Digital Marketing

WHO THIS COURSE IS FOR
Small business owners, creators, communicators, marketers

or anyone who wants to learn the basics of digital marketing.

KEY TAKEAWAYS

You know how to build a digital marketing strategy.

You understand how keywords deliver strong results on search queries.

You know why people search online and create pages that

align with search behaviours.

You select keywords and create content always with SEO in mind.

You optimize your web pages, increase site traffic,

and convert visitors into customers.

This is a self-paced, six-week course.
Seleceted free and Open learning resources are provided.
Prepare to complete four assignments.
Plan on studying 10 hours per week.
Learn at your own pace but avoid rushing. Stress can block learning and retention.*

*Source: NPJ -: Science of Learning

“Apple computers isn’t in the computer business, they’re in the empowerment business. They took computing technology once hoarded by IBM and gave it to individuals."

– Terry O'Reilly, marketing expert, author and host of CBC's Under the Influence

Get ready to transform your marketing mindset

Traditional online marketing methods just don’t cut it anymore. Today’s constantly evolving digital landscape demands agile thinking (test, get feedback, revise), data-driven strategy and a deep understanding of how consumer behavior has changed. This course explains each step and shows you how to design a digital marketing strategy that can work well for you and your customers. What was once nice to have, digital marketing skills are now considered a core competency is today's work world.

Understanding our shift to digital marketing

Research shows that 64% of Gen Z and 59% of Millennials discover products via social media. This data was gathered during HubSpot’s 2024 Consumer Trends Survey and reported in their 2025 State of Marketing & Trends Report. This survey highlights how social media has become the preferred product discovery channel for younger generations, reflecting a major shift in consumer behavior and a steadily growing, changing marketing strategy today.

Strategic shifts include:

From funnel to flywheel: Campaigns focus on continuous engagement rather than linear conversion.
Agile marketing: Brands adapt campaigns in real-time based on social trends.
Community-first strategies: Learn how leveraged, user-generated content can build trust and scale.
Data-centric frameworks: Campaigns are now built around behavioral insights and predictive analytics.

These shifts are popular among marketers because they work. We all need to rethink how we build campaigns from platform choice, social trends, copywriting style, engagement strategies -- all must be designed to build trust. Analytics and new research shows us the way.

Developing these skills matters more now

Given that global commerce, consumer attention and brand interactions have shifted almost entirely online, the ability to understand and navigate the digital landscape is now a major professional advantage. Here's what you will learn in this six-week course -

Build a plan, rollout and analyze marketing online to create a framework that fits your needs.
Think in new ways and effectively communicate with consumers to sell products.
Understand why firms communicate with consumers instead of talking about themselves.
The consumer experience has been so altered; discover the implications for strategic planning.
Access in-depth studies on digital marketing framework centered on conversion-based marketing.
Learn how to attract visitors, create leads who become customers and foster customer loyalty.
Develop a content strategy, create content and build content calendars.
How to analyze and measure customer engagement and create value with customers.

What you will learn

The main goal of marketing: to create value and the ways you can achieve this goal.
The concepts of personas, customer journey maps and calculating customer lifetime value.
SEO and keywords, why they matter -- for your work, for consumers, and for competitor analysis.
Key terms of online strategy, the objectives of the four stages of the RACE framework, how it links to personas and journeys, and how to use it to support competitive analysis.
The Reach stage, landing pages, paid media activities, payment models and targeting approaches.
The basics of content creation aligned with the RACE framework, gated and ungated content, pillar pages and content creation calendars.
Conversion rate optimization and ways to optimize webpages.
The concepts of engagement and loyalty, how to calculate customer lifetime value and shape your marketing strategy.

Our learning resources are free and Open

This course is based on the teachings of Digital Marketing Strategy, written by Pierre-Yann Dolbec and published in 2023 by Concordia University Open Textbooks, Montreal, Quebec. Dolbec is an assistant professor of marketing and is the Concordia University Research Chair in Complexity and Markets at Concordia’s John Molson School of Business.

Learn how the Internet has transformed businesses, activities and how consumers go about buying products. This textbook provides a way of conceptualizing how to organize, manage and analyze marketing online.

Included is the RACE framework, created by Dr. Dave Chaffey, cofounder of Smart Insights. The RACE framework is a practical tool for building a firm, data-driven foundation to support a digital marketing strategy. Other strategies will be discussed and learners can choose their preferred tools.

The Digital Marketing Strategy textbook and the RACE framework are yours to download and keep.

Prerequisites

Education

Minimum: Grade 12 completion.
Solid reading and writing sklls and the ability to speak clearly, listen intently and think critically.

Technical skills

Computer and calculator familiarity.
Keyboarding - accuracy, speed, spell check, correct posture as a habit.
Ability to search online.