Author Topic: Marketing or Specific Internet Marketing focus in MBA  (Read 3794 times)

OSUBearCub

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Marketing or Specific Internet Marketing focus in MBA
« on: September 29, 2014, 04:40:57 PM »
I need advice.  Getting a free MBA but have two focus areas to chose from.  Any Mustachians have insight into a specific "Internet Marketing" focus versus "Marketing Management" focus.  I've listed the courses for each below.  What are your thoughts on which might be more germane to the changing landscape of Marketing?  (The rest of the program is a very solid, traditional MBA.)

Internet Marketing Concentration Courses

MBA 594 Search Engine Optimization
Study the fundamentals and best practices of SEO, including keyword research and analysis, link-building, link-baiting, and copywriting.

MBA 595 Social Media
Learn to design, implement, and evaluate an effective social media strategy that integrates blogs, video, photos, social networks and search optimized press releases.

MBA 593 Web Analytics
Learn the basic framework of web analysis, gain proficiency at testing, and leverage analytics insight into useful surveys, experiments and assessments such as A/B splits and multivariate testing.

MBA 592 Conversion Optimization
Successfully convert visitors to customers by studying customer personas, optimization techniques, and methods for establishing credibility with your users.

Marketing Management Concentration Courses

MBA 676 Marketing Strategies in the Digital Age
This class focuses on the marketing efforts that companies of all sizes use to create effective Internet strategies. Students will also investigate what new technologies are dominating the marketplace today, and what we can expect as the Internet and other technologies evolve. The student will become fluent in the language of e-marketing and learn how to effectively design and execute an organization's digital marketing plan.

MBA 663 Marketing Communication
Integrated marketing communication is the central theme in this class. Students learn to evaluate and integrate print, radio and television advertising, direct response marketing, Web site design, and databases into coherent communications programs.

MBA 666 Consumer Behavior
Understanding why consumers do the things they do is essential in marketing. In this course, students will explore the many influences that affect individual purchase and consumption behavior. The wide-ranging approach taken will draw on current theory in psychology, sociology and anthropology.

Find out more about the curriculum of our online MBA program: Request more information or call us at (866) 295-3104 to speak to one of our Admissions Advisors right away.

J Boogie

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Re: Marketing or Specific Internet Marketing focus in MBA
« Reply #1 on: September 29, 2014, 05:13:30 PM »
Internet sounds a lot more interesting and you can leave out the internet part when applying to companies that might prefer a traditional mgt mba.  If you have an interest in it, go for it!

Beric01

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Re: Marketing or Specific Internet Marketing focus in MBA
« Reply #2 on: September 29, 2014, 05:31:37 PM »
Business Admin with marketing concentration (Bachelor's) recent grad here. What is the specific goal you're looking to leverage this MBA towards? And what's your current background/understanding of marketing?

MBA 594 Search Engine Optimization - nothing you couldn't learn in an afternoon browsing the web.
MBA 595 Social Media - same thing - no real hard skills here at all. They're most likely going to talk about how every company should have a Facebook account, Twitter feed, etc. Most social media "training" is BS - I should know, as I took such a course.

MBA 593 Web Analytics and MBA 592 Conversion Optimization both look somewhat more interesting. But the thing I worry about studying specifically internet marketing is that it's applicability is short-term. This stuff is already being automated as we speak. The only reason SEO even exists is because you have search engines like Google scanning the web. What if the techniques change? Your skill becomes obsolete.

In my opinion the Marketing Management Concentration classes look like they will give you a lot better picture of marketing overall, as well as how it is changing. No you won't get as many specific skills, but you will understand marketing in general much better, which should help you in your career long-term.

Of course, if you're just getting this MBA to put "SEO", "web analytics", and "social media" on your resume, then ignore all I just said.

vagon

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Re: Marketing or Specific Internet Marketing focus in MBA
« Reply #3 on: September 29, 2014, 06:32:11 PM »
Internet marketing is a progressive field, literally all about getting the best ROI for money spent.
An MBA is a conservative management degree, with normally a poor ROI.

When you look at internet marketing practitioners they will question your analytic capabilities given the poor ROI, though mentioning work paying for it will probably over come this.

When you look at who will value your MBA it will be big business executives. They will be ranking you based off brand, they'll pay attention first to the school you went to and then secondly by the focus. An Internet Marketing major it will cheapen the brand of your MBA, unless you play the school trump card and went to say Stanford or MIT.

Go for the Marketing Management focus.

thedayisbrave

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Re: Marketing or Specific Internet Marketing focus in MBA
« Reply #4 on: September 30, 2014, 09:16:09 AM »
Of course it depends on your interests but I'll echo what others have said here.  The Marketing Management focus may seem a little more dull/traditional and 'not as applicable' in today's situation, but it'll give you better fundamentals and a more solid understanding of the ins-and-outs.  Internet marketing you can learn pretty quickly - you don't necessarily need to have a focus on it, as it's stuff you can generally pick up pretty quickly on an as-needed basis. 

OSUBearCub

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Re: Marketing or Specific Internet Marketing focus in MBA
« Reply #5 on: September 30, 2014, 11:00:30 AM »
The company I work for is the most "tech" arm of a global corporation.  It's complicated but my distinct lack of a business or tech background actually got me in the door.  They pay for the degrees because they have direct application within our organization as means of promoting from within.  My understanding of Marketing comes from my exposure to the marketing people who work with my specific team (they're a few levels up but the organization is pretty flat - I've seen what they do on a day-to-day basis).

Name recognition: it's a small school but it's very well known internally.  The brand reputation wouldn't be an issue.  Externally, it's just another small, private, liberal arts school with great name recognition in a very small region of the country.  The school is probably unknown elsewhere.

I have no interest in leaving this company in the near future but I would like to keep options open down the road:

1. The Internet Marketing focus could have been written from the job descriptions of our marketing folks (the jobs I want at this company). 

2. I'm drawn to the theory basis of the Marketing Management Focus.  I feel it would build a theory base that could grow and evolve as I adapt those theories to practical application within the scope of my future jobs.  Thus, I could sell the broader-based theory side of my degree to a wider hiring audience - if I should want or need to move to another company.

Your thoughts are really helping me work this one out.  Keep 'em coming! :-)

vagon

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Re: Marketing or Specific Internet Marketing focus in MBA
« Reply #6 on: October 01, 2014, 03:31:58 AM »
Well let me finish with this then... read Web Analytics 2.0 and tell me how much of it applies today beyond high level theory.

If you want something to build off, go marketing if you want a (possible) quick promo I guess the other focus.

aschmidt2930

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Re: Marketing or Specific Internet Marketing focus in MBA
« Reply #7 on: October 01, 2014, 07:35:58 PM »
The problem with most SEO courses is one secret release from Google, and a majority of what you've been taught is worthless, or even harmful to your search rankings.  I would shy away from Social Media as well, but the analytics could be very useful.

If you're interested in marketing, Marketing Automation and CRM systems are absolutely the way to go.  It's a somewhat new (Last 10 years in it's current form) field and rapidly growing, and people with the mix of marketing/sales acumen and technical knowledge to be a power user of the software are highly in demand.  Get a year or two of experience in it and you'll have huge leverage in the employment market and be pulling in an extremely strong salary.  One thing to mention is it requires some knowledge of basic coding, such as HTML, CSS, and in some cases Java.