MSDM Curriculum

This is a three-week orientation course to acquaint new students with the systems, processes, and resources available in our M.S. Digital Marketing program.

This course provides an introduction to Digital Marketing, and to the ways marketers have had to adapt their strategies in this increasingly digital world. The course will familiarize students with the strategic aspects of digital customer experience, usability, analytics, digital content monetization, and online customer acquisition. Students will explore a range of digital marketing tools and tactics including: content marketing, display advertising, digital video, search engines, social media, mobile, gaming, and more. A practical approach is adopted in this course. In addition to becoming acquainted with basic principles of digital marketing, students will begin to develop the skills to solve real-world business problems and exploit digital business opportunities.

This course will help students analyze why brands are shifting from traditional marketing to content marketing: the new way to create meaningful and lasting customer relationships. To succeed in our hyper-connected digital world, students need to understand what is changing, how to create a content marketing strategy, and how to measure success. The course will focus on the process to design a content marketing strategy that enables brands to engage customers and build authentic connections across multiple channels and touchpoints.

An essential component of marketing is understanding consumer behavior. This course provides an overview of fundamental concepts of Consumer Behavior from the point-of-view of consumers living in a digital world. The course examines the decisions consumers make, the processes underlying these decisions, and the psychological and sociological factors that influence buying behavior. More specifically, students will learn about various external and internal influences affecting the field of consumer behavior considering the impact of social media,online communities, and always-on mobile connectivity. Such influences include social groups, online research and communication, social class, culture, perception, motivation, attitude, and self-concept, among others. The course also examines the impact of digital marketing on society, both domestic and global.

This course introduces the concept of a Customer Journey which spans digital channels (web, mobile, app) and non-digital touchpoints (1:1, call center etc.). Customer Journey Analytics is the process of tracking and analyzing the way customers use combinations of channels to interact with an organization. The focus of the course is on digital analytics through practical applications, with an end goal of deriving actionable insights that will impact the organization’s acquisition, experience and retention strategies. It provides a broad overview of key digital analytics strategies, concepts, issues, challenges and tools.

Marketers spend far more of their advertising budgets on the internet than on any other media. This class covers the key concepts in digital advertising and helps you to not only understand what happens as a consumer but also as a planner, strategist, and buyer of ads. This will include getting a fundamental understanding of the various digital outlets (video, display, search, and audio) as well as audiences, bidding, transparency, and technology. We will cover how to build and test media plans and then turn them into digital marketing plans for a company that we will present.

This course will provide a basic understanding of the laws and regulations applicable to digital marketing as well as introduce ethical frameworks that can be leveraged to enhance marketing strategies, communications and business decisions. The course provides an in-depth study of the areas of law and ethics that are most critical to digital marketing business judgment and decision making. Topics such as ethics, fairness and privacy are discussed in detail as critical to growing a business, doing things the right way and earning and retaining customers by meeting and exceeding their expectations.

These topics are further explored through in-depth discussions, lectures, readings, videos, case studies to facilitate review of topics and issues that apply across marketing channels such as: free speech, intellectual property, truth in advertising, data privacy and security, demographic and behavioral targeting and customer relationship management.  Issues unique to marketing channels such as: online behavioral advertising, email, mobile, search, social, viral, crowdsourcing and user generated content will also be an area of focus in the course.

This is a “hands-on” capstone course that emphasizes marketing decision-making in our increasingly digital world. Throughout the course, the focus is on teaching students how to apply key digital marketing terms, concepts, tools, and frameworks to meet real-world business objectives. Students will learn how organizations leverage digital marketing practices to achieve sustainable competitive advantage.

The omnipresence of digital channels has provided a flood of consumer information that marketers have struggled to manage, comprehend, and effectively use. In addition, those channels have created expectations that digital technologies in isolation provide a complete picture of motivations, attitudes, and identities that drive consumer behaviors. In this course, we’ll explore how digital technologies (as well as more traditional marketing research techniques) produce consumer data that can be transformed into information and ultimately insights that enhance decision-making. The goal of this course is to expand students’ understanding of marketing research and digital data collection methods, and develop their skills as producers, analysts, and managers of these critical tools and their outputs. 

Mobile has made a dramatic impact on our lives, influencing everything from the way we consume news, learn, and shop, to the way we connect with our friends and larger community. The rise of mobile has led to an unprecedented opportunity for technology to empower marketing and create powerful, customer experiences.

Topics will extend beyond mobile advertising and mobile apps to technology trends that are altering how we can target, engage and serve consumers. These include: Artificial Intelligence (AI), Machine Learning, Augmented and Virtual Reality technologies, Internet of Things, Location Based Marketing and Mobile Payment Technologies. This course provides a best practices approach to mobile marketing and explores how it fits within the integrated marketing mix. Leave this course with a transferable method and the mindset to improve your role within any organization or department.

This course teaches students to apply marketing knowledge, research tools and methods to meet the demands of omnichannel consumers through both digital and brick-and-mortar sales channels. Students will gain an understanding of all aspects of the B2C and B2B ecommerce ecosystem, including: technology platforms, payment options, supply chains, security considerations, customer service, acquisition marketing efforts, and more. In addition, this class explores the increasing use of digital tools in the physical retail environment.

Search Marketing involves capturing consumer intent at each stage of the consideration, information, and buying cycle. This online Search Marketing course includes techniques of both “organic” and “paid” search and how to optimize your content for various devices and channels. It covers the basics and advanced tools of Search Engine Optimization (SEO) needed to improve your rankings during a search query. Students will analyze detailed examples of the code and content B2C and B2B websites use to achieve better search placement and apply this knowledge to their own website to practice SEO tactics. The course incorporates how SEO relates to paid advertising including Pay Per Click (PPC), display advertising, remarketing, affiliate marketing, native advertising, and programmatic advertising and provides tools Google, Amazon and Facebook use to help improve and measure the performance of your search marketing efforts.

Social networking consumes several hours of our daily life, mostly on our mobile devices. This course focuses on current social media trends and marketing strategies, both for consumer and business audiences. It will explore the social media marketing ecosystem and how organizations incorporate social media into their business strategy. The course will also provide best practices for students to present their personal brands on social media.

Looking to gain a deep understanding of the essential role branding plays in digital marketing today? Branding in a Digital World explores the importance of brand-building through digital media (paid, owned, and earned) and how it contributes to creating and maintaining a successful business through the power of storytelling, reach & frequency, and the measurement of brand campaigns. The course explores how brand marketing works in different contexts, including global organizations where brands span multiple markets. Additionally, students will learn how to sustain a brand over time and the strategies required to keep it relevant in a dynamic and ever-changing marketplace.

Want to know how digital marketers drive conversions and boost revenue through their campaigns? Performance Marketing in a Digital World explores digital marketing tactics that get results. In this course, students learn how to create and execute effective performance marketing campaigns using digital tactics such as search, display, and video advertising. We’ll also explore the use of artificial intelligence (AI) in digital marketing for achieving performance-oriented results. Finally, students will learn how to design and build conversion-focused media plans using these tactics, with an emphasis on analyzing ad performance and ROI.

Artificial Intelligence (AI) can dramatically enhance all the core activities of marketing: understanding customer needs; engaging, educating and influencing customers along the buying journey; and matching them to an organization’s product and service offerings. This course offers an in-depth exploration of the impact of AI on the marketing industry and how to leverage these technologies to create more personalized and effective marketing strategies.

The course covers the latest developments and applications of AI in marketing, including machine learning, natural language processing, and computer vision, as well as AI-powered marketing initiatives such as chatbots, recommendation systems, and personalized advertising. The course also includes a discussion of the ethical and privacy considerations surrounding AI in marketing and how to evaluate the performance of AI-powered marketing initiatives. Students will learn how to create data-driven marketing strategies using AI technologies and understand the future trends and developments of AI in marketing. The course is designed for students who are interested in understanding the impact of AI on the marketing industry and how to use AI to drive business growth and improve customer engagement.

The metaverse is inevitable. Also, it is already here. The metaverse economy is projected to reach $5-$13 trillion by 2030. At the intersection of physical and digital, the metaverse offers consumers an entirely new way of interacting with brands while shopping, learning, working, socializing, and entertaining. Organizations around the globe have started utilizing metaverse worlds, digital twins, augmented and virtual reality, NFT’s, etc. And as usual, marketers need to be at the cutting edge of these innovative technologies to help their companies realize the huge opportunities the metaverse presents and to successfully target, engage, and serve their customers.

Course topics will cover the landscape, use cases, consumer behavior, brand promotion, product development, marketing analytics, and ethics in the metaverse. All modules include practical exercises or hands-on workshops in the metaverse. After completing this course, students will be able to identify business opportunities for brands in the metaverse and to propose appropriate products or services to better serve their customers.