MKTG3033 Integrated Marketing Communications
The Complete Exam Bible · S2 2026MKTG3033 Overview
- 6 unit undergraduate course
- Semester 2, 2026
- In-person workshops
- Invigilated final exam
- Research School of Management
Integrated Marketing Communications is an undergraduate course in the Research School of Management at the Australian National University, taught in person in Semester 2, 2026 through pre-recorded lectures and weekly workshops.
- Assessed by Four coursework tasks plus an invigilated final exam
- Hardest move Applying a concept to the facts of a new case
- How to prepare Rehearse framing, targeting, planning and evaluation on fresh scenarios
What you get in the full MKTG3033 Exam Bible
- 10 chapters, 49 pages — every examinable topic, week by week
- 26 original practice questions, each with a model answer in the A3 Final Exam format
- 10 worked examples, solved the way MKTG3033 marks
- 16 computed figures, redrawn from the course’s own numbers
- Exam-morning plan for the A3 Final Exam (30%) — what to revise last, where marks are lost
Free on this page: assessment table, chapter map, one worked example, key terms, FAQ. The rest is in the full exam bible.
How MKTG3033 is assessed
| Component | Weight | Format |
|---|---|---|
| A1 (Part A) Communication Analysis (in-class tasks) | 15% | Individual; four equally weighted in-class written tasks in Weeks 2 to 5 |
| A1 (Part B) Communication Analysis (recorded presentation) | 20% | Individual; 3 to 4 minute video framing analysis, due 3 September 2026 |
| A2 (Part A) Communication Strategy (in-class tasks) | 15% | Individual; four equally weighted in-class written tasks in Weeks 6 to 9 |
| A2 (Part B) Client Pitch Presentation | 20% | Group; 10-minute in-person pitch plus 5-minute Q&A in Week 10 or 11 |
| A3 Final Exam | 30% | Individual; in-person invigilated exam held in the exam period after teaching ends |
All five weights come from the Semester 2, 2026 class summary, match the Canvas assessment overview and total 100%. The class summary states that format, timing and permitted materials for the final exam are published on Canvas later in the semester.
What other students are asking about MKTG3033
- Where can I find lecture notes or study guides for MKTG3033 at anu?
- The MKTG3033 study guide in AskSia Library covers Integrated Marketing Communications in 10 chapters, with the assessment table, a chapter-by-chapter topic map, key terms and a worked example, free to read on this page.
- Is there a final exam in MKTG3033, and how much is it worth?
- Yes. In the offering this AskSia Library guide is built from, A3 Final Exam carries 30% of the MKTG3033 mark; the full split is A1 (Part A) Communication Analysis (in-class tasks) 15%, A1 (Part B) Communication Analysis (recorded presentation) 20%, A2 (Part A) Communication Strategy (in-class tasks) 15%, A2 (Part B) Client Pitch Presentation 20%,.
- What does MKTG3033 cover on framing: how messages construct reality?
- In AskSia Library's MKTG3033 guide, the Framing: How Messages Construct Reality chapter explains frame analysis · competing institutional logics · the comparison questions · recorded framing analysis.
- What does MKTG3033 cover on critical audiences, target publics and legitimacy?
- In AskSia Library's MKTG3033 guide, the Critical Audiences, Target Publics and Legitimacy chapter explains gambling versus gaming · legitimacy judgements · target publics · personas and role play.
- What does MKTG3033 cover on media pathways and news values?
- In AskSia Library's MKTG3033 guide, the Media Pathways and News Values chapter explains communication pathways · PESO media types · news values · pathway choice on a budget.
Current MKTG3033 dates
| Date | Item | Control |
|---|---|---|
| 30 October 2026 | Class end date | Teaching for the Second Semester 2026 class ends on this date. |
| Exam period after teaching ends | A3 Final Exam | In-person invigilated exam worth 30%; check Canvas and your personal exam timetable for the date, time and permitted materials. |
| 9 December 2026 | Final exam results returned | Return of assessment date listed for the A3 Final Exam. |
Dates are as published in the Semester 2, 2026 class summary and the 2026 course page. Confirm exact deadlines and submission settings in the live LMS.
What MKTG3033 covers
Ten chapters follow the teaching weeks, from two-way communication and framing through the campaign planning cycle to the client pitch.
Strategic Communication as Two-Way Meaning Making
IP-IT model · speaking versus communicating · stakeholders, publics and audiencesWeek 1 opens with a reading by Jim Macnamara that separates three ideas people usually blur: speaking, information and communication. Communication, on this view, is the meaning formed in the receiver, so organisations cannot simply send it.
- Speaking, information and communication as separate ideas
- Why content counts only as output
- The IP-IT model of four purposes
- Speaking-to-listening ratios and transactional communication
- Stakeholders, publics and audiences compared
- The talking and listening self-test
Framing: How Messages Construct Reality
Frame analysis · competing institutional logics · the comparison questions · recorded framing analysisFraming is the analytical core of the first assessment block. This chapter explains what a frame is, how it builds meaning through selection, emphasis and omission, and why rival actors give one issue different frames.
- What a frame selects, stresses and hides
- Cognitive framing through metaphors and key terms
- One issue carried by several frames
- Gift and payment logics in donor recruitment
- The seven comparison questions plus a consequence
- Planning the recorded framing analysis
Critical Audiences, Target Publics and Legitimacy
Gambling versus gaming · legitimacy judgements · target publics · personas and role playWeek 3 turns from the message to the people receiving it. This chapter uses the required article on how the shift from gambling to gaming changed perceptions of legitimacy, and the workshop questions on why non-users were more influenced than users.
- Legitimacy as an audience judgement
- Gambling versus gaming and the label effect
- Users, non-users and audience knowledge
- Target publics in Mahoney’s chapter 6
- The AI-policy role play for five publics
- Personas built from evidence
Media Pathways and News Values
Communication pathways · PESO media types · news values · pathway choice on a budgetWeek 4 asks how messages reach people.
- Pathways as channels for objectives
- Media fragmentation and the PESO model
- Reading a media mix from a campaign flowchart
- Control against credibility across media types
- Five news values for earned coverage
- Choosing pathways on a small budget
Brand, Reputation and Organisational Response
Reputation versus legitimacy · competing narratives · brand reestablishment · voice and authenticityWeek 5 asks what framing means for brands and organisations.
- A brand as what audiences conclude
- Reputation and legitimacy as different judgements
- Competing narratives and organisational response
- Positioning that flexes across publics
- Voice, credit and strengths-based storytelling
- When a trend would damage the brand
Research and Situation Analysis
RACE and ROPE · review, desktop research, mini analysis · evidence, assumptions and gapsWeek 6 begins the planning half of the course with problem definition and research.
- Research as the first stage of RACE and ROPE
- Reviewing a client brief as a team
- Desktop research sources and tools
- Writing a mini situation analysis
- Key issue and key opportunity
- Evidence, assumptions and information gaps
Communication Goals and SMART Objectives
Goal ladder · SMART checks · baseline targets · communication versus tactical objectivesWeek 7 turns the situation analysis into commitments.
- Organisational goal, communication goal, objective
- The five SMART checks
- A sentence frame for objectives
- Setting targets from a baseline
- Communication versus tactical objectives
- Leading and lagging indicators
Messages, Publics, Pathways and Tools
Attitudinal segments · values over facts · Vision-Barrier-Action · message pillars by publicWeek 8 shows how strategy becomes words.
- How the message research was built
- Supporters, persuadables and opponents
- Four tips on values, story, solutions and tone
- Intrinsic and extrinsic values
- The Vision-Barrier-Action framework
- Message pillars matched to publics
Campaign Measurement and Evaluation
Outputs, out-takes, outcomes, impact · the Missing Type case · reflection rubric bandsWeek 9 closes the planning cycle with one question: how will you know the campaign succeeded?
- Outputs, out-takes, outcomes and impact
- Planning evaluation at the start
- The Missing Type donor campaign
- Performance against target and baseline
- Correlation versus causation in results
- Reflection rubric bands
The Client Pitch and the Creative Brief
Pitch story · ten-minute timing · creative brief sections · client-agency relationshipWeeks 10 and 11 are live client pitches: ten minutes in person, five minutes of questions, to a panel of the client, tutors and the convenor.
- A pitch, not a report
- Situation, insight, big idea, plan, evaluation
- The ten-minute timing
- Creative brief sections and constraints
- The client-agency relationship
- Preparing the whole team for questions
It treats marketing communication as a planned, integrated practice: advertising, direct mail, social media, email, search and content marketing combined so that stakeholders receive clear, consistent information in formats that resonate. The semester has two halves.
In the analysis weeks you learn why sending a message is not the same as communicating, how frames select and hide, why audiences rather than organisations grant legitimacy, how media pathways and news values decide reach, and how brand and reputation depend on what audiences conclude.
In the execution weeks you plan a campaign the way an agency does: situation analysis, communication goals and SMART objectives, messages matched to publics and pathways, and evaluation that separates outputs from outcomes.
The course is research-led, drawing on studies of framing, legitimacy, reputation and audience analysis, and it is built around live clients, ranging from a free tax clinic and a behavioural research lab to a heritage guest house and a First Nations-led community development organisation.
This guide follows those weeks in order, works an original example in every chapter, and closes with mixed practice and an exam-morning page.
Worked example · free
How much of a year's donor need did one campaign month deliver?
- +1Place the figure at the right level: registrations are an outcome, the behaviour the campaign objective named, not an output such as coverage.
- +2Compare with the annual need: 57,000 ÷ 200,000 = 0.285, so one month delivered 28.5% of the year’s required new volunteers.
- +2Interpret the gap: a strong month still leaves most of the annual need, and the 14% versus 5% contrast shows one segment is far under-represented among donors.
- +1Recommend: set a separate SMART objective for ethnic minority registrations with its own baseline, so success is judged per segment rather than in total.
Key terms
- IP-IT model
- A model of four communication purposes, inform, persuade, interact and transact, ordered from one-way sending to two-way exchange.
- Frame
- The organising idea that tells an audience what an issue is about by selecting, stressing and omitting facts, words and images.
- Cognitive framing
- Shaping how people think about an issue through subtle language cues such as metaphors and key terms.
- Legitimacy
- An audience judgement that an organisation or activity is appropriate and acceptable to exist and operate.
- Target public
- A defined group with a relationship to the organisation whose information needs a strategy is designed to meet.
- PESO model
- A way of sorting media pathways into paid, earned, shared and owned types, each trading control against credibility.
- News values
- The criteria journalists use to judge a story newsworthy: timeliness, proximity, conflict and controversy, human interest and relevance.
- Situation analysis
- A short, evidenced account of what is happening, why it matters, who is affected and what evidence supports it.
- SMART objective
- A specific, measurable, achievable, relevant and time-bound statement of the change a campaign must produce in a public.
- Vision-Barrier-Action
- A message structure that leads with a shared vision and its values, names the barrier, then states the action.
- Out-takes
- What audiences take from campaign content, such as engagement, shares and website visits, measured between outputs and outcomes.
- Creative brief
- The client document that sets out background, objectives, audiences, messages, measures, timelines and budget for a campaign.
MKTG3033 FAQ
How is Integrated Marketing Communications at ANU assessed in Semester 2, 2026?
The class summary lists five tasks: in-class communication analysis tasks in Weeks 2 to 5 (15%), a recorded framing analysis video (20%), in-class communication strategy tasks in Weeks 6 to 9 (15%), a group client pitch (20%) and an in-person invigilated final exam (30%). Coursework therefore carries 70% of the mark.
What does the final exam assess?
The official overview says it tests understanding of key strategic communication concepts and the ability to apply them in a structured, time-constrained setting. It builds on framing analysis, audience targeting, positioning and campaign strategy. Details of format, timing and permitted materials are released on Canvas later in the semester, so revise by applying concepts to new scenarios.
What is framing and why does the course start there?
A frame selects and stresses some facts, words and images while leaving others out, which tells audiences what an issue is about. The first assessed tasks in Weeks 2 to 5 build skills in identifying, comparing and evaluating frames, and the recorded presentation asks how competing frames affect an organisation’s reputation and legitimacy.
Why do non-users react more strongly to a label change?
In the Week 3 workshop on gambling and gaming, people with direct experience rely on what they already know, while people without it lean on cultural representations. A new label therefore supplies more of a non-user’s understanding, so it moves their legitimacy judgement further. Communicators gain most influence over audiences who know least, which also raises ethical questions.
What structure should the client pitch follow?
The course guidance treats it as a story: situation, insight, big idea, plan and evaluation, inside a ten-minute limit followed by five minutes of questions. The suggested timing gives strategy three minutes and evaluation one. The class summary also asks for a clear strategic process such as RACE or ROPE, linking research, objectives, strategy and evaluation.
What is the difference between outputs and outcomes in campaign evaluation?
Outputs describe what a campaign produced and placed, such as coverage or posts. Outcomes are changes in the audience, such as awareness, attitudes or registrations. In the Missing Type case, articles carrying the key message were outputs, while 57,000 donor registrations in the month were the outcome. Evaluation that reports only outputs measures effort rather than effect.
Can I use generative AI in this course?
The course guidelines encourage thoughtful, ethical use for brainstorming ideas, practising reframing, getting feedback on structure and checking understanding. You may not use it to generate complete assessment responses or analysis, and over-reliance on reflective or analytical tasks is treated as an academic integrity breach. Individual assessment guidelines on Canvas take precedence over the general rules.
Questions students ask in each MKTG3033 chapter
- Why does the course say speaking is not communication?
- Speaking produces words, images or video, but meaning only forms when someone receives and processes them. People can decode a message differently, ignore it or understand it and still disagree. The Week 1 reading therefore judges communication by what arrives in other minds, which is why campaign plans must include ways of hearing back. Chapter 01 · Strategic Communication as Two-Way Meaning Making
- How do I identify a frame in a news story or advertisement?
- Look for the organising idea, then the cues that build it: key words, metaphors, images, who is quoted and what comes first. Ask what cause, judgement and remedy the text implies. Finally ask what is missing. The Week 2 comparison worksheet adds source, intended audience, emotional and rational appeals, and key words. Chapter 02 · Framing: How Messages Construct Reality
- Why did changing the word gambling to gaming matter?
- The Week 3 article on framing the game shows that cultural representations shape whether consumers see an activity as legitimate. Gaming sounds like entertainment while gambling carries a moral warning, so the label shifted acceptance, especially among people without direct experience who depend on representations to form a view. Chapter 03 · Critical Audiences, Target Publics and Legitimacy
- What does PESO stand for in media planning?
- Paid, earned, shared and owned media. Paid is space or time bought from a media owner, earned is coverage others choose to give, shared is content people circulate and discuss, and owned is channels the organisation runs. Each trades message control against credibility, so most campaigns combine several types. Chapter 04 · Media Pathways and News Values
- What is the difference between reputation and legitimacy?
- Legitimacy is the judgement that an organisation or activity is appropriate to exist and operate. Reputation is how well audiences rate its performance and conduct against others. An airline that runs late every week is still accepted as a lawful, appropriate business, yet travellers may rate it poorly, so analyse the two judgements separately. Chapter 05 · Brand, Reputation and Organisational Response
- What should a situation analysis include?
- The Week 7 workshop asks for four things: what is happening, why it matters, who is affected and what evidence supports your understanding. The course tracker adds a key issue, a key opportunity, an evidence table with sources, and a list of missing information with the person responsible for finding it. Chapter 06 · Research and Situation Analysis
- What is the difference between a communication goal and an objective?
- A goal states direction, such as making eligible residents aware a free service exists. An objective states proof: a measurable change in a defined public by a date, such as a target number of appointment requests in a season. Goals sit above objectives in the course tracker, and tactics come last. Chapter 07 · Communication Goals and SMART Objectives
- Why should campaigns lead with values rather than facts?
- The message guide’s research found that values and emotions move people more than statistics do, and that they reject facts that do not feel right. Its advice is to embed facts in an emotive narrative that engages helpful values, such as family love or curiosity, rather than opening with data. Chapter 08 · Messages, Publics, Pathways and Tools
- What are out-takes in communication evaluation?
- Out-takes sit between outputs and outcomes. They are what audiences take from campaign content, such as engagement, shares, hashtag use and website visits. In the Missing Type case, over 19,000 social posts and 11,000 website visits were out-takes, showing people engaged before the registrations that counted as outcomes. Chapter 09 · Campaign Measurement and Evaluation
- How long is the client pitch and who watches it?
- The class summary specifies a 10-minute in-person professional pitch plus a 5-minute Q&A, with teams stopped at ten minutes. The Week 9 announcement explained that the panel is the client or its representative, the tutors and the convenor, rather than the rest of the class, so treat it as an agency pitch. Chapter 10 · The Client Pitch and the Creative Brief
How to study for the exam
Revise in two passes that mirror the semester. In the first pass, take chapters 1 to 5 and practise analysis on real material: pick a current news story, name its frame and the cues that build it, identify the public it targets, judge what it does to the organisation’s legitimacy and reputation, and note which media pathway carried it. Doing one of these a day keeps the vocabulary active.
In the second pass, take chapters 6 to 10 and run the planning cycle on one invented client from start to finish: a mini situation analysis, a communication goal, two SMART objectives with baselines, a Vision-Barrier-Action message for your largest movable segment, a PESO pathway mix that fits a small budget, and an evaluation plan that separates outputs, out-takes and outcomes. Finish with a ten-minute pitch outline.
Throughout, reread the feedback from your in-class tasks and pitch, because it shows how this course’s markers reward justification and evidence, and attempt each worked example before reading the model answer.
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