The word ‘essentials’ in its title might give the impression that the CIM Certificate's ‘Marketing Essentials’ module is a walk in the park. But be warned: this is not the case. As the first module usually studied when pursuing a Professional Certificate in Marketing, its three-hour exam demands preparation.
The exam is broken into two parts. Part A requires candidates to answer 10 short questions, each carrying four marks. Part B includes three questions based on a case study, each carrying 20 marks. The following tips tell you how to successfully approach and complete all of them.
Tip 1: Be concise. It is important to take note of the answer length you need to provide based on the marks awarded for it. In Part A, candidates are asked to provide short answers. In fact, try not to write more than five to six lines for a two-mark question. Addressing the requirements is all that is needed.

Tip 2: Understand the questions. Part B requires a very different approach. They are designed to test your ability to apply theory to a given context. They always raise key points and students are required to identify these points to contextualise the answers. For example, a question could be as follows: “As a marketing manager of a newly formed manufacturing company in the fashion industry, you are required to recommend a suitable pricing strategy that will help the company to grow.” In this question, the key words are “newly formed”, “manufacturing company”, “fashion industry” and “grow”.

Tip 3: Allocate your time. The exam being set for three hours (180 minutes), it implies that the maximum time that you could spend for one mark is 1.8 minute (180/100). Leaving 0.8 minutes or 42 seconds per question for reading and preparation time, the maximum time that should be spent on writing is one minute per mark. Therefore, for a 10 marks question, you can devote 10 minutes. All