Overview
Top reasons to study with us
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15
15th for Thought Leadership-Master's in Marketing
QS Business Master's Rankings (2025)
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41
41st for Master's in Marketing (world)
QS Business Master's Rankings (2025)
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Top 50 for Marketing in the QS World University Rankings by Subject 2024
Marketing is the dynamic core of business and can be a force for strategic change. However, what does it take to create a marketing visionary? How do you ensure communications flow across global business landscapes?
The MRes Advanced Marketing Management programme creates the next generation of marketing leaders. It develops advanced professional thinking, analysis and marketing management skills. It is the ideal next step for marketing or business management graduates who want to uncover deeper marketing insights. It also offers aspiring marketing managers the chance to develop their skills.
Our core modules provide broader marketing management knowledge. You then choose options to support your passions. Client interaction is integral to teaching. We encourage collaborative skill building such as group work, group contracting and away days. Your dissertation can be library-based. Or you can choose to solve a problem for a key partner company such as Microsoft, a social entrepreneur or a media organisation.
You will develop an understanding of management nuances and gain a higher level of professional insight. You will learn how to speak strategically from a managerial platform and manage multiple stakeholders. Our graduates have the skills to tackle evolving marketing problems and to solve social challenges.
As part of the UK’s longest-established marketing faculty, this programme has been established for more than a decade, so you will access a valuable and extensive database of global alumni. Many act as guest speakers and provide career feedback. We also offer dedicated marketing career support with help navigating recruitment processes, CV development and career planning.
The MRes option follows the same programme as the MSc Advanced Marketing Management course to the dissertation. It then focuses on a research-led proposal to lead into PhD level study.
Course Content
Over the first two terms, you study core modules, including:
- Marketing in Practice
- Researching Markets and Marketing
- Brand Management
You will also study a choice of optional modules in the form of pathways that cut across significant topics on digital, global, and/or responsible marketing. Examples are provided below:
- Digital Marketing
- Online Consumer Engagement
- Global Consumer Culture
- Global Strategic Marketing
- Critical Consumption
- Responsible Markets
In the third term, from May to July, you will work on a research-led proposal to lead into PhD level study.
Entry requirements
Academic Requirements
2:1 Hons degree (UK or equivalent) in Marketing or a related Business Management degree with minor marketing components. We welcome students with marketing experienced gained within a degree in Marketing, a Business Management degree, or practically within industry.
We may also consider non-standard applicants, please contact us for information.
If you have studied outside of the UK, we would advise you to check our list of international qualifications before submitting your application.
English Language Requirements
We may ask you to provide a recognised English language qualification, dependent upon your nationality and where you have studied previously.
We normally require an IELTS (Academic) Test with an overall score of at least 7.0, and a minimum of 6.0 in each element of the test. We also consider other English language qualifications.
If your score is below our requirements, you may be eligible for one of our pre-sessional English language programmes.
Contact: Admissions Team +44 (0) 1524 592032 or email pgadmissions@lancaster.ac.uk
Course structure
You will study a range of modules as part of your course, some examples of which are listed below.
Information contained on the website with respect to modules is correct at the time of publication, but changes may be necessary, for example as a result of student feedback, Professional Statutory and Regulatory Bodies' (PSRB) requirements, staff changes, and new research. Not all optional modules are available every year.
Core
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This module aims to develop managerial and life skills required for self-improvement and employability during and after studies:
- Team building and collaborative Skills
- Managerial and interpersonal skills
- Writing and communicating effectively
- Employability workshops and career events
This module aims to enhance your skills, both for the programme and to prepare you for the workplace after graduation. It is not a formally assessed.
The dissertation represents the keystone module in the MRes in Advanced Marketing Management.
It integrates the key intellectual skills (including critical thinking) with the generic research skills from the research methodology classes in order to investigate a specific topic from one of the specialist areas of Marketing.
Students on this module must complete a research based dissertation which also represents an important opportunity for students to further and deepen their individual understanding of a research topic in a specific area of marketing.
This module focuses on applying brand management theory into real-world scenarios by examining various brands and case studies. The objectives of this module are to:
- develop an understanding of the hierarchical structure and process of brand management actions;
- raise awareness of the decisions involved in brand management;
- explore the criteria used to evaluate and monitor brand-related activities.
The module delves into the role of brand management in organisations and consumer culture. It covers the types of decisions involved in managing brands and discusses contemporary challenges and opportunities. The module includes a range of lectures and case studies and is assessed through group work and examination.
Marketing in Practice contains three sub-modules:
- Practising Marketing Management,
- The Mindful Marketer and
- Strategic Marketing.
The central aim of Marketing in Practice is to allow you to develop the crucial skills of criticality and reflexivity – personal capabilities that are crucial whether you are an aspiring marketing manager or marketing academic.
The module "Researching Markets and Marketing" encompasses both qualitative and quantitative research components.
The qualitative research aspect of the module will focus on developing advanced skills in critical reflection and applying qualitative research techniques (such as focus groups, interviews, projective techniques and observation) in marketing. The primary objective of this component is to engage in and reflect on the qualitative research process and provide practical insights in marketing contexts.
For the quantitative part of this module, you will learn various statistical techniques using SPSS, a widely used industry statistical package in market research and scholarly research in marketing. The statistical techniques you will learn include analysis of variance, regression analysis, factor analysis, and experimentation. The primary focus of this part of the module is to enable you to build a narrative from data to facilitate informed managerial decision-making.
Optional
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Through Consumer Behaviour research and practice, this module examines how we come to know our consumers (hence, helping in developing your understanding of marketing knowledge). It aims to develop a critical understanding of contemporary issues and problems in marketing relating to consumer behaviour. Understanding consumer behaviour will also facilitate a better development of marketing strategy.
The main focus of this module is to understand how businesses operate within markets. Specifically, the module will teach you how businesses purchase from and market to each other. Throughout the module, you will develop skills in three main areas:
- identifying and explaining important factors that affect business markets,
- using concepts, models, and theories to analyse market structures, marketing strategies, and purchasing strategies, and
- conducting business negotiations and developing strategies that promote long-term value creation.
This module is designed to provide an in-depth understanding of various forms of online consumer engagement in the context of online consumer behaviour and digital marketing. Students will gain insights into a wide range of topics, such as online consumers, digital engagement, social media, and digital channel marketing.
The module will also cover the latest trends in online consumer engagement, such as augmented reality, virtual reality, and artificial intelligence. By the end of the module, you will have developed a critical understanding of these topics and will be able to apply your knowledge in the field of digital marketing.
After completing the digital marketing module on content and SEO, the Campaigns, Insights and Analytics module aims to provide you with more in-depth knowledge of digital marketing practices from a practitioner's point of view. This module covers essential aspects that influence the digital marketing landscape and how to use industry-standard data analytics software to inform decision-making and campaign strategies.
This module endorses a holistic mindset for digital marketing. Assessing popular websites and their effectiveness in marketing and branding through web analytics. You will be encouraged to think less in terms of Search Engine Optimisation (SEO) and Search Engine Marketing (SEM) but rather think in terms of optimising communications because neither SEO nor SEM exist in isolation.
This module aims to explore how ethics and sustainability are conceptualised, studied and applied to marketing management.
We will explore classical and contemporary understandings of ethics in social life, business, and marketing and how the sustainability concept has emerged and evolved into its contemporary theoretical and applied state. We will critically evaluate the ethics and sustainability nexus in contemporary theories of marketing ethics and sustainability. Finally, we will consider actual behaviours in marketing management and their implications for ethics and sustainability and conclude with a theory-informed and student-led look into the future of ethics and sustainability in marketing management.
In today's global marketplace, successful companies must adapt to the changing socio-cultural landscape of the world. This is especially important as globalism and nationalism debates continue to rise.
This module takes the view that the global marketplace is characterised by increasingly diverse yet interrelated cultures, creating new opportunities and challenges for international marketers.
Focusing on the consumer and cultural aspects of global marketing management, this module will go beyond the textbook to examine the pluralistic and ever-changing consumer market shaped by globalisation and fragmentation. Specifically, this module is organised around four substantive areas representing the most dominant arenas of international consumer research:
- cultural convergence versus divergence,
- the dark side of global consumer culture,
- cross-cultural research, and
- the marginalised consumers in the global market.
This module considers global strategic marketing from two thematic perspectives: the internationalisation of the firm and the globalisation of markets. The first theme looks at the way in which firms expand into markets through consideration of the organisational and marketing challenges. This includes market selection, entry mode choice and brand strategy. The second theme looks at the changes that occur in global markets and how this creates a dynamic environment, both positive and negative for international businesses.
The purpose of this module is to assist you in developing a critical understanding and analysis of market structures, as well as the difficulties involved in establishing, maintaining, and restructuring markets that prioritise ethical and responsible practices. By engaging in both theoretical reflection and practical discussion, this module aims to reveal ways in which markets may be transformed to accommodate the needs of various stakeholders, including the environment.
Fees and funding
Location | Full Time (per year) | Part Time (per year) |
---|---|---|
Home | £15,650 | n/a |
International | £31,500 | n/a |
Additional fees and funding information accordion
There may be extra costs related to your course for items such as books, stationery, printing, photocopying, binding and general subsistence on trips and visits. Following graduation, you may need to pay a subscription to a professional body for some chosen careers.
Specific additional costs for studying at Lancaster are listed below.
College fees
Lancaster is proud to be one of only a handful of UK universities to have a collegiate system. Every student belongs to a college, and all students pay a small College Membership Fee which supports the running of college events and activities. Students on some distance-learning courses are not liable to pay a college fee.
For students starting in 2025, the fee is £40 for undergraduates and research students and £15 for students on one-year courses.
Computer equipment and internet access
To support your studies, you will also require access to a computer, along with reliable internet access. You will be able to access a range of software and services from a Windows, Mac, Chromebook or Linux device. For certain degree programmes, you may need a specific device, or we may provide you with a laptop and appropriate software - details of which will be available on relevant programme pages. A dedicated IT support helpdesk is available in the event of any problems.
The University provides limited financial support to assist students who do not have the required IT equipment or broadband support in place.
For most taught postgraduate applications there is a non-refundable application fee of £40. We cannot consider applications until this fee has been paid, as advised on our online secure payment system. There is no application fee for postgraduate research applications.
For some of our courses you will need to pay a deposit to accept your offer and secure your place. We will let you know in your offer letter if a deposit is required and you will be given a deadline date when this is due to be paid.
The fee that you pay will depend on whether you are considered to be a home or international student. Read more about how we assign your fee status.
If you are studying on a programme of more than one year’s duration, tuition fees are reviewed annually and are not fixed for the duration of your studies. Read more about fees in subsequent years.
Scholarships and bursaries
You may be eligible for the following funding opportunities, depending on your fee status and course. You will be automatically considered for our main scholarships and bursaries when you apply, so there's nothing extra that you need to do.
Unfortunately no scholarships and bursaries match your selection, but there are more listed on scholarships and bursaries page.
If you're considering postgraduate research you should look at our funded PhD opportunities.
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We also have other, more specialised scholarships and bursaries - such as those for students from specific countries.
Browse Lancaster University's scholarships and bursaries.
Important Information
The information on this site relates primarily to 2025/2026 entry to the University and every effort has been taken to ensure the information is correct at the time of publication.
The University will use all reasonable effort to deliver the courses as described, but the University reserves the right to make changes to advertised courses. In exceptional circumstances that are beyond the University’s reasonable control (Force Majeure Events), we may need to amend the programmes and provision advertised. In this event, the University will take reasonable steps to minimise the disruption to your studies. If a course is withdrawn or if there are any fundamental changes to your course, we will give you reasonable notice and you will be entitled to request that you are considered for an alternative course or withdraw your application. You are advised to revisit our website for up-to-date course information before you submit your application.
More information on limits to the University’s liability can be found in our legal information.
Our Students’ Charter
We believe in the importance of a strong and productive partnership between our students and staff. In order to ensure your time at Lancaster is a positive experience we have worked with the Students’ Union to articulate this relationship and the standards to which the University and its students aspire. View our Charter and other policies.