Hi,

I am 23, Indian and looking to apply to postgraduate courses in Marketing at European B-schools. These are the schools I am currently considering:

Imperial College London
King's College London
ESCP Europe - London campus
Warwick Business School
Cass Business School

Also, I am specifically interested in studying marketing in the luxury/fashion sector. So I am also applying to:

Bocconi - Masters in Fashion, Experience & Design
Emlyon - Msc Luxury Management & Marketing (taught in Paris, London & Shanghai)

My main objective from the course would be to accelerate my career and secure a job immediately after graduation. So placement services, global reputation, ranking and location are of key importance to me.

Given these factors, in what order should I prioritise my current list of schools? Should I apply to any other school as well?

I would truly appreciate any guidance/insights!

Assuming that you don't write and speak French or Italian fluently, your focus should be either on learning one of those languages or on the UK. A compromise would be something like the Neoma MSc in marketing French excellence, which is aimed at international students who want to work in their domestic markets for French brands. http://www.neoma-bs.com/en/programmes/advanced-masters-and-masters-of-science-full-time/msc-in-marketing-french-excellence/presentation-of-the-programme

For the UK schools, I think this post is very useful: https://find-mba.com/board/general-forum/best-msc-mim-degrees-for-international-students-placement-52915. I think Imperial, ESCP Europe and Cass stand out on your list. I'd also look at Lancaster (the CUG ranks them the top UK school for marketing graduates' outcomes), Cranfield and UCD. The UK and Ireland are tiny islands. I would not worry much about location. We have national labour markets, and you can be anywhere in a few hours.

As one of their MRes in management alumni, I had a great education at King's but it doesn't have notable careers services.

Assuming that you don't write and speak French or Italian fluently, your focus should be either on learning one of those languages or on the UK. A compromise would be something like the Neoma MSc in marketing French excellence, which is aimed at international students who want to work in their domestic markets for French brands. http://www.neoma-bs.com/en/programmes/advanced-masters-and-masters-of-science-full-time/msc-in-marketing-french-excellence/presentation-of-the-programme

For the UK schools, I think this post is very useful: https://find-mba.com/board/general-forum/best-msc-mim-degrees-for-international-students-placement-52915. I think Imperial, ESCP Europe and Cass stand out on your list. I'd also look at Lancaster (the CUG ranks them the top UK school for marketing graduates' outcomes), Cranfield and UCD. The UK and Ireland are tiny islands. I would not worry much about location. We have national labour markets, and you can be anywhere in a few hours.

As one of their MRes in management alumni, I had a great education at King's but it doesn't have notable careers services.

[Edited by Arpita_ph3 on Mar 15, 2018]

This LSE's student satisfaction scores are very low. Any success students have is mostly to do with their pre-existing talent. It has a very modest corporate relations team for 1000 students: one full-time career consultant across all the undergraduate and graduate courses; one person working for corporate connections, especially with projects for the CEMS MSc, an events organiser and a part-time colleague. I would absolutely not consider the LSE as a peer of these other schools, and for marketing I find its MSc's focus on quantitative analysis to be a very poor preparation for the workplace and purely a by-product of the school's research.

Warwick, of course, is not so good for placement for international students but it is an excellent business school. I assume it has excellent brand equity in India.

In contrast with the LSE and Kings, Lancaster and Cranfield have MSc degrees with an advanced, strategic curriculum. There's a reason why Lancaster's BSc in marketing is has the best graduate prospects in the country, with some deep expertise in advertising, consumer culture, brand management and business marketing (I've given guest lectures there -
https://www.slideshare.net/dchapple/marketing-communications-and-brands-in-business-markets and I think their students are very well prepared ). Their c. 800 alumni in India seem to be in good place: https://www.linkedin.com/search/results/people/?company=&facetGeoRegion=%5B%22in%3A0%22%5D&facetSchool=%5B%2212603%22%5D&firstName=&keywords=marketing&lastName=&origin=FACETED_SEARCH&school=&title= Tata is thei top employer, as it is for Cranfield's 400 marketing alumni in India. UCD has just 120.

UCD, and especially their masters in marketing practice, has really impressive insight into marketing consultancy, sales and business development and strategic market creation.

[Edited by Duncan on Mar 15, 2018]

This LSE's student satisfaction scores are very low. Any success students have is mostly to do with their pre-existing talent. It has a very modest corporate relations team for 1000 students: one full-time career consultant across all the undergraduate and graduate courses; one person working for corporate connections, especially with projects for the CEMS MSc, an events organiser and a part-time colleague. I would absolutely not consider the LSE as a peer of these other schools, and for marketing I find its MSc's focus on quantitative analysis to be a very poor preparation for the workplace and purely a by-product of the school's research.

Warwick, of course, is not so good for placement for international students but it is an excellent business school. I assume it has excellent brand equity in India.

In contrast with the LSE and Kings, Lancaster and Cranfield have MSc degrees with an advanced, strategic curriculum. There's a reason why Lancaster's BSc in marketing is has the best graduate prospects in the country, with some deep expertise in advertising, consumer culture, brand management and business marketing (I've given guest lectures there -
https://www.slideshare.net/dchapple/marketing-communications-and-brands-in-business-markets and I think their students are very well prepared ). Their c. 800 alumni in India seem to be in good place: https://www.linkedin.com/search/results/people/?company=&facetGeoRegion=%5B%22in%3A0%22%5D&facetSchool=%5B%2212603%22%5D&firstName=&keywords=marketing&lastName=&origin=FACETED_SEARCH&school=&title= Tata is thei top employer, as it is for Cranfield's 400 marketing alumni in India. UCD has just 120.

UCD, and especially their masters in marketing practice, has really impressive insight into marketing consultancy, sales and business development and strategic market creation.

[Edited by Arpita_ph3 on Mar 15, 2018]

Honestly, it's not surprising for anyone who knows the Russell Group universities: Birmingham, Cardiff. Edinburgh, Glasgow, the LSE, Newcastle, Queen Mary etc are all great for research but not so hot for teaching. Their focus in on research and, especially in London, the most powerful researchers are drawn there who have a greatest ability to avoid teaching. As a result, many of the business schools with the lowest student satisfaction are in or around (Bedfordshire, Birkbeck, Brunel, Goldsmiths, Greenwich, Kingston, London Met, Middlesex, Roehampton, UAL, UEL and Westminster all score poorly in the CUG).

Manchester is not comparable with Lancaster or Cranfield in terms of its depth of marketing education or its placement ability. It is certainly comparable with the other schools ranked in the FT MSc ranking for management.

The Emlyon programme is an excellent option for people with fluent written and spoken French, or who intend to return to their home country.

[Edited by Duncan on Mar 15, 2018]

Honestly, it's not surprising for anyone who knows the Russell Group universities: Birmingham, Cardiff. Edinburgh, Glasgow, the LSE, Newcastle, Queen Mary etc are all great for research but not so hot for teaching. Their focus in on research and, especially in London, the most powerful researchers are drawn there who have a greatest ability to avoid teaching. As a result, many of the business schools with the lowest student satisfaction are in or around (Bedfordshire, Birkbeck, Brunel, Goldsmiths, Greenwich, Kingston, London Met, Middlesex, Roehampton, UAL, UEL and Westminster all score poorly in the CUG).

Ah, okay. Glad to now be informed about this


Manchester is not comparable with Lancaster or Cranfield in terms of its depth of marketing education or its placement ability. It is certainly comparable with the other schools ranked in the FT MSc ranking for management.

The Emlyon programme is an excellent option for people with fluent written and spoken French, or who intend to return to their home country.

[Edited by Arpita_ph3 on Mar 16, 2018]

The same order as their MIM ranking