Graduate Program

The program prepares a student for career opportunities in business firms, non-profit organizations or governmental agencies. Marketing is the business function tasked with attracting, retaining and growing customers. To do this effectively, marketers need to research customer needs, target the right customers, and then offer them value with the right combination of product, price, place and promotion.

Marketing is widely applicable to organizations and individuals: everyone has clients, and serving them well results in positive outcomes. There are many sub-functions of marketing which need to be staffed with people who have marketing knowledge and skills: advertising, branding, channel management, customer relationship management, data analytics, marketing research, pricing, public relations, and sales, to name a few. Marketing tasks typically involve a blend of creativity and analysis. Both large and small organizations, for profit and non-profit organizations, need marketers to manage these sub-functions.

Average annual salary for entry-level marketing positions in San Francisco is about $53,000 (salary.com). Graduates of our MBA program who specialize in marketing work for organizations such as Apple, Clif Bar, Clorox, Hewlett Packard, Kaiser Permanente, Samsung, and many small start-ups and non-profit organizations.

Master of Business Administration (MBA)

The MBA is a highly structured (five 800-level courses are predetermined) and broadly based degree designed to prepare students for career opportunities in business firms, non-profit organizations, or governmental agencies. Limited specialization and elective graduate courses, all at the 800 level, should be selected, upon advisement, from the graduate course listing for the Lam Family College of Business.

Prerequisites

Our graduate course offerings begin with the prerequisite requirement (BUS 787 Marketing Management). MBA students may take MKTG 860 Strategic Marketing to fulfill the Marketing / Globalization advanced requirement.

Elective Courses

These elective courses are available to MBA students:

  • MKTG 820 Digital Marketing
  • MKTG 862 Advertising
  • MKTG 875 Brand Management
  • MKTG 861 Consumer Behavior
  • MKTG 885 Marketing of High-Technology Products and Services
  • MKTG 886 Marketing Analytics

Graduate Certificate in Marketing in the Digital Economy

MBA students who complete the three-course sequence of MKTG 820 Digital Marketing, MKTG 885 Marketing of High-Technology Products and Services, and MKTG 886 Marketing Analytics can apply for this certificate, which provides evidence of specialization on the academic transcript. 

Certificate Application

To receive the certificate, students would take the required courses and upon completion, fill out the certificate application form (pdf) and email it to Christopher Kingston, director of student advising (cak@sfsu.edu). 

To Learn More

To learn more about the certificate program or the individual courses:

 

    Faculty Advisers

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