Marketing 101

Introductory level
Kickstart your marketing career!
Let us give you the practical skills and real insights you need to start your journey. Learn how brands connect, and how you can too.

Perfect for beginners or career changers ready to think like a marketer.

Learn with nesma and get extra tutor hours!

nesma Certificate

Digital Marketing Institute
Format
On demand
Start date
Any time
Duration
6 hours
nesma credits
15
Course fee

FREE
Tutor(s)
Scott Goodacre, Jo Dolezal, David Colley

Get credits towards a recognised qualification
Join the nesma marketing community!

Over 75,000
learners

5.0 (62 reviews) 

Why learn with nesma?

We offer personalised learning that adapts to your changing situation at work and home, and more tutor hours to make sure you achieve your learning goals faster! 

Plus using our exclusive SkillsView™ and dedicated advisors, we work with you to help you build learning pathways to help you get that promotion! 

Watch our video to learn more about the nesma Way!


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Unique offers for this programme

We provide a unique range of offers to support your learning experience when completing this course:
  • CIM Foundation Certificate - qualify faster.

  • Access additional learning resources free on your personal Learning Hub space.
  • CIM Dual Award options - get your Marketing Essentials Award in 3 weeks!
  • Earn 15 nesma credits towards a CIM or DMI qualification.

Course description

If you're a student or just starting out in your career, this practical, hands-on course is the perfect way to step into marketing.

You'll explore the core concepts behind successful campaigns – from what makes customers tick, to how brands build trust and loyalty.

Ideal for anyone curious about marketing or considering it as a future career path. No experience needed – just a passion to learn and a fresh perspective!
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What you'll learn

Understand what marketing really is – and why it matters
Explore customer behaviour and what drives buying decisions
Learn how to connect brands with the right audience
Discover how to deliver value and build brand loyalty

Your course includes

  • Interactive e-learning on key marketing topics
  • Tutor support
  • 25+ useful online articles
  • 15+ videos and podcasts, to reinforce your learning
  • Reflective tasks, to get you thinking like a marketer!
  • Quizzes, to check your progress
  • Downloadable resources
  • Certificate of completion

Your foundation for a career in marketing

This course is designed for students, career starters, or anyone curious about how marketing shapes the world around us.

You’ll learn the fundamentals – from what marketing really means, to how brands connect with customers and build loyalty through value, trust and insight.

We’ll cover customer behaviour, brand positioning, segmentation, and the psychology behind buying decisions – giving you a solid grounding in marketing strategy and practice.

By the end, you’ll understand how marketing works across business functions and feel confident applying your knowledge in studies, interviews, or your first marketing role.

Get ready to think like a marketer and take your first step into an exciting career!

Course topics

  • What is marketing?
  • Marketing in action
  • How marketing supports customer satisfaction
  • Understand the customer buying process
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All our learners gain access to the nesma Learning Hub via your own homepage.

From here you can access all your courses, materials and activities, see your progress and work with other learners. 

The platform provides broader benefits including skills passport, activity badges and access to skills intelligence, offers and news!

Aims

You’ll gain the knowledge, confidence and core marketing skills to understand how brands connect with people and create value.

In short, you’ll become nesma certified with a solid foundation in marketing – ready to apply your learning in further study, job applications or your first role in the industry.

Certification Exam 

 
You’ll complete exercises and activities throughout the course to build your skills. At the end, you’ll sit a 20-question exam.

We’ll give you the tools and confidence to pass with ease, and you'll be able to download your certificate of completion as evidence of all your hard work and efforts!

Who is it for?

This course is designed for anyone starting out in marketing or looking to build a strong foundation, including recent graduates, career changers, interns, marketing assistants, coordinators and junior marketers.

It’s also ideal for anyone who wants to understand marketing to support their job – whether in sales, customer service, communications or business – helping them collaborate better and make informed decisions. If you're not sure, talk to us :)

Learning outcomes


Learning outcome 1
Learning outcome 2
Learning outcome 3
Learning outcome 4

Define what is meant by marketing
Explore key definitions of marketing as both a management and an exchange process, understand market orientation and discover the importance of identifying and satisfying customer needs.

Explore the importance of the marketing function

Learn all about the important role that marketing plays as a bridge between the business and its customers, as well as a link between other functions within the business...helping all processes to run smoothly and deliver a great customer experience!

Identify how marketing supports customer satisfaction
Explore customer needs and wants, discover how to apply the Segmentation, Targeting and Positioning (STP) Model to pinpoint your audience and really connect with them, and learn about how effective relationship marketing can boost customer retention, word-of-mouth marketing and advocacy!


Your course creators

Outline the customer buying process
Understand the reasons and motivations behind why customers buy, the decision-making process that they go through when making a purchase and the key role that marketing can play at every step in this journey!

Scott Goodacre

Digital marketing & CIM specialist

Scott is a qualified teacher and digital marketer with experience since 2006. He delivers CIM digital modules and helps businesses track and improve their online marketing. He runs his own consultancy and writes a sports marketing blog, The Online Rule. He enjoys solving marketing challenges across diverse sectors.

Jo Dolezal

Social media strategy specialist

Jo has over 20 years’ experience in marketing and communications, and runs Dolezal Consulting. She delivers CIM social media and content strategy awards and bespoke training. As Senior Social Media Specialist at NIHR, she leads campaigns and strategy. Jo is a Chartered Marketer with an MA in Marketing and specialises in strategic planning for niche markets.

David Colley

Brand & marketing communications specialist

David combines industry experience in design, print and marketing with academic expertise as a Senior Lecturer at Manchester Metropolitan University. Teaching CIM qualifications since 2018, he specialises in branding and marketing communications, and researches craft beer brand design. He’s also active in his local community cinema CIC.

Course content

1. What is marketing?

See how marketing goes beyond advertising to become a strategic, value-driven process at the heart of business success. You’ll explore how marketing creates value through exchanges that benefit both customers and the organisation, using key concepts like the definition and purpose of marketing, the difference between customers and consumers, and the role of market orientation in driving customer satisfaction.

2. Marketing in action

See how marketing connects the whole business by working across departments to align decisions with customer needs. You’ll explore marketing in action through the Customer–Company–Competitor (3Cs) model, and understand how it influences customer expectations and experience by collaborating with teams from product and finance to operations and supply chain.

3. How marketing supports customer satisfaction

See how marketing puts the customer at the centre by teaching you to segment markets, define audiences, and build loyalty through value and relationships. You’ll explore customer needs, functional vs emotional benefits, the segmentation-targeting-positioning (STP) model, and how to create brand advocates.

4. Understand the customer buying process

See what drives people to buy and how marketers support their journey. You’ll explore the five stages of the customer decision process, different buyer motivations like problem-solving or impulse, hedonic versus utilitarian needs, post-purchase behaviour, and how marketing builds loyalty beyond the sale.

What our learners say

Landed my first job

Thanks to the training, I felt ready for my marketing interview and landed my first job.
— Hannah R.

Clear and practical

The course made marketing easy to understand and helped me get job-ready.
— Alex J.

Great for beginners

If you’re new to marketing, this course sets you up to succeed in interviews.
— Jess D.

Helped me qualify faster!

This course gave me the confidence and head start I needed to complete my CIM qualification faster.
— Charlie M.

Ready for the real world!

This course prepared me well for real marketing challenges and job interviews.
— Taylor W.

Opened new opportunities

The course opened doors and helped me get noticed by employers.
— Emma T.

15% off if you sign up for a short course today.

Use the promo code on the right when you register, to get advantage of this offer before it ends!
Use promo code:

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Still not sure?  Talk to an advisor now...

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