Marketing Strategy
Course description
This course aims at providing students with an understanding of the basic instruments of strategic marketing. The course covers fundamental elements of marketing planning (analyzing the competitive environment, setting the stage for the marketing mix, gathering market information, designing the marketing-mix) as well as market research methods and statistical method necessary to evaluate market research data. During the course, students are introduced to basic methods that are typically used in market research: Cluster analysis, regression analysis, and analysis of variance. Both field data and fictional training datasets are used to practice the application of these methods with the software package JMP Pro by SAS.
Course objectives
Upon completion of this course, students should have the ability to formulate, design, and evaluate market research studies to tackle typical strategic questions in the marketing environment.
Examination type
- Non-compulsory group presentation towards extra credit
- Compulsory 2-hour written exam at the end of the semester. The written exam contains both case studies with statistical output and essay questions.
Literature
Books
Marketingplanung (by Torsten Tomczak and Alfred Kuß)
Marktforschung (by Alfred Kuß, Raimund Wildner, and Henning Kreis)
Marketingmanagement (by Christian Homburg)
Articles
Typically students have to read and prepare at least two academic articles with considerable impact in the field.
Syllabus
0) Introduction to Marketing Strategy
1) Marketing Strategy: Setting the Stage
2) Marketing Strategy: Brand Management
3) Gathering Information: Customer Behavior and Psychology
4) Gathering Information: Market Research
5) Gathering Information: Looking for Causes
6) Gathering Information: Data- and Information Management
7) Digital Marketing
8) Marketing Controlling: Judgement and Decision Making I
9) Marketing Controlling: Judgement and Decision Making II
10) The Marketing Organisation
11) Ethical and Moral Questions in Marketing