Seeking an Introduction to Marketing Textbook? Global Textbook Offers an Option Available to All at No Cost

Over the past 100+ years, the marketing discipline has dramatically evolved since the Wharton School of Business offered the first marketing course, "Marketing Products", in 1904. 

As the discipline has evolved, a massive amount content on the subject of marketing has been published and made available to practitioners, faculty and students via the traditional textbook model (i.e. publishers develop textbooks and supplements for faculty to require for their course, and in turn, students are required to purchase the textbook to complete the course).

When you conduct an Advanced Search for Titles with "Introduction to Marketing" in them on Amazon.com, you initially find 110 results (http://goo.gl/y5dPZ). Many of these specialize in various marketing sub-topics, but at least 15 could qualify as viable foundational textbook options for undergraduate Introduction to Marketing Courses.

Amazon's Bestselling title to date is Marketing: An Introduction (9th Edition) by Gary Armstrong and Philip Kotler, published in 2008 by Pearson (now in its 10th edition). The price for this title ranges from $136.99 to $5.94 (Unknown binding - YIKES) and  it's already superseded.

Here is the Table of Contents for the 8th Edition of Marketing: An Introduction (better layout than TOC for 10th edition

This is an excellent text that certainly addresses the key terms & concepts covered in my Introduction to Marketing course, and if you are a good shopper you can locate a copy of this text (in print or electronic) at a great value.

Another option to this traditional textbook model is made available to faculty and students by The Global Text Project. This exciting initiative creates open content electronic textbooks that are freely available from their website. One of their available marketing textbook titles is "Core Concepts of Marketing" by John Burnett (2008).

When you review this title's Table of Contents, its worth considering adopting as a foundational or supplemental text Introduction to Marketing courses.

SOURCES
Evolution of Marketing Textbooks: Survival of the Fittest Approach (1997)
Core Concepts of Marketing by John Burnett (2008)
Marketing: An Introduction (9th Edition) via Amazon.com

I'm Using 16 Books for My Marketing Course and I Didn't Pay for One of Them! Ebook Databases Enable Students to Turn Page on Traditional Textbook Options. Can Publishers Keep Up

Yes, you read correctly...

Using existing electronic library database resources, students are linked to sixteen (16) high-quality ebook sources that support 100% of their Introduction to Marketing course at Southern New Hampshire University.

Embedded Ebook Link Model
Instead of looking for THE textbook that matches with a course, we have taken the course Key Terms and Concepts and have mapped those back to relevant content available via an ebook database (Books 24x7). For this particular course, that means students are seamlessly drawing on 16 different titles via embedded links they can access via a course ebook (PDF file) or via the Blackboard course site.

Using embedded links to this database, students can access the specific content relating to Key Terms and Concepts; decreasing the time spent on wading through chapters of traditional textbook delivered content and increase the time they apply essential content to a variety of activities throughout the course.

Ingredients for the Model
We are in the second semester of this developing model, but we are basically utilizing these existing resources to delivery course content that helps students exceed course learning outcomes without purchasing a textbook.

1. Teaching and Library Faculty
2. Library ebook database - Books 24x7,
3. Blackboard Learning Management System
4. Syllabus

Results
Over 90% of the 130+ students enrolled in my Introduction to Marketing sections have opted for the embedded link model vs. the traditional textbook. In addition, that same percentage of students using the embedded link option enjoyed the opportunity to access has indicated high levels of satisfaction with the embedded ebook links and

Looking Ahead...
Technology has created the opportunity for faculty to provide high-quality relevant content to students in any discipline with very little effort and without relying on a traditional textbook model.

It's difficult to say if this model will gain traction and expand to other courses and disciplines, but it continues to be an exciting project to pursue as publishers scramble to monetize an increasingly challenging environment.

How are you using existing resources to deliver content to your students?

CASE STUDY
Southern New Hampshire University | Forging New Ground by Going Digital