Ekin is an Assistant Professor of Marketing at the Martin V. Smith School of Business and Economics. She teaches Principles of Marketing, along with electives like Promotional Strategy, Marketing Strategy, Brand Management, New Product Development and Directed Studies customized to the student's interests in the undergraduate level as well as Management and Marketing in the MBA level.
Her classes are not conventional lectures. In this age of information, her objective is never to teach content alone, which is available and accessible to all; but rather enhance students' critical thinking and argumentation skills, along with the application of key concepts to real world situations. To this end her classes collaborate with local non-profits, social enterprises and small businesses in the Ventura county area, with the support of the Center of Community Engagement.
Her research has been featured in academic and practitioner journals such as Journal of Advertising Research, Journal of Consumer Behavior, Business Horizons, Journal of Public Affairs, Product Planning and Control, Journal of Commercial Biotechnology. Ekin is interested in a multiplicity of topics due to her interdisciplinary background. Her main area of interest is advertising strategies directed at skeptical consumers, but she also works on the rising applications of neuro-marketing and consumer co-creation.