Digital & Social Media Marketing (DMM)

Digital and Social Media Strategies This introductory subject looks at the various components of using, interacting with, and creating a digital presence. These subject stresses the importance of effective textual, audio, and visual communication, alongside the necessity for ethical practices that emphasize privacy and security. Explore how to strategize, plan and communicate a digital strategy. Assessing trends highlights how digital marketing is always changing as is our relation to the ideologies it helps to construct.

Consumer Behaviour for Digital Marketing Consumer and market understanding are critical inputs to manage and grow a brand in today’s marketplace. In this course, students apply concepts from psychology, sociology and economics to understand the purchase behaviour of consumers, relate these concepts to marketing theory and practice, and identify insights into the formulation and implementation of marketing strategies and tactics. Students will learn current and future trends in consumer behaviour with a North American focus and what it means for brand marketers.

Search Engine Strategies Search Engine Marketing (SEM), including Search Engine Optimization (SEO) and Pay-Per-Click (PPC) is part of an integrated marketing communications strategy. This subject will look at the purpose of a search engine, how SEO can help organizations improve search engine rankings, PPC tools and techniques.

Technical Skills for Digital and Social Media This subject explores the technologies and workings behind digital communications and social media platforms. Beginning with a short history on group communication through technology, the course moves onto hands-on experience with digital, social media, marketing and analytics platforms. Following industry best practices and standardized processes, students apply their knowledge to develop marketing programs using industry recognized tools.

Content Marketing Management Content is the essence and substance of brand building that drives social media programs. Content Marketing is a strategic approach designed to help further an organization’s brand by focusing on the creation & distribution of relevant and interesting content aimed at attracting and retaining a defined audience. This course will introduce students to the concepts of content marketing and equip students with the tools and abilities to create a content marketing plan.

Managing Web Design and Development for Digital Marketing Managing Web Design & Development for Digital Direct Marketing equips students with the essential skills to design and implement effective web-based marketing strategies. Students will learn to create compelling marketing materials that utilize text, graphics, color, and layout to enhance brand messaging and meet business objectives. The course also covers the creation of a basic e-commerce store using WooCommerce, and the development of websites with WordPress, ensuring students can integrate written and video content to achieve specific marketing and communication goals. Additionally, the course delves into the analysis of ethical, privacy, and security considerations in digital marketing, with a focus on understanding copyright and licensing issues. Students will evaluate web content for effectiveness, analyze the impact of mobile devices on content strategies, and explore the use of Google Ads and Google Analytics to optimize digital marketing efforts. Fundamental concepts of network communications, clients, and servers will also be covered to provide a comprehensive understanding of internet and web-based technologies.

Content Creation - Words and Pictures Words and pictures have always been a powerful way for businesses to market and raise awareness for a product, cause or idea. Why? Because it is one of the most cross-platform and accessible ways to consume content anywhere. In this subject, you will learn about concept development and production processes in the creation of strategic digital content. You will produce social media content, data visualizations, short articles, blogs and images using a current digital platform to market an idea or raise awareness for a cause or product.

Content Creation - Audio and Video From 10-second reels to 15-minute vlogs to full-hour video podcasts, visual storytelling has become the base platform behind viral or branded content production. In this course, we will cover audio and visual production, including concept development, all phases of production – pre-production, production and post-production - the creation of social and digital content for promotion, as well as video podcasting. Students will create audio and video content using a current digital platform to market an idea or raise awareness for a cause or product.

Internet Market Research Through applied learning, this subject will explore how online qualitative and quantitative data is collected, analyzed, and applied to achieve desired marketing and business objectives. Topics include segmentation; data sources like social media, social listening tools, email surveys; crowdsourcing research; online research design and analysis. Conducting a real-world research project and case studies will impart hands-on knowledge to optimize a brand?s digital strategy through research.

Data and Analytics for Digital and Social Media Marketing It is important to measure the effectiveness of social media marketing programs. This subject will explore the integration of email profile data and web analytics; site recency, frequency, monetary (RFM) analysis; site usage; and Digital Media Monitoring and Dashboards.

Influence Based Marketing Influencer marketing is quickly becoming a key pillar in the marketing mix. As consumers change their media consumption habits and the traditional media landscape continues to shrink, social influencers have risen as the new class of persuasive and credible voices, able to sway consumer opinion and drive sales for brands around the globe. This course will take a deep dive into influencer marketing, unpacking the disciplines roots, providing best in class campaign examples and detailing the different types of influencers and the roles they can play in integrated campaigns. Students will learn how to find and vet influencers to maintain brand safety and how to create content that aligns to the consumer decision journey. At the end of the course, students will be able to measure and identify key performance indicators of success, developing their own strategic influencer marketing campaign.

Digital & Social Media Capstone This Capstone course will require you to combine multiple skills gained throughout the broader program and use them to create an actionable social media marketing plan on behalf of a real client assignment. In addition, Capstone will include a look at what brands are successfully integrating social media into their brand building efforts and require active participation in assessing their effectiveness through group discussion. Digital thought leaders will make guest appearances and active engagement will be required. This course will operate as an “agency”. Each week we will discuss current trends and topics and hold weekly team meetings to review and strategize a full-scale Digital Marketing Plan for specific Capstone Client Partners.