Redesigned marketing curriculum is tailored to new generation of strategic marketers

The Masters in Marketing Strategy trains students to take a planned, research-based approach to customer insights, to manage both digital and human interfaces, and to navigate between analytical rigour and creative and conceptual thinking.

It also includes a 3-month market research consultancy project that challenges students to apply their knowledge to a real business case, and a study tour to Dublin.

“We want to send a stronger message that we are not training marketers, but rather future marketing managers. In other words, professionals who can lead, not just follow instructions. That means understanding the numbers, making sense of customer data, using technology in the right way—but also stepping back and taking a strategic view” says Frank Goedertier, Programme Director of the Masters in Marketing Strategy.

“Marketers today are expected to connect the dots between data-driven insights, ideas and impact. This programme is built to train them to do that, by combining strategic thinking with hands-on skills, and by encouraging a long-term view of how marketing decisions shape business performance.”

The programme covers five core blocks:

• Marketing Strategy Fundamentals
  This learning component offers strategic insights across various marketing sub-domains (eg, general marketing strategies, sales strategies, service strategies, branding strategies, channel strategies, business case development and budgeting strategies…).
• The Strategic Use of Technology & Data Analytics in Marketing
  Data and technology dominate the world today and are crucial in every strategic approach. In marketing, this translates to the increasing need to leverage customer-interface technologies, to be skilled in data-telling, to engage in customer engineering, marketing analytics, customer profiling and to do market research in general.
• Marketing Strategy & Creative Ideation  
  Next to being data-driven, every marketing strategy contains a strategic storyline that includes a creative marketing idea or concept backed up by a clear customer insight. For this reason, this block focuses on customer insight generation, trend watching, creative ideation – and reflects on marketing-relevant inclusivity, sustainability and ethical considerations.
• Management Skills & Personal Development  
  Strategically savvy, leading, all-round marketers also need to develop the right marketing and leadership skills. The fourth programme block focuses on offering students hands-on training on general management skills, negotiation, public speaking, pitching and presenting, etc.
• Business Integration  
  The final programme block focuses on learning to apply the knowledge, techniques, and skills of the previous blocks in real-world settings. A key component of this block is a 3-month in-company marketing consultancy project.

The curriculum now dives deeper into:

• Creative Strategy & Conceptual Thinking – Building strategic storylines with creative twists and concepts backed up by clear customer insights.
• Data-Driven Decision-Making & Data-telling – Using AI, customer analytics tools, and market research insights to guide your choices.
• Digital Technology Immersion – Experiencing and experimenting with customer interface technology to explore customer management use cases & applications 
• Finance for Marketing Strategy – Understanding finance essentials, becoming familiar with marketing budgeting techniques, and developing business case development skills.
• Strategic Leadership Skills – Developing the mindset to lead beyond your function – with a focus on ethics, sustainability, and business-wide impact.

The first intake will start in September 2025.