University of Salford

MA Digital Video Production and Marketing

MA Digital Video Production & Marketing is a balanced course - half theoretical/analytical, and half practice-based. This balance reflects the nature of the career itself, where data-driven content is rooted in both creativity and analysis.

Each intensive module will tackle different aspects of either the analytical or practical side of the skillset.

Heavily informed by industry practice and professionals, students will dissect the key tenets of the role of a digital video marketing professional, moving on to apply these to real-life industry scenarios.

Problem-based learning and collaboration will be central to this programme, which mirrors industry practice. Students will develop their communication skills, and will develop and acquire new skills as each module progresses.

To complement the focus on analytics and practice-based learning, students will also develop autonomous learning skills through theoretical classwork, individual and group-based production practice and real-world industry experience.

Video – from Instagram to Amazon - is the new mainstream, for the millennial and post-millennial generations, in both their editorial enjoyment and retail use of technology. This course will therefore be conducted with strong industry engagement and visitors at its core. Guest speakers will be drawn in from major social providers within Manchester, such as The LADBible, one of the world’s major social video channels, and Money Supermarket, Auto Trader, AO.com, Missguided, Manchester United FC and other major users of social video.

Meanwhile, the final trimester will be specifically built around a piece of industry work by the students, where they will be given the opportunity to work with a specific company and product. They will get to the heart of both its marketing analytics and its creative needs, in order to produce a well-planned piece of creative work. The process will directly replicate the actual job they would be doing in the industry after leaving for digital video marketing jobs. Further, their wider study of marketing analytics will give them the basics of a toolkit which is directly used by technology-driven media producers such as BBC iPlayer and Channel 4 in the north of England.

Just as in the real world, marketers and creatives need to collaborate, so that will be the case in this course.

Trimester one

• Social and Advertising Video Production
• Digital Marketing and Analytics

Trimester two

• Creation of Video for E-commerce
• Search and Social Media Marketing

Trimester three

• Digital Video Production and Marketing in Practice

Students will receive direct induction into a vibrant and growing industry. As a Prolific North list of the top e-commerce companies in the North demonstrates, the industry is particularly strong in this region.

It is strong, double-digit growth in this market at the moment, much of it at the expense of linear TV advertising, which declined in 2018 by over 10%. E-commerce as a whole is a $2.3 trillion industry this year, enjoying double-digit growth. Students will gain valuable overviews and insight into the field.

Already in Manchester, there are hundreds of jobs in the field of e-commerce-driven content, since Manchester is a strong hub for e-commerce as a whole. Channel 4 has stated that they are creating their Digital Production Unit in Leeds, with a thrust towards social and digital content. The Hut Group are creating an e-commerce content production centre in Manchester. BBC Sport and BBC iPlayer are both on-site at MediaCity.