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Integrated Marketing Communications

Find the Right Integrated Marketing Communications Program for You

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IMC Full-Time Master's Program

IMC Full-Time Master's Program

Launch your career in the marketing communications field with an intense five quarters that prepare you to understand and engage consumers, solve marketing challenges and build strong brands in the digital age.

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IMC Professional Master's Program

IMC Professional Master's Program

Expand your authority as a marketing professional through our faculty’s unparalleled leadership and your new relationships and connections with this flexible, hybrid program.

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Undergraduate IMC student

IMC Certificate

IMC Certificate

Learn how to better engage people in your cause—no matter what type of job you choose to pursue. IMC skills are transferable in a career that requires effective marketing and communication using multiple formats in a strategic and creative way.

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IMC Online short courses

IMC Online short courses

The suite of future-focused courses is designed to provide working professionals with the same high-quality research and insights that help prepare our on-campus students to lead into the future.

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Four Integrated Marketing Communications students

Why Medill IMC?

The future belongs to those who understand the art and science of marketing communications. Adopt the IMC "way of thinking" and gain the confidence to be an innovative leader.

  • Combine classroom learning with real-world experiences.
  • Work collaboratively with global companies, faculty and your peers.
  • Create innovative marketing communications strategies.
  • Understand and engage consumers in the digital age.
  • Balance qualitative and quantitative data to build strong brands.

Our integrated marketing communications programs will help set you apart from others in the industry and prepare you for the future.

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How is IMC different from an MBA?

The Medill IMC master’s program uniquely prepares you to excel in marketing communications in any industry. Everything you learn at Medill will be centered on consumer understanding. The master's program that is right for you depends on the skills you want to develop for your future career path.

Diversity, Equity & Inclusion

The diversity of students, faculty and staff at the Medill School of Journalism, Media, Integrated Marketing Communications has been a source of innovation, excellence and leadership throughout our history.

Today Medill continues its commitment to creating an inclusive environment and to providing equity in opportunities regarding research, teaching, administration and student services. Medill is dedicated to creating a socially just community by strengthening policies, developing programs, and fostering acceptance for a broad range of communities and concepts. We aim to welcome students, staff and faculty from diverse backgrounds and support them so they may thrive in our community.

Diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) are also essential to the professional skills we teach in preparing our students for careers in media.

Innovation is in our DNA:
IMC Research Groups

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IMC Spiegel Research Center

IMC Spiegel Research Center

Proving the relationship between customer engagement and purchase behavior, the Spiegel Research Center (SRC) is focused on evidence-based, data-driven analysis. The center conducts studies focusing on consumer behavior in social media and on mobile devices. The experienced SRC researchers provide evidence that shows which types of customer engagement with media and brands results in financial impact.

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Retail Analytics Council

Retail Analytics Council

The Retail Analytics Council (RAC) is the leading organization focused on the study of consumer shopping behavior across retail platforms and the impact of technology. Established in August 2014, RAC is an initiative between Medill IMC, Northwestern and the Platt Retail Institute.

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Intent Lab

Intent Lab

Intent Lab is a research unit created by Medill IMC and Performics. Its purpose is to find new ways to strengthen brands through understanding how consumer decisions are made and how brand engagement can be improved. Intent Lab research enables brands to optimize their marketing communications to drive measurable performance through visibility, relevancy, conversion, sales and ROI.

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Local News Initiative

Local News Initiative

The Medill Local News Initiative is an innovative research and development project aimed at providing greater understanding of how digital audiences engage with local news and finding new approaches to bolster local news business models.

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Your Medill IMC Network

Christiana Stewart
Jose Costa
Charlotte Tsou
Anthony Fleet
Kristen Nomura
Craig Greenfield
Younghee Lee
Christiana Stewart
Christiana Stewart (IMC15)
North America Director of Email Marketing, Nike
Jose Costa
Jose Costa (IMC04)
Chief Executive Officer at Magnolia Wash Holdings
Charlotte Tsou
Charlotte Tsou (IMC02)
Head of Marketing Analytics & Insights, Prudential Financial
Anthony Fleet
Anthony Fleet (IMC17)
Critical Communications Manager, United Airlines
Kristen Nomura
Kristen Nomura (IMC03)
Director, Display & Video Go-to-Market Strategy, Americas at Google
Craig Greenfield
Craig Greenfield (IMC00)
EVP, Customer Success at Mediaocean
Younghee Lee
Younghee Lee (MSA90)
Chief Marketing Officer at Samsung Electronics

Christiana Stewart (IMC15)North America Director of Email Marketing, Nike

"Medill truly taught me what it means to put the consumer at the center of all your marketing strategies - how they think, what they want, when we should talk to them. Not only that, I came out with a lifelong network of friends and colleagues that look out for eachother across the industry."

Jose Costa (IMC04)Chief Executive Officer at Magnolia Wash Holdings

Jose Costa has a long track record of leading large, multi-unit retail organizations with responsibility of +$2B in annual sales. Costa has increased organizational performance in multiple industries through identifying and realizing new growth opportunities, developing integrated strategies, and hiring and developing exceptional talent

Charlotte Tsou (IMC02)Head of Marketing Analytics & Insights, Prudential Financial

A 20+ years multi-national leader, Tsou has held several leadership positions in the U.S., Asia, and Latin America. In her current role as head of marketing analytics & insights for Prudential Financial, Tsou oversees enterprise marketing analytics agenda, primary research, and machine-driven insights and trends generation.

Anthony Fleet (IMC17)Critical Communications Manager, United Airlines

"Medill introduced me to a bigger and broader world of highly intelligent and ambitious people. During my time as a student, I gained valuable experience both inside and outside of the classroom that directly contributes to my success as a communication professional."

Kristen Nomura (IMC03)Director, Display & Video Go-to-Market Strategy, Americas at Google

Nomura is a seasoned strategy and operations leader, with experience leading go-to-market strategies and operational improvement initiatives for large digital media sales teams.

Craig Greenfield (IMC00)EVP, Customer Success at Mediaocean

Greenfield is a dynamic change agent with a deep understanding of integrated marketing communications and proven experience applying segmentation, targeting, and positioning to create customer value.

Younghee Lee (MSA90)Chief Marketing Officer at Samsung Electronics

Lee oversees Samsung's global brands and strategic marketing communications.

Vijay Viswanathan
Jacqueline Babb
Michelle Weinberger
Danielle Robinson Bell
Ernest Duplessis
Nancy Hobor
Ed Malthouse
Ashlee Humphreys
Lan Nguyen Chaplin
Vijay Viswanathan
Vijay Viswanathan
Hamad Bin Khalifa Al-Thani Professor of Integrated Marketing Communications and Associate Dean of IMC
Jacqueline Babb
Jacqueline Babb
Senior Lecturer and Director of IMC Full-Time Program
Michelle Weinberger
Michelle Weinberger
Associate Professor
Danielle Robinson Bell
Danielle Robinson Bell
Assistant Professor and Director of the IMC Professional Program
Ernest Duplessis
Ernest Duplessis (IMC96)
Associate Professor
Nancy Hobor
Nancy Hobor
Associate Professor
Ed Malthouse
Ed Malthouse
Erastus Otis Haven Professor
Ashlee Humphreys
Ashlee Humphreys
Associate Professor
Lan Nguyen Chaplin
Lan Nguyen Chaplin
Professor

Vijay ViswanathanHamad Bin Khalifa Al-Thani Professor of Integrated Marketing Communications and Associate Dean of IMC

Vijay Viswanathan's research focuses on consumer decision making, especially in the realm of branding, pricing, cross-media consumption and social influence. His research has important implications for the economic impact of managerial decisions related to marketing communications.

Jacqueline BabbSenior Lecturer and Director of IMC Full-Time Program

Jacqueline Babb is a committed and experienced marketing professional and educator with 20 years of experience. She teaches courses in marketing strategy, IMC strategy and digital marketing.

Michelle WeinbergerAssociate Professor

Michelle Weinberger's research takes a sociological approach to understanding consumers, stakeholders and marketplace actors. She studies socio-cultural aspects of consumption and the role of various forms of marketing communications in creating meaning for stakeholders.

Danielle Robinson BellAssistant Professor and Director of the IMC Professional Program

Danielle Robinson Bell's area of expertise is strategic communications and its impact on business outcomes for organizations, brands and executives. She specializes in work that advances efforts related to culture, equity, inclusion, women and BIPOC in the workplace.

Ernest Duplessis (IMC96)Associate Professor

Ernest Duplessis was formerly senior vice president of corporate communications and government affairs at Mondelēz International. His career includes over 25 years of public relations, internal and external communications, investor relations and government affairs experience spanning corporate America and the U.S. Military.

Nancy HoborAssociate Professor

Nancy A. Hobor is a senior lecturer in Medill’s Integrated Marketing Communications graduate program and has more than 30 years of experience helping companies strengthen their reputations and position themselves internally and externally. Within strategic communications, she has a passion for investor relations and employee engagement.

Ed MalthouseErastus Otis Haven Professor

Ed Malthouse's research interests center on media marketing, database marketing, advertising, new media and IMC. He develops statistical models and applies them to large data sets of consumer information to help managers make marketing decisions.

Ashlee HumphreysAssociate Professor

Ashlee Humphreys is an associate professor at Medill. Trained as a sociologist, she examines core topics in consumer behavior and marketing strategy. Her research investigates the role of legal and cultural institutions in creating markets, the influence of language on consumer judgments of legitimacy, and the process of consumer co-creation.

Lan Nguyen ChaplinProfessor

Lan Nguyen Chaplin's research focuses on branding, materialism and children’s consumer behavior, and she has published and spoken extensively on these areas.

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IMC Opportunities For Northwestern Undergraduates And Marketers

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IMC Certificate

This program is for you if you want to build upon your Northwestern undergraduate major with a specialized certificate covering marketing, communications, advertising, digital strategy, social media, analytics and more.

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IMC Online short courses

Designed to provide working professionals with the same high-quality research and insights that help prepare our on-campus students to lead into the future, these courses focus on delivering functional tools and frameworks, allowing you to obtain industry-relevant skills in a format that suits modern lives and busy schedules.

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