GRA 6433 Marketing Communication
GRA 6433 Marketing Communication
Communication is a fundamental part of most marketplace transactions. In its purest form, price communicates the information necessary for a transaction. In most cases, however, marketers have to communicate more than just price in order to establish, sustain, and grow their business. So how does communication in the marketplace work? How can marketers succeed in nowaday's increasingly digital and international communication environment? In order to address these important questions, this course aims to provide a deep understanding of marketing communication, both in terms of real-life application and as a field of scientific research.
Over the duration of the course, students will work in groups to develop a communication strategy for a real industry client. The lectures will provide inspiration for the group projects in two ways:
1) We will discuss key theories and findings in communication planning and consumer psychology. These insights may be used in the communication strategy, but we will also pay close attention to theoretical and methodological challenges in these research areas.
2) We will meet guest speakers holding various key functions in marketing communication (e.g., on the agency side, the client side, the media side). These practitioners will provide insights into the daily business and the current challenges of marketing communication.
Upon successful completion of this course, the students will have a sound platform of knowledge on:
- The science of marketing communication: After completing the course, students will know about three relevant scientific literatures: First, theories of sensory perception, attention, memory, and emotion explain how consumers process marketing messages. Second, theories of attitude formation and persuasion help us understand how consumers are influenced by marketing communication. Third, theories of advertising effectiveness and planning give insights on how to design communication campaigns and allocate budgets. We will critically discuss these theories and their potential to guide managerial decision-making. In addition, we will take deep dives into more specialized fields of research (e.g., viral marketing).
- The practice of marketing communication: By working on an applied project for a real industry client and getting feedback from advertising professionals, students will learn first-hand about best practices in marketing communication.
Upon successful completion of this course, the students will be able to
- Address the managerial challenges of marketing communication in an analytical manner, both related to digital and non-digital channels
- Develop a communication strategy based on a client briefing
- Present a communication strategy in a clear and convincing way
- Critically evaluate the internal and external validity of scientific research in the field of marketing communication
After completing this course, students should appreciate key psychological and business-related factors that affect the effectiveness of marketing communication campaigns. The theoretical and practical knowledge provided in the course should enable students to critically assess marketing communication activities from the perspective of a marketer, but also in their role as consumers, and from an ethical perspective.
- Marketing communication: An introduction
- Creating a powerful communication campaign
- Structure of an advertising/communication agency
- How to develop campaigns based on client briefings
- Creativity and the creative process
- Introducing the group assignment case
- Understanding consumer information processing
- Psychological models of attention, perception, and memory
- Overt vs. covert attention
- Implicit vs. explicit memory
- How to gain attention? How to be memorable?
- How marketing communications work
- Is there a unifying model of “how advertising works”?
- Hierarchy-of-effects models
- The elaboration-likelihood model
- Resisting persuasion: The persuasion knowledge model
- Non-conscious processing and persuasion
- Content marketing: Can virality be engineered?
- Managing marketing communications
- Media channels and planning
- Integrated marketing communications (IMC)
- Budgeting and measuring impact
- Message execution
- Message strategies: Cognitive, affective, conative
- Executional frameworks: Animation, authoritative, demonstration, dramatization, informative, fantasy, slice-of-life, testimonial
- Advertising appeals: Rationality, empathy, fear, humor, eroticism
- Multisensory marketing communication
- Appealing to the senses in marketing communication
- Multisensory interactions
- Mental simulation
- Persuasion tools
- Social influence techniques: Reciprocation, commitment, social proof, authority, liking, scarcity
- How can we change entrenched attitudes?
- Applications in real-life settings
The course combines class room lectures and out-of-class project work.
Class attendance is expected and checked. Iit is the student’s own responsibility to obtain any information provided in class.
Come to class well prepared (i.e., make sure you have read the assigned readings and completed any assigned tasks).
Electronic devices: Out of respect for fellow students and faculty, please do not use laptops, iPads, cell phones, or other gadgets in class (unless requested by me).
This is a course with continuous assessment (several exam components) and one final exam code. Each exam component is graded by using points on a scale from 0-100. The components will be weighted together according to the information in the course description in order to calculate the final letter grade for the examination code (course). Students who fail to participate in one/some/all exam elements will get a lower grade or may fail the course. You will find detailed information about the point system and the cut off points with reference to the letter grades when the course starts.
At resit, all exam components must, as a main rule, be retaken during next scheduled course.
All courses in the Masters programme will assume that students have fulfilled the admission requirements for the programme. In addition, courses in second, third and/or fourth semester can have specific prerequisites and will assume that students have followed normal study progression. For double degree and exchange students, please note that equivalent courses are accepted.
GRA 4145 Brand Management or equivalent.
| Assessments |
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Exam category: Activity Form of assessment: Presentation Weight: 45 Grouping: Group (4 - 5) Duration: 1 Semester(s) Exam code: GRA 64331 Grading scale: Point scale leading to ECTS letter grade Resit: All components must, as a main rule, be retaken during next scheduled course |
Exam category: Submission Form of assessment: Written submission Invigilation Weight: 40 Grouping: Individual Support materials:
Duration: 2 Hour(s) Comment: Written examination under supervision. Exam code: GRA 64331 Grading scale: Point scale leading to ECTS letter grade Resit: All components must, as a main rule, be retaken during next scheduled course |
Exam category: Activity Form of assessment: Class participation Weight: 15 Grouping: Individual Duration: 1 Semester(s) Comment: Assessed through activities that evaluate successful engagement with class materials (e.g., handing in short essays/questions about assigned readings before class starts and/or about the lecture contents after class; Kahoots, and other similar exercises.) Exam code: GRA 64331 Grading scale: Point scale leading to ECTS letter grade Resit: All components must, as a main rule, be retaken during next scheduled course |
A course of 1 ECTS credit corresponds to a workload of 26-30 hours. Therefore a course of 6 ECTS credits corresponds to a workload of at least 160 hours.
Business representatives will be present during the presentation.