blackboard).
Papers exceeding 250 words automatically suffer a 20% reduction in grade. Other formatting
violations incur an automatic 10% deduction for each violation. Papers must not exceed one page
or 250 words and must be formatted correctly.
Your task is to integrate chapter one content and apply its theories to a real-world marketing
problem. Read the Girl Scout Cookie case* (located in the Chapter 1 folder in the Course Documents
section). Then answer this question:
What kind of marketing management philosophy do the girl scouts use to sell their
cookies? Justify your answer with examples from the case.
*NOTE: The case for this assignment is the “Girl Scout Cookies” case from MKTG 6 by Lamb,
Hair, and McDaniel. It is located at http://bit.ly/1BYOSHX. The question asked above is not
from the case. Answers to questions from the cases are easy to find online. But it is also fairly
easy to write new questions that are not addressed by any online case comments.

Exhibit 4
Firstname Lastname
MRKT 320, Spring 2016
One-page Paper #1
Title: The Production and Sales Orientation of the Girl Scouts
Word count: 244
The Girl Scout case portrays an organization that has a production and sales orientation.
Changes the organization has made to “spark sales and create cost saving opportunities” reflect these
two philosophies.
Production Orientation: The Girl Scouts mandated a price increase without examining the
impact of the change on consumer demand. Without any input from customers, they also reduced the
content of the box and changed the packaging to generate production efficiencies, thus demonstrating a
lack of a market orientation.
Sales Orientation: Sales have decreased each year for several years. Instead of discussing
reasons for the decline with customers (e.g., price, customer needs, wants, preferences), the Girl Scouts
doubled down on selling techniques. Scouts are encouraged to sell 100 boxes of cookies. They learn
selling strategies such as asking “reluctant buyers” questions: “Can I get you to buy just one box?” or
“What’s your favorite cookie?” The scouts are taught how to “get creative” in selling and how to close
the sale. No mention is made of satisfying customer wants and needs. All emphasis is on generating
sales. The only time customer preferences are even hinted at is in the discussion on eliminating slow-
selling products tailored to specific market segments (Latinos, diabetic customers).
While there is some evidence of a societal market orientation (e.g., preparing the girl
scouts for future success in life), the case describes an organization that is primarily focused on
production efficiencies and sales increases rather than on input from the customer.

Exhibit 5
Writing Error Abbreviations
# Space Spacing error
Abbr Avoid abbreviations
Adj/adv Mixing up adj/adv forms of word
Adj Attr The too long attributive adjective string problem
Adj/noun Mixing up adj/noun forms of word
Adj string String of attributive adj, break with prep
Agent Make agent explicit
Agr SV agreement
Art Article problems (the, a, this, some)
As As instead because, since, when, etc.
Aspect Vague use this, other single words
Awa As well as = and
Awk Awk sentence/phrase (can’t say just why)
Bracket Use a bracket
Broad Broad reference which, this, that, etc.
But Coherence problem due to repeated shifts in
direction
C-adj Series of attributive adjectives
C-adv Adverb:, therefore, or use ; therefore,
C-appos With appositive, restatement,
C-attr Comma with series of attributive adjectives
C-city City, State
C-conj I like milk, and cream; Sentence, and Sentence
C-intr Introductory phrase, long
C-not Unnecessary comma
C-paren Parenthetical elements
C-rest Restrictive/Nonrestrictive
Cap Capitalization error
C-seri Comma series error: Tom, Dick and Harry
Cap-not Don’t use CAPS for emphasis
Case Who/whom, he/him
Coh-pro Use pronoun to improve coherence
Coh-topic Keep sentence topics consistent if possible
Colloq Too colloquial
Colon Use a colon
Combine Combine sentences, subord one [in brackets]
Compare Faulty comparison
Contr Contractions
Correl Correlatives: mismatched or parallelism
CS Comma splice
Dash1 --
Dash2 -- --
Dic Diction error--connotations
Dm Dangling modifier
End End sentence with main point (circle, arrow)
Fact Factual error
Feel Feel, think--don’t need
Frag Fragment
Fused Fused Sentence
Hyph excellent-tasting food
Id Idiom error
Inset Inset quotations, no “
Itit Mixing different senses of it
Its Its/It’s confusion
Like/as Like (prep) as (conj)
Logic Unclear/faulty logic
Mass Mass/Count problem
Metaphor Misuse metaphorical language
Miss Missing words
Mm Misplaced Modifier
Name Using first name inappropriately
Nbegin Don’t begin sentence with a number
Noba Not only...but also // problem
Nom Nominalization
Note Revise according to marginal notes
Num Two, not 2
Only Only placement
Para Parallelism problem
Para Gram Could and have eaten; declaration and attention to
Pass-not Unnecessary Passive
Pass-use Use passive to avoid long subject
Pl Plural/singular error
Pos Possessive error
PR Pronoun reference problems
PR-# # pronoun / referent don’t agree
PR-resump Resumptive appositive which, that,
Prd-() Period with citation ( ).
Prd-end Need a terminal period.
Prd-.. .. not Dr.. at end of sentence
Prd-not Drop unnecessary period or replace with right mark
Prf Proofreading errors
Pred Predication error
Prep Revise awk string of prepositional phrases
Q” “, “?; footnote."1, not footnote1."
Qwithin Quotations within quotations
Q-int Quotation integration in text
Qmatch One “-- need a matching “
Q-corr Quote quotation accurately
Qua Italicize word qua word
Ques ? as terminal punctuation
Red Redundant material (underlined)
Rep Awkward repetition (underlined)
Rest Restrictive/nonrestrictive punctuation
Runon Run-on sentence
Semi , , ; , , ; Inappropriate use of ;
Separate Break sentence two for emphasis
Sequence Sequence of tenses
Series Order series from short to long
Source Give bibliography citations
Sp Spelling error
Split Don’t S/V, help verb/main verb, etc.
Splitinf Split infinitive
SuborH Subordinate to Highlight
SuborV Vague subordination
Subj Subjunctive error
Tense Wrong verb tense
Title Italicize or underline titles
Trans Transition problem
Utilize Use
Vague Precise detailed language (underlined)
Verb Form Wrong form verb: underlined verb
Who Who for people, not who for things
WW Wrong word--the one underlined
You Avoid informal you

*The 25 page document that provides examples of each of these errors--examples taken from
marketing student writing--and that shows how to correct each error will be provided to MER
readers upon request.