Industry placement models for Marketing

T Level industry placements are a vital part of the Marketing curriculum. They allow students to apply their learning in a real working environment, develop technical and employability skills, and gain insight into how marketing supports business objectives.

Each placement must last a minimum of 315 hours. The examples below show the main ways an employer might structure those hours: day release, block placement or a mixed model.

There are also flexible delivery approaches that can help employers support placements in different ways, including work taster activities, part-time work, split placements, supply chain or network placements, hybrid working and small team projects. These are explained later on this page.

Your local school or college will help you choose a model that works for your organisation and supports the student’s learning goals.

Placement models

There are three main models for structuring placements:

1. Day release

Students attend the workplace for one or two days per week over a longer period.

This model works well when:

• Marketing activity is regular or ongoing
• The student can support weekly content, research or reporting tasks
• The employer wants the student to build knowledge gradually
• The supervisor would prefer to limit placement time to set days each week

Example: A student supports a small business every Thursday by researching competitors, drafting social media posts, updating website content and preparing a short monthly report on customer engagement.

Over time, the student becomes more familiar with the organisation’s customers, tone of voice and marketing channels. As their confidence grows, they begin suggesting content ideas, helping to schedule posts and using basic analytics to understand which messages are working best.

2. Block placement

Students attend the workplace full-time for several weeks, often around a specific project, campaign or busy period.

This model works well when:

• A campaign, event or product launch needs focused support
• The employer has a defined short-term project
• The student can be immersed in the organisation’s marketing activity
• Placement dates can be planned around business or campaign cycles

Example: An events company offers a block placement in the build-up to a major local event. The student supports the marketing team with audience research, event listings, social media content, email updates, supplier information and promotional materials.

As the event approaches, the student helps monitor engagement, respond to agreed enquiries, prepare content for the event day and support the team with final checks. On the day of the event, they help gather photos, feedback and customer insights, before contributing to the post-event review.

3. Mixed model

This combines day release and block placement.

This model works well when:

• The student needs time to understand the organisation before supporting a campaign
• Marketing activity includes both regular tasks and project-based work
• The employer wants to build the student’s confidence before a busier period
• The placement is spread across both years of the T Level

Example: A large company offers a placement linked to a product launch later in the year. The student starts by attending one day a week to learn about the organisation’s brand, customers, products, tone of voice and approval processes.

Later in the placement, the student returns for a block during the more intensive launch period. They support campaign planning, draft content, help coordinate internal updates, prepare launch materials, monitor campaign activity and contribute to the final evaluation.

Flexible delivery approaches

Schools and colleges can work with employers to design an industry placement using a range or combination of approaches where the core placement requirements are met and the placement gives the student a substantive opportunity to apply learning, develop skills over time and contribute to real work activities. These can make placements easier to offer, especially for smaller employers, project-based organisations or businesses that cannot commit to all 315 hours in one setting.

Work taster activities: Students can complete up to 35 hours of work taster activities to explore marketing roles, shadow staff and build confidence before starting a full placement. Examples could include sitting in on a campaign planning meeting, attending a marketing workshop, shadowing a marketing assistant, joining a short employer visit, or completing a mock task such as drafting a social media post or reviewing a target audience.

Hybrid or remote placement: For Marketing, remote hours should normally be used for no more than 20% of the placement where possible, with students spending most of their time working face-to-face with an employer. Where remote working is established practice in the sector, it may be appropriate for learners to spend more than 20% working remotely. This might include research, content drafting, scheduling, reporting or online check-ins. The employer should be set up to support remote work, the student should have a suitable environment to work in, and must be prepared to work remotely, complete tasks independently, get appropriate equipment, and use online tools to communicate and collaborate.

Part-time work: Part-time work can count towards placement hours if the work is occupationally relevant to the Marketing T Level. The school or college must oversee the placement and ensure safeguarding in the same way as any other external placement. As with any other model, the employer must support the student’s learning goals and reviews.

Multiple employers: A placement can be split across multiple employers. The student must work to a single set of learning goals throughout to make sure the placement experience is coherent. All employers must write an appraisal of the student’s performance. Schools and colleges should use no more than two employers unless the student would benefit from broader sector exposure or this does not work from an employer’s perspective, for example because the work is short term. This can help where one employer can offer valuable marketing tasks but not the full placement hours.

Small team projects: Students can spend up to one-third of their placement hours working in a small team on a real employer-set brief. This is different from a split placement because students may complete much of the project from school or college, rather than spending all of that time in the employer’s workplace. The external employer must supervise the project, monitor progress against learning goals, give feedback and run at least one formal review meeting for each student on the project. Team sizes should be small, normally 5 to 7 students per team, and tasks should be based around a real scenario for the employer, ideally a live challenge.

For Marketing, this could involve a small group of students developing campaign ideas for a local business, researching a target audience, creating sample content, or presenting recommendations for how the employer could promote a new service.

Your school or college will advise which approaches are suitable and make sure the placement remains meaningful, relevant and well supported.

Planning your placement

Your local school or college will work with you to design a placement that suits your organisation.

They can:

• Match students with the right skills and interests
• Help agree placement objectives, learning goals and typical activities.
• Support supervision, onboarding and employer oversight.
• Support employers to put the right safety and insurance measures in place
• Advise on remote or flexible delivery
• Monitor progress and help resolve issues

Industry placements are a flexible, supported way to develop future marketing talent while giving students meaningful experience of the workplace.