BADM 420: Advanced Marketing Management

The University of Illinois at Urbana Champaign

Spring 2026

Instructor: Dr. Mark Wolters

Instructor Contact Information: mwolter@illinois.edu

Office Hours: 13 Wohlers Hall – Tuesdays I am in my office from 11:30am until I come to class. You can also speak with the instructor directly after class. Please let the instructor know if you are coming to office hours so he can block off time for your appointment. The instructor will be glad to meet you early or late if you are unable to make it to office hours.

Instructor’s Mailbox: 330E Wohlers Hall

OBJECTIVES OF THE COURSE

• Marketing Strategy: students will learn how to use marketing analytical tools in real world settings in order to determine better marketing, business, sales & product development tactics. 
• Branding: students will learn about brand development, how firms integrate branding throughout their infrastructure, and how to personally brand themselves for the Digital Economy.
• Segmentation, Targeting & Positioning: students will learn a number of ways to segment industries and client bases in order to better position their firms, products and services for their target markets.
• Digital & Social Media Marketing: students will be given an overview of digital and social media marketing trends, analysis and decision needs. This section will focus on the real world application of online sales, websites, digital advertising and the analytical tools that are used in the digital marketplace.
• Sales & Salesforce Management: students will gain an overview of the best practices for managing marketing and salesforce teams. They will also learn the basics of sales and sale techniques.
• Soft Skills & Professional Development: students will develop their soft skills for the marketplace allowing them to better transition into the working world as well as stand out in the crowded career placement field.

TEACHING METHOD

The classes will be a mix of lecture from the instructor, project analysis from the students and in class discussions. If time and relevancy permit the last 20 minutes of class will be devoted to in class group exercises dealing with the topic covered that lecture.

Furthermore, the course will be broken up into modules where each module will focus on one specific set of marketing issues. The main modules are Strategic Marketing, Digital Marketing, Professional Development, and Sales Training.

CLASS RESOURCES  

• Required Textbook – Essentials for a Career in Marketing 8^th Edition by Mark Wolters, published by Stipes Publishing, 2026. All slides and handouts are in this book. Available at Illini Union Bookstore.  Additional materials will be made available during the semester via Canvas.
• Social Media: please follow @woltersworld on Instagram, X/Twitter, Facebook, YouTube as well as @professorwolters on YouTube, Facebook, and Instagram.

COURSE EVALUATIONS – Descriptions and guidelines will be provided online prior to each project’s assignment.

• Political Marketing Write Up: Explanation in back of Book. 10% of final grade.
• Personal Branding Write Up: Explanation in back of Book. 10% of final grade. 
• Viral Video Assignment: 15% of final grade. Student teams will create a video that will be used to show social media data analytics.
• Strategic Marketing Project: 30% of Final Grade. Due in class. A bound printed copy will be provided to the instructor and an electronic copy will be sent to the company contact with the instructor being cc’d on the email with mwolter@illinois.edu if the instructor is not included on the electronic copy the project will be docked one letter grade for every day that the electronic copy is not sent. Project explanation found in the textbook. Include the grading rubric found in the back of the book.  
• Final Marketing Presentation: 15% of Final Grade. Explanation and Rubric found in the back of the book. Each team will need to provide a grading rubric from the back of the book with each team member’s name listed on the Rubric.
• Team Evaluation: 10% of Final Grade. Due in class by April 23rd. You are able to turn in the hard copy of the team evaluation prior to this date in class or at the instructor’s office hours. If you do not turn this in you lose 10% of your grade.  
• Class Participation & In-Class Exercises: 10%. These are found in the back of the book and will be assigned in class. You will turn in the sheets from the back of the book at the end of class. Please allow 10 days for attendance points to show up on Canvas.

GRADE SCALE

Grade Scale
90% – 100%	A
80% – 89%	B
70% – 79%	C
60% – 69%	D
59% and Below	F

CLASS SCHEDULE – subject to change

Topic 1 – Networking Essentials

Topic 2 – Personal Branding

Topic 3 – How to Develop Professional Presentations

Topic 4 – Dealing with Customers

Topic 5 – Discovering Trends in Marketing

Topic 6 – Strategy Formulation

Topic 7 – Industry Key Success Factors

Topic 8 – Market Sizing

Topic 9 – Sales Force Management

Topic 10 – Sales Strategy Development

Topic 11 – Selling and Sales Tips

Topic 12 – Selling and Sales Training

Topic 13 – Digital & Social Media Marketing – Digital First Consumers

Topic 14 – Digital & Social Media Marketing – Website & More

Topic 15 – Digital & Social Media Marketing – SOSTAC Model

Topic 16 – Digital & Social Media Marketing – Social Media Plans

Topic 17 – Non – Profit Marketing – no slides for this class

Topic 18 – How to Get your Boss & Co-Workers to Listen to You

Topic 19 – What I wish I knew Before I finished College

Topic 20 – Brand Development (may be used with Topic 6)

Please note that these dates and topics are subject to change at the instructor’s discretion. The instructor will inform students on any changes during lecture time. There should be two or three guest speakers during the semester and this will impact the order of topics. There are multiple faculty teaching this course, therefore some adjustments may be made.

Day	Date	Topic	Other	Assignment
Tue	1/20	Syllabus Day – Introduction to the course		Get the book at UI Bookstore
Thur	1/22	Networking Essentials
Tue	1/27	Personal Branding		Assign Personal Branding
Thur	1/29	How to Develop Professional Presentations
Tue	2/3	How to Develop Professional Presentations
Thur	2/5	Dealing with Customers
Tue	2/10	Discovering Trends in Marketing
Thur	2/12	Strategy Formulation & Implementation		Personal Branding Due
Tue	2/17	In Class Work Day – no instruction		Team meets to work on project
Thur	2/19	Strategy Formulation & Implementation
Tue	2/24	Industry Key Succes Factors	Assign Political Marketing Assignment
Thur	2/26	Crowdsourcing Ideas
Tue	3/3	Market Sizing + Evening with Matt Foreman chat		Evening Online Class too
Thur	3/5	Sales Force Management – Online Class		Watch the Online Videos
Tue	3/10	Sales Strategy		Political Marketing Due
Thur	3/12	Sales Training & Tips
Tue	3/17	SPRING BREAK – NO CLASS
Thur	3/19	SPRING BREAK – NO CLASS
Tue	3/24	Salesforce Management	Assign Viral Video
Thur	3/26	Digital & Social Media – Digital 1st Consumers
Tue	3/31	Digital & Social Media – Website & More
Thur	4/2	Time for Groups to Film Their Videos Together		No in-class instruction
Tue	4/7	Digital & Social Media Marketing – SOSTAC		Viral Videos Due
Thur	4/9	Digital & Social Media Marketing – SM Plan
Tue	4/14	Non-Profit Marketing		Guest Lecturer J. Xamis
Thur	4/16	In Class Work Day – No Instruction		Finish Project with Group
Tue	4/21	What I wish I knew before I finished College		Final Projects Due
Thur	4/23	Final Presentations		Team Evaluations Due
Tue	4/28	Final Presentations
Thur	4/30	Final Presentations
Tue	5/5	Final Presentations – if needed
Thur		We Have no Final so Enjoy Your Break!		Say “HI!” at alumni functions I will be lonely

COURSE POLICIES:

Attendance Policy: I truly enjoy teaching, especially when there are students in the classroom. So, please come. You are permitted to miss three (3) class attendance checks without any penalties, if you miss more than three your grade will be negatively impacted. If your attendance and participation suffer to such an extreme that it becomes an issue with the professor or your teammates, the professor reserves the right to FAIL students for lack of attendance and/or group in class participation. Please note that there is no reason to inform the professor on why you are missing class. The three freebee attendance checks are for interviews, illness, any reason, and the professor does not need to know why.

Mobile Phones: Please set your phone to vibrate or off during the class period (and do not answer them if they do go off). If you have an emergency where you need to be able to answer your phone during class please make me aware of the situation before class, so your slipping out to take the call does not cause any problems. If you are continually looking at your phone it is a distraction to other students and the instructor. Also, if you do this at work your boss will not like it.

Laptop/Facebook “updater” devices: No laptops are allowed to be used in class during the professor’s lecture. You can use them in the in-class discussion at the end of the course, but not during class. We both know that there is no need for the laptop to be open during class. This is extremely the case when there are guest speakers. If a student is on their computer (unless asked to do) during a guest speaker visit, there will be attendance points taken off of the students attendance grade.

Common Courtesy Policy: Students are expected to show respect towards the other students, faculty and guest speakers in the course. These courtesies include respecting others’ opinions, giving full attention to presenters, acting in a professional manner with respect to external contacts, other students and faculty. If you do not want to be in class, then do not come. Your attendance grade will reflect those absences.  

Plagiarism and Academic Dishonesty: Please do your own work. If it is found out that you copied, plagiarized, paid someone to do the work for you, used works from previous semesters you will receive a zero (0) on that assignment as well as a zero (0) in class participation. Also, if the act is severe further university action may be taken.

Special Accommodations: If you have any condition, such as a physical or learning disability, which will make it difficult for you to carry out the work as outlined above please notify myself, Mark Wolters during the first week of the course and I will do my best to accommodate you. Requests for special accommodations will require documentation from the Disability Resources and Educational Services (DRES).

Emergency Procedures: In the case of tornado or other emergencies Wohlers Hall and the Armory both have designated tornado shelters in their basements. BIF is not set up as a tornado shelter; however, the basement stairwells can be used in case of immediate emergency. In the case of fire note the stairwells. In the case of a shooter on the campus, lock down the classroom and move to a place of safety within the classroom. If you see a suspicious package, please alert campus police immediately.

Syllabus Changes: The Professor reserves the right to change the syllabus as necessary. The final decision and information about the syllabus and assignments are directly from the professor and these may be discussed in class. But the professor reserves the right to change any assignment, project, topic in the course syllabus if he sees fit. Not being at the class where the professor announces the changes is not an excuse to get out of the changes.

Grade Posting: The University prohibits posting grades by student name or SSN. These guidelines prohibit me from e-mailing or telephoning of grades to students. I will use the Compass system to keep up the grade reports as well as speak directly with students to share their grades on assignments/projects etc. If you want to know where your grade stands at any particular point in the semester please write me an email and then we can discuss your grade in office hours. Also, please note that the Canvas system will show you a class grade. That grade is not the actual grade you have as Canvas cannot weight the assignments correctly.

Final Note: This is a capstone course, which means you are here to show me what you have learned over the past three to four years. Then use that information and knowledge of marketing in order to help your company improve their marketing. Therefore, you will not be learning new topics in this class, but we will be covering the most important marketing topics for your future career prospects.

Additional Emergency Procedures from the U of I & Homeland Security

Run > Hide > Fight

Emergencies can happen anywhere and at any time. It is important that we take a minute to prepare for a situation in which our safety or even our lives could depend on our ability to react quickly. When we’re faced with any kind of emergency – like fire, severe weather or if someone is trying to hurt you – we have three options: Run, hide or fight.

Run

Leaving the area quickly is the best option if it is safe to do so.

Take time now to learn the different ways to leave your building.

Leave personal items behind.

Assist those who need help, but consider whether doing so puts yourself at risk.

Alert authorities of the emergency when it is safe to do so.

Hide

When you can’t or don’t want to run, take shelter indoors.

Take time now to learn different ways to seek shelter in your building.

If severe weather is imminent, go to the nearest indoor storm refuge area.

If someone is trying to hurt you and you can’t evacuate, get to a place where you can’t be seen, lock or barricade your area, silence your phone, don’t make any noise and don’t come out until you receive an Illini-Alert indicating it is safe to do so.

Fight

As a last resort, you may need to fight to increase your chances of survival.

Think about what kind of common items are in your area which you can use to defend yourself.

Team up with others to fight if the situation allows.

Mentally prepare yourself – you may be in a fight for your life.