Program Overview

BA (Hons) Business and Marketing Management via Study Centres

Overview

Gain a world-class undergraduate degree from a British university without leaving your own country. The content of this course is the same as the Sunderland campus-based course BA (Hons) Business and Marketing Management.

BA (Hons) Business and Marketing Management focuses on the skills you need to be an effective marketing manager. You’ll focus on marketing management, planning and strategy, marketing communications, consumer behaviour, and digital marketing.

Why us?

• The Sunderland Business School is a member of ‘The Association of Business Schools’
• We've been shortlisted for Business School of the Year in the Times Higher Education Awards 2024

Course structure

Teaching methods include lectures, seminars, debates, tutorials, and computer-based learning. You'll be encouraged to develop independent study skills. Throughout the course, the focus is on innovative learning, by doing and reflecting. You'll take part in problem-based learning, where you work within a small team to explore issues or decide how to manage a situation. This helps you to dissect, challenge, and debate issues.

Your progress will be assessed with business simulations, presentations, reports, essays, tests, and time-constrained assessments.

Course modules

Year 1 (national level 4):

• Essential Study and Employment Skills (20 credits)
  • Gain the key study skills that are critical to your academic development and success. Develop your understanding and appreciation of the importance of transferable employability skills, as well as the importance of engaging in opportunities to develop personally at university and beyond.
• Introduction to Marketing (20 credits)
  • Gain an introduction to the concept of marketing and identify the role it plays in our every day lives, whether that be the products and services we use, the price we pay, or how we’re communicated to. Explore how organisations look to build relationships with their customers to ensure mutual satisfaction and value is received.
• Introduction to Human Resource Management and Talent Development (20 credits)
  • Examine how the effective deployment of human resources is essential to an organisation’s survival and growth through the cornerstones of human resource management practice, namely the key aspects of the HR cycle. Explore key concepts of recruiting and selecting, development, motivation, performance, rewards, and retention. Focus is placed on the use of theoretical best practice models and how they translate in reality to the workplace.
• Introduction to Accounting and Finance (20 credits)
  • Explore and investigate the three key areas within the field of accounting and finance including financial accounting, management accounting, and business finance. Learn the role and importance of how financial information can be utilised by managers and external users within the decision-making process. Create and analyse key financial statements, understand the range of account options used by internal managers, and gain knowledge of various financing techniques that can be used to ensure business success.
• Introduction to Managing and Leading People (20 credits)
  • Gain an introduction to the concepts of managing and leading people within an organisational context. Acquire an understanding of the role of managers and leaders in leading and managing the human aspects within the global organisational arena. Explore the key management and leadership activities associated with managing change to impact positively on organisational performance.
• Introduction to Business Operations and Services (20 credits)
  • Explore the key processes and practices within businesses operations and services. Gain knowledge that will help define the nature of business operations and services by considering various aspects of quality, cost, and delivery. Learn how business operations are interrelated to other functions in business, for example, marketing, HR, and finance.

Year 2 (national level 5):

• Personal and Professional Development (20 credits)
  • Investigate the impact that your behaviour has upon your professional success. Engage with and reflect upon experiences and how they inform understanding of personal qualities that underpin your effectiveness. Use a structured environment to focus upon what it is that you want from the world of work and, just as importantly, to increase your chances of achieving it.
• Quality Management for Organisational Excellence (20 credits)
  • Develop the ability to apply the concept of excellence in an organisational context. Gaining new knowledge will support you in appraising the EFQM Excellence Framework (European Framework for Quality Management. Developing your ability to recognise the difference in relationships between enablers and results that support identification of underpinning theories of excellence, leading to summarising of how organisations can be assessed using the excellence framework.
• Business Ethics, Responsibility and Sustainability (20 credits)
  • Explore the various moral issues and dilemmas facing businesses in an era when people, governments, and media expect them to demonstrate responsible actions, ethical behaviour, and sustainable practices. Review personal values and reflect on how these might apply to businesses. Use case studies to investigate moral issues faced by firms today, examine the diversity of business environments they face, and contemplate the dilemmas they experience when doing business abroad.
• Digital Marketing (20 credits)
  • Learn the key aspects of digital marketing, including search engine optimisation, website development, e-commerce, advertising online, email marketing, social media marketing, and digital analytics, and understand the role of each in effective online marketing. Investigate how the likes of personalization, viral marketing, influencers, affiliate marketing, and gaming can be successfully integrated within a digital strategy. Explore what the digital marketer must consider in addressing the behaviour and expectations of customers in both B2C and B2B markets, be they local, national, or global.
• Marketing Management and Metrics (20 credits)
  • Building on your understanding of organisations, their environment, and marketing theory introduced in level 4, explore the role of marketing management in organisations today. Appraise marketing’s contribution to the creation and delivery of value to organisations’ stakeholders. Learn how organisations of various types measure their marketing performance.
• Integrated Marketing Communications (20 credits)
  • Learn how to develop an integrated marketing communication plan and campaign, from a client and agency perspective. Analyse and be creative in a hands-on and practical module. Discover key theoretical models and principles of marketing communications and the promotional mix including advertising, sales promotion, public relations, personal selling, direct marketing, and new media.

Year 3 (national level 6):

• Developing the Reflexive Practitioner (20 credits)
  • Consider, diagnose, and express your professional behaviours and values as an aspiring manager and leader in finance, marketing, human resources, or management. Examine the module leader’s research which includes the ‘Developing the Reflexive Practitioner’ toolkit, a web-based guide for developing as professionals in the increasingly complex world of management. Present your reflections as podcasts or vlogs, or as digital reflections.
• Strategic Marketing (20 credits)
  • Understand how strategic marketing is critical to organisations in achieving sustainable competitive advantage. Examine key concepts and approaches in advanced strategic marketing evaluation and formulation which are vital to understanding and meeting the challenges of current and future competitive environments. Assess the contemporary strategic marketing options available to organisations and examine how these can be applied effectively in contemporary marketing strategy and practice.
• Psychology of Consumers in a Digital Age (20 credits)
  • Familiarise yourself with consumers’ decision-making journeys by drawing comparisons with the traditional and digital consumers who are increasingly shopping by using omni channels. Discuss prevalent models with particular references to communications strategies, innovation, and sociocultural customs affecting the business. Consider the scope of digital behaviour by utilising various theoretical approaches in order to develop consumer models which befit you as the digital consumer.
• Critical and Emerging Themes in Marketing (20 credits)
  • Identify, examine, and evaluate the critical and emerging issues in marketing. Undertake critical and in-depth academic literature reviews to inform debate and discussion into these key marketing themes. Explore topics that range from classic marketing concepts to contemporary and emerging practice, to future challenges in marketing. Be highly engaged and involved in the evaluation of selected topics and their impact on marketing practice, businesses and organisations, and different marketing contexts.
• Branding and Reputation Management (20 credits)
  • Explore the influence of branding on our purchasing behaviour. Examine the importance of an effective brand strategy to contemporary organisations. Explore the nature of customers’ relationships with brands to identify the key influencers upon customer brand loyalty.
• Marketing Research in Practice (20 credits)
  • Learn how to conduct research by considering a specific and substantive marketing problem, issue, or task. Examine the scope of marketing research in terms of its practices, techniques, and their relevance in aiding decision-making and problem-solving. Think critically by analytically and dialogically engaging with current debates and controversies.

Facilities

For more information on location and facilities, please check the study centre website.

Entry requirements

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Please contact the study centre for more information on their specific requirements and equivalent qualifications from outside the UK.

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Fees and finance

Please contact the relevant study centre for information about tuition fees and scholarships.

This information was correct at the time of publication.

Career ready

As a graduate from this course, you'll have excellent skills and knowledge in marketing management, planning and strategy, marketing communications, consumer behaviour, and internet marketing. You'll be ready to step into a marketing role in a wide variety of industries, both in your own country and across the world.

Some of the companies which employ our Business graduates include Microsoft, IBM, Nike, Adidas, P&G, Lloyds Bank, Marriott Hotels, and the NHS.