Iowa State Marketing (Bachelor's): Tuition, Graduate Salary, and Debt
- Bachelor's in Marketing
- Public university
- Ames, IA
- About 331 graduates a year
College Scorecard June 2026 release · BLS wages May 2025
The short answer
Iowa State marketing graduates earn about what marketing graduates earn nationally, $48,304 in their first year. The typical graduate leaves with $23,250 in federal loans, close to the national median of $24,250. Several Iowa programs report higher pay.
How it compares
Each figure is the median for graduates of the program. The Iowa and national columns are the medians across all marketing bachelor's programs that report the figure.
Five years out, Iowa State graduates earn more than the national figure and about $3,610 more than the Iowa median.
Debt and first-year pay at every Iowa marketing program
Programs in the upper left give graduates higher pay for less debt. Dashed lines mark the Iowa medians.
Hover over or tap a dot to see the school. Only programs that report both earnings and debt are shown.
What graduates earn over time
Pay rises about 42% between the first and fifth year.
Year 1 and year 5 figures come from different graduating classes, so the growth rate is an estimate.
Does family income change the outcome?
Graduates who received Pell Grants, which go to students from lower-income families, earned $3,603 less in their first year than other graduates. Students who expect to rely on grants should weigh this gap.
Paying back the loans
On a standard 10-year plan, the median debt means a payment of about $246 a month, or 6.1% of a graduate's typical monthly pay in the first year.
The government publishes these as ranges to protect privacy. They were measured in 2018 to 2020, partly during the pandemic pause on federal loan payments, so the forbearance share may be higher than usual. Separately, 113 parents took out Parent PLUS loans for these students, with a median of $32,146.
Where graduates work, and what the pay is worth
50% of graduates (192 of 384) were working in Iowa one year after graduating. Prices in the Ames area are about 11% below the national average, so a $48,304 salary here buys what about $54,378 buys in a typical US city.
Careers this field leads to
These are the jobs that the federal crosswalk from fields of study to occupations links to marketing, largest first. Pay is the median across all experience levels.
Market Research Analysts and Marketing Specialists
$66,390Median pay in Iowa. 8,880 people work in this job in Iowa. Nationally, jobs are projected to grow 7% from 2025 to 2035, with about 82,000 openings a year. Typical education to start: bachelor's degree.
Sales Managers
$134,010Median pay in Iowa. 3,260 people work in this job in Iowa. Nationally, jobs are projected to grow 5% from 2025 to 2035, with about 47,300 openings a year. Typical education to start: bachelor's degree, plus less than 5 years of related work experience.
Marketing Managers
$131,120Median pay in Iowa. 2,210 people work in this job in Iowa. Nationally, jobs are projected to grow 7% from 2025 to 2035, with about 34,000 openings a year. Typical education to start: bachelor's degree, plus 5 years or more of related work experience.
Web and Digital Interface Designers
$69,060Median pay in Iowa. 670 people work in this job in Iowa. Nationally, jobs are projected to grow 6% from 2025 to 2035, with about 8,300 openings a year. Typical education to start: bachelor's degree.
About Iowa State
Marketing ranks 29th of 63 bachelor's programs at Iowa State by first-year earnings. The top three are Electrical Engineering ($84,913), Computer Engineering ($79,182), and Computer Science ($78,517).
Other marketing bachelor's programs near Ames
Common questions
The median graduate earns $48,304 one year after graduating and $68,459 five years after. The median across marketing bachelor's programs in Iowa is $47,374.
The median federal loan balance is $23,250, which ranks 3rd lowest of 11 marketing bachelor's programs in Iowa. That works out to about $246 a month over 10 years.
On the numbers, yes for most students. Debt equals 48% of first-year earnings, against a national median of 53%, and the share of borrowers in default two years into repayment is 5% or less. If the highest possible early salary is the main goal, several Iowa programs report higher pay.
Most do. 50% (192 of 384) were working in Iowa one year after graduating.
About this data
- Earnings and debt only include students who received federal financial aid (grants or loans).
- Earnings only count graduates who were working and not enrolled in more school. Graduates who went straight to further study are not included.
- Debt only includes federal loans. Private loans and credit cards are not counted.
- Some schools with several campuses report one combined figure for all of them. We count each of those schools once, and leave them out of Iowa comparisons when their main campus is in another state.
- Scorecard figures describe graduating classes from several years ago. BLS wages are from May 2025.
- School-level numbers like tuition, admission rate, and graduation rate are for the whole school, not the marketing program.
Sources
- U.S. Department of Education, College Scorecard, field of study and institution files, June 2026 release
- Bureau of Labor Statistics, Occupational Employment and Wage Statistics, May 2025
- Bureau of Labor Statistics, Employment Projections 2025 to 2035
- Bureau of Economic Analysis, Regional Price Parities, 2024
- NCES, CIP 2020 to SOC 2018 crosswalk, and IPEDS institution directory, 2024