The Online Master's in Marketing
Building on our history of innovation, William & Mary is introducing an online master’s degree in marketing designed to prepare the next generation of leaders in this dynamic field. An extension of the long-standing foundation of excellence that makes our graduate business programs among the highest-ranked in the nation, our online Master of Science in Marketing offers broad yet deep expertise in the tools, technologies and strategies used by forward-thinking marketers across industries.
Whether you are hoping to build a solid foundation for a career pivot into marketing or you’re ready to position yourself on a trajectory toward upper management and the c-suite, the Online Master’s in Marketing offers everything you need to know to thrive in today’s rapidly evolving digital world.
Explore the Online Master’s in Marketing
Online Master’s in Marketing by the Numbers
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What Is a Renaissance Marketer?
The Online Master’s in Marketing has been designed to create a new type of marketing leader through the cultivation of what are often considered disparate skills sets across the analytic, strategic and creative sides of marketing.
Renaissance Marketers are not interested in business as usual.
They are comfortable in a dynamic world and not bound to the mechanistic rhythms of conventional workflows. Embracing ambiguity and iteration, Renaissance Marketers understand that the best use of time is often nonlinear. They are adept at the digital and analytics-based skills that drive innovative decision-making. They are capable and fluent in the rapidly evolving technology that defines their profession, and they recognize its role as an enabler of collaboration and insight.
To Renaissance Marketers, no challenge is simply an obstacle to overcome.
They treat even the most difficult problems as opportunities for strategic creativity and innovative brand strategy. They approach their work informed by, but not beholden to, time-tested methods: They balance the wisdom to respect proven processes with the courage to adapt them—or even radically change them—for current challenges.
Renaissance Marketers look outward.
Because they understand broad collaboration to be key to identifying problems and creating solutions, they act with humility, engage with empathy, and create a culture of respect that nonetheless challenges all involved to do their best work. In this environment, they cultivate new ideas by inviting diverse perspectives, engaging in deep immersion, encouraging open debate and treating every idea as a hypothesis to be tested.
Renaissance Marketers strive to create an impact on the problem at hand, the company they work in, the market they serve and the world they inhabit.
Are you ready to become a Renaissance Marketer?
Our graduates are:
- Empowered with strategic, innovative vision and leading-edge digital skills
- Adept at using analytical tools to drive decision-making
- Fluent in quantitative and qualitative analysis techniques, including conjoint analysis, cluster analysis, and customer lifetime value calculations
Are You Up to the Marketing Challenge?
At the core of our Online Master’s in Marketing program lies the Marketing Challenge: the defining, unifying project that you create, refine and build throughout your coursework. To complete it successfully, you must expand your thinking and adopt a broader, strategic view of marketing.
Work starts right away in the foundational Renaissance Marketer course. You’ll start to develop your unique Marketing Challenge, establishing parameters for a project you’ll work on throughout the master's program.
At the beginning of each course, you’ll identify areas of your Marketing Challenge that need development, and the current class’s possible impact on its outcome. At the course’s end, you will update your challenge’s parameters, discuss the course’s impact on it and outline your next steps.
As you grow professionally through work on the Marketing Challenge, you’ll create value for your current business. The challenge gives you opportunities to reach out to senior leaders in your company with whom you don’t interact on a daily basis. In meeting with them, you’ll have the chance to demonstrate strategic skill by addressing your challenge’s tactical requirements. You will become adept at collaboration and relationship building through peer discussions.
William & Mary students have recently created and addressed these Marketing Challenges:
- With podcasting companies focusing predominantly on high-income audiences, how do we create compelling podcast content for an underserved population and connect it to a brand that serves that audience?
- How do we increase referrals from general veterinary practitioners to veterinary neurologists?
- How do we create and market a content creation company for Black men?
Expert Guidance Through an Ever-Changing Field
Study with faculty creators and innovators who have been influential in building nationally and internationally known companies and brands, including:
- American Express
- Arby's
- Best Buy
- Burger King
- Discover Financial
- Domino's Pizza
- Expedia
- Geico
- Kraft Foods
- MetLife
- Microsoft
- Mondelez (Oreo, Chips Ahoy, Velveeta)
- Morgan Stanley
- Old Navy
- Taco Bell
- Target
- Turkish Airlines
- Uber
- UPS
- Volkswagen
- Walmart
- Zillow
Program Prep Course
Program Prep Course (0 credits)
This course can be waived by scoring 80 percent or higher on a marketing background assessment, by demonstrating three years of direct experience on a marketing team, or by possessing an undergraduate degree in marketing or an MBA.
Foundation Course
BUAD 5207 Renaissance Marketer (4 credits)
Analytics and Insight Courses
BUAD 5217 Analytics for Evaluation and Situation Analysis (4 credits)
BUAD 5247 Analytics for Planning and Optimization (4 credits)
Marketing Innovation Courses
BUAD 5257 Product Management and New Product Development Strategies (4 credits)
BUAD 5267 Market-Driven Innovation Strategy and Management (4 credits)
Modern Integrated Marketing Courses
BUAD 5277 Integrated Campaign Marketing (4 credits)
BUAD 5287 Digital Content Management (4 credits)
Residency Support Course
BUAD 5237 Residency (1 credit)
- To help students better understand and assimilate into the culture of William & Mary and the Mason School of Business
- To teach content that is best learned in a face-to-face environment (e.g., experiential exercises)
- To allow students to make connections with faculty and each other along with an opportunity to create relationships that will endure beyond the end of the program
Capstone Course
BUAD 5297 Capstone: Revolutionary Marketing Leadership (4 credits)
Online Master’s in Marketing at a Glance
- Complete in as few as 15 months
- 1 free program prep course
- 1 on-campus residency
- 2 opportunities to start per year
Discover Our Online Experience
Finding a Common Ground: Residency and the Program Prep Course
Students in the Online Master’s in Marketing program arrive with a diversity of personal and professional backgrounds. That’s why our marketing master’s degree program includes two opportunities to begin building a shared experience with your cohort, both in terms of marketing knowledge and your interpersonal relationships with one another.
The Program Prep Course offers you the chance to prepare yourself for the intellectually challenging course content that will follow throughout the remainder of the program. This self-guided online course ensures that you have the proper mastery of math and foundational marketing principles to succeed in subsequent classes. And best of all, this course is completely free!
The Program Prep Course can be waived by scoring 80 percent or higher on a marketing background assessment, by demonstrating three years of direct experience on a marketing team, or by possessing an undergraduate degree in marketing or an MBA.
For the Residency Weekend, we invite you to make the trip to our beautiful Williamsburg campus to meet your online classmates and faculty face to face for the first time. In addition to bonding and networking over the course of three days, you will complete a one-credit course introducing you to unique aspects of the William & Mary experience and helping develop the interpersonal skills that are essential for any successful marketing leader.
The residency curriculum is structured around three themes:
- Collaboration: Content and exercises designed to capitalize on face-to-face opportunities
- Culture: Experiences to more tightly bind students to the culture of William & Mary and the Raymond A. Mason School of Business
- Connections: Social interactions designed to create relationships between students and faculty that endure beyond the end of the program
Residency Weekends are offered twice per academic year. While we recommend attending the residency weekend nearest to the beginning of your time in the program, doing so is not required.
Get to Know the Raymond A. Mason School of Business
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2. Retrieved on March 18, 2020, from princetonreview.com/business-school-rankings?rankings=best-professors
3. Retrieved on January 20, 2020, from www.bls.gov/ooh/management/advertising-promotions-and-marketing-managers.htm
4. Retrieved on January 20, 2020, from ncta.com/whats-new/iot-has-quietly-and-quickly-changed-our-lives
5. Retrieved on January 20, 2020, from emarketer.com/content/us-time-spent-with-media-in-2019-has-plateaued-with-digital-making-up-losses-by-old-media
6. Retrieved on January 20, 2020, from linkedin.com/pulse/have-we-reached-peak-ad-social-media-ryan-holmes/