Nora Barnes of UMass Dartmouth Continues to Lead the Social Media Conversation

Posted on September 5, 2008 by Jennifer Brady

UMassOnline Director of Marketing, Jennifer Brady Dr. Nora Ganim Barnes, Chancellor Professor of Marketing and Director for the Center for Marketing Research at the University of Massachusetts Dartmouth, has been featured here often for her pioneering research work and findings about the growing value of social media and networks in education. Her groundbreaking work is, in fact, gaining her a national reputation among educators and others. Most recently she was featured in an article entitled “Universities turn to Web to recruit new generation,” published by SignOnSanDiego.

As the story notes, recent research by Dr. Barnes found that social media technologies and techniques are being adopted by universities at a faster rate than at Fortune 500 companies. Why is this happening? “You’ve got to go where your audience is, and for people in the age group they’re targeting, life exists online. Schools that don’t have an online presence in social media are going to be sidelined.”

If you have a minute to examine the full feature, you’ll find some very compelling statistics on university adoption rates for social media as compiled by Dr. Barnes. While we at UMassOnline may have been an early advocate for the trend – this site being a prime example – we’re rapidly gaining a lot of company for this concept.

For more information about, and insight into Dr. Barnes’ innovative research, other posts about her and her work on this site include: Highlights from the UMassOnline Marketing Roundtable and UMass Dartmouth Study Shows College Internet Adoption Faster than Fortune 500.