Think about some of your favorite brands—chances are, there is a high-powered brand manager working behind the scenes to ensure the brand resonates with you, one of its target consumers. Brand managers oversee the integrity of a brand across all marketing activities in tech, consumer packaged goods (CPG), and service industries. The position of brand manager requires strategic thinking, focus on the customer experience, communication with multiple stakeholders and cross-functional teams, creativity, and analytical skills. Brand managers are creative, organized multitaskers who often serve as the liaison between the marketing group, design team, and engineers to oversee the consistency of the brand image. While every day is different, typical activities of a brand manager include conducting and analyzing research to identify brand opportunities, understanding market trends and competitive landscape, creating and maintaining brand marketing budget, managing cross-platform brand communication strategy, developing the brand story, executing marketing and advertising campaigns, and overseeing the overall health of a brand. When managing a brand’s products or services in a tech firm, brand and product managers may also be involved in ideation, prototyping, user experience (UX) testing, and business casing. This concentration offers the opportunity to learn these skills across coursework in marketing, consumer behavior, advertising, new product development, marketing analytics, project management, demand planning and forecasting, and product innovation. As such, the core brand management course paired with a flexible, yet focused list of electives supports students in the aspects of brand management that are most relevant for their future career prospects.
Concentration in Brand Management
| Code | Title | Hours |
|---|---|---|
| Required Course | ||
| MKTG 3720 | Brand Management | 4 |
| Electives | ||
| Complete three electives, with at least 8 credits from MKTG courses: | 12 | |
| Innovation! | ||
| Project Management | ||
| Enabling Technologies for Consumer Engagement | ||
| Marketing Research | ||
or MKTG 3402 | Gaining Insights from Consumer Data | |
| Managing Customer Engagement in a Service World | ||
| Advertising and Brand Promotion | ||
| Consumer Behavior | ||
| New Product Development | ||
or ENTR 3330 | Design Thinking for Startups | |
or ENTR 3335 | Product Innovation and Portfolio Management | |
| Understanding the Platform Economy | ||
| A maximum of one course may be applied to requirements of a second concentration. | ||