Cranfield University MSc Strategic Marketing: What to expect?
28/02/2020

Hello, my name is Effie Katsa and I’m a Cranfield School of Management MSc Strategic Marketing student. In this blog post I’m going to share my experience and thoughts for the first term of the programme, my life as an off-campus student and give some recommendations for future Cranfield students.
My experience with Cranfield School of Management started when I decided that I want to extend my studies. After I finished my bachelor’s degree and I was seeking for a job I realised that marketing knowledge is really important for many job fields. I found out about Cranfield School of Management from my partner. He is a Cranfield alum and he was always telling me that his experience with Cranfield was one of the best of his life.
So I decided to take the chance and apply for MSc in Strategic Marketing. First of all I applied for the eligibility check; if you are unsure of your suitability for one of the Master’s programmes then the university admissions team are happy to review your details and give you feedback before you take the time to make a formal application. After about a week I got a feedback from the university to advise that I should go ahead and make an application. I believe that the eligibility check was really helpful in order to give me motivation to do my application and also to find out if I’m suitable for the specific program. I highly recommend for future applicants to give it a try. After I did the application for the programme and got the study offer, I accepted soon after and then I started to plan my move to England.
The first term of the MSc started at the end of September. In the first week we had the chance to meet the programme director and some of our module leaders, to get to know my course mates and break the ice between us and lastly to inform about what exactly we are going to experience from the beginning until the end of the term. During the orientation week everyone, the staff and the professors, were really helpful and made us feel at home. For me the highlight of the orientation week was the dinner that took place at Mitchell Hall, and both students and the professors were there. It was a great opportunity to get to know the professors a little bit better and socialize with my course mates who I hadn’t had the chance to meet during that week.
By the second week we had started our regular scheduled classes. The modules that we focused on in the first term were B2B and Key Account Management, Sales Management, Customer Relationships, Retailing and Omnichanel, and Big data, Insights and Analytics. In all modules we had weekly lectures and often also had guest speakers from well-known companies who talked to us about marketing insights and their experience in industry. My personal favourite modules were customer relationships and retailing because of my past working experience in fashion retailing. During these modules I had the chance to get to know more about the industries and have a better view about how the market works.
At this point I would like to mention that I didn’t apply for accommodation on-campus. That means that I’m not the best person to tell you about any experience in regards to staying in Cranfield’s halls. However, I know that many of the Cranfield students are staying off-campus this year. I will share my experience of being an off-campus student and more specifically living in Milton Keynes. Milton Keynes is one of the two largest towns close to Cranfield School of Management (the second one being Bedford). Milton Keynes is approximately 15 minutes away from Cranfield by car and 30-45 minutes by bus. It is really easy to visit Cranfield School of Management from Milton Keynes since there are regular bus schedules and there are many bus stops all around Milton Keynes.

The last thing that I want to share is some information about life off-campus. As I was mentioning before, I’m living in Milton Keynes which is a town where you can enjoy many things. Since Cranfield is a small village with little activities that you can do, your best option for dining, shopping and entertainment, is visiting Milton Keynes. In central Milton Keynes you can find two shopping malls, MK Centre and Intu Milton Keynes. In these malls you can do shopping from groceries to clothing and technology. For entertainment Xscape is the best option since is a place you can find a cinema, bowling and pool tables. There is even an indoor skiing slope. Lastly, Milton Keynes central railway station has regular train schedules to and from London which takes 30 minutes to 1 hour, depending on which train you get. That is my experience so far with Cranfield School of Management. Right now the second term has just started and I’m looking forward to sharing my stories about it on my next blog post. Also I hope my recommendations were helpful for anyone who’s considering applying for Cranfield’s MSc in Strategic Marketing for the next academic year.
Categories & Tags:
Leave a comment on this post:
You might also like…
Finding full-text Economist articles…
If you’re looking for The Economist, the place to go is ProQuest One Business. Follow these step-by-step instructions to get full-text access. Login here and click on the Publications option at the top, above the ...
Changes to Library Services over Easter, 18-21 April
Libraries on the Cranfield site Both Kings Norton Library and the School of Management Library (Building 111, first floor) will be open 24/7 over the Easter weekend. You will be able to use the study ...
Searching Statista: Effective strategies and Research AI tips
Statista is a global data and business intelligence platform with an extensive collection of statistics, reports, and insights on over 80,000 topics from 22,500 sources in 170 industries. It offers data on the global digital ...
Introducing…. BankFocus (Orbis)
For anyone researching the financial sector, BankFocus is a great place to start, providing financial and company data for finance institutions and companies from across the world. The service allows you to search for a ...
The Implications of US Tariffs on global supply chains
US President Donald Trump's new tariff policies announced on April 2, 2025 are expected to cause significant disruptions to the global supply chains, affecting multiple sectors and countries. A simple mathematical equation uses a country’s ...
Mastering the art of revising your writing
You’ve done the research and written your first draft. Now it’s time for one of the most crucial jobs as a writer - revising your writing to ensure your reader does not have to work ...
Thank you Effie for your detailed description of Cranfield studies and your life in MK. I have received an offer for MS Strategic Marketing, hopefully, I make it for a scholarship (I am in the process of selection). I am looking forward study at Cranfield. I wonder how you have managed all courses within one term; was it hard, were there a lot of reading materials to review and lots of writing tasks to submit? Does MK have schools? I plan to come with my husband and kids. Take care, Karly