MSc Tourism Marketing Management

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Delivery:
Full time according to Funding Council definitions, Part-Time

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Accredited by The Tourism Management Institute, we are one of the top universities in the world for the study of tourism and hospitality, 10th in the world for hospitality and leisure management according to the QS University Rankings 2019 and 2nd in the UK (10th in the world) for hospitality and tourism management according to the Shanghai Rankings of Academic Subjects 2019.

This Master’s degree is a conversion course – intended for students who have not studied the subject previously, and ideal for graduates who would like to change subjects or career direction. It aims to establish your understanding of the principles of tourism marketing management, providing you with a framework to understand business development and marketing planning.

Specifically, it examines the relationships between the customer experience and marketing organisations, research planning, budgeting, marketing strategies and communication.

You’ll develop a critical understanding of contemporary issues in marketing and the ability to question current marketing patterns and trends. In that context, attention is given to the use of IT and social media in destination management and marketing.

The speed of change in the global tourism and hospitality industries means that students need to be kept abreast of contemporary issues. This is achieved through our close links with industry and an opportunity for students to engage in a full-time work placement. You can also undertake a semester abroad as part of your course. You can study in a range of countries worldwide at the end of the taught component of your Master’s degree.

This course is delivered by a team of research-active, internationally recognised experts with a wide range of industry and academic experience. This includes Professor Dimitrios Buhalis, who is known for his work on technology in tourism research, practice, and education and is one of the most cited authors in the world on tourism marketing. This ensures that discussion in lectures and seminars is informed by both cutting edge research and practice.

Gain a more detailed insight about this course by watching our online presentation, delivered by Senior Lecturer Dr Susanna Curtin.

Key information

Next start date:

September 2019, January 2020, September 2020, January 2021

Location:

Bournemouth University, Talbot Campus

Duration:

September: 1 year full-time (16 months with optional study exchange). January: 16 months full-time (18 months with optional study exchange), 2 years part-time or with optional 30-week work placement

Accreditations:

United Nations World Tourism Organisation (UNWTO); Tourism Management Institute

Required subjects:

All subjects considered

Entry requirements:

A Bachelors Honours degree with 2:2 in any subject or equivalent.

International entry requirements:

If English is not your first language you'll need IELTS 6.0 (Academic) with a minimum of 5.5 in each component. For more information check out our full entry requirements.

Accredited by:

Course details

If you want to study part-time, you’ll study alongside full-time students over two years. You'll be expected to study a minimum of three units per year, along with your dissertation towards the end of your second year. The timetable for when units take place varies each year but the typical delivery for one unit is four hours a week, split between two sessions, so you will be required to be on campus at least two days a week. We can work with you to consider the timetable and make an appropriate individual plan in terms of which order to study which units.

Download the programme specification (pdf 454kb)

Core units

The Tourism & Hospitality Industries: This unit will provide you with a comprehensive overview of the operations of the tourism and hospitality industries. It includes many guest speakers from industry.
Business Strategy & Finance: This looks at the foundations of strategic analysis and choices that tie into an organisation’s business decisions. This includes private, public and third sector. You'll study the corporate finance sources of organisations, reporting and interpreting financial data. This will help you understand the dynamics of the tourism, hospitality and leisure sectors.
Tourism Marketing Innovation: This unit will provide you with the academic knowledge and professional skills to study marketing innovations in the tourism and hospitality context. The emphasis is on a strategic approach and a global perspective is adopted.
eTourism & Digital Marketing: This unit explores how information technology and digital competence determines the competitiveness of tourism and hospitality organisations and destinations. This unit examines the latest developments in technological revolutions and applies them to the tourism and hospitality industries.
Destinations: Contexts for Tourism & Hospitality: Placing the tourism destination at the heart of discussion, this unit explores the physical, conceptual and administrative spaces in which tourism and hospitality activities occur, and as such provide the context for an exploration of the complex and interrelated activities of tourist activities. The unit will be international in nature, drawing on examples and practices from developed and developing nations.
Dissertation: The 15,000-word dissertation is the conclusion of your learning experience, where you’ll carry out a detailed research project into any aspect of tourism marketing of your choice.

Option units

Option units (choose one):

Air Transport & Tourism: The aim of the unit is to develop your awareness of the role of aviation management in the successful planning and development of international tourism. It will evaluate the potential barriers to continued growth and explore the conflicts and challenges of meeting both economic and environmental targets, highlighting the contribution of aviation to greenhouse gas emissions (GHG).
Conference Tourism: Here, you'll reflect on the conference sector's growth, and examine its present state by identifying the size, value, trends and growth of major conference destinations throughout the world. You'll also suggest how destinations and venues can develop a better conference product.
Crisis & Disaster Management: You'll develop a systematic understanding of the unique needs and critical resources that exist within key sectors and activities of Tourism, Hospitality and Events. You'll complete a number of strategic and tactical planning exercises aimed at addressing the need to integrate tourism and events within risk reduction, response and recovery strategies.
Design for Tourism & Hospitality: This unit addresses the role and significance of design in and for the tourism and hospitality industries at the level of individual businesses and organisations or sites and events. It considers the design of tangible and intangible objects or ‘things’ such as buildings (exteriors and interiors), maps and guides, souvenirs, live events, corporate identities, business processes, and servicescapes
Entrepreneurship: The process of creating a new entrepreneurial venture, and funding sources for new and upcoming entrepreneurs. There's a focus on identifying and evaluating entrepreneurial opportunities. Entrepreneurial development may cover a single entity, a further investment by a portfolio entrepreneur, a management buy-out, a spin out or a venture in an existing organisation.
Food Design & Marketing: This unit focuses on food in terms of its aesthetics, the processes and tools used, and the spaces where food is prepared, distributed and consumed, and how these are promoted and communicated to the consumers.
Global Food & Drink: The unit will provide an in-depth analysis of the role of food and drink in the international hospitality, tourism, retail and events business environment. An understanding of the nature of our relationship with food socially, economically, politically, environmentally and in terms of technology is a valuable addition to other strategic and operational areas of expertise.
Sport Tourism: Learn about the features of sport tourism and the changing demands for it, along with its supply structures and impacts on and responses from sport and tourism providers. You'll explore how sport, tourism and events interact.
Tourism & the Media: This unit will develop your ability to critique and apply media theories, practices and discourses in relation to tourism.
Tourism Culture & Society: The unit explores the principles, concepts and practices of tourism from the perspective of social science and cultural studies theories. More specifically, the unit discusses the contributions of social science disciplines in understanding the multiple dimensions and manifestations of tourism globally.
Tourism Management & the Natural Environment: This unit focuses on the complex relationships between the tourism industry and the natural environment, and the ways in which tourism can be managed to ensure that it contributes to biodiversity and conservation.

Please note that option units require minimum numbers in order to run and may only be available on a semester by semester basis. They may also change from year to year.

Optional work placement

The placement is intended to foster personal and professional development, and to help you to make a connection between academic learning and the working world. You should consider how a range of management theories can be used, and if management in industry could be improved. The transferable skills developed will improve your performance in your future career, both as employee and manager.

Optional study abroad

Studying abroad is an incredible opportunity to experience a new country and culture while continuing your degree. If you choose the study abroad option, you will complete a semester (around 3 months) overseas at one of our partner institutions.

If you start your course in September, you will complete semester one and two at BU then finish for the summer break. You will start the study abroad option in September of your second year, at the same time as completing your dissertation and complete the course in January of the second year.

If you start your course in January, you will complete semester one, break for summer and then complete semester two at BU. You will start the study abroad option in January of your second year, at the same time as completing your dissertation and complete the course in July of the second year.

You can choose to study abroad or take the optional work placement but not both.

Find out more about studying abroad.

Programme specification

Programme specifications provide definitive records of the University's taught degrees in line with Quality Assurance Agency requirements. Every taught course leading to a BU Award has a programme specification which describes its aims, structure, content and learning outcomes, plus the teaching, learning and assessment methods used.

Whilst every effort is made to ensure the accuracy of the programme specification, the information is liable to change to take advantage of exciting new approaches to teaching and learning as well as developments in industry. If you have been unable to locate the programme specification for the course you are interested in, it will be available as soon as the latest version is ready. Alternatively please contact us for assistance.

Placements

An exciting and valuable part of your studies with us is the opportunity to gain valuable experience through full-time paid industrial placements, for a minimum of 30 weeks. You will have the option to start your placement when the taught part of the programme finishes, usually in April (for September students) and in August (for January students).

Find out more about postgraduate placements

What job roles can you expect?

What support is available?

We provide a lot of support for you to help you find work, including a block of seminars, covering topics such as writing a CV and a covering letter, completing an application form, performing well in interviews, and we also provide language support to assist you with the written elements of your applications.

However, it is ultimately your responsibility to find work. The university does not guarantee that you will find a place. As you all probably know, it is hard work finding a job, and for this reason, many students change their mind once they are here, and choose a taught unit instead of doing the placement.

During your time on placement you will be supported by a unit tutor and a placement development advisor who will visit you on placement and keep in touch by phone and email.

International students

If you choose to do a placement as part of your course:

If you have previously studied in the UK, we will consider any study limit that may apply. We will issue your CAS according to the length of time you are entitled to under UKVI regulations (if you do not have enough time left for a work placement year, we will issue your CAS to cover your course dates only).
If you decide after you have enrolled on your course that you do not want to do a placement, this will be reported to the UKVI when you have successfully completed your course.

If you choose not to do a placement as part of your course:

We will note this on your CAS and your visa will only be granted long enough to cover your taught course, excluding placement.
If you change your mind while you are here and decide you want to do a placement, you will need to leave the UK to make a new Tier 4 visa application for the additional year of study. You would need to pay for your return travel back to your home country, as well as the cost of a new Tier 4 student visa application.

Your application

This course will be suited to applicants who:

Are creative and enthusiastic
Are able to work to tight and competing deadlines
Are able to work independently as well as enjoy working with other people
Can adapt to working with students from a diverse range of cultural backgrounds.

How to apply

What we’re looking for

You should have a strong interest and passion for extending your skills and knowledge relating to tourism management and marketing, especially during the final stage of the course when you must research one topic of interest and write a dissertation on this subject.

Though you must be able to work alone, you must also have the social skills required to interact with others, as the course requires you to do group work. You should also have cultural flexibility as you will meet other students from a diverse range of cultures.

Selection methods

How and when to apply

There is no application deadline for this course. However, if you will need a visa to come to the UK to study, think carefully about the length of time it will take for your visa application to be processed and make sure your visa will be ready in time for the beginning of your course.

Click the green ‘Apply now’ button to submit your application free of charge online through myHub, our application portal. You will create your own myHub account so that you can track the progress of your application. Don’t forget to save your application as you go; you can return to it at as many times as you want before you submit it. For more information visit our How to apply section.

Entry requirements

General entry requirements

The normal requirements for embarking upon a postgraduate taught degree are:

A Bachelors Honours degree with 2:2 in any subject or equivalent.

If you lack the formal academic qualifications needed to enter a postgraduate or post-experience degree, there are several alternative routes to follow - some based on experience. Contact the Future Students Enquiry Team for more information.

International entry requirements

You can find details of the international qualifications we accept, and what level of study they apply to, on our entry requirements for non-UK students' page.

If English is not your first language, you will need to provide evidence that you understand English to a satisfactory level. English language requirements for this course are normally:

IELTS (Academic) 6.0 with minimum 5.5 in each component, or equivalent.

View further information about our English language requirements.

Bournemouth University International College offers a number of pre-sessional English and preparatory programmes to prepare international students for postgraduate study at BU. Admission to the degree is guaranteed on successful completion of your course to the required level.

Careers

This course provides you with the opportunity to become immersed in the Faculty of Management and gives you a unique opportunity to mix with a diverse range of nationalities. This will increase your intercultural competence, which is vital preparation for working in a mixed-nationality workforce or dealing with a mixed-nationality clientele.

Potential graduate job roles

Some of our Tourism Marketing Management graduates are now undertaking roles in:

Senior management
Marketing
Destination management
International airlines
Tour operation companies.

As you progress through the course you will gain a better idea of the areas in which you want to specialise in your career. The skills you learn should stand you in good stead for your continuing professional development too – giving you more control over your future career direction.

Industries worked in

Further study

Costs and fees

You can find full information about the deposits required and how to pay your fees in our postgraduate fees and funding section, including details of the Postgraduate Loan (subject to fee status).

All fees are quoted in pounds sterling and are per annum. Fees quoted are for tuition only unless stated otherwise. Your tuition fees will be the same for each year of your course.

Find out more about living expenses for postgraduate students

No hidden extras

What’s included in your tuition fee?

Your tuition fee covers expenses associated with your course including tuition materials, access to facilities, mandatory field trips and the following:

One set of study-related consumables such as a memory stick/ DVD
Materials for laboratory and field-based teaching activity
Support for finding placements (UK or abroad) and fieldwork, and non-financial support whilst on placement.
A range of student services – advisors, help desks, counsellors, placement support and careers service
The Library – access to a wide range of electronic resources (databases, e-journals and e-books), print and multimedia collections, subject librarians and study spaces
IT labs (some open 24/7), wireless network, AV equipment to borrow
Peer Assisted Learning (PAL) scheme
Disability and additional learning support
The BU Language Centre to help you develop/improve foreign or English language skills
24 hours a day, 365 days a year security team.

Costs of living and other expenses you need to consider

Accommodation and living costs: view our price guide
Text books: remember that our award-winning library is stocked with a large range of text books for all courses, as well as online resources such as industry journals, free of charge
General stationery and other supplies such as print and presentation materials: the Students’ Union shops stock a wide range of stationery supplies on both campuses
Travel to, from and between BU campuses: our bus service operates in the local areas offering a subsidised travel rate; we also have a large number of secure bike storage compounds
SportBU membership: check out our student membership packages, sports events, varsity teams, information about our new facilities and more on the SportBU webpages
Optional fieldwork travel, outdoor wear and footwear (where applicable)
Telephone and travel costs incurred when undertaking interviews for coursework/securing placements.
A fee will be payable towards the cost of an Educational Psychology Assessment if this is required in connection with additional learning support. BU pays for approximately two-thirds of the cost of this assessment for UK students. For more details and current pricing please visit the students section of the website.

Repeat units

Deposits

International (non-EU) students need to pay a non-refundable £2,000 deposit to secure their place on a postgraduate course. You will need to pay your deposit by the date stated in your offer letter. The remainder of your fee will be payable on registration/enrolment. There are two exceptions to the non-refundable rule on the deposit:

You fail to meet the academic or English requirements of your offer
You are refused a visa to enter the UK, provided the reason for the refusal is not a fraudulent application.

Financial help available from BU

Our staff

On this course you will be taught by staff with relevant expertise and knowledge appropriate to the content of the unit. This could include senior academic staff, qualified professional practitioners and research students, many of whom are actively engaged in research and/or professional practice which is integrated into the teaching of this course. You may also benefit from guest lectures from industry, including our alumni.

You can find out more about some of the staff that are currently teaching on the course and their research activities below. Please note that teaching staff can change.

Dr Sean Beer – Senior Academic

Sean Beer is a senior academic with a passionate interest in the interaction between tourism, culture, food, the countryside and the food supply chain. He has considerable practical experience in hospitality, agriculture, marketing, the food supply chain and the rural economy in general, gained in family businesses and the food industry, local and international. His principal research interests include the food supply chain, consumer behaviour, rural business, society and development. On the MSc Tourism Marketing Management he leads the core ‘Business Strategy and Finance’ unit, and the optional ‘Food and Drink’ unit.

View Dr Sean Beer’s staff profile

Dr Lorraine Brown – Associate Professor of Tourism

Professor Dimitrios Buhalis – Professor of Tourism and Head of the Department of Tourism and Hospitality

Dimitrios Buhalis is Professor of Tourism and Head of the Department of Tourism and Hospitality. He is an internationally recognised expert in strategic management and tourism market. He has research expertise in the impact of ICT within the tourism industry, strategic tourism marketing, and the management of tourism distribution channels. He is the author of 18 books and over 100 academic papers. On the MSc Tourism Marketing Management he teaches on the ‘Tourism Marketing Innovation’ and ‘eTourism and Digital Marketing’ units.

View Professor Dimitrios Buhalis’ staff profile

Dr Viachaslau Filimonau – Principal Academic

Viachaslau Filimonau is a Principal Academic with research interests in sustainable mobility patterns, environmental management practices in tourism & hospitality enterprises and pro-environmental consumer behaviour. Viachaslau holds a BSc degree in Geography, a MSc degree in Environmental Management and Policy and a PhD in Tourism. On the MSc Tourism Marketing Management he teaches on the ‘Business Strategy and Finance’ unit.

View Dr Viachaslau Filimonau’s staff profile

Professor Adele Ladkin – Professor of Tourism Employment

Adele Ladkin is Professor of Tourism Employment. She has research interests in labour and human resources aspects of tourism and hospitality, along with and in the influences of digital technologies on the travel experience. On the MSc Tourism Marketing Management degree she leads the ‘Destinations: Contexts for Tourism & Hospitality’ unit, and also teaches on the ‘Tourism & Hospitality Industries’ unit.

View Professor Adele Ladkin’s staff profile

Jeff Sadd – Lecturer in Finance

Jeff Sadd is a lecturer in finance across many programmes within the Faculty of Management. His professional career background was in the International Capital Markets, specialising in Derivative Risk Management, working both in London and New York, where he was a Director of Derivative Trading and Management for a major UK bank. For the MSc Tourism Management programme, he teaches on the Business, Strategy and Finance, offering students a mix of academic and "real world" approaches to finance.

View Professor Jeff Sadd’s staff profile

Dr Daisy Fan - Lecturer

Dr Philipp Wassler - Lecturer

Dr Philipp Wassler holds a PhD from Hong Kong Polytechnic University. His research interests include the phenomenology of the tourist experience and tourism in Asia. On the MSc Tourism Marketing Management he teaches on the ’Tourism Marketing Innovations’ and ‘Tourism and Hospitality Industries’, unit and also the ‘Tourism Management & the Natural Environment’ option unit.

View Dr Philipp Wassler's staff profile