University of St Andrews

MLitt in Marketing

The modules published below are examples of what has been taught in previous academic years and may be subject to change before you start your program.

Each module typically consists of three to five contact hours per week including lectures, seminars, tutorials, and workshops. Assessment is either entirely by coursework or through a combination of coursework (50%) and a two-hour end-of-semester examination (50%).

Compulsory

• Contemporary Global Issues in Management: focuses on how various global trends impact economies, organizations, and the practice of management, business, and marketing within the context of responsible enterprise
• Consumer Behaviour and Marketing Research: teaches you how to think systematically and critically about consumer behavior, and understand how the principles of consumer behavior inform methodological design in consumer research
• Marketing Strategy (new for 2024-2025): examines how organizations create value propositions to target distinct customer segments at the strategic level. This module explores the management of both strategy and the organization to build valuable customers and create stakeholder relationships, leading to lasting success. Focusing on the fundamental drivers of long-term prosperity and placing the firm’s capabilities at the service of customers and other stakeholders and not the other way around, the module demonstrates how organizations successfully deploy the 'outside-in' strategic framework
• Dialogue and Debate in Marketing (Masterclasses): guest speakers with experience in marketing and related disciplines to explore key marketing topics such as globalization, consumer trust, technology, social marketing and behavior change, PR, and branding in interactive ‘masterclass’ sessions to develop an understanding of the topics through the lens of the practitioner.

Optional

Students choose two optional modules, taking one each semester.

Here is a sample of optional modules that may be offered.

• Behavioural Finance
• Entrepreneurship and Business Development
• Entrepreneurship, Innovation and Creativity
• Financial Systems
• International Financial Management
• International Marketing
• Leadership in Organisations
• Managing People in Global Markets
• Marketing and Society
• Managing Non-Governmental Organisations
• Risk Management
• Scenario Thinking and Strategy.

Dissertation

The final element of the MLitt is a 15,000-word dissertation. The dissertation is normally on a specific area of marketing; students can develop a topic of their own that interests them and contributes to future career development and further study goals.

You will be encouraged to consider a topic for the dissertation during Semester 1 and will submit your dissertation proposal early in Semester 2. The School of Management will review your proposal and assign a relevant dissertation supervisor based on the proposal.

To prepare you for the research required for your dissertation, you will attend a program of weekly lectures as part of your Dissertation module. Dissertation projects may be group-based or completed individually (students are assessed individually regardless). You will undertake your research and write your dissertation over the summer, submitting it in late August.

If students choose not to complete the dissertation requirement for their Master's degree (MLitt), there are exit awards available that allow suitably qualified candidates to receive a Postgraduate Diploma. By choosing an exit award, you will finish your degree at the end of the second semester of study and receive a PGDip instead of an MLitt.

Teaching

Teaching format

Teaching is delivered through a mixture of core and optional modules using a range of delivery methods including lectures, small group tutorials, workshops, and seminars. The average marketing cohort is 40 students.

From June to August, students undertake a research project culminating in a written dissertation of 15,000 words.

Assessment

Assessment comprises a combination of coursework and examinations.

Support

Marketing students are academically supported by their dedicated program director as well as the Director of Postgraduate Programs.

Alumni from the Masters in Marketing and more generally from other Masters programmes in the School of Management have secured employment in the fields of general management, marketing and brand management, marketing research, management consultancy, fund administration and other aspects of the financial services industry.

Graduates from the Masters in Marketing have taken up roles in a wide variety of organisations in the public and private sectors including:

• Accenture
• Amazon
• Boston Consulting Group
• Google
• L'Oreal
• LinkedIn
• Microsoft
• Procter and Gamble
• Unilever
• Volkswagen Group

In the past, students in this programme have also gone on to set up their businesses and have become successful entrepreneurs in different sectors.

Further study

Many Management graduates continue their education by enrolling in PhD programmes at St Andrews or elsewhere.