Marketing
AICornell Certificate Program

Marketing teams are being asked to modernize fast, connect data to decisions, and use AI responsibly, all while still delivering growth. In the Marketing AI Certificate program, authored by faculty from the Cornell SC Johnson College of Business, you will build a practical roadmap for digital transformation in marketing, learn how to choose and plan across paid and owned digital media, and design a performance marketing approach that shows where automation, machine learning, and AI can strengthen the customer journey without eroding trust.

You will apply what you learn to your own organization through guided projects so you finish with concrete plans you can use to align stakeholders, prioritize initiatives, and move from experimentation to execution.

If you want a clear transformation framework, practical digital channel plans, and a responsible approach to applying AI and automation to performance marketing, you should choose Cornell's Marketing AI Certificate.

You’re not just watching content about AI and digital marketing; you’re building an actionable marketing transformation and performance plan, with structure, feedback, and real workplace application.

Unlike many online programs that are mostly self-directed, Cornell’s Marketing AI Certificate uses eCornell’s cohort-based learning model, expert facilitation, and applied projects to help you turn concepts into decisions you can defend at work. You will:

• Diagnose your organization’s marketing data and transformation maturity and build a roadmap for improving data, analytics, insight delivery, and team agility
• Make practical channel decisions by assessing paid media options (such as SEM, email, display, retargeting, video, social, and mobile) and owned media options (such as SEO, content marketing, social pages, and mobile apps)
• Design a performance marketing strategy using clear hypotheses, levers, and KPIs, then identify where automation and machine learning can strengthen segmentation, personalization, and optimization while protecting customer trust

Enrolling in this certificate also provides you with a 6-month All-Access Pass to eCornell's live online AI Workshops, interactive sessions led by world-class Cornell faculty that combine Ivy League insight with practical applications for busy professionals. Each 3-hour Workshop features structured instruction, guided practice, and real tools to build competitive AI capabilities, plus the opportunity to connect with a global cohort of growth-oriented peers. While AI Workshops are not required, they enhance certificate programs through:

• Integrating AI perspectives across most curricula
• Responding to emerging AI developments and trends
• Offering direct engagement with Cornell faculty at the forefront of AI research

Plus, by enrolling in the Marketing AI Certificate, you get two years of access to Marketing Symposium and AI Symposium, each featuring two days of live, highly interactive virtual Zoom sessions that will explore today’s most pressing topics, giving you a unique opportunity to engage in real-time conversations with peers and experts from the Cornell community and beyond.

You also earn a Cornell University credential that communicates credible, job-relevant capability in marketing transformation and AI-informed decision making.

Cornell’s Marketing AI Certificate is designed for working professionals who want to lead or contribute to modern, performance-driven marketing in a digitally transforming organization.

The Marketing AI Certificate is a strong fit if you are:

• A marketing manager, brand manager, or CMO who needs a practical roadmap for digital transformation and AI-enabled marketing
• A marketing automation specialist, growth marketer, or content marketer who wants to connect channel planning to data, measurement, and experimentation
• A product manager or entrepreneur who needs to choose the right paid and owned channels and build an ROI-minded marketing system
• A marketing data analyst or cross-functional partner who wants a shared, marketing-first language for AI, machine learning, and responsible data use You don’t need to be a data scientist to succeed.

You should be ready to work with marketing goals, customer journeys, and metrics, and to apply frameworks to your own organization through project work.

You will complete applied, multi-part projects that use your organization, product, or service as the context, so your work directly translates into a roadmap and plans you can use on the job.

Examples of projects learners have built in Cornell’s Marketing AI Certificate include:

• Automating a HIPAA-aware medication onboarding journey that triggers email and direct mail when a senior living resident is marked as a pending move-in, reducing enrollment friction and increasing pharmacy adoption
• Designing a preventive-care adherence program that segments patients by screening history and location and triggers personalized outreach to lift annual mammogram appointments by 10% while safeguarding trust and sensitivity
• Orchestrating real-time, behavior-based personalization across web, app, email, and dealer handoffs to increase certified pre-owned inquiries and test-drive bookings with clear consent and privacy controls
• Building a full-funnel paid media and CRM plan for a major promotional moment that connects nostalgia-led storytelling to app installs, conversions, loyalty retention, and advocacy with channel-specific KPIs and budget allocation
• Scaling an owned-media engine for a B2B webinar and virtual events platform by combining SEO with answer-engine and generative-engine optimization to increase AI-driven discoverability and convert content engagement into a pipeline

Across the certificate, you will evaluate your current-state capabilities, prioritize the most relevant channels and use cases, and turn AI concepts into concrete marketing decisions, measurement plans, and execution-ready strategies.

Cornell’s Marketing AI Certificate equips you to lead AI-informed, performance-driven marketing by turning digital transformation concepts into practical channel plans, measurement systems, and automation opportunities you can apply at work.

After completing the certificate, you will have the skills to:

• Design a performance marketing strategy
• Identify opportunities to use AI to augment your marketing processes
• Prioritize and manage resources across both paid and owned media channels
• Assess the relevance of paid channels to addressing specific customer needs and marketing objectives
• Recognize threats to trust for your customers and determine how to safeguard their privacy

Students commonly report that they leave with a clearer, step-by-step framework for marketing digital transformation, more confidence discussing AI and transformation with stakeholders, and a practical toolkit of templates and routines they continue using after the program. They also highlight rigorous but approachable content, detailed facilitator feedback that improves how they apply concepts, and the professional credibility of a Cornell-backed credential they can share on LinkedIn and résumés.

In addition, because eCornell represents the pinnacle of premium online professional education, participants in eCornell's programs often experience long-term career transformation such as promotions to more senior roles, salary increases, improved networking opportunities, and successful career transitions.

Cornell’s Marketing AI Certificate, which consists of 4 short courses, is designed to be completed in 2 months. Each course in this certificate runs for 2 weeks, with a typical weekly time commitment of 3 to 5 hours.

Most of the learning is asynchronous, so you can complete readings, videos, assignments, and project milestones on your own schedule within each course’s weekly deadlines. You will also have opportunities to join live sessions led by your facilitator, which help you pressure-test ideas, learn from peers, and get implementation questions answered in real time.

Students commonly describe this program as a highly practical, strategy-forward learning experience that helps them connect modern marketing, digital transformation, and AI into an actionable plan they can use immediately at work. Many say the content is rigorous in the best way, pushing them to think bigger about how data, culture, processes, and technology fit together, while still being presented in a clear, approachable format for busy professionals.

What students tend to highlight most often includes:

• A clear, step-by-step framework for marketing digital transformation that makes complex change feel manageable
• Concrete guidance for identifying, prioritizing, and launching AI initiatives and automation use cases in marketing
• Projects that evaluate your own organization and turn lessons into real plans, dashboards, tests, and insight routines
• Faculty expertise and real-world examples that show how leading brands operationalize modern marketing capabilities
• Thoughtful, detailed facilitator feedback that strengthens strategic thinking and improves how students apply concepts
• Short, focused lessons, often video based, that are easy to absorb and revisit when needed
• Coursework that feels immediately relevant and applicable to day-to-day marketing, communications, and leadership roles
• A flexible online structure that fits demanding schedules while still keeping learners on track with milestones
• A strong sense of professional credibility from earning a Cornell-backed credential students share on LinkedIn and résumés

Overall, students say they leave with a sharper marketing strategy mindset, stronger confidence discussing AI and transformation with stakeholders, and a toolkit of frameworks and templates they continue using long after the courses end.

Cornell’s Marketing AI Certificate is built for marketers and marketing-adjacent leaders who need to make better decisions about data, channels, measurement, and AI use cases, not to become machine learning engineers.

You will learn core AI and machine learning concepts in practical terms, including how supervised, unsupervised, and reinforcement learning connect to real marketing work such as segmentation, personalization, experimentation, and optimization. You’ll also evaluate the kinds of systems marketers commonly work with, such as CRMs, DMPs, and CDPs, and you’ll consider modern approaches to privacy-preserving analytics.

If you are comfortable working with marketing goals, customer journeys, and KPIs, you will be well positioned to succeed.

You will learn how to evaluate and plan across both paid and owned digital media so you can choose the right mix for your objective, funnel stage, and resources.

On the paid media side, you will assess channels such as search engine marketing (SEM), email marketing, display advertising, retargeting, video, social media ads, and mobile advertising, with attention to pros, cons, and measurement.

On the owned media side, you will assess channels such as SEO and content marketing, as well as social media pages, mobile apps, and emerging experiences like VR and AR, then draft practical marketing plans that align content, channels, and timing.

You will learn to treat trust as a core marketing asset and to design AI-enabled marketing in a way that respects customer expectations, consent, and privacy.

In the Digital Transformation in Marketing course, you will examine common data realities such as silos, missing data, and PII risk, and explore privacy-preserving approaches to data sharing and analytics. You’ll also look at bias in data and algorithms then discuss how to identify and mitigate it.

In the Marketing Automation and AI course, you will apply a practical trust-and-privacy lens to personalization, including how to avoid crossing into the "creepy zone," how to align data use to customer value, and how to choose the right level of data granularity when building predictive and optimization efforts.