Free Online Marketing Courses Help You Decide Whether to Start an Online Marketing Degree Program

While marketing is not a career field that always requires a college degree, an online marketing degree program can definitely provide you the skills and education to make the most of your marketing career. Jobs exist at all levels of marketing, allowing you to cash in on your two year, four year or six year degree; Read our article, "Interested in an Online Degree in Marketing? You have Four Levels to Choose From" to help you decide how far you want to go with your marketing education. And of course, as with anything there are advantages and disadvantages of distance learning education.  If you are still unsure whether an online marketing degree program is right for you, consider testing the waters with a free online marketing course.

Can I Test Drive an Online Marketing Course?

Want to ensure that an online marketing degree program is the right fit for you? Then test drive a marketing course with one of the following free courses. That's right - you can take an online course for free!  A number of schools have made a limited amount of online courses available to the general public for free - yes, no strings attached, no cost to you; many of them include marketing courses. Of course, these courses will not earn you credit towards an online marketing degree program, they are simply designed to let you test the waters of marketing to see if the subject matter is interesting and in line with your expectations, and if you feel like you have the self-discipline to do an online course and program.

Where are these Free Courses?

If you conduct an online search for free marketing courses a lot of sources will reveal themselves. You can also go directly to a few specific schools and organizations. MIT offers free courses through their School of Management, just search MIT School of Management. An open source website called OpenLearn has a variety of online courses, including business and marketing. Even Yale and Notre Dame have reportedly made a variety of their courses available for free online; check their respective websites for details. University of California, Berkley has also made a variety of the lectures for their courses available online. While these lecture videos will not give you a feel specifically for an online marketing degree program, they can help you evaluate your interest in marketing overall.

How Can I Make the Most of These Free Courses?

To really get value from these free classes you need to take them seriously. If you choose a lecture, truly watch and listen to the lecture, absorbing the material. Consider how the material meets your expectations and whether this information seems interesting to you. If the principles of marketing they discuss bore you half to death you may wish to consider something other than an online marketing degree program. If you find the material interesting, contemplate how it might translate into actual online learning. Does the material seem to lend itself to written discussion and assignments? Do you feel that the content will keep you interested enough to proactively attend to your classes? If you answer yes to these questions, then consider an online marketing degree program and get started right away.