I want to know how I should go about my career so that I climb the ladder of success in the Marketing field as fast as possible. I already have a Masters in Marketing. Which additional skills do I need to gain in order to give my career a boost?
A degree is a great start! What works well is successful campaigns to spread awareness - get people to sign up for a social media account, contribute to a Kickstarter, raise money for charity. Interning for a medium size firm as their marketer will give you a chance to make mistakes, learn basics of email and social, and get some small wins to get paid positions down the line. Hop on a call with me and I'd be happy to help you plan a career trajectory.
Hi there,
I've been in Marketing for 12 years now, the last 10 in Procter & Gamble. In parallel I've created 3 startups, so my opinion is the following. While you will learn tactics by working directly in startups, you will have a faster learning of strategy and consumer driven design and marketing in large corporate companies, such as P&G or Unilever. That is the kind of marketing that doesn't fade away. After ~3-4 years, consider if you still like corporate or if you are ready to start your business/work in a startup. If you do, you'll have learned in Corporate not only marketing, but also acquired the structure and discipline needed in any future business you might want to work in (or launch).
Now, while rewards of working in corporate are high, succeeding in Corporate is not an easy task. You can learn more on wolfleaders.com or reach out directly to me on Clarity.
Take care,
Serena
I don't want to sound rude, but maybe if you have to ask this question you shouldn't be in marketing.
With that said, here are some tips:
1. Know that in marketing, as an employee in a PR firm the pace is very accelerated, you get few shots at making great impressions and you must take huge risks at each one. There is a high turnover in employees in marketing because of this fast pace high demand...
2. Try doing consulting work, I personally help small businesses evaluate their current offerings to the market, find the right product market fit and create strategies to pitch their adjusted value props to the market.
3. learn about blue ocean strategy if you haven't.
4. Pick one marketing approach, print, digital, animation, strategy, analysis, financial, SaaS, PR, sales marketing, coaching, regional sales management, there are many ways to implement "marketing" with clients.
5. Don't see growth as a corporate ladder.. in marketing that's almost non-existent.
Attend meetups, brownbags, etc where you can network and explore more real life approaches to marketing and meet people for possible future opportunities.
If you have a more direct question feel free to contact me, I have an MBA, sold several startups and have run my own marketing and consultancy team for about 8 years, currently serving as a strategic account manager for several companies.
If you're asking this question you've clearly learnt the most important lesson there is to learn in any career... When you know you don't know something look for the people who do!!
I can't tell you the right answer for you, you'll have to find that for yourself, but I can give you a few useful tips from my career which started way back in 2001 :)
The first thing I did after graduating from my Marketing degree was simple - Take the first Marketing job ANYONE was willing to offer me - In my case it was in the "mailroom" of a boutique investment company. Now - You may get lucky and get a head start, but I never regretted the long hours and crappy pay because I learnt the way Marketing worked from the bottom up and I got to see how some REALLY smart people did things. I was only there for a year, long enough to learn the basics of the real world (which bore very little resemblance to all of the fancy stuff I learnt at university) and to learn what the different parts of real marketing looked like.
The next tip is probably the most important driver in my success as a marketer - Marketing is a LOT of things today, and to be successful you need to find the aspect of marketing that you are passionate about. Personally, I'm a geek, I love computers and I love numbers, so digital marketing came very naturally to me, and even while I was trying to steer my career away from it, I just couldn't resist logging in and getting involved in digital conversation. Today it's what I do and I've even managed to build a very successful consulting business in the field... but the secret really came down to it being my passion. Even when I wasn't working, I often found myself spending my free time reading books on digital marketing and consumer behavior BECAUSE I LOVED IT.
Lastly, SAY YES! Then believe in yourself to be able to follow through. It's a little known secret that most people in business never really like to admit, but no one is "born with it" and no one starts their career with 3 years experience in anything. We all start from the same place - Go! If you believe in your ability to do something, and someone asks you whether you can, say YES! confidently and proudly, then figure out how to do it and do it WELL. If you're young and just starting out in your career, a lot of people won't be willing to give you a chance if you don't already have the skills they need... but a lot of people confuse skills and experience... just because you've never done it doesn't mean you can't do it and don't be ashamed to tell someone you can do something AS LONG AS YOU COMMIT TO BEING BLOODY GOOD AT IT. That last part is really important, because if you say you can and don't commit to proving that you could... well... I'm not sure what would happen I've never tried it, but I can only imagine it would end uncomfortably for everyone.
Lastly, a piece of personal advice from someone who's had to hire and fire a lot of marketers over the years... Don't let your masters go to your head, real world experience really does mean a lot and I've seen a lot of younger candidates think they can "skip ahead" because they've got a masters degree, only to fall at the first "real-world" question because they answer in academic gibberish. Don't be afraid to be humble and to start out in a job that you might consider to be fairly "low-level", it's not beneath you, and if it gets you some points on your resume a year from now you'll be stepping up to bat at a higher paying and better job and you'll be armed with all the tools to get the job.
Enjoy this part of your career, it may not pay the big bucks, but you've got an entire universe of different roles to discover and the more of them you can sample the richer you'll be for it!
My area of expertise includes more than 20 years of combined experience in marketing communications, business education and business management. I have experience in 12 industries including entertainment, nonprofit, professional services, academia and STEAM. My customer base includes individuals and organizations in the U.S., the Caribbean, Africa and the U.K.
1. The business of marketing varies by industry, e.g., CPG marketing is completely different from entertainment or even nonprofit marketing. Therefore, select opportunities by industry.
2. Since you want to "climb the ladder of success," and you already have a master's degree in marketing, decide what company recruits for marketers with your expertise and education. Compare company job descriptions with your resume. If the two don't match, compensate with relevant or transferable experience via voluntarism or contract and part-time work.
3. There is marketing strategy and then there are marketing tactics and tools. These days, employers expect marketers (I include publicists, salespeople, creatives, communications pros and strategists) to be versed in marketing tactics as well as popular marketing tools. Top marketers know HubSpot or a similar CRM, HTML/basic website coding, the difference between UI/UX design, social media (all), Google analytics and even photo, video and print production. Decide which tech skills you'll add-on or strengthen then refer back to #2. Why? It's better to add-on the skills that you will enjoy learning/doing so that if a skill dictates assignment completion, which most marketing tech skills do, you'll still be able to excel in your position.
4. You mentioned wanting to succeed in the marketing field “as fast as possible.” Being a marketing consultant within a company like Deloitte, working for an agency or being an entrepreneur who creates/does something memorable (a viral ad/video; a sensational product, book/article, SaaS, etc.) will a. brand you AND b. put you on the hot list ASAP, everywhere!
Let’s brainstorm ways that you can excel: https://clarity.fm/ishaedwards
This is common sense, so do not rank some over others simply because one marketing job salary or the service fee is higher than the other. From my own perspective I see a rising demand for User Experience Optimizer/Analyst in the field of marketing. If you still seem confused by all this, then take this quiz to find out a bit about yourself and see what we think should be your marketing career path. You want to do some research on companies and what skills specifically are required for certain marketing positions. If you choose your field and you are committed on that, then find job posts that are to the point and does not require things that does not seem like should be your responsibilities. Once you know what skills and experience is required you can go ahead and get some courses online. There are several entry-level marketing courses you can get for free. Then you can basically cancel your LinkedIn Premium trial any time and still get access to the courses. It is a must have if you want to succeed as a professional in our modern society.
To become a successful marketer, you need to grow your contact base. Well, among other things, they attend networking events. Frankly, marketing is a lot about people and trust. People, and marketers especially, are drawn to other people who are ambitious and goal oriented. “How are you planning to do that?”, “Where are you applying?”, “What position do you have in mind?” are the questions flying at you. And marketers sure like to teach other people. Marketers are social beings. Now that you have you been more than equipped to start your own blog. For sure there are hundreds and thousands of blogs in every marketing niche and you as a novice marketer cannot match up with these superstars. If you have exceptional writing skills, you might even end up as a professional blogger and say no to whatever marketing job is offered to you.
First, you need to prove that you truly are a marketing hero. Thing is that the average Joe does not know that much about marketing. Especially, when we are talking about new digital marketing trends and what to follow and what not to follow.
If not however, it does not mean that the marketing field is not for you. It is not linked to marketing, but still gives a good idea of how to stay motivated and focused on all times. I personally like to read and learn new stuff about marketing when I feel demotivated.
Thing is that if you do not ask for money or ask extraordinarily little of it, then people do not respect you and think that your advice is not valuable. It is okay to say no to people who are willing to pay you little money even if you are broke.
It can be as simple as giving the client a daily or weekly update in addition to the industry typical once a month report. Once you have successfully closed a client and delivered the results you agreed upon, it is time to ask yourself, what kind of marketing position you want. But it is not all about money obviously. Self-employment in many cases can also lead to building your own marketing agency.
As with everything in life, marketing keeps evolving all the time. Simply gather ideas about various topics. For example, collect ideas for your blog and for your social media. I keep a Trello board system for myself to track everything I am currently doing and things I am planning to do soon.
If you have some degree, which means that you have higher education and you are capable of learning new things then it is all good. If you have like PhD in marketing, then yes, some public sector institution probably will pay more.
Besides if you do have any questions give me a call: https://clarity.fm/joy-brotonath
