Course description

Title of the Teaching Unit

Digital Marketing

Code of the Teaching Unit

21GE022

Academic year

2025 - 2026

Cycle

Number of credits

Number of hours

Quarter

Weighting

Site

Anjou

Teaching language

English

Teacher in charge

Godefroid Eric

Objectives and contribution to the program

Marketing is under constant and big pressure to perform: required to meet changing customer expectations in the era of digital transformation, asked to prepare strong brand plans, judged by the sales department, obliged to deal with multiple stakeholders, and scrutinized by financial controlling.
Yet marketing is a multifaceted discipline that plays a key role in any type of organization. Accordingly, it necessitates strong strategic and operational skills, in a context of digital transformation.
This course aims at providing students with knowledge and tools that will support them in their future managerial career. It will give students a comprehensive understanding of how marketing plans can be developed and executed, taking humans and the planet into account.

In terms of know-how, students will be able to:

• Identify and explain major environmental and customer/consumer related trends, and their impact on companies’ marketing strategy
• Describe and explain the importance of customer centricity.
• Describe the key elements that are part of a situation analysis.
• Define and explain the constitutive elements of a marketing strategy.
• Describe and explain the marketing frameworks that support both situation analysis and marketing strategy.

In terms of skills, Students should be able to:

• Run internal and external situations’ audit
• Know how to assess a company’s marketing effectiveness
• Design & develop a strategic marketing plan taking human & environmental factors into account.
• Leverage marketing frameworks

Prerequisites and corequisites

Participation in the marketing course requires bachelor’s knowledge. A good command of English (being comfortable with a B2 level) with written and oral capabilities.

Content

The course will essentially aim at explaining the concepts and methodologies to perform strategic marketing, from situation analysis to strategy to execution, to the target market. It will illustrate them with practical examples of various companies and setting them in a context in which the notions of companies, markets and consumers stand out.

The first-half of the course will be the lecture from the teacher, the second part of the course will be the presentation of the group work by the students.

Detailed course content :

Course Content
INTRODUCTION
0. Introduction - Scope and expectations of the course
WHERE TO PLAY – FROM SITUATION ANALYSIS TO STRATEGY
1.A. Market understanding - Today’s dynamics and trends
1.B. Market understanding – Situation analysis – 5C Audit – Target Customer needs research
2. Competitive advantage & value creation – ERRC competitive advantage model – Unique value proposition
3. Consistency Design into brand, products and customer journey
HOW TO PLAY – FROM STRATEGY TO EXECUTION
4.A. Communication plan – Launch plan & customer acquisition
4.B. Communication plan – Customer Journey Marketing & customer loyalty
5.A Organization & Planning – 5.B Performance tracking & optimization
STUDENT WORK - PRESENTATIONS

Teaching methods

- Ex-cathedra course, in person, with explanation of concepts and frameworks illustrated by numerous concrete examples & case studies
- Participation of guest speaker(s) sharing their experience in specific areas of expertise
- Polls, quizzes & interactive activities during class.
- Individual readings provided to complement the knowledge and critical views
- Q&A

Assessment method

• Written exam – 60% of the points (12 out of 20 points) - MCQ (Multiple Choices Questions) + Open questions lasting a maximum of 1,5 hour (live at the ICHEC), done with a closed book.

• Student work in group – 40% of the points (8 out of 20 points) – Based on the final written work from the group + bonus points for the individual oral presentation

References

The slides covered in class constitute the main support. Students can download these from ICHEC Moodle and annotate them in class. The slides will be made available the day before the course session.

Consulting the reference book is recommended for deepening the concepts seens during the course sessions. This book serves as a reference document, presenting in detail some of the various concepts and theoretical notions that students need to assimilate. The book is a supplement for students but is not mandatory; chapters not covered in class are not part of the exam material. Articles and case studies are also posted on the platform to illustrate and enrich the theoretical concepts presented in the course slides.

It is advised to get the following reference books for deepening the concepts explained in course:

1/ “Marketing Strategy & Management”
Diane M. Phillips, Sage Education. (English version)
Paper or electronic version.

2/ “Blue Ocean strategy” - How to create uncontested market space and make the competition irrelevant
W. Chan Kim & Renee Mauborgne, Harvard Business review press. (English version)
Paper or electronic version.