Marketing is not just an important business function, but it is in many cases the key driver of a business. Its role is to create, communicate, deliver and exchange offerings that have value for consumers. This comprehensive and practical introductory course deals with the principles of marketing, with a focus on digital marketing. Major topics covered in this course are identifying market opportunities, buyer behavior and customer decision-making, marketing strategy (segmentation, target market selection and positioning), marketing mix decisions, branding, and digital inbound marketing. Students will work on several practical cases throughout the semester and complete one team project. There is one guest speaker session.

Upon completion of this course, students will be able to:

• Analyze customers, competitors and the business context
• Understand how to develop an effective marketing strategy
• Design a strategy implementation program (marketing-mix decisions)
• Understand the principles of inbound marketing
• Develop their practical problem solving skills
• Strengthen their written and oral communication skills in English

Full participation is highly recommended.

You need to attend at least 60% of all modules in order to pass the course successfully. If you fail to complete a pre-module assignment (you complete it by submitting it in time and in an acceptable quality), this counts as absence. If you fail to participate in an online live session, this also counts as absence. You are allowed max. 5 absences in total. For example, you if miss 4 pre-module assignments and 1 live session, you can still successfully pass the course.

Students who cannot attend the exam because of illness or another well-founded reason can re-take it in mid June. Please contact the lecturer in advance.

There are seven live sessions of 2 hrs, and seven pre-module sessions that are expected to take 2-3 hours to complete (with the exception of the first pre-module task that only takes max. 1 hr to complete).

Live modules (Zoom, times as announced in the syllabus): These modules are a mix of short teacher-centered lectures, group break out sessions, and short student presentations and discussions. While you are expected to familiarize yourself with basic concepts and theories during the preceding pre-module tasks, live sessions will be used for recaps, to answer questions, discuss more complex matters, and apply your theoretical knowledge to practical examples and exercises. We will hardly cover any new content, but instead use the session to review and deepen the contents of the pre-module assignments and readings. Students are expected to actively participate in discussions and exercises during the live session. During dicussions you are expected to turn the camera on.

Pre-module readings and assignments (to be completed before each live session): The goal is to introduce you to key concepts and theories in marketing management. Contents will be taken up in the subsequent live module. Each pre-module consists of a mandatory reading list ('readings' include different formats such as articles, videos, lecture casts, etc.) and a set of open-ended questions to self-assess your learning progress. You receive one participation point for completing a pre-module assignment. The pre-module assignments will be published on Friday morning (9 am) in the week prior the live session. You can submit the pre-module assignment until the evening prior to the live session (deadline: Wednesday 11.59 pm). In other words, you have a six-day window to complete each assignment and familiarize yourself with the mandatory readings. Please note that if you fail to submit the assignment in time and in an acceptable quality, this also counts as an absence.

In addition to completing all modules, students are required to work on a team challenge. Students will not only work on their own group project, but are also required to comment and reflect on the group work of their peers.

At the end of the course, there is a final written online exam (60 minutes).

There are three grading components:

• Group project: 30 pts (25 pts for your own project, and 5 pts for commenting on your peers' presentations)
• Participation points: 7 pts (1 pt in each module)
• Final written exam: 63 pts

Grading:

90 pts or more: 1 (excellent), 80 pts or more: 2 (good), 70 pts or more (satisfactory), 60 pts or more: 4 (sufficient), 59.5 pts or less: 5 (fail).

Optional bonus points by participating in lab studies:

Students can earn up to 3 bonus points if they voluntarily participate in a research study series organized by the Department of Marketing. The online studies will take up to 60 minutes to complete.

Please contact me by email: ulrike.kaiser@wu.ac.at, or write a message via MS Teams.