Marketing challenge? PLU’s Marketing Analytics students can help

Thinking of rolling out a new product line? Wondering about the effectiveness of your social media content? How do you determine your customers’ purchasing needs?

Marketing analytics is more than a trendy business practice. Businesses and organizations depend on data to help form key decisions about their operations, like what products or services people want and at what price.

The Pacific Lutheran University Master of Science in Marketing Analytics(MSMA) program is educating and training the next generation of global marketing and business leaders. Quantitatively rigorous and qualitatively rich, the STEM-designated program is the only one of its kind in the area.

In addition to learning how to initiate projects to capture and collect data, and use advanced research methods and statistical modeling to analyze the data, MSMA students learn how to formulate recommendations and communicate data-driven decisions with business and organizational leaders. They work directly with industry clients, with faculty support, to solve real-world marketing issues.

“Companies may have a problem but don’t know how to approach it,” said Qin Zhang, assistant professor of marketing for PLU’s School of Business. “The work our students are doing enables them to make very informed and data-supported decisions.”

The MSMA program is meeting industry and marketing demand. According to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, it’s estimated that the marketing research analyst occupation will grow 23 percent from 2016 to 2026. By comparison, other occupations are estimated to grow at 7 percent.

To date, around 40 students have completed the program. With broad skills transferable across industries, graduates are prepared for a wealth of job options, including marketing research analysts, brand managers, big data analysts, marketing scientists, economic analysts and more. “We’re bringing candidates to industry who are capable and trained and hit the ground running,” said Mari Peterson, director of the MSMA program.

If your company or organization has a marketing issue and would like to work with a student consultant or marketing team, contact Mari Peterson at mpeterson@plu.edu or 253.535.7445. She’ll put you in contact with a faculty member who will help determine a good fit within the program and customize an approach to help find the solution.